Thailand

Wow. It's actually over. It feels so surreal that this day is actually here. I have been waiting for it for so long but now that it's finally the day that we leave Thailand, I don't want to go! Soon I will have to say goodbye to all of the amazing, wonderful friends that I have made on my DTS which makes me want to cry! But I am excited to come home and see my family and the awesome friends I have back in Chicago. I also get to visit Eric and Sam and my nephew Cole in Virginia which I'm stoked about! That makes coming home a lot easier.

Anyways, now I will tell you about Thailand. Thailand has been an amazing adventure! I have loved everyday that I have been here and I would definitely come back if I ever get the chance. It is completely different from Nepal, the people, the climate, the culture, the food, everything. It's probably good that I went to Nepal before I came here though because I'm sure I would not have appreciated Thailand as much as I have if I had come right from the comforts of Australia or America. But getting off the plane in Bangkok was awesome. As I walked outside it almost felt like I was in Florida, there were palm trees and nice buildings and streets with street lamps! And there were lots of nice cars and taxis that DIDN'T honk every five seconds. That was such a relief. We spent two days in Bangkok at the YWAM base for orientation and for a little adjustment to the Thai culture. And after two days we took a bus to Chaing Rai. I was a little nervous when I heard that we were taking a bus because I knew it was a 10 hour drive and I knew what those were like in Nepal so I was worried it might be the same here in Thailand, but let me tell you, it was not. The bus was nicer than any airplane I've ever been on; it had massage chairs that reclined almost all the way, and leg rests, we had personal tvs and even refreshments, it was incredible. 

In Chiang Rai we stayed in a children's home that housed 10 kids. The kids would come there to go to school in Chiang Rai and to be taught about God's word and taught how to be disciplined. It was cool to see their passion for The Lord, every morning they would wake up at 5:30 and have some worship and prayer before they started their morning chores. They were so much fun to get to know and to play games with, they loved when we taught them new games and were so willing to learn everything they could from us. While we were there we didn't do that much ministry, we stayed at the children's home the entire time and helped them with whatever they needed. We finished putting concrete on their driveway and we painted ceiling tiles and we painted a lot of rooms in one of their buildings. We also took turns to help cook lunch and dinner. The food that we got at the children's home was the best food that I've had during my entire time on DTS. Everyday we had eggs and chicken and usually fried rice or pad Thai, it was awesome, I looked forward to every meal. We were also there to help the children learn how to speak English so every night we had to plan games or a lesson that would help them learn English, it was actually a lot of fun. One day while we were in Chiang Rai we had the chance to go to a primary school and teach English there.while we were there we had the chance to do the Jonah skit and I got to share the gospel with over 60 kids, it was awesome.

After Chiang Rai we drove to Mea sai which is right on the border of Myanmar. Our time there was very different from our time in the children's home. We went out everyday and did ministry; several days we were able to go to a drop-in center which is where children from the street come and get taught about God and also get a free meal. We would go there and share some testimonies and do some dramas and just bless the kids there. That was kind of our theme in Mea Sai, to build relationships and bless the people there. We actually got to do a lot of sports ministry while we were there which was awesome! We were able to play volleyball, basketball and soccer. The soccer field that we usually played on was astro turf which was a nice change from the dirt fields that we played on in Nepal. We even had jerseys made for us that were designed by one of the staff members of YWAM Borders which is the ministry that we stayed with. We got to try lots of tasty Thai food while in Mea Sai, I even tried "Dancing Shrimp" which is just tiny little shrimps that are still alive whenyou eat them, that was pretty adventurous for me, usually I would never do something like that but I guess you have to take risks in order to have stories to tell! In Mae Sai they have a base that teaches SBS which is a YWAM second level school that stands for school of biblical studies, so one day me and a couple of people from my team were able to sit in one of there classes. It was the first day of Revelation which was really exciting for me because I had just finished reading Revelation the day before. We had eight hours of lectures but it actually went really fast because what we were learning was so interesting and I learned so much. We had lots of fun in Mea Sai but it went so fast! We were only there for 9 days but it felt like 5 because of all the stuff we did, every day was so full of activity. Sometimes after a full day of ministry we would go to the soccer field and play till 10 or 11 before we went to bed, it was a blast though!

We were also able to get a real Thai massage which was incredible. One hour of a full body massage for only $6. So awesome.

Well the past two days have been spent in Bangkok again. We went bowling one day and yesterday we went to a water park! It was a great way to end an awesome outreach. God has been so good to us this entire time, he never fails to amaze me with his blessings and his provision. I have learned so much during these three months and I'm excited to take it home and use it to bless the people around me! We leave tonight for Perth, please pray for safe travels for now and for when I go home in a little over a week! 

Okay here are some pictures from out time in Thailand.

These are the girls from the children's home. This was on the last day that we were there, they did a dance for us in these beautiful costumes.

These are some pictures of us working at the children's home, lating concrete and painting walls! In the last picture we were stuffing bananas with chocolate chips to roast over the fire.

These pictures are from the primary school that we taught at, the kids were beautiful.

While in Chiang Rai we got to ride ostriches and elephants! It was the coolest experience of my life! My favorite was the elephants.

These were the jerseys that were made for us! They even have our numbers on them.

One day we got to visit this Burmese couple in the hospital and they had just had this beautiful baby girl! 

And this was when we got to visit the country of Laos! We went to the golden triangle which is where Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos meet. We took a boat on the Mekong river and spent the morning in the markets of Laos, it was pretty neat.

Well that's all for now! I'm coming home soon so then I can tell you all about my adventure in person! 

Love you all! See you soon :)

Xo, Helen

Leaving Nepal

Wow. It's over. I'm in the airport waiting to head out to Thailand! I can't believe it's already here, these past weeks feel like they flew now that I think about it. Even though the time felt slow during our time in Nepal, looking back it seems like just yesterday that we were in Perth talking about everything that we were going to do. And now it's almost over! Just 29 days till I'm back in Perth and then only 12 till I'm back home! I feel like I should be more excited to be home than I actually am.. I'm so excited to see my family and sleep in my own bed and cook and go back to work, but I'm not looking forward to leaving all of my amazing friends that I have made on this journey and to leave all the adventures that I have experienced.

Anyways these past two weeks were so much fun! We went to a district called Surkhet and it was my favorite place that I've been to so far in Nepal. We stayed at the YWAM base there and they took such great care of us! We each had our own, fairly comfy, bed and a big bathroom where we could take really nice bucket showers. Everyday they cooked us amazing food; at each meal we were excited to see what it would be because every time it was so good! Especially breakfast, we had delicious oatmeal one day which I had been missing a lot because I haven't had it since Perth, they also made us French toast which was incredible, especially when you dip it into your milk tea, one interesting breakfast food that we had was cornflakes with hot milk. It sounds pretty gross, but it actually was really tasty, it was actually better then cornflakes with cold milk. So yes, we were really well taken care of in Surkhet, the only thing we didn't have was wifi, which was actually a blessing. It's nice to not have the distraction of the internet all the time.

Ministry was awesome in Surkhet! We did a lot of open airs, which is where we draw a big crowd by singing a song or doing a dance or a drama and then we hit the people with the gospel. It's possibly one of my favorite things to do. In total, we preached the gospel to 440 people. It was so much fun, usually we would act out the story of Jonah, which it would narrate, and then afterwards someone would stand up and preach the gospel. I have really grown to love telling people about God's love for them, it seems like whenever I share it, I grow to love it more. We definitely planted a lot of seeds in Surkhet and I'm excited for the teams that come in the future to reap the harvest.

We were also able to use sports as ministry! That was so much fun because that has been our goal since the beginning, we are the sports dts after all. We played soccer almost everyday that we had ministry. There was a soccer "field" about a 7 minute walk from the base, it was just a huge dirt filed that had soccer goals on either side. The first and second time that we played we just played local people from the village and each time we beat them pretty badly. I don't think they liked that very much so on the third day we came to the field and there were lots of really talented looking soccer players all with cleats and socks and all their gear. I was pretty intimidated because I knew that it was going to be a really hard toe hour game ahead of us. I was right. It turned out that we were playing the best players from the Surkhet soccer clubs and it was our turn to lose badly. We still had lots of fun though and every time we played we attracted a huge crowd of spectators. So the last day we took advantage of the huge crowd and told them why we are here and we preached the gospel to them, it was a really good opportunity.

That was basically our trip in away, the bus ride to and from turned out to only be 14 hours instead of 25 which was a blessing I guess. It was definitely not like a Coach bus in the states, but I wasn't really expecting that. The bus probably would have been so much better if they didn't blast nepali music the whole time or play bizarre Hindi movies, but at least we had our own seats and wifi, so I'm not going to complain too much. H

Here are a few pictures from surkhet, there are many more but I don't have them yet.

This was the soccer field and my team before one of our games :)

This was on one of our ministry days, we went to pray for this family at their house and they served us tea, which is typical nepali culture.

This was at a restaurant after a night of youth fellowship, we ate lots and lots of momos and I got chicken butter masala with some naan bread, so delicious!

Well that's all for now. I'm about to board my flight! Be praying for our team, especially against sickness, I'm getting over some type of stomach thing right now and it's really hard to do any ministry when you're sick. Hopefully I'll be able to blog soon and tell you about Thailand!

Bon voyage!

Xo, Helen 

 

My adventure in a land far far Away

Wow, these past two weeks were the hardest weeks of my life, but they were incredibly worth it. Two weeks ago my Thailand team left for our adventure to this little village named Away. Away was far up in the mountains and we could only get there by foot. It took four days to get there, the first day we took a bus, the second day we took a jeep (which broke down twice in the middle of the mountains) and then we hiked for two days. We stayed in two random huts on the side of the road which was quite the experience, and I wasn't able to shower for twelve days straight. One of the reasons this trip was so hard for me was because the day we left I was incredibly sick with diarrhea and vomiting. I was hiking up mountains on an empty stomach and I was also pretty dehydrated. I definitely learned to trust God in so many new ways during this trip and I was constantly surrendering my rights to him, such as my right to a comfy bed, or cleanliness, or any comforts that I'm used to, but I knew that the work that God had for me in Away was worth it. Even when I was feeling like I couldn't hike up anymore mountains and when I was so homesick that I was in tears, God reminded me from his word that his "power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9) and that "I can do all things through him who strengthens me" (Philippians 4:13). That was really encouraging during that two day, uphill hike, because I knew that God was taking care of me.

In Away, we stayed with the pastor of the only church in the village. It's crazy how hospitable nepali people are, the pastor and his family gave up their house for us and cooked every meal for us and even did our dishes, they wouldn't allow us to do anything! While living in that house I truly realized how luxurious my house is at home, in fact while I was in Away I realized how good I had it here in Kathmandu. I thought that Kathmandu was hard living, but at least here I have a toilet and showers and a stove and a bed, while in Away I slept on the floor, went to the bathroom in the wilderness, I didn't shower once, and all of our food was cooked over an open fire. It was a good revelation though because it made me realize that I don't really need all the luxuries that I have, I can definitely survive on a lot less.

The food that the pastor cooked for us was usually pretty good! We got more protein in Away then we do here in Kathmandu, which was definitely a treat because my body really misses all the protein that I used to eat. We still had rice everyday, but they were almost always accompanied with dhal (sort of like a lentil soup) and egg. It really amazed me how everything was cooked over an open fire, but because of that, meals take forever to make. I feel like if I lived there and had a family there (which I'm not planning on doing), all I would do all day is cook and do laundry.

Ministry wise, God did some amazing things through us in Away. We saw fifteen people become Christians and we even saw an old man who was deaf in one ear regain his hearing! One day, after playing volleyball with some teenagers in the village, I shared the gospel with all of them and three of them decided to accept Jesus as their savior. Almost every morning there would be people at the pastors house asking for prayer from us which was really encouraging. The hardest part about evangelism in Away was that everyone had all these excuses. They would say that they wanted to become Christians, but because their parents and grandparents were Buddhist or Hindu they couldn't because then they would be shunned by their family. It was so frustrating. But God still used us and we planted a lot of seeds in that village. One day, when we were going to one of the surrounding villages, we stopped in front of a herd of about 65 goats. We just kind of stood there looking at each other and then the pastor told us that we were supposed to pray for the goats. We were a little confused as to what to pray for, but we did it anyway, that was probably the funniest day of ministry.

The view in away was incredible! We were right next to a snow capped mountain and at night the sky was full of stars, I had never seen anything like it in my life, it almost didn't even seem real. My friends and I would joke as we slept in little huts by the side of the road, we would say we were staying in an all star hotel because we could see ALL the stars. Sometimes our situations were so ridiculous that we just had to laugh, otherwise I think I would have cried. A lot. It rained one day in Away and on all the mountains around us it was snowing. It didn't snow in Away because we were only 7,000 feet above sea level and in order for it to snow it has to be around 8,000 I think. But the view was so awesome after the snow and the rain, all the dust was cleared away and the colors were so vivid! I couldn't believe I was seeing it in person because those types of views you only expect to see on the computer backgrounds or something, but I did see it and it was awesome.

Even though getting to Away and living there for a week was one of the hardest experiences of my life, I wouldn't trade it for anything. I learned so much on the journey about myself and about God, and I really grew as a person, especially in toughness I think. Four months ago I never pictured myself doing anything like this, and I didn't want to either, but I learned during lecture phase that it's usually not Barbour what I want, it's about what God wants and he is worth everything that I am.

Well we only have about two weeks left in Nepal and then my team is off to Thailand! I'm actually getting really excited for that part of my adventure, I'm ready for something different. Please be praying for my team! Especially for health, I have a cold at the moment but it's not that bad. We really need to stay healthy though so that we can keep doing evangelism and everything else! Also being sick away from home is not very fun, so keep us in your prayers! 

Here is one picture from the trip. I promise I will post more soon, but I'm trying to have my friend send them to me and it's taking a while. But I will post a blog that is all pictures soon!

This was the last day of our hike to Away, I think the village was just around that little mountain.

Nepal

Sorry I haven't updated you guys in so long! I can't believe I've been in Nepal for two weeks already, time is actually going by quite fast. 

Nepal is crazy! It's crazy to wake up every morning and watch the sun rise over the Himalayas, it's absolutely beautiful. Everything here is completely different than what I am used to. I guess I just was so caught up in western culture that I didn't realize that not everyone in the world lives like we do. I mean, I had read about it and seen pictures of the way other non-western cultures live, but you aren't able to grasp it until you actually live in it. One of the most shocking things that I had to get used to was the fact that there is trash everywhere! They don't have garbage cans anywhere, they just throw the trash on the ground or in ditches or in a river. I also had to get used to squaty potties and (cold) bucket showers. I think I've only taken 4 showers since being here, I know that sounds gross, but I've surrendered the right to be clean and to look good and honestly, life is much easier.

Ministry is going so well. The second day here we were in a village evangelizing and right before we were about to go home, a man just came right up to us and asked us if we could tell him about Jesus. We did of course and he became a Christian right there. It was incredible! The people here are really open to hearing about Jesus, but they are really attached to their Hindu culture and that is what's holding them back from accepting him. Be praying that those barriers are broken down! The people are also so friendly and generous. When we go to villages we are almost always invited to have tea or something to eat. It's crazy to think that these people have so little yet they are still willing to offer us what they have. Even when we went to a slum we were invited back by a Christian lady who lived there to have tea. Her "house" was maybe half the size of my bedroom at home. It made me realize how blessed I have been and it also made me decide to never complain again about anything, because I have no right to. Going to the slum was pretty eye opening. I was really not looking forward to it because it was so far out of my comfort zone, but now I'm actually pretty comfortable out of my comfort zone. Anyways first we played some soccer with some of the kids in the slum which was pretty fun, I think they thought we were giants.. (Everyone here is tiny). But then my friend Julie and I found some girls who were about my age and we started talking to them a little bit. One of the girls was clipping her toenails and Julie asked if she had any nail polish so we could paint their nails. She brought it over and before we knew it about ten little girls were flocking around us want their nails painted! The girls loved it so much, I could just see it on their faces. They asked if we could come back the next day and to my surprise, I actually wanted to! It was just so awesome sharing God's love in that way.

We have been really blessed though while being here so far. The base that we are staying at has wifi and they have beds for us which we weren't actually expecting. They have also been feeding us really well. It's a lot of rice and lentils, but we also get a lot of potato and cauliflower curry! That's like one of my favorite things at home! We has chicken at maybe three times a week, but we don't get much meat besides that which was kind of hard to get used to. I'm very thankful for what we get though, and I'm especially thankful for the tea every morning!  It's so yummy!

Everything is so cheap here! It's dangerous to go shopping because since everything is so cheap I buy a ton of things but then I end up still spending heaps if money. I bought a really nice inflatable sleeping pad and a couple of fleeces, a North Face and a Jack Wolfskin, and then a North Face thermal which I've worn for a week straight now, it's really warm :). I don't understand how shop owners make any money here because it seems like everyone has their own shop and they all sell the exact same thing, it's very thought provoking. 

I almost forgot to tell you guys about the bus system here! Almost every day we take the bus to our ministry location. The "bus" is basically a 13-15 seat van that 25-35 people are crammed into. Sometimes I sit there with 30 other people squished next to me and I think that there is no possible way that more people can fit on this bus, but somehow they manage to get like 5 more people inside, well some of them are hanging out the side I guess. Everyday is a new adventure, and it seems like everyday a new record is set as to how many people we fit inside a bus.

I can honestly say that I have really enjoyed these past two weeks in Nepal, it has made me appreciate everything that I have so much more. Each experience has grown me in some way; squaty potties have given me a deep appreciation for western toilets, holding beautiful babies in the villages we go to has really given me a heart for the people here, and sitting through 4 hour Nepalese church services has made me realize how much I miss my church back at home and how important it is to gather with other believers and worship God. But tomorrow I am off on a new adventure. My team leaves for Dhading tomorrow, and from what I've heard, it's going to be very different then here in Kathmandu. We're taking a four hour bus ride to a children's home in Dhading where we will be staying the night. The next day we will be starting a two day trek to an unreached village. We will stay in that village for five days and then trek back to the children's home and then take a bus back to Kathmandu. Basically I will not be showering for 11 days and I won't be doing laundry either. It's going to be an unforgettable experience, that's for sure. But I'm so excited to share the gospel to an unreached village! That is such an awesome opportunity! 

Well that's definitely not everything I've done since being here, but at least you get an idea of how I've been living and what I've been doing these past two weeks! Please be praying for my team as we leave tomorrow, pray that we make it safely and that nobody gets sick while we are there. Also pray that people will come to know Christ as we share the gospel with them! 

Okay, hopefully I can blog when I get back from Dhading. I really really miss everyone at home! Love you! See you in two and a half months :)

Here's a picture of my team in the mountains! Sorry there aren't more pictures, I have them but they're on my phone and I don't have wifi on my phone.

Xo, Helen