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Houston? Rogers That.

Did I say I was glad to be back in Dallas? Our "home" without a home so to speak? Well, when we returned from our 6-week stint away, we left again - this time to see Matt, my little brother, get inducted into his medical school in Houston! Wow! I am so proud of him and it was great to see him and my parents and sister (who also just finished taking the Texas Bar Exam and just graduated from Law School at UT - did I mention my siblings are smart?) who all attended and drove to Houston for the night. Houston reminds me much of Bangkok - hot, humid, boggly, and mosquitoey mostly ALL the time. I like to make up my own words (e.g. mosquitoey). However, the trip was a big one for us because I had to say my first big goodbye - to my brother. It does not yet seem real that I won't get to see him or talk to him whenever I want. I was thankful to have the opportunity to get to see him before we left and before school gets really busy for him.

The same morning we left for Houston, we also welcomed Sgt. Mike Leeman back from Iraq after he has been there serving in the army for over a year! We are so proud of him and are excited for him to start Officer Candidate School in Georgia soon.

Baltimore and the East Coast beach trip

First week of August we found ourselves at Penn Station in Baltimore, a far cry from NYC's massive Penn Station we had departed from only 3 hrs before. We visited Camden Yards, the Bronsons' favorite baseball stadium and home of their beloved Orioles before flying in Bethany's Rodeo to Ocean City, Maryland for a week at the beach with the Bronsons, the Jacksons, and the Crowleys, both family friends of the Bronsons that go way back! We had a few run-ins with some rather pesky, biting horseflies that seemed to love the scent & taste of OFF! repellant, but we managed to enjoy our hard life of being at the beach in a beautiful house a family friend allowed us so graciously to use. A family vacation was great for the Bronsons all to enjoy with the many changes that are taking place in all of our lives right now!

Finally, we returned from 6 weeks of being gone from Dallas, (basically the majority of the hot summer) - we had been to St. Louis, Missouri; New York City, Amsterdam, Baltimore, and the East Coast of Maryland. We were rested from our week at the beach, but feeling rather weary of returning to once again living out of suitcases and scattered miscellaneous boxes, bags, duffels, you name it, and really missing a place we can call HOME. It has been a difficult and humbling thing to realize our need to ask people - family & friends - for help during this time. Obviously not only for financial support for our 2 years we are preparing for, but just for other means of support - a place to live, a place to store our stuff, help with packing & moving several times, getting all of our ducks in a row before leaving the country. I've had to realize again & again that I cannot do everything myself and that we have to swallow our pride many-a-time as we prepare to go and even over the next 2 years. But wait!! Suddenly Erin & Aaron are moving to DC for a new job! Which kind of foils our plan to live with them til we leave in September. However, not to worry - Brian & Katherine Steinbrueck to the rescue! Our Vanderbilt friends move to Dallas for a new job while we are gone in New York and alas! they have an extra bedroom for us. They are so kind to host us for a few weeks before we leave again to see my parents & the Rogers family at the Texas coast for the last time. So today we moved yet again - out of Erin & Aaron's house, and into Brian & Katherine's house. Andrew & Brian are currently out buying a bed for us to sleep in!

Are you getting somewhere? Or did you get lost in Amsterdam?

Recently I had the opportunity to travel to Amsterdam, The Netherlands (Holland) after a very generous friend offered the trip to me for virtually free travel costs!! Amazing! Chris and Tang Dalo are former co-workers of Andrew's from his 2 years in Bangkok and now live in Connecticut. We loved travelling together and just had a blast seeing the sights, eating Indonesian food, traversing the city by foot & tram occasionally, and seeing President Bush protests.
If any of you have ever seen this beautiful canal city, it is well worth the trip. The city is gorgeous, formed by rings and rings and more rings of circular streets & circular canals, one after the other after the other. Walking is the preferred mode of transportation, but we soon learned that crossing the street can be a hazardous situation as you check left and right several times for: Trams (innavigable from their tracks, so better watch out), Haphazardly driven bikes (don't suddenly dart out in the road or you may lose a limb), Buses (narrow streets don't allow for much room), and of course, Cars, Pedestrians, and Things-Left-Behind-By-People-Not-Cleaning-Up-After-their-Pets (if you know what I mean.)
We had a fabulous time, though, and visited the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum, Rembrandt's House, the Anne Frank Huis, (where she and her family hid for 2 years before being taken to concentration camps), the Heineken Brewery, and a Canal Tour. We also came across a few sights that probably could not be seen anywhere but Amsterdam, including a public urinal and a street performer making bird chirping sounds (for money.)

Flowers in Flushing and Training in the Big Apple

In July, we ventured to New York City for MTW Pre-field Training. We were paired with a Korean-American church, Living Faith Community Church in Flushing, Queens, near the Mets' stadium and where the US Open takes place. The churhc is in a neighborhood with pretty walk-up houses, and hydrangeas abound!

Our ministry with the church was mainly advertising for their Vacation Bible School in August, but we spent most of our time fellowshipping with them and taking part in Sunday worship services by giving our testimonies and giving the Children's Gospel presentations. The area of Flushing is a dense area of mostly Korean and Chinese. In fact, most of the businesses in the area (including our daily staples of Starbucks & Dunkin Donuts) had Chines & Korean characters on their signs. There's way more foreign languages spoken and seen in Flushing than English!

We were excited to be living in an Eastern European community in Sunnyside, Queens, and going to our daily MTW classes/lectures in Long Island City, Queens, which were both closer to Manhattan midtown. We found ourselves excited to live in a new area of NYC, because we both knew Manhattan well and have spent much time there previously. Queens is probably the most diverse place on Earth! It is said that more than 160 languages are spoken and over 150 nationalities found there. Riding our 7 train every day we mostly saw Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Turkish, Indian, and many other cultures, so it was refreshing to be in such a diverse borough. I could not have fathomed the enormity of Queens before living there...in my mind NYC to me was Manhattan, so Queens was venturing into a world unknown! Queens is cheaper than Manhattan too - we found many ethnic restuarants that we frequented - mostly Thai, Lebanese, Turkish, and Japanese.

Our classes every afternoon centered on many facets of missionary strategy and living: Language learning acquisition, church-planting philosophies, evangelism, and cultural textualization of planting churches and starting ministries. Our last week in New York we found ourselves procrastinating just like the good ole days at Vanderbilt....we finished all our final assignments in the last 2 days of the month. We scrambled to see and visit with all our friends in the city, and loved the last bit of time we were able to spend with them. We celebrated our last night by kareoking with some of our Thai friends and Andrew's former co-workers from Bangkok - can't wait for all those kareoking opportunities in Thailand!!

Nomads....

This itineration process has been a very unique time in our lives. We've been blessed by great travelling opportunities. From the time we've left our jobs in April and moved to a new place in Dallas, we were able to visit friends and family in: Washington DC & Virginia; Baltimore; New York City; Southport, CT; Nashville, TN; Austin, San Antonio, and Port Aransas, TX. It's been a nutty few months travelling, but well worth the time and effort to see people before we go. We felt privileged to get to see Jimmy D, our college friend, receive a Washington Post Agnes Meyer Outstanding Teacher Award, which is a huge honor for DC teachers. Here are some pictures from our trip, in Washington Square in NYC, with my friends Krista & Alison, Jimmy D, and dogwood trees blooming!

We have missed stability and life in Dallas as we live out of suitcases now. In fact, at the end of June we packed up all our things: from furniture, to clothes, to trinkets & frames, and drove to St. Louis to store it all in Andrew's parents' basement! You realize how much pointless stuff you accumulate through the years.
Simplifying our lives in this way has been somewhat refreshing, but very stressful too! We've really had to force feed ourselves the Gospel daily as we struggle through major adjustments, with many more to come as we move to Thailand. One of the hardest things for me has been relying on other people for things: rides to the airport, borrowing cars, staying in others' houses/apartments, and of course, financial support and prayer! We just cannot do it all ourselves and I HATE to admit that most times. It's been a lesson in learning to surrender control and rely upon the Lord to provide so many things for us and in His timing, not mine. Right now we are living in the extra bedroom of Aaron & Erin's house, Andrew's brother and his wife. It is like a slumber party every night for both Erin & me and Aaron & Andrew! We love living with them but it is hard to not have a place to call home, and to have our remaining suitcases and boxes strewn about in two small bedrooms. We are thankful for this provision in having a place to live for an interim few months.

A First and a Twenty-Sixth....

After Andrew & I returned from our trip to Bangkok, it was time to leave our jobs...I left my advertising job and Andrew, in a crazy turn of events, was actually officially laid off from his job at a commercial real estate company. The first of many adjustments we would make in the ensuing months!
We were speaking at some churches in South Texas at the beginnning of April, one which happened to be on my 26th birthday, so we were able to celebrate with my family in San Antonio. Nathan & Stacy and Matt & Kate were able to drive the one-hour trip from Austin as well. The birthday was a nice relaxation as we had just moved out of our apartment and into a smaller, cheaper apartment - across the street. This living arrangement was necessary as we only needed a place for 3 months before we'd leave for NYC training.
Our family LOVES dachshunds, especially the newest member of the family, Stacy & Nate's 2 and a half year old Maya. For Christmas I had been given a fun, black, silver-sequined shirt from Stacy (& Nathan, of course). I was astounded to find the same shirt months later: black tank top, silver sequins and all - except Maya-sized! Here we are above celebrating my birthday together in matching outfits.
A week later Andrew & I celebrated our FIRST anniversary early, as the 16th fell on Easter Sunday this year. We can hardly believe it's been a year already. I still remember our wedding day like it happened a few days ago. This year has honestly FLOWN by as we've been in the missions mindset and applied to MTW after only 4 months of marriage. Praise God for a good first year! We've learned so much about each other and have discovered how sanctifying marriage is. We still have so much to learn...but have the rest of our lives to do that!
Andrew surprised me with a trip to Fort Worth for our anniversary. Nothin like Cow-town to celebrate! We ate at the Riata, went to the Kimball Art Museum (Andrew was very patient) and then to the zoo, my favorite! A few pictures of that COLD morning. We decided all the animals were out and about because of the chill in the air.

The Blogging Universe - February Trip to Thailand

So I have joined the blogging world, lest I feel left out of the universe of MTW Thailand team's blogging efforts! I've decided to begin with our trip to Thailand in February as a start.

Andrew and I planned our trip to Thailand around PCPC's trip to Nong Khai in northeast Thailand. PCPC has been involved with Thai & Lao refugees in East Dallas since the 80's, and to this day we have a Lao Presbyterian Fellowship within our church. In Nong Khai, PCPC has helped fund the building of a new church for the Lao/Thai Christian community of believers they have worked with for years. We attended the dedication of this building in February - a grand ceremony, service and dinner celebration with entertainers - the whole nine yards! Our church's Director of Missions & Outreach, Curt Dobbs, spoke, as well as Paul Taylor, the MTW Director of Missions in Asia. We also had the opportunity to visit a group of doctors staying in Vientiane, Laos (right over the Mekong River and Thai/Lao border) and doing 40 surgeries on children with facial deformities. Every year, this group (LEAP) independently raises money to travel to 4-5 locations worldwide to do these surgeries. We felt blessed to have the opportunity to see them in action in a Russian-built hospital in Vientiane. We also visited the Providence School, a Christian (!) school with grades 1-4.

We spent time in Bangkok as well, seeing old co-worker friends of Andrew's, visiting with college friends Brandi & Frank Dixon (serving in Beijing, China) and visiting Jack, Kim, Gracyn, & Aidan Cunningham and Halley Davis, part of the MTW team in Bang Na we are preparing to join in September. Yes, they have baby elephants on downtown streets of Bangkok! I was able to see Thailand with my very own eyes for the first time, experience the LONG flight (about 24-hour travel from Dallas to Bangkok) and have REAL, authentic sticky rice with mango! My favorite Thai dessert.

Praise God for the safe trip there and back and for the fruitful time spent with the Cunninghams, the Dixons, the LEAP team, and the Nong Khai Gennesaret Church!

Pictures include: Eating lunch in Bkk w/ former co-workers and Dallas friend Kim (working at same company Andrew worked for previously); Performances in Nong Khai for church dedication; downtown Bangkok gridlock; the sanctuary of Gennesaret Church; 2 shots at Providence School in Vientiane, Laos; Board Members of Gennesaret Church, standing in front of the new building, including PCPC's Curt & Sue Dobbs; Our Klong (water canals) Tour of Bangkok with Halley and Brandi & Frank. That huge fruit is a jackfruit!