May 5, 2008

It has been amazingly warm here in Cambridge the past 4 days- warm AND sunny, a combination we don't often get. G even got a bit sunburned today, sitting on our patio for a few hours. Even Nelly came out to enjoy the nice weather, although it was too hot for her to sit on us, and she resorted to sitting on the mulch under a plant instead. :) I have clothes hanging out on the line, and believe it or not I'm sitting here on the patio outside my house this instant! I was one of the few 5 year olds to have a computer in their house (in 1984!), so I basically grew up with it, but I still really appreciate technology. :)

Our first ladies' daytime CE course was this morning, and it went very well. We had 2 ladies from Japan, and one from Korea, and we're missing 2 who will come next week. The ladies were all very genuinely interested in hearing about JC, and were very curious abt the bbl overall. I learned a lot about Japanese and Korean rlgns as well- they were happy to share with us about them. My co-leader is from Singapore, so we all learned a lot about each other. I'm excited to have some new Japanese and Korean friends!

I have another update on E- I haven't forgotten about her. :) I can't remember what I said last- briefly, it turns out that her depression was in part triggered by some serious physical abuse by one of her housemates- the woman beat her, punched her, and generally harassed her. Well finally she went to the police about it, moved to a new house, and that helped a lot. At the same time this was happening, she was fired from her job at Borders because of her depression, which is 100% loudly illegal here. So now she is involved in 2 court cases- Borders has to either rehire her, or settle out of court for a large sum of money. They aren't likely to hire her back because the problem was with her boss, and E worked in a specialised section of Borders, so only the one in Cambridge had it. Court case #2 is against this former housemate for physical assault, and she's also very likely to win that one, which will involve a cash settlement as well. E doesn't understand yet why Gd let all this happen, but her fth is growing, and she's feeling much better and is back to her normal self now. She also decided to leave the Polish ch where she was attending, because it turns out they were making her depression issues worse by telling her that she didn't believe hard enough or properly- if she did she'd be healed. That of course is not true, and it seems like that ch may in fact be more of a cult. Anyway E thanks everyone for the prs and I'll let you know when I hear from her about the settlements.

Some of you know that we have O week in less than 2 weeks- we're riding down with the Michigan crew Friday May 16th. If you could pr for us that we'd be both focused here on our work here and also preparing for O week (which is a large task) at the same time we'd appreciate it. Also pr for us to be able to adjust back to life here when we get back- after an intense week we'll be visiting with folks for a few days and then more travel, and more adjusting. It's all worth it, but we'd appreciate the prs.

We're also looking into catteries for Nelly, because she isn't happy at home and also doesn't really like it when a stranger comes in to feed her- she's just scared of them. At a cattery her day would be more interesting, and she'd have regular interaction with people everyday. The cats all seem to be fine with cohabiting at a cattery- I guess since it's no one's territory they're happy to coexist. :) She seemed to like it last time, although she clung to my neck when we picked her up. :)

If any of you have been following the cyclone disaster in Myanmar, you know how bad it is there- please pr for relief agencies to get food and clean water to people quickly.