I LOVE it here! We have been in Thailand for about a week now, and I am absolutely loving it! Here are just a few of the reasons I love this country:
1) Pad Thai – absolutely love it as well as all the other interesting foods we have here. It is also VERY cheap! Usually less than $1.50 will get you a great plate of food at a restaurant!
2) Longan & Rambutan – two of my favorite fruits! I fell in love with longan when I lived in Taiwan. They are SOO good!!
3) Songkran – a holiday that is going on right now in Thailand. For approximately a week, they have a country-wide water fight. And when I say water fight, I definitely mean full out war. You can’t really leave the house without being entirely drenched from head to toe. Water guns, buckets, barrels, hoses, ice cold water, dirty moat water: you name it, they use it! I definitely had to join the fight and purchase a water gun.
Songkran in Chiang Mai with my teammates Anjali and Trena. So much fun!
4) The elephant rides – well, I haven’t actually done this yet, but it is definitely on my list!
5) The shopping – well, if you know me at all, you know that I don’t really like to shop. BUT it is true, they do have great shopping
6) Thai tea, green milk tea, and all the other drinks they have here — SO incredibly good!!
7) The people – yesterday, during the water fight, we met so many great people. We are hoping to meet up with one of the girls we met later tonight.
8) The ministry – it is incredible. Much more sobering than the rest of this blog has been so I will write more on this another time. Working in the red light district, being Jesus and befriending the prostitutes, the customers, the children in the bars, that is our main ministry. So, you can imagine the heaviness that is involved with this.
I do love it here, even as heavy as all of that is. Thank-you for helping me be involved in a ministry like this. My heart breaks for these girls, these children, these men. It is hard to process it all. Here is my request. I go out to the bars on Monday and Wednesday evenings from 8-10:30pm as well as Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 3-5:30pm for the next 2 1/2 weeks. We spend time in the bars, talking, making friends, setting up other times to hang out with these girls. Considering the time change, if you could especially pray for my team and I during those hours, it would be greatly appreciated!
Thank-you and much love to you!
