The Return of the Worm!

Everyone's favorite dining adventure from my last trip here was the bamboo worms. They are a specialty of northern Thailand. A friend jokingly calls them "Thai French fries." Crispy little beggars that are deep fried and available at any market in Chiang Rai.



Worms with naam prik, a sort of salsa like substance that comes in hot, nuclear and 'dude, where did your lips go?' This is the mild version. The Li Hpu people serve a dark red version that is insanely hot, and I loved it!



Ate a handful of the little beggars this time. Just like chewing on shoestring potatoes, with a bit less salt. And shoestring potatoes don't look at you as you eat them.

One of my very favorite dishes in Thailand is khao soy noodles. It is not easy to find in Bangkok because it is a northern Thai dish. I was told that if I went north, I HAD to eat khao soy in Chiang Mai or Chiang Rai, so we at them both places. It is noodles with a bit of vegetables, chunks of chicken (usually full chicken wings), bean sprouts, and a soup with a coconut milk base. It is fairly spicy, but then you dump in crushed red pepper and chunks of red onion and...oh my, this stuff is wonderful!

White House

I am sorry that these posts from this week's trip are not in chronological order. I just add things as they occur to me...

The moment we arrived in Chinag Mai on the first day, we walked straight in to the beginning of a church service. We were going there to visit White House, the drug rehab center sponsored by Immanuel Church, and had been invited to share at the church attended by the folks in treatment. Ah Jan Winit had told me to expect a very small crowd, "probably less than twenty, including everyone in the van." We got there and discovered the whole church had turned out and they had invited another church, so there were well over a hundred folks.

Ah Jan Winit invited me to come up and speak to the church for a while. At the end of the service, the senior pastor said something in Thai, pointing at me. I heard the word 'farang,' (foreigner), but didn't understand anything else. Afterward, the team said he told the church that 'Uncle farang,' had given one of the most touching messages he had heard in years. Wow. Way cool!

The church was packed.

How old would you guess this boy to be? You're probably wrong. He is thirteen years old. And I am visiting with him because he is IN drug rehab. His mother died as a result of her heroin addiction and she managed to get him hooked, too. He has been living at White House for several months now and will be there for another year or so before, most likely, moving to an orphanage.

Unlike most drug rehab sites in the US, here you stay at least six months, and they would like you to stay two years. Actually, the older 'patients' are even encouraged to enroll in Bible College after treatment, and they are assisted with tuition. This is exactly how my buddy Vee got started on the road to ministry.

The housing units at White House. Vee stayed in one of these for months during his treatment some ten or twelve years ago. The men of the team stayed here overnight, while the women stayed in the main house. Bare tile floor with mattresses thrown down, but I've slept in far worse here! Outdoor toilets and cold showers all week. Keeps you awake!

The director here actually owns the property and Immanuel is paying operating expenses. The director is getting older, though, and has mentioned thinking about shutting the place down and selling the property. Ah Jan Winit and the board are praying about possibly purchasing the property and, when the director retires, assuming the task of daily operations.

Part of the team during a quick devotional time before heading back onto the road and to our next adventure.

Meeting with Hill Tribe people

All day Wednesday was spent in Chiang Mai, participating in a pastor's conference for pastors and their wives from the Li Hpu hill tribe. (Pronounced "La Hoo".) The Li Hpu have their own dialect that is very different from traditional Thai and even Ah Jan Winit needed a translator. He spoke at four sessions, two each in the morning and afternoon, and each time for about an hour. The subject was worship.

Here, the group is worshipping at the start of a session. Ah Jan Winit is playing his beloved violin.




Each team member was to share a few thoughts on the subject of worship. Two or three of us spoke at the start of each session before Ah Jan Winit spoke. I spoke in the last session.

Thankfully, my translator understood Li Hpu, Thai, AND English!

The team's sharing and Ah Jan Winit's preaching went over very well. Afterward, the leader told Winit that they plan to have a major meeting in a few months, with up to five thousand in attendance and they want Immanuel to share and teach there, also!

Im Jai House

At the opposite end of the spectrum from Nana orphanage is Im Jai house, an orphanage in Chiang Mai. (Im jai, roughly translated, means "full heart.") This facility was founded by a member of Immanuel Church. She sent to Pastor Winit about twelve years ago and said she felt led to start an orphanage. Ah Jan Winit went to the church board and they prayed about it. Shortly later, he presented this lady with 50,000 bahts and said, "I don't know how we do this, but go ahead. This is a good thing."

After several years in a donated building, the orphanage was forced to look for a new location. A local missionary sent word back to the US to everyone she knew and shortly, they had nearly fifty million bahts (over a million dollars U.S.) Today, they operate in this wonderful new facility.

Im Jai house currently serves a little over forty children from five or six years old through high school. Most are the children of AIDS victims. All (or almost all) are Thai, unlike at Nana. Still, the fact remains that, although their housing is much nicer, they are orphans and have profound hurts and many issues to work through.

We met with the children Wednesday evening and Ah Jan Winit gave a brief talk about Jesus telling the disciples to throw their net on the other side of the boat, and the huge catch of fish. Each team member told some story about fishing. I told about a time when a friend and I went fishing on the Grand River and sank our boat in the middle of the night.

Im Jai house has gone through some difficulties over the past couple of years and has lost a lot of financial support. Although they have wonderful facilities, they are struggling to meet their ongoing expenses. Immanuel church has stepped up its support substantially to help stand in the gap for them.

Chiang Rai

Not much to say that would improve on the photos, but to give you a sense of where I spent the last week. It is just amazing to see the clouds so close. It is much cooler here than in Bangkok and it is incredibly beautiful.

Molo

This is Molo. He is a six year old from the Nana Orphanage. Molo died the day before we arrived.

Molo was an orphan to Burmese parents who died of AIDS. He had lived at Nana for the past year. From what I understand, several weeks ago, someone showed up at Nana and, saying he was a relative, took Molo and crossed over to Burma. Apparently, Molo ran away and made his way to Mae Sai. The orphanage supplements it's finances with a restaurant in town run by orphanage volunteers. They believe he was waiting for the restaurant to open so he could go to them and be taken 'home.' In the meantime, doing what he knew best, he was begging on the streets when he was struck and killed by a car.

After we left, Abraham, the mission director, was leaving to pick up his body at the hospital and bring him back to the orphanage for burial.

Nana Orphanage

At the very northern edge of Thailand is a city called Mae Sai. Just outside of Mae Sai is Nana orphanage, which works with orphans from Burma (Myanmar) who really have no other options. These are either true orphans or abandoned children. Nana currently houses over a hundred kids. It is not operated by Immanuel church, but we are their primary financial supporter. This week, the team visited to check up on how things are going and to deliver a gift of 50,000 baht to allow them to stock their fish pond with a sustainable population of fish that will help with feeding the kids.

This is the main administration building.

The staff living quarters. Not kidding.

The new library, just opened. It actually has a solar cell that will provide the room with two hours of electricity a day.

Me with some of the kids. This site is not equipped for infants, and only takes in kids three or four years old and up. The public schools will not provide free education for the children, because they are Burmese, not Thai, so the orphanage has to pay tuition for every kid. It's not that much, but with a hundred kids, it adds up fast.

One of the dorms. The blue stuff is mosquito netting. This part of Thailand is home to malaria, which is transmitted by mosquito, and the netting helps protect the kids while they sleep.

The boy sitting on his bunk is new at Nana. He was found a few weeks ago, abandoned in the jungles between Burma and Thailand. He can not speak in a known language. He does not know Burmese or Thai or any of the dialects from the area. He has a few words he appears to have made up on his own for common things. It's not like he was raised by wolves, but he has had NO education or love shown to him. He is still uncomfortable around others, so he prefers to sit on his bunk, rather than play. Here, he is looking at pictures in a children's book.

Whan you order chicken fingers in Thailand...

Be prepared to eat the real thing!

I actually forgot to take photos today at Jarurat. Today, it was Ah Jan Vee, Tony and me. We sang and I talked about Jesus walking on the water and we had a coloring book page with that illustration. The day went well.

We were late taking off for Soi 107, and by the time we got there, some of the kids had already gone. The team there had the kids painting small clay figures. This was their last day of arts and crafts.

Next Sunday, the slum team is having an all day retreat to spend time together praying and planning for the upcoming months and the direction of the slum ministry. It will be exciting to see where the team senses we are being led and what changes we may see in our work with the kids.

Monday morning, I start four days of vacation and head off with a team from church to assist with revival services in a hill tribes church in Chiang Mai, far to the north. I have no idea what other things we'll be doing, but check in next weekend, as I am sure I will have plenty of photos to share.

Back to Ja Rurat and Soi 107

After being gone last weekend, it was good to be back with the team in the slums this week. At Ja Rurat, two young ladies, Nok and Noom, accompanied Vee and me. They brought an activity with them... making angles using Popsicle sticks and paper doilies (I have no clue where they got them.) So, we sang a few simple choruses and I talked to the children ("dek dek") about the angle appearing to Mary and telling her that God had chosen her to be Jesus' mother. Then, we went right in to making angels.

Some did a really nice job!
One prayer request is that the kids coming to Ja Rurat keep getting younger and younger. I believe this is because it has mostly been just Vee and me, so we can not do what we do at Soi 107 and divide them into age groups. We have to keep things very simple for the little ones, and I think the older kids me be getting bored and quit coming. We just need wisdom in how to attract and keep the older kids and we need more folks from church to join us so we can build a full team for Ja Rurat like we have at Soi 107.

Just at the edge of the commons area where we meet, there is always a group of adults who live nearby.

At Soi 107, the turnout is still quite good. Many of the kids had left by the time I took this. I expect there were close to forty there yesterday. We really need to expand the area we meet in to make room for all the kids.
At Soi 107, we normally teach English, but schools are on break right now, so we are doing the same and instead of teaching English, we are doing a few weeks of arts and crafts. This week, the kids got small canvas book bags and were able to decorate them with fabric paints. They had a great time.
I was talking with a friend earlier this week. I said, "You know, I've got a really good life."

He replied "Ya think!?"

I am so incredibly grateful every day for this wonderful adventure!

Khao Lak - Final Images

Rows of new houses built by relief groups for the people of Khao Lak. These are much smaller than they appear here, and the bottom level is mainly storage, keeping the living quarters well above ground level. It is interesting to go through town and see little housing additions like this, each with one after another of the same exact style, depending on what group built them. These are among the best. Many are not much more than concrete cubes, but they are sturdy and great houses by the standards of small Thai towns.

Aa-jan Vee and me standing before 'green water,' that Discovery Channel kind of beautiful greenish ocean water, near Khao Lak. (Aa-jan is the Thai word used for master teacher or pastor.)
Khao Lak is sandwiched between the ocean to the west and the mountains jut behind it to the east. The mountains are regularly shrouded in mist like this.
Looking back at Khao Lak.
Aa-jan Vee looking out to the horizon, I am sure thinking the same thing everyone does in moments like that... "What must it have been like to see the wave coming?"

Khao lak - Fishing Village

There's no doubt that the major industries in Khao Lak are tourism and fishing. The tsunami had big impacts on both. After the disaster, relief agencies and church organizations rushed in. People were asked what they needed. Most men replied they needed a fishing boat because fishing was the best job available. So many men in the community were given new boats. This immediately led to overfishing the waters in the area and now all fishermen are struggling with the lack of fish and with the high price of gas.

Below, women cleaning the day's catch from local fishing crews.

Racks of small fish fillets, drying in the sun. Dried fish is a very important food source in this region. I had dried cuttlefish (squid) for breakfast one morning. It was a lot like chewing leather with a distinctively fishy taste. I recommend sticking to Cheerios.

Larger fishing boats lined up to unload the day's catch.
This crew is re-filling the hold of their boat with ice to keep their next catch fresh. Notice how young the two boys in the middle are. It's hard to see this, but just below the ice shavings, that is ONE fish. It is a monster, wrapped all around the huge cooler. The tail starts in the lower left and it wraps around with the head near the tail. This one fish is worth several thousand baht.

Khao Lak Teachers

At most of the schools we visited, we were also able to have some time to speak directly with the teachers. At each of these stops, Vee asked me to share my testimony with them, with David Johnson translating. Vee then used my testimony to challenge them with the gospel.

Below: the staff at the first school we visited.


Sharing my testimony.
Sharing at another school. At this one, one of the teachers talked at length afterward about how she is 'almost' ready to become a Christian, but that she is praying for some kind of miracle before she can take that step. Vee explained that giving your life to Christ IS a miracle.
The team poses with the staff of one of the schools we visited. They were such wonderful people and welcomed us with open arms and hearts.

The Khao Lak Kids

Much of the week in Khao Lak revolved around kids. We went to several schools and presented small assemblies, in which the team led the kids in Christian songs and games. Part of this was aimed at the kids and part at the teachers (as you'll see in the next post.) The team members were really gifted at getting the kids involved and having fun. Of course, getting any attention from outsiders is a big deal to them all, so they loved it.


The kids below are at a school operated by a Christian organization for Burmese children (from Myanmar). There is a lot of anti-Burmese prejudice in Thailand. Until this year, Burmese children were not allowed to attend public schools in and around Khao Lak. The tough thing is realizing that kids are just kids. They don't deserve this kind of treatment. This school educates about sixty kids. Eight of them left this year to try the public schools, but six returned in two weeks because of the bad treatment they got. They genuinely enjoyed the assembly and the change of pace from their regular routine. These kids were just wonderful.

At most stops, I talked about where I am from and explain that while they are in school, kids from my home town are in bed, asleep, but the same God who loves the kids in Kansas City loves them, too. When I explain my nick name is Big C, they always laugh and clap.

Vee speaking to one of the groups.

This little one marched right up to me while Vee was speaking and plopped down in my lap like she was home.