Hanging on to the cliff!

Hi Y'all,
It has been a full week... lots of ups and downs! We are acclamating to the steep decent between our apartment and the bakery immediately below on the hill and though we still need to "hang on" to the cliff/dirt as we come and go we are becoming more nimble and confident and are not so short of breath coming up! Not quite as agile as the local goats yet though!

Speaking of goats... saw a mama goat yesterday in the bazaar... she had issues! She had udders full of milk and a broken leg and someone had put on a plaster cast and she was limping down the hill in a most pitiful way! Limping seems to be the order of the week in many ways!

Our project is sure limping along. The bricks came last Saturday and the next 2 days a mason came and laid up bricks for 2 days to his shoulder level. His wife mixed up the cement mortar and it seemed like things were progressing! Those days and every day since we have beeen promised that 3 more masons would arrive including the head contractor and that "work would go quickly now!" However day after day no one has come and the work has come to a screeching halt again. I was told it was partly cause we needed wood planks to serve as scaffolding so they could reach the higher rows of brick laying. SO we ran around for a few days gathering KOT ( planks) and found 5 we can buy from a friend but that is clearly no longer the hold up !
I just have to be content to let this all move in God's timing and trust HE will complete it on schedule! It is the balance between "yo Nepal ho" and God's masterful agenda.

Another limp in the community get-along is the great and sad turn of events that has led to the closure of the local hospital that my Dad/ Mom pioneered 45 years ago. He started one 8 KM's away in Pokara in 1968 and after many years was asked to start one in Dadeldhura, the district center. He was with TEAM so it has been called TEAM Hospital ever since and though they tried to turn it over to a national NGO 5 years ago and change the name accordingly everyone knows it as TEAM Hospital. Local community and politicians have been very unhappy with the new management and have basically forced the NGO out and it is offically being turned over to the government as of May 14th. However everything has come to a screeching halt there as well and yesterday staff were told to see emergencies only! Staff are told they have 20 days to pack and be out of their housing. The gov and NGO leaders have inventoried all the supplies and everything is supposed to be turned over to the gov. Everyone knows the gov staff will be swooping in and claiming every last item and taking them to their own homes and by the time of the official tiurnover, one will be hard pressed to find a single piece of equipment left on the campus! In fact much of it has already walked. Some of it may have been our own staff thinking "why let those gov staff have these diapers... we should disperse them to our own staff and community with kids!" Etc. We watched a bus pull up yesterday and load it full of equipment and later saw it in the bazaar again... No one was givning any answers to questions so one can only surmise!
It is a very corrupt system and so sad to watch!

Our staff are being led to believe the hospital will be transfered to Bajang 2 hours away by bus but I am told there are currently no buildings or infastructure built there. They will have to start from scratch and now there will clearly be no supplies or equipment saved to take there so it appears to at best a" long range goal" and at worst a lot of empty promises to the staff. They are all very discouraged and fustrated and sad. Many did not plan ahead or head the writing on the wall (though some of us saw this coming several years ago) and have no plan "B" and no skills to take elsewhere. In typical Nepali fashion, they live day to day and are saying "now what will we do? How will I finish putting my son through college? How will I pay my rent? how will I eat?"

I did get to share with a large group of staff in their devotions yesterday and encourage them. I shared that 2 ways we KNOW for sure God is with us, is we can look back and see when HE was with us in the past and was faithful time and time again. Since HE NEVER changes we can be sure HE will be with us in the future regardless how bleak. And secondly we have HIS promises! I challeneged them to get a jourrnal and keep a record as they search their Bibles for comfort in this time of trial, to record every promise they read of in the word and refer to that often as well as record all their blessings and proof that God has had their backs in the past!
Tuesday I took 2 Sweedish surgeons and Diane, to Baitadi for a road trip... 90KMs. It was a lot of fun! Some of the highlights were we happened to see 3 wedding parties, 2 of which entertained us for the sake of our cameras, the cow that was eating the sock, our yummy picnic of tuna salad sandwiches and fresh bagels, and the scenic drive in a private taxi!
We visited the district hospital and within 5 minutes the surgeons were pressed into setting fractures on 2 impoverished patients ( ages 10 and 15) and plastering them! They btried to refer them to a hospital in India 45 KMs away but they were too poor to afford to go. The gov hospital had lidocaine but no plaster so the families were sent to run to the "medical" store and return with 4 rolls of plaster and some cotton each and so clinic was conducted on the doctors Chuti ( vacation time!). They also advised on 2 other cases as well before I hurried them out lest they spend their whole afternoon seeing patients.

All in all it was a pleasurable day and eating american Hershy bars and drinking hot Earl Grey tea from a thermos I had brought at the top of a ridge pit stop topped off our excursion. They seemed to appreciate the personal "tour guide explanations"!

Yesterday I took 3 new US foreigners, the 2 Sweedish Drs, and Diane on a local tour through the bazaaar and to buy fabric for local dress. We took them straight to the local tailor to have it all sewn up too. Now they all know where to buy toilet paper so are equipped for another few weeks in Dadeldhura! Perhaps I have a new career opportunity as a tour guide here!
Wel,l better take my drip shower ( hot but no water pressure!) and get down to the bakery to see if Sundari needs help making lunch for all these Bideshis! ( foreigners). There seem to be quite a bunch of us each meal now!
Thanks for your continued prayers!
Diane is off to get some antibiotics at Megh's "Medical". This cold has gone on quite long enough! Several Bideshis and locals all have the same symptoms! Pray for her healing.
I am feeling great! Just impatient on the project issues!

Your nickle's worth of advice today: if you decide to eat socks... make sure you know which side of the laundry they are from!

Blessings,
Dawn Didi