Hellooo from Thailand!! Three weeks ago was the last day of ministry in Guatemala and I didn’t realize how hard it would be. I cried and cried when I had to say goodbye to everyone that I had met there. After the last day of ministry, we had a time of debriefing for three days in Antigua, Guatemala. Then we travelled from Guatemala City to Mexico City to Los Angeles to Taipei, Taiwan to Chiang Mai, Thailand, which took 5 days. Now I am excited to be in Thailand for three weeks. Pad Thai 24/7!! We found out a few weeks ago that we are not staying at the hostel in Chiang Mai with some other teams on my squad, but my team of seven will be alone in a small town hours away called Mae Ai. At first, I wasn’t too thrilled to go to the countryside and live in a ghost town, but I LOVE Mae Ai and the school we teach at. Even though all the street vendors don’t speak English and there isn’t much to do here, we still are thriving.
We live in a house that has no furniture right across the street from the school. There is a small kitchen with a refrigerator, microwave, and hot plate. We have three bedrooms where we blew up our sleeping pads. And we have a bathroom with a shower head and squatty potty. It is such a simple, cute little house. Every day we wake up around 7:00 am, eat breakfast, greet the kids at the front gate before school, then teach. Hannah and I teach the cute four year olds all morning, which involves teaching the alphabet, numbers, days of the week, months, colors, animals, and greetings. The kids are really smart and somehow can remember English and Thai at four years old. After we teach them in the morning we eat lunch, have a break, and then I get to help Lucy and Maggie teach the middle schoolers English grammar. Honestly I don’t even remember some of the grammar rules so it can be a little challenging at times. After teaching for the day some of us workout and then have Pad Thai for dinner that we buy from a local vendor for only 30 baht, which is less than a U.S. dollar. For the last week I’ve had Pad Thai every night and I haven’t gotten tired of it yet. It might even beat quesadillas as my favorite food now, lol.
So far our team has grown closer because we are together all day every day. Guatemala was great, but I didn’t have to step out of my comfort zone that much. Here I am immersed more in the Thai culture, our living conditions are more difficult, and conversations take more effort since Thai is a lot harder than Spanish. I am so excited to see what God has in store for the next 2 weeks and the relationships that we will form with the kids. Just a few days ago Lucy and I got to share our testimonies with some kids after school. Since this school is Buddhist, Christianity isn’t taught in the classes, but we had the opportunity to share about God! He can work in so many ways!
I wish I was in the States for Christmas with my family so give extra hugs to your family and be thankful you get to celebrate with them!
Merry Christmas!!
Peace and blessings,
Nicole
