Hey guys,
As I currently write this newsletter, I have been in Thailand for about a month now. Through this newsletter, I hope to let you know how my travels were from America to Thailand, what stuff my team and I have been doing for ministry, and how life is like for me living in another country with World Racers.
Starting with my travels, on January 26 my squad and I left from Atlanta, Georgia to go to Thailand. As a reminder, my squad (S squad) is a group of 16 other young adults ages 21-30, who I will be going to the same countries with during my mission trip at World Race. Before arriving in Bangkok, Thailand, we had 2 layovers which occurred in Denver and in Vancouver, Canada. After arriving in Bangkok, our squad started splitting up into our 3 different teams to go to our assigned ministry host location. My team, which we call ourselves The Sent Ministry, then had to take 2 train rides and walk approximately 45 minutes with our luggage (which weighed about 60 pounds each) approximately 2-3 miles to get to a bus stop. After arriving at the bus stop, we then had a 10 hour bus ride followed by a 15 minute car ride to our final destination which was at a hostel located in Chiang Mai. Overall, our commute to get to Chiang Mai was about a 50 hour making for a pretty long day. We will be staying at this hostel until March 16 while working with a local ministry. Once we arrived, our first week was a bit of an orientation week/ slow ease into various ministry stuff/ learning how to live in another country.
That said, in my first month here, my team has had the privilege to do various ministry opportunities. Our main assigned ministry has been helping victims either of human trafficking or of similar situations transition back to normal life. Our team was assigned tasks in helping fix up a restoration home and in helping prepare/ then teach a business administration course. Starting with the restoration home, the purpose of this home is for certain women who are in need to have a place to stay to heal and get back on their feet. Our job was to help fix a house that had been recently flooded. We painted and cleaned this house for about a week. One of the workers was so grateful and told us that if it wasn’t for us, it would have taken their team a month to restore. Our other task, which has been and will be our main task for our time in Thailand, is helping with a business administration training course. In short, victims need to learn skills so they can be able to transition to the workplace and be properly equipped. The course we helped develop deals with basic business administration skills as well as healing aspects. This is the first run through of this course and is hopefully going to be continually used and refined to better serve the women. While teaching the course, our team is also taking notes for the course to be refined to better suit their needs and flow best.
In addition to this, our team for ministry has been able to do various prayer walks and evangelism in the red-light district area (a location of bars where prostitution/ sex trafficking occurs). There are many tourists in the area which gives us opportunities to talk to people when we feel led to talk to them. Our team is also trying to just be aware of opportunities to share about Jesus and pray for people which is a lifestyle we should all live by. Specifically living in Thailand where Buddhism in the main religion and there is about 1% Christianity in the country, ministry is different and needs to be done specific to the culturally appropriate way. It is a bit more of a relational country than the West so learning this and doing things in a Thai way takes a bit of learning and adjusting. Finally, we have also gotten connected with a Christian ministry for kids. Through this, we have been able to serve in the ministry by playing/ helping with soccer once a week for a 2 hour time period while continuing to build up relationships/ love them.
Living in another country with World Racers has been quite the experience for me. We are a team of 6 people, and it is always an experience living with people in a confined space. Of course, just trying to figure out where things are such as stores or brands is an experience and trying to figure out what food to get and who is to cook/ etc. can be challenging. It has also been interesting living in a community where we having to do most things together like ministry, meals, and other team time activities. As a team, we are also required to do daily feedback which is in essence calling out their identity in Christ and pointing out things about people (good or bad) in a loving way with the view to call them higher toward God. Additionally, there is also time for daily reflection and continued realization that in order to pour out, one has to continually fill themselves up with God. As a team, we do this individually and help one another in our times of need.
Overall things are good, but as always, each day of life can be a struggle. Learning to live in another country with inconveniences and lack of comfort has been more challenging for me than I originally expected. Since being here in Thailand, I have gotten sick and have had multiple stomach issues. Mentally, I have struggled part of my time here as a result of this and other things. Despite this, I have a choice daily to live in thankfulness and remain in Christ and not rely on my own strength. With this in mind, I have been getting better physically and mentally and am doing so much better! I am so thankful for this.
That said, I would appreciate continued prayer for mine and my team’s health (physical and mental health), for fruit in the ministry stuff we are doing/ for the people we are serving to have open hearts to Jesus, and for more opportunities to share the gospel with people who have open hearts to it. For photos, please click the following links below which will show my social media pages and my S squad’s Instagram account where I will occasionally appear in. As always, I love and appreciate the support and appreciate all of you who have reached out to me, who have been praying for me, and who have been supporting me in this process.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/john.bianoski.7
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/johnbianoski/?next=%2Fjohnb01357%2F
Squad Instagram Page: https://www.instagram.com/worldracessquad/
