Thailand Mission and Cultural Trip 2012 - Journal 2

The entire group is here! Here are the names:

Abby Alcantara, Andrea Pedro, Danielle Diaz, Emily Franklin, Jackie Le, Jose DeLa Cruz, Kaitlynn James, Kalene Harlan, Kathrin Klemm, Kathryn Brenner, Kisna Toruno, Michael Behrens, Michelle Jansco, Pedrito Maynard-Reid, Sean Mitchell, Shawna Barnes, Silvana Wondal, Spring Townsend, and Zach Santos.

It is a large group, a fun group, and a rearing--to-go group. I’m excited! I’m glad to have Spring along and and grateful that she'll be able to drive the second van. She already is taking a lot of pressure off of me. This year the entire team of students is in one of the men’s dormitories. But the ladies have their own suite. All the rooms are air-conditioned, with two beds to a room and two rooms share a bathroom. The dorms provide linen and 2 large bottles of water daily, clean the rooms twice per week, and do daily laundry.

I was surprised to run into David and Annabelle Bell at the airport last night. After many years at Chiang Mai Adventist Academy as Director, they are returning to Canada. It was a delight to work with them on the 2005 Mission Trip and to visit there every year and spend time with the students we are sponsoring. This is the first year that I will not be able to visit CAA. So it was such a surprising delight to be able to say goodbye to them.

Today some caught up on a bit of sleep this morning, while the rest of us got about 90 minutes of shut-eye before we were up to greet the Thailand morning. Kisna and Silvana went out and got pampered with a full hour Thai massage for only $6.00! After lunch I gave the traditional orientation before all of us piled into the two vans to head to Tesco Lotus (a store similar to our super Walmart). On the way, they were overwhelmed and over-delighted to stop at a huge fruit stand area along the highway. They were like kids in a candy store. Tonight Kisna tasted durian for the first time and loved it. Thailand and the fruits reminds her so much of her native Nicaragua. After shopping a bit at the Tesco Lotus, I took them for the traditional pizza feed. What a fun time and a fun group! We ended the day at Vespers, put on by the students from Indonesia.