Reconnect with old friends

9/14/2013

We had been back a few days, and needed to do some grocery shopping. There was a great deal of changes at the bazaar, many new vendors have moved into the container-shops installed by the bazaar owner. We had problem finding where things were. Even though we were happy to see vegetables and fruits (more types than we can remember), but the price has gone up again, especially meat (10% since June/13).

9/15/2013

We attended International Church in Bishkek and met with quite a few people – T and J from England who have been most instrumental in our transition to our new ministry. We attended their workshop “Crossroad” around June, 2012. They have been also been training others – organization/government/university staff and university students for the last 2-3 years all throughout Central Asia. They will provide us on 9/26-27 a team building workshop (Introduction) for our staff. We have started with our construction since 5/1/2013 – the Hardware and now it is time to start working with the Software aspect – the People. This time, they also brought another person, Judith, a new friend from England who attended a retreat where Jackie taught in England. T and J brought Judith along this time to experience Kyrgyzstan.

After Sunday Service, we also met with B and H who also came from England. They are a very well- traveled couple in Central Asia with B being a seasoned business person and H – his personal translator and life partner. They are the ones that encouraged T and J to share their rich business consulting experiences with people who long to learn and need business knowledge in these parts of the world.

Both B and H played a very crucial part in helping us to process what happened to us in 2012 in mission work. They helped us to see that God always has a purpose behind every event that He allows to happen to His people even though we may not fully comprehend what happened, when it happened. Through them, we learned to stop being just busy, but to be still, and seek for God’s face. We need to learn His will for us and follow His calling for us – to really know the Vision that He had already planted in our hearts a while back. Indeed they were God-sent and we praise Him from the bottom of our hearts and God is putting all sorts of wonderful people around us to witness to us, to remind us who we are and what we are to do!

9/16/2013

Meantime, we needed to pick out material for the house such as the flooring for the whole house – classroom, hallway, offices, kitchen, bath walls, the indoor, outdoor paint, the heating system, the light fixtures, and many other things. So Irma drove us to Bishkek (1 ½ hours away) and spent almost a whole day doing the selection, price negotiation and ordering. We basically picked out what to buy so Irma could go at a later time with payment (cash) and bring back the material with a big van or truck.