trying to find a place to live, going to my first bible study (which i reckon i understood all of about 5 %), going to various New Year parties, meeting up with various Thai friends i have previously met, spending way too much time on MSN with my new Thai friends in Korat, spending time at the orphanage and working out how i can best be helping them this year plus lots more. it's been a blast so far, and even though i don't actually start my Thai classes til tomorrow, i feel that my Thai has already improved heaps. Something to really praise God for so far.
So tomorrow kind of kicks off the formalities of my time here. I'll begin my day with my first team meeting with the Pioneers team that i'm here with, then i'll be off to school for my first Thai lesson. After only being here for a week, my weekly 'timetable' seems to be filling up pretty quickly. Monday, Wednesday & Friday mornings will be at school, Monday and Wednesday afternoon and evenings will be at the orphanage, Friday night i will have Bible Study, Saturday night i'll be heading off to music practice, then church on Sunday. There's still plenty of other things i want to do, but i think the wise thing to do for now is to hang back on committing to too much while i still try and settle in.
In the next few posts, i'll fill you in on a few more specific details of what i'll be up to this year. For this one, i'll start with an outline of what i hope to do at the orphanage. Most of my time will be spent with one of the Orphanage houses from Bethany House, but this one is called Cana House. The parents of this house, Niphon & Ratree go to the church that i will be going to (grace church). It's been awesome getting to know them better in the past week and they actually helped me to buy my bike today too which was really nice. On the days that i go over to Cana House, i'll mainly be helping the kids with their english and possibly even teaching them how to play some instruments (whatever they want to learn that i can play). For many Thai's, if they are able to speak english, it will really help them have the chance to get better jobs, so when the time comes for them to have to leave the orphanage, hopefully we can give the kids the best chance of being able to have a 'better' life.
The second thing that i hope to help the orphanage with is with a business they have just started which is a small restaurant in Chiang Mai. There are several really good reasons why it would be really good for this business venture to be successful. Firstly, it's a bit of a tent making business to help them to be able to pay the rent of their new house,
Secondly, to give the kids an opportunity to get some work experience and for those that are able, to learn some business skills that will help them in the future
Thirdly, if it is something that is successful, hopefully in the future when the kids are at an age where they need to leave the orphanage, they could provide some employment for the kids that need to leave if they want.
There are just so many opportunities to be helping the orphanage with this new restaurant as they don't really have a business plan or any ideas of what they want to. i've already got heaps of ideas of ways to help the restaurant already which i reckon would be really easy, but i need to be wise in how to go about it all.
Another opportunity that just came up today at church with 'help' with the worship team at church. I'm not sure what that means exactly to be honest. i'm sure some of it will be to help play various instruments (which would be heaps of fun), but ideally, i'd love to be sharing with them 'Why' we do sing songs and what is 'worship'? i must admit It's not something i've looked at for a while, so it would be great for those who are praying, for wisdom in what to share, and ability to be able to do it in a helpful way despite my lack of language, so hopefully not too much will be lost in translation.
For those who are praying:
- please pray for wisdom in how to best help Cana House and especially in providing advice and what i do to that will be helpful and useful for their business. Also pray that i won't be stepping on toes and doing things that are culturally inappropriate.
- pray for wisdom in what to share and 'help' the worship team with on Saturday night
- pray that this awesome townhouse that we've been looking at will come through - great location, great landlord, all essentials like fridge, stove, hot water, furniture etc for a great price. Just waiting on the landlord to get back to me
