The Bomb? (no pun intended)

So before reading this everyone must PROMISE me to read the whole thing before freaking out. I'm totally okay and everyone here is fine!!!!!! (Mom I'm looking at you....haha)

Yesterday night we had a bomb scare here in Bangkok. I was out shopping for video gear with Andrew, John Wood and Pastor Doug. We were at the MBK mall getting ready to head home when Pastor Doug gets a phone call from the mission president. Apparently there was a bomb rumored to be found in a 7-11 in Bangkok so we should stay put and not go anywhere. This wasn't a laughing matter but we kind of chuckled to ourselves anyway because 7-11's here are as common as stop signs or bus stops. A bit later we hear back from the mission president and find out it was the 7-11 attached to my apartment building. WHOA!
So my first thought was "GOI!" while we weren't near any blast radius (I didn't think) we live on the top of the building, 6th story, she had been home sick all day with a bad cold. We got ahold of her and told her not to go out (I was more for Plan B of taking a bus to Chang Mai and getting out of the city as fast as possible, but apparently she was supposed to stay put). We had a nervous dinner together and headed back to the apartment.
We took the BTS (train) to our neighborhood and in the Song Tao (its a truck with benches in the back that you pay 6b for, very common) Pastor Doug questioned some of the other Thai's that were riding with us.
One of the girls said, "Oh! I heard about that, its actually 2 blocks down, its not the 7-11 on Soi 42 (my street) its on Soi 45!" We get off the Song Tao at my street and it looked like she was right at first, no one looked any different than usual…street vendors were out, 7-11 was open, nothing had changed. So the video guys decided they wanted to see some of the footage and action actually happening at the site. We got to Soi 45 but nothing looked different there either. So confusing! Doug asked a old man standing on the street corner about it and he said, "Oh! Not this 7-11, different street!" No one knew! Apparently it was all rumor.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief and started back to the mission. The guys decided to drop me off at the apartment for good measure and just to make sure we asked a fish sales-lady in front of 7-11 about the bomb scare. She said,"UGH, yea that was here! I didn't sell anything all day! Bomb squad wasn't hungry! It was at the bank next-door." Relieving? I think not, still next to my apartment building! She continued to give us more details though and we found out that the bomb wasn't 'a bomb' EXACTLY… it was a bottle of oil that someone had left at the bank. While purposes could have seemed sinister, more than likely it was just a street-vendors cook fire.

SO everything is fine. Kind of anti-climatic actually, it's kind of ironic that it had to be THIS street of all places, next door in fact, haha. Out of the BILLIONS of streets, people, 7-11's in the city it was THIS one. I'm so thankful for the friendly turn of last nights events, we are WITHOUT A DOUBT being watched over.

Hello Strangers

 Figured a new post was a wee-bit overdue. I have come to realize that there IS no normal when it comes to graphic design in Thailand. I haven't worked with the same person for more than a week, the same projects for more than a few days, and definitely haven't been in the same place for more than a few hours...hahaha. It's been pretty crazy.
So everyone reading this seriously missed out on THE weekend and should consider investing in plane tickets for the next weekend in case of further lost opportunities :) haha. Basically (if you could sum up an adventure with one word, HA!) it went something like this...
Saturday: I ended up doing powerpoint slides for the Burmese church. I was definitely groaning about going but dude, it was SO rewarding!!!! I asked the pastors wife (who would have adopted me if I was for sale, but its okay mom!) who told me to show up at 9:30 for church the day before, BUT her husband the pastor said, "WELL....church doesn't actually start till 11:00 but Sabbath School is at 9:30." So I'm thinking, "Hey hey hey! This girl is sleeping in!" Goi and Andrew left early that morning because they had to go film a baptism at the church near the SDA Hospital and took my time getting ready, but couldn't force myself to procrastinate longer than 10:15 because I'm still working off jet-lag...haha.
So, I showed up at 10:15-ish and walked into the church and the entire Sabbath School STOPS in the middle of the lesson and is like, 'NICOLE! So glad you made it!" I felt awful for being late. They all scooted down a row of chairs and I was stuck front and center, THEN the person who had been giving the sabbath school in Burmese looks at this other guy sitting near me and nods. This random person gets up and starts translating everything the Burmese guy says into English, JUST FOR ME. O.O
I set up the powerpoints after that, but everyone in the church had to stop and talk, "Ma-te-abue Nicole! (hello in burmese)" Talk about a church you just want to put in your pocket and take with you everywhere.
Goi and Andrew showed up later to film 6 baptisms that happened at the church that day, and after the pastors wife had watched us all eat and was pleased with the amount of rice/noodles/fruit we all consumed let us leave for the day.
We went to the park for the afternoon, chased pidgeons, played cards and watched this hackey-sack-volleyball game that was really incredible! I'll have to attach a video so you can understand better.
Then Shannon (sp?) this crazy Australian guy that helps us with video sometimes called us up and asked if we wanted to go to an upscale vegetarian buffett. We all said sure and got in this taxi heading towards China-town (how is it that every city has a Chinatown? what happened to Mexican-town?!)
It was kinda interesting actually because we had to go through a really touristy section of BKK and ended up getting mobbed by salesmen, odd...because the white people seemed to out-number the Thai's there.
We finally got to the restaurant and besides being also a tourist hotspot it was REALLY FUN. Its seat-yourself, and we chose floor cushions on the balcony level. It wasn't "upscale" looking, it actually resembled the ideal hippie-pad. Tapestries, rugs, lights, incense everywhere. They had Thai dancers (Goi says that every person, even boys, have to learn cultural thai dancing in high-school). The food was REALLY good, but apparently the cafe here serves dishes that are pretty similar for half price, I haven't eaten at the mission school enough yet to know.
After that we caught a Thai movie called "Hello Stranger" if it ever makes it to foreign film sections in Blockbusters near you...RENT IT! It was adorable. Definitely going to win a foreign film/indie film award soon. You laugh, you cry. It was about two Thai teenagers who go to Korea on vacation (apparently Thais revere Koreans almost as much as white-foreigners) and get dumped. We learned a LOT about Thai culture and Korean culture from the film actually. SUPER CUTE!
On the way back home I bumped into a mannequin and Shannon got me to "wai" it (its the typical Thai greeting where you do the "prayer hands" and bow at each other) he swore it was super impolite...the saleslady must have thought I was crazy!
Looks like I'm saving Sundays events for a later date...hahaha. Saturday was just too cool. Love ya guys!

Vespas :)

Fridays here are usually half-day's, not just because of the Adventist system but the Thai weekend starts Friday. This doesn't exactly mean I have time "off" because when you're on the film crew weekends are required and your free time is completely changing. I happened to get off a few hours though and ran back to the apartment, threw my wash into one of the three machines I saw and ran back up the stairs (6 floors, yes...i am the stair-master) and cleaned our room. It looked like the room hadn't been cleaned since the 80's but in reality it had only been a week since Goi scrubbed the floors. It kind of felt like I was punishing myself scrubbing the bathroom floors with a toilet wand but apparently thats the norm around here, haha. When I finished the room I ran back to get my wash and the adventure began:
The washmachine I had chosen was apparently designed for the smallest load size, hence the cheaper price. Woops! My load was definitely over that after 2 weeks of intense sweating in 70% humidity. Sooooo it finished the spin cycle, then started filling up with water again, then pouring out the top! The lady that lives in the bottom of the apartment came out yelling something, then appeared to dial 911 on a telephone and gesturing at me. She runs back and unplugs the washer then this Thai girl (the person she'd been calling) comes out and starts translating...apparently my load was too big, the lady gave me a bucket for my sopping wet laundry and told me to come back tomorrow to try again in the bigger washer if I wanted. I felt awful but she was apologizing to me the whole time. I got my laundry back upstairs *way heavier than before* and managed to hang it up on the mini-porch thing we've got out our window. I have no hangers yet because we have to go to a market to get some, so its all just massed on the bars of the window...probably be dry by next Thursday if theres no rain :/
I managed to make it back to do powerpoints for vespers tonight at the church the Evangelism meetings have been taking place at, of course our one clicker belongs to the conference president who needed it this weekend, so I'm clicking every slide from the back on my computer. Woohoo! *obvious sarcasm* The church here is SO sweet though, everyone wanted to talk when it was over and I even remember lots of names from this last week. It was great too because I got to see these teenagers taking photos in front of the backdrop I made "myspace style", made me feel kinda cool, hahaha. Sometimes its good to step back and see how what we're doing actually effects people.

Ode to A Sis

So Christine my dear...I MISS YOU! You need to figure out how to use skype, and a video cam. Even the parents figured it out before you, haha. Mom and Dad are internet pro's right now, and even showed Aunt Ruby and the cousins, you're a bit behind the times my love :) haha. For all of you reading this, harass Christine into internet connectivity por-favor!
Besides my need to talk to my sister, things are winding down a bit over here. Last night was Wednesday night "missionary time". Every Weds here all the SM's get together and hang out for an evening just to relax and chat about how the rest of the week went. The latest tradition has been roasting marshmallows on a rooftop :) Someone missed smores and got the idea to roast marshmallows over this small pit-fire on the roof where we all meet. Thing is, Asian marshmallows are smaller and no Jumbo-fluffy-thing. They all come with filling too. So we've been roasting tiny blueberry, strawberry and chocolate puffs the last two weeks, haha. Everytime different missionaries seem to be able to make it, and some have other things going on, so the group is always different.
One of the missionaries is a spanish speaker so it's been great to "practicar un poquito", and it seems like most are from Walla Walla so we all have friends in common. Can't wait to do it again guys! :)

Long Time No See!

Hey all-who-read-this-blog,
I just got off of skype with my parents, Aunt Ruby, Forest, Drew and the cat and I was reminded that I hadn't posted in a while. Woops! The evangelistic meetings have been a little chaotic lately, lots of late nights and lots of work. I feel kind of useless in the video department, but if they need anything in graphics or just moral support I'm here :) Doug has enough design projects for me to keep busy till NEXT December should I so choose haha, so theres always ways I can keep productive next to these busy bees. This lady at the Burmese Evangelistic Meetings keeps feeding me! I ate yesterday, but she didn't SEE me eat so she made me eat again! (It's very impolite to refuse food here) She even made a special plate of chicken curry and watched me eat it, hahaha. Adorable.
I'm including a photo of what it's like designing here lately...enjoy!

The Home Stretch!

So I've been working on this project now the full week since I've been here. An evangelistic seminar starts this Sunday and began with revival meetings that started tonight (Friday). Andrew, Goi and I were in charge of production, design, etc. for the whole event. This means that I had to convert 300+ powerpoints into Burmese in three days, in addition to creating a backdrop for the video gear that matched the pastor's sons flyer design for the event. Tonight we had the first mock-up and filmed the whole thing to find all the glitches (of which there were many) and fix the backdrops, etc. So two more days until the event, hopefully all goes well. I'm attaching a very candid photo Doug took of the backdrop & me and wished me to share with all of you....(no I did not pose like this) enjoy!

A Typical Tuesday?

I showed up for work just like every day so far. Showered in the morning, picked up fruit and a juice from a local street vendor on my 4 block commute to work from the apartment. Started Thai worship at 7:30am sharp and started work at 8:00am after that. To my surprise however, we were picking up another missionary from Germany today, Sandrina.
Pastor Doug, Goi, Andrew and me all rode the skytrain to the airport, picked up Sandrina and took her for a "Welcome to Bangkok" tour of the city. We even got to go to the top of the tallest building in Thailand with a revolving observation deck to get a better view of the city.
After we finished some Mango smoothies at the restaurant in the skyscraper Doug had to go to a meeting at the SDA Hospital and we took Sandrina to the church plant in Tomburi, Bangkok where she would be staying. It was more of the historical section of the city, had some beautiful Wats and architecture. The Tomburi church plant was where the old Hope for Bangkok headquarters used to be (the mission office that I'm working at now) some of the past missionaries designed a beautiful mural for the wall of their vegetarian restaurant. We are a good hour plus from there now so Sandrina will have a commute to see other missionaries :/ she'll have to jump in quick!
After leaving her there we got back at four (an hour late) and went back to work. The Burmese Pastor had finally arrived with his family to help set up and answer questions about the upcoming Evangelistic Series. So Andrew and Goi set up the stage and video equipment while I asked questions about what posters they liked and if my burmese was correct. After a powerpoint nightmare and some progress on the staging we finally left work at around 7:30pm. LATE.
**BONUS! Today was nature week: I saw a snail with a shell the size of my fist AND my first cocroach crawled across my pillow tonight. O.M.G. I can't say I hate them because in Thai Goi says that whatever you hate will "come to you". Probably wise advice..**
On a positive side I ran into two more student missionaries tonight from Walla Walla, another Andrew and...I want to say Julia? Ops, I forgot. We all had dinner at the Greenhouse today, yummmmm more pad thai!

Today we went to one of the Kings Palaces in Bangkok. HUGE gardens complete with a maze (thanks to PUC I do know the difference between mazes and labyrinths now, haha) It was my first time using public transportation actually, ever other time we've gone out to food we've just hiked and the mission has a car. We took a bus and hopped in the back of two trucks O.O at first I thought I was hitchhiking but it doesn't count because we actually paid 7 baht to do it…hahaha. 
We tried to go kayaking on the lake next to the palace but it wasn't allowed because of the thunderstorm, we met some people from South Africa that heard us playing UNO in the lobby while we were waiting (thinking it was going to clear up, which it never did).
We then also decided to wait until 5:00PM because Goi and Andrew had seen the Thai aerobics/dance class that took place in the gardens and wanted to watch again. SO much fun! It was interrupted at 6:00 however by the national anthem, kind of eerie because anyone that hears it STOPS in place and everything they were doing. Almost like M. Night Shamalan's "The Happening". I'm completely exhausted and over-exercised and need to catch up on my jet-lag so this is all for tonight folks :)

Wat?

I just had the most AMAZING day. Goi told me yesterday that we were going to "Iceland" and I kept asking her if we were going ice-skating, getting ice-cream, should I bring a jacket? She just smiled and nodded at me, obviously I didn't make sense and we had an English/Thai misunderstanding, haha. I copied what she was wearing just to be safe and threw on shorts and a tshirt grabbed my purse and we walked to the mission college much to my surprise. We had breakfast with the pastors family (thai breakfast rice, pomelo, and pineapple juice) then they all started packing up to go to the ISLAND…we were taking a trip to an ISLAND not ICELAND, haha. Goi didn't know that the "s" was silent.
The Island as it turns out is not someplace off the coast of Thailand, its actually an island in the city on the river. FUN FACT: Thailand is in fact sinking several inches a year, the entire city was built on a swamp. We arrived at a Wat (Buddhist temple) somewhere in Bangkok, and had to take a ferry across the river to get to the Island. Once we had crossed we rented bikes for several hours and started on a concrete sidewalk. The sidewalk was several yards above the water level and we were completely surrounded by buildings on all sides at first, they even had tarps draped across the pathway which made it feel almost like going through caves but seeing inside peoples homes/stores at the same time. It was actually a really good thing the tarps were up because it was raining for the first bit of the ride. After a while it opened up a bit and you could see the houses more clearly, everything was raised on stilts and completely open. Every now and again there would be a Buddhist temple sandwiched in between the houses, also raised up on stilts but extremely ornately carved. Apparently the Island is the countries major source of terra-cotta pot-making because the earth underneath the houses is red clay. We saw some random giant pots on the sidewalk occasionally but otherwise I didn't get to see any potters. The entire time there were other bikers and people walking on the path but there were also scooters, so dodging traffic was difficult sometimes. The thing that shocked me the most was everything GROWING everywhere. It seems like if you sneeze here some how your snot would grow a banana tree. No joke EVERYTHING grows in the craziest places. There were trees growing up out of the water in between houses, lotus flowers, random vines and fruits I have never seen before. You name it, it grows there. And I don't think there is such thing as a "weed" either, everything is edible.
While flora and fauna is abundant, livestock is as well, I almost ran over a flock of chickens and ducks, and it was near impossible to avoid hitting a dog. FUN FACT2: Dogs are the lowest form of society here in Thailand. Buddhists believe that if your bad deeds outweigh your good deeds when you die you reincarnate in the next life into a dog. Thus, almost every dog is seen as more of a rat. They're scrawny, bones and skin mostly, flea bitten and often injured creatures here. If someone owns a dog, they're most likely non-Buddhist practicing people. Amazingly there are still tons of them, the only reason they survive is because no one is going to spay or neuter the unwanted animals so they just multiply anyway.
We just got back and I'm prepared to sleep away some more jet-lag, miraculously I've made it till 4:13PM today without crashing. Very impressive...We finished off our day with some amazing pad Thai from street vendors below the apartment and I'm stuffed...
I promise pictures WILL come of the grand day, I was completely unprepared though and didn't bring my camera, I borrowed the pastors and will get photos up very soon :)

Land HO!

I'm here, safe and sound! I'm sure I look like a deer in headlights right now everything is SO different here. I have a small apartment about two blocks away from the office I work at, my room mate Goi is pretty much my life-line right now. I'm learning a lot from just watching her live here. Our room is about the size of my dorm room in college (shout out to Kayloni!) and has a queen size bed that we share with a big fan pointed at us. I've learned to sleep with no blankets and just a silk sheet if I get cold. The heat I was warned so much about but so far lots of the buildings and offices have AC and its up so high I actually appreciate the warmth when I go outside! The shower and toiled is interesting. Pretty much the "bathroom" is a giant shower with a toilet in it. The shower head only has one temperature COLD, haha, and most people here don't use toilet paper they use a hose to 'rinse off' kind of like the Buvet in Argentina except standing up. We have a giant window overlooking the city view, they don't have screens here either so you can just hang outside of it. This can be REALLY fun when it's raining which it usually does every afternoon in a downpour. There IS lots of traffic which can make it hard to sleep sometimes but I'm still trying to figure out WHY…there is a city-wide curfew at 1:00 AM and anyone caught on the streets can be arrested. I take it cars are exempt from this…

Work is getting busy lately, they have lots for me to do but are nice and give me afternoons off for right now because I'm so jet-lagged. I hear it lasts about two weeks, ugh. I keep trying not to fall asleep in meetings that are in Thai…I really now possess the potential to sleep ALL day. It feels like 3 AM after lunch here, so then I fall asleep and wake up when its dark, then fall asleep again. Work I hear is really going to pick up though in the next couple weeks and I'll have to be fully conscious then, lol. I'm basically working with the same 4 people every day, Goi (my roommate) Andrew (Student Missionary from Southern) and Doug (the pastor) give or take any Thai people we talk with about doing films with or that need posters, brochures or some other designed material. We can end the day whenever we want to really and then the afternoons are ours… Goi is a mean badminton player and although I slept through yesterdays match I hear I'll be playing in the future. We eat dinner in the room, I was shown several promising street vendor locations to find great noodles, pad thai, fresh fruit (DEF not American fruit) and a SMOOTHIE VENDOR! YEYA!

I hear theres LOTS of SM's in Thailand and 4 that are in Bangkok also, but we're all kind of spread out in pairs so I haven't met anyone else yet. Andrew and me were assigned to this location on the Design Team and the others were assigned to church-schools around the city to teach English. Hopefully we'll be able to do a weekend outing or something when Goi, Andrew and me aren't working.

I have internet at work but I'm trying to get it here in Goi's apartment too because being disconnected from you guys is hard :( The time change is kinda rough but if any of you are awake in the mornings…hopefully I'll see you online :)

Fail

So...I've been telling people I'm leaving September 8th for about a month, this last week I've just been saying, "Yea, I leave Tuesday." Things feeling like they're winding up and getting closer, I decided to send out a mass email letting all my friends and family know my address and internet contact info for the next year, also saying, "Don't text me after Tuesday!" Not one hour after I send this email my mom and me decide we should check my ticket info and make sure I'm flying out of Akron airport and not Cleveland...
Little did I know Tuesday is NOT the 8th of September, it's the 7th! I'm leaving Wednesday! Fail.