Day 18: Our last day in Mae Sot

 

We spent a few hours teaching English to some of the people from Lighthouse MB Church

Dave and Louise took us out for a wonderful Thai dinner overlooking the city of Mae Sot

We had arranged late last night to join some of the members of Lighthouse this morning to have fun with some English games, songs, and Bible stories. We were kind of relieved that we would be going to an already-existing English teaching event and could be part of it!

Well...when we woke up Louise mentioned she may have miscommunicated and we were to be the ones leading things! Thankfully Lindsay and I were able to work as a team and use our "teacher skills" and some great ideas and advice from Louise to come up with a plan. It wasn't eloquent based on some of the more detailed lesson plans we've created before, but in the end it worked so well :)

Two of the items that were up for debate between Lindsay and I were, 1) were these kids or adults? and 2) how much English do they already know? I think I won that debate because they were adults and already had a reasonable amount of English understanding...yikes! Louise suggested that we do some worship, look at some of the vocabulary used in the song, tell and act out a parable (again, looking at words used), and memorize a verse in English, so that's what we planned out!

When we got to the church we waited for people to gather, introduced ourselves, and did a quick "introduction" activity with everyone there so they all had to get up and practice doing introductions and naming different objects on the "Spot It" cards they were given. We then looked at the English lyrics for the song, Revelation Song, and discussed some of the words used and their pronunciation and read through Revelation 5 in Burmese so they could read it in their own language. We then sang the song and discussed some of the words in it a bit more.

Once we finished with the song we introduced some of the words and phrases that are used in the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard and then had everyone act it out. Lindsay spent a few moments afterwards sharing the story of how she shared this parable with her Grandma Stofer and how--even in her 90's--it was never too late to come to Jesus and accept him.

We closed our time by reading through Ephesian 2:8-9 in English, learning some actions to help with memorization, and then eating lunch together with everyone...whew! It was a lot packed into only a few hours!

Louise brought us back to the hotel where we had some swim time and journal writing time before we were picked up again to go out to dinner. The plan was to go to a waterfall just out of town but when we got there we found out it had actually close 30 minutes prior, so we went straight to dinner! It was a beautiful location overlooking the city of Mae Sot, and with all of the burning pollution/smoke in the air the sunset was especially colourful :) We spent time talking about missions, ministry calling, what we saw and learned in Mae Sot, and further getting to know each other. We are so very thankful for our time here seeing all that God is doing in Thailand and with the Burmese people!

Tomorrow morning we hop on a bus we have chartered with Wichian, Siriwan's husband (...she leads Naomi House in Chiang Mai) to take us down to Hua Hin for some family time on the beach. Louise is actually coming with us down to Bangkok as she is going to also take some much-needed rest, so we will have the chance to chat with her for another few hours. If anyone has time to come to Mae Sot and see what God is doing--and you are up for spur-of-the-moment English teaching--we suggest you consider it!

Day 17: We finally get a massage...and it wasn't even the best part of the day!

 

Juliet spent most of the afternoon playing games and doing origami with Julia, Sayama Ma Nwei's 12-year old daughter

Sayama Ma Nwei and her husband, Saya Ah Ti, are praying that God would start many churches and save 1,000,000 Burmese people through them

We slept in until 9am today! Woo-hoo! Once we got up we decided to head to Borderline Tea Garden for a late breakfast/brunch. We heard about them not because of the food, but because of the store that they run at the front, Borderline Shop. The shop was setup as a way for Burmese women who are living in exile to still make money. They have all sorts of purses, clothing, bags, book covers, washable feminine hygiene products, and many other types of goods for sale. Each one was created by a Burmese woman who sells their goods to help provide for their families (keeping in mind that many Burmese are under-employed as they don't have proper immigration documentation and are being exploited). Juliet purchase a hair scrunchie and a book to draw in!

We had mentioned to Dave that we were interested in possibly having a massage, and by God's plan he messaged us just as we were leaving Borderline with the location of the massage place he and Louise recommend...which was just a 2 minute walk away! We walked over and both Lindsay and I were able to book a massage right away while the kids stayed in the front lobby area and watched Netflix...all of us had what we wanted at that moment!

We really didn't have much time after the massage, however, as Louise was coming by with the 4 boys just 1 hour later. We raced back to the hotel to quickly get ready, and then we were out the door to go to another part of town to meet Sayama Ma Nwei and her husband, Saya Ah Ti. Sayama is a Burmese pastor in another area of Mae Sot who is hosting a house church of 60-70 people every Sunday! And for some events, has had 250 people at the house! She was a pastor in Myanmar before they escaped to Thailand and has quite the amazing story of God's protection and deliverance from the Burmese military who shot at her, took her oldest daughter hostage, and forced her family to flee across the border during the night to avoid further military resistance. She has so much trauma and still knows that God was with her and gave her great peace. She has expressed that she has a dream to grow the number of churches she has helped plant and prays that God will use her to see 1,000,000 Burmese come to know Jesus...amazing!

We stayed for about 3 hours talking, playing soccer, and Juliet and their 12-year old daughter (Julia) spent hours together playing! It really was a great time together with other believers on the other side of the world, using translators to talk with each other.

When Dave picked us up we had a plan to take Jayzin, Clement, Shalom, and Simon out for dinner and back to the hotel to go in the pool with us. They were really excited as they said they had actually JUST been talking about how they wish could go swimming in a pool earlier that afternoon! We had a great time with them at the pool. Clement and Shalom asked Lindsay and I for help learning how to swim, and James spent most of the time getting Jayzin and Simon to play with him, jumping and diving into the pool and playing games. What a great way to spend some of our last moments here in Mae Sot!

Day 16: April 1...was Dave playing a joke on us??

 

We found some rabbits and rats for sale in the Burmese market...that's not a dish we're quite ready to eat...

The Moei (or Thaungyin) River separates Thailand from Myanmar

Dave picked us up at 9am today so that we could go do a scavenger hunt at a Burmese market. He gave us a list of 10 tasks to accomplish at the market such as finding 5 different fish, buying a rose, finding the face powder that Burmese wear and finding out what it is made out of, and smelling shrimp paste! We walked up and down the market looking at things...and what a bunch of things we found! At the surface, it can seem like all markets are the same, but when you look closer you will notice themes. Some markets have more fresh fish, some have more fresh fruits and veggies, some have more cooked meat, some have more toys and trinkets, some have more clothes, and sometimes we find that markets will have a variety of these things, although often clumped together. This market had a lot of fish, few clothes, lots of small supplies like face powders and creams, and live animals...such as turtles, eels, fish, rabbits, and rats...all for food!

After we spent a couple hours at the market looking for things our final task was to find Lucky Tea House WITHOUT using Google Maps (only by asking people) and order lunch! It is a Burmese restaurant so we enjoyed some of their classic chickpea, egg, and naan breakfast (VERY yummy!) and some different roti dishes. Roti entered Thailand through India and has been customized by the Thai people through deep frying, adding bananas and eggs, sweet and condensed milk, and chocolate. We also had smoothies.

At both the market and at the store we experienced something we hadn't yet: proactive begging. We had people come up to us in both the market and while we were eating asking for money. We have certainly seen people on the street begging before, but never had we experienced people coming up and asking for money. And unlike back home, it was persistent, meaning they continued to stand there until they received what they deemed as enough. It was uncomfortable, but also OK to experience...we are still processing that to be frank. As an example, at the restaurant a young boy--maybe 10ish--came and stood at our table and gestured that he wanted food. We had eaten everything at our table so had nothing to give him other than the strawberries we bought during our scavenger hunt. We passed them to him and he continued to stand there, so not knowing what else to do, we passed him some money, at which point he took it then walked to another table that had leftover food on it and started to eat.

We caught a Grab back to the hotel for a small bit of pool time but that was all we had as we were getting picked up by Louise at 3:15 to go meet some of the young Burmese youth and go to one of the small churches started in a storage locker turned church.

After Louise picked us up we went to pickup 4 boys: Jayzin (who got baptized), Simon (Pastor Stephen's son), Clement, and Shalom (Pastor Michael's son). We all drove to Gate 13, where the church/storage locker was, and once there met Pastor Maung Maung and his wife Nu Nu. Sidenote: in Burmese, Saya is the word for a male pastor/teacher, and Sayama is the word for a female pastor/teacher. We started by having conversations with the boys and Saya Maung Maung so they could work on their English, then went for a walk to a market right on the border of Thailand and Myanmar.

That was a bit of surreal experience. Just across the river there was another country being torn apart by civil war, bombings, mass shootings, intense exploitation of people (in all ways imaginable and not). We were standing on the Thai side--relatively safe--and the boys told us that there were most-likely military people hiding in the bushes and surrounding areas ready to shoot anyone who tried to cross the river and escape to Thailand. The military in Myanmar would rather kill their own people than let them escape and not be part of their coup d'état. We didn't stay long as the boys said they didn't feel safe there, so we moved back to the storage locker to play some games, eat dinner, talk some more, and hear more about the ministry there.

We really enjoyed the day, and the highlight was hanging out with those 4 youth. They are all ages 15-17 and just so much fun! They love worship, Jesus, trust God and are obedient, and were easy to talk to (and had a lot of fun playing with James!) Hopefully we were as encouraging to them as they were to us!

Day 15: Easter Sunday and a Baptism!

 

I had the honour of being asked to pray for Jayzin just before he was baptized

There were a lot of songs for the Easter Service - some even in English!

We're getting to watch a surprising amount of hockey while in Thailand! The Cougars play an 8am game on Sunday morning here, which means it was a 6pm back in BC, so a great way to kick off the day!

After some hockey we took the kids to the pool for a little bit before Dave picked us up to go to their place for lunch at 12:30. It was really nice - Dave picked up some candy for them so they could do an Easter Egg hunt! We had some homemade quiche and muffins made by Dave, and sat and chatted. We were also the beneficiaries of some of his fancy blueberry-note coffee. We drank it straight (over ice) and it was actually nice! It was not bitter at all and didn't have a nasty aftertaste or anything like that. Dave is quite the coffee afficionado (which I guess comes in handy with the work they are doing with the coffee company in Myanmar) so we learned a bit of what makes some of the coffee different here versus back home.

Louise drove us home around 2:15 so we had a short amount of downtime before heading back out to the church. Dave picked us up just before 4pm, and by the time we got to the church they had just started filling up the baptism tank! (and by that, I mean a grey tarp lining the inside of a metal frame, which had a major leak in it so we had to keep the water running to keep it full!) We socialized and talked with people, listened to some of the rehearsal for the violins that were going to be playing, and waited until everyone who was supposed to be there for the baptism had arrived (probably around 5:15).

Jayzin has quite the story (I'll provide a brief version of it here, but if you're not subscribed to Dave & Louise's newsletter I'd highly recommend it! It's possible she puts more of his testimony in a future one). Jayzin is here by himself, at 15. His parents sent him here 6 months ago when the military conscription started in Myanmar. He is from a Buddhist family and didn't know anything about Jesus...but the uncle and aunt he was sent to live with became Christians a little while ago! When he first arrived they asked him if he wanted to come to church and he said "yes", although he didn't know what that meant. He came and they started having a prayer time, and during that time he had a powerful encounter with Jesus and has decided to follow Him!

The church service was amazing. Most of the music was in Myanmar, but there were a few English songs they included, as well as some dual-language songs. Similar to what we experienced at Kingdom Life Church in Chiang Mai, it was so great to be able to worship together with those who serve the same God on the other side of the world! Louise preached, with translation help from Pastor Stephen, and although our kids did OK...by the time we hit 7:30 they were done so we had to cut our time there short. We caught a Grab to the mall to grab some dinner and then came back to the hotel to get ready for bed.

One thing that we've heard over and over again from Cynthia and Dave & Louise is the actual "cost" to choosing to follow Jesus for Buddhist people...it is a big deal. For them, they are choosing to put their trust in Jesus to save them, rather than their own "making merit" to earn a better place in the next life. The countries of Thailand and Myanmar are also so embedded with Buddhism that it is not just religious but also cultural. When they leave this to choose Jesus it often creates division with their family, communities, and everything they know. It is a BIG deal and it is one that they don't choose lightly because of the cost. Please pray for Jayzin and all of the Buddhist people that are making the brave decision to follow Jesus.

A Day Off

 

We said goodbye to Cynthia and Maceo

The card game, "Lost Cities", once again travelled with us to Thailand!

When Cynthia and Maceo offered to drive us to Mae Sot last Tuesday they did not know that they would both feel sick to various degrees and would end up staying an extra 3 nights. Between a bad cold, migraines, sinus infections, and difficulty breathing due to air quality (it's burning season here so kind of like forest fire season back home) they not only stayed the extra 3 days but didn't even get to really get out to explore Mae Sot, join us for any of the ministry opportunities, or even really play in the pool. Today, however, before they checked out of the hotel, we did get the kids together in the pool for a few hours of play time while Cynthia and Lindsay went out to grab coffee and bring back some lunch.

Before spending time at the pool in the morning, however, we were able to catch the first 1.5 periods of the Cougars-Chiefs first playoff game! Go Cougars Go!

After the pool we ate a quick lunch around the pool and got cleaned up before Cynthia and Maceo had to start on the 5-hour drive back to Chiang Mai. Once they left, we did some journaling with the kids and finished off the movie we had started the night before.

By mid-afternoon we were ready to go out exploring so we took a Grab to a market and wandered around. It was hot, however, and Juliet was quick to point that out. James also really wanted to buy a tie-dye t-shirt he saw (with the $0 he had saved up) so we decided to extend him some grace and purchase the 100 baht shirt for him (that's like $3.85 CAD). We then walked to an amazing little Burmese restaurant Dave introduced us to for dinner. The restaurant is called Mingalarbar, which means "hello" in Burmese. I just realized that I have switched from saying "Myanmar" to "Burmese." As far as we can tell when talking to the Myanmar people, they also interchange it.

We came home shortly after 5:30 and took the kids to the pool for a few hours where Lindsay played with them for a bit and then we sat and played Lost Cities. This is a card game we actually brought to Thailand with us back in 2009...except it was during that trip that we had the bug spray explode (this post even exists to immortalize that event lol).

We finished at the pool, got ready for bed, and watched another movie with the kids. We are finding that we often have a time in the evening after things have wound down. We also want to keep the kids up a bit more in the evenings to get used to it, but will have to revert them back to a more standard bedtime once we get back home.

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday and we will be meeting up with Dave and Louise for lunch (and a possible Easter Egg Hunt!), going to a baptism, and the church service. We will see what all happens!

Good Friday - Sharing the Gospel at 2 more refugee camps

 

Hkun Myat (pronounced "Khun-yah") passionately shared the Gospel with the village. His wife, Nu Nu, helped with logistics, translation, and leading activities with kids.

Louise shared her testimony and the Lord's prayer with the translation help from Pastor Stephen

Pastor Stephen, Hkun Myat, and Louise all preached the Gospel and seven people stood up to say they wanted to receive Jesus!

Dave picked us up at 9am and took us to grab some Myanmar breakfast to-go before heading to Lighthouse to load up the truck with supplies. Once we got to the church we grabbed some canned fish and noodles, picked up pastors Stephen and Michael, and met Louise and headed about 10 minutes away to meet up with Hkun Myat and Nu Nu, a Myanmar couple who has decided to leave their jobs, start a pig farm to provide for their needs, and dedicate their lives to sharing the Gospel and giving hope to other Myanmar refugees!

The first camp we got to we met outside on tarps again. Louise and Nu Nu led some kids activities with a parachute and a ball, Pastor Michael led some music, Hkun Myat preached, and Louise told her testimony and shared how in the Lord's prayer we are asking God's Kingdom to come to Earth...and what an amazing Kingdom it is, filled with hope, peace, love, healing, and belonging...for all peoples! We ended our time together by praying for all the elders/adults there and then giving some canned fish and noodles to them to thank them for coming. Someone in the village was also selling coconut water so we bought enough for all the kids in that village and the next one to hand out.

We then drove to another village and met in a one-room hut/home. Pastor Michael did some music, Pastor Stephen preached, and Louise told a bit of her testimony and had our family come up and help act out the parable of the Unforgiving Servant (Matthew 18:21-35). She shared that because she has been forgiving of soooo much she has the ability to forgive others, including those who have deeply wronged her. She shared that one of the ways we can start to follow Jesus is by forgiving other people too. After this, Pastor Stephen spoke for a bit and asked if anyone would be interested in receiving Jesus and making him the leader of their life, and seven people stood up and said "YES!" Praise God! After this we gave out more canned fish, noodles, and coconut water and then headed to get some lunch and take our kids to a waterfall.

Louise took us to a waterfall nearby and to grab some lunch. The lunch wasn't great, unfortunately, and Louise actually got sick later that day and the next. We were fine, thanks be to God! The waterfall wasn't big, but instead had multiple tiers that you could go up to and stand in and have water pour on you. The biggest pool, however, was at the bottom of the falls. We stayed there for an hour or so and the kids rented inner tubes and played at the bottom. After that we left and came back to the hotel.

We got ourselves showered and cleaned up, walked over the mall to grab some dinner, stopped in at a little kids fair across the street to let the kids ride some electric scooters, had a quick dip in the pool, and watched half of a movie with them before calling it a night.

Day 12: A Visit to Open Heaven Church

 

Lindsay shared her testimony of God's goodness and provision during our adoption of James and pregnancy with Juliet

James was great at playing with the other kids (this was a game of dodgeball)

We didn't know what we were going to be doing today as we hadn't exactly formalized our plans with Dave & Louise the day before (today was the final day to get that grant proposal in so they were busy!) We had a slower start to the day, waking up around 8am, so figured that we would use the morning to hang out in the pool (Lindsay and the kids) and I spent some of the morning working on our budgeting/month end and a proposal I needed to submit for work (I should have done it before we left but things got busy!)

The kids had a lot of fun at the pool--thank goodness there is one, otherwise they might be a little more stir crazy than they are already--and they stayed down there until about noon when we ordered in lunch.

We messaged back and forth with Dave and decided that he would pick us up around 4pm to go to an outreach church event at a Myanmar refugee camp that Lighthouse MB Church was involved with. For the rest of the afternoon we finished watching the movie Wonka (that we started the night before), picked up a few small grocery items, and went back in the pool...it was a low key afternoon too!

Dave picked us up at 4pm and we went to Lighthouse to meet with everyone. They have 15 interns that live, serve, and learn together at the church. Every Thursday night they split up into teams and go do outreach at different Myanmar refugee camps. Dave loaded up his truck with us and a number of other people from the church (interns and members) and we drove about 10 minutes to a camp that was tucked away on the land of a Thai family, off-the-beaten-path. Dave said that it is common for refugees to gather together under the leadership of an elder who will help negotiate on behalf of the community. They aren't a formal church with a building, but as a group of people coming together to learn about Jesus, they are calling themselves "Open Heaven Church."

As you can see from the photo and video above, the village is modest. There are elevated wood huts on short stilts, dusty roads, and limited services. They do have wells for water, some electricity, and their own small store setup, but it is very modest and a far-cry from anything that we have ever seen back home. We had a bit of time before things "started" to play dodgeball, walk around, and talk with people. One of the church members, Chris, and one of the interns, Mai Mai, were able to do translation for us.

When it was time to get started, the interns setup a couple tarps to sit on and many people from the community came to join us. The adults all sat together on the tarps in one area, and the children all joined together in another area. The children did lots of songs, colouring, and crafts, and James stayed there with them the whole time! Lindsay and Juliet stayed for a while and then came over the adult tarp as Lindsay and I were going to share a bit of our testimonies (with translation help from Chris).

Pastor Michael led a few worship songs in Myanmar and everyone sang and clapped. Lighthouse has been involved in the community for at least a year (we aren't sure how long) so they had some familiarity with the songs already. Lindsay and I both shared testimonies, as did another Myanmar fellow, then we all prayed and handed out some cooking oil and noodles. We weren't there for long - maybe 1.5-2 hours, then we went back to the church to say goodnight.

Tomorrow we are going to go to a few other small outreach events the church is doing so we will report back on that tomorrow!