Thailand: Day 7

Well, right now I am at the Allen's house. We moved out of the hotel this morning and will be staying with them for the next 3 nights until we go to Bangkok. It's hard to believe that today we've been here for a week! It seems like it's only been a day or two and at the same time, seems like we've been here forever because we've made such wonderful new friends that we will treasure for the rest of our lives. My mom and Elijah are still at the hotel though, which is just around the corner, but this way Jason and I can have some quality visiting time with David & Michelle and have some alone time to process all we have seen and heard this past week.

First of all, on Friday night we ended up not going to the mall but to the Night Bazaar which is a huge sales market that takes place every evening. It went on and on and on down the streets of Chiang Mai with everything you can imagine buying! We were tired from the day and so only stayed about an hour and a half, but while we were down there we ate at McDonald's. It was so funny to find that in the middle of all of the Thai culture down there but it was nice to have some American food, however unhealthy it was. :-)

Day 7: On Saturday we left our hotel at 8:30am to go to the huge fundraising garage sale that took place at Grace International School. This is a beautiful Christian english-speaking school that was initially started about 10 years ago for missionary children. Their website is www.gisthailand.org if you want to read about it. All of the Chiang Mai missionary families that we have visited with, have their children enrolled here. It was locked so we didn't get to go inside, but we are hoping to do that on Monday. If I knew that Elijah would be in a school that wonderful over here, I would move over here immediately! :-) I was so impressed with the campus and was told that it was an old sports recreation center that went bankrupt and then was turned into Grace. Anyways, there were a bunch of mini garage sales set up all over the campus - my mom had several bags full by lunchtime! Those of you that know her will not be surprised. :-)We were fortunate to be here for this event since it only happens once a year. Garage sales are not very common in Thailand and so many people show up for this one.

After the garage sale, we ate lunch and then about 20 of us from Payap & Cheung Doi churches drove about an hour away to a very famous waterfall in this area. I cannot remember the name of it (so any of you that do, help me out), but it is so unique and was probably one of my favorite things we have done so far. No moss grows on the waterfall and so you can walk completely up and down it without slipping. It is broken into sections and so all together I would say that it's hundreds of feet from top to bottom. It took us a little while to get to the bottom of it. I did not wear the proper clothes because I guess I didn't realize how wet we would get! Luckily I had Elijah's swimsuit and he was soaked by the time we left! He had a blast and wanted to climb all by himself, so with supervision of course, we let him and stayed right behind him. I know that the pictures are going to make Jason's parents nervous though. :-) It was just beautiful and we were out in the jungle so I got some beautiful pictures that I can't wait to show you! Don't worry, at least when we get back home, I will get all of the pictures up somehow so you all can see them. This was definitely a highlight of our trip so far.

That evening, we had dinner at the Payap church again out on the porch and then went back to the hotel and to bed. It had been a long day and had taken a lot of muscle & stamina to get up and down the waterfall so we were very tired! About the food here though...Jason and I have both enjoyed the food a great deal! He said that he would move over here for the food alone! It has been a bit spicy for my mom but for us and Elijah, we have loved all of it! I brought some American snacks for Elijah but have hardly needed them since we've been here because he's been eating the Thai food so well.

I had better go - we just got back from church at Cheung Doi this morning and are going to rest before heading to Walking Street this afternoon / evening. This happens only on Sundays and is even better / cheaper shopping than the night bazaar! Jason headed out the door for his first Thai massage - he has never even had one in the states before so he's pretty excited. Until next time....