Post-graduation update (and photos) - PART 1

The school year is finished—here at the Sunshine Orchard campus. February 21 was graduation day, and what a day that was! And even for all the challenges and hurts and character-building trials, I can’t wait for the next school year registration to start in May! In the meantime, there’s plenty to keep me busy with language studies and medical stuff and working with other campus projects and such, even if the schedule is a bit more relaxed at times.
I wish I could have gotten around to posting more frequently since my last update in November. But for this update I will just try to give some highlights along with as many photos as I can. I have ~1,400 photos since November, although most of those were taken by students who borrowed my camera. You may notice that I rarely have any photos of my primary line of work/goals (nursing), and that is because I am often involved in other areas and often only get last-minute calls for medical help, which I usually am not able (or forget) to photograph.


The above photo is inside the entry area of the Tha Song Yang hospital, where we often bring some of the more critical patients.  I’ve been too shy to photograph the inside of the hospital wards, which have no privacy and are usually crammed with patients and family members who sleep with them.


In December I also started bringing four students at a time to the dental clinic in TSY (above), since we had dozens of students that needed urgent dental work. (I would like to learn how to pull teeth and do basic dental work for when I go to the remote mountain villages, but I haven’t had a way to experience that yet…and I’m not going to experiment on the students when we have access to a fairly inexpensive clinic nearby!)


During the prime hiking season during the winter holidays, I was able to hike and climb the cliffs behind the school and explore some caves out in the jungle with some of the adventurous boys.


Saw Dih Yin up on the rocks.


Some of the caves were really nice inside. The boys were scared when they saw signs of snakes though.


After a long hike, cooking and eating sticky rice in bamboo at the creek was a great way to restore some energy.


Jungle vines are always fun.


Bi Li, inside one of the caves we explored. (There must be 50+ caves on the mountain/cliffs behind the school—some of them are quite large and extensive although many routes are collapsed.)


It's rare to see elephants around here, so this was a happy chance sighting while working near the river.


Construction work on the new boy’s dorms in December. After many complications, the girl’s dorms are underway as of February, so we hope they will all be ready before the new school year starts in May/June!


We did a lot of excavation by hand, before finally being able to hire a tractor. (We could not get a backhoe, but we have many backs-hoeing.)


On Christmas eve there were games for the kids who were still at the school. (I'm not sure what they all were since I was gone to the hospital then.)


Trying to climb a slippery oily pole was a fun hit with the boys.


Our Christmas program in the chapel. Many villagers came to this event, and we also shared warm blankets with them. Many people do not have adequate blankets for the foggy frigid temperatures in the 40s-50s that our houses are in the winter.


Then on Christmas day, we had a campout on the mountain with our Grade 9-10 students!


We all slept in the open air on mats like these, except our cook who borrowed a tent from someone who had one!


Thankfully it wasn't as cold as the foggy 48 degree mornings earlier that week!


Cooking sticky rice in bamboo over the fire.


Group photo with part of the grade 9-10 class at our Christmas campout.


Saw Ghay Wah (this student has severe deformity from polio) with Naw Da Blet.


This was at a New Years picnic at the river. Here are some students playing "Red Light, Green Light" on the ground with Saw Ghay Wah (since he can only crawl with his hands).


Many KNU and BGF soldiers met peacefully at the Karen New Years celebration.  (One of our students went to Burma for this gathering--photo by SDY)


I finally got to the point where I could make it to the top of the coconut trees here. But the hardest part isn’t climbing—It’s harder to try to maneuver in the cramped branches to be able to reach the coconuts, without breaking the branches, etc.


One of the first big coconuts that I harvested (on my 2nd successful tree climb). It was worth the effort, and I made part of it into coconut sticky rice.


One week, I had some free time and decided to head north to visit some friends and help with their work projects for starting a new jungle school. This is the nice part of the highway going north.


It’s not uncommon for this highway to go back and forth between nice pavement and rutted dirt/gravel road!  They've been slowly working on this highway for years.... but washouts like these sometimes do not get repaired before the next rainy season. Or else they just get washed out again and again.


Here, they are doing major work on the highway. But it seems there's no real road construction signs or flagman delays or pilot cars on these highways. You just drive through the dirt and dodge the equipment when it's around.


Once I reached the town of Mae Ngao, I used the Sharon family's inflatable kayak to paddle down the river for two hours, to find their new place in the jungle.


Their house and new school is being built in a peaceful spot down the river where there is lots of natural clean water (springs) and other resources.


I had fun playing and working with their adopted kids. Well, at least one person is working! (At the moment anyway!)


Here’s their small river boat--we were heading back up to town to do some shopping (Jason is taking us up the river to where the motorbike and trailer stays).


Destiny, the youngest in the adopted family. Jason caught this big tire floating down the river in the jungle, and made good use of it!


On Sabbath we hiked to a waterfall in the jungle not far from their home.


Here we were collecting sand/gravel from the river, to carry up the hill to use for cement for the new school's toilets. Then on Monday I ended my fun “vacation” and headed back down to Sunshine Orchard.

Please see PART 2 for the best part of this update…(our baptism and graduation, and another story...)!