Elephants!!

So every November in Sarin Thailand they hold an elephant festival where hundreds of elephants from all over converge in one place to have an elephant buffet and show to celebrate these animals. This year we were lucky enough to go and enjoy feeding and walking among these giant animal.

Here I am waiting for this elephant to take the cucumber.

It was impressive to be right in the middle of these giant animals walking all around you.

You can see all these elephants eating at the buffet tables filled with food for them.

Krispy

About 2 months ago the first Krispy Kreme arrived in Thailand!! Here you see a line a month after it opened. The line looked like a line for a ride at Disney snaking back a forth even going out side. The other day we were at the mall and my mother-in-law decided to stand in line while we did other things to see how long it would take and an hour later she finally got to the donuts. Needless to say the Thai's are loving the melt in your mouth goodness of the donut. I however can wait for visits to the states to get mine, I just can't be in line for an hour for a donut.

Word from a sponser

So at the school this year there has been 3 traveling commercials this one was disguised as public service teaching how to was hands but was full of product placement. The other two were not disguised at all one was a promotion for sony computers and the most recent was an unashamed plug for build a bear. It is odd to see these groups at the school shoveling their wares, but its just another one of those things here in Bangkok.

Eat meat?

So I'm not sure you can read this but we were at a vegetarian Indian restaurant the other day and in their menu they had this cool comparison between carnivores herbivore and humans. You can look at it yourself and see were we as humans might be when it comes to what we should eat. Click on the pic to make it bigger and a little easier to see.

N1H1 Holiday

So I love Asia and their reactions to the flu. Just when you thought the scare of N1H1 was over we have a few teachers come down with it and our school declares a week long break! Can you believe it we have a whole week! I feel bad for the teachers who are sick but it is pretty cool to have some days off. Well I hope you all stay healthy out there and have a happy sabbath.

My brother?

So I'm playing around with my itouch app again and I put my face into one with a little more weight and a nice mullet and I end up looking like my middle brother.

More fruit (logan)

So here is a logan, from the outside they look like mini potatoes but on the inside there is a little segmented fruit. The fruit it self has a pleasant taste but the seeds inside are bad and bitter. The segments are so small its hard to eat around the seeds so you end up with a bad taste in your mouth or so little fruit they are not worth eating.

Nine Years!!

So yesterday Alana and I celebrated or nine year wedding anniversary! Here we are waiting for a taxi in the rain trying to get to the restaurant. Due to the rain and a bad location we were unable to catch a taxi so we had a romantic song tao ride (cramped, hot, slow) to the BTS to get to our location. After an hour we finally got to eat and the rest of the night was smooth but all of it lovely because I was with my bride. How much things change in 9 years and how time flies. I would have never thought we would be celebrating our nine year wedding anniversary on the streets of Bangkok Thailand. Though much has changed one thing hasn't, I am still married to the most wonderful woman. I thank God for such a blessing.

Plank eye

So I walked around trying to stay focused on what was right, but everywhere I went I saw sin. Everyone seemed to have issues that were clearly wrong. How come I was the only one who could see them. My neighbor has a plank in his eye as did the deacon, and also the church elder, even the pastor's eye had a plank in it. Was I the only one seeing clearly?

Then one day I looked in the mirror and to my dismay I had a plank in my eye! I dawned on me that the plank I had been seeing in others was merely my own plank. I was so busy looking at others. I thought they had the problems when it was I not them. So I looked to Jesus and again I saw a plank but this one was different. On this plank was Jesus hanging with all my faults. This plank was beautiful because it was the cross.

Before I was distracted by others instead of attracted by my Lord. I had spent so much time looking at others to notice my own plank, but more importantly to busy to bee looking at my Jesus. Once I looked to Jesus He took my plank and the plank in others eyes were now mere specks.

Lord may I be attracted by Jesus not distracted by others.

Interesting verse

So one of the biggest challenges of working in Thailand is that Buddhism is so ingrained in the culture and customs that it's hard to know how to approach some of the customs and whether or not those customs are indeed problems for God or are they just hard for me. In Thailand it seems everything is tied to something Buddhist. As a matter of fact Thai hold three things very important (these things were taught to me in a cultural class by Thai's); The King the nation and Buddhism. I have even had christian Thai's tell me that they are Buddhist Christians, they are Christian but believe in Buddhist principle (which are also Christian principles when the list them). Needless to say it is sometimes hard to know how and when and even if to approach some of these issues because they are so ingrained in the culture they have become almost one and the same and if you question whether or not they should examine the festivals or traditions they think your trying to change their culture to more western. To be honest thats hard because I don't want to make Thailand more like the western culture I want them to remain uniquely Thai but also to adopt the culture of Heaven.

Anyways while contemplating these issues I came across and interesting verse in a pretty well known story. 2 Kings 5 tells the story of Naaman a commandeer of a foreign coming to Israel to be healed of leprosy. Elisha hears about this and calls for Naaman and asked him to wash in the Jordan 7 times which Naaman does after the prodding of his servants. Most know that Naaman did this and was cured after the 7th dip and then out of gratitude tries to give Elisha gifts that Elisha does not accept. Naaman then tells Elisha he will never offer a burnt offering or sacrifice to any other God other but the Lord. Now a verse that I had never heard as part of the story verse 18 reads:

But may the Lord forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I bow there also--when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the Lord forgive your servant for this.

Elisha then tells him to go in peace. What does this mean or how does it apply? It seems to go compromise. Is Elisha being culturally sensitive? Is he allowing for Naaman's weak faith or his understanding? To be honest I'm not sure but it does give me pause to think and to realize that God is truly a God of grace and compassion. Just a little food for thought. May God bless you all.

What about Alana?

So here is Alana all dressed up in some others photos, pretty cool huh. My favorite one is the first one it makes me smile.

Jonah?

So Here is Jonah wrapped in the body of older pictures the middle one certainly is funny. Is this what the little guy might look like in the future? No one knows but its fun to see these pics.

An Old Kaiya?

So here some cool little pictures made with an itouch app. You can put a face of anyone you have a picture of into the face of an old picture. Here is Kaiya some with some interesting looks from the 60's 70's and 80's enjoy the. Soon well see some of Jonah and Alana.

Congratulation Class of 2010

So these past couple of weeks were full of graduations here and I would like to say congratulations to all the 2010 graduates but especially this little group of grads, the 2010 EIS kindergardeners. Look at how cool these little guys are in their cap and gowns that were more elaborate than my college ones. We weren't thinking of putting Kaiya in school till first grade but after seeing these cool get ups how can. we pass. Though in the second pic you can see graduating can be tiring.

Obstruction of my view

So have you ever been driving on the highway and lamented the fact that there are billboards everywhere that detract from a nice drive. I remember driving cross country a couple of times and noticing that billboards littered the landscape sometimes very nice landscape at that. Well here in Thailand things are the same but a little worse. Here is a sign that is not unlike many others here that is located off the side of the highway with nice scenery, and on top of that it is huge, easily the size of four american billboards. There a quite a few of these monstrosities all over and it is a shame that to make a few dollars companies must put these behemoths in the way of God's beautiful advertisement, nature.

Bag my drink

So here in Thailand when you order a drink off the street they sometimes put your drink in a bag as to save the bottles or cups. Here you see my first drink in a bag. It feels awkward to be carrying a bag with your drink but maybe I'll get used to it. The drink by the way is a coconut smoothie, very tasty.

Bonus Photo (EIS Songkron festival)

Songkron

So I had my first experience with the Songkron holiday here in Thailand. Not sure what it all really means however I do know there is an aspect of respect and blessings from the elders and a whole lot of water. A huge component is playing water, or just plain ol getting soaked everywhere you go. On every street there are groups of people with buckets, hoses and water guns soaking everyone who passes by. If you travel you better take a taxi, no walking or open aired transport, because they don’t care they will soak you as you drive by on the motorcycle taxi (really not that safe). They don’t care if your old, if you have a baby, are carrying groceries or if your listening to your ipod, they will get you wet if you walk by or drive by. It is a cool holiday an was nice to experience and it’s cool to see little old ladies carrying water guns on the BTS even if you get wet while going to 7eleven. Here are some photos of the EIS Songkron program.

Photo of the colorful attire at the EIS Songkron festival.

The seniors getting blessings from the teachers.

A traditional dance and colorful costumes.

Some more getting around

So here is the MRT or the subway, and boy was it crowded. You can see on the bottom right I had to basically rest the phone on someone's head to take this photo. This is the only time we have used the MRT since moving here since it goes to places we usually don't go. Just another way of getting around.

Sea of red shirts

So you might have heard of the political unrest here in Bangkok, well don't worry everything is ok for us and we are far from the real action. However a couple of weeks ago we were on our way back for the Adventist hospital where we were getting shots for the kiddies and decided to head to do a little shopping not fully realizing that shopping district was one of the rallying places of the red shirts. When we got off the water taxi we soon saw the sea of red everywhere. It was a very interesting atmosphere more street party than political party and venders everywhere selling red items, we even got Kaiya a red clapper (safe there), of course all of this was before last weekends eruptions of tempers. It should be an interesting next couple of weeks in Bangkok, but once again we are in a safe area and see nothing really in our part of town, it really is more of an inconvenience for us because some of the things we want to do are closed due to the rally. Just wanted to share our day among the reds, grace and peace to you all.

That's huge man

So look at the size of this apple, it's huge almost the size of kaiya's head!! It was really tasty too.

Not in my taxi

So here we are riding in a taxi, and this particular taxi had a sign of things not allowed in the taxi. Some might be hard to see but they are starting form the right; no smoking, no durian fruit, no drinking, no dogs, an interesting picture after that which we can assume means no getting it on, no guns, and a no goats. The no goats confused me if you can think of what it may be let me know. In other taxis we have seen no passing gas sign this was the first one with such a long list of don'ts, funny ones too.

Silly 3D glasses

So need I say more about how cool these glasses are? I think not

More Getting Around

So I've taken pics walking, on a water taxi and motorcycle taxi, and now I show you the sky train. Lots of ways to get around in Bangkok, next time taxi.

Cell phone pic: Slums

So here is a pic from a slum we were at on Saturday for a community service project we did. We had a rice drive in which we collected 1 and a half tons of rice to give out to a poorer community. Here is a pic from that place as you can see the living conditions are horrible and under that trash is water that goes under most of the dwellings in this community. Some very sad sights there but we were blessed to help and hope we blessed a few along the way.