Hello! I'm sorry for the delayed update, but I was expecting to have pictures of the mission trip by now to post. However, that hasn't happened. I will follow up with a picture blog as soon as I get them.
The mission trip with my church was a lot of fun. We went to a hilltribe village about 5 hours south of Bangkok to help a church that is getting established there. We lived in the homes with the people and ate their food, which was quite interesting since they are poor. The food was not really bad, but it made me thankful for what I have. The first night I thought "Oh no. . . edible, but not too tasty". They had tiny egg plants in 3 different dishes and another dish of green vegetables and egg. I like vegetables, but I'm not a huge fan of eggplant. It was an experience. However, the food improved a little bit the next morning as we had some fish as well. Thank God that no matter what they gave us to eat, I was always able to find something I like and could honestly tell them it was delicious every time. I think all of my Thai friends who went along also had a difficult time with the food as most of them had never done anything like this before. It also rained about 4 times a day and all of the roads were dirt . . . I mean mud. We kept having to change the path to our house a little bit everyday and I've never rinsed my feet off so much haha.
Aside from the food, everyone was very nice. The family I was staying with was very sweet and I could tell really loved their children, which is honestly not too common in this area. Their daughter kind of attached herself to me as many of the other kids did as well, which surprised me and was an answer to prayer. Many times children are scared of me because I'm a foreigner. However, when I introduced myself as "Pi Fah" (my time name that means blue and sky), everyone clapped and got excited. In most of the pictures taken of me, I have 2 or 3 kids next to me. :D.
On the first day, we all walked around and saw the area we would be living in. We were next to pineapple fields so we got to eat the best pineapple in the world everyday we were there. Amazingly enough, I wasn't tired of it. That night we sang songs with the kids and The second day we seperated the older kids and the younger kids and did one day backyard Bible clubs :D. and we showed the Jesus film in Thai that evening for everyone in the village. On Sunday, I taught a little bit of English, we went to church, which was all in Thai and Galien (the tribe's native language), had a sports day, and had group time. On Monday, we spent a little more time with the kids, packed up our stuff, said goodbye to everyone, and headed home.
It was a learning experience for me. For one thing, I was reminded of how much of a difference a little love can make. I worked with the younger kids and we had one little boy who wouldn't listen to anyone. We couldn't get him to sit down or anything. The next day, I played with him a little, gave him a hug, and told him I and Jesus loved him. After that, he would listen to almost anything I asked him to do. It was the most dramatic change I've ever seen. His favorite thing to do was back up and run into my open arms which would wrap into a big hug and tickle him a little. Many of the families in this area enjoy drinking alcohol and their children suffer in many ways. Also, Thai culture is not one for showing affection or saying "I love you", so the kids are starving for it.
The other thing that I was excited to see is a Thai church going out on a mission trip. I was the only foreigner on this trip and I played a very minor role. The Thai people planned it and did everything. It was so nice to see :D. God is working through the Thai people and they are reaching out to their own people not only in Bangkok, but in other areas as well. This was a step out of their comfort zone and I think all of our eyes were opened a little bit.
Next week school starts! YEAH! Summer break is fun, but just as when I was a student, I'm ready to get back to a normal schedule and have a little more structure in my life. I'll have to remind myself of this in a couple of months hahaha. Please pray that I will build relationships with my students and teach them to the best of my ability. Also, there are 5 university students joining our church for the summer to help us build relationships with the students. I am hoping to have them in my classes to give my students a chance to talk with real foreigners and to help them meet more students. There are a lot of things planned for this summer and I pray God's hand will be on all of it. Please join me in this prayer.
5/10/08
English Class
Saturday was a fun morning. People at my church have desired to reach out to the community and offer English classes for a cheap price and asked me to plan the lessons, etc. They wanted to use Bible stories as a means of conversational English classes. Today was our first class. It was fun! We played a get to know you game and a tongue twister game :D. They all felt silly trying to say "Sally sells seashells by the seashore" and "Vince visited Venice in seventh grade". Then, we broke up into 2 different groups because we had one woman who couldn't speak ANY English and 3 girls who could speak English pretty well. We also had several girls from church who were there to help and get to know the people who came. They ended up chatting about Noah and getting to know each other for over an hour and they were all smiles and looked like they enjoyed it! Praise God!!
Pray for one woman who came. She has had a Belgian man coming to the grocery store she works at (also the one my church is located in) and talking with her for the past month. He can't speak any Thai and she can't speak English (so you know how much they know about each other), but he calls her his love and wants her to come to his apartment, which she, wisely, hasn't done. However, it appears she wants to get to know him. One of the foreigners called him today and invited him to come next week. Hopefully with the help of Thai friends, we can translate and let them actually communicate with each other and offer any counsel they are willing to take. His son and his Thai daughter-in-law live in Bangkok and his wife of 26 years died, so we think he's simply lonely. However, we want to help this woman too. Just pray for wisdom for the American M working with them and for the Thais who will be translating.
Finally, I would like to share part of a song that I heard tonight by Charlie Hall. It's called Come for Me.
Jesus, come take me away/ I long to see Your face/ This world is broken, yet beautifully made/Jesus, come take me away
Jesus, I'll patiently wait/ 'Til like a vapor I'll fade/ Help me fulfill all of your dreams for these days/ Jesus, I'll patiently wait
You'll come again with a shout/ Like a theif in the night You'll come riding on clouds/ Finally the voice I have followed for life has a glorious face that is lit up with light/ And You'll come for me/ no more pain, peace/ No more fear, release/ Just lost and consumed with my glorious King
Jesus, today I am tired/ I need Your music to come and inspire/ I give myself to be refined in this fire/ But Jesus, today I'm so tired
May we always await the day the Lord comes back and serve Him no matter where we are while we wait. God bless you all :D.
Pray for one woman who came. She has had a Belgian man coming to the grocery store she works at (also the one my church is located in) and talking with her for the past month. He can't speak any Thai and she can't speak English (so you know how much they know about each other), but he calls her his love and wants her to come to his apartment, which she, wisely, hasn't done. However, it appears she wants to get to know him. One of the foreigners called him today and invited him to come next week. Hopefully with the help of Thai friends, we can translate and let them actually communicate with each other and offer any counsel they are willing to take. His son and his Thai daughter-in-law live in Bangkok and his wife of 26 years died, so we think he's simply lonely. However, we want to help this woman too. Just pray for wisdom for the American M working with them and for the Thais who will be translating.
Finally, I would like to share part of a song that I heard tonight by Charlie Hall. It's called Come for Me.
Jesus, come take me away/ I long to see Your face/ This world is broken, yet beautifully made/Jesus, come take me away
Jesus, I'll patiently wait/ 'Til like a vapor I'll fade/ Help me fulfill all of your dreams for these days/ Jesus, I'll patiently wait
You'll come again with a shout/ Like a theif in the night You'll come riding on clouds/ Finally the voice I have followed for life has a glorious face that is lit up with light/ And You'll come for me/ no more pain, peace/ No more fear, release/ Just lost and consumed with my glorious King
Jesus, today I am tired/ I need Your music to come and inspire/ I give myself to be refined in this fire/ But Jesus, today I'm so tired
May we always await the day the Lord comes back and serve Him no matter where we are while we wait. God bless you all :D.
5/6/08
FLOOD!!! . . . Inside????
Well, I did something today that I found very funny. Normally, I'm an EXCELLENT multi-tasker, but today my refined skills failed me miserably haha. My washer is set up outside of my bathroom, but needs to drain into my bathroom, so a friend and I set up this nice neat little arrangement.
It works great as long as the drainage hose stays INSIDE the bathroom. However, today somehow it betrayed me and decided to fall over the little ledge that seperates the bathroom and my BEDROOM. Needless to say, water was everywhere. It wasn't a true flood thankfully, but I took my mop and some dirty towels that hadn't been washed yet and had fun cleaning up all the water. Another blessing was my machine was on the RINSE cycle, not wash cycle.
This is a shot of my apartment from my bathroom. By this time the water was mostly dried up and the fan was taking care of the last little section. However, you can see where the water intruded so unwelcomingly into my room haha. Praise God I have tile! I just laughed when I realized what happened. Quite an interesting experience that I'll laugh about for a long time. Hope it made you laugh as well.
It works great as long as the drainage hose stays INSIDE the bathroom. However, today somehow it betrayed me and decided to fall over the little ledge that seperates the bathroom and my BEDROOM. Needless to say, water was everywhere. It wasn't a true flood thankfully, but I took my mop and some dirty towels that hadn't been washed yet and had fun cleaning up all the water. Another blessing was my machine was on the RINSE cycle, not wash cycle. 
This is a shot of my apartment from my bathroom. By this time the water was mostly dried up and the fan was taking care of the last little section. However, you can see where the water intruded so unwelcomingly into my room haha. Praise God I have tile! I just laughed when I realized what happened. Quite an interesting experience that I'll laugh about for a long time. Hope it made you laugh as well.
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