Thanksgiving at the beach and other news

While many of you were celebrating the US holiday of Thanksgiving, we arose at 4:45 AM to head to downtown Yangon, board a bus, and travel to Chaung Tha Beach for a church retreat!

Our adventure began when we woke up and realized that our electricity was out. Try getting 8 people ready for a trip at that hour in complete darkness! There were few mishaps though, and no minor injuries from the lack of light. I laughed when I realized this was the first morning I was actually out of bed before the sun was up (we start getting daylight at about 6 AM). Our projected time of departure for the beach was 7AM, and we left at 7:10! This was a miracle in and of itself with 140 people on the trip!

We arrived about 7 hours later, after covering only about 150-200 miles. The bus was not quite as luxurious as tour buses that I’ve been on, and our air conditioning fritzed out an hour or so into the trip. Steep hills and an old bus sometimes made our speed drop to under 15 mph, which doesn’t create much of a breeze in the windows. This made our mid-day trip along bumpy one-lane roads quite uncomfortable. We were more than ready to arrive after that journey.

The beach was beautiful, and we had a fun time of eating Burmese cuisine, except breakfast which was “Western” style and consisted of a fried egg and toast with jam. Craig, Ben, and I led some mixers and ice breakers, and we had sessions of praise music and speakers. Ben and I rented some bikes and took a ride down the beach, which was practically untouched by people except the small settlements of 2-3 dwellings where local people lived by the shore. We practiced our Burmese skills with a couple of children who approached us, and were pleased that they could understand our inquiries of “what is your name” and “how old are you”. They giggled a bit at us, but answered nevertheless.

Last week we began a regular visit to a small “children’s home” in northern Yangon and taught an English class. I worked with the younger (primary grades) and Ben with the older children (secondary). We both really enjoyed our time with them, and are excited to return to them again and build upon what we’ve already done. Everyone here is taught English. However, We have found that their pronunciation is often unintelligible. This happens because neither they nor their teachers, or their teacher’s teachers actually learned the language from a native English speaker. Imagine how distorted the game “telephone” is. Well, this is how our Burmese friends’ English skills are - distorted! They are so excited to have the opportunity to hear and learn from us.

In other exciting news, our friends Angie Pyle and Daniel and Talinn Phillips just arrived in Yangon on Sunday. We were so excited to see them, and so excited that they came with gifts from home. Thank you if you were a part of collecting things to bring us. I saw more coffee than I’ve seen since I got here - which was a pretty good treat for me!

The Garrisons, Phillips, and Angie went on an overnight trip to our friend’s farm. We saved this trip to do for when they arrived, but Ben, Sarah G. and I weren’t able to go because Ben and Sarah have been sick. Luckily, they both seem to be on the upswing of things. We were disappointed to miss this trip though!

Ben and I are in the process of planning a trip up north to be tourists. We are going to go the week before Christmas and will visit Kalaw and Inle Lake in Shan State and Bagan, an ancient historical region along the Irrawaddy River where there are many untouched ruins. We are pleased to be able to spend some time in a part of the country that will be a little cooler than here!

I’m listening to some Christmas music right now, trying to get in the Christmas mood. Palm trees and air conditioning don’t really evoke Christmas feelings though. It’s funny isn’t it - I’m envious of you who have cold weather, and there are some who are probably envious of our warm weather.