Thailand 2006

January Newsletter

Here is our newsletter for the month of January.  Download the January Newsletter (.pdf)

Week 4.1

It's Sunday again and hopefully a start to another great week.  I found out yesterday that I am up to speak again tonight.  It was in the bulletin all week, but I can't read Thai, so I didn't know.  I will make sure to ask from now on.

We had an excellent turn out for last Thursday night's orientation.  We had close to 70 people show up and sign up for a time to study with us. Another 10-15 called the following day.  This is much more than I expected, so we have our work cut out for us.  But with the great support system that we have here, I don't foresee any real problems.

On Friday, we got to appreciate and celebrate the birthday of one of our favorite people here. Her name is Pbun (you say the 'p' and the 'b' together and it means Apple, and is what we call her), and we kind of selfishly took her out to OutBack Steakhouse for her 29th birthday.  It was a lot of fun!  We won't be eating there very often because we spent the same amount for food at OutBack as we did the rest of the week before then.

I guess a Happy New Year! is in order as the Chinese New Year was celebrated over the last couple of days.  We saw some Chinese dragon dancing in the streets and heard Chinese firecrackers for almost 2 days straight.

On Saturday, the church had a devotional and barbecue for the youth.  Not much to say about that except that the youth here are very impressive in their ability and willingness to serve this church.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This week, the real work begins. Keep us in mind this week as we will start meeting with our students on Wednesday.

Soon, look for a video and a picture album for the month of January.

Week 3.1

It's Wednesday and we are getting geared up for our orientation meeting on Thursday.  We have seen a handful of potential students trickle by the church to take an English assessment test to determine their ability level.  We are expecting a lot of people to show up, thanks to a Christian who posted something about free English lessons on a popular public news site here in Bangkok.  I guess we will just have to wait and see how many show up to the orientation.  Hopefully it won't be more than we can handle... but that is a good problem to have.

Yesterday was an adventure.  We went on a search through Bangkok to find some Thai language schools.  We would like to learn as much Thai as possible while we are here.  I was on the internet the night before looking up schools that were close enough to the church building for us to easily travel by taxi, tuk-tuk, bus, or (preferably) sky train.  So, with a map of Bangkok, and 3 1-day passes for the MTS Sky Train, we ventured out.  And we did pretty well.  We found 3 out of the 5 schools that we were looking for, and 2 of those schools are under consideration.  They are a little more expensive than we had budgeted, so we may end up doing some self-study and tutoring with some of the Thai Christians here at the church.

Sunday, again, was a great day.  Bro. Larry Henderson (who is in Thailand with his skydiving team to do some surveying of the Kingdom of Thailand for the king himself) spoke during the morning worship about Christian compassion from Colossians.  I then got to lead a lively class about the nature of the church and the false teachings of denominationalism.  In the class, we had Julie and Dalissa and myself, and also a male Christian from Nigeria named John and an older female Christian (I don't remember her name) who is an Indian converted Muslim from Amsterdam.  She was from a "community-style" christian church, and in the class, we had a discussion about how the Holy Spirit works through us and through the Word.  She believed that the Holy Spirit told her to come to Thailand, and she even believed that the Holy Spirit told her what type of fruit to eat.  She also commented on how lovely the A Capella worship service was, and that she had never heard singing like that before.  It was a (can I say) "fun" discussion.

Then I got to speak to the church on Sunday night about the work that we have set out to do here in Bangkok.  P'Glome provided the translation.  I also spoke about "Always following God" and used the faith of Joseph in Matthew 1 and 2 for some examples of belief.

We also had 2 more baptisms here on Sunday.  2 women, Gitar and Pen Rung were added to the church, bring the total to 5 new Christians at the Somprasong 4 church so far this year.

Week 2.2

Work has begun.  I believe we are finally over our jet-lag, and we have actually been able to be quite productive this week.

We spent the bulk of Tuesday preparing and printing the lesson books for our students. I am glad that we waited to print the books over here, because they cost a fraction of the price from what I found in the US.

On Wednesday, we visited one of the largest Buddhist temples in Bangkok, Wat Pra Kaew, also known as The Temple of the Emerald Buddha.   You can see photos here.  Like many things over here, the scale and "other-worldliness" are somewhat lost in pictures.  Some things you are just not able to capture: like the two Thai policemen I saw on one motor scooter, swerving through traffic, one carrying a fruit basket... just weird.  I will try to write some descriptions on the photos sometime this week, but you can get some information about Wat Pra Kaew here. 

After the tour through Wat Pra Kaew, a Thai Christian, Nui, met us to take us to Tamasat University.  We went there to promote our English program by handing out information fliers and speaking to and meeting potential students.

And today, Friday, we just got back from two other universities, Saun Sunanta University and Suan Dusit University.  All in all, we spoke to and handed out about 800 fliers.  If only 5% of the people respond (40 people), that will give us a great start to the program.

Tomorrow, the church will be busy with an exhibition about the life of Christ.  It starts this weekend, and I found out that it will run and be open for 3 months.  I am excited, because it can be a tool to help us tell the story of Jesus to our students.

On Sunday, Larry Henderson (a long time missionary in Thailand, son of Parker and Donna Henderson) will speak during the morning worship.  The elders have asked me to teach a Bible class in English for English speakers, or anyone else who can come and understand a Bible lesson in English.  The class is about the origins and nature of the Church.  Then, the elders have asked me to speak during the evening worship.  They want me to make a presentation about our mission trip, our goals, and in general, why we decided to come to Thailand.  Because "we love the Thai Christians and want to help" doesn't quite take 25-30 minutes to say (even in Thai),I will have to come up with something.

Week 2.1

If I had to pick one thing that I enjoyed most about Thailand, it would be worshiping with the Somprasong 4 Church of Christ; and we got to do that today.  The worship service here is pretty much the same as any other church of Christ worship service, except that everything is in Thai.  An English translation is provided through a set of headphones.

We got to witness 2 new Christians being added to the church today.  This morning a young lady named Lek and this evening a young man name Aey were baptized.  Some of the goals for this congregation were announced this morning and one was to have 30 new Christians by the end of the year.  Hopefully we can help them accomplish this goal. 

Yesterday, the Thai people celebrated National Children's Day.  It is like Mother's and Father's day, but for kids.  The lesson this morning was about children and how special and important children are.  And after services, a special presentation was made to the children of the congregation (or at least the ones who were brave enough to go to the front.)  Each child either recited a memory verse (mostly Jn 3:16) or sang a song (usually "Blue Skies and Rainbows), and then were presented with a gift.

Then, like every Sunday, we ate.  On today's menu: pork and eggs.  Going clockwise from 12:00 - Scrambled eggs squares; White rice; Pork skin salad, HOT!(yes the skin of a pig, quite chewy); and pork and cabbage soup (the most tasty).  A chocolate chip cookie in the middle.

Week 1.1

We met with P'Rung yesterday to talk about getting started, students, lesson materials, and general goals.  There are already some English lessons going on here, but it is a very basic English class (alphabet, numbers, colors, objects, etc...)  Hopefully we can observe a couple of these classes to see if we can help.  Not knowing much Thai may hinder us from taking over these beginner classes right away.

We will be meeting with the 3 elders here at the Soi 4 church on Sunday so that they can welcome us, and so that we can talk about our goals, intentions, concerns, and ideas.

Next week we will travel to 3 of the local colleges to advertise our reading program to hopefully get some more advanced English speakers to take lessons from us.  We will be visiting one of the campuses with a student who is also a member here at Soi 4.  We will get to meet her friends and hopefully meet and talk to and encourage a lot of university students to come.  We have set an initial orientation date for Monday, 23 January for those who are interested in our English program.  P'Rung will also be calling some of our students from 3 years ago to tell them that we are here.

We have met another American, Heather, who is here on her time off from teaching English in China at a university.  Dalissa and Julie (and myself a little) spent a good part of yesterday helping her put together an English hymnal to coincide with the Thai hymnal for worship.

Today, the church will be busy with workers to get an open house ready for next weekend.  Even though the doors are open 7 days a week, and someone is available at almost any time, a special invitation has been made to the community surrounding the church to visit.  They will be holding special presentations about the life of Christ.  (Some Thai history.  Not unlike other ancient civilizations, much of the stories about the Thai mythological gods are not written down in books, but are handed down orally and painted on murals that surround temple shrines to Buddha.)  In the spirit of what most Thai people are accustom to seeing, a large display on murals of the life of Christ will be shown at this open house, and there will also be many Thai Christians there available to answer questions.  Also, there will be a movie shown about the life of Christ, and I am sure that there will be food.

We've Arrived

Good Morning Bangkok!  I am writing from the 5th story roof of the classroom/apartment building at the Somprasong 4 Church of Christ.  It is now 4:30 am here locally on Thursday, the 12th of January.  I am up here because I wanted to see the sun wake up Bangkok, and also I get a wireless internet signal up here.

Our 26 hours of traveling were without incident, other than the hour of terror when I believed that I had lost my passport.  Travel tip:  If you have a hidden pocket on your carry-on, do not put your passport into that pocket for safe keeping.  You will not think to check it until you are at the travelers aid station, calling the lost and found departments of every airport you have visited.

Our good buddy, Baow, picked us up at the airport in Bangkok at around 11:30 last night.  When we stepped outside of the airport, it was a refreshingly muggy 75 degrees with the distinct "Bangkok stink" in the air.  We got to catch up some on what some of our favorite people here at the Soi 4 Church people.

It was sad to find out that one of our friends here had died last year.  I am not sure exactly when, but Aey was killed in a car accident here in Bangkok. Aey was an incredibly funny guy, who was also somewhat of a celebrity.  He was a professional movie extra in Thai movies, and on our last trip, Natalie and Michael actually were able to join him as extras for a day.  As sad as it is that he is not here to greet us, I am so thankful for this congregation of God's people to loved Aey and showed him Christ.

Tomorrow, tomorrow...

...you're only a day away.

Our bags are packed, and everything that we could fit into our 2 check-in luggage items will hopefully be everything we need for the next 8 months.  It has been an adventure getting to our departure date.  Since we sold our house in Murfreesboro, TN we have traveled about 4,900 across this great country visiting family; from Missouri to Mississippi to Texas to Nebraska.  We are now back in Tennessee, ready to get on a plane.

We got to worship one last time with the great group of Christians at the LaVergne Church of Christ last night. I would like to personally thank everyone for giving Dalissa and myself so much encouragement and support.  I hope that I can pass it on to the people with whom we will be working.

I hope to have pictures from our travel very soon, and possibly even VIDEO!

Next time I write, I write from Bangkok, Thailand.