How covid-19 is affecting Nepal- an interview

Never in my lifetime has the entire world been up against the same obstacle at the same time. Corona virus is on everyone's minds and is drastically shifting our daily life no matter if you live in San Francisco, Lisbon, Sydney, Jakarta or Timbuktu.

In an effort to make the world smaller and bring us together as friends and neighbors, I am excited to start a series where I interview people from all different countries about how they are experiencing this situation! 

Today, I am interviewing Ashleigh Matto who has lived in Kathmandu Nepal for the last 5 years with her Finnish husband and their three kiddos.....



1) Where do you currently live and what brought you there?

We live in Kathmandu, Nepal. We are here working with a faith based INGO and working in the development sector. We have projects in many parts of Nepal working in the areas of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). We are also working in education. And we work in livelihood, which is helping people see the opportunities to create livings. We moved here in 2015 after the earthquake.

2) What do you love most about where you live?

This is a hard question to answer. We have lived in Kathmandu for 5 years and the first two and a half years were really hard. If you would have asked me then, I would have answered with half a smile and told you that I thought the mountains were beautiful or something vague like that. But God matures us and that’s when change in our mind happens. Today I can honestly say, ‘Yes, I love the mountains and the nature that Nepal has. And I love the people who are beautiful and hospitable and so different from myself.’ But what I love most…is such a small thing….I will try to explain. Nepal drinks tea…chiya to be exact. There are small (think small) tea shops everywhere and …this is what I love….the shop keeper will carry a few cups of tea across the street to the neighbor shop. And that’s what I love.

3) How has your city and country been affected by Covid-19?

Its March 26 and as of now, Nepal has been hit only barely by Covid-19. But the feeling is that it’s the calm before the storm. We are a country sandwiched in between India and China. How can it be that there are only 3 known cases so far? But on March 24, the country made the decision to lockdown. We have joined the world and are waving to our neighbor from rooftops and balconies asking and hoping that all are healthy.

Nepal is a social country. I mean, who isn’t? But this country thrives in community, in ‘village’. Social distancing will be hard and I’m sure there will be resistance after we are in lockdown for longer.

4) How have you personally be affected?

We are in lockdown. Both my husband and I are trying to work and homeschool our three kids (8,6, and 4). It takes a lot of energy as so many families are experiencing right now. It’s funny how you can be home all day and still go to bed exhausted. But personally speaking, the daily change of events has had an effect on me. Just last night, I went to bed and my heart was racing. Anticipating what ‘new’ tomorrow would bring. The big questions of ‘are we going to leave?’ or ‘what happens when it gets worse here?’ are things I wish someone else would answer for me. There just seems to be a lot of question marks right now and the unknown is hard to put your foot into.

But I’m also really thankful. It’s given us time to work on the kinks we have in my own life and in our family. We have to address them, right? You grow patient in situations where you can choose to be patient. And joy…it’s the same, right? Lockdown is going to be a good place to grow some fruits of the Spirit!

5) How have you seen God work in the midst of this time?

I have seen how my friends, who don’t live in relationship with the Author of Peace, worry and allow fear to take over. But Im sure thankful for the truth that Jesus is with us and knows clearly the whole picture and it doesn’t scare Him at all. We can trust Him. I have seen that (besides last night when my heart was racing, ha) I have had another level of ‘ok-ness’ in this upside-down time and it can only be explained in Jesus.


6) Any last things you want to share?

I love what Mother Teresa has said, “God has called us not to be successful, but to be faithful.”

This time is tough and uncomfortable. But sometimes we aren’t called into amazing, successful, beautiful, pointed at your giftings things. But we are called to love Jesus and love the people around us anywhere. We are called to be faithful to that.

So beautiful Ashleigh, thank you so much for sharing! 

Friends, I hope this gives you a little glimpse into what people are experiencing in Nepal!! Please leave any encouragement and love for Ashleigh:)  I will be sharing more interviews from around the world and I hope you'll join me for them:) We have the beautiful capacity to love and encourage and pray for others, so let's press into that in this season! 

Have a great weekend, and if you're on IG, come follow me @hope_engaged where I will be sharing lots of pictures from our travels, as well as travel itineraries in my stories!! 

Also...be looking for a super fun give-away soon!! Can't wait to share with you!! xoxo 

Back from India and Nepal

We just returned from 2 weeks in India and Nepal. It was a very unique trip. One week of work in India, and one week of visiting family and friends in Nepal.

Both countries had their challenges and their rewards. 

Kolkata was all sorts of chaos. It was gritty and dirty, loud and very stimulating, but we found so much beauty working with the women of Sari Bari. It was bucket showers, spicy foods, and pollution. But it was also communication with body language and laughter (smiles and hand holding with the women). It was hearing stories, watching women make beautiful quilts and bags. It was sensing a freedom in the midst of oppression. 

Nepal was relaxing and nostalgic. Walking down the street of our old apartment, wandering through the fruit and vegetable market we used to buy all our produce at, and generally soaking up all the memories we made in that beautiful country. It was also grand reunions, first with Kevin's sister and brother in law who live there with their 3 kids, and second with all the sweet girls from the aftercare home we worked at. There were happy tears, and much laugher, lots and lots of stories, and just good fellowship. It was also cold with little electricity and not much gas. If you didn't know, India has stopped the petrol and gas from going into Nepal (because Nepal changed their constitution to a secular nation and not a Hindu one, so India was not too happy about that), so there is little heat.  I slept in my jacket and threw a few hand warmers into bed just to cozy it up. But cold or not, it was such  delightful time of reunions with old friends and family.

I took next to no personal pictures on this trip. Because I was shooting 8 hours a day for Sari Bari in India, the last thing I wanted to do when I left was take pictures. And once in Nepal, I just wanted to fully be present and not distracted with my camera. So, here are the crumbs of pictures I took:)

I am so grateful for this trip in many ways. I hope to share more about my time there, as i'm still processing. But this will do it for now:) Happy Wednesday friends!

Nepal

Many of you know that Kevin and I lived in Nepal in 2013. It became a dear dear place for us, and my heart is grieving over the massive earthquake that shook the country on Saturday.

Kevin and I were making breakfast on Saturday morning when we heard the news, and immediately my heart sank. My mind raced, wondering, "how are our sweet precious girls at the aftercare home? Are they hurt? Are they alive" ... "are our friends ok?" ... "how is our church family there?". Kevin and I got on facebook and many of our friends had sent messages that they were alive and surviving the chaos. We got word through text that each girl in the home was also ok, as well as the staff. Our hearts felt more grounded, but still...the devastation continued to overwhelm us.

Kevin and I have been watching countless videos of the damage. Almost every historical world heritage site has been destroyed or at least damaged. The roads are mangled. The buildings crumbling. But mostly the loss of lives is devastating. And the loss of emotional peace and security for many will haunt them in this next season of surviving.

It's hard to imagine being in such a huge natural disaster. Last year when there was an earthquake in my city, I remember being so frightened to fall asleep. I stayed up that night praying for people who lived in fear because of a traumatic natural disaster. The trauma and magnitude of what our friends in Nepal are facing is real and intense. Most of our friends have been sleeping in shelters the last few nights, displaced from their homes. Can you even imagine?

Would you join me in praying for Nepal?
For peace and comfort as they rebuild...
For resources of food, water and electricity to not run out...
For wisdom and good management of the relief organizations...
For unity and trust as people work together...
For God to do something amazing and bring hope when there is so much hopelessness...

Thank you friends. Your support and prayers are important.
If you are interested in giving, I found a list of charities doing relief work in Nepal here. I've had personal experience with both Samaritans Purse as well as World Vision, and know they are reputable!

Thankful that we can still play a part in the relief process by praying and giving:) May God take our small offering and multiply it for his purpose! Thank you for caring friends.

A few of our posts from Nepal:
Our Life in Nepal:                                       In the Girls Home:                   Travel in Nepal: 
Making a home in Nepal                              On Being Rescued                    Bhaktapur
My husband, redeeming a view of man       On Being Brave                         The Villages
Exploring in Kathmandu                             Celebrating a birthday        Swayambu {Monkey} Temple
Being Sick in Nepal                                                                                      Durbar Square
Our Marriage in Nepal                                                                                    Bodhnath temple
One year ago we moved to Nepal                                                               The time we almost died 
Our first week in Nepal                                                                                   Pokhara
Our first day in Nepal                                                                                      Chitwan
                                                                                                                   

Gifting Freedom…A fun opportunity this Christmas!

 Last year, while we were working in Nepal, we became good friends with a woman who started an organization called Beauty for Ashes. I went to their office many times to check out their jewelry and scarves, and to look into potential job opportunities to employ the girls from the home we worked. You see, BFA employs women coming out of sex-trafficking. They have an incredible discipleship program, where they mentor these women with love and care. This holiday season, Trade for Freedom, who is partnered with BFA, approached me with a neat gift idea for Christmas, and I wanted to share it with all of you….
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You can't tell by her hands. 

As you see her hands working the beads onto the thread, you can't see the darkness her hands have had to live through. You can't see that these beads have set her free, because the beads mean income and the beads mean discipleship. The beads mean her life is set free.

Beauty of Ashes Nepal is what's working every day to set these hands and several other sets of hand free from sex trafficking and to provide safety to those who are at-risk for becoming a statistic.  When you live in a country that ranks fifth in the world for the population entrapped in sex trafficking per capita, someone needs to provide hope.

This Christmas, Trade for Freedom is partnering with Beauty for Ashes Nepal to help be that hope. These beautiful hands are crafting an exclusive jewelry line and working themselves into a future that has light and life.

Will you join with us?

Will you join with us to gift freedom?

This year, we are offering the gift of a jewelry subscription. Each month, a special jewelry item will be delivered to your door. You can buy a subscription for 6 or 12 month increments. 

One hundred jewelry subscriptions sold means 5 new women will be employed and become discipled next year. 

And the beautiful hope that they weave into each design will be delivered to your home, or the home of someone you love, each month, reminding you that we can change the world and that we can be part of the hope.

We must be that hope. Because each year more than 10,000 women and girls are trafficked from Nepal into the international sex trade, to be prostituted in brothels, in India and increasingly around the world.  

This Christmas, join us in gifting hope. 

To gift hope, you can purchase a jewelry subscription handcrafted by the Beauty for Ashes family from Trade for Freedom.  www.tradeforfreedom.com

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Ladies...I just spoke with the director from Trade for Freedom and she said this…

"Also, I just finalized the new, exclusive designs today with Beauty for Ashes! The pieces are gorgeous.  A collage of gold, turquoise, tibetan beads, and rose wood." 

Really…is there anything more lovely than gold, turquoise, and rose wood? *swoon*

Well… Actually there is…and that is supporting a cause that offers a life-giving employment opportunity to a sweet sister across the world. I think it's a win-win! 

Happy Wednesday Friends! 

One year ago, we moved to Nepal

Today Kev and I went on a bike ride, and while the wind whipped through my hair and we chattered on about life, he suddenly turned to me with a large grin and said, "exactly a year ago we moved to Nepal"….

goodness! has a it really been a whole year? 

I'll never forget the feelings that struck my whole body when his family dropped us off at the airport exactly a year ago. We hugged and said goodbye, and then started to walk away from them, towards our terminal. It was a surreal feeling. Just months before, we had been contacted by an aftercare home in Nepal to see if we could come and partner with them to build the infrastructure of the home (I worked on policy/procedural work, and Kevin worked on the accounting and financial side).

We had NO idea what to expect. A million thoughts ran through my mind…"what is our apartment going to be like?", "will the girls like me?", "what do people eat in Nepal?". Kevin and I were all nerves, excitement/nervousness/BRING IT ON!!! We wanted to embrace life to the fullest in Nepal and embrace the beauty that it would bring to our marriage, our hearts, and our faith.

To say that our lives were transformed in Nepal just doesn't seem to do our experience justice. Those five months were incredibly healing, abundantly restorative, and epically inspirational!

For nostalgic sake, here are my top 5 favorite things about our time in Nepal:

1. Being with the Girls: The home where we worked housed a handful of the most precious girls you could imagine. These girls were once in horribly abusive situations, some trafficked across international borders, and had been rescued and brought to the home. Kevin and I had the incredible privilege of spending many of our days with the girls, teaching English, planning movie nights, taking them on excursions, playing games, and just listening to them. I cannot express the loveliness of these young girls. For all they had experienced in their short lives, they fought bravely to accept their past and make a new future. Being around them was a passionate experience, as embraced every song, dance, and cooking endeavor with such fervor.  The amount of times we laughed and giggled and cried with them will forever be engraved on my heart. They are my heroes.

2. Exploring a New City: We lived in Kathmandu, which is the capital of Nepal. And a colorful capital at that! It is a jam-packed, in your face, loud, crazy, fun, and colorful city. Every outing was an adventure, even the most mundane walk to the aftercare home each day was sure to surprise us. Some days we'd be walking down a path, and an elephant (with his master) would walk by us (um, HELLO elephant!), other days we'd have to shoo a cow away from the ATM to withdraw money. Some days Kev and I would hop on a micro-van for 15 cents and just get off wherever we wanted and set out on foot to explore {here}.

3. Meeting new friends: Moving to a new country can be hard, especially when you leave so many incredible friends and family members behind. However, in the same vein, meeting new people can be one of the greatest aspects to living abroad! God totally provided an incredible community for us in Nepal, as we met people so committed to fighting human trafficking and bringing freedom to the country! We met dear friends all around the world, whom we shared meals with, played in a volleyball league with, and just had fun telling stories and exploring the city with! I met 4 of the most lovely ladies whom I still keep in touch with from, that were from England, South Africa, Australian and the USA.

4. Spending every day with my Husband, working together for a cause that Mattered: This was a dream to me. Kevin and I love being together, and in the USA, we unfortunately had separate jobs that took us away from each other most of the day. But in Nepal, not only did we get to work together, but we got to spend our time on a mission that made a difference in the lives of the girls in the home. Kev and I got to dream, and pray, and read, and rest together. We laughed when the electricity went out all the time and we had to eat our dinner by the light of a candle. He supported me when I failed miserably in our Nepali language classes, and every day we set out together to figure out how to live in Nepal (like where to buy our produce, etc. {here}). My absolute favorite thing was watching my sweet husband with the girls in the home. You can read more about this {here}.

5. Seeing the Power of God's love: I have never seen the power of God's love in a deeper, more tangible way that I did in Nepal. In the home where we worked, all the staff members were committed Christians, however none of them ever "pushed" their beliefs on the girls. They just LOVED them fiercly and deeply. One day, a few weeks after a new girl arrived to the home, she pulled our house mother aside and said, "This is the first time i've ever felt loved. It's because your Christians, isn't it?". I was so moved by this statement. That this precious girl knew God's love, not because it had been forced on her, but because it had been generously given to her in the form of day to day care, in the hugs at night when she had nightmares, in the family dinners, in the smiles and warmth and affection that just flowed. God's love is powerful, and when it is lived out, it covers over so much. I saw this love, and experienced it, and it made me a new person.

6. Sweet Rest: In moving to Nepal, I think I had the idea that we'd be "giving out" so much energy and time. And while this was true, I also found that the slow pace of life was restorative. For most of the day, there was no electricity so using the internet was out (which, leeezzz be honest, takes up a lot of our time normally, right?!). My Nepali phone was circa 2002, and was as basic as they come, so there was no distraction there! And I hardly knew anyone when I first moved there. This combination gave me a lot of time on my hands. Because of this, I did very revolutionary things….like rest, and read and pray:) There was so much healing when my heart and mind was forced to be still. God taught me so much about loving others, forgiving others, and choosing to always be positive. Those lessons lifted my spirits!

I will forever thank God for the experience Kev and I were gifted in Nepal. I look back a year later, and realize how the experience truly changed our lives!!

Happy Monday friends,
love Katie 

Happy New Years! A year in review...

I'm not sure about you, but I LOVE reflecting.

with a passion. 

You know how they all say "an unexamined life isn't worth living"…

and  I agree. 

We find richness in taking the time to process our year, 

growing and learning from all we encountered. 

introspection is where it's at! 

today I read through almost my whole journal from the past year,

and saw all the prayers and tears I poured onto the pages,

asking God to make me new, to grant me peace, to replace the unhealthy with the healthy.

And as I got to end, I realized,

the culmination of this year was that the Lord did 

just that. 

my heart was the last page, and it is

new

at peace

and healthy. 

This was one of the best years of my life, absolutely. 

From Asia, to Europe, to the Rice Fields…God did a miracle. 

Let's go…

Big Sur

We started off the year with some fun trips around California…driving up the Coast to Big Sur! It was beautiful and we got to spend time with Kev's brother and his wife!  {here}

Celebrated a Birthday

I'm all about themed dress up parties, and this was no exception! My sweet friend Chels and I co-hosted a Mad-Men styled themed birthday party! It was a blast. You can see more pics {here}

Nepal

The biggest most life-altering change was moving to Nepal. and it was AMAZING. 

We fell in love with the girls in the home where we worked {here}

learned the art of open air shopping for our food {here}

travled a lot around the country {Pokhara, Bhaktapur, Swayambou, Boudha, Pashuputi, Chitwan}

and just loved to explore our hometown of Kathmandu {here}

Europe 

 We were so blessed to get to fly to Europe for two weeks this summer to attend the wedding of our old exchange student Aline! {here}

Kev and I flew into Paris for 2 romantic days

Then met my family for a few week trip to Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, France, 

and finally Holland where the wedding was! We rented an adorable home in Delft! 

So much beauty {here} and a slew of pictures to come in 2014!!

 

Shooting a Wedding in Nepal

Out of the blue, a sweet couple who had found my blog, asked if I would shoot their wedding in Nepal.

I was honored! The day was absolutely stunning! 

To see more lovely pictures..{getting ready} {ceremony} {couple shots}

SE Asia

 After a very tearful goodbye in Nepal, Kevin and I took advantage of being in Asia

and spent almost a month traveling through Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. 

Thailand {Railey Beach, Phra Nang, Phra Nang at Night, The Islands}

Cambodia {Siem Reap, Angkor Wat, Countryside, Lotus Pond, Ton Le Sap Lake}

Vietnam {posts coming!!}

 The Farm

In a random but fun turn of events, my dad who is a rice farmer, suggested that if Kevin and I wanted

we could come home and work the rice harvest! 

And we thought…"why not?" {here}

It was an incredible experience!! I mean, come on…I drove a tractor! haha

Getting to farm with generations of family was amazing! 

{especially with my 90 year old grandfather blowing me kisses from the harvester!}

farm sunsets {here}

Channel Islands 

Much like starting the year with some trips around our native California, 

we ended the year by taking an incredible backpacking trip with my siblings to the Channel Islands!! 

To see more pictures {here}

Even though all the travel was amazing and incredible,

my favorite part of the year was seeing God work and mold

my anxious heart into a place of abundant peace! 

I will be sharing more about my peace journey this coming year, 

but a few posts related to this process are below:

forgiveness {here}

peace from pain {here}

my health journey {part 1} {part 2}

I am so excited for what 2014 has to offer. 

I find that HOPE seems to be spilling out everywhere I look. 

Many blessings on you this next year for:) 

May it be full of peace, freedom, and feeling LOVED and wanted by the King of Kings! 

much love,

Katie