It's not the typical family vacation spot. But this is where we're going for the kids' week school break. From Singapore, it is relatively inexpensive to fly to nearby SE Asian countries, so let's go for it.
This is the poorest part of Thailand. Farmland. No, not all of Thailand is BEACH RESORTS.
We're not sure if where we'll sleep will have mattresses let alone pillows. We're trying to decide whether to take a can of RAID to spray on whatever it is we do sleep on.
But we're excited.
We're going to meet the family and freinds of our dear helper LOONNI. She's been there for 3 weeks now. Deciding whether to stay with them or come back to work for us. It's a hard decision.
Before she came to Singapore, she'd never met a Christian, let alone heard how much Jesus loves her and wanted to give meaning to her life. She learned and believed that Jesus also gave her hope that the good parts of life here on earth are just a sign of the wonders to come in an eternal life with no pain...no poverty. Now she wants to share this Good News with her family and friends from her village. We don't think there's another church within hours of where she's from. We want to do what we can to give her claims a little more backing. Her claims of having "new life" from this Jewish Savior who lived 2000 years ago and claimed to be the Son of God.
Interesting that this remote place we're going is possibly near where the NE Thailand boy lives who we've been sponsoring through Compassion for the last 6 years. More than 4 weeks ago I wrote to Compassion to find out if there were a way to find out where exactly "Hathai Christian Banklang School" is. If we're going all this way, and it's VERY unlikely that we'll go again, wouldn't it be nice to have a chance to meet in person? It's probably not very often that sponsors just happen to be "in the area." Surely they'll be helpful in letting us meet him...
I get an email back from Compassion:
Hello Friends. Thank you for your email. Unfortunately, we cannot
arrange a child visit that quickly. We do need about 6 weeks notice to
arrange a visit. Please go to our website www.compassion.com to find
information about personal visits and upcoming tours.
blah blah blah.
That settled that. The answer was "NO." I don't have time to keep writing emails. Something told me that it would prove pointless in the end, and I'm over my head busy trying to keep up with ministry obligations AND all the work that Loonni normally helps with (like line drying all the laundry...I know, I know, poor baby, doesn't have her maid for a month!). Anyway, a web search for tracking him down proved fruitless. So, it doesn't look like Watcherin Kumkhert will meet the family who's been sponsoring him, and writing him the past 6 years. I didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday. I know that it would take SOME arrangements on behalf of Compassion staff, but why would it take 6 weeks if we are arranging all the travel and will get there ourselves? I asked my husband. He had an interesting reply:
"Well things like this take time." He said. "Besides the expected arranging of a host to meet us in town and then go with us to the school, they would have to first send a scout out to that area of Thailand to find a kid who looks like the one in our picture. Same height. Approximate age. This could take a week or so. Then, once they've found him, they would have to go to a nearby school and bribe the principal to agree during our visit that the school is named Hathai Christian Banklang School..."
I smile. Jim's so funny sometimes.
"Then they would have to make all NEW signs to cover the REAL school signs. Another week or so."
Uh huh.
"And then they'd have to pay someone to go over our pictures with the kid to make sure he knows who we are and gives the right responses."
I told him that I was going to blog this conversation.
"All these things take time Kimberly. You can't just SHOW UP to see your kid."
Ah well. God is sovereign. Compassion is a good organization (even if more than half of what we give in sponsorship goes to overhead/administrative costs for people to do things like answer a sponsor's emails) We've got plenty to trust the Lord about on this crazy trip without the added leg of finding Watcherin.
Bless him Lord. Help him stay on track in his studies. Help him to grow up to truly follow you and be a leader to help his people out of spiritual bondage and poverty. Thank you for Compassion and other organizations like them who are doing what they can, and the best they know how, to eliminate wretched poverty on this planet. In Jesus name, AMEN.
No comments:
Post a Comment