We have gotten off to a rapidly slow start here at the training center, kind of like a herd of turtles! But I must say that progress is being made! Since we quickly ascertained that our house was falling down around us, we got busy and have been replacing it as fast as we could. We replaced the roof structure, the floor, and the railings, and we have the walls finished and are just waiting for Jason to come back so that we can put them up also. (the walls are built outside, and will be  moved into place when ready) My home went from ok, to terrible, to pretty good, and I am waiting for great any day now!

It is quite a bit of work just to set up a new home in a strange land. (I say strange in a nice way) One of the most important aspects of setting up a new home is to find containers that ants do not enjoy, or that they find too challenging to get into. I thought that we were doing pretty well in that respect until this morning, when I found tiny little ants enjoying my distilled water! At once I jumped into action, since this was an act of terrorism. I would have called out the marines, but the only available person was Micah, and he was busy.  So, I grabbed the ant chalk and drew a line around my water jug, and I am standing by to make sure that it works. (It did work very well, and now the water is ant free)

We have also built a roof over the well. We found that nobody used the well, since it was very dirty water. But, Jason and Travis went and pulled up buckets of water each day until they got it much cleaner. We decided that if we could keep the leaves and beetle nuts and stuff out of the well, then we could actually use it, at least for bathing and doing laundry. So, now we have a new roof covering the well, and it is a really nice place to go and do laundry and take baths on hot afternoons.

Another major accomplishment was to buy a battery for my house. We had no way to charge our phones or computers, and since I am supposed to be the S.E. Asia Communications Director for Jesus For Asia, I figured that it was rather important that I be able to communicate! So, now I have a huge battery sitting here in the living room. I still have to find a way to charge it from home, but at this point, all methods of charging it are out of the financial question. Ben was all ready to go and buy me a solar panel… until I found out how much it would cost! So, until we can get one, I take my big battery to town and pay to have it charged there. It is still better than nothing! We have been putting it to very good use, since we have 8 cell phones to charge, and 4 computers! (they do not all belong to me…. each person has their own, and since the Haberkams are staying here, and Woot and the caretaker also use it, that is why we have so many.)

We are still trying to learn Thai and Karen. I am having an easier time with Thai than Karen. I have a computer program to teach Thai, but I am trying to learn Karen from our caretaker, who is also building our house, and working and doing all the projects that I come up with. I think that it all boils down to needing a full time person to teach Karen if I am to make any real progress. I am an impatient person when it comes to learning things, I want to have the language learned already so that I can talk to people!

We have also started to try to reach out to our neighbors a little bit. Some of them have come over for worship, and we visit them when we have time. I have hired several of them to build necessary things like walls, and flooring for my house. We feel that it is very important to have a good relationship with them.

So, that is my report on the first 20 days at the training center.