WHOOP!

Above pictures are: with a sweet couple at the leprosy village, at the Buddhist temple, the rafts we floated on, my rafting group, the hut/house we stayed in one night and lastly the elephant ride.

This past week with the Aggies here in Chiang Mai has been AMAZING!! A group of about 20 Aggies are on this trip called AFCO where they travel around doing different mission work in Asia. This is also the group Leah and I spent a week in Cambodia with. Here is a brief summary of our wonderful week with them...

Friday: Aggies arrive, yay!!

Saturday: Sports day at the waterfall with Thai students and then shopping at Night Bizarre

Sunday: We went to church at this village church, went bungee jumping with Thais and then went to this thing called "Walking Street" which is full of crafts and entertainment.

Monday: We went to a Christian leprosy village which was incredible. This village is now a rehabilitation center mainly for the elderly. We were able to sing Christian songs with many of the lepers and then we got to visit their little homes in the village. They were all such sweet people and they taught me a lot about faith and happiness. We were also able to buy lots of souvenirs at the gift store there to help support this village. After that some of us went to see a movie, The Happening (which isn’t 'happenin' by the way) and then just hung out at the zone the rest of the night.

Tuesday: We woke up and headed over to Shawn Todd’s house, one of the missionaries here, and had an amazing breakfast. We had equipping time and some alone time which was so nice to just stop in the middle of a busy week. After that we went to visit this beautiful temple and got a glimpse of the Buddhist faith. It just hurt me inside to see all of these people bowing down to the statues. I just wanted to run up and tell say, "Don’t you know that there is something so much greater than a statue to worship?" It really made me sad and just kinda shook me up. After that we headed over to Chuang Doi (another church here in Chiang Mai) and had cell group and taught English there for awhile. That night all of the Aggies, Thais and us went to see Kung Fu Panda which was HILARIOUS!!

Wednesday: We woke up and Robert had equipping time for us and the Aggies, and some more quiet time. We then went to this very cool umbrella factory where we watched the whole process of making these Asian fans and umbrellas. You can also have paintings done there, and by paintings I mean you can take anything in the world and they will paint on it for you. Tons of Aggies got their bibles painted on, and others just bought things there to paint. I plan to go back later and get some things painted myself. That night we had a talent show/ movie night at the zone. Us ACU girls decided to do a Sing Song Act about Thailand which is on my Facebook profile if you would like to check it out. It was so much fun and most of the Aggies knew what Sing Song was and LOVED our act. We then watched a very interesting Thai movie about and elephant and then went to sleep.

Thursday: We woke up and had more equipping time with Robert and the Aggies again. After that we went out in small groups and had lunch at the Payap university campus which is right next to The Zone. We passed out fliers about the Zone and invited people cell group that night. It was so much fun getting to talk to all of the Thais on campus and it was great to see so many show up that night at The Zone. We fixed dinner and had cell group at the Zone, which was awesome as usual.

Friday: We left early in the morning for our weekend rafting/elephant trip. We arrived in Chiang Rai in the afternoon and then floated down the river on a bamboo raft for 6 hours. It was the most peaceful and beautiful experience of my life. They divided us up into small raft groups and Leah and I got put with four of the biggest guys on the trip, so we were a little cramped. They are all great guys so we had TONS of fun. I loved just watching the mountains as we floated down this peaceful little river... that is an experience I will never forget. We arrived at a small Christian village late that night. They had prepared this big feast and then festivities for our visit there. They sang for us and then taught us some traditional Thai dances... it was so incredible. It was so awesome for them to share their faith to us through music and dance. That night we stayed with our raft groups in some of the small huts in the villages. So many families opened up their homes for us, and we pretty much took up their whole home. They showed such great Christian love and hospitality.

Saturday: We woke up the next morning (for me it was 4am to the sound of tons of roosters crowing) and then got back on the bamboo rafts for another 4 hours. At our next location we took 2 hour elephant rides through the mountains. Those things don't have seatbelts, so I almost went flying off the elephant several times. I was more scared on that elephant than I was Bungee jumping... no joke. It was so awesome to see this beautiful greean mountain scenery from the back of an elephant. We went to a waterfall after that and then left the Aggies to head back to Chiang Mai for church the next day.

I had so many life changing and incredible experiences that I could just ramble on and on about from this week. This was probably the most amazing week of my life and God is just healing me and allowing me to grow and change in powerful ways.