Saturday, June 26 - Campus Team

A cereal breakfast as usual was not the case for Saturday morning. Dave was gracious enough to make pancakes for everyone which was a nice change from cereal every morning. Lee was nice enough also to finish the pancakes the girls were unable to finish. After breakfast we headed over to the church at which point we split up and the campus team stayed to decorate the building. We then headed over to the badminton courts. After a long hard battle two of our team members came out on top: Jessica got 4th and Ricky got 2nd.

Our team then went back to our apartments and were able to take very refreshing well deserved showers. We then headed back to the church for a party. The party was full of music, games, testimonies of Chantelle and a Thai person, and the national anthems of both America and Thailand. We then gave away the trophies to 1st 2nd and 3rd places and celebrated the birthday of a young Thai man by singing Happy Birthday and eating ice-cream cake. We then headed back to the apartments for debriefing and sleep. It was a great day and thanks you very much for you prayers and thoughts!

-Brittney Braaksma

Saturday June 26-Mercy Team

Hello all, I'm usually on the Campus team but on Saturday the roles were switched around as all the guys who are on Campus team went on Mercy team and of course the girls switched to Campus team from Mercy team so that they could play in the badmitton tournament. First though, the morning started off in a great way with Dave bringing us delicious chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast, another great change from cereal! After breakfast we rode on a song-taew to church and my group, all the guys, went to Mahatthai 3 to finish our concrete work and other projects. Saturday's concrete work went much faster than Fridays, many of the Thai team members helped us and members of the community also came so that the Thais became really the leaders of the project while we just filled in where needed. Also, Mr. Hendrikse and Mr. Bolkema finshed their cabinent they have been working on for the past couple days. After doing concrete from 10-4ish and completley finishing the concrete in the Sala we went back to BFL to shower and take a bit of a nap/rest time. Then we went to Futsaholic, which is a really nice outdoor soccer field complex which is roofed and has nets all around the field. It has 3 fields and is just a really nice facility to play in. We played 4 games of soccer, only winnning our first sadly but it was really fun to play against the Thais. Our strategy was to just pack it in on defense and try to keep the other teams from scoring, Lee was our goalie and I think he found his new career for the future :) Even though we didn't do too well it was loads of fun. After soccer, we went back to BFL and got some sleep after a really tiring day. I know my day is Saturday, but I have to add a litttle bit from Sunday. On Sunday, one o the foreign exchange students from our school, Sara Sornpaisarn's parents came to church with us. After church, the four seniors in our group and the Bolkemas went out to lunch with the Sornpaisarns to a really nice resteraunt where we got to try many differnt foods including Crab, Prawn, Shrimp, Jellyfish, and some famous Chinese soups, it was lots of fun trying to crack open the crabs, and really eat everything with your fingers. We now know why Sara is such a good friend, her parents are extremley nice and great people and it was so fun meeting with them. So thats pretty much it for now, see you guys in a few days!
-Nathan Hendrikse

Hey everyone! This is the team in Thailand! Sorry this blog is so late. It is Sunday night and I am going to try to remember Tuesday. We started our day with breakfast and devotions at the BFL. We then headed to the ministry center to hear two testimonies from the ladies from Napada. (Napada is a handbag ministry where ladies from the community meet everyday to make awesome Thai purses for us and others to enjoy.) After that we prepped for the VBS for the afternoon. We left for lunch at the market with Sarah and Mary. After lunch we went to Mahatthai 3 to do some more work. We painted rafters and washed roof tiles for Som-o's house. It was HARD work! Nobody complained or whined, so that was good. I think we all saw what we have that the people in Mahatthai don't and thought better than to complain. At 5:30 we went to supper at the Sala. We went to Mahatthai 1 to do our second night of VBS. It ended up being in front of a giant Buddah. After VBS we had our first experience in the night market. It was alot of fun. After the night market we went back to the BFL to go to bed.
With love from the team,
--Taylor Kappers signing out.

Friday, June 25th
This morning the whole group woke up early to make it to the church by 9:00. We met as a group with Dave and the crew for devotions and prayer. After devotions, both the campus team and the mercy team headed over to Mahathai for various projects. A small group of us went to Somo's house to help with construction on the roof and bathroom. Another group finished moving a seemingly endless hill of dirt. The last and largest group worked demolishing an old concrete patio and replacing it with a brand new concrete one. Overall, the day was hot and tiring, but by God's grace we were able to get several projects accomplished and no one was seriously injured. After our work at Mahathai we went back and freshened up in our apartments. We then headed over to the church ministry building for an English fair. Local Thais came to our 8 different stations to learn various English lessons, including telling time, learning English songs, and learning how to survive an English job interview. After the English fair some of our group went and walked through the night market. When we got back to the apartments we met for a quick debriefing of the day before bed. After that, some of the kids took the elevator to the roof of the apartments to view the night sky over Bangkok.
Thank you for your continuous prayers,
Halie

Thursday, June 24, 2010:

Sa wat dii kha! (hello) from Thailand. Today was our day away--our day of rest and adventure. The three "old" lady adult leaders, along with Mary Randolph and Jan Veldhorst, headed out on the bus, then the sky train, and arrived at the Jim Thompson House and Museum--silk manufacturing. We saw beautiful gardens, unique architecture in his home and lots of Buddhas (scary). If you would like to know more about Jim Thompson, google him. : ~ )

Next, we went to a mall in downtown Bangkok and ate lunch. We enjoyed our first Thailand Japanese cuisine experience. We let Jan do the ordering as she ordered in Thai. The food was delicious. If you would like to see a picture of our food, see Doris!

We did our very best to help the Thailand economy. We purchased souvenirs, both for ourselves and our family and friends. We got some really fun deals because we had Jan with us and she took us to her favorite shops. The owners like her so they gave us great discounts. Being Dutch, we REALLY appreciated that! If you would like to see a souvenir, see Nancy!

In the shops, we met some wonderful Thai people. They are so friendly and quiet. The women speak in such quiet voices. Needless to say, this was not enough noise to cover up the sound of Chantelle tipping over a basket full of chop sticks. If you would like to see how fast chop sticks can be picked up in a foreign country, see Chantelle!

Last but not least was an hour-long foot massage for less than $6.00 American money...aaaaahhhhhh! All five of us were treated royally from the minute we walked into the
room. We were busy talking for a few minutes but then we relaxed and all talking stopped. Hey, guys, if you would like to keep us quiet, get us gift certificates for a massage near you.

We had a fantastic day out! We joined the rest of the gang at church for a pizza party.

Blessings on your day!
Nancy, Doris, and Chantelle

Thursday, June 24 "Group 3"

Today we broke into three groups and went out to see the city. I was a part of a group with Jim H., Bret F., Ben J., Zack F., and Dave Veldhorst. We began by taking the bus and skytrain to downtown Bangkok. The air conditioning in the skytrain was the first highlight of the trip! We then walked for 5-10 minutes to the dock where we got on a boat on the Chao Phraya River which we took to a Buddhist temple containing the reclining Buddha (46 meters long)-which translates to "really big". A tour guide took us around the temple area and explained the sights. He also explained that Buddhist monks are required to obey 220+ commandments. Do you think they read all of those in church every Sunday? Next we went back up the river on the boat to the skytrain station and headed back to downtown. After finding a restaurant with American food (hamburgers and fries), we rode a tuk tuk (three-wheeled) taxi to the Bangkok Bible College and Seminary. Then we walked through downtown to a mall, where we wandered around the shops for a short while, before returning home for pizza and Pepsi. We had a wonderful time seeing an amazing city (and enjoyed some American food for a change). God has blessed us in many ways during this trip, and the day away was a real treat. Thanks to Dave and the staff for entertaining us for a day!

Myron Bolkema

Wednesday: Mercy Team

I'm sure this blog entry is totally out of order, but what can I say...I'm a busy girl these days! So here's an update on our wearabouts for Wednesday. Everyone on the mercy team went to Mahattai, which is a low-income area near the church, and worked on a few different projects. Some of us (mostly Chai, Mote, and Jay) worked on removing the old concrete from the Sala (a meeting house the mercy team uses in Mahattai); others helped to repair a roof, and some of the girls and I went to a lady’s house and helped her move a big pile of dirt. Talk about hard work! You all would have been proud of us girls hoeing and shoveling and rock-smashing! After working all afternoon, we had a delicious supper of fried chicken, sticky rice, soup, and “Thai Cucumber” aka cantaloupe. Then we had a prayer meeting in the Sala with some of the kids from the area. It was a great experience hearing prayers in Thai and English being prayed at the same time. When we were done with the meeting, we went over to the church for the “coffeehouse” event where we handed out trophies to the winning soccer teams from the tournament we sponsored the other day. The YWAM (youth with a mission) worship team played music, and we had a great time learning Thai dances, singing and praying together. We then hopped on a song taew, like usual, and went straight to bed at our apartments after the long day of work.
-liz :]