It wasn’t too spectacular of a weekend, but we had a few fun photos that captured a glimpse of what goes on in our driveway.

We’re pretty sure they were playing hospital. The girls had these blankets laid out where one girl would lay down and place a piece of styrofoam over her eyes. The other girls were mixing up what looked like herbal medicines using water, mud, and weeds from our yard & compost.

I’m not sure what the squeegee was used for, but I do know I threw it away earlier in the day after using it to scrub down the bathroom.

We also gave them some of the packing materials from our recent packages and showed them how to pop them.

We don’t have a photo, but we also caught one of the little girls making faces at herself in the mirrored taillight of a neighbor’s truck. They don’t really have mirrors in their homes, and it was really adorable to see her discovering herself and the faces she could make!

We’ve been out of the office for the past few days with our current team in town, but we stopped in today and were greeted with three packages that had arrived during our absence!

Oh, yes. Three. We’re spoiled.

And it’s not even a birthday!

And we opened them to find jewelry, greeting cards, pens, and the best array of American food!  So fun.

We already had some Fig Newtons and Goldfish tonight! It felt like summer. Don’t these feel like snack foods you could eat on vacation?

Our boss asked today why all the Americans were at work today; apparently we could have asked for the day off. Stephen said it was because the Americans who were the most excited to celebrate America were also the ones to stay.

I’m pretty sure I just didn’t know it was a possibility.

But, we had a A&W rootbeer floats to celebrate anyway!

 

It’s all been a bit of a whirlwind in our lives, but it’s good. God has been good.

First off, we survived our first team!  We spent a surprising seventeen days with them and sent them on a bus to Chiang Mai yesterday morning. We had a really wonderful time in Noh Poe refugee camp spending time with the students of the two dorms that Partners support there. We were also able to participate in the camp-wide celebration of World Refugee Day. Oh, and we encountered the largest spider I have ever seen. It was the size where if you smashed it with your hand, you probably wouldn’t win. The body was comparable to a flashdrive, with each leg spanning at least three inches. And we got to watch it devour a three inch cockroach.

Stephen & I had a chance to continue building relationships with our contacts there, and learned some gardening techniques from our host. Thara Lah Say (Thara is teacher in Karen) is the headmaster of one of the dorms and is the former Karen Camp Commander of Noh Poe.  He has a huge organic garden growing inside the camp that allows him to help feed the dorms. He was pleased to hear about our burgeoning community garden, offered some advice, and gave us 15 (yes, 15!) banana tree stalks to plant in our yard!  We couldn’t fit them all, so we shared some with the Partners office and staff, but we do have 7 banana trees of three different types of bananas now planted. Fortunately, they say bananas are the easiest thing to grow, and we should be reaping the benefits in just eight months.

In all, we really loved the team and appreciated their flexibility & willingness to serve in any way they could. We still have much to learn, but this was a good initiation project.

We returned home to a) one day in the office to catch up on, well, everything from the last seventeen days and b) a package!  Can I just tell you that the Bakers are some of the best package-senders I’ve met, so we were pretty excited when we saw a big box from them.  We weren’t disappointed, either, and found, among other things, Cinnamon Toast Crunch & Golden Grahams!  They also used US newspapers to fill the box, so we promptly uncrumpled that to enjoy some American comics and news.

After our day at the office, we were headed home to clean up the mess from traveling, catch up on laundry, and hopefully be ready to rest for our two days off on Thursday & Friday. Instead, we found our neighbor kids ready to play and our super-ambitious neighborman ready to plant.

And thus began an evening of gardening. We now have all seven banana stalks planted, and we’ve transferred the pumpkin, okra, and some tomatoes into the ground.  And there’s a chance we may be working on it more tonight. Hard to say.

Good news is, we’re finding ways to communicate.  We’re finding out which parents & kids are Karen, attempting to communicate, and otherwise working with actions. The kids have been destroying our driveway & yard, breaking things and leaving trash. They also decided to color the side of our house by smearing flowers into designs. Yesterday I went out to clean up while they were there, got them to help wash down the walls & pick up trash. We’re doing our best to set up boundaries: no touching the motorbike, no entering the house. Those are the two big ones right now.  That said, we’re making progress. They’re learning. When I heard them open the door and look inside, they meet my eye and said, “No,” pulling it back closed.

We did have one incident yesterday where the kids were splashing in our…tub? in the yard. It’s a water pump & cement bucket; they tend to have water tubs all over, allowing you to have stored rain water or city water for dry seasons or when city water is cut off. Either way, the kids were playing in it and splashing each other in the yard. Not a problem until the one-and-a-half year old toddler tipped in to the two feet deep water.  His parents were helping us garden and didn’t seem too worried, but I was thankful Stephen was close enough to pull him out.

So now we’re here and enjoying two days off. We had Cinnamon Toast Crunch for breakfast and looking forward to time to step outside the whirlwind.

We’re still learning how to define a) community and b) garden.

We had another translation session for our so-called community garden on Monday. A sweet friend from work came home with us and the team in town, with hopes of re-explaining the garden, handing off a key to the gate, and communally enjoying an afternoon of weeding to prepare the soil for the plants that are growing oh-so-quickly and will very soon need to be transferred.

We think the translation went okay. It’s always hard to say, really.

But, we gave them a key–so they can get into the garden or store any valuable items (including themselves) locked inside for safety.  We also attempted the “let’s garden together now” idea, but it was a flop. She suggested the next day, when we were busy at work.

We came home to find the garden unchanged, and decided to go for a run.  We returned to find one man inside our yard, completely conquering the weeds. This jungle grew up on us in about a month, and we spent the following two months painfully attempting to eliminate the mess of weeds, thorns, ivy, ants, mice, frogs, and lizards that had taken over.  And this one man was doing about a weeks worth of work for Stephen & I.

In Stephen’s words, “How long were we gone?”

One of the things we’ve discussed with this garden idea is that it’s very difficult to make plans, i.e. “Let’s work together every Saturday” or “Let’s meet at 8 am tomorrow”. We decided from the beginning that it would take flexibility, so that when opportunities arose to garden with them or play with the kids or help in someway–we take it.

So we did.  Well, mostly Stephen in this case.

The next hour continued the subjugation of our yard. And it was divided into two categories: eat or not eat? This was communicated through motions that I wish so badly I could have Stephen imitate for you over a blog. Hilarious.

The things that remain: a papaya tree, a mango tree, about three bushes used for some kind of soup that we have no idea about.

The best part, I think, was the large tree on the side of the yard. The man promptly motioned to Stephen that you can’t eat it, went to get an old and broken machete, and took it out. The whole tree. I mean, why would you keep it if you can eat it?!

So our yard now looks like this. And we’re finding community to be any number of persons, at any age attempting to be friends, despite the inability to communicate at all.  And we’re finding that a garden is simply things you can eat–nothing more, nothing less.

We tried again with the community garden this Saturday, and again we got quite a good response from the local children.  Unfortunately, they were more interested in us than the work, and most of the morning looked like this:
We had lots of observers, umbrella-shade-holders, and curious huggers who wanted to feel my sopping wet shirt.  They did enjoy watering the plants.

It was something like community.

But, can you see the plants sprouting up in the background?! (In the black bags by the house, not the jungle of weeds we’re still trying to tackle.)  Nearly everything has sprouted–all 19 varieties planted.

So, despite a very hot Saturday with just the two of us working amidst chaos, we’re hopeful.

“What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives growth.”  1 Corinthians 3:5-7

“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”*

We’ve been anxious to develop our friendships with the community across the street.  We’ve been playing soccer with the kids and sending out smiles, but have trying to think of ways to get to know them more.

We’ve also been working on our garden–primarily picking weeds. In the process, I’m becoming very aware of the work involved in a garden, which is further complicated by our consistent traveling with teams.

Thus evolved our community garden.  We thought if we could open the space up to this community, it would be an opportunity to work together, build friendships, and help them, as well.  We’ve continued to work on the weeding, but just yesterday had two translators join us to visit the community and invite them to join us to work in the garden.

It was a slow start this morning.  We had “planned” (as much as possible between languages) to start around 9am, but ended up weeding by ourselves (with onlookers, of course) for about two hours.  In this time we also had to move the previous three piles we had started of the weeds were pulling–we just started these piles of pulled weeds not thinking it would take us weeks to finish.  We tried to move them together in a location where they can be safely burned.  Unfortunately, we found a ginormous ant colony in the first pile, a any colony and a cricket colony in the second pile, and a mouse family in the third. (Yes, a dad, a mom, and a little bitty baby mouse.)

Around this time, our translator (and co-worker at Partners), Marci, stopped by to see how things were going.  We tried again to invite them over to plant, and enjoyed an afternoon of planting!

It was admittedly mostly kids today, but they were such good workers and so sweet.

Here are the beginnings of our garden!  We planted sixteen types of plants into these little bags, and then we’ll replant them once they’re growing strong.  For now, they’re under the awning of our house to prevent them from drowning during rainy season.

And then we enjoyed some sweet drinks afterward.

We’re so excited to see the friendships that will develop.  We’re already feeling like rockstars when we drive down the street with lines of kids on both sides shouting “Hello!” and “Bye! Bye!” all at the same time.

While we’re at it though, here are a few our concerns and prayers:

– They are in very tight financial situations, where they can only work occasionally.  Because of this, they are desperate to work for us and be paid.  We’re trying to help in ways where we’re providing for needs (via food, clothing, tarps, etc.) rather than simply handing out money. We also really want to be friends with them, rather than have them working for us.

– Communication is difficult. We’re trying to communicate the idea of working together and thus benefitting from the harvest together, but that’s proving more difficult than expected. We’re really praying that they will understand we want to be friends and not expect pay for working together.

– We’re really hoping the garden is exceptionally fruitful. We want to be able to bless them with food and help in a very practical way.

– It will take creativity to bless them.  We’re trying to keep our eyes open for needs we see in the community and ways we can possibly help to protect them from threats they face from the local police, as we witnessed when we first arrived.

But it was a good day. May the friendships begin.

*last line of Casablanca, which I only know from When Harry Met Sally really.

The birthday celebration continues with two more packages last week and another today! It’s been more than fun to keep opening little treasures from the other side of the world.

One of the treasures sent our way is a beautiful mug from my sweet friend, Mal. And the best part:

it made it around the world, and back!

We got our TOT bill (for internet) in the mail yesterday to find this:

Issue date?  1 May.

Due date?  22 April.

Oh, yes, that makes complete sense.

It’s also 500 baht cheaper than we thought. Considering our current experiences here, I’m preparing myself for a 500 baht late fee.

(Oh, and by the way, 54 is the Buddhist year. It says 2554 more often than 2011 around here.)

I’d have to say this last trip could definitely be titled an adventure. And I think it’s very good we’re here for another reason.  The highlights were by far the encouraging stories and seeing what God is doing; and there were definitely times I was wishing for a magic escape button that read, “Welp, I tried!”

As I look through the photos that attempt to capture this and think through the stories in my head, I can tell you right now this will be a scattered blog–hopefully some will make you laugh, parts will inevitably make you cringe, and you’ll likely be saddened. Consider yourself warned.

First, we headed out about 7 hours to Beung Klung village, right on the border.  We stayed with a Karen family there where the husband oversees the clinic we were continuing onto (about one hour with four-wheel drive or three-ish hours hiking). He’s a make-do doctor, and we happened to witness about three minor surgeries performed on his porch with semi-sterilized tools and cats meandering through.

We also visited Burma because it’s quite easy to walk across right there. Our group includes Marci (a nurse from America heading up Partners’ medical team; married to a Karen man, Be So Toe, who is taking the photo); Nenana, their daughter; and friends from the family we stayed with. We may or may not have come back from the border with an amazing two-person chair…

We also did medical checks while we were in Beung Klung, just checking a group of kids that come for a program each Saturday (with Compassion International) for basic health problems.

Marci did the real checkups, since she’s actually trained.

I helped with cleaning minor cuts with alcohol and bandaging them (some US-level minor and others that would have been of higher concern and made me cringe a little) and giving out de-worming medicine (which Stephen & I also now take every six months). The kids were so sweet and overwhelmingly brave as I used the alcohol on their open cuts and they swallowed the pills spectacularly–much better than me, really.  I must say, though, it’s a mental adjustment to switch to medicine in the remote villages, and American medical staff would have been horrified with our use of the same water cup for all the kids to take medicine.

And Stephen did an amazing job of entertaining the other kids while they waited their turn! This was an exciting game of Rat, Rat, Elephant (easier to say in Karen than duck & goose).

We also gave out some medical supplies to a man in Beung Klung that was actually over from Burma. He organized a clinic there and was absolutely thrilled to have all the supplies we gave him. It was so wonderful to hear him say “a million thanks, a million thanks” over and over to us. He was beautifully determined to give his life for the sake of his people.

Oh, and at one point while we were in town, a woman touched my leg and told me I had “the whitest legs she had ever seen”. Awesome.

The next day saw our drive to Laytonku. We took the 4-wheel drive the whole way, but it is quite a drive. Extremely steep hills and curves of mud that I really couldn’t describe to you, but these pictures will at least suggest it:

At times Be Soe Toe ran ahead to clear the path of large branches and things.

And we stopped at a lovely river we crossed through.

[the muddy truck upon arrival]

This is the clinic in Laytonku that Partners supports. We delivered supplies, Marci did some training with the four staff doctors, and we stayed in the dormitory rooms here. The clinic sees about 300 patients per month, treating for basic needs of malaria, anemia, worms, colds, and infections.

Within fifteen minutes of our arrival in Laytonku, a dog was killed on our behalf, just about twenty feet behind us. (They truly know how to welcome me!) I’ll leave out too many details of the dripping blood and cooking it whole over the fire and just say I never expected a charred dog to look like that…and it really didn’t taste too bad!

The evening we arrived, we had dinner and then sat around on the porch as one of doctors played the Karen harp for us. As I sat in our room doorway listening, I kept hearing a rustling to my right. I’d look back to see nothing, until the third time when I saw a large rodent curry past about a foot behind me. I jumped up pretty quickly and they asked what it was. I calmed relayed it was either a mouse or a rat, to which a Karen man looked in our room and said, “Yes, maybe. It’s possible.”  To this I wanted to reply, “Possible? We’ve moved beyond possible. It’s definitely there. Now what are we going to do about it?”  But they didn’t seem to interested in doing much about it at all, so I sat back down and wondered how I was going to sleep on the floor with this fellow.

Turns out, he was quite busy, so we got to listen to him for most of the night. He would rummage around loudly in a rice sack, shimmy up the door frame, and cross over the ceiling beam. He’d deliver something and hurry back for more. I got a good look at him each time he’d cross the ceiling beam that was lit from the main light. It was either an abnormally large mouse or a normal size rat. I decided I would rather it be a mouse and convinced myself of such.

I read a quote while we were there from Allan Eubank, a missionary in Thailand since the 1960s, with his son having started Free Burma Rangers.  He noted during one of his times in a remote village, “We try to keep our minds on high spiritual things yet little distractions occupy so much of our attention. It seems that much of my notes are on trivial difficulties that are strange to my former life.” My thoughts exactly.

The grounds of the clinic were absolutely lovely. This is from the clinic porch looking into Burma.

And to give you a picture of what the clinic operates like…

one of the doctors

the newly delivered medicines

a young patient with malaria; the IV is hanging from a nail above

the clinic records for Marci to look over

We also delivered some mosquito nets, which this little boy was clearly happy to receive!

This is before heading out for church on Sunday.

On the way, we stopped by the home of this family. (Actually, Eliya on the far right was the head doctor from Beung Klung.)  The village was fairly quiet while we were there because there had been an incident just a couple days before. Because Laytonku is so close to the border and quite difficult to get to from Thailand, they do a lot of trade with Burma.  The headmaster and vice headmaster of the village (brothers) and their father had been asked to come to a meeting with the local Burmese leaders to discuss trade in the area. They agreed to all the terms of trade, but then as they were leaving, the Burmese Army shot at them, killing the vice headmaster. In the photo above, the widowed wife is to the right, and the older woman is the mother.  Two of his children are in the photo, but one was away with the father & headmaster, reporting the story.

And so we visited this family in mourning, with very little to offer. We took time to pray for them and allowed our hearts to break for them.

I’m still processing this.

We also visited another family with two girls who had been helped by the local clinic.

Aren’t they lovely? They are cousins, but they live in the same home. Two of the kids were orphaned and are now living with their aunt.  The girl on the right had a cleft-lip surgery done that has healed up very well. The girl on the left had a bad case of TB and was malnourished. They are both in great health now.

We were scheduled to leave Monday to go back to Beung Klung for a night, but it rained for a lot of the morning. We decided to try heading back through the mud, but a little while in decided it was quite a risk with the truck loaded down with people. After about 15 minutes of driving, we hopped out to walk while Eliya drove it back the rest of the way.  Stephen and I, Marci, Be Soe Toe, and Nenana hiked back.  This was about half an hour in, before it started to pour. Really, really pour.

What you can’t tell in this photo, too, is that I’m barefoot–the mud is really hard to grip in with flipflops.  And when you’re walking up extremely steep hills, you have to grip by walking on the rocks and patches of grass/thorns. Thus, you have about two hours of what most would call “adventure”: walking in the rain barefoot, walking on little pieces of shale, wringing out my skirt every little while, picking out a few thorns, and learning to control your slides in the mud.  It was fun in some ways; the hike was absolutely gorgeous. But I am still suffering from sliced up, sore feet three days later!

And so were home and really thankful we went. It was really encouraging to see what God is doing through Partners and be a part of bringing a few small glimmers of hope.