While Tamara and the boys all have a year-long resident visa that allows them to live in the city, Jamin must do a “visa run” every few months as he is on a tourist visa that only allows him to stay in country a certain length of time. This week, Jamin has to do a mandatory “visa-run”. With the help of a free ticket from air miles, Jamin will be going to India on April 23 for about 2 weeks.
In late 2011, our family took a 3 week trip to India. The main purpose of this trip was to see what kind of ministry was going on among the Tibetan-inhabited areas of northern India. Across the Himalaya’s of India, there are dozens of areas where ethnic Tibetans live. Some of these are refugees. India currently has over 125,000 Tibetan refugees who have fled Tibet since China took it over in 1959. Other Tibetans have lived in the Indian Himalaya’s for hundreds of years. There are also many sub-groups of Tibetans, such as Sherpa, Lhoba, Monba and Bhutia, who speak different dialects of the Tibetan language, but are considered to be ethnic Tibetans. Altogether, there are many hundreds of thousands (perhaps close to a million) of ethnic Tibetans/Tibetan speaking people scattered across the Himalaya’s of far northern India. Like Tibetans in Tibet, most of these people are completely unreached when it comes to the Gospel.
Mt. Kangchenjunga, the 3rd highest peak on earth, viewed from the Tibetan town of Darjeeling in northern India.
The Himalaya’s towering above Darjeeling
Prayer flags in the clouds above Gangtok, capital town of Sikkim. Sikkim used to be its own kingdom until it became part of India in 1975. It borders Tibet to the north and was part of Tibet for many centuries.
Rumtek Monastery…many of the monks here are Kham Tibetans from Yushu Prefecture
Most of you who read our updates are well aware of how difficult it is for us to get permission to live and work among the specific group of Tibetans we have been focused on the past 10 years. Even when we have gotten permission to live in our target area, we still have the problem of not having a long-term visa. The best case scenario is for us to make a “visa run” every 60 or 90 days. The “visa run” requires us to make a long 13 to 15 hour drive (across high, snow-covered roads) to the nearest city and then take 2 or 3 flights so that we can go to Thailand, Malaysia or somewhere else to renew our visa. This is not only extremely expensive, but very inconvenient and time consuming. We had to do these “visa runs” every 60 to 90 days from late 2009 to early 2012 and simply cannot continue to do it any longer due to how hard it is.
In addition to having to do a “visa run”, part of the reason that Jamin is going to India is to research possible future ministry options there. While India has its own difficulties (extreme poverty, poor infrastructure, dirty, water/electricity shortages, etc), the visa situation for Americans is a little easier than in Tibet. India has been on our hearts for the past year and we are trying to discern if moving to India and working with Tibetans there is in our future. We are NOT saying that we are moving to India at this point. We are simply researching possible options there.
Street-side barber in Kolkata, India
Tibetan Buddhist temple in Kalimpong, India
While in India, Jamin will be spending a week in two different locations. The first week will be spent in Ladakh, in far northwestern India. Ladakh, commonly referred to as “Little Tibet”, was part of western Tibet for many hundreds of years. It is a high elevation region (12,000 to 17,000 feet) that is cut-off from the rest of India for 8 or 9 months each year due to heavy snow. Jamin will have to fly in because the road to this area is only open from late June through late September/early October. Ladakh is said to have the best preserved Tibetan culture found anywhere in India.
The other area that Jamin will be going to is Sikkim. Sikkim is a small state of India that borders Tibet to the north, Bhutan to the east and Nepal to the west. It used to be its own country until it became a part of India in 1975. Both Sikkim and Ladakh share the same religion and culture that Tibetans have. Also, the written language, which Jamin can already read and write well, is the same in these areas as it is in Tibet.
Pray with us as Jamin researches this area. Pray also that the Lord will direct our steps as we minister among the Tibetan people.
Blessings!