One Day at a Time...

Some village homes near my current housing
in Tambon Sop Poeng 

As I sit down to write this during the afternoon of what would be Thanksgiving Day in America, I think back a bit and thank God for His many blessings and marvel at the fact that I’ve been here in Chiang Mai province for three weeks already, and it has all been sort of a blur! I wish I could really write down my thoughts and a better update of things, but there is so much to sort through in my mind and I’ll just try to hit some highlights the best I can.

 

What has it been like for this missionary in his first overseas cross-cultural experience? It’s hard for me to think of a way to describe my experience, but as far as the culture I really like it here and can’t complain at all! It was great to start out staying with the Rawlings family who helped with my initial needs and with great food! Any difficulties are minor so far—I was blessed to never have any jet-lag or significant health issues to speak of up to this point. Other than the occasional small inconvenience such as insects in my bed, an embedded leech on my foot, and blisters from walking in new types of flip-flops, etc, life here has been rather too easy! (Compared to what I’ll likely get used to when I start to live out in the jungle!) Sure, the weather might get a bit hot/muggy with no A/C, and sometimes cold at night while trying to take baths with cold water, and it’s a new experience to eat rice three times a day and practice “surviving” without toilet paper or a refrigerator, and ride motorbikes barefoot in busy traffic! But all that hasn’t really been an adjustment at all—I don’t mind adapting to new ways of doing things! Instead, the most challenging part of missionary life for me at this juncture has been simply the relative lack of ability to communicate with the local people (in addition to my usual challenges in this area)—since I don’t know nearly enough Thai language.

Motorbikes are the core of transportation in country and city alike

The first week I was here, I unexpectedly got called to the home of a poor Buddhist family in the village, to assess their bed-bound 82-year-old grandmother. She was apparently getting weaker ever since she came back home from the hospital. I felt totally overwhelmed suddenly stepping into the home and into a culture and situation I had no experience with, and not knowing any of the Thai language that was relevant to the situation (although another American was there during my assessment who was able to translate some things in a limited fashion). I wasn’t able to get a complete history due to the language barrier, and as much as I could decipher they felt that the hospital had not been able to help her, so I wondered if the hospital had sent her home to die. It seemed the family wanted to keep her at home and do the best they could, so I tried to communicate some advice on things they could do to help her. She had a slight fever and slightly increased pulse and respirations, but they said she had been eating well and outputting normally. I didn’t see any mottling or other signs of immediate death. But later I found out that she died the next day. I was a bit mortified, and it’s hard to avoid thinking of all the “what ifs” and “if onlys”, but I was at least glad that I had a chance to pray with the family that evening, even though they didn’t understand a word of English.

Chiang Mai city from an overlook

Meanwhile a lot of other things were going on in my introduction to Thailand. I was able to take a road trip to Chiang Khong (on the Laos border) with Steve Rawlings (www.leadingtothelight.org) and some friends, where we had meetings with some of the few Adventists in that area and acquired a building rental for starting health ministry and other projects in that area. (The new bridge to Laos in that town is opening shortly, which will bring a huge influx of people very quickly!) After returning from that trip, John (an SM who I am housing with in the village at the moment) and I rented cheap motorbikes in Chiang Mai for a day so that we could learn a bit about getting around in the city on our own and also do some basic shopping. We very quickly learned about one of the few traffic rules which are actually enforced in the city—when you accidentally park in the poorly-marked “no parking” areas, the police will chain up your motorbike until you go pay at the police station! We also found that town trips to Chiang Mai can take a long day to just get one or two things accomplished—due partly to the crazy traffic, our unfamiliarity to the city, and the difficulty of finding the right stores and items when everything is printed in Thai instead of English! But the next day I was happy to meet with my Thai great-aunt who happened to be visiting her family in Chiang Mai (she lives mostly in the U.S.), and she fed me and helped me find a few needed items in the city also! It was great to get acquainted with her a little bit and meet her family also.

I’m thankful for God’s leading during the following week, in which I was able to find an inexpensive Honda Wave 125cc motorbike for sale (from someone who knows English) and get it registered in my name, along with getting the necessary paperwork for getting my Thai driver’s licenses. This will be an invaluable tool for my transportation (amazing gas mileage and nice to navigate the city traffic), especially once I get it modified for working in the mountains where the roads can be very muddy and rough. The Honda is in good shape, but had a few problems such as a bad clutch…thankfully repairs are quite cheap here, even from Honda dealers. It’s just hard to know when cheap is more cheap than you want, because it seems that a lot of things in Thailand are of cheap quality and not made to last!

Overlooking the mountains from Doi Pui near the city

Lately, as I mentioned earlier about my chief concern being the language barrier with the Thai people, I’ve started working on learning the Thai alphabet, sounds and tonal rules, so I can begin to read the language and develop my speaking ability better in the future. Previously I was listening to audio courses and just learning a few words and phrases, but I’d like to develop that more with a knowledge of the characters—there are 44 consonants and 32 vowels, along with complicated tonal rules for the 5 tones used with the characters. It’s a slow process but I’m happy for the progress so far…it’s just hard to know how much time to spend on this when I need to start learning the Karen language also, since I plan to work with the Karen people in the jungle once I move to the next parts of my journey. Due to some changes in the situation with Gayle’s jungle work and her interpreter, it looks like I will be going (later) to stay and help temporarily at Sunshine Orchard (www.karenoutreach.org), where there is a great work to be done with the Karen children and youth, many of whom are in training to go back to work with their home villages in Burma, where many of them are refugees from. This is a change from what I was expecting, but I know it will be a good experience with much to learn as I learn the new culture with the Karen people and begin my work out there. Please keep my language(s) acquisition in prayer as well as prayers for these important projects and the people who I will be working with in the future!