Hit the Ground Running

 
Once we arrived in Bangkok, we hit the ground running. I kept a journal for a number of years while in Thailand and in the journal, I noted that our plane landed and we cleared customs in Bangkok at 1:00 am on Saturday, November 6, 1982 which completed a 27 ½ hour plane ride. I suppose it took us another hour or two to get to the Bangkok Christian Guest, get checked in and get in the bed.

Being new to jet lag, we only slept a few hours then we were up for breakfast. After lunch we were met by Roger and Gen Getz who were serving as the mission treasurer and Merle Brown who was going to replace Roger as treasurer after some language training. We took care of some business, then walked the area streets for a while.  In the photo, Marcia and I are on the right, Roger and Gen Getz in the middle and Bob and Pat Coats on the left. The photo was taken July 1, 1983. 

Sunday, morning we were met by Baptist missionaries Paul and Winnie Dodge who took us to the 8:00 am International Church service and then to the 10:30 am service of the Saeng Sawan Baptist church, a Chinese/Thai congregation where Paul was serving as pastor and advisor. The Dodges had started a English as a Second Language (ESL) program there and invited us to help teach. We agreed as it seemed a good way to get involved and a good opportunity to practice our Thai. The Dodges took us to lunch after that service and that was our first ever Thai food.

The International Church had a monthly Hilltribes Sale where products from handcraft and home industry programs from all over Thailand were collected and sold to support the various programs and people. We were dazzled by the variety of goods, the colorful patterns and the skills involved to make the goods. Since we were destined to work with the Karen people, Marcia worked the booth with Karen goods as seen in the photo. One of the big splashes of color was provided by a program that taught quilting. We had to buy a couple quilts, one of which is on our bed  today. We gave away a “Texas Star” quilt, but kept the "log cabin" quilt in the photo below.

By Monday, we’d only been in the country for a full day or so but Roger Getz met us at the Guest House and took us to the nearby Standard-Chartered Bank to open an account so we could cash US checks and have access to Thai Baht. From there, we had to go to a nearby hospital for a physical so we could get a work permit.

Tuesday, we signed up for language school, Wednesday we went to get our drivers’ license and Friday we went to the Kamput Refugee Camp on the Cambodian (Kampuchean) border. At the Guest House, we were meeting many of the missionaries from Chiang Mai that we would be working with so there were many conversations with them. If there was free time, we booked some tours so we could see some of Bangkok and there was shopping to do to get set up to live here. Language school started November 17^th. It took a little while to move into our apartment which happened on December 17^th.

I wish I could say we were adapting well to being in Bangkok but to be honest, every walk on the street was making us sick. The heat, exhaust and overall mix of “Bangkok body odor” would make us queasy. Going into the hospital for the work permit physical was almost too much. The waiting areas were jammed packed with people in all kinds of distress that I wasn’t used to seeing which combined with the general atmosphere turned me all shades of green. Fortunately, my stomach contents stayed in place (barely) and once I finally got to see the doctor, the physical itself was very brief. In fact, the physical consisted of a quick look by the doctor followed by. “You have any problems?” I figured he didn’t want to hear about my problems with Bangkok’s smells so, I lied and said no. The doctor was satisfied, signed the form and let me go.

Within a few days of arrival, we were also getting frequent bouts of “Bangkok Belly”. So Bangkok kept us “running” in multiple ways and we kept well stocked with Lomotil and Pepto Bismol. In our early days, my journal would often describe the state of our stomachs and whether we fortified ourselves with Lomotil, Pepto or both before hitting the streets and starting the day. It took a lot of effort to “stay in the pink” as the Pepto ads would say, but we were able to do what we needed to do.