Last Day In Bangkok

It's my last day in Bangkok and I'm trying to remember everything that I need to get and do.

Yesterday we went to Myanmar and just toured around with a Karen (a people group in Myanmar) lady who showed us all the sites from the Judsons history (Adoniram and Ann). It's funny because I read one of the famous Judson biographies before I left and I don't thing Yangon has changed much since the early 1800s when the Judsons first got there. I'll post pictures later.

We also got to meet a worker there who's with my denomination. It was so neat how God connected us before I even left home. I didn't even know she was with our denomination until yesterday!:)

Today, I just finished going to Rahab Ministry in Patpong to pick up all the jewelry we ordered. The woman, Sarah, who runs the ministry was there so she showed me the presentation about the ministry which was so cool and sad at the same time. Prostitution is actually illegal in Bangkok, believe it or not, but is so prevalent. These clubs "hire" women as "dancers" and that's how they get around the prostitution thing. And sadly, most of the girls who come and start doing it are sent by their families because they want them to earn a lot of money and send it to them. A lot if the women come as well because of debt and they can earn more money doing this than anything else. They're paid more than minimum wage as prostitutes. Here's the really sad thing, the average woman who dances can have a man come in and pay 500 baht for her for the evening. 500 baht is about 16 US dollars. Can you imagine being worth 16 dollars?! A lot of the men who buy them are westerners (I hate that about Bangkok where you see these disgusting old men walking around with a young girl). But it's quite typical for Japanese companies to reward good work with their men employees by sending them on a 6 day holiday to Bangkok and buy them women. Also, a lot of Thai men will bring their sons to the clubs and buy them a prostitute as a "rite of passage".

Sarah also said that it's very common for Thai men to frequent the brothels and it's something that's just expected or done in a marriage.

Rahab does this awesome outreach with these "dance clubs" where they actually go in and just befriend the women to tell them about Jesus and that He has a plan and a value for their lives. The ones who come to Christ have an opportunity to work at Rahab making jewelry or other things, they're paid just above minimum wage and many of them are also living in a home owned by Rahab M.

It was so great to meet some of these women and learn their stories.

I'm actually getting a pedicure now:). Ah! And then I go back to the hotel to meet back up with my friends who are bringing my three bags back to me so I can pack for tomorrow's flight home.

Pray that I can sleep in that long, almost 13 hour flight back. I get back at 7:30 a.m. On Tuesday and I plan on working from home so I'll need some shut eye as I'll go through the day without sleeping. Back to Chicago time!