We have are still up to our ears in pouring cement. It is a big job leveling and we do not want cracks and problems. Yesterday I went to get a tractor to level the lot a bit yesterday and the owner, a friend said, you go ahead and do it yourself. So here I am having some fun. Today we pour another 8 cubic meters of cement for our basketball court. By the way, the funds for this project came partly from a Thai friend and special gifts for this project.

The Air horn is fixed and pouring Cement!

Just in case you are wondering, one of our church members, Matt, has a new Auto-Electric shop in our town and fixed the offending horn from the last blog for me the next day. About a month ago he also fixed my alternator which had worn brushes and no longer generated electric power.

It is nice to have Matt around for these things. And he is very inexpensive too.

We are pouring the concrete for our open air sports area this week. This is exciting for all of us. Yesterday we have 4 men putting in the forms and doing final leveling the ground. We are making the basketball court about 20 percent smaller than official size, at least now since we decided not to cut down the big tree which provides sun shade and a guava tree. And besides this is the tropics, it is good to have a bit shorter court. If perhaps we did decide to go bigger in the future there is lots of room for that on the same spot necessitating removing the trees. As of this post we are 1/3 done.

My Air Horn

I will tell you about a funny story that happened yesterday while dropping kids off after Sunday school.

One of the narrow village lanes in one of the villages where we have some kids off the main road where I pick up and drop off a sixth grader and a fourth grader off, is always cluttered with bicycles and motorcycles and recently a car (over New Years) parked just so it is hard to drive through.

Thais as you know are kind of lazy when it comes to this kind of stuff and kind of clutter unused lanes and streets rather than park in the empty nearby yard. Besides there is plenty of shade on the road another priorty in the hot tropics. Well, each week I have had to tap my horn "beep-beep" to get passage. And they take there time coming out and moving the respective motorcycles and bicycles.

Until yesterday...I simply tapped my horn lightly hoping to get passage and the relay for the air horns went into locked on. And was it really loud and would not stop. I desperately tried a dozen things to get rid of the offending horn blast. At the same time, I could see out of the corner of my eye that they were scrambling. I pulled a few fuses and nothing worked. Finally I had to get down on the ground laying on my back and unplug the power from the compressor that supplies the air to the horn. My ears were ringing when this whole operation was finished and then I saw the road. Not one bicycle, motorcycle in sight....the car even moved closer to the curb.

And everyone was standing rather stiffly, "stunned" I guess, wide eyes, observing me as I now quietly rolled away down the now easy to drive on lane.I wonder what will happen next week....and I am sure they are too.

First Christmas party for many happy Thai Children at our Center

There was not one sad kid in a group of over 80 who joined us for our annual Christmas party.
I could say that most have never had the fun of a Christmas party with lots of singing about our Lord, a Bible message, Bible memory, group games with fellow youth, and a big meal and gifts from each child who registered. We had children register only 75 cents each assuring each gift was carefully selected (most cost more than a dollar or two) and a chance to win the big prize (a big loveable stuffed teddy bear!) costing less than 10 dollars. Our friends in the local Lions club also added some cheer by giving gift bags with a toothbrush, toothpaste, hand cream, soap, pencils, pens and other school supplies. We also gave each child a Christmas theme gospel message. Needless to say, it is a Christmas to remember for these children.
Recently a grandmother and a widow, who cares for Sugas, pictured below, who is one of our regular students, told us thank you for two extra KFC Chicken meals we sent home with Sugas after Sunday night church. She said she had not had supper and did not have anything to eat and was so very pleased with the delicious supper we provided for her. That sure make you understand the Christmas spirit and reminds us how good we really do have it. I have always noted that little Sugas always ate a lot and went back for seconds when we provided meals for our childrens programs. Now I know why.
When this girl won the prize Teddy Bear, there was a great round of cheers! At least someone got it!

And there was lots of delicious Thai style food -- Here Ann on of our active members and a college girl is helping serve food. And this is the seconds (and Thirds line!)

Christmas Eve Caroling! All 33 of us!

"We WISH You a Merry Christmas, We Wish YOU A Merry Christmas, We Wish You A MERRY CHRISTMAS and a Happy New Year."

Left is a picture of the Nativity scene using the very popular LEGO toys. This Chrismas, for our Childrens party on Saturday, I have found a whole set of LEGO pictures representing the Nativity and have the Christmas Story for the children told using these toys. Amazing!

One of the funnest things we have done this year was our Caroling outing with our area youth. For weeks the youth have enjoyed learning and singing Christmas songs to join in with the seasonal Christmas cheer. Actually this year we are having our annual Christmas party for the kids on Saturday the 28th because Thai schools and government offices do not close in Thailand, a predominantly Buddhist country, on Christmas Day. We have registered a total of 100 + children for our Christmas party gift exchange. But the "Caroling Night" was in the evening and filled with lots of singing at many of their homes, we also visited Kentucky Fried Chicken at the local Lotus Shopping Mall, though a special arrangement with the manager who had studied English at our center. We sang our Christmas songs had fried chicken, french fries, sodas, and a softserve ice cream. The KFC store was really a fun stop because they special service we received and the happy shoppers who stopped to see the singers, all 33 of us singing traditional Christmas song. We also had some Northeast Thai Christmas melodies and one very pretty song from Japan. The singers were feed cookies and snacks at most of the places we went and the last stop was where the largest group of kids in our group lived where we had cookies and Hot chocolate. It was great fun and a experience many will remember for a long time, celebrating Christmas in Sawang Dandin. This Sunday we are doing a joint Christmas Service Sunday night with Santisuk Baptist Church in Sakon Nakhon Province.