Beautiful

Here are some photos I took a couple of days ago, so you can see a little more of what we see everyday. (except for the first picture) The eclipse. The picture looks boring until you zoom in pretty close. The girls here are not very shy of cameras, and they thank you when you take their picture. The Steck's house. It's the only completely wooden house on camps, I think The Steck's car. Sometimes we ride to town by standing on the back bumper and hanging on to the metal basket thing on the top of the car. It's a very thrilling way to travel. The Steck's front porch, which functions as a waiting room for their clinic. You can see all kinds of sicknesses and injuries cared for right there on the porch. The rainbow before the storm. When it rains here, it can rain HARD, harder than anything I've seen in the States. A little papaya tree! Just in case you wondered what one looks like. Rain on half of the campus, and blue ...

For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him.  As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.  Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him.  For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. Psalm 103:11-14 Unconditional love. It's that idea that holds everyone's interest with a firm grip. We want it to be real. We want to experience it for ourselves. Everyone searches for it. Some look in the wrong place, get hurt, and then become cynical. Their bitterness makes others' search even more desperate. Some claim to find it. Others wait, watching to see if their experience is genuine. Some say they don't care, don't need it. Everyone wonders.  Does real, unconditional love exist?  If it does, how do you get it? That's the thing; as humans, we are so motivated by getting, receiving, and taking for ourselves. Mayb...

Fifth grade is over, and I'm walking back up the hill to my hut. Zinmaroo comes down the hill on the way to her next class, and we silently clasp hands in passing. She says she likes teaching, but I haven't been able to tell. If she doesn't enjoy it, I can sympathize with her. I'm so glad that I came here for a short while before I graduate. I only wish I had been able to come before I got so far along in my education major. Doing mission work is totally what some people need do to to be able to know what they would or would not like doing for the rest of their lives.  I hesitate to say this, because it could be that I am speaking out-of-turn. Maybe I'm just discouraged with my circumstances. Maybe if I stuck with this long enough, I would really start to like it. Maybe I haven't given it enough time. Maybe I'm just homesick (strangely enough), or miss the people back home too much. Don't get me wrong; I love it here in Thailand. I have been learnin...

It was a couple of nights ago after chapel, and Thara Joko had just asked if there were any announcements. Thara Eh K'Nyaw stood up and spoke in Karen for a few minutes in a very serious tone of voice. The students were very solemn, and we wondered what the announcement was about. On the way back to our hut in the dark, Tharamu Zinmaroo clung to Hannah in semi-serious fear. "She was saying something about a crazy man who beats women." Hannah told me. And so we got the story from Sharon, who understands Karen pretty well. Thara Eh K'Nyaw had been warning the students of the presences of two different crazy men who had been seen near and on campus. One of them was older, and had been rumored to dislike women and children to the point of his beating on them. The other was younger, and when Thara Eh K'Nyaw saw him walking quickly along the road one day, he thought the man looked a little too big and strong to fool with by himself. So we were warned about those m...

It is Monday morning. Yesterday, I went to Mae Sot, for my first and only visa run. Mae Sot is right on the border between Burma and Thailand, so all I had to do was leave Thailand, cross the river into Burma, and then come back into Thailand. Pretty simple and straightforwards. : ) As we drove down the busy street towards the bridge that crosses the Moei River, Mrs. Steck, Hannah and Sharon simultaneously tried to tell me where I needed to go, what buildings to go to, when to cross the street (because Thais drive on the left side, and Burmese drive on the right side, so the road switches on the Burmese side of the bridge), and what to do.  I only half-heard them. Coming from the quiet peaceful jungle, into the business of traffic and milling people, I was trying to stay calm. It's ok, you can do this.  Don't worry.  Stay calm.  Just do it.    I mechanically nodded my head and repeated the directions back to the Stecks, all the while tryin...

Another week has slipped past, and I'm not sure what I'm writing this post about. *smiles* Ok. I don't always have to have a brilliant thought to write about. I'll just tell you about everyday things. Sometimes those are actually the most brilliant things, anyway; we just don't realize it. Dwee May Saw is propped up against my knee, looking at a catalog of sport shirts. He dragged himself into my room earlier with a big smile on his face, pulling his pile of wilted flowers, an empty tin can, and a box of crayons. It used to be that I would dread hearing him come, and would shrink inside when he flung open the door with an excited "Waah!", but now I'm not sure how I will get along without him. He doesn't want to leave and go back to live with him grandmother (Not surprisingly. He doesn't get nearly as much attention over there), so I don't know how long he'll be here. Maybe he'll stay as long as I do. Speaking of which - My t...

' Jungle Palm So on Sabbath, we went to the waterfalls again, and I finally took pictures. The next day, some students, some teachers, and some visitors went hiking in the jungle to visit a pagoda. The pictures are all mixed up, though. Hiking through the jungle The bigger waterfall of the two we went to I am so glad they put a sign there...I might not have known that was a waterfall! The road there was unbelievable. Some of the hairpin turns you couldn't take at more than five miles per hour. Sun over the jungle A view from one of the mountain tops Mountains and rice fields The river that divides Burma from Thailand. Burma is on the right side of it. The river and the mountains Another one of those turns Down in the valley, just past Mae Salid Burmese refugee camp Yesterday, we took a long trek through the jungle to visit an ancient pagoda. The trail was very faint at times, and mostly it was all steep...