Date: 2016-06-23
From: Rockfish Gap

To: Off Trail
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

You never know where the hitched hikers might pop up! Last night, we left a house in Virginia at 1:30am and drove 6 hours to attend a ceremony in South Carolina for a friend of ours who had just joined the US army and was graduating from boot camp. The friend is a chemical engineer from Nepal who studied and worked in the US but as his visa was expiring, was going to have to leave the country. It is strange that our country's immigration policies welcome with open arms the poorest people, which are a tremendous burden to social programs, but then close the doors to productive and contributing workers. Perhaps it is all in the spirit of being the land of opportunity, with us offering hope to the poor while not robbing the poor countries of their desperately needed talent, but it is difficult when you know someone personally that has gotten to taste western culture and then has to return to poverty. Thankfully, in our friend's case, there was another option. He was able to join the US army with a needed language skill and apply for naturalization. We stayed with the aunt and uncle of one of his college friends who had also joined the military several years ago for the same reason. It was such a pleasure meeting the aunt and uncle and being welcomed into their home with very short notice. They invited us to join them for some home cooked Nepalese cuisine and stay the night. We then made the drive with their nephew, our friend's college buddy, early this morning.The graduation ceremony was a patriotic display of our nation's military might. A military band kept us entertained during marches, awards, oaths, and other pomp. The highlight was that they granted our friend leave for one day and gave him orders to report to a base in Virginia near where we are staying. We toured an outdoor museum on the base displaying the fiercest killing machines American minds have created and then treated him to an all you can eat bbq buffet before driving 6 more hours back up to Charlottesville, trading stories of boot camp and hiking the whole time.Back at the house, we had another delicious dinner and continued trading stories. The patriarch of the family was a former member of the British armed forces who had participated in an exchange program with the US army special forces. Now a Security consultant, he had lots of fantastic stories. His wife had converted to Christianity at some point and has started a nonprofit organization called "Assisting Indigenous Ministries (AIM)" which helps Christians in Southeast Asia more effectively share the gospel in places like Bangladesh, India, and Nepal.In her home country of Nepal, about 10,000 young girls are drugged and kidnapped from villages and exported as sex slaves to places like Mumbai every year according to human trafficking statistics. Families are being tricked into thinking their daughters are being given better lives such as jobs or schooling when in reality the job they are given is no profit to them. Women who escape or age out of the business and return to Nepal come back with baggage ranging from HIV to severe emotional trauma, putting a heavy burden on the already impoverished nation whose total population is less than the greater metropolitan Houston area. The love of Christ is greater than any darkness, and God has placed this burden on her heart. God has given her a vision that includes local churches taking a lead role in showing Christ's love in a way that reduces the likelihood of desperate parents entrusting their daughters to these wicked men by providing opportunities to those poverty stricken and exploited families. Hopefully God uses her to help bring an end to the despicable practice while opening the door for the gospel in an otherwise dark place. We enjoyed chatting with this woman who God was using in such an effective way. Her way of life reminded us of the life we are called to in Micah 6:8 "he has shown you, oh man, what the Lord requires of you, do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God"