Love Is All You Need

Isn't that view just amazing?!?! That's part of the view from the Akha church in Luka's village. We attended church there on Sunday. The kids performed a song for us. They were adorable. The adults performed for us as well, and they sounded amazing. And then we performed for them, we sang "God is so Good" in both Akha and English. I'm sure we didn't sound as great as they did, but we sang from our hearts. I believe it was well received. They served us an incredible lunch then we toured the church and village. We saw the spot where they want to put the water bottling & ice factory, pending government approval. We don't speak the same language, but our love for Jesus and for each other joined us together.

The evening found us once again in town. Most of us ate at a pizza place, it wasn't quite like home but was good anyhow. Elaine found a McDonald's and that was just like home, with added curly fries. And as I suspected, Mark got his ice cream!

Monday brought several Akha pastors and their families to AYDC for their monthly meeting. It was a time of fellowship and encouragement. Mark and Pastor Kim shared a little as well as some of them shared with us. Then we shared the noon meal together. Again, I was reminded that while we don't share the same verbal language, our hearts share the love of Jesus.

Before I came to Thailand, I asked my kids to write a note or draw a picture for me to bring with me. One of my girls drew a picture of me and her, she wrote "Love is all you need". She didn't know it, but that has proven to be true, over and over this trip. We love each other and love on each other because we love Jesus and we love His people. Love trumps language barriers.

Rice, Games, & Blessings

We have a new found respect for rice farmers. The rice AYDC grows on site here feeds them for about 6 months. This last week was planting time. On Friday, we helped. It was fun and blessed us to be able to help them in that way, at least we hope we were helpful. It is hard work, and we've all been feeling it. Some more than others. Lol. There were all sorts of God's creatures socializing with us in the rice paddies, such as snakes, mud crabs, and an infinite number of creepy crawlies. Thankfully, most of us were not aware of them until close to the end.

Friday was a holiday in celebration of the king's birthday so the schools were closed. Many families of the AYDC kids came and helped plant the rice, then took their kids home for the weekend. There were a handful of kids that stayed here. On Saturday, we spent time playing games, painting faces, playing legos, and weaving lanyards/bracelets. 

 Saturday evening we were invited to dinner at a friend of Luka & Ghan's. People from her small community/neighborhood joined us as well. She has recently been in the hospital and had surgery on her intestines. This dinner was a celebration of God's faithfulness and provision. In turn, people took the opportunity to bless her financially. It was heart warming to look around and see the people love on each other, and on us. To bless one another. We sat and sang together, worshipping our awesome God. It blessed my heart tremendously. 

After we left there, we found ourselves again at the Night Bazaar and Walking Street. We enjoyed the sights & sounds of all they had to offer. It started raining as we were getting ready to leave. Mark missed out on getting ice cream at Swenson's. I'm sure he won't miss out tonight!

Full Days

Days here have been full. Full of things to do and people to see. Full of laughter. Full of love. Full of Jesus. Thursday was no exception. We started our day by visiting the school that Luka & Ghan's girls attend, Chiang Rai International Christian School (CRICS). They follow the same schedule that we do in the USA and are currently on summer break. We met a couple, Peter & Mary, who are among the founding members of CRICS. The school started as a co-op between families who are serving in the area, and has grown into an accredited school with a little over 200 students. Classes are taught in English with exception of their Thai language & enrichment classes. They serve Kinder - 12th Grades. They are always looking for teachers who would like to join their team. If you'd like their info, let me know.

We visited a small water bottling factory that Luka & Ghan are modeling the one they're building after. We also visited Phamee Akha Village, Ghan's home village, where we saw her brother's water bottling factory and her other brother's coffee shop. We had wonderful coffees & teas and an extraordinary view!!

Ghan's village is near the cave that the 13 Thai boys were lost in. We could see the side of the cave on the mountain. Ghan's village helped serve as the central hub while the search and rescue efforts were underway.
 We went to shops near the Myanmar border, and stopped by a mural that is being created about the rescue. We wrapped up our day with some grocery shopping, dinner, and then our nightly team devo.

English Camp at Pongprae Vuittayakhom - Day 2

We spent two days at Pongprae Vuittayakhom School. The second day,  our format and teaching teams stayed the same but our lessons were different. The kids came to school excited and ready to learn more English and participate in more activities.

Connie and Char's lesson was two parts. With the way the rotations ended up, both teams taught the first part and second part twice each. The lesson centered around a book about Earthworms. It brought vocab and sentence structure to the students. We also started most rotations with a "This or That" game. The starting person wraps a length of yarn around their wrist and then answers a question like "Chocolate or Vanilla?"   They say their preference, and then others in the circle who share the same raise their hand. Then the yarn is thrown to another person, and so on, eventually throwing another "this or that" question into the mix until everyone is connected. A short explanation of how we all make different choices and like different things but we're all still connected to our friends wrapped up the game. Some kids in one of our groups labeled our web as the Friendship Bridge. We thought that was fitting.

Michelle's crew read a book "Seven Blind Mice" which helped focus on colors and days of the week for their vocab. The kids were able to put their new vocab words to work with water color painting. I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing this was the favorite station of the day.

Elaine and her team focused on phonics, letter sounds, and days of the week.

The staff at the school loved having us there. They were so kind and gracious to us. They were wonderful hosts. They brought us snacks and water each morning, they provided a delicious lunch each day, and brought us goodies & coffee in the afternoon. We are so appreciative of their kindness towards us. At the end of the day, we were thanked for coming and invited to come again. I think it's safe to say, we all enjoyed the experience, and we will be back again some day.

So blessed we were by these sweet kids and their teachers. Some of the AYDC students attend this school, and they were very proud to have us there, telling their classmates that we were their people. As if it was their honor to share us with the rest of the school. I hope it was as much of a blessing to them to have us there as it was for us to be there. And yes, in case you were wondering, we were all tuckered out by the end of the day.