The House Collective

bones.

by Filed Under: house church, kelli, photos, stephen 2 Comments

We moved into this neighborhood eleven years ago now. The kids that were five and six are now sixteen and seventeen. The ones we watched get married are bringing home second and third kids. The ones who had kids have grandkids.

In the short version, we worked for an organization that wanted to change the big picture, while we saw the need—and maybe our place—in the small picture right in front of us. We wanted to invest here, so we started building.

We built our relationships slowly. In another language, over some tragedies and Memory games, over meals and community meetings. It was weird and nontraditional, to say the least.

And then somewhere along the way, we wondered if we were even the right people for this anyway. We wanted to see more local leadership, and we wondered if we were just in the way. And maybe I just felt like I’d been building for years but wasn’t sure what I was looking at.

I was ready to step back: back into my passport country, back into English, back into an adoption system that would tell me the next step in the process.

But in the most unexpected way, it felt like God said we were placed. We were in position for something. I’m not speaking to philosophy or ideology here, just my own story: while we might not be local or the best for the job or the ones you’d pick out in a crowd, we were placed now. We were in position. We did know the language. We did know the families. We did know the unknowns. We’d started building something that we should continue. It felt like God just said to stay put. Keep building. Wait.

So after that visit to the States, we still went back. With mixed feelings, yes; but we did.

______________

I’ve had Ezekiel 37 on my mind for years, woven throughout this story. I’ve had different people speak to me about it; to share about our community and reference it. I memorized it earlier this year, meditating on the poetry of it.

“Oh, Lord God, you know.” (v.3)

It’s been a long decade of meditating and ruminating.

And then this year—amidst all that 2020 brought us!—there was a rattling.

It’s hard to put it into words. It was dreams, shared by a teenager in tears. It was in conversations, some very, very hard. It was in tears. It was in actual miracles. (Clearly I’m a skeptic. I’m using “actual miracles” so that I believe it, too.)

And then this.

In December, I was sitting on the steps of our church waiting for Stephen to return for the second trip home. This particular Sunday was the first of the month: we had brought bread for communion and flowers for the church from Flour & Flowers. The Reinforcers had run sound and managed the new projector recently installed. The Sunday school teachers fell through unexpectedly at the last minute. With ten or so kids from our community attending and dropping coins all over the tile floors, Stephen and I gathered all the kids outside for a pick up Sunday school lesson.

I was tired as I sat there.

“I’m getting baptized. I’m taking the class and then I’ll get baptized next month.”
“What?”
“Baptized. You know? I’m getting baptized next month. I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. And this is what I’m going to do. It’s true. It’s what I believe.”

Later in the week, as we did our Honest Advent by Scott Erickson (recommended!), we read this,

“It’s a surprise that life can come through barren places.
It’s a surprise that meek nobodies partake in divine plans.”

This is how I felt in that moment. I’ve been looking at this desert for a number of years. Sometimes the endless English classes and market runs; friends telling me of the problems in their marriages and families; language learning and impromptu Sunday school in my second language: it feels like endless desert sometimes. It feels like dry bones. It feels like God is asking me, “Can these bones live?”

And often I’m replying–with a sigh or groan–“Oh, Lord God, YOU KNOW.”

Subtext: Oh, Lord God, you know if this is worth anything. Oh, Lord God, you know if we are building anything.

And then life pops up. And I’m sitting in front of a fifteen-year-old that we’ve known since he was five. He’s walked in and out of that door hundred and hundreds of times. We’ve watched his face get rounder and then thinner over and over again. We’ve had conversations about who the Buddhist god is and who our God is. We’ve watched him draw on his hands while sitting in Bible study some weeks and eagerly join the discussion in others.

And now he’s telling me he’s choosing to blaze the path in his very Buddhist family. He’s pondered it, he’s considered what he sees. And he believes.

Because there is a divine plan here, and we as nobodies get to be a part of it. We get to sit on the steps in the middle of a desert and see the the life pop through. We are watching dry bones take on sinews and flesh and breathe life, because we serve a God who does that. He is Emmanuel, here with us in the desert and among the dry bones.

Creating life.

immigration.

by Filed Under: kelli 3 Comments

{Insert cliche statement about this year and all it’s been.}

I’ll just say that my sons two favorite role play games currently are:
Playing Covid //  He blocks your way, takes your temperature and tells you if it’s okay or not; then gives you hand sanitizer.
Playing Immigration // He takes any nearby notebook and flips through page by page with dramatic, loud stamping on each page. Then hands it back, asks for money, and says “Thank you” respectfully in Thai. 

We have spent a lot of time at Immigration this year, going nearly every month. And pretty much every time, they aren’t sure if we’ll get another extension; or what the situation will be when we’re back. We wait and hope and pray and consider our options.

And due to the continuing health situation worldwide, they usually extend it at the bottom of the ninth, and we get another stamp. 

Plus a bright red stamp stating this is an exception.

It’s been stressful throughout, but took some new, extra stressful turns last month. 

At our last appointment we were given sixty days and told this was our last extension; they were done. No more red exemption stamps.

Sixty days to figure out a plan.

In sixty days, two of us are kicked out of this country to get a new visa, but our passports aren’t very welcomed worldwide currently (so we can’t hop to nearby country as we usually do). So, we are likely needing to return to the US to apply for a new visa, quarantining on both sides of the trip—one side being government run and expensive. This also requires they actually give us the new visa once stateside, which always felt unsure before covid and visa restrictions! 

Oh, and one of us, in sixty days, can still live here. And yet can’t actually travel to the one place the other two would need to go. 

So, in sixty days, in the midst of an international pandemic, we can either try to get two people special permission to stay in Thailand, or one person special permission to go to America. 

________________

We started with the Embassy, which was as helpful as I feared they might be. They said they can do nothing, even as we are two Americans with a Thai son. (My movie experience did not give me a realistic perspective of the US Embassy.) 

They did send us information for how to apply for a visa for America, so we are considering that as a back up for if we are kicked out. We’d like to have this on hand. However, it takes a whole lot of paperwork and an interview in Bangkok. And we need to ensure that we apply for the correct one that doesn’t later make citizenship more difficult. 

…So we wrote our lawyer in America to ask about more details.

Meanwhile, we are looking at what the paperwork includes; and considering our options. Most of the processes take 6 months to one year; we don’t have that and would need a special exception. Due to Covid and current inter-provincial restrictions, we’d need permission to travel to Bangkok. It also is a much greater risk of exposure, as we’d be traveling into red zones. But this is only through January; so do we wait to February? That is a delay, but we needed special permission anyway…

So while we wait to hear from our US lawyer and wait to see how Covid and restrictions play out, we work on things from the Thai side. 

We spoke with friends in Thailand, who recommended other friends. This person asks for paperwork, then talks to that person; that person asks for paperwork. Then someone asks for a different item of paperwork, and I go searching. And really, we just wait to see if anyone who knows the system or knows the language or knows the options gets in touch with us. I respond to messages throughout the days answering questions and sending more info. I stay up at night, gathering the documents together. 

And now we’ve hired a lawyer. We have an office staff who helps with visas, and she does speak the language and helps us understand the process. But she, too, is learning the process. It turns out it’s not always easy to understand for the people utilizing it, even if you do know the language.

So for the past few days I’ve been working with lawyers on both sides of the world, while I watch a clock ticking down. {39 days.}

It’s given me a new perspective on immigration in America.

We work with refugees and migrants here; and we’ve been immigrants for a decade. We are a mixed culture and country family. It’s not surprising that I believe in open borders and a generous immigration policy.

But still, this month I understand more of how immigrants feel in America; how my friends feel. I understand more of what I believe about the immigration process and immigration reform.

I understand more of how the DACA students feel, waiting daily as laws change and update. But it isn’t just a law to them. It’s their life. The life they know and live.

The children with citizenship and parents without; the fear of being deported as a partial unit. The fear for one and not the other.  I feel a little closer to them today.

I understand the stress of not knowing exactly what I’m aiming for; or how to appease the powers that be. Some days thinking maybe language would be the thing that would help me; frustrated at myself for not studying enough. But other days realizing communication isn’t actually the problem. Still more days thinking that while I study “jump” and “medicine” I might be quite far away from language becoming helpful in the immigration office. 

We share the feeling of wanting to stay somewhere so badly: of feeling at home and feeling known in a place, but then also feeling like they really don’t want us at all. Do they not see that I am trying to contribute? I am giving everything I have to make this home and be a contributing part of this society. 

We know the fear of being kicked out of the life we know: for me, the only life I know as a married woman; the only life I know as a mom. The place where my work and my books and my memories are. The place where my community and my friends are.

But beyond the life I personally know; the fear of my being separated from my son, because we hold two different passports. “They would never do that,” I think. He’s my son!

Oh, but they do do that. 

Whoever “they” is.

It happened so many times in the past few years in America; hundreds of children, including families they are struggling to reunify. Did you know sometimes they resorted to using DNA to match families because the records were destroyed?

I don’t have the same DNA as my son.

________________

I caught myself this week in a paradox.

I have great respect for our US immigration lawyer. He does a lot of work in the refugee community we used to work in, and I’m so thankful he’s helping people to stay and figure out their processes. I’m thankful our money is going to support him to help more people. I’m thankful he’s helping us maneuver the US immigration process.

But then this week, I found myself skeptical of our lawyer here; does he just want us to give him more money? Does he understand we don’t have endless resources?

I caught myself feeling a respect for immigration lawyers in America, helping people to stay; but then am skeptical of lawyers here just wanting to make money.

But perhaps he just wants us to be able to stay, too.

Perhaps my eyes are stained by stereotypes. 

________________

And so we wait. I have no conclusion as of yet. Just 39 days to see where God takes us.

Literally where. We have no idea.

I don’t love it, this not knowing. But I’m also choosing to be thankful that each challenge gives me a better understanding of others’ challenges.

the end of an era.

by Filed Under: kelli, photos Leave a Comment

In the midst of so many other big things, we bought a car! While I never would have thought we’d be a two-car family in Thailand, there are many things about my life I never would have thought.

While our Toyota SUV is perfect for the community–large enough to fit in lots of people, closed in the back to keep everyone safer, old enough to handle blood and vomit and fish stink, tough enough to carry 500 kilos of rice…It’s perfect in so many ways. However, to make long trips out of Mae Sot, it needed some significant repairs. And pouring huge amounts of money in an older, fish-smelling car felt a little unwise.

But as Covid pushed up the cost of in-country flights and we are limited to staying in Thailand for the foreseeable future: we were starting to feel trapped. After renting a car for a trip a few weeks ago, we began to consider what a family car might look like for us. In the end, we decided that we couldn’t really afford to buy a new community-useful car, but we could afford a family-useful car while keeping this community car running.

Enter a new-to-us 2004 Honda Civic that we now use for our family of three!

And with that, we couldn’t really find a need to have a community car, a family car, AND a motorbike. And since we very, very rarely find us going anywhere without a child or community members; even more rarely without large amounts of rice or flour.

We said goodbye to our motorbike of ten years.
And we were sadder about it than we expected!

{Oak helped our sadness by deciding the very day we drove it to the new owners to wear his superhero cape and mask everywhere we went. 🥰}

It really does feel like the end of an era. We bought this motorbike new when we moved and drove every one of its 34,650 kilometers right here in Mae Sot. 😳

We bought community Christmas presents on it for a few years.

We took instruments to home church on it more times than I could count.

We carried 25 kilogram bags of flour on it, in additional to all our groceries for years.

We took visitors for fun rides around the city.

We drove it as a family of three.

And he can really rock a helmet more than most.

Years ago when we bought it, it was the best way to experience a new city. We smelled all the smells, so that we still to refer to “the cotton candy corner.” We felt all the heat and rain and wind right on us everywhere we went, learning to sit in the shade during stoplights.

It represents so much of making life here in Mae Sot our home: conquering fears, adjusting, becoming us–here, in this context.

And while it’s the end of an era, I kind of hope we can go back to it some day…whether that’s teaching our kids to drive one if we’re still living in Asia (!) or if that’s making our lives in America work with one car and a moto.

I really have no idea.

I’m just kind sad to see it go! But I’m also realizing this is just another version of the mom haircut. It was inevitable as we grow beyond twenty-somethings moving to a faraway country and making it up as they go.

Now we’re thirty-somethings raising a family in a faraway country and making it up as we go.

Somehow that’s a little bit different and has us saying goodbye to our motorbike.

It’s been real, it’s been fun. It’s been really, really fun.

celebrate!

by Filed Under: kelli, on the house, photos Leave a Comment

And this called for celebration!

The following Sunday, we planned an ice cream party to bring together most everyone we know in town: friends from the neighborhood, friends from church, friends from Oak’s school, friends from our expatriate community. All the friends, and all the celebrating.

To make it even better, this turned out to be Thai Mother’s Day, and we celebrated it that morning at church.

And then we threw the most chaotic ice cream party! Thankfully, we asked a friend to come and take pictures. I am so, so thankful, because it was a blur of joy and smiles.

We hired the youth to come and help host, and they did amazing. They even showed up in black bottoms and white tops, because they are stellar.

And even when it got like this in the first few minutes, Pyint Soe just ran his fingers through his hair and kept going for two more hours.

They love Oak so well, and I love them for it.

I am so thankful for how these photos capture a blend of cultures, lives, and stories, all coming together to celebrate our son.

We planned to leave town that evening for a few days to celebrate as a family. Stephen laughed out loud when the hotel called around 4pm asking when we’d be checking in. At that moment, we were both drenched in sweat, Oak was covered in ice cream and dirt, a few hundred people filled our home, and we had a few hours drive ahead of us.

We live full. 🥰

officially ours.

by Filed Under: kelli, photos 1 Comment

Not that there are too many things competing, but this is our best news of 2020. It’s also one of the few things worth shouting on this blog!

As of 7 August 2020, HE’S OFFICIALLY OURS.

There was the day we thought it was going to be official. So we got dressed up and made a thing of it.

It wasn’t.

But then it WAS. And we can’t hardly believe it. We had two dear Thai friends wait with us for hours–with their kids, too–so they could be our witnesses.

And then in a very anticlimactic moment, we were handed two officially stamped and officially dull-looking documents.

And just like that, we’re officially a family.
We submitted our application 1,931 days ago.
We brought him home 448 days ago.

He calls us mom and dad; we call him son. It’s a beautiful thing.

this boy.

by Filed Under: kelli, photos, playhouse Leave a Comment

As Covid remains controlled in Thailand, it’s been lovely to have Oak back in school and have more time out in the community. And he’s just too cute to miss some of this.

He’s loving music and knows the words and beats to so many songs. He can identify a song by the first few measures, just like the other musician in our home. ☺️

Living in a community center means you usually have a few “aunties” or “older siblings” to listen to your masterpieces, and sometimes even a few friends to make a band.

After reading his Roaring Rockets book, Oak showed an interest in space. We have started studying a bit about the planets and even made our own “oxygen helmets” and “gravity boots”!

Of course, Dad stepped it up a bit.

This boy brings us so much fun!

i is for ice cream.

by Filed Under: house church, kelli, on the house, photos, schoolhouse Leave a Comment

In July, as Thai schools began to open back up, we decided to re-start our weekly English program. Every Saturday, we open our doors at 9am for a crowd of kiddos.

We start with music and a couple read-aloud stories–I’m still working toward story hour right here in my home! Lun then teaches a Bible story, sometimes with music or a memory verse.

We then gather around for rice that Thida has beautifully put together. I love this time every week.

We then break into groups for English and Burmese classes. We have four groups. The 2-5 year olds begin with Burmese with Thida and then move to English with Pwin Pyu Hein and I; the 6-9 year olds are opposite that, with some extra writing practice in both English & Burmese.

In English, these two groups are working through the alphabet and focusing on a letter each week–which brought us to “I is for Ice Cream!” this week.

The older two groups are divided by level. Lun helps them to learn new English words connected with the Bible story she’s just taught. Our expatriate neighbor, Mia, comes by to teach the two older groups in English, too–usually with a game or craft or something magical!

And just like that our house is a menagerie of voices for an hour or so, until they all move outside.

Each week we try to give the younger kids a creative way to work on their English: making grapes with their fingerprints and eating grapes; folding origami hats…and then ice cream. Can you really learn ice cream without eating it? I think not.

We went all out with beautiful cones and rainbow ice cream!

love is hard.

by Filed Under: kelli Leave a Comment

This has been ruminating in my mind, a quote from one of my favorite authors, Fredrick Backman in Beartown.

“Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion.
The world becomes much easier to understand
and much less terrifying
if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies,
we and they,
good and evil.
The easiest way to unite a group isn’t through love,
because love is hard.
It makes demands.
Hate is simple.”

I’d gladly recommend anything he’s written. He’s a brilliant analyzer of the society that surrounds us and the realities that make us. But this quote from Beartown is so well said, as I watch the world right now–in particular my American world. It is so close, and yet so far away from me.

And it is so divided.

Love IS hard. It demands so much of us.

I have just been letting this roll around in my mind for a few days, wondering where I’m contributing.
Am I adding to the love or the division?
Am I creating a we|they or an us?
Am I dividing or unifying?

In 1 Corinthians 13, we see all the demands of love: love is patient, love is kind, love does not envy or boast, love is not arrogant, love is not rude…love bears all things, love believes all things, love hopes all things, love endures all things.

{Love is HARD.}

I’m trying to love anyway.

feeling old and loving youth.

by Filed Under: house church, kelli, on the house, photos, playhouse, schoolhouse Leave a Comment

Per usual, every season looks different for us. And ’tis the season for youth!

As things unfolded after our COVID quarantine here in Mae Sot, we have seen more and more opportunities for the youth in our community. I can’t always explain how things unfold, but we have a youth room now. And twice a week, we have youth night: one night with dinner, English and games; a second with a bible study and games. For English, we are doing a study on Planet Earth, and we’re all learning so much! For our bible study, we are working through the Alpha Series for youth, and we are really enjoying the conversations it’s opening up.

We also mix in a few birthdays and movie nights! And they are loving the new games we have set up on the projector each week.

We also have a whole lot of youth working with us, particularly Stephen. We have hired Pyint Soe full-time, so he works with us five days a week. He continues to serve at church, running sound and Powerpoint, and manages all of the correspondence with our pastor. He also makes the bulletin and oversees four other youth helping to gather the materials for each week. Through this, they are all learning live sound, Powerpoint, typing in Burmese, and other computer skills.

We also have these youth creating a database of music resources for the Burmese church. Pyint Soe is also overseeing this: teaching three teenagers from our church to type in Burmese and use computers regularly, as well as overseeing all the data entry. He’s incredibly organized and a great teacher; and he and Stephen are quite similar. He’s perfect for this!

Further, Stephen continues to train Pyint Soe and two of the other youth on sound recording and editing.

They are working on two different projects right now as they continue to do at-home education because of COVID. Their more-open schedules are allowing them to continue working, and a few of them are practicing & learning musical instruments two to three times per week.

In all, this hires seven youth in our church and community each week, providing snack money for those living at the church with their needs provided for. For those in our community, this helps to provide for their families each week.

Beyond this, Stephen also has two interns from the local technical college working with him for six months. They are working on an album as a part of OneHouse–including weekly translation nights!

As you can see this adding up, it’s busy. Thankfully, we have Lun helping is all of this! Also thankfully, Oak loves the youth; he can join for Planet Earth, and our meals with the youth and translators. It is fun to hear him call for his “big sisters” and “big brothers” when they walk in the door. He also prays for them every night before bed.

That said, having your toddler call the youth his brothers and sisters has a way of making you feel quite old. Then I cringed at one of the girl’s gaudy make-up, and encouraged another not to just stare at their phones all day, and then crashed into bed after doing the dishes at 9:30pm…it’s all making me feel a bit old.

Even feeling old, it is so fun to have this time with the youth every week. They are all in really pivotal seasons, both making big decisions now and having more on the horizon.

Speaking of all the decisions they have on their horizons–leave it to me to have a language blunder & make a story!

We have a prayer board at the front of our church, and last week I was reading it, where it had 26.07.2020 in big letters, and then an announcement. I didn’t know the first word, but the second is “celebration”–used often in wedding ceremonies–and then had two names: Khiang Khaing Win, who comes to youth and works with us, and another name I didn’t know.

I sort of panicked: getting married? She’s only fifteen! And she’s living at the church–the same place Yaminoo lives and is also fifteen. My brain was scrambling. Was she pregnant and they were requiring her to marry? What brought this on?! I hadn’t even heard of a boyfriend. It all seemed so fast, and I was completely overwhelmed. I was already trying to figure out how I’d make a cake in the next week, because I knew I’d be asked to provide the wedding cake.

Then they announced it up front–the following week, a word I didn’t know + the word sounding like wedding; everyone responding happily…I was overwhelmed.

After the service, I ran up to Yaminoo and asked, “She’s getting married? I don’t understand! Who?”
To which Yaminoo responded, “Yes! Khaing Khaing Win! Wait? What?”
“She’s getting MARRIED?”
“NO! WHAT?!”

Turns out the word I didn’t know and kept skipping was the word for baptism. A baptism celebration. No cake needed, no boy involved, and nothing to panic over. And a week’s notice now seemed acceptable 🙄

Yaminoo and I cleared it up, but of course the crazy foreigner lady’s language blunder made the rounds.

But we did have a lovely thing to celebrate this Sunday!

grace is here.

by Filed Under: kelli 1 Comment

I think I’m with many–dare I say all?–when I say that it’s been a challenging season.

There have been so many beautiful moments that came out of our quarantine, and I don’t want to miss that.

Oh, I don’t want to miss it. This season with our son and as a family of three: to have so much time together just before we celebrate one year with him, while still living so engrossed in a community? This is something we are so grateful for and will forever cherish as a gift to us, just as he is.

And while I don’t want to miss the beautiful moments, I also don’t want to ignore the messier, uglier ones.

While we can’t host classes yet, we have welcomed our employees back to work. It’s been truly harder than just going back to normal: without normal routines of school and church and a neighborhood full of stir-crazy kids (including our own), we are trying to produce something. It’s a lot of work.

This week we hired a new employee, in somewhat epic proportions for our little home. He’s nearly full time, and–if I’m honest–it feels risky. It’s a risk of our time and energy and investment. It’s a risk for our family and our time together. It’s a risk for us financially.

Today, I was talking with one of my best friends in the community. I love her, respect her, learn from her often. We talked about her family, her kids; my family, my kids.

And for some reason, today I saw that she is in poverty. She is thriving more now than before, but in poverty. She is still there, her kids are still struggling to get out of it. Her kids are still walking in the challenges of it, as they go to school and marry and have kids and live life. The cycles are there, in the life of one of my best friends. And even ten years later, and with years ahead where I’ll keep fighting for her: there is so little I can do about it.

The cycles. The investments. The risks. The work. The choices.

That’s what has felt the most significant to me: it is a choice to create work and produce things together amidst the chaos. It is a choice to risk and hope and believe that God is making something grow. It is a choice to keep fighting cycles. It is a choice to keep hoping for wins when you see losses.

_____________

Late tonight, after all the [necessary] to do list items were completed, I took the recommendations of a husband who knows me better than I know myself, and I jumped rope and did my yoga.

I breathed in and out. And I listened to It Is Finished by Passion.

It is done, it is finished
Christ has won, He is risen
Grace is here
Love has triumphed over death forever

Strongholds
Bowing to the Savior
Resurrection power
Over every circumstance
His word stands final and forever
It will not be shaken
He alone has won it all

…This is how I fight my battles | This is how I fight my battles

I thought of our home and how grace is here. I thought of every circumstance, a God who is unshaken and winning. I thought of my battles: being fought over a day of making things work, of taking risks, of hoping.

I’m fighting my battles my jumping rope while being reminded that Christ has won. By breathing in and out over my yoga mat reminded that His word stands final and forever. By getting up and investing again tomorrow, knowing strongholds bow to the Savior. By taking risks believing in the power of the resurrection.

I want to choose honesty here and just say that sometimes I’m not sure if we’re getting this right. I’m not sure if we’re getting anywhere. I’m not sure if the cycles are being broken. I’m not sure if the seeds are growing or things are changing.

And while I make the choices and risks and investments of myself, I worry about the ones that affect my son. I worry about the thousands of dollars invested in this neighborhood, in us, and in our friends.

Grace is here.
Grace is here.
Grace is here.

This is how I fight my battles.
This is how I fight my battles.
This is how I fight my battles.