There was a slight delay in this week's posting as we'd been in Bangkok for the last 10 days and have just returned. The ALMA Marriage Encounter Weekend was very hard at times but our marriage is much stronger as a result of the weekend. We thought our youngest son would struggle with Rich's parent's looking after him for the weekend but it was our eldest who really had a hard time and was very despondent. Coming back to Lopburi, we were hit by the heat. It is getting so HOT here. It is good to be back home.

Build It Up

All those hours of Play School has left its mark on our eldest.

Earning his Keep

We thought that it was about time our 1 y.o earn his keep in our family.

Lopburi Post Office Spirit House

This is a photo of the front of our local post office. Many of the packages sent to this postoffice have 'disappear' more often than not (so please send packages to Bangkok and not here!). There is a large phot of the king of Thailand on the right which is typical of most public buildings in Thailand.
Also at the front of nearly every building in Thailand is the spirit house. It is believed that you must offer food and prayers to this spirit house so that the spirits do not get angered and bring bad luck to the property.

Medical Care in Thailand

The boys were sick again last week and this meant another trip to the local medical clinic. Medical care in Thailand is a bit different to that in Australia. First, they don't have appointments so it is first in first served at the clinic. Most clinics in Lopburi open only after 5:30pm because during the day the doctors work at the local hospital and then open their clinics to make more money. So we went with the boys to the clinic at 5:20pm and generally there are at least 3 other people waiting near the entrance. This clinic is popular because the lady doctor is a paeditrician. By the time the clinic opens (around 5:30pm) there are usually around 5 children waiting and their parents. When the door opens it is a rush to the pad of paper where you put your child's name and wieght on and this determines the order the children are seen. You don't pay for seeing the doctor but only the medicines she prescribes. So our youngest came out with 4 bottles of medicines for his bronchitis. An antibotic, a mucolytic, ventolin and panadol. This was about 160 baht or just over $5! At least the medical care is very cheap. Also, all the pharmacies sell all types of medicine without a prescription. So when we spilled a bit of the antibotic and needed some more the chemist was happy to just give us another bottle.

Thai bible

I recently purchased a Thai-English Bible which I took to church for the first time today. Surprisingly, I could understand more than I thought I would. These last two weeks I have been studying the Christian Communications module at the language school, learning how to pray and lead church meetings in Thai. Today at church, I could comprehend so much more of the prayers and what was going on in the service. Praise God!

Thai style hair cuts

The boys were taken to the local barber about 30 metres from our house and given a Thai style boy's hair cut. Temperatures in Lopburi are starting to increase, so we hope the boys appreciate the cool change.

Holiday pics 2

Gives new meaning to living out of a suitcase. The boys are so full of life and energy!

Home church visit

Our minister and elder from our home church in Sydney visited us for the last 2 days. It was so encouraging for us to spend time with them and pray together. They had a chance to experience an array of Thai food, sit in on one of my language classes, feed some monkeys and see how we were doing here in Lopburi. They left tonight to go on to Chiang Dao to investigate opportunities for partnership amongst the Lisu tribal group.

dRats

Before. Food in the middle. Glue surrounding it.

After - 5 very stuck rats

Lately we've been discovering holes in our bread bag with slices of bread half eaten, nibbles off our apples and chunks out of our bananas which are left on top of our cupboard. We'd seen glimpses of mice or rats in our house a couple of times so we were certain of our culprits. I'd heard Thais using some sticky glue like substance on boards to catch such vermin from my father-in-law when he used to live in Thailand. So I went to the hardware store and advised him that I had rats in my house, do you have that you can catch rats with and sure enough he took me to the part of shop with a tin of rat glue and plastic dish to put it on.
I thought there was perhaps one or two rats at moments. I laid the dish out overnight and this morning I was horrified to see 5 rats stuck to the board which was under the cupboard. One more rat was caught upstairs in the boy's room.
As Buddhists, most Thais will not kill any animals, even rats. The glue gets around this problem because they are not technically the ones killing the animals. They'll starve to death because they are stuck to the board, but their conscience is clear because they didn't kill it. It starved. A bit arbitrary some might argue in the West.
How do you get rid of a snake if it is in your building? You catch the snake and then tie it by its tail from the ceiling and then let it starve to death.