ADRA

I headed to be the receiver once again this morning.  The teacher, Ohng, was reviewing with Leah the supine position for hand, head, face and stomach.  I always try to remember everything so I can do it later on my family if we ever have an opportunity to do so before I forget.  Towards the end of this mornings lesson Ohng, invited Leah and my family to eat lunch with her.  She would cook for us.  That was so sweet, but today would not work because Laren had scheduled an appointment to go out to  ADRA (Adventist Development and Relief Agency).  She said no problem she would fix us lunch tomorrow, vegetarian, after we had told her we were vegetarians.

Chiang Mai SDA Church

As soon as I could get ready after massage, Laren and I left to walk to the Adventist church where one of the ADRA workers was to met us and drive us out to the ADRA office. The church is about a 15-20 minute walk along a busy one-way street.  Many of the people here wear face masks due to the high pollution with all the car/motorcycle exhaust fumes in the air.

We made it with 10 minutes to spare before or appointed meeting time, in fact the appointed time came and went. Finally we connected and away we went on highway 108.  It seemed complicated so we were glad to not have to try to figure out how to tell a song tau or Tuk Tuk driver how to get there since we didn't know ourselves.

ADRA Office in Chiang Mai

We meet with Thomas Benton who is the program director for Thailand ADRA. We are seriously trying to gather all the information we can to help us in the work that needs to be done at Sunshine Orchard Children's Home and Learning Center.  We talked about budget, courses, hiring teachers, connecting with ADRA when they did training sessions at the various refugee camps, etc, etc.  He kindly said he would email more info to us and will connect us to another person who is more directly involved in some areas that we need more info in.  What a blessing this meeting was and how it will help us with the vocational training program we are needing to implement.  It wasn't as helpful for Laren, as ADRA does very little agriculture programs at this time here in Thailand.  I am very grateful for their unselfishness in sharing info and resources with us.  It is another answer to prayer.

After we were done with our appointment, Thomas took us to a nearby restaurant where the lady spoke some English and we could get some vegetarian food.  We had not had time to eat before we came so were rather hungry by 3:30pm.  This was a typical "rustic" eating place and sure enough we asked her what our options were and she started listing off different dishes she could make vegetarian.  It was a one woman show, she did everything, waitress, cook, dishes and taking the money.  Laren told her to make the food just a "little" spicy.  Oops, that was a mistake,  A "little" spicy is to spicy for me.  It was really good flavor, a kind of noodle soup, but my nose started running and eyes watering.  I ordered some rice to help decrease the hot a bit.  It did help so I was able to eat it all.  The total cost for lunch was only 70 baht, or $2.10. Lower costs for things is another real blessing especially to volunteer workers like us :)

Traffic on the roads

We had to walk a bit of a distance to get back to highway 108 where we could get another Song Tau to go back to our room and the kids, probably about 1/2 a mile in distance.  It took only a couple of minutes to catch our ride back to the mote area where we are staying.  Once there we had some more walking to do.  We walk a lot for 2 reasons: 1) It is good exercise and 2) It doesn't cost anything so it preserves the money we have.  Laren and I looked for a bookstore that the Rawlings had told us about to look for a bird book.  Studying birds is part of our homeschooling and we needed something to identify the birds we have and would see.  We found the bookstore (after quite a bit of a jaunt), and we found a bird book!  Now we are ready to identify all the beautiful birds that we have been seeing!

Finally, we were back.  It was a good day, but busy and tomorrow we were planning to leave early to meet the Rawlings to take a song tau out to Chiang Mai Academy and see Pastor Phamor's gardens and greenhouses.  We had to leave early so we could get back in time to eat lunch with the owners of the guesthouse or motel where we are staying.

Being a friend, not just saying you want to be a friend, is the key to establishing relationships. Thank you, Lord, for all these opportunities that you give us to grow and learn.