Remember this post about gambling, arrests, and loaning money? It was probably one of the more complicated periods of time in our neighborhood, and it hasn’t really ended in some ways. Since loaning Mong Ey the money to avoid being jailed, we came home in the middle of the day to find her and a few friends gambling in our yard, where they felt they couldn’t be arrested behind our gate. We had to be quite forceful to say we don’t agree with her gambling illegally, and the key for our gate that we gave her for the garden & safety was not be used for gambling. If we found her gambling again, we would take away the key, and they wouldn’t be able to use the garden while we weren’t there or store their bicycles in their for safety.

It is really difficult to extend grace; it is really difficult to know how to be loving and how to not be walked on. It is really difficult to know what to do in controversial, cross-culture situations, and it’s even more difficult in a language you are learning. Every sentence becomes such a carefully and limitedly worded effort!

I have wondered if we did the right thing to give her the money, to be direct about the gambling, to be so forceful with the language I barely know. Would we still be friends? Has the relationship changed completely?

I still don’t know the answers to most of these questions or any of the other million questions I ask. But when we got back from our trip, we did receive payment back of the 1,000 baht (about $30) we loaned! It came in this little pink envelope.

It might not mean much to you, and maybe it shouldn’t mean that much to me, but I felt so thankful. It was like a symbol of friendship, of mutual respect. In some ways it has showed us that all the really difficult conversations have made the friendship deeper.

So we’re thankful!

This neighborhood gives some of the best welcomes I can fathom.

There is something really lovely about returning from a trip and struggling to get up to your front door amidst a crowd of people shouting your name, taking your bags, and helping you unlock your door.  There are the comments on haircuts and who has been sick.

And then we just settle in to all the familiar smells and sounds and faces, which we love.

It is just good to be here, in a home that God has really given us a grateful heart for.

We are still in the middle of many difficult decisions and choices, all of which we are praying through and attempting to share as we can. On this particular evening, I had been in tears praying through some things we just don’t know the answers to, and Stephen pulled out his guitar to sing some worship songs together. He played, we sang, and this little sweetheart came to the door to listen. We invited her in and she crawled on my lap to listen as we sang and sang and sang. I have never met an eight-year-old that wanted to be held and cuddled as much as this one.

We then played a few games of Memory, and she womped us every time because she has the bends and tears on the cards memorized. And then a few more joined, and we all headed to the kitchen.  Stephen worked on a couple household projects while four little girls sat and ate yogurt, playing Angry Birds, taking turns using the bathroom, and laughing their little hearts out.

And this, among many other little moments right outside our door, make this home so good to be welcomed back to.

The students in my last class spent a lot of their free time weaving, making traditional Karen shirts and bags. While we were there, they were so sweet to let us watch and observe, and even teach! It was a really great opportunity to spend time with the students outside of class, practice Karen, and learn a new skill.

Not surprisingly, it’s a time consuming process. They begin with huge bundles of string about the size of a football. They stretch it out onto a bamboo contraption that spins, and you wind it into a ball of string like the ones above. I probably should have taken a photo of bamboo contraption, since that is likely difficult to picture. But in essence, just know that its pretty incredible that the entire process uses string, bamboo in all different shapes and sizes and forms, and one rice bag that stretches around your back. That’s pretty much it.

They then layout the string in the design they want as they set up the loom. Stephen and I each designed a bag by choosing our colors and patterns, and then they showed us how to create it step by step. This is the beginnings of my bag, which was more colorful in real life than I initially expected in my design. Let’s just say that the entire process of making my bag received comments of, “Wow, so bright!” and “So many colors!” and “There is only one bag that like that in the world. Only one.”  And then more wows.

And then it went to the loom. I’m not even sure how to describe it. It’s just complicated and incredible. I spent a few hours weaving while we were there, and it was probably the coolest skill I have ever learned: how to weave traditional fabric in the middle of the jungle?!  It was just incredible to have this contraption wrapped around your waist, hundred and hundreds of strings in front of you, and when you get it just right, you create material, exactly in the pattern you had chosen.  Pretty incredible. It’s also quite exhausting: the band rests around your lower back, so you hold the fabric taut the entire time with the pressure on your back. You are also using your arms the entire time, so what looks like a sitting, restful activity can make you very, very sore in following days.

The students were so patient, because I pretty much needed a friend to sit by me while I weaved, helping me to sort out any problems that arose. I would do fine for five or ten minutes, and then a string would get tripped up.

After it is finished on the loom, it is just a long strip of fabric. It is then sewn together to make a bag or shirt, and some extra embroidery is usually added. The girls will all sit together in the covered area, some setting up new looms, some winding string, some weaving, and others sewing or adding embroidery. It’s all very time consuming, but they’ll sit and talk or listen to music and BBC while they work.

Once you are as skilled as they are, a bag takes just a day or two and a shirt takes three to four days. At the beginning of the year they made matching uniforms for all the students and school committee–a total of fifty shirts all alike and very detailed!

I was so thankful they took the time to teach!

…And then we went on a trip without internet and didn’t blog for a few weeks!

It’s like the weirdest work-cation ever.

Yim went ahead of us for this trip and taught for a week on economics and the basics of government.  We were scheduled to meet her at the restaurant to have lunch together and then travel further to the school we were staying ats.

She arrived, said she was starving, and ordered rice with a variety of proteins: meat, fat, bones, and eggs.

At this point, we knew we were in for an adventure, and that we might be hungry along the way.

We were hungry for a lot of it. Rice, noodles, and green beans were our staples. We had a few potato and pumpkin surprises; there were pork and fish served, but not in a way that we chose to eat them. Let’s just say one of the pork dishes Stephen had to ask if it was floating in spices or blood; and when he learned it was very red spices, he was able to find two pieces of meat–not fat or intestines or unidentifiables.

The teaching didn’t go quite as we expected, but I’m sure I say that every time. There are always surprises. Even so, we taught. Hopefully they learned! We did manage to have some lively discussions.

This was our classroom at the beginning.

This was our classroom after a day or two, attempting to make us all equal and closer for discussion.

When we discussed the importance of free media in democracy & development, I started by asking the students about New York City. What is it like? Can you draw a picture of it? They drew the Statue of Liberty first. I asked if the people lived in the Statue of Liberty? Is that all that is in the whole city? In the end, they drew this and told me about the people renting rooms out of these tall buildings. I then ask them if they have been to New York City–to which I get a resounding “NO!” and much laughter–and use it as an example of how media tells us about places we haven’t been or experienced; it shows us what life is like in different places and how it might be different that our experience. We can use that knowledge to vote and participate in government, hope for different things, etc. I thought their drawing turned out pretty great!

My favorite of Yim’s commentary on one particular student, just as we were arriving and he passed by us: “I think he has a psychology problem. He thinks he is always right.”

“A psychology problem? Arrogance?”

We argued about that one for a little while.

The creatures were abundant. We were warned about the red ants that make your hands swell. Our room was corrupted with snails and ants and spiders.

After overhearing the girls’ have a conversation about a snail that bit one of the girls, I asked and was told that the snails suck blood, similar to leeches. I asked Yim for a second opinion, and she confirmed. I told her we had a lot of snails in our room; should I do something about it? She looked at me wide-eyed and emphatically replied, “Yes! Get rid of them! Snails are very bad!” I had no idea. And to be honest, they weren’t my greatest concern.

I was told to “shake the bathroom door” every time, but especially at night, because Yim had been greeted by a snake twice. I just made a mental note not to drink anything after 4pm. It did help my perspective: the foot-long lizard and ginormous spider and trail of hundreds of ants are no longer a concern.

A girl was stung by a scorpion while she did laundry right next to me on the first morning after we arrived. Yim treated her with MSG on the wound, which supposedly kept the swelling down. (I remain skeptical.)  We were then told to “shake out all of our clothes” because a number of scorpions were being discovered.

Awesome.

Showering was a highlight. For one, the view was stunning. All the girls shower in the same area in sarongs, with a beautiful stretch of mountains behind us and, by 5pm or so, a moon shining above. It’s just like South Pacific!

I try to savor the beauty of it all just enough to not lose focus of keeping my sarong on, which I can’t say I’m skillful at. It takes about six buckets just to get my hair wet throughout, which is six bucks of water pulling my sarong down. Who knows how well my female students got to know me!

The water felt wonderful on the hot, humid days: it was freezing and refreshing. Then it began to rain, and continued to rain for five days straight. At this point, showering was just very, very cold; and it took a few minutes to convince myself it was indeed a good idea to dump this bucket of ice water on my head.

We had electricity by generator every night from 6pm-9pm; just enough time to charge the computer for Stephen to work on videos & photos and study by light. The students are (supposed) to sleep by 9pm; I was usually out cold by 8:30pm because it’s somehow exhausting: I’m not sure what. We have few responsibilities as guests: I teach, we talk with the students, Stephen takes photos & videos, we do laundry, we shower. We occasionally walk to a local snack shop, sing songs, or learn to weave. That’s the entire day. We sleep wonderfully–it’s pitch black and sounds so natural. Once you talk yourself out of a few fears, you’re out cold. The students are up at 4:30am to a whistle; we sleep in to 6:30am. Ten glorious hours!

Here are some students up studying late before the exam. You would think from this photo that I’m a difficult teacher and it was a hard class, but I think the girls were just nervous. There were only four questions.

We didn’t have internet or phone where we were, but we could hike thirty minutes or so to get internet on our phones–supposedly. It only worked two times, because rain and other daily occurrences can limit the signal. You can find the locations are because there are (random) bamboo poles stuck in the ground with a little shelf carved out of it where your phone can sit in the exact spot to get service. There is a rubber band there to hold your phone.  It was bizarre that people had found these spots, where on the bamboo pole you got service, but just an inch to the left and you had nothing. Here we are looking for service:

That’s the gist of our work-cation, but more stories to come.

Today was our turn to take a trip to the hospital.

Stephen woke up today with a fever of about 100 degrees. I thought it might be the same bug I got last weekend, when I had a fever for just a day with coughing and cold symptoms. He started taking paracetamol, but it was getting worse as I watched him through the day. He slept solidly all morning, but had a 102 fever by about 3pm, and then it spiked again around 4pm. His body was really hot to the touch, so we headed to the hospital to see if he had dengue or malaria.

The doctors saw him quickly and sent him to the lab for blood. Without eating much through the day and having such a high fever, they had him in a wheelchair. As they put the tourniquet on his arm, he said he was starting to feel light-headed and might pass out. I tried to tell the nurse, as I stood up and put my hands by his head–the only part not supported by the wheelchair. Within just a few seconds he was out and his head fell into my hands.

Stephen passes out quiet often with needles, so I wasn’t too concerned at him saying he might pass out. But then I looked at his face–his eyelids were oddly blue and his face was sickly yellow. And then, just as the other nurses and doctors rushed to help, he started seizing a little.  His eyes didn’t close when he passed out, but his eyeballs rolled back, so I could only see the whites of eyes. His arms, chest, and legs were convulsing.

Absolutely terrifying.

One of the nurses asked me something along the lines of, “What’s he doing?” as they wheeled him off the emergency room, with his feet dragging on the floor. He told me later he woke up to “music” in the hallway.

And then they hooked him up to oxygen, blood pressure, and a heart rate monitor; they took his blood sugar.

They went ahead and took blood while he was laying down, and then they left him to rest while the labs were processed. By this point he seemed okay, so I was less fearful.

However, his pulse was incredibly fast & irregular, or the machine didn’t work properly. He would read at about 94 beats per minute, and suddenly spike to 181! The whole screen would go red, the heart-beat mountains would go flat, the red light at the top would light up, and it would beep panic sounds like I used to hear on ER.  Yet the nurses and doctors did nothing when this happened, leaving me to wake him and make sure he opened his eyes when the heart-beat mountains went flat.

Not something I want to relive.

However, in the end, he didn’t have dengue or malaria. He has an upper respiratory infection, which I think is actually what I was sick with last weekend and gave to him–it just hit him much, much worse.  He’s now on antibiotics and we’re just watching his fever closely.

Prayers appreciated still, but mostly let’s just give thanks that he’s sleeping right here next to me!

Stephen & I took a swing dancing class last weekend and loved it!
It took me a bit to get the photos from a friend, but we obviously look like we were having fun. We’ve been practicing since then, too–we’ll be pros before too long.

I received one of the sweetest gifts I’ve ever gotten on Friday night.

Stephen went to the clinic with a mother and little one about 7pm. My little favorite came running up to him when he got back, asking for me with a present in hand. He told her I’d be back in twenty minutes from football.

She came running up with a beautiful little package.

A white box wrapped in shiny gift wrap with rubber bands holding it all together.  And inside, a really beautiful necklace; a beautiful, long strand of red beads.

I’m not even sure how to respond now as I write this days later. It’s such a beautiful, real gift. They bring us flowers and little treasures all the time: treasures I love; flowers I put in little cups on the table. But this is something of real value to her. Even the paper it was wrapped in is a treasure in their little homes.

I can’t really tell you the value this necklace holds.
It’s just one of the sweetest gifts I have ever received.

Today was a long day in the middle of a long week and a long month.  A couple kids came over asking to play, and I agreed. I sat in the community space and pulled out a onesie I am embroidering for a friend’s baby, and started to work.

A couple kids held their interest with Angry Birds, but a couple of twelve-year-old girls looked on as I threaded my needle. It was one of those “Why not?” moments I have quite often in our lives here, and I asked if they wanted to sew, too. I got an enthusiastic yes, so I brought out a couple pieces of spare fabric I had, some embroidery thread, needles, and scissors.

At first I thought they’d embroider, so I suggested they cut out a square of fabric. Instead, they cut out shirts, holding the fabric up to them and measuring with their fingers.  And so we had a sewing night.

But two twelve-year-old girls come with little siblings, so we got louder. And with noise comes more curious children, so we grew. There were nine of us in all. It wasn’t really what I had planned while Stephen had his Burmese lesson in the other room, but they were very, very quiet for nine very loud children.

Not all the little siblings are potty trained, so disinfectants became a part of our evening.

Chit Ne Oo finished her shirt first. Though she had measured it against herself, I think she discovered as she went along that it probably wasn’t going to fit her twelve-year-old self. She called for Yuh Meh Oo, the smallest eight-year-old I’ve seen, to try it on.

That didn’t work either.

So they moved on to Awh Awh Lay, a three year old, who was obviously thrilled to be the chosen model.

It still took some combined effort to get the shirt on him, but turned out pretty adorable in the end! And pretty impressive for a quick project.

The seamstress & model.

The second shirt didn’t fit its seamstress either, but it did work for the eight-year-old! I really love the pocket she added on this one.

Again, seamstress & model.

Our sewing party expanded, and one of the boys decided to make some shorts.

He was about half way when we sent them home with a needle & thread to finish at 9pm, but I’m pretty certain these won’t be fitting him either.

Chit Ne Oo made a second shirt for her little brother, and I think this one might fit him!

A creative little purse with double buttons.

And this is probably my favorite set of photos of the night. Mwei Mwei made a shirt for herself, and was pretty determined it was going to fit. She just kept trying–

So I embroidered one small design on a baby onesie, and they managed to make four shirts, a pair of shorts, and a bag, while providing a fun night for all of us!

Thankfully, we now have a functioning water pump & air conditioner, and electricity throughout our home!  It wasn’t the easiest day among the many languages and more frustrations, but hey: we’re all in except for clean water.  And that should come soon, right?!

Until then, we’re celebrating the best part of our days: the community that keeps us smiling at every encounter.

Last night I went to the clinic with a ten-year-old boy and translator. The little boy has had a swollen ankle and knee for over a week, so we went to get an X-ray and some medicine. The doctor speaks great English, allowing me to know what is wrong and then translate into  Karen and onto the parents in Burmese–and it might be my new favorite clinic as we were in and out in less than an hour!  Our challenge was with the assistants. They only spoke Thai, so the medication was given to us with Thai instructions, which I understood very little of.  Mong Ey knows some Thai, so I let her listen to them and then asked in Karen if she understood. She said yes, and we headed home.

It was at home when they were looking at the medicine and talking for quite some time. I asked again if Mong Ey understood the instructions, and she said yes. Then she pointed to the date–5 August 2556–at the top of the package and asked if she should give him five pills. Five pills?!  I said no, that was in fact the date today, and the instructions were down here where it said to take just one pill a day…and wondered to myself what she was going to do when she got to the 2556 of the year?!

Just a few minutes after getting home, we were sitting down to dinner when a few kids at the back door ask for water. As we’re giving them some, a naked three year old little boy came bursting through the door and ran into the kitchen. Stephen tried to tell him no, to remind him of the boundaries, but he was boundless. He exploded into the kitchen, making all the kids in the doorway laugh at Stephen’s failed attempt to stop him and his grand naked entrance. Embarrassed, he fell to the floor and cried for his sister. Adorable.

After school today, a sweet little girl stopped by to give me flowers before she even went home to drop off her bag and lunch box.

I let three little girls come in to play, at which point they hid their shoes behind the door to prevent the other kids from knowing the opportunity. They asked to play Dots on my phone, and with just three of them, I said yes. They each took one turn–the usual amount they get to play–and then asked to play again. I said yes, they could keep passing it around with each person playing once and then sharing.  The opportunity at endless play delighted them–and one little girl jumped up and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

Another little girl climbed up on the table next to me and laid on my arm while I typed this blog.
So much love.

The water has gone down throughout town and along the border, leaving us in less chaos. Please do continue to pray for many who have homes to clean up, and as we still do not have clean water to our homes. For us, it is simply an inconvenience of limiting showers while dishes pile up and laundry invades. For others, it means there is no drinking water and more sickness.

While you continue to pray, I wanted to bring you a more joyful post from our time in Chiang Mai!

Amidst meeting with counselors and many meetings for work, we tried to take a time of rest. We enjoyed familiar foods, shopping, and even a movie!  Here are some snapshots of the fun.

This is actually in Mae Sot, but hilarious in any town. When it pours rain, Stephen dons waterproof pants, a waterproof jacket, and puts everything we own–computer, books, phones, and more–into individual waterproof bags. Apparently others in town are taking the opposite approach? They say less is more!

One of tasks in Chiang Mai was to get my phone fixed. We had purchased an unlocked 3GS iPhone in the States for me, but it stopped charging just one week after we got back.  Thankfully, this is the land of fixing technology.

In our defense, we did try to take it to the official Apple store and have it fixed “above board.” They refused, saying they cannot work on phones that originated in the US. But this nice man on the creepy fourth floor of a prison-like mall agreed to help!  I’m not really sure what went down, but I know Stephen thoroughly enjoyed watching him work among piles of broken phones that he took bits and pieces from. And for just $10 and a working phone, it was well-worth the experience!

This was above his work station: a collection of 3G & 3GS backings, and a huge, confusing schematic of the iPhone4 chip.

A documentation of the best cup of coffee we’ve ever had in Thailand. The coffee shop was much too cool for us, but the coffee was delightful!

We went on a Sunday afternoon outing with another Partners staff family to visit the newest in Chiang Mai–a 3D Art Museum. It was absolutely weird and interesting!

These are just some examples for you: famous paintings or live-action paintings, all painted in 3D. There are no frames at all, everything is painted directly onto the wall. Many are designed for you to take photos with them, such as the one below that has the shepherd girl holding an iPhone, so you can come up next to her and pose holding yours.

It was so bizarre. It was very true to local culture, designed for that experience. It was as if the Thais just knew what to do: with each photo, they knew how it was designed for them to pose. Most required me to really think about it: I’m not used to trying to find ways for me to fit into artwork. Overall, the cultural experience was the best part, but it also provided laughs all around.