Friday, July 16, 2010

looking back - June 14

Journal entry from June 14

What I see sitting here in front of our hotel - 3 Seasons Hotel Yangon
- a green iron fence and gate beyond the potted plants that give protective feeling and greenery in this concrete jungle.
- apartment buildings
- an Internet cafe on the lower floor
- a little boy playing naked on his balcony across the street 4 stories up
- mothers walking their children to school, they are under their umbrellas
- people walking by, many people
- the hotel manager welcomes someone at the gate
- Joelle and Seraya playing under their umbrellas
- a woman on the seventh floor of the apartment building across from me lowers something on a line to the street below. Looks like all the balconies have a string/rope to lower items to the street
- laundry hanging out to dry on many balconies
- 2 dogs fighting in the street
- taxis and vans and lorries and trucks and all kinds of compact vehicles pass by
- it has been one hour and no one has collected the item that the woman lowered
- a man on a trishaw passes by

One hotel butler with great service. They were all good but Ed like to make our life fun.

The grandmother of the hotel was thrilled with the girls but could only speak Burmese. Staying at the 3 seasons is staying as close to the people as you can, it's a small hotel, a family feel.

The front patio area was a nice place to relax and watch Myanmar go by.

Buddist monks walked by every morning, collecting their food offering for the day.


Our room had 4 beds and big bathroom, even enough room to hang a wash line. We stayed in this hotel for 2 weeks.

Ed, our hotel butler took the girls on a trishaw ride on a few special evenings.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Let the Pictures Begin

We flew on this plane.We were this excited!
And this excited about the food.
But the kids of Burma are the best part.

Monday, July 12, 2010

Looking Back

Hey a big hello and thanks to all of you who have been following along for the past month or so. Thanks for all the prayers you prayed and times you cried or celebrated with us as we experienced so many things. Now that I am back in Canada I want to back track a little and write some stories from my journal that I could not write while we were in Myanmar and Thailand, or didn't have time to write. I also hope the kids will let me write some things they wrote in their journals, as a way of sharing the trip from another point of view. I also hope to start putting up a few pictures, maybe video clips as well. So check back soon for journal entries and pictures.
This week we are with Ben's family in Langley while Ben does homework from his class he took before we left Altona.

Prayer requests
- That we would find a good video editing program for our video we captured and that as we prepare for sharing opportunities about our trip, that we would do so to the glory of God.
- Ben be efficient with his time for Homework, and that he can actually do it, without getting too distracted by the rest of us having fun:)

Answers to Prayer
- Ben is feeling well
- we all adjusted back to Canada time

How I'm feeling
- Happy for the kids to play with their cousins
- cold (I'm used to the heat now and 24 feels cool)

Thursday, July 08, 2010

Our last day in Asia

We leave Bangkok tomorrow.
We are sad and happy to leave.
Happy to arrive back in Canada and be with family again.

Prayer requests:
- that we get over jetlag quickly
- (Ben feels he is comnig down with something)-that this will be nothing, just tired

Praise
- Our time at the camp was a real blessing
- we rode an elephant
- God showed us so many wonderful things and blessed us with so many new friends

How I am feeling
- hot, smelly, ready for some new clothing choices and no more washing laundry in the sink
- Extremely happy to have experienced so much and been so blessed to be able to do this.

Monday, July 05, 2010

Bamboo Hut

Here we are in our bamboo hut. Just like I always imagined jungle missionaries living. Except I can hardly believe I can use the internet here. We are in an open air hut and lots of animals and people around, even running around under the hut. We have met a few people just randomly but most people are too shy to meet us they just smile from a distance because they do not speak English. There are two teachers from the Bible school that speak English and they have been taking us around and visiting with us. The stories here are amazing and often tragic. The people have a lot of sorrow but you know what the one thing we keep on hearing is singing, everyone sings. They start at 5:30 and go until 9 pm. Actually at this moment it is quiet because all the students are in class but I am sure the singing will start up again soon. We have not been wandering the camp because we were told no to, so we have only been here at the school and we went to church yesterday, where Ben did give a short message. This morning we managed to engage some children in playing with some small airplanes we brought along, and we have also been able to invite a few passer-byers into our hut for a visit. We had been waiting for a man we were told to wait for and we finnally spoke to him this morning. We were not sure what the plan would be for the next few days, so Ben was only asked this morning to teach and so he has had about 1/2 hour now to prepare what he will teach and he is not even sure how long yet...maybe up to 4 hours. We are just going with the flow of the Spirit, like we planned. They always say the motto of the pastor is "Be ready to preach, pray, or die." So here he has to live by it, though we have no intentions of the die part. It is actually very safe, except for maybe the bugs, we have sprayed a lot of insect repellant onto our skin in the past few days to be sure we do not get bit by a malaria or denge fever mozzi. So we will be protected from bugs but I'm not sure about the brain tumour we'll get from the chemicals.. Oh well if one thing won't kill you another thing will. We leave here tomorrow I think and will find our way back to the airport in Bangkok for our flight back to Canada on Friday. The adventure of the Klassen's is almost over.