The Joy of Lahu Children

The 4 days (April 25-28) we spent in the Lahu Village were among the top days of the whole Thailand experience for me! We arrived late in the eventing after over 3 hours in the back of rotdengs (red trucks). Within seconds of arriving, there were children all over us, overjoyed at the prospect of new playmates, and by the end of our time there it was so difficult to leave them! We spent all of our free time playing with them, which was a blast, and a little exhausting ;)

Once we arrived, we lined up and families claimed us as guests to stay in their homes. My friend Diana and I ended up with the cutest older couple ever! The most interesting dynamic of host stays in the villages was the language barrier. Hilltribes have their own language, and not everyone speaks Thai. By the same token, even fewer people speak English! Luckily, our host father spoke Thai and we were able to find out more about them, such as the fact that they have two daughters living in Chiang Mai and had gone to college already. They were the sweetest couple and they had a nice big mattress on the floor in their living room for us. Their house was a traditional village home, but made of wood instead of bamboo showing that they were slightly more wealthy than some others (their daughters likely send them money). There was another house on their property that was the kitchen; we never ate with them, however, because we had all our meals together in the village fellowship hall. There was also an outhouse with 2 rooms: the bathroom which had a squatty potty and a spigot; and the laundry room which had a spigot and a bucket =)

So, our schedule while there was jam-packed! Here are some things we did:

Moon Cakes!
The first night, we made moon cakes which are made by shaping pounded sticky rice dough into a perfectly round shape. Having the 'roundest of them all' means your babies will have the cutest face!! (I didn't win though, sad!)

Fishing!
In the most literal sense, of course. We traveled to the nearby river and made dams throughout one area so that the water would recede enough for us to pile as many fish, bugs and crabs into a bunch of baskets as possible! I found quite a few bugs and crabs, no fish though! After that, they made our catches of the day into delicious soup for lunch... pretty good and very spicy!

Orphanage!
Later that day, we went about an hour up the mountain where we visited an orphanage. There, the kids put on a show for us (adorable!) and then we were free to socialize with them and play with them before dinner. I made friends with the sweetest 15 year old girl, Moochi. She spoke the tiniest bit of English and I the tiniest bit of Thai so together we were able to bond a bit =). After dinner we had to say good bye, which was honestly the most difficult good bye I've had to say in Thailand! Something about her joy and desire to get to know me combined with her love of Christ and her siblings evident in her conversation and actions made me enjoy her presence and long to form a real relationship with her. She even gave me a bracelet that I'm still wearing many months later, thinking of her and her beauty, inside and out!

Moochi is beside me doing the Asian "I'm cute" sign (looks like a peace sign), and her little sister is on the other side.

Sunday Church!
On Sunday we attended 3 services. The 9 am women's service was first; the girls in our group sang a few songs and then Aj. Ann preached. it was a lovely time to let the women bond and have time to themselves to refresh and be renewed. The 11 am service was much busier, with all the children and families in attendance. The whole group of us sang a few more songs and this time Aj. Mike preached. The church is definitely the heart of the village, as evident through God's presence throughout the service. Later in the afternoon there was another service, much less formal, in which people shared testimonies and everyone sang songs. They asked for students to share, so 2 from our group shared. First I shared 2 Corinthians 5:17 about everyone being a new creation in Christ. This passage has always meant a lot to me and I saw it in a new way as I encountered this village and its people. Then, another student shared on Christ's love and how he experienced that love through the villagers' hospitality.

Even the children were a part of the 11 am service =)

Overall, seeing the villagers all together in the little building singing songs of praise to the same God I serve was definitely an uplifting experience. In Thailand, a Buddhist country, the Christian community is the minority. It's almost opposite in the hilltribe villages. Generally, entire villages are Christian or live in complete peace and coexist mutually with other religions. Contrastly, in America, Christians sometimes bear the mindset of having power and control over others around them who are different. I loved experiencing Christ from so many new perspectives as I saw how he was completely unwrapped from my comfortable, familiar context and re-wrapped into a different culture and way of life. Also, the hilltribe culture feels so much more like the original church than anything I've experienced in America. There, they were so much more focused on loving each other and on living the way Jesus did, it put me to shame at times as a Christian but also gave me hope for the future of Christianity. The early church gave of their possessions to the good of the whole group, sharing their resources and experiences, and that is how the Lahu village was. I saw joy in every generation and felt hospitality and acceptance from every person I encountered.

Another part of our time there was spending time with Vithoon, a young visionary trying to change his village's mindset about farming in order to bring about sustainable changes. Obviously, for this community, farming is THE way of life and the way of survival. Therefore, changing practices that have been in place for so long (in this case, slash-and-burn practices) is unheard of because it is new, different, and there is less evidence that it works in the long run. However, in the long run slash-and-burn has depleted the area's usable land and caused environmental effects that are doing more harm than good. Vithoon is working to teach new practices to area farmers. These are risky, but thus far are more productive than traditional methods. His farm includes a variety of crops in one area that ensure the area stays fertile and preventing the need for burning.

Demonstrating some sustainable farm practices.

The group of us walking to see more of the farm.

Vithoon and his passion for farming!

Koh Samet, the ultimate island experience!

How to have an awesome time on Spring Break in Thailand:

Step one: bring all your bags with you on a water taxi to the Grand Palace, and look like the ultimate tourist with your huge bags, bumping into everyone you come into contact with.
Step two: After taking enough pictures to post onto your blog, take a taxi to the bus station from said palace.
Step three: Find the bus you need and buy your bus and ferry tickets (round trip, about $11).
Step four: Ride on smelly bus with smellier bathrooms for approximately 3 hours to Ban Phe.
Step five: Wait at bus station for the rest of your group to catch up (Remember, you are traveling as a group of 12).
Step six: Buy a nice iced tea and some ice cream and continue waiting. Don't forget, you still have your huge bags.
Step seven: Board the ferry to your selected island!
Step eight: Sit on the ferry in shock because you are FINALLY going to make it to spring break.
Step nine: Arrive at Koh Samet and find a taxi (truck) willing to take 12 people (and their big bags) around on the island to find some lodging.
Step ten: Say may ow, khop khun kha (no thanks!) to the 5,000 baht a night hotel (over $250) and settle on the 300 baht a night place ($10).
Step eleven: Settle into your bungalow by dragging your huge bags up tiny steps to the cozy picturesque bed under a mosquitoe net in the adorable room =)
Step twelve: Eat good food, bask in the sun, do basically nothing (with the exception of some shopping), eat more food, bask in the sun even more, and do even less for 5 days. O, and make friends with a dog, whom you name Coconut.

Gorgeous view! (Plus people following the steps and basking)

Bask away, my friends

COCONUT!

Breakfast and Lunch hotspot! (Although, I took the pic at night lol)

Step thirteen: Forget to take pictures of important things like your bungalow and all the cool beachside restaurants where you ate.
Step fourteen: Repeat transportation back to Bangkok: ferry to Ban Phe, bus to Bangkok, taxi to train station.
Step fifteen: Reunite with old friends who went to a different island and then board the night train to Chiang Mai.
Step sixteen: Arrive in Chiang Mai after 13 hours on a train and realize how much you missed 'home'.
Step seventeen: Eat your favorite Chiang Mai foods that you've missed, get your visa renewed and get ready for another crazy adventure to the hilltribe villages of Thailand!

Tune in again soon for 2 more village posts!!

Ruins, Temples, and Finding Nemo

Back in Time: SST Treks Across Thailand

On Sunday, March 13, all 20 of us and our ajaans (professors) piled into a large pink Finding Nemo charter bus. Yes, there was literally a scene from the movie painted on the side! We had said good-bye to our families and given them our appreciative gifts, and we were ready to be jolted around on a huge bus.

So, here’s a rundown of our top adventures each day:

Sunday:  

In the morning we stopped at a really pretty temple in Lampang, Wat Prathat Lampang Loung. The temple was really lively that day and there were many people giving alms and worshipping. In addition, there was a nice quiet part of the temple ground where there was a HUGE bo tree. Buddhists show their support of the religion by using sticks to support trees. Here’s a pic:

GIANT Bo tree with lots of support =)

My favorite stop was at Si Satchanalai Historical Park, a park of about 4 old temples and their ruins. It was a really quiet and peaceful time we spent there because there was almost no one else at the park. I really enjoyed walking slowly through and taking lots of pictures! Here’s a few:

The sky was doing crazy cool things that day

Cool brick walls, always a nice photo ;)

There's a tree in the middle of the temple!

Monday: MY FAVORITE DAY!

I don’t think in any other circumstances a Monday would fall into the category of my favorite day! Alas, it was a blast… we went to Sukhothai, one of the former kingdoms of Thailand. While there, we rented bikes and rode around to various parts of the old city… these were also mostly ruined temples, but the neat part was that we had learned about them all in our Thai class. In class, they were just temples. In real life, they were lively representations of thai history, art and culture. It was beautiful, peaceful and of course, riding bikes was fun! This also the stop where we saw the HUGE Buddha image... it was SO cool, and almost impossible to fit in my camera lens ;) Nonetheless, here's a few pics of the day:

That is one BIG hand!

No picture can really catch the magnitude of this buddha!

They were selling all this beautiful art outside the temple.

Big foot!

Tuesday:

In the morning we went to a really cute little Folk Museum of daily Thai culture from the past. It had everything from cooking tools to farming tools to toys to bedding to clothing to medicinal tools. It was adorable, but, of course, no pics allowed! Later that day we traveled to Lopburi, a city known for its…. MONKEYS! Yes, that’s right, the city of monkeys. We went to a temple where the monkeys preside and they were a little crazy. They jumped all over some people and even stole someone’s earrings! Here’s a few cute monkey pics:

I'm a sucker for babies of any species ;)

Comfy beds =)

Cleaning time!

 

Wednesday:

We had spent the night in the monkey hotel in Lopburi, then we went to the King Narai National Museum in the morning, where we saw the ruins of an old palace. Then we travelled to Ayuthaya and visited the study center (a museum) and then an old temple/ historical park in Ayuthaya. We also had dinner on a boat that night, it was so pretty! Here are a few pics of the historical park (my camera couldn't take non-blurry pictures on the boat):

The little god statue on the right is actually one of the elements of Thai Buddhism stolen from Hinduism.

My favorite flowers in Thailand!

On our way back to our hotel after dinner on the boat, we stopped at a gorgeous, old, historically significant temple in the city that was beautifully lit-up. The next day we saw it again. Here's one night and one day pic:

Night...

And cloudy day... and a different angle

Thursday:
After seeing the Wat Chat Wat Ta Na Ram in the morning, we headed to the Baang Pa Summer Palace before heading to Bangkok. The king who had that palace built had traveled to England sometime before and there was a very western feel to the entire grounds of the palace. Here are a few pics:

After the palace, we headed to Bangkok, our final destination! Once there, we took a one hour canal tour through the city on the River of Kings.

A cute little family eating dinner on the water and waving at the passers-by =)

Literally, the first time I saw sunshine in DAYS. Not good for my health!

Friday:
The final day of our trek across Thailand! We headed to the temple of the Emerald Buddha and the Grand Palace: Beautiful!! Plus, it was one of the few sunny days we enjoyed during the field trip, that's why these pictures are so bright and cheery!

I could not get over how blue the sky was!!

Ashley and me in front of the Temple

I loved these little guys holding the Jedi up!

Palace!

Then we began our epic travel adventure to Koh Samet... which I will leave you in suspense about! Tune-in next time!

Back in Chiang Mai!

Hello again!! Long time, no post… oops!

So, I’m currently writing to you from my new apartment, complete with a huge patio and lots of living space… this will be my home until May 15^th. I’m staying with 3 other girls and we are all taking a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) course at CMU’s Language Institute. All of our other study abroad-ers have already safely arrived back in the states with the exception of a few others of us struck with Thailand fever that can’t seem to leave!

In a typical TEFL day we wake up around 8, have some breakfast and work on our lesson plans for the day-if it’s our turn to teach! Then we head to campus for class at 11. We have a 90-minute in-put lesson, followed by an hour for lunch and another 90-minute in-put lesson. The in-put lessons are usually about teaching strategies, classroom dynamics, English language, lesson planning, and other fun things teachers need to know! After that, we have an hour of prep time for teaching. There are 12 total ‘trainees,’ 6 from our program, 2 of our Thai buddies who have better English than I, and 4 other male students. We have an Italian, a Brit, a Scot, and an American, and all a little older than us silly college kids.

So, the 12 of us are split into 2 groups of 6, and each group is responsible for teaching one of the two different classes. I am in the group teaching pre-intermediate English students and so we cycle through who teaches which days (each teaching about 30 minutes of a 2 hour class). So far, I’ve taught 3 times, and it’s definitely exciting!! I can already tell that I and the others in my group are improving, and I am way more comfortable with my students. Luckily, our students are mostly around the same age, which is college-aged, and they are really good students! They listen, do their best to understand and they work really hard—it makes teaching rewarding! I'm excited to progress as a teacher and by the end I'll be teaching 1-hour lessons... yikes! It will be fun and having the certificate will allow me to get good jobs abroad teaching someday, maybe, who knows!

Alright, my friends, here's the plan... Over the next few weeks, I'm going to take you back in time to the following events:

-SST Field trip across Thailand

-Spring Break in Kho Samet!!

-Lahu Village for 5 days

-Karen Village for 2 1/2 weeks

Then, you will be all caught up on my life for the past month and a half, and you won't have to miss me so much!! Also, all of the above posts will have pictures!! (Gotta make sure you'll at least look at my blog!) 

And here's the link to my facebook Thailand album, which I just added 25 new pictures to:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/fbx/?set=a.10150107361059757.291467.563504756&l=48d74466c8

I pray you have a happy and blessed Easter holiday with your friends and family!! Blessings your way!!

A long week of lasts, good-byes, and peace-outs!

Monday: We said good-bye to the Baan Phonsawan kiddos... even though I only went there for internship for about 2 weeks, those adorable, energetic little munchkins stole my heart and I'll never forget them! We had a party for our last day and we did our best to leave in such a way that the good-byes were minimally emotional, which was helpful! This was also the last day of art class! We got some of our stuff back so here's a few pics:

So, I didn't actually make the pottery, I just painted it.....

...and carved it =)

So, this was really fun (not). We used stucco to create these pretty flowers, most of which had much more detail than mine, and I didn't even do the work! I kept bringing it up and the professor kept fixing it, and I'm pretty sure he did most of it, haha.

Thank goodness I have the ability to trace! These projects were from two different days, but they were pretty fun, especially since I didn't have to do anything free handed!

For our silversmithing project (it's not actual silver though, haha) we used hammer and tools and it was loud.... but then they put our projects on pretty black boxes (excellent for gift-giving!)

Tuesday: This was actually not a good-bye or last day! After classes, a group of us went to the International Women's Day Conference. One of the Social work seniors doing her full-time internship here presented the Thai Woman of the Year Award to its recipient since she was the one who had nominated her! The recipient was a woman at her internship, Grandma Cares, who has done a lot of research and work in the field of HIV/AIDS.

Wednesday: Last day of normal classes! We said good-bye to our Thai writing professor, Aj. Anek, and for our final we have to mail him a postcard in Thai sometime while we are on spring break! He gave us all the useful sentences to write on the postcard, so how's that for an easy A!

Thursday: LAST EXAM! (Well, minus the easy postcard). We took our final in Thai culture class. Now, as far as classes, go, I will write one short paper in the village, but other than that I'm done with classes until August! CRAZY! For dinner on Thursday, I went out with my entire family for dinner (usually I only eat meals with my sister and mother, so this was a rare treat!). They gave me a beautiful skirt as a gift and we ate lots of fun seafood (including some raw shrimp!). All in all, a good day =)

Friday: We had a free day, so a friend and I headed to massage place and got 120 baht, 1-hour massages ($4!). We did a little shopping and hanging out too, and then Friday night was the lovely farewell dinner! We performed our skits for our families and a few girls did some musical numbers and we ate delicious food! Also, a good day =)

Saturday: Today has been a relaxing do nothing but packing day. It is also the last night with our families! My family was pretty busy today, but it was nice to have a quiet day to pack my stuff and prepare my gift for my family, which I will give them in the morning! It includes most of the art work I have pictured above and a few things from America (ie, Virginia Peanuts and a Virginia totebag!). Also, my little sister got her ears pierced this past week, so I got her some earrings from the mall =)

SUNDAY: Tomorrow we are leaving for our 12-day adventure through Thailand! We will be travelling as a group on a tour bus to Sukhotahai, Pitsanulok, Ayuttyah, Lopburi, and Bangkok. This trip ends Friday, and then we are let loose for Spring Break! A group of us are heading to Kho Samet, an island off the southern coast of Thailand for this part of the trip, which will end on March 24th. Then, we will be back in Chiang Mai for a night before we head off to the Lahu village for a few days and the Karen village for a few weeks! I will not have my computer except for that day in between the trip and the village, so consider this your break from reading my ramblings ;) I'll try to keep up with a written journal every few days to have something to look back on next time I post!

There's also been a little change in plans for my stay here in Thailand! I'm staying an extra month! I will be taking a course in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) that will provide me with a certification enabling me to teach English in other countries. I don't yet have specific plans for how I'll use the certificate, but I do think it will help to open up doors in the future since I hope to, at some point, live and work abroad! So, I will be home on May 22nd instead of April 22nd! There are 5 other students staying, so we're working on finding some cheap lodging altogether and all looking forward to our extra time in Thailand!

Well, that's all for now. I ask that you keep Japan, Hawaii, and the west coast in your prayers as they recover from the recent earthquake and tsunami.... I don't know that there has been much effect here in Thailand, thankfully, but I do know many people are mourning their losses and suffering, so I pray for their quick recovery back to a sense of 'normal'.

I also pray you are all doing well! Have a blessed and meaningful day, my friends.

More weekend fun!

So, last weekend (March 4-6), I stayed with the two social work majors doing their full-time senior internships who have a little dorm room/ apartment on the other side of CMU. We saw a movie (The Adjustment Bureau) at the big fancy mall with some other friends on Friday night... it was nice to be see an English movie, but odd to watch tv where people did not "wai" (sort of like a bow/nod) each other and say "Sa-wat-dii-kha!" I've gotten too used to Thai tv with my family!

Saturday morning, we went to Wat Jet Yod in the morning. I've come to realize and appreciate how peaceful wats are.... there's definitely something serene about them, plus their full of beautiful art and there's always a bo tree, and those are huge and gorgeous because I love trees =) Here's a few pics (though this tree is neither a bo tree nor at Wat Jet Yod, but it's still huge and COOL.... I'll post a bo tree pic sometime soon though)

Saturday afternoon, we went to the show that some from our group were a part of, as singers and dancers. The show was called "Searching for Sanook" and was about living one's dreams even when others tell you you can't. The show was put on by an InterACT Theatre project in which actors with disabilities are brought together to help put on the show. Everyone who was a part of it had wonderful things to say about working with the actors and it seemed to really change and touch some lives! The show itself was beautiful and well-done! The ending song, "Higher and Higher" in a medly with another thai song, was mesmerizing. There was such unity among the actors and everyone sang beautifully. Here's a few pictures that don't even begin to capture the moment, but, well, it's the best I could do =)

Saturday night we bought some movies and had a relaxing, veg-out movie-watching session =) Another little touch of home... sleepovers are the best! Sunday was also a pretty awesome day. We went to church in the morning and then went to Aj. Ann's and Aj. Mike's for lunch. This was a birthday celebration for Aj. Ann and one of our Thai profs, Aj. Rian! It was also a lunch for our special guests who joined us from America... Messiah's President, Kim Phipps, Messiah's VP of Enrollment, John Chopka, and Messiah's Assistant Director of Admissions for International Student Recruitment, Cindy Blount... they were doing some recruitment in SE Asia and stopped in for a day to see us! It was really neat to have them there, and we enjoyed telling them all about Enchanting Thailand =)

ALSO!! Two weekends ago on Sunday (Feb 27), we took a Thai cooking class! It was really fun to learn how to cook good food, and then we got to eat it! We made fried bananas, pad thai, mixed veggies, and yummy soup (which I forget the name of). We also got some little recipe books so I can't wait to try my hand at cooking it again in America! The woman that was teaching managed to keep herself really near to our little station and hardly let us do the work, lol, so I'm definitely excited to really try it out some time!

That Monday (Feb 28) was our final for Thai language! There were 2 parts, an individual part where we had to talk for 4 minutes (I probably talked for 2, lol... but they don't really keep track!) and then a group portion where we performed a skit in Thai. Our skit featured 2 farang students (aka, us) played by my friend Diana and I, who mumbled around and messed up thai and made silly mistakes getting used to living in Thailand. It included a scene where we we had our first thai class, then a market scene where we managed to bargain a price for a purse up instead of down (yay language barrier!) and a thai massage scene where we ended up in massive pain! It was really fun, and funny! I have no idea about what my grade is in the class, but I'm glad the exam is over!

Post about this past week to come... very soon. Maybe right now. Maybe not.

Peace =)