It is Sunday afternoon, and Lizzy and I have been in Thailand for four days now. And we love it! While we thought we would be living in the city of Chaing Rai, we are actually staying about an hour outside the city in a small village, in a house on a big river. The landscape is absolutely gorgeous. Greener than I ever could have imagined, with trees and rolling hills every where. The house may appear deceivingly luxurious in the picture. We sleep on the floor, take showers with facets hooked into the wall over the toilet, and have become accustomed to eating and sleeping with bugs EVERYWHERE. That being said, it is a really great experience to be able to live out here in the village and get a sample of how these people live.

The Thai people are incredible. I think here in the village, foreigners are few and far between. So we stick out. They wave to us, smile, and laugh at our few Thai phrases (we have only really learned hello and thank you, but use them probably 200x a day. They all seem to be very happy, even though they would be considered poor by our standards.

The village in which we are staying has several Buddhist statues and temples. While visiting the temple, we saw one monk shaving another monk's head. While observing, the monk doing the shaving turned to me and said “you want?” Despite a brief consideration of being able to forever say that I was shaved by a Buddhist monk, I declined.

 

Our group in the back of a truck, coming home from the Buddhist temples.

We woke up early Saturday morning and walked to a local school where we were able to spend the day moving furniture, painting a playground, and repainting lines on the basketball and volleyball courts. While this may seem like fairly easy work, it was made ridiculously difficult by the heat and humidity. I knew it would be hot and humid here, but was not expecting this. I literally sweat all day and night. I walk down the street and my shirt is drenched. I don't think my body was made for this climate. The school administrators were very grateful for our work and fed us a traditional Thai lunch.

Lizzy and Taylor hard at work, moving at the school.

Eating lunch at the school. 

The heat was so stifling that Lizzy had to hold am umbrella for me while I painted.

Speaking of food... the food hear is incredible. I haven't had anything I don't like. From pad thai to all kinds of curry to the incredible produce, it is all delicious. And cheap. Most meals don't cost more than a dollar.

Being an hour outside the city, we would normally take a van to church. But this weekend, there is a festival going on, and, as a result, we couldn't find a van to take us into the city. So instead, we fulfilled one of Lizzy's lifelong dream—riding elephants! Small boats took us down the river about two hours to the elephants. The scenery was beautiful as we were winding between the hills and mountains. We rode on the elephants throughout a small village and even into the river. They are beautiful and majestic creatures. We were also able to feed them bananas (which Lizzy decided to do with her mouth instead of her hands). I think the whole experience was everything she ever dreamed it would be.

Thanks again for all of your support and for helping to get Lizzy and I here. We have had a lot of fun so far, but have also been able to help the amazing people of Thailand. We are going to be going in pairs to local schools tomorrow to teach English. We are excited for our first full week in Thailand and to be able to find opportunities to serve these people!