OK, I'm really not trying to sound morbid, but in some ways I truly am feeling sad. The days keep ticking away until I return to America. And while I am excited to see family and friends again, I can tell I am already grieving the fact that I am leaving a whole lot of friends behind in Thailand, maybe to return or maybe not. I just don't know yet. I would appreciate your prayers that God would enable me to make the most of the time I have left here; also that I would be able to discern His voice regarding another term here.
So, what do these "last days" hold for me? I find I have more free time as other activities are beginning to phase out. But I am still teaching English at my apartment 3-4 nights per week, and I still teach English at The Shelter, which pretty much takes up a day in itself (2 hours to get there, 2 hours to teach and 2 hours to return home).
And I have several friends who want to take me somewhere for a weekend. In fact, this weeken I will be going to Surathani province somewhere in the south with my friend Kwan. Maybe I will have a lot of pictures to post from that trip.:)
This past Friday I finally got together with my neighbor, Dang. She took me and another of her friends to visit yet another of her friends.
Of course, almost any activity with a Thai involves eating, and sure enough, her friend Bpet had prepared a meal for us to eat at 4:00 in the afternoon! Then we went outside and explored her land, including a variety of fruit trees and plants, which of course, they wanted me to sample. I had water lily seeds (they taste like raw peas), some sort of sour fruit, and dragon fruit.
Saturday afternoon I taught my last class at Promise Baptist Church. I had told the class early on that we could eat out the last day of class, but they had forgotten, so we made plans to meet at 3:00 Sunday afternoon instead.
Since Saturday evening plans were cancelled, I was able to attend the celebration meeting in Bang Phli with the team and Thai friends. We ate a huge meal together. Then Colleen, along with Eder and Pon (a brand new believer) led us in singing Thai worship songs. Following that we split up into several groups to study a portion of Scripture together. I was blessed to be there; those meetings are special times.
When I got home about 10 pm that evening, my friend Kun called up to see if she could spend the night in my apartment because her boyfriend was having a group of his friends overnight. So I was happy to enjoy her company that evening, and the next morning she brought me breakfast--corn flakes covered with tuna salad. That was a first! But it was tasty.
Sunday afternon I met my English class as planned. We went to a restaurant called "Somtam Dontrii", meaning papaya salad music, or something like that. It was a very nice place surrounded with lush greenery and some parrots (both fake and real:). The food was AWESOME; we had fried fish, several kinds of papaya salad, grilled pork, tom yam gung (a popular Thai shrimp/coconut milk soup), and "jelly" for dessert. "Jelly" is actually jello, but this particular jelly was sweetened, jelled coconut milk. YUMMMM!
After the meal I handed out certificates outside, and we took pictures together.
After I came home Sunday evening, Gop came up to read from his English book for an hour or so. His mom had given me bamii giaw to eat for supper, but as I wasn't hungry, I offered it to Gop. We ended up eating it together.:) Then he played games on the internet till almost 9:00, when I had asked him to leave.
However, as he was on his way out, I showed him my game of 4 stars (Connect 4), and then he wanted to play a few games. So we sat on the floor and played 4 stars until his brother Lak called for him to come down. :)
Thus ended my Sunday.
