I believe I am a master of underestimation: Especially in the sense of how long jobs take to finish in my mind as compared to the real world. So every week I proclaim what I can get done, and every week I am out by a day or two. But, there is light somewhere at the end of the tunnel and I estimate I will see it next week.
As slow as it may be, we are making progress with the renovation. All the second floor stud walls are done and all but one of them have been set into place. We had our doubts when we realized about 35% of the wood we ordered was basically useless and that which remained needed a lot of planing. And then my planer went dull and it is not the kind you can sharpen easily and new blades take two weeks on special order. So we went scrounging for wood and we redeemed some of the rejected wood, and somehow we made it to the end of structural part of the build. Yeah!
In fact, we even found time to put up some of the cement fiberboard siding, and it looks like it is going to work out pretty well. But I found out you need a few extra pairs of hands to hang that stuff. In my head I can get that job done in the next couple of days.
On the last post you might remember that we dug a septic tank. This week we are pleased to report that we now have one fully operational toilet. We even have enough downslope water pressure to make it function. This week we hope to get the remaining bathroom tile done so we can have our first indoor showers. It doesn't get any better than that eh?
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| The new throne |
Last week Anchalee found me a helper, a young guy named Som Yoht. I guess he is in his mid twenties. It doesn't seem like he has had much school; he says his head doesn't work too well. But he like to practice English with me and I can speak to him in my terrible Thai. He shows up at 8:00 each day, and no matter when we quit for the day, he sticks around for a few hours more. I thought he was just mooching food, but it turns out that he is hiding from his own home.
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| Som Yoht and me putting up some cement fiberboard |
Som Yoht is nice guy and he is doing his best to stay out of trouble, but when he goes home the village wasters show up and force him to take their drugs and drink their whiskey. He really doesn't want to do it any more but when he refuses they beat him up. The poor guy is barely 120 pounds. I don't think he can put up much of a struggle. So we let him hang around our place as long as he likes.
It seems to me that although the village is quite poor, poverty is not the biggest problem. What is bringing them down is the total lack of hope for a different future. In Thailand drugs are cheap and plentiful and you don't really have to work hard to stay alive. There really isn't much in the natural world to get people out of the destructive cycle of drugs, alcohol, and violence. We are not sure what form the outreach part of our ministry will take, once we are settled in here, but one thing is clear. Apathy, drugs, lack of education, and an inconsistent Christian presence has got this village bound up and off of the Kingdom radar. It is going to be interesting for us to be part of God's answer for this village.
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Be Blessed
