Mae Hong Son

This past week, some friends and I had the opportunity to visit a home Remember Nhu partners with in the Mae Hong Son province to share some Christmas joy and love. It’s about a six hour ride through the mountains with 1,864 torturous curves, which I spent praying that the Lord would just take my soul because I was sure I wouldn’t make it out of the van alive (and really, who spent their time counting all these curves?!). Many Americans who come to Thailand for Remember Nhu are typically from the west coast region of the US. What I consider mountains here in Thailand, most consider large hills. We agree to disagree, however, driving through them, loop after turn after curve was nauseating, mountains or hill. There were a few close calls and many Dramamine pills consumed but we made it there and back without any accidents, PTL *hands in the air emoji*.

We were asked to visit this home in particular because they were unable to join the rest of the Remember Nhu homes in Chiang Mai for our Christmas celebration the previous week. Christmas celebration is one of the few times all our homes in Thailand are able to get together. We didn’t want the children to miss out on Christmas gifts and a special meal, so we made the 247 km (154 mile) drive through the mountains to visit children and house parents we had never met to share presents and time with them.

Mae Hong Son province is similar in feel to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. It’s surrounded by beautiful mountains and has tons of quaint shops filled with tourists from all over the world. There are day tours to nearby villages and landmarks in the surrounding area and night markets every night of the week. We stayed in a hotel near a lake that has a night market. During the week, while the children were in school, we were able to visit a Long Neck Hill tribe, a mile and half long bamboo bridge across a rice field, a Chinese village in the mountains, and a beautiful waterfall in addition to getting lost in the countryside.

It's indescribable how beautiful Thailand’s country side is. I will always choose the beach over the mountains, but the green foliage that surrounds and grows from the trees and mountains is captivating, almost suffocating. There’s so much of it, so much of nature that isn’t common in everyday city life. Driving through the mountain roads made me feel like I was transported back to the beginning of creation. Just thinking about how God opened his mouth and spoke nature into existence was overwhelming. My mind wandered off thinking about how He existed before the earth was created and how he exists outside of time. When I was a child I asked my mom who created God and she said that no one created him, that he has always existed and I couldn’t understand how. How can he have always existed? As an adult, in that moment, I tried to wrap my mind around God’s existence again. Maybe as an adult I could figure out the mystery of God. How could he have always existed? How old is He really? But swallowed in the mountains, surrounded by greenery so overwhelming, I became frustrated and had to stop thinking all together. There’s no way I can ever wrap my mind around how big God really is and as frightening as that realization is, there is comfort in knowing that the God who created the universe, the God who is so big that when I try to think about it my brain literally hurts, loves me unconditionally and thinks of me too. Seeing the country side made me understand how beautiful and wonderful the Lord’s creation is. 

Visiting the children’s home showed me what true agape love means.

Agape is defined as: the highest form of love, charity, the love of God for man and of man for God. Not to be confused with philia—brotherly love—agape love embraces a universal, unconditional love that transcends, that serves regardless of circumstances (Google).

Walking up the dirt driveway to the children’s home that is adjacent to their church building, the children share two separate bedrooms, one for eight girls and one for five boys. Their beds are made of thin blue plastic mattresses that line two large metal bed frames. I imagine the girls feeling like they’re at a sleepover talking to each other as they nod off. There is a strong sense of family when you see the children and house parents interact; a sense of safety and security that can only be found in a home where love and trust is evident. Seeing the children’s smiling faces as they ran up to us, complete strangers, to hold our hands and show us around was heartwarming.

We visited the home for four days to teach the house parents English, host an English camp for the children, and have a Christmas celebration complete with gifts and a delicious lunch. We sang ABC’s and practiced introducing ourselves. We colored and played Connect 4. We shared traditional hill tribe meals and a Thai favorite, chicken with sticky rice and papaya salad (Som Tum). We watched movies and took tons of photos of each other. We listened to each other speak in our native language and tried to figure out what was said. We laughed and tickled each other and enjoyed each other’s company.

Seeing how little these children had and yet how joyful they were was a shining example that more doesn’t always mean better. In the moments shared with these loving children and house parents, I wish I was a millionaire. I wish I could build a wonderful house filled with separate bedrooms for each child, complete with indoor bathrooms and central heating and air. I wish I could have purchased a truck for the home so the house parents could make one trip to and from school when dropping the children off. I wish I could have purchased a complete wardrobe for each child, filled with clothes that fit correctly and express each child’s style. I wish I could make the situation right for each child, so they wouldn’t have to live in a children’s home.

When I stare at the faces of these children, my heart is broken into a million pieces. A million ways the world is so broken. They smile because they have a mound of rice on their plates; my heart aches because they are separated from their families. They laugh because another child has done something silly, I hold back my tears because life has been unfair to them. They’re growing up not knowing or barely escaping the truth about how evil this world is, and I know there are many other children who won’t escape it.

It’s a slippery slope my heart walks along, feeling immense joy that these children are prevented from the possibility of being sold into human trafficking, whether it be child labor or sex labor, and feeling distraught that they’ll never have what I consider a normal childhood; growing up with your family, vacations, family dinners, and so on.

At the end of the day, I am truly grateful for being a part of an organization that is doing all it can to help children in dangerous situations, to end human trafficking, to give a future to those who would not have the opportunity if it wasn’t for organizations like Remember Nhu. Although my heart breaks from the many injustices our children face, my heart also rejoices because now our children can be children.