Wednesday - after the storm

Out of nearly 200 mission teams from our church, the "What to Bring" lists have always included "rainwear"..... until now.  The missionaries here, plus all the guidebooks said there was 0% chance of rain this time of year.  So.... I took "rainwear" off the list.  Big mistake!  Last night a huge thunderstorm came thru, with lots of thunder and lightning and strong winds.  The electricity at the hotel went out for about 2 hours early this morning.  Everyone here was shocked to see rain this time of year...but they say it also snowed for the first time ever in Vietnam last week!  The rain continued most of the day, completely throwing off all our work plans.  But we are nothing if not flexible!

We started the day by going back to Blessing Home to distribute gift bags we brought for the kids along with a Stephanie's Small Comfort blanket for each child.  But only 11 children, out of 50 showed up and we found out it was because many of their homes had been damaged by the storm.  Since we couldn't build the cement wall planned for today, we took umbrellas and walked to a couple of near by homes of some of the children where there had been damage.

I'm so glad we got to see some of the children's homes.  Pattaya is a pretty big, touristy city and and seeing the "slums", as they call them, was quite a contrast to the rest of the city where all the tourists are.  Suddenly we were on dirt, rugged roads and the homes were all made from corragated tin, wood and whatever else could be salvaged from somewhere.  Some of the homes were completely open on the side toward the street.  The wind blew some of the tin roofs off some of the homes and rain was coming into these homes.  Family members and lots of their belongings were all wet.  We wanted to help but you just couldn't get up on those roofs when they were wet.

The church van took us a little further away to another area where many of the children came from.  We went as far as we could by car and then had to get out and walk as the car couldn't get thru any further because the roads were non-existent.  We walked around for about an hour saying "sawhatika"  (hello) to all we saw.  The poverty was horrible and it was hard to imagine people living in those conditions.... especially since just several miles away was this beautiful beach vacation spot.

Everyone was home during the day because the children couldn't go to school because of the rain and the adults (many of them) are involved in the drug trade that goes on at night.  During the day they are involved in drinking, a huge problem here.  (I'm relating what the Methodist pastor was telling us).  We visited the home of little "Nat", a little girl (maybe 4 years old) who goes to Blessing HOme.  The people she lives with are not her family or relatives.  They only took her in to be a drug runner for them.  Mike and Sherri are trying to get her out of this home but it's very involved.  All of her real family are in jail.

It was an interesting morning and good for us to see where the children live.  Remarkarbly, even tho there aren't a lot of Christians here, they are looked upon very favorably.  Thais see Christians as loving, caring and compassionate and willing to put their faith into action. In wandering around town, if you try to speak Thai, you are ask if you are Christian because most of the tourists don't even try to speak their language but the Christians do.  They say we "love them enough to learn their language".

Our "ah ha" moment of the day - learning that the lines painted on the streets to divide the two sides of traffic are only suggestions!  If your lanes of traffic are all backed up, you are welcome to drive in the on-coming traffic lanes and they will just veer around you!  Not good on the heart tho!  lol