This photo was from one of our first days in Thailand and on the Race as I went out exploring the streets and what Chiang Mai would have to offer.
One of the main things I knew I wanted to do when going to Thailand, was to go to an elephant sanctuary. I highly recommend this to anyone because it was one of the coolest experiences I’ve ever had. We got to feed and bathe the elephants as well as just get to love on these gentle giants. Just make sure you use an ethical source if you ever go. If they offer elephant rides or tricks, don’t support it as the elephants are typically mistreated there.
At our first ever ministry on the Race we worked at an orphanage. We had the privilege to meet a group of Australians that came to work there as well. One day they even took us to go swim and hang out.
This is a photo of me trying to keep cool as I got my first tattoo. Little did I know that I would later add on to it twice. Now I have full piece that says “Called To Create” with mountains, trees, and a lake that God inspired me to create.
While in Thailand we heard rumors of this real peculiar cafe that allows you to play with pet hedgehogs and we just had to go see these adorable little guys for ourselves.
At our first debrief we went to the city of Lampang and found this really cool temple in the clouds.
Then my team and I went to go stay at a children’s home in a village in Chiang Dao for two weeks. This was our amazing family while we were there. We had a very strict schedule. We ate breakfast and did devotions early in the morning and then spent most of the day helping work on some extra land the family had. We were helping them clear out bamboo in order to make a fenced perimeter around the land for a house. We ate with the family, played, watched movies, did chores, and worshiped together (even with a language barrier). This was one of my favorite times of my entire Race.
While working in the village, my team convinced me to climb some bamboo trees. As I jumped out of the tree I slightly twisted my ankle. This is me trying to convince our base leader from Chiang Mai that I was fine. The look on my face tells you that I regretted doing climbing.
While in the village we saw some really random things. One of those moments was when we were walking down the road at night and saw these cows chilling by a fire. They were completely left unattended with no owner in sight. I found this to be so funny because the cows were perfectly content and just hanging out by the fire. This was an almost every night thing.
Another funny thing we would see while walking down the same road was this dog that would poke his head through his owner’s fence as we walked by. The dog never barked at us, but would just watch. The first time I saw this I though his head was stuck and I was trying to figure out how to help. Eventually I found out that the dog was just weird and liked to hang his head out the fence.
On one of our adventure days, the team and I got to explore this really cool cave. At some points it got really small and you had to squeeze through. It was really funny to see Ben and Justin struggling to squeeze because they are so big.
One of the weirder things that my team did while in the village was getting notches in our eyebrows. We all did it except Tikki because well….. it’s Tikki.
These were some of my favorite photos from Thailand and al the great memories that they carry with them. I hope you enjoyed getting a little glimpse of what life was like for me in Thailand and the Race. Thank you and God bless!
