Engineering Soccer

So it's been 2 months since I last really tried to put words down on this (web)page. And to be fair, I did make a very photogenic newsletter to make up for it last month (next one coming out STAT) - but even so, I can't help but feel a bit behind the times with the blogging community for those of you who get info about me from here rather than my newsletter. (If that's YOU, feel free to send me your email address and I'll get you on there.)

For everyone's sake I'll start with the month of June, because again, I don't really wanna repeat all the stuff I put in my newsletter for May.

Ok, enough housekeeping.

After that whole light-speed baking ordeal, big transitions have happened. I'm now working extensively with a ministry called The Centre, which is basically a youth center geared towards the university students of Chiang Mai and Ratchamangala Techno Universities - allowing for VERY inexpensive English tutoring but with the intent of so much more.

God has blessed me with 21+ students that I see on a daily basis working with their English skills, homework, etc, but really allowing me a role in their lives that would've otherwise been difficult to attain.
In Thailand, a Khruu (teacher) is a highly respected position and therefore comes with a lot of professional distance. However, when I as a "teacher" engage with the students on a more personal level and seek to build relationships with my students outside of class, a very different type of situation becomes available.

I can see God's clear opportunity in one such class especially:
After starting teaching a class of all Electrical Engineers, we started asking about each other and once they realized I was seriously interested in getting to know all of them more, I was quickly invited to go get "tanked at a bar" with them. I declined the specific offer, but have since been playing soccer with them and 15+ other friends of theirs from their Uni on a weekly basis, grabbing dinner afterwards and meeting up for different events throughout the week. In all my time here, I have never been allowed into such a tight-knit group of unbelievers so quickly!

Please join me in praying for all my students, but these guys especially. Looking for opportunities to go deeper into what really matters in this life. With SUCH a lack of real male role models, I'm praying that I may be a witness of a man that isn't only concerned with drinking, chasing women, and the next soccer match and introduce them to other Thai believers that can have an even more profound influence on their lives than I ever could.

Still go out to BHJ every once in awhile, just saw them this past weekend and was glad to see all of my little sisters and family doing well!
Thank you for the continued support through prayer, finances and verbal encouragements. Continuing to pray for all back in the States as well.

Light-Speed Baking

BREATHE.

So things have finally stopped spinning from the past 6 weeks! It was a crazy, fast-paced month and a half! Since the girls took a break from school at the end of March it seemed like time had turned into a frantic scramble to insert the quarter into the retro Galaga (or insert favorite reminiscent 80's/90's video game here) console as the deep computer voice counted down 

"Continue? 10...9...8...7...6...."

Enough to get your blood pumping even as you read this, right?

Hot season seemed to have an intensifying effect on how things ballooned as well; with temperatures reaching 103° F ('F' obviously standing for 'FREAKISHLY OVERWHELMINGLY HOT')! 

So even though things have stopped ticking and the oven has begun to cool off, this is a quick update of what baking at light-speed feels like:

The girls aged 16 and older went to a discipleship school at our church in Chiang Mai every weekday, learning much and applying even more! At the end of it all 14 of them were baptized and recommitted their lives to God's calling and leading of their lives! Those younger and I had a blast with English and games, arts and crafts, Bible stories and even a few cooking classes thrown in there by our cook, Leah.

Compassion asked me to be more closely involved with some of their work and had me helping translate letters, cards, emails and a few documents for future meetings with international offices. The students I've been teaching have become good friends, and I'm looking forward to seeing where God directs their lives and how ours will intersect in the future.

TheLight saw a major makeover as we moved to a permanent location rather than bumming space off the nearby cafe. We moved things over to what is now known as บ้านtheLight (theLight House). Many hours were spent getting things ready by purging the spider-infested corners, and cleaning up the grounds. It now houses the pastor and his wife, P' Sinn and Ann, as well as a few volunteers working with them.

Songkran came with a tidal wave of activity, causing many to shut their doors, strap on water guns and hit the moat. Technically it was only during Friday/Saturday/Sunday, but I started getting hit by ice-cold, putrid moat water on Monday. Thankfully, God kept my health intact and protected me from any motorcycle accidents during the water and alcohol-drenched holiday. One report I saw after the week of water-throwing said that vehicle accidents elevated 800% during the long weekend!

Lastly, I was BLESSED beyond measure with the last-minute visit from my girlfriend, Casey. She was able to come out for 13 days, spend time with the girls at BHJ, visit with her old friends and co-workers while I was still busy with teaching at the orphanage and Compassion. And on in-between days we explored waterfalls, made a day-trip to Chiang Rai, had evening dates and then took an over-night train to Bangkok where we had a final day together before she boarded her plane early the next morning.

Thank you all SO much for the continued encouragement through prayer, finances and the occasional funny YouTube video!

Surprises and Songkran!

April has arrived!

Which basically means that hot season is in full effect = smoke and pollution killing your lungs while the heat sucks every ounce of fluid from your pores. The last several weeks have been spent with itchy eyes and several daily wardrobe changes, but finally have had some days of rain to clear the skies! 

Life here has gotten busier since the beginning of March with work at the orphanage ramping up in hours spent and projects to do since the girls are on their school break. Those over 16 have been going to a discipleship school at a church in Chiang Mai and seeing very good results midway though the 6 weeks! Many of them have become disillusioned with friends, boys, money, etc. and are now coming back from their days at the church visibly taking ownership of their faith. The ones under 16 are here daily with the staff and I where we've been putting together different classes and games and things for them to do. It's been a lot of fun being able to spend full days with them and teaching English, playing games, and being an "older brother" again with such ample time. Whereas before, during school, there was barely time enough to help 3 different girls with homework between the time they got home, showered, had dinner and the sky turned dark and I returned home.

Teaching and helping at Compassion has been going well! Its been exciting to be involved with such a large foundation and opening doors to further opportunities than the simple "help improve English grammar" that God got my attention with back in January.

Starting this week is the annual water fight that turns all of Chiang Mai into a splash zone for the all-out water warfare festival known as Songkran! Nothing says "Happy Traditional Thai New Year" like a bucket of cold putrid water thrown with force at you while driving down the highway. This time of year the board shorts and dry-bags come out in full force while packs of roaming children and adults alike seek and destroy anyone not already soaked...and even those who are for good measure.

Praises!

God blessed me with several over-the-top gifts earlier; first of which being the unforeseen visit of a friend from Colorado, Laken Chapman, who is living and working with YWAM in Norway. For the entire two days we were able to spend we couldn't shake the smiles and surreal feelings of how in the world God could have placed us here for this time. (Still smiling at the AWESOMENESS of God)

Second, although not as welcome as a surprise visit from a friend; a trip to the hospital on Saturday due to a shoulder injury playing ultimate frisbee proved no broken bones but severely strained muscles. I'm extremely grateful for the speedy aid of friends and the quick/cheap diagnosis of what we had feared to be a long drawn-out recovery and inability to drive. I'm still feeling the effects of it but have been massaging the muscles and taking relaxants and anti-inflammatories to allow for faster results and ability to get back to driving myself around.

Lastly - God has blessed me EVEN MORE with the surprise return of my girlfriend, Casey to Chiang Mai for 2 weeks, arriving the last week of April!! Since last saying goodbye in mid December we weren't sure of the next time we'd be together. But with jobs and timing and affordable plane tickets we'll get to spend the better part of her time here exploring more of Chiang Mai and Bangkok, allowing her to visit with old friends and more time with the girls at BHJ whom she's already acquainted with.

Prayer

Please pray for the following things:

• A quick recovery for my shoulder and continued health and safety (especially during the "Dangerous Driving days of Songkran" (April 9 - 16)
• Time spent with the girls at BHJ to be well-used and encouragement of their faith before going back into the routines of school.
• Continued intimacy with our Father and protection from the Enemy.
• A blessed time with Casey as neither of us know the exact time we'll get to see each other again after her departure early May.

Thank you all for the many many blessings and constant prayer that keeps me doing the things God has set before me!

Two for One

Considering that these last two months have nearly passed by without much communication on this blog I'm offering a special: two for one blog posts! I know, I thought it was brilliant, too! If only all things belated in life came with double portions; 

vacations... 

birthday presents... 

desserts....

We'll leave overdue bills and taxes out of this analogy, but I digress....

January
After a few days of readjustment to the slower-yet-somehow-busier way of life here, I settled back into working at BHJ, teaching the staff and girls during the week. And after praying about an opportunity yet unseen took a part-time position teaching English at Compassion International in Chiang Mai, while still giving me time to work with Matt Parker in coordinating things for summer teams with Destined Traveler (destinedtraveler.com).

It was good to be back in the swing of things with the different facets of ministry God has allotted me, and was very refreshing to get back into the community with theLight and all the people I had missed and was looking forward to getting back to. 

The girls at BHJ had a million questions about the previous month in America, asking about family, food, snow and of course of the previously kept secret about my girlfriend, whom they had met without prior knowledge of relationship status (on purpose to hinder such cooing and clucking at the time, now received in full force).

February
Being the shortest month seemed to make it go by even faster than necessary, add in several trips to the villages and a team from America and it made for speedy several weeks hardly worthy being called a 'month.'

Thanks to God I was able to get all the paperwork together to get the stamp on my passport allowing me another month while they process the additional 11 they're allegedly going to grant me in March. I'm unworried, but when dealing with red tape, any victory is a great one and hiccups tend to be monumental.

I took a little time away from Compassion to go with the team to the villages around Chiang Dao to help facilitate, translate and be with those in the villages I've already been in contact with. Although this trip was more construction based than previous trips, I was still able to spend time with some of the people, especially the many kids in one village who Kamsen and I had spent a good deal of time with several months earlier. Aside from erecting swing sets to be used near the church and a school, we spent a lot of time in prayer over the villages and the surrounding area, asking for God's cultivation of the hearts of those nearby to His word. 
In one village especially, there has been much evidence of Spiritual warfare occurring to those in Christ and seeking to further the Gospel. It strengthened my heart to hear some of the kids that Kamsen and I had earlier helped learn to pray, asking for courage and protection against the things in their village that until recently had been causes of great fear.

Wrapping up this month I'll be going up to another region of the mountains with Matt and another missionary, Lord willing,  to set up some areas of contact for us to go into later with some anti-trafficking and AIDS education, of which they've been asking for.

As always,I am EXTREMELY grateful for those praying and supporting the things God has allowed me to be a part of. Please be praying for God's word to be spread throughout, and for the enemy's hold to be destroyed.
As well, please pray for health as I've been sick several times this month, from the common cold to food poisoning.

Culture Shock and the Reverse

 Culture shock is a big part of anybody's life who's ever been abroad and back.

One of the weirdest parts of it all is the REVERSE side of culture shock, when you come back to what is in fact your home country, culture and former reality. Obviously the depths of how it is felt depends on the length of time spent outside of it, and I can't really imagine what it would be like returning several years after being away; but I can tell you about what it was like after being gone for 15 months.

-I used to pride myself on my "thick skinned" abilities to stay warm in the midst of a cold Colorado winter, but 60 seconds into standing outside in Los Angeles, California, and I was ready for some tropical weather again. (And not to sound like a whiner, but I really don't enjoy the heat over here most days!)

-What happened to cash? I'm not really condemning credit and debit cards, but after living in an all-cash economy, and then trying to buy normal things with greenbacks only to have the cashier stare at me like I was from the dark ages wasn't really something I expected. Seriously, one clerk seemed to expect to encounter spiders when they opened the register till!

-Everything is so CLEAN! It didn't take my mom 30 seconds walking down the "sidewalks" of Thailand to realize she was going to need to be concious of her foot placement. But the States actually take care that there aren't dead/sick/lazy dogs laying across the concrete, and seemed to have realized that spools of wires hanging down from streetlights and power cables might not be such a great thing to put in a pedestrian's way.

-There's space to breath. Walking around everywhere you'd either have to be drunk or just horrible at walking to actually bump into sombody with all the space and lack of people in your immediate proximity. Coming from living in a city that has 1,000 people/square mile can feel a little tight, especially when they're all trying to avoid said dogs and power lines on a 3 foot wide walkway.


-And the biggest shock of all was the EASE of talking with ANYBODY. There was no need to look up specific words in advance or awkward mumbling searching for the right tone just so you could get a table by the window. It took living with basic conversation skills to truly appreciate the awesome capability to just chat with the barista, or stranger in line.



Now after being in the US for 6 weeks, its good and bad to be back in the hot, sticky, cash-wielding, Thai-speaking crowds of SE Asia. But oddly enough there were no shocks to come back to; it was all the same as I had left it, and I took that to mean that I must be home.