You heard correct ladies and gents! I made it to the Texas embassy in Malaysia! Bringing the closest thing I had to a taco in Malaysia to my mouth. That spicy Texas wrap was delicious and the award goes to Texas Chicken for the best little bastion of home I have been to. And that was one of the last things I did in Malaysia. Soon, a few days later, I hopped on a bus surrounded by all the teary faces of friends we had made in Malaysia. Jestus, who had said we had said bye the week before, returned as he always did when he said bye one last time for this leg in the adventure of life. JayShawn and his parents and siblings were all there on that early morning demonstrating to us that six-year-olds have no sleep schedule as he was up late the night before. PT and pastor Mathew (JayShawn’s dad) circled us up and prayed for us and likewise, we prayed for them. After a few more teary goodbyes we piled onto that bus and off we were to the frozen north.
Oh, wait.
It’s Thailand.
Nevermind.
We traveled north…
Reaching the border we piled out and had an uneventful border crossing and after a few more minutes of driving, reached the Hat Yai train station where we had some time to rest and get our first taste of Thailand. I was charged with watching over the luggage so I didn’t see the town but I asked Brandon to get me some Thai food and a random fruit and he did not disappoint. He got me some green sugary noodles and a pear that was the size of my head and was shaped more like an apple. That is exactly what I asked for. Praise the Lord for cheesy sayings that are truly wise. For example, expect nothing and you will be pleased by anything.
I settled down, laying down to rest on the bags, and when I woke, I hurt my eye and had to take out my contacts. It’s always a pain when that happens and, I didn’t shut my eyes for over 20 minutes. Anyway, my eye hurt for about an hour before it recovered a bit and we started to pick up our stuff to get on the first train up the Thai strip. The trip was about 14 hours through the night and I found the merchant logistics quite interesting. Each merchant had many different things to sell ranging from cigarettes, which people could smoke outside the train at the connection points, to Jok which was an unexpectedly tasty soup. They were really fun to talk to even with their limited English and one man was an absolute jokester and he made us laugh quite a few times. Once each merchant sold a good amount of their stock they would hop off at the next stop and be replaced with someone else. Looking at this I assumed it might be organized or at least there were supporting functions outside the train for the merchant to buy more stock and store their earned money. On this first train, I got some decent sleep because Carter gave me his pillow so I got about 5 hours of sleep. Carter I believe went to the back after a while and talked with some Buddhist monks which we were starting to realize were quite common to see. Lee also told me after I woke that I moved a lot and practically rolled a full 360 while sleeping. I was probably dreaming about being an alligator but who’s to say.
Dawn light appeared on the horizon and we started hitting the edge of Bangkok which was a fascinating amalgamation of rice fields, banana farms, and antique housing all packed together giving way to bigger and bigger buildings until we finally reached the train station and buildings towered in the distance. Disembarking from our first train ride we said goodbye to the girls staying in Bangkok, we were greeted by the Thai national anthem played every morning in many places and got ready for a 7-hour layover. My crusade to eat all the fruit I could find led me to buy tamarind, a fruit leather peanut that tasted much better than the snowcone I had a year or two ago, and share it with anyone who would try it. It wasn’t bad at all and I’d have it again if I knew where to find it. For lunch, I had a nice spicy Thai dish and charged my phone which was not much higher than 30% for most of both trips.
Stepping onto the next train we settled into our seats and struggled to put all our stuff up top. Most Thai people didn’t bring much of anything on these rides which surprised me. For example, this one man, who absolutely baffled Carter and me, bought with him, a hoodie and a fanny pack and proceeded to just lay down to sleep the whole 14-hour trip. After eating some dinner on the train we finally got settled in and I tried to nap a bit on this ride but that didn’t really work eventually, Karis came over and we watched a hilarious movie and talked about the deeper facts of the movie afterward. Poor Lee lost his seat and decided to sleep on the floor under the inoperable sinks. Speaking to Lee he said that he couldn’t find an area where both the seats were open so he could take up 3 seats and look like a speed square.
The end of this train did not greet us with a sunrise. Instead, it spat us out just before sunrise, and again the very handsome king of Thailand’s painting welcomed us to Chiang Mai, Thailand. Saying goodbye to the other two groups we all hopped in our RodDengs one group going to the Bella Goose hostel, our group heading to our airbnb, and the final group heading up the Chiang Dao. It was barely sunrise when we reached our pleasant estate which God blessed us with and soon I was snoozing. We had one other rest day where we read our Bibles and chilled at home before we got ready to meet our hosts the next day.
I can’t wait to tell y’all all about the Free Burma Rangers and all their lessons and stories that I get to share with you! I’ll get that out by Friday because I’m testing out actually scheduling things! I’d also like to say that I finished Psalms yesterday! It was an awesome read and I 100% read it out loud. It’s so fulfilling when you fill your life with Scripture because even when you mess up you have a strong rock to cling to. So with that ladies and gents, God bless you all, and have a wonderful day.
