Today was orphanage day. After a rude awakening this morning, and having to make a conscious decision to open my eyes despite only five hrs of sleep, we were on our way out. We spent a good half hour holding babies and toddlers, swinging them around and playing and laughing. They were so eager to smile at us. As far as I could tell, there were three new babies for a total of eight. I think we would have been content to stay in there all day if there weren't other kids to see. We were hoping to see a bunch of the school age kids but couldn't today, for some reason they were out. We were able to see the rest of them though. Some of them actually recognized me (without Sara, amazingly) which was so wonderful. We pulled out our goodies and the usual chaos erupted. We did our best to manage and help them share, but without completely speaking their language it was kind of up to them to figure it out among themselves. The biggest hits this time were nail polish for the older girls, and long balloons made into anything you could imagine--compliments of Donna! By the end of the day, most of them we wearing hats or bracelets or holding dogs or swords, all made out of balloons. If one of them popped or broke, one of the girls would snatch it up, cut off the bad end, and blow it up again. She's definitely gotten the hang of reusing and recycling. We broke for lunch, and grabbed a bite to eat at a nearby restaurant. Our driver ate with us, and I just have to say that everything about that meal was good for my soul. I talked a little with the driver who only speaks Chinese, struggled through basic topics as best I could. I am not usually one for small talk but, somehow doing it in Chinese makes it so much more fun. And the food... How I have missed Chinese food. We even got to order my favorite dish, tu dou si. Yum. After killing some time post lunch, we returned to the orph once nap time was over. The chaos of the morning was definitely absent in the afternoon, which was so so great. It enabled us to spend a lot more quality time actually playing with kids. Some of the boys became totally entranced when Donna started coloring tie dye fireworks, and they wanted to pose for the camera with each one when it was finished. I got to spend some bonding time with Ezra (he needs a family!) playing clapping games. Jackson (he also needs a family!) and I played Rock Paper Scissors, and it turns out he is a fantastic artist! I also spent some time with Miles, who has some sort of developmental delay (seems to be some autistic tendencies in my opinion), getting to know him. I discovered he has a great laugh! I had never heard him make a sound before today, in any of my visits previously. To be fair, today was also the first time I tried tickling him. One boy kept trying to do silly things with my hands, like high fives and fist bumps, so I decided to try something: you know that silly little saying that starts out, "Hey, my name is Chubby..." and you make your face chubby the whole time while you're telling it? Ok, if you don't, that probably sounds ridiculous. But trust me, kids love it. I use it all the time. I tried to translate it into Chinese today... It kind of tanked because I ended up just saying, "Hey, my name is Fat..." and the kids kept laughing at my silly vocabulary. But, at least they laughed. That was the point anyway, right? All in all a great day. Orphanage days are always a great reminder to me of why I do what I do. They make all the hard work so worth it.
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Today is our last full day in Thailand! Tomorrow we head to the airport and fly on to China.
Our seven weeks here have been sweet, chock full of learning and growth. We are ready to move on from this season, but sad to leave all our friends. We've gone pretty deep with the people here, and it is always hard to part with people that have laughed and cried and grown together. But, all good things must come to an end. We will be traveling basically all day tomorrow. We leave the house at 9am tomorrow, drive to the airport in Bangkok, then fly out at 3pm, from Bangkok to Sichuan, with a layover in Hong Kong. We won't make it to our destination until almost midnight. It's gonna be a long day... The very next morning, we are going to the orphanage! Please be lifting us up as Donna and I go spend the day with the wonderful children. Sara will not be with us, so it will be interesting communicating with the driver and the director as far as plans and details. But we are excited, nonetheless. We will hopefully get some great stories and pictures to share with you! We'll have three more days after that, for a total of four full days in Sichuan. It's gonna be crazy fast and a whirlwind of stuff going on. Sara and I have lots to talk about... I haven't seen her since May! I'm very excited to be reunited with my dear friend and co-director. Again, please be lifting the two of us up as we catch up and discuss lots of things, all in the two days she will be in town with us. We also have a meeting at CRDF, our umbrella organization, if you would like to be lifting that up as well. Lots of people to see, places to go! Literally. I'll write again when we get there! |
A note from Rebekah...If you've ever wondered what it would be like to start a nonprofit from the ground up, to open a home for ORPHANS with special needs in Asia, you've come to the right place. Archives
August 2019
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