November 2008

Well, it shouldn't come as a surprise that another two weeks have rolled on by, but I can't shake the notion of how quick time seems to travel over here, thirteen degrees north of the equator. Heck, my birthday is less than three weeks away already! It seems like yesterday that I was working for my cousin moving office furniture from one location to another, but I haven't assembled a desk or a cubicle in almost six months now. Goodness!


Exciting News

For those of you who have been following my updates closely, you'll remember that my last letter asked you to pray for the purchase of a building to house a new church plant in Nonthaburi that would minister to the church body in this area. I write this even now with a lump forming in my throat: God is good! The purchase was approved by the bank, the seller accepted the terms and there is a firm possession date! Oh, it's an amazing thing—the family who's been looking to do this has been searching for almost six months to find a suitable location, and time after time, they get turned down either by the banks or by the sellers (i.e., someone else bought it moments before they made an offer). Praise God with us for the provision of this building! Please, however, do not stop praying about this project: there still is much work ahead. I've been told that we can start looking in / decorating the building on the 15th of December, but that actual possession/moving in will be come by 1 January, 2009. The family has asked me to come & look at the place sometime in this upcoming week, and from all information that I've received, it's going to be an empty shell. Would you be interested in supporting this extension of the kingdom financially? If so, please, I encourage you to fire me off an e-mail!


A Personal Victory

As far as school & my work from 7-5 Monday to Friday goes... I have finally succeeded in re-establishing the non-fiction section of the library, following the Dewey Decimal categorisation in a (loose) numerically ordered fashion. I'm not sure the last time the library was this organised…

Currently, the library now is alphabetised for both the elementary & high school fiction collections; the non-fiction collection is classified semi-consistently and students are beginning to learn how proper organisation actually works! The major projects that loom on the horizon right now, though, include re-tagging the multitude of books that previous librarians, in their sloth, just designated "REF" (reference books), whether or not they actually were reference materials. As it stands, there is no semblance to the "REF" collection and encyclopedias are shoved together with sesame street readers and colouring books all on random shelves throughout the remainder of the western wall.

Ominous project number two is now rearing its head also: the creation and digitisation of a library catalogue. As of this past week, the library now has a new computer that will act as a website database server, where staff & students from all over campus will be able to search library records & see if we have the books that they are looking for (and where those books are located, as well). Of course, this means physically tagging every book on campus with a bar code & entering book information into the database (some will be automated, if the ISBN has a matching record in other library databases around the world, but for the remainder of our books, etc., we'll have to manually create new records). It's gonna be gruelling & I'm not sure if little ol' me will be able to complete that task all by myself before April comes...


Odds & Ends

Last weekend, GES had its overnight camp program, where we take students off campus to cushy hotel environments & pretend to teach them how to survive in the wilderness (or at least that is the stated purpose, I've been told). What we actually end up doing is just hanging out & having fun—pretty much like a summer camp atmosphere with very little obligations. This year's program went relatively well, save for a few instances of poor judgement on some students' parts. We had to send a handful of students home early & dole out over a half-dozen suspensions for breaking some pretty serious rules... *sigh* teenagers and their lack of forward thought. How do I know? Because I remember quite well how my brain used to work: I also thought I was a genius and that I considered all of the outcomes of all of my actions, but a decade later looking back, I now realise how foolish some of my choices actually were (don't get me wrong—they were fun things; just not always the brightest choices).

This upcoming weekend, the majority of the staff will be heading out on a church retreat along with the majority of our ex-pat English-speaking church, CCC. A handful of others including myself will not be attending. I don't know. For me, I have always found difficulty in feeling like I belong in any sort of community—mostly because my brain works on quite a different wavelength than most people's, and also because I would characterise myself as being a shy individual. I'm a big advocate of organic Christianity—growing out from a tight-knit core, incorporating more & more into the community as it builds outwards—and when I come face to face with the majority of Christian communities which work in the more 'normal person' way of social mixers & big, aloof parties, I feel myself to be a fish out of water. Christian community & finding a real church home in Thailand has been the most elusive thing for me in my year & a half living here...

Probably the biggest reason that I will not be going to the retreat is because of the preparations that I feel I need to make for my classes on the following week. Not having a degree in Computers & not having any training at all in Library / Information Management has put me in a sticky position of having to learn & master content as I go along—just like last year, but now again with new material. The rest of the staff this year have almost all been placed in positions that jive with their university/college education (what class do you teach with a Drama / Psychology degree?) and I think that that gives them a bit of an edge in this whole school/planning ordeal. Oh well / mai bpen lai / no worries. Don't sweat the little stuff, right?


Concluding remarks

To condense this update for you in a pithy point-form version:

• We got the building for the church plant & possession begins 1 Jan, '09.
• My work in the library continues to be productive, despite its daunting nature
• Overnight camp went well, despite student behaviour hiccups

What you could pray for:

• This new church plant / project in Nonthaburi. That the details and the resources would come together so that the ministry can charge ahead at full steam in January. If you, someone you know, or an organisation that you're aware of would be willing to lend a financial hand in acquiring the supporting infrastructure (chairs, light bulbs, tables, paper, paint, coffee, etc.) for the physical location & / or for the ministry itself, please contact me.


• The students who made some unwise choices this past week—that they would be open to the benefits of correction & not become bitter/resentful from the punishments, and that this may provide an avenue toward a relationship with Christ/breaking down walls


• Continued staff unity, professionally & more importantly, spiritually. That we would grow together as one body & one unit, supporting each other as we try to live out Christ's spiritual mandate of making disciples throughout the world.

That's all I got for now. Check back again in a couple weeks for further updates!