Let me tell you about Thailand. This is the land of 1000 smiles! Every one drives either a giant truck or a little motorcycle. There is no in between. The toilets are too weak to flush toilet paper so we have to through it away. The locals use a hose instead of toilet paper. It leaves you feeling “shower fresh”. The WORST thing that can happen to you here is having the bubble tea cart run out of bubbles. The English language is more of a fad here than anything else. It is common to see English words or phrases on t-shirts and signs that don’t really make much sense. No one really cares that “ 3D – Democracy Decency Drug” doesn’t mean anything. It still deserves to be a large banner at the public school, just as “Ass Monkey” is a very reasonable thing to put on a t-shirt. They are experiencing the hottest summer here in 65 years and the heat index is in the 90’s-100’s every day. I am currently living in an old post office with large metal shutters that cover the windows and doors. We have been instructed that the men across the street have impure thoughts and we should always keep out metal blast doors closed. AKA stay safe inside your human-oven house! We convinced our host to cut a few of the locks on the metal shutters and open them for us seeing as how there is no air conditioning and I have been sweating so much I haven’t really needed to pee since arriving in Thailand. We are lucky enough to be here in prime fruit season and it is wonderful. I have especially enjoyed Rombuton, a small, spiky, bright pink and green fruit with translucent jelly-like meat inside, and there is nothing quite like working to pick and open your own coconut for the fresh, sweet water held within.
Team Arboretum has been given the task of teaching English in four different public elementary schools while here, as well as visit the local juvenile delinquent center. The kids are amazing. They are full of so much life and eager to learn. One of my favorite games to play with the kids is telephone. It is entertaining to hear them turn “The green dog said hello” into “The king is small. Hello?”. The confusion on their face is priceless. Don’t worry, we are responsible teachers…. for the most part! We concentrate on correct pronunciation for a portion of each lesson and tongue twister have been my best friend. I do have to admit, though, ‘rice’ and ‘lice’ do sound the same to them. I like to ask the kids what they had for lunch… We do, of course, take these opportunities to tell the kids stories from the Bible and sing silly Sunday school songs with them when they will translate over well enough.
Every Sunday we attended New Jerusalem Church. It is a very small house church, but they have air conditioning and good sound equipment. We usually perform several songs and give a few testimonies. There is an American team of missionaries visiting the pastor here and it has been interesting to serve along side other Americans while in Thailand. They come from a deliverance ministry in Florida. Yep, you heard me right. Deliverance. Yes, that does mean casting out, cutting ties, and freeing the soul from oppressive demons. Honestly, this is a whole realm of Christianity I have had very little encounter with (mostly what I saw in Africa) and no one has every really explained it to me. I learn best through experiences so I sat in on a few deliverance sessions, asked a lot of questions, brought my findings back to my team and to scripture and also asked to have a deliverance preformed on me. I am of the mindset that it is important to experience something for yourself before speaking on it to others. That, however, is a story that could be a blog in and of itself and I will not go in to detail here, except to say that it really wasn’t that strange and I wasn’t writhing on the floor and drooling everywhere like you may have seen on TV.
Our free days here have been such a blessing! We have spent time hiking through national parks, swimming in beautiful waterfalls, boating out to top-rated Thai islands, riding inflatable banana boats pulled by jet skis, and exploring local outdoor markets where it is common to find people selling pig faces, eatable bugs, gutted frogs, fish so fresh their tails are still moving, and bags of milk tea.
Monks really are everywhere; in fact, I have had the pleasure of having a few little monks as students in English class. However, if a woman touches a monk they have to go through a cleansing process that takes about a month so the entire class had to be careful with them when we would play interactive games in class.
In short, Thailand is a vibrant, happy country with a lot of fascinating culture to share. I see why this place is pretty high on many peoples bucket list of places to travel.
