Thailand Fun Facts:
- Bangkok is the World’s Most Visited City (ahead of London).
- Buddhism is the country’s main religion- 95% participation.
- It is against the law to criticize the monarchy.
- Thailand has won just 7 gold medals in the Olympic Games. (I will be rooting for Thailand in all upcoming Olympics!)
Ministry:
This month my team is doing an Unsung Hero month.
Unsung Hero: Men and women who are dedicated to serving some of the most impoverished populations in the world, yet rarely receive recognition for their dedication and service. These givers may also live with meager conditions but give consistently from an abundance of God’s love. Their names may not be in the history books, their acts unknown to the rest of the world, while unrecognized, they shake a generation and move a culture and ultimately build the kingdom.
Our ministry this month is to look for current ministries and organizations that would like or could use volunteers. We research on-line, make new friends through daily activities, and try to network with our friends and churches back home to find these ministries. I love networking! Thank you to all who have given me names and leads; I am truly hoping I can meet all of your people. My cousin, Hattie, is currently a missionary with YWAM in Chiang Mai, which is pretty cool to at least be in the same country as Hattie. Hopefully it will work out for us to meet up at some point. Once we meet with our new contacts we decide if they would be a good fit to partner with the World Race. Regardless if they are a good fit for the World Race or not, it gives us a chance to encourage fellow believers and meet new people.
Our past week looked a little like this:
Arrived to hostel at 5am on Friday morning the 2nd of January.
Saturday- Unsung Hero training and Internet research
Sunday- Church- thanks to Alicia’s connection (Alicia’s friend from home is in Thailand for a 2week mission trip, so she invited us to come to the church she would be at. Once we arrived at the church, we realized that the pastor is one of Chrisyln’s contacts. Such a small world! From this contact we were invited to their campus ministry and English classes.)
Monday-Tuesday- Finish Unsung Hero training, research, outings to figure out public transportation, and Team leader training with Bella.
Wednesday- Morning walk with Susan and Chrislyn where we saw a Christian church and decided to go in and see what we could see. We ended up meeting two of the pastors and hearing about their church and school. Their school is a trilingual school. They invited us to come to one of the English classes. We are waiting to hear back from them. They also gave us calendars. I love meeting new people! Then in the afternoon we decided to go to the red light district to pray and see if there was anything we could do. We came across a lot of homeless people along the way. We went to a grocery store and bought granola bars and apples, (I bought chocolate candies to add to this too- thank you St. Malachy!), to give to the street people as we walked. A blog will be coming about this experience. Then last night we went to a Bible study we found through Facebook. It was wonderful! There were 32 of us there, mainly American missionary women from the ages 22-35, and we studied Hebrews. From this opportunity we all walked away with new contacts to look into today.
That my friends is a little of what an Unsung Hero month looks like! I self-appointed myself to Adventure Leader for the month. Each week I am going to plan an adventure for the team because you never know who you will meet on an adventure. Maybe the next contact for World Race! Maybe a famous Olympian! Maybe the next Mother Theresa! For example, tomorrow we are going to a diary farm north of Bangkok. I am so excited! Thank you Justin Chesnut for making this happen! (Shout out to my semester of being an Agriculture Education major!)
Living:
This month I am with the women of Team Deep and the married women. Team name this month is Team Deeper or Reel Deeper. The married women are with us for the first 10 days while their husbands are with the man team: Manistry Month. Manistry Month gives are wonderful 8 men a chance to be around dudes all day every day. They have put up with 35 women for 6 months, so time for a little man time. After 10 days the women will join up with the men and join a married couple Unsung Hero team. When they leave it will leave: Bella (our team leader), Danielle, Alicia, Courtney T., and I.
We live in hostels and currently are in a really nice one. We walk everywhere we need to go or take the subway. We eat out for all of our meals, but street food is so cheep. You can get a good meal for $1.50-$3.00. My new favorite meal is Pad Thai. I’m loving our Thailand experiences. God is good in Thailand!
Lots of love in this new year! Happy 2015 from Thailand!
(Pictures: dinner on the street and Tuk-Tuks!)
