by Ali Claxton


Mithu didi, early 50’s

Mithu was born on the street. She lived on the street her whole life, married another street dweller, gave birth to her children on the street, and lived for the most part underneath a piece of plastic atop a rubbish heap. When Pastor Noel first met Mithu, she was dying. Lying on top of the Bagmati Bridge, her hair was wild and matted, her face covered in dirt, and she was severely feverish. She told Noel that her husband had returned late at night, heavily drunk, and had set upon her, beating her with an iron pole. He had broken her back, and now she was lying there begging, and waiting to die.

Noel had seen and talked to thousands of people with similarly tragic stories, but tears instantly sprang to his eyes. Saying nothing at all, he reached out a hand to comfort her, and silently prayed. As his hand touched her, Mithu jumped up, leapt back and began to scream, ‘Fire, fire, fire!’ She was standing, shouting, and an astonished and slightly apprehensive Noel asked her what was wrong. ‘Fire, fire!’ she continued to cry, until eventually she realized she was standing, and her fever was gone. Turning amazed and frightened eyes to Noel, she told him he must be some sort of God – he had cured her. When Noel told her that it was Jesus who had healed her, at first she assumed Noel was Jesus - it was the first time she had heard of Jesus, and Noel hadn’t quite gotten around to mentioning the whole Christian malarkey before the fire and the leaping started.

Mithu didi came home with Noel that day – Noel’s house was the first house she had ever set foot inside in her whole life. After a couple of months supporting Mithu with food hampers, they began to discuss her dreams. Mithu dreamed of being a vegetable seller in the temple area, able to support herself. The church bought her a sheet of tarpaulin, and several kilos of various different types of vegetables, and she was off…. Cured, joyful and self-sufficient. Pastor Noel told her to find a room to rent, which she did, and Vineyard Kathmandu covered the first few months rent until she was able to support herself. Mithu rented a room only a few streets away from the riverbed which had been her home for so long. The area itself is one of the dirtiest, poorest areas in Kathmandu. The houses are all ancient mud constructs, with each tiny room housing a whole family - sometimes up to fifty families live in one house. Mithu now runs a home group, and hers is the most vibrant and fast growing of all the Vineyard homegroups in Kathmandu. From her room, she ministers to the poor and needy, feeding people who call upon her, helping the women who are just as she once was, and generally being a light shining in the pitchest-black dark.

On my first visit to Kathmandu Vineyard, I noticed, at the front, an immaculate middle-aged women in a sari, who seemed to be getting a little carried away by the worship. In all honesty, I figured she wasn’t quite right in the head. For the entire service, she stood on her own at the front beneath the stage, dancing unashamedly, with her arms in the air and a look of ecstasy on her face. Later I discovered her name was Mithu didi, and when I heard her story, I suddenly understood.