English teaching opportunities galore

Since we've been back there have been plenty of new opportunities to teach English in Lampang.  I've started to teach at a local tutoring school for highschoolers (photo above).  The co-owner of the academy (Golf) I've known since our first months in Lampang.  For part of the lesson I'm using the "Big Picture Story Bible" and reading one of the stories with comprehension questions afterward.  With over 50 students it's hard to teach conversational English.  I'm teaching there again this afternoon.  A woman went to Golf this week asking if he was able to help her son prepare for an interview for an American Foundation in Thailand which gives Thai students a chance to study and travel overseas.  So Golf directed her to me.  So this week I'm helping this woman's son with interview skills.  Also, I was contacted by a couple who run a fruit drink shop, whether we could help at another tutoring academy which had just opened.     

Obviously, we can't take up all these opportunities, but they have been a way of making new contacts and hopefully through them we can find people who are seeking Christ.  It does show that more and more people know about us now than before.

However, if we had some short-terms staying for an extended period of time, they could take up these opportunities and our team for other opportunities.

Our son's first romantic card

When I checked my eldest son's school bag today I found this card inside.  Our son's first romantic card from a girl in his class (who apparently is his best friend).  O.k. she spelt his name wrong, but English isn't her first language.   Even at such a young age she knew that in matters of love it is best to write in his own heart language.

 

We've been amazed at our son's ability to adapt to change.  He has been in 4 different schools in the last 2 years.  Yet every time he has adjusted and made friends so easily, even when he can't speak the language.  He has such a good attitude.  Last week I saw him taking one of The Lighthouse flyers off the top of the cabinet and I asked him what he was doing.   He replied that he wanted to give the flyers to his friends at school so that they could come and learn about Jesus at The Lighthouse.  Wow! 

Although our eldest son can breeze through change our other two children have found it more difficult.  Our middle son still cries everyday when we drop him off at school and have to leave him.  We hope he settles soon.

Mistakes you make living cross culturally

When our son was chosen by his teacher to be the class representative for the upcoming Teacher's day at school  last week we didn't think much about it.  We just thought it involved giving a 'wai' (A Thai greeting where you put your hands together like when you pray) to the teacher.  The teacher asked us to buy some things which we didn't know the meaning but we were going to ask our neighbours to help so no big deal.  However, today talking to our househelper, who is a Christian, she explained that what our son will be doing is part of a Buddhist ceremony and not only will he have to "wai" the teacher, but a monk as well.

If we had known earlier we would have told the teachers that we were Christians and that because of our beliefs it is not appropriate for our son participate in Buddhist rituals.  However, he and the other representatives from the other classes have been practicing what they are to do in this ceremony for the last few days.  Teacher's day is tomorrow, so it is too late to replace our son with someone else.

It raises difficult questions as to what is cultural and what is religious in Thai society?  The 'wai' is so much a part of Thai society that to not 'wai' someone would be quite rude.  However, does a 'wai' to a monk make it something different?  Is that idoltory? 

We want to convery the message that we respect Buddhism and Buddhist, yet there are somethings we as Christians cannot do as it is dishonoring of God.  Making these choices as a newish missionary is so hard as you don't understand the culture nor can you probably seek clarification as our language is yet inadequate.

Why aren't they following the Bible?

This was in a recent prayerletter from a missionary working in another country ...

"6 months after becoming a Christian Mrs E went with a friend to her church. She enjoyed the preaching but thought the praying was strange. First, they all prayed out loud together. She felt like she didn’t have anything to say and couldn’t concentrate and so kept quiet but felt foolish. She didn’t want to just pretend and make a noise. Then the pastor and others were speaking gibberish. She wondered if it was English? She said it made her most uncomfortable. She was there for communion but was told it was only for baptised people. She was also told that if she wasn’t baptised then she wasn’t yet a Christian. She felt rejected by the very people who ought to feel most like her family. She said if she hadn’t loved Jesus she would never have visited that church again. I now have to spend my time explaining the church to her! She often asks, “ but why aren’t they following the Bible?" It's hard to explain!"

Makes you almost want to cry or bang your head against the wall.

It's arrived - finally!

Today was a joyous day.  Our homeschooling boxes from the US arrived.  We'd thought they'd never come. We'd be following the boxes journey from the US starting 24 May on the Fedex tracking system. Each day we'd check with interest where our boxes were that day.   It traveled to Canada, then China and finally to Thailand on 29 May.  It looked it was going to make the estimated delivery date of 31 May.  But then there was a dreaded "clearance delay".  Our boxes were held up in customs again and we were fearing the worst.  Googling Fedex clearance delays in Thailand, there were some horror stories of exorbitant duties being charged and how bad Fedex was.  Well on Friday, after almost a week our home schooling boxes cleared customs.  They reached Chiang Mai Saturday morning and they were on a Fedex delievery van.  This was it we thought.  However, by Saturday evening nothing.  There was an update on the tracking system - "delivery exception - Business closed.  No delivery attempt" and the package was back in Chiang Mai!  What!  Another let down.  I doubt that they even came.  We were home for a large part of the day and my mobile was switched on.

Anyway, today our Sonlight homeschooling boxes arrived.  I had to go out and meet the Fedex van at the petrol station because he had no idea how to get to our house, even with our househelper explaining in Thai.  I didn't even mind paying the extra 1,200 baht "clearance charge".  We got the boxes!  So the home schooling journey can now begin.

Happy faces

I also extended my motor bike license today and it only took about 10 minutes!  Thanks Peter and Karl for your suggestions about using the address on my work permit.  It worked at the transport office at Big C.  PTL for days like today when things go well.

Sleepless ideas for making new contacts

I couldn’t sleep one night last week.  Perhaps it was because my mind was racing with new ideas about how I can make new contacts here in Lampang.  Here are the ideas which we popping into my head sometime from midnight to 2am.

1. I could try to find a Buddhist monk to meet us with.  I’ll ask him to teach me about Buddhism in Thai.  That way I can improve my Thai as well have an opportunity to talk about Buddhism and Christianity.  Last week at church, I heard a testimony from a Buddhist monk who had converted to Christianity in the last two years.  Last year I’d seen this monk all robed up coming to church and I’d wonder what he was doing there.  Maybe he could introduce me to one of his more open monk friends

2. Go to the local universities and offer to lecture a subject in Christian History or an Introduction to the Bible.  I would have to teach in English as my Thai is not good enough yet.  But maybe it could be parts of an arts or philosophy or those majoring in English.

3. Go to some of the bigger private schools in Lampang and ask the head of English department if they want me to meet one on one with some of their Thai English teachers to improve their conversational English or pronunciation.  1 hour a week.  That would undoubtedly lead to questions about life and deeper questions.

4. Ask my friend who runs a tutoring school whether he has friends or students who want to keep up their English and offer to meet up with them one on one.

5. Try to find students or Thais wanting to study in Australia and run a course to help improve their English or help them in the process.

I have no idea if any of these ideas will work but over the next few weeks I’ll try some of them if I don’t lose my nerve.

Pulling my hair out

I went to the transport department in Lampang again today to try to renew my motorbike license which had expired while in Australia.  I was there yesterday and they said that I needed a medical certificate before they could renew it.  So I went to the hospital, wait and hour and got the medical certificate.  Today, they advised me that the statuary declaration of my place of residence which I had completed at the Australia embassy in Bangkok last year was only valid for 1 year and therefore 3 months out of date.  I had to get a new one.  That means I either have to drive 6 hours to Bangkok or fly there and then pay another AU$50 to get a new statuary declaration.  It is extremely inconvenient.  I'll nearly pulling my hair out with all the bureaucracy I have to go through to just get simple things done.

Oh by the way, she said, your medical certificate only lasts 30 days.  I don't think I'll get to the embassy within the next 30 days, which will mean another trip to the hospital to get a new medical certificate.  I guess I should be thankful that she at least told me in advance and not when I went back there. 

Personal effects stuck in customs

We had boxes sent from Australia with mostly used clothes, toys and homeschooling material.  Personal items brought to Thailand are legally free from customs duty if I have a work permit (which I do) but the customs department at the airport are asking for THB 25,000 (AU$923) as customs and other charges to clear the items.  All the items in the boxes combined are probably not worth that much.  It is so unreasonable.

But we are in a bind.  It has cost AU$600 to send the boxes to Thailand.  Some foreigners in this situation have basically told customs that they can keep the boxes and they'll just buy everything new, after which customs have dramatically reduced the fee. 

But our son's school shoes are in the boxes which we needed last week as well as personal things which we'd really like as soon as possible.  It's got me so angry and I'm normally a pretty calm guy. We are trying to negotiate with customs now.  But everyday that passes they levy a storage cost for the boxes.

House hunting Thai Style

Apart from some "farang" (foreigner) exclusive suburbs in Bangkok or Chiang Mai there are no real estate agents in Thailand.  So when you are looking for a house you have one of two options.  You start driving around town for signs like this one above.  I've spent hours doing this without much luck.

The other option is to ask your friends if they know of any houses for rent.  Well, after giving up on the first option, we've been asking many of our Thai friends if they know of any houses for rent.

We haven't seen inside this house but it doesn't look much bigger than our house.  We may see it tomorrow. It is in a good location though.  The problem with our current house is that it is:-
1. A neighbour's dangerous pit bull escapes once in a while, viciously biting people or killing other animals.
2. Noisy schizophrenic who keeps us up at night (though our neighbours haven't seen him/her for a couple of months now)
3. There are so many dogs living in our and surround streets that at night when one sets them off, they all start barking disturbing our sleep.
4. The house gets extremely hot as there are no shady trees and because of the way it is built.  Although it has a good number of rooms, in the hot seasons we can't use the rooms without air-conditioning because it is boiling.
5. Electrical wiring is terrible. The extension cord burst into flames when I tried to start the washing machine.
6. Very low water pressure, meaning that during parts of the day, the water is only trickling
7. The house is a bit small for 3 very energetic kids, especially when they can't play on the street because of the threat of the before mentioned dog.

The good thing about the house though is that we've got some good neighbours who we've become friends with.

We can put up with a lot of the above, but we are here for another 3 and half years and there is enough to deal with living cross culturally, so if we can take away some of the additional stresses we think it would be worth moving.

I liked this house at first.  However, Lisa's got much better house sense then me and she made me realise that this house is actually smaller than the one we have.

 Also, this is what the kitchen looked like.  What kitchen you ask.  Exactly.  We'd have to buy a whole new kitchen.

So the search continues.  It been so great to have our Thai friends do the hard work for us in trying to find houses and great for our relationship.  I think they feel good in being able to help us out.

How hard is it to get a rabies vaccination?

Our youngest needed a series of pre-exposure rabies vaccinations and our middle son a booster.  I first tried at a doctor's clinic two days ago but she didn't stock rabies vaccinations.  I had to go to the hospital.  So yesterday I went to the hospital.

I went to the pediatrics department where they normally do children's vaccinations. 

Nurse 1: 
Do you have your vaccination book? (No still waiting to clear customs at the airport with our other unaccompanied luggage)

Have your children been bitten by a dog? (No, they need pre-exposure vaccinations as recommended by our missions medical's director).  Fortunately I had the email from our medical adviser as well as the Rabies information sheet from the medical advisers in our mission.

Waiting, waiting, waiting.  The pediatrician finally comes.  The nurse speaks to her about us and then she directs us to the emergency department.

Nurse 2:
All the same questions as above again.

Emergency Doctor:
All the same questions again.
Also, "Why do you want them to be vaccinated?" 
(Well it's recommended by our medical adviser as well as the World Health Organization).
"Well normally in Thailand we don't give pre-exposure vaccination.  You don't really need it" 
(Our househelper was bitten by a dog in our street) 
"Ok if you really want it then we'll do it for you" (Yes, we really want it)

Nurse 3:
Fills out an appointment card.  She has made 4 further appointments, which is for a post-exposure vaccination schedule (5 shots) rather than a pre-exposure vaccination schedule (3 shots).  I toy with the idea of just leaving it and coming back at what I know are the right times but decide to try to sort things out now rather than having to go through the whole process again next week.

So, 1 and half hours later, with two tired and screaming kids I leave the hospital exhausted.

In Thailand, even thought it has a high rate of dog bites and rabies, they don't routinely give pre-exposure rabies injections probably because it is so expensive.  It costs us about 700 baht a shot (AU$23) but that is 2-3 days average wage here in Thailand.  3 shots and you are looking at a week's or more pay.  So it is not cheap for something which may or may not happen.  They are more likely to wait until they get bitten and then get 5 shots (normally paid for by the owner of the dog if there is one).

I could have got the shots done in Australia but it costs AU$100 a shot so I waited because it is much cheaper here.

Anyway, next time I'll get a letter from our mission's medical adviser requesting these vaccinations, which should avoid most of what I went through yesterday.