Village Home Stay

The past week and a half I have been working with a ministry here in Chiang Mai called Lighthouse In Action.  I highly encourage you to watch this video to see what I am involved with here.



I have been mostly involved with the slum ministry and bar ministry, which I will write about in another post soon.  However, I had the amazing opportunity of going out to a rural village two hours outside Chiang Mai to stay with a local family and help them in their everyday life.  Myself and two others from our team excitedly volunteered and went out, ready for adventure!  We had a translator come along named Pi Bing, who we had the pleasure of getting to know throughout the trip!  (In Thailand you say "Pi" in front of people's names, especially older ones, as a sign of respect.)  She is hilarious and kind and I feel so blessed that she was able to come with us!

The family we stayed with consisted of a married couple, Pi Ci and Pi Aaron and their two children, along with the six children they have taken in. These children are either orphans or in less-than-ideal home situations and their parents allowed them to come and live with Pi Ci and Pi Aaron. The kids come from a neighboring hill tribe, where pimps often frequent to buy children and women to prostitute them out in the city. The parents often consent as it is a source of income that is greater at times than the work they are doing in the village. Pi Ci and Pi Aaron (as well as Abba House and a few other "safe houses" in Thailand) are doing what they can in their power to prevent that from happening. They developed relationships with the parents of these children that were "at risk" and are bringing them up in a safe, christian home, with the hopes that these children can learn valuable skills and grow up to become not only good citizens but also Godly influences wherever they go. Pi Ci hopes that when they are adults they will want to return to their village and reach out to others that have been in similar situations.

During our time there, we mostly played games with the children, loved them, taught them English, and helped with homework.  I have been developing such a heart for the orphans of this world and children that are mistreated, and I absolutely LOVED getting to know these kids for this short time.  We went to a nearby creek and hot spring with the kids on Saturday and it was a blast, as well!  These children welcomed us from the start and their joy was contagious!  You can tell that they are now safe and loved.

We also worked in the rice fields for a day with the villagers.  It was an incredible experience that I will never forget!  I can't say that we're very good rice farmers, but I think they appreciated our help, or at least our comedic relief.  I can't even count how many times I heard the word "falang" (foreigner) interspersed with laughter, but we were certainly laughing as well.  At one point, I saw a spider the size of a quarter crawl into my pant leg and I screamed like a little girl as I did a whimsical sort of shake dance.  That certainly got a lot of laughs, but hey, it was going into my pants!  What's a girl to do?

Me, at the end of a day's work in the rice fields

Working in the fields also gave me a more personal understanding of how this work is difficult, which is why some see prostitution as better work with more pay.  The goal of Lighthouse in having this opportunity for us is so that we can positively influence these families in rural settings to seek other options instead of allowing their children or themselves (either knowingly or unknowingly) to enter into prostitution.  We work alongside them so that we can build relationships and help out as much as we can.  We definitely learned a lot and had a good time doing it!

I am so thankful for this opportunity and I miss these kids SO much already!