Here are some updates on our family…..
Our son Josiah recently had his 6th birthday! We brought some small party items back from the US and had a small party for Josiah and some close friends on February 7th. He had a lot of fun! Since school is still closed for the New Year holiday, Josiah is being home-schooled Starting in early March, Josiah will begin going to a bilingual (English-Chinese) school in our city. We will go to the bilingual school for half a day and will be home-schooled the other half. He is very excited to start going to school again. Josiah loves to read and his reading level is already near a 2nd grade level!
Tyler, age 4, has adjusted well to life back in Asia. He loves the food here…especially thukpa, a Tibetan style of noodle. The skin graft on his birthmark continues to heal. It will still take another 6 to 8 months for the graft to completely heal. Tyler will also begin going to the same school that Josiah will in early March. We plan to start teaching him how to read next month. Both boys are picking up Tibetan and Chinese phrases.
Tamara continues to teach everyday, but from mid-March to mid-July she will only teach 2 days per week. Once her teaching schedule goes to twice a week, she will begin studying Tibetan with a tutor. In early January, Tamara’s mother had major surgery that has left her with some big lifestyle changes. Fortunately, the damage can be repaired in a surgery that will probably take place in the summer, but for now Tamara’s mother needs daily assistance. On March 1st, Tamara is going to return to Olympia, WA for a little over 2 weeks to help care for her mother.
Jamin has been busy with Tibetan class each day. He is studying the Lhasa dialect of Tibetan and fortunately found a teacher from there easily. Lhasa is over 1000 miles away and there are few Lhasa speakers in our city. This teacher will only be here until mid-April so Jamin is trying to have class with her as much as possible before she leaves. Jamin has also been helping to manage a guesthouse in the city that is owned by a local Chinese Christian woman. We have known this woman for many years. She asked Jamin to manage the popular 70 bed guesthouse while she took a much needed vacation for 2 months. Since it is the low season, Jamin doesn’t have too many responsibilities, but it is nice that we can be a blessing to this Christian woman who has helped us immensely over the years.
Gonlung Monastery, one of the largest Buddhist monasteries near the city
Some of the 300 monks who live at Gonlung Monastery
View above the valley from the lingkhor (Buddhist pilgrimage circuit that goes around the monastery).
In early February, Jamin took a short drive to Gonlung Monastery, the second largest Tibetan Buddhist monastery that is close to the city. Located just an hour away, the monastery is home to about 300 Buddhist monks and is situated in a beautiful valley at about 10,000 feet in elevation. Jamin has been out to this monastery many times over the years and has built a friendship with a few of the monks. Jamin tries to go out to this monastery at least once a month to visit friends and to walk the lingkhor, the Buddhist pilgrimage circuit around the monastery. Each day, Tibetan Buddhist pilgrims walk the lingkhor around the monastery in order to earn merit and karma. Jamin likes to walk around this circuit while praying for the region and his monk friends.
Josiah and Tyler with a friend standing in front of a chorten (mound like structure that contains Buddhist relics). There are millions of chortens like this across Tibet.
Our friends village where we stayed
A few days ago, our family returned from visiting some friends of ours that live in a nearby village (close/nearby on the Tibetan Plateau means anything within 6 hours driving distance). The husband of this family was the first Tibetan that we ever met. Jamin met him first more than 11 years ago. We hadn’t been to their village area since January 2009, when we attended their wedding. For the past 7 years, this couple, who have a 6 year old son, have lived and worked in the Tibetan capital city of Lhasa. We have visited them numerous times over the years in Lhasa. Over the past 11 years, we have had numerous opportunities to share the Gospel with the husband. He has been given a bible and has seen the Jesus Film in his native Tibetan language. When we entered his home, we were surprised to see him reading a copy of the The Purpose Driven Life. He was even taking notes! The husband will be coming to the city within the next week and we are planning to get together with him. Pray with us that our friend remains open to the truth of the Gospel and that we will be able to share more about the Creator with him.
Small village we recently passed through
For the past few weeks, we have been having our Tibetan friends who live in the city over for dinner about 3 times per week. Sharing meals in Tibetan culture is an intimate matter and is something that we love to do. During meal times, our friends will often share with us the issues going on in their lives, the struggles they are facing and the concerns that they have. It is also a good way to introduce the Gospel to them.
We recently attended the weddings of 2 of our good friends. One friend is a woman from Jyekundo, the town that we used to live in that was destroyed by an earthquake. This friend we have known for about 7 years. She lives most of the year in the city and has probably been to our home 50 times or more over the years. Her wedding had nearly 600 Kham Tibetans from Yushu prefecture in attendance, with many of them wearing traditional fox fur hats, sheep wool coats and yak hide boots….the same style of clothing that nomad Tibetans have worn for the past 1000 years or more. This wedding, like most Tibetan weddings, was a lot of fun and had lots of food, singing and good times.
The second wedding we went to was for a Muslim woman friend of ours. The city we live in has nearly 400,000 Muslims living in it. We have known this Muslim friend of ours for going on 5 years. Her wedding was quite small, so we were honored that she would invite us. There was also a lot of excellent food served there.
The political situation across the Tibetan Plateau remains tense. There have been several new self-immolations (political protests by lighting oneself on fire) the past 2 weeks and altogether, there have now been 102 total self-immolations since 2010 (more than 80 of these took place in 2012). The government here still refuses to dialogue with the Tibetan people on their grievances and refuses to let them peacefully protest the oppressive government that is over them. Pray that a peaceful solution to this very complex matter can be reached.
We hope you are all doing well! Thank you all for your prayer support and financial support of our ministry among the Tibetan people!
Blessings!