Earthquakes, Conference & More!

As many of you may have heard, there was a pretty big earthquake in Myanmar (a.k.a. Burma) last week. It was about a 7 on the Richter Scale in Myanmar, and by the time it went the 150 miles to Chiang Mai we felt it at about a 5. I had never experienced and earthquake before. I never thought I would experience an earthquake. When the first one hit, Damien and I were So confused. We had no idea that they have them here (come to find out they happen every 3 or 4 years) so when we felt it we didn't' know what was going on. It wasn't until we looked on a Thai forum that we realized we weren't crazy and many other people felt it. Thank God it wasn't a bad one because we did absolutely nothing to protect ourselves or the kids...you know, in all of our confusion. Since most houses here are made of cement, everyone just runs outside. The door frames are of no help. But next time we will be prepared! After the initial confusion wore off, it was actually exciting. Talking to colleagues who were just as shocked. Walking outside to see the neighbors who knew what to do and were already out there. Feeling the aftershocks. But then we started realizing that although it may not have been bad in Chiang Mai, it wasn't a little earthquake and there had to be damages and injuries where it originated. It may not have been a large-scale disaster, but still, many people lost their homes. Entire villages were destroyed. Many people died, and many more are in the hospital. These are not people who will be getting any help from their government. These are not people who have money to build a new home or pay medical bills. And because it's not a huge disaster in the eyes of the rest of the world, they will be getting very little outside help. Please pray for the people in Myanmar and Northern Thailand. Our organization put out a notice that we can share with you. Sadly, one of the churches that our Organization partners with was having a closing ceremony of a 3-day training conference when the earthquake hit and the church collapsed killing 23 and injuring about 100. Here is the statement: "On March 24 an earthquake measuring 6.8 occurred near the border of Northern Thailand and SE Myanmar. There was extensive damage on both sides of the border with over 70 known dead so far. Our team members nearest the area are shaken up but fine. In the home area of one partner organization, a church collapsed during a service and 23 were killed. Aftershocks continue to occur. Please pray for the families of those who have been killed, for the injured and for those who have lost their homes. Pray for God's healing touch on those affected by this difficult situation."

Right now we're at our yearly "group" conference. Our group consists of about over 200 people (plus kids) working in Mainland Southeast Asia. Once a year everyone comes together for a week to share what has been going on in their projects and ministries. It's a great time reflect on what God has done over the past year. Since this is our first year at conference, it's also great to meet "colleagues" that we have heard of but never met in person. While we're in meetings all day, the kid are in a super great VBS program put on by a group of people who have come from the US just to minister to us during our conference. I have to say, it's sort of strange being on this end of a missions trip. We're usually the ones going, not the ones where people are coming on their own missions trip to minister to us. Our meetings today went from 8:30 until 5:30, so they took great care of our kids the entire day! And we still have 5 more days of this. :-) Sora didn't love it, but she survived. And the best part about conference - watching Orin and Miciah connect with special friends who they LOVE! One little boy, Adon, who Orin was friends with in Dallas is here. They were on furlough two year ago while we were assigned to Dallas. It was so hard for Orin when they left and it was so exciting to know that when we moved here we'd see him every so often. And then there is Jonas. He is a little boy from CLI (the training we had in October when we first moved here). He is 8 and the boys fell in love with him. It's so great to see them running around having so much fun. Socially, things have been hard for Orin at school. Much of it because he starting half-way through the year. I haven't seen him so relaxed in months and it's great to see!

Here are a few more random things I've been thinking about lately:

Speaking Thai is hard. Understanding Thai is hard. Speaking & Understand Thai on the phone is even harder. But worst of all, is being woken up from the dead of sleep early in the morning and trying to talk on the phone in Thai. I still can't really do it. My Thai is not that great even in person. But the other morning someone called (waking us up) to say they were coming to install our Internet. This is about how the conversation went: Caller: "Hello, we're coming install your Internet. Are you at home? We're coming at 8am." Me: "What?' (well, it's more like "Please repeat). Caller: Repeats. Me: (thinking no way I want them here at 8). "Yes, we are at home. Come at 10am." Caller: We want to come at 8am. Me: "Can you come at 10am." Ok, so this sounds like a crazy simple conversation. But it was a HUGE step for me. I actually understood and could say enough for them to say ok, they'd come at 10am! I don't really enjoy learning Thai but little successes help to motivate me to keep working at it...and someday I may speak a little better than a 3-year old!

Driving here is crazy. But in some way it's not that crazy. It just seems to work. People don't really follow driving rules. You know, things like traffic signs and lights, the fact that we have lanes and you're supposed to stay in them, etc... It really is amazing how a 2 lane road easily becomes 4 lanes throughout most of the day. There are about as many motorbikes on the road as there are cars. And I've noticed that people drive motorbikes as if they are in a car. And people drive cars as if they are in a motorbike. Motorbikes can't go as fast as cars, but for some reason people drive them as if they could. They aren't as safe as cars but they pull out into oncoming traffic without looking as if they would be ok if they got hit. And they pile their two toddlers and an infant onto their one motorbike and drive around as if they were in their family minivan! And people in cars like do things like drive in the middle of two lanes. You know, how motorbikes will drive in between a lane to pass cars. And cars will pull onto the side of the road, as if they are in a motorbike and won't actually block a lane of traffic during rush hour!

Sort of on that subject, I'm amazed at how much more lax I've become when it comes to child/car safety. In the US I would have NEVER thought about letting my kids ride in the car without being strapped in their car seats. If I drove across the parking lot without full belts on I was nervous. But something about seeing a family of 5 on a motorbike without helmets; or a woman driving a motorbike with her newborn in her arms that will mess with your perspective. We went a month with the boys just riding around in regular seats. If we're not going far I let the boys ride in the front seat (we don't have airbags). They wear their seat belts, but still, NEVER would have done before. It just makes me laugh at how I guess for me, safety has become relative in some way. And the fact that I have a car means that my kids are still 100x safer than any kid on a motorbike.

I don't know why, but about every 6 weeks I go through this anti-Thai food period. I don't know why, but suddenly just thinking about it makes me nauseous. I'm hoping this stops happening! :-)

I was recently talking to a friend here and were were discussing how much more time it takes to do things here than in the US (washing dishes without a dishwasher or hot water in our sink; line-drying all of our clothes, etc..). She said the thing that she spends the greatest amount more time doing here than in the US is pest control! Boy, that is so true. I've just come to accept the family of ants that live in our house...in our kitchen, in the stair way, in the living room. Everyone has them. It's just life. Sometimes in the kitchen I kill them...and sometimes even do a little bit of bug spray on the line of them that is coming down from the window (even though I know that 10 minutes later the line will be back). I don't even mind the geckos that we see on our walls and ceilings. Even little spiders I can deal with. But the other day I had the biggest spider I had ever seen in my sink. I actually saw it bringing food with one of its lets up to it's mouth and eating. It was as big as my hand! I literally think I used an entire bottle of bug spray. If I ever see one again (which I'm sure I will) I will seriously be looking into see if CM has an exterminator. I don't care what the cost is!

The weather has been crazy here. It's hot season and the past month has for the most part been cooler than cool season! The Thai people we know even say it's NEVER been like this before. This is supposed to be the hottest part of the year. Before it got cool, it was reaching about 104 degrees each day for a week. It's supposed to be like that all throughout March and April, but somehow, we got to skip March. When we came home from Hong Kong and we were walking from the plane to the terminal, we were seriously wondering if we had gotten on the wrong plane. Normally you can feel the heat radiating in on you, but we felt nothing. It's been great!

I think I mentioned that Orin has been getting special tutoring for his handwriting. We're so happy with how the school has approached the things he excels in as well has where he struggles. His special reading group (all of the kids in this KG group read on a 3 or 4 grade level) are reading Flat Stanly and getting to go on a special field trip around CM to take pictures of him and send them to a school in Tucson, AZ. On the other end of the spectrum, because he started half-way through the year, his handwriting was behind and one of the principles actually works with him three days a week. He has improved so much over the last three months because of it. Damien met with her recently, and we found out she's actually doing more occupational therapy with him than actual handwriting. She said she's worked with a lot of kids and she's never seen a child with such weak hands and poor motor skills. They work on strengthening and coordination skills mostly. Just that has helped his handwriting so much. It's so interesting to hear these things because it makes so much sense. He didn't start feeding himself with silverware until he was almost 4. He didn't start dressing himself until he was around that age three. And until he started this therapy he still had a really difficult time with socks. All this time we though he just didn't want to do it...but turns out it was just really hard for him because his hands just don't work.

We love garlic. Growing up in New Orleans, we ate a lot of garlic. We've lived in a lot of places and none of them cook with garlic they way we do in New Orleans. But NOLA is nothing compared to the amount of garlic used in Thai cooking. We'll be eating a chicken dish and there will be tons of huge, whole pieces of garlic all mixed in that you're supposed to eat. There are Thai dishes that are basically rice, plain chicken, and a half of a cup of whole dried garlic dumped on top. Thank goodness we like garlic!