All Alone - But So Not Alone!

Now that Amanda and Kara are gone it is weird to write this by myself. I am very used to writing and speaking and thinking in "we." But now it is just a different "we" I guess.  I have so many friends here it is funny when people ask me if I am lonely now. Mark is still here, will be here until August, and we do all of the intern things together. And pretty much everything else, too. In Thai class I have several good farang friends  that I can talk to about home and hang out with. Awn comes by almost everyday to hang out and study and it has been so fun to speak Tinglish with her and to hear how she is learning more about Christ all the time just by hanging out at the Zone.

LST just left yesterday and it was sad to see them go but as always, there is no normal here at the Zone and we already have some other friends staying here a few days that have been traveling around the world. Kara said one time that when people are here it seems like they have always been here and when people leave it feels like they have been gone for years and its really true.

This week Mark and I are starting new English classes to try to pick up where the LST group left off. We will have group classes and will probably be doing a kind of continuation of reading in the Bible where the students left off in the LST book. I am excited and ready to teach again. It is really a nice break to not teach when LST is here but I think I feel a lot more useful when I am teaching. Also my Thai class is over in 2 days and I will be done with learning Thai ( in a classroom) forever! I'm kind of glad to have some time off from it, it has been getting harder and more frustrating. But I'm glad to know so much now!

กระดูกแห้ง- Dry Bones!

So, I broke my leg. After an exciting morning with Kara and Laquita at the Tiger Kingdom, we decided to make a pit stop at some elephant statues to take an “America’s Next Top Model” photo shoot.  The last shot was of me and Kara jumping off the backs of two elephants while holding hands. It seemed like a good idea in theory, but in actuality it was the decision which would change the course of my time in Thailand. I jumped off the elephant and landed wrong, I knew immediately that I had broken something in my leg. I could hear the break vibrate throughout my body. Even now when I close my eyes I can hear the sound of the cracking replay in my head. While I lay there screaming profusely Laquita just stood there laughing at how good of an actress I was. When I took my hand off my foot, they could see that something was not right. Kara later stated, “I could tell that something was not right, it looked like your food was not attached.” Two passerby’s on their motorbikes over heard the horrible screams and stopped to help. They thought I had been bitten by a snake. After seeing that I had actually broken my leg, one of the men called an ambulance. 

Amanda needed a nap so I (Kara) am going to continue. We waited for about 40 minutes for the ambulance to come. When it finally arrived it turned out to be a pickup truck with a cover on the back. They laid her in the bed of the pickup, but they didn’t secure her to anything so she was rolling all over the place.  Laquita and I tried to tell her some jokes to get her mind off the situation, but Laquita told one about diarrhea and that made her want to throw up even more.  The ambulance had a very loud siren, it but stopped at every red light and no one got out of our way. At the hospital they took her to the emergency room and everyone in the room grabbed her leg to assess the situation. They actually grabbed and poked and twisted it. They said they needed an x-ray to determine if it was fractured when it was clearly broken. This was when Hilary and Mark showed up after getting a rot dang from the Zone because we had to leave the truck at the statues. They walked up and heard some blood curdling screams and Hil said, “Yep, we found her, I’d know that scream anywhere.”  In the ER they said her tibia was broken and she had to be admitted to wait for the specialist to talk about surgery. They wanted to put in an IV to give her fluids and pain medicine, but it was Amanda’s first experience with one and she wasn’t very excited about it. She’s a little afraid of needles, ok a lot afraid of needles, but she was very brave and she got some good pain medicine through it, so it was all worth it.

There doesn’t seem to be too many rules here at the hospital. I have been in every room, including the emergency room and operating room, with Amanda and I’ve had to do some of the duties of the nurses even though there are plenty of nurses here. I pushed her bed to the second floor and was in charge of the broken leg when moving her. It’s been quite an adventure. Eventually we got a private room with a fan, its own bathroom, a balcony, a minibar and a TV with Thai stations. It’s pretty luxurious. They had to put a wooden splint on her leg in ER, but the only one they had was for about a 6 foot man, so it didn’t exactly fit her body very well.  It did keep things from moving around though. The only problem was that once she had the splint on there was no way to get her pants off. The only course of action was to remove her pants with scissors! Nothing exciting had been happening for about 3 hours, but right when they began to cut off her pants we had 5 people come to visit. We were so glad to see them, but it was very ironic that it happened when Amanda was the most naked. We waited just a little longer and the doctor finally came. His English was pretty good but we were glad we had our Thai friends to talk to him too. We definitely wanted Jan to be there with us to talk to the doctor and help us decide what was best. The doctor told us that after looking at the x-rays he discovered that both of the bones in Amanda’s lower leg were broken and she would definitely need surgery. The question after that was when and where. After much discussion, everyone decided the best thing to do would be to fly back to the States and have surgery there. We had a group prayer with several of the church members and then we waited for Amanda to have a cast put on at around 10 that night. The cast will help keep her bones stable on the flight to America.  Mark and Hil had to take Laquita to the airport so I stayed with Amanda. We were all glad that Quita was able to be with us in this crazy time, but it was sad that her ended this way. Right before it was time to get the cast the nurse came in and said it was time to pee pee. Aside from her using the term “pee pee,” this seemed like a normal request. However, when Amanda tried to start moving toward the restroom the nurse stopped her and pointed at the bed. It quickly became clear that she wanted Amanda to “pee pee” in the bed. Naturally, Amanda refused, the nurse eventually got her a bed pan, and we all had a good laugh about it. Next, we were off to the operating room. They had to put her to sleep while they set the bones because it was going to hurt A LOT. Amanda did great and she now has a beautiful blue cast. The drugs made her pretty loopy though. She started asking everyone for pizza and trying to talk to the nurses in Thai. I’m not exactly sure what she said, but everyone seemed to think it was really funny. They took some more x-rays after that and the bones looked much better.  We headed back to our room to try and get some sleep, but we found out that sleep is hard to come by in the hospital. The doctor woke us up at about 12:30 to talk about the x-rays and then the nurses came in about every hour and turned on the lights to give Amanda medicine and take out the IV and things like that. 

In the morning she had physical therapy, which means they taught her how to use crutches. It took them a long time to find short enough crutches for her. We think she is the shortest farang they have ever seen. She worked up quite a sweat practicing going up and down the stairs. After that she needed a shower.  Amanda has always had a dream of getting a sponge bath and let’s just say it wasn’t as good as she had hoped. In fact it was one of the most awkward times of her life. But we have all had a good time laughing about all the weird and different things that have happened while at the hospital. 

Hil and Mark were able to talk to Korean Air and get our tickets changed to depart this Wednesday, the 16^th and arrive home on the night of the 17^th. It is a answered prayer that we didn’t have to pay anything extra and we could get a flight so fast. They also contacted lots of people that needed to know what was going on, like fiancées and sisters and the church. I will be flying back with Amanda and now we both have to pack up several months of stuff in only 1 day. It could be really fun. We will miss everyone here and were looking forward to these last two weeks, but are excited to see our families and fiancées even sooner than expected. We’re realizing all of the blessings that we’ve been able to experience through this ordeal: support from our Christian family here and at home, friends who are willing to do anything to help, knowing some Thai to help get around, to hear one of our non-Christian friends pray for the first time, that Amanda didn’t take the last Thai class and waste her money, that the tickets were so easy to change, that Amanda’s Mom is able to come home and take care of her for a while, and that she could get an appointment with a doctor at home so quickly.  These things are proof that God is in control. Thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers. Please continue praying that we have a safe journey home and that Amanda’s road to recovery is quick and as smooth as possible. See you in America!!!

Top Ten of the New Year!

We are going to do a new series of Top Tens and we are starting with favorite experiences of the New Year as today is the Chinese New Year. This list is in no particular order because we would all want to rank them differently.

1. Amanda and Hilary have officially completed Thai 3! This is Amanda's last Thai class so we are glad she is pretty much fluent now :) Hil has one more and will start again on Monday. It has been great to connect with the people in our class and learn to speak, read and write in Thai.

2.Rise up Thailand was a Christian concert that we went to at Payap University here in Chiang Mai. It was very inspiring for us to see that many Christians from all over the world coming together for the soul purpose to praise and worship God.

3.Teaching English in Baw Gaew. We had the amazing opportunity to travel to the mountain village of Baw Gaew and teach 8 English lessons to a group of 100 7th, 8th and 9th graders. It was such a blessing to spend time with these students and teachers!

4.Robert's return. Robert went back to America the first week in December to visit his father who was in bad health. He was there over a month and returned in mid January. We were very happy when he returned to Chiang Mai.


5.Amanda and Drew's day of adventure. Amanda and Drew go to go on a fun day of adventure in the mountains. We went zip lining, white water rafting, elephant riding, bamboo rafting, and were able to visit a butterfly and orchid farm. It was so much for us to get to spend the day together and get to see God in the beauty of nature together.

6.Fiancees! Andy and Drew got to spend almost two weeks in Thailand with us and it was wonderful! They got to be a part of all the things we do at the zone and see how we live our day to day lives. We loved having them here!

7.LST parties have been really great so far. We had a Words and Things party and a Groundhog's Day party. Many of the Chinese students Mark studies with have been attending and several of our friends that had been studying English with us in between LST groups. It is great to connect with them when we aren't actually teaching right now.

8.We got a new LST group that will be with us until the end of February. It is made up of a Tom and Helen, a married couple, and Sheila and Michele, an aunt and niece duo. They are so much fun and are up for anything. They are great additions to the zone!

9.The five churches in the Chiang Mai area all met here this last Sunday and we had about 120 people crowded into the top floor. It is so fun to see everyone and the singing was amazing with that many people in one place.

10. Laquita is here visiting for Africa. She went to A&M with us and is serving abroad in Kenya for a year. We look forward to spending the next two weeks with her and showing her around Thailand!