So it's been a little while... first of all, i just want to say that the most beautiful place on earth is the Burmese-Thai border where we are staying. This terrible computer wont let Josh put up any pictures, so you'll have to wait. I can tell you that i swam to Burma and made it back alive. We visited a Karen village. I'm trying to think of how to describe it....it's kind of like a ghetto, but in bamboo huts. It's in the middle of a Thai village, but the Thai government doesnt want them there, so they arent allowed to have electricity. The roofs of their houses are made of leaves and everything else (litteraly everything) is bamboo. These people don't have papers, so they cant go to the refugee camps. They cant go back to their country because the Burmese government will try to kill them. The men do whatever work they can for almost no pay (60 Bhat - $2 a DAY). This is who we are going to help. We got a Thai-Karen translator and Pastor Manat translated English from Thai for us (kinda a process). We want them to eventually be self sustaining, so we're going to do some stuff to help them (I wont bore you with the details).

After that we took a motor-bike ride through some sketchy dirt trail/road thing. I was pretty fun, but the village wasnt what we're looking for. On the way back, Josh and I decided to take our motor bike (Josh was driving and i'm sure they arent made for 2 full-sized american men) through a river crossing. Let's just say it ended with waist-deep water and us fishing the bike out. I'm not a mechanic, but i doubt that's good for the engine. I truck came by literally 30 seconds after we got the water out of the exhaust pipes and the guy happens to have the exact tools (keep in mind we are in the middle of freakin no where) to take apart the engine compartment and drains another liter of water. It started, ran, and we drove it for the next 3 days. Thanks God.

Next day, we visited a church that they are trying to build (dont have the money). They have the support logs and the roof, but no walls or floor. by the way, the columns were brought off the mountain by elephants. We're going to pay for it to get completed and get electricity. Pastor Steven (this little rad Thai guy that we swear is our gaurdian angel/ninja) is going to live there and pastor this village. It's going to be cool.

Thats all for now. I have a madly infected ankle burn from a motor bike, so pray God heals that before it gets gangrenous. I took a picture 3 days ago and it looks way worse now.




I should have labeled this post. Sorry, but it's James. Aj is fine. Thank you Aj's family for all of your concern. My sister/doc gave me a joyous cornacopioa of antibiotics to get, so hopefully the infection will subside soon.