Thank you for all of those who are praying for our church in Myanmar and asking how they can be of help. The good news is they are all fine. But the situation is difficult. Below is an email I got from one of our leaders.
"_______ is the township where we live and where our church is. As you know, people in this area live in the 7th or 8th floor-tall apartment buildings. The storm cut off power lines and no water because we use power for water pump. No restaurant can operate since there is no water - no tea-shop, no noodle shop. All prices go up more than 500%. One egg use to be only 70- 80 kyats now it is about 300 kyats – in downtown it is 800 kyats!! The most difficult thing is not having water. There is a long queue just in front of some water purifier factory. Other prices are dramatically rocketing. Gasoline use to be about 2500 kyats and last year it was increased to 5000 kyats per/gallon. Now it is 10, 000 kyats and only the lucky one get it. Every supply has run out. Food supply run out. Kan-kong (water cress leave) used to be just 30 kyats and now is 200 kyats. Every time, trucks loaded with food arrived, people quickly swam and buy everything. Food supply has run out. Rice, cooking oil, bean and charcoal are not only expensive but unavailable in many places. Another reason is shop owners are also afraid of burglary and robbery. Since almost every roof has been blown away, the price of metal roof has increased more than 500%. One kilo of nail for roofing is 10, 000kyats from merely 1500kyatw! And there is no enough supply. If one is lucky, he could get a few pieces. Transportation is difficult. The public transportation fare up radically. Many of our church members have a very difficult time coming to church. Most trees have been falling down. Many of these threes are almost a hundred years old. It will take years to regain what the city used to be."We are trying to find out if there is an opportunity for us to be of practical help. As you may have read in the papers, the military regime is making it difficult for outside help to reach the locals. I will keep you posted once we are able to find a way. Please keep our members and leaders in your prayers.
