Mission College - Home Base
We've been here at Mission College for almost 2 weeks. We've spent our days getting acquainted with the area, staff, and students, getting settled in, and trying to get things going. Since we are independent volunteers, we don't really have anyone telling us what to do. They've given us the project and it's up to us to determine what gets done and how it happens. There are people we can go to if we need help or advice, but other than that, we're basically on our own. It's nice to have such freedom, but it's also quite overwhelming at times.
I couldn't ask to be in a better, more beautiful place (with the exception of Saipan)! The weather is great. The people are super friendly. The food - even in the cafeteria - is delicious. And the campus is perfect - quiet, out of the city, breath-taking views, and flowers blooming everywhere! Plus, it's fun to be back on a college campus with hundreds of other young people all the time.
The church is the highest point of campus - a light set upon a hill. And you can see it's surrounded with row upon row of bougonvillia bushes of every color. They're actually planted everywhere around campus brightening the whole place and making it a tropical paradise!
A teak sala Thai in the middle of campus - it's a nice, shaded and breezy place to sit, relax, pray, or visit with friends.
The Library and IT building.....but this picture is mostly to show all the motorcycles parked out front. They're everywhere around campus. And there's always tiny little parking stalls outside all the buildings!
Right now, our main focus is the Mission Outreach Center in the town of Muak Lek - it's about a 10 minute motor-cycle drive from campus. It's a store-front building with 2 classrooms, a kitchen, and a couple bedrooms on the third floor. Andrew and 2 other students who are helping with the Center live there. They sleep on the floor, shower with cold water, wash their dishes under a spicket outside, and use squat toilets - they're hard-core missionaries!!
I live on campus in the girls dorm because it's safer and I couldn't live down there with the guys. So I have it pretty good right now, although it is taking a little getting used to dorm life again.
We spent several hours last weekend cleaning up the Center. We scrubbed floors, painted walls, rearranged furniture, and scoured the kitchen. The kitchen had to be the worst!!! It looks a lot better now, but I'm just thankful that I'm not living down there, because with 3 guys, it's bound to be back to it's grungy state in no time!!
Seyha (from Cambodia, one of Andrew's housemates), painting the walls
For starters, we are teaching English to children in the evenings at the Center. There's about 15 kids who come to the center and we teach them songs, tell stories, play games, and give English lessons. Andrew and I teach the older children in the 2nd floor classroom, while Bah (Andrew's other housemate - Thai) teaches the younger children downstairs. I may also begin teaching in town at one of the government schools in the mornings, if things work out. Also, we spend time visiting people in the surrounding neighborhood - getting to know them and forming relationships so we can soon tell them about Jesus.
The rest of our time is spent planning and preparing our lessons to teach. We don't really have any materials right now so everything has to be created from scratch. We're working on getting some teacher resources to follow so we can teach in a logical sequence. And we also spend time studying the Thai language. We attend a class here at the college 2 days a week and then spend time studying outside of class as well. Learning the language is so important because we aren't very useful if we can't communicate with the people. The structure of the language is quite simple, but it's the tones that make it difficult - if you use the right word, but with the wrong tone, they have no idea what you're saying! Teaching English is one good way to reach out to the people and soon we'll be able to teach them more about Jesus in English, but I believe that it's also important to be able to teach them about Jesus in their native tongue.
One thing that we're really enjoying about Thailand is all the fruit!!! Bananas, guava, coconut, mango, durian, jackfruit, mangosteen, dragon fruit, and big juicy pineapples (and all sorts of other local apples - custard apple, rose apple, etc)!! Not only is dragon fruit delicious, but it's also very beautiful. It's brilliant pink skin is a stark contrast to it's white flesh and tiny, kiwi-like seeds. Mangosteen is one of our favorites, but it's not quite the season yet, so it's only a rare treat right now. Durian has been an adventure - I really like it, but the first time Andrew had it here he almost threw up! (Word of advice: to get used to it, start off by eating it frozen.....that tones it down a little bit!). And jackfruit! We bought a huge 10 lb jackfruit and have been waiting all week for it to "get old" and smell good - then it's ready to eat. Last night it was finally ready and we were able to hack into it's spiny skin and eat all the goodness inside!! The 4 of us ate quite a bit, but there was still a bunch left over for later.
Our huge jackfruit
Cutting it up...... it has a really sticky sap in the center that has to be removed first before it can be eaten.
Andrew's first experience with jackfruit - he thinks it tastes like banana bubble gum!
My first mangosteen - it's delicate, milky flesh is extremely delectable!
I couldn't ask to be in a better, more beautiful place (with the exception of Saipan)! The weather is great. The people are super friendly. The food - even in the cafeteria - is delicious. And the campus is perfect - quiet, out of the city, breath-taking views, and flowers blooming everywhere! Plus, it's fun to be back on a college campus with hundreds of other young people all the time.
A view of the Administration building and beyond from the top of the church steps.
The church is the highest point of campus - a light set upon a hill. And you can see it's surrounded with row upon row of bougonvillia bushes of every color. They're actually planted everywhere around campus brightening the whole place and making it a tropical paradise!
A teak sala Thai in the middle of campus - it's a nice, shaded and breezy place to sit, relax, pray, or visit with friends.
The Library and IT building.....but this picture is mostly to show all the motorcycles parked out front. They're everywhere around campus. And there's always tiny little parking stalls outside all the buildings!
The front of the Center - two, side-by-side store-front buildings
The downstairs classroom
I live on campus in the girls dorm because it's safer and I couldn't live down there with the guys. So I have it pretty good right now, although it is taking a little getting used to dorm life again.
We spent several hours last weekend cleaning up the Center. We scrubbed floors, painted walls, rearranged furniture, and scoured the kitchen. The kitchen had to be the worst!!! It looks a lot better now, but I'm just thankful that I'm not living down there, because with 3 guys, it's bound to be back to it's grungy state in no time!!
Andrew scrubbing and mopping the floor
Seyha (from Cambodia, one of Andrew's housemates), painting the walls
The kids in our class hard at work
The rest of our time is spent planning and preparing our lessons to teach. We don't really have any materials right now so everything has to be created from scratch. We're working on getting some teacher resources to follow so we can teach in a logical sequence. And we also spend time studying the Thai language. We attend a class here at the college 2 days a week and then spend time studying outside of class as well. Learning the language is so important because we aren't very useful if we can't communicate with the people. The structure of the language is quite simple, but it's the tones that make it difficult - if you use the right word, but with the wrong tone, they have no idea what you're saying! Teaching English is one good way to reach out to the people and soon we'll be able to teach them more about Jesus in English, but I believe that it's also important to be able to teach them about Jesus in their native tongue.
One thing that we're really enjoying about Thailand is all the fruit!!! Bananas, guava, coconut, mango, durian, jackfruit, mangosteen, dragon fruit, and big juicy pineapples (and all sorts of other local apples - custard apple, rose apple, etc)!! Not only is dragon fruit delicious, but it's also very beautiful. It's brilliant pink skin is a stark contrast to it's white flesh and tiny, kiwi-like seeds. Mangosteen is one of our favorites, but it's not quite the season yet, so it's only a rare treat right now. Durian has been an adventure - I really like it, but the first time Andrew had it here he almost threw up! (Word of advice: to get used to it, start off by eating it frozen.....that tones it down a little bit!). And jackfruit! We bought a huge 10 lb jackfruit and have been waiting all week for it to "get old" and smell good - then it's ready to eat. Last night it was finally ready and we were able to hack into it's spiny skin and eat all the goodness inside!! The 4 of us ate quite a bit, but there was still a bunch left over for later.
The inside of a dragon fruit
Our huge jackfruit
Cutting it up...... it has a really sticky sap in the center that has to be removed first before it can be eaten.
Andrew's first experience with jackfruit - he thinks it tastes like banana bubble gum!
My first mangosteen - it's delicate, milky flesh is extremely delectable!
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