tsunami.

I didn't tell my parents b/c I knew they would worry, but the place that we went, Khao Lak was one of the places hardest hit by the tsunami. Even 3 years later, the impact of that day is still a reality in the lives of those who experienced it.

This is a boat that was escorting a Thai Prince. The wave took his life and washed this police boat over 2 kilometers inland.

This is a sign on the Similan Island we stayed on.

Our snorkling instructor showed us a video that his brother made of Khao Lak when the tsunami hit. You may know that the water went out...but I was very surprised that it was for 20 minutes. You could hear the people yelling for the people on the beach to run, but there were a lot of people (mostly foreigners) that were walking on the beach and looking at all that was normally covered by water...fish, shells, you can imagine. One image that I'll never forget was that of a young child looking at shells and unsuspectingly being engulfed by this wave.

It's very interesting to me the way that the Thais have embraced what happened. They sell DVDs and are eager to share what happened, I believe they just want people to be aware and to remember their loss.

the beach.

For Christmas break, Damaris and I went down south for the beach. We left on the 20th and came home on the 30th, but the trip really started a few days prior to the actual departure. Damaris and I knew that our bus left @ 7 for Bangkok, and were discussing when we would be able to get to the bus station (b/c we had to take public transportation). Well, I KNEW for sure that the buses to go downtown ran later than 5:30 ish, so I insisted that we leave 5:45 at the earliest. Around 6:15 when no buses had come, Damaris was about to get mad at me...and a mini-car pulls over and drops a lady off. Another woman from the car approaches us and tells us that they're teachers and asks us where we're going. We said the bus station, and she said she'd be happy to give us a ride. So Damaris, I and our huge backpacks smush in the backseat for our ride downtown. HUGE blessing!

It's an over-night bus, so we left at 7 pm and arrived in BKK around 6 am. Not a bad way to travel really. The seats are pretty big and recline way back. I always have trouble reclining though, there's just something about taking someone's personal space that I struggle with... Around 1 am I was glancing out my window and for about a 1/2 mile this truck had accidently been dropping boxes and the contents were all over the road. What were the contents? Straws. White straws all over the road...hahaha

We arrive in BKK and ride the city bus from the north bus terminal to the south...an hour and a half. Not bad for 18 baht. So we eventually make it to the south bus station, and decide that rather than stay the day in BKK, we'll go to Hua Hin - a beach about 3 hours away and spend the day there and then take an overnight bus down to our destination - Khao Lak. Hua Hin was a nice place, but very touristy.

We took an overnight bus from Hua Hin to Khao Lak - this is the beach.

arrive around 6 AM in Khao Lak walked around for a while, try to communicate where we want to go, get sent to the wrong place, walk a couple km back to where we started and then call Bens, an amazing Thai girl that works at the YWAM base. So, we get settled in our guest room that's right next to the base there that ministers to tsunami survivors. We spent a couple days there in Khao Lak...to be continued...these are beautiful designs made by crabs.

Christmas break.

We're officially on Christmas break until January 7. Today was the school Christmas party. It started after lunch and lasted until school let out at 3:30. They did fun Christmas songs - I got to sing a carol in Thai with 2 other adult Thai students! :) Then the students made ornaments/did activities while the adults did our gift exchange and then they played musical chairs and did a balloon pop game (where you put a balloon on your ankle and have to stomp on other people's balloons while trying to keep yours safe!) and then the kids all had a gift exchange. What a special place this school is...

My roommate Damaris and I are leaving tomorrow night at 7pm to get on an overnight bus to Bangkok. We'll arrive there at 5 am and look into purchasing another ticket down to Khao Lak. It will be about 13 hours from Bangkok. We'll be staying at a YWAM base in Khao Lak (where the red dot is on the map) and then camping for 3 nights on Ko Similan...then we're not sure..we might stay longer. It's nice to be free like that...did you know Thailand means "free" land. I love that. They really do have an awesome King here. He really lives to serve these people and make the country better.
This is where I was last Christmas Eve! It's amazing to think about what and where God has brought us in a year. I encourage you to think about that, I'll do it too on this trip. We can do it together :) So, where have you been in 2007? What have you learned? My friend pointed out that your "gut response" is really usually the most truthful.

HUGE prayer request is safety traveling and spending time at the beach and meeting people God puts in our path.

reaching out.

We loaded up the entire school in trucks and went on an outreach Monday. We went to Sansuk School near Chang San. (i think) Sansuk means fun, by the way...it's also the name brand of sandals in the states :)

We pulled in around 10 AM to around 500 students waiting for us. We were welcomed with 2 beautiful Akha dances in their traditional clothing, followed by our kids doing the "funky chicken" haha. We played a couple games like the balloon stomp and gave them school a TV, DVD player and 90 kilos of oranges! haha.

Thai phrase of the day: Dichan rak khun kha. - I love you.

loy krathong.

Loy Krathong is one of the biggest festivals in Thailand. They were shooting fireworks for a month prior to the day to prove it. This is a traditionally Buddhist celebration where they float these little rafts that are slightly bigger than a cd and made out of banana leaves out on the river. It happens on the night of the first full moon of the 12th month of the Thai lunar year. The rafts are floated to honor Buddha and also are used to represent letting go of grudges and anger. They'll usually put a piece of hair or a fingernail on the raft to represent letting go of the bad parts of oneself. The Thais we were with said that it all started to thank the Goddess of Water for all she provides. They also think it will bring them good luck for the coming year.

One of our ESL students invited Damaris and I to spend the evening with him and his friends for the festival. We didn't float the Kratongs b/c we have Jesus, but it was still wonderful to hang out with the Thais and observe this beautiful custom. This is the group photo we took when it was still light out. Our student is standing on the back row on the far left. This is a family putting their float on the river.


Damaris and I letting go of our Khom Loy!

mekong friendship festival.

Thursday night, after the big meal, Phet and I met up with Lek, a girl from church to go to the Mekong Friendship Festival. It's a celebration of all the countries that border the Mekong River, China, Burma, Laos ad Thailand. It was a big festival, complete with what appeared to be used fair rides, traditional dances and fried bugs. They had everything from different artisans from those countries to people selling fake Prada. Lek, Phet and I had a fun time, the highlight was when we played this game where you paid 10 Baht to "go fishing" and you pulled a plastic egg out of this little kiddy pool and it had a number on it and the number correlated with a prize. I pulled out 16 and got this incredibly lumpy pillow with movie stars on both sides! So lucky!!

Thai Phrase of the Day- Duan naa dichan ca pay khao lak, klay talee. Next month I will go to Khao Lak, near the ocean.
**If the letters c, k, p don't have an h behind them, they are un-aspirated, meaning you say them without really pushing any air out of your mouth. The "p" in "pay" sounds a lot like a "b" like in spaghetti.

Jesus is rad quote of the day - Jesus replied, "What is impossible with men in possible with God."

yes, there was turkey.

Many of you may be curious as to the Thanksgiving that we had here in Chiang Rai. Yes, there was turkey. A few grocery stores have them imported and one of the families here had a group of us "farang" (foreigners) over to share in the big day. Here are a few pictures of the spread. We had turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, sweet tea and a few other specialties. It was awesome and I ate my little heart out.

Afterward, we played wii, and sat around and shared laughs, just like a big family :) it was beautiful.