Day 12 - Udon Thani Vision Trip

Day 12 - Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Wake up time was around 6:30AM and breakfast was at 7:30AM in the hotel restaurant. Ja and Elena from SDRF joined us for breakfast. Everywhere we looked we saw signs of the huge prostitution industry in Thailand.

Sights such as this was very common during breakfast.

After breakfast, the team was off to the Isan Aquatics Farm.

We got a tour of the Isan Aquatics Farm from the director, Khun Mon. My guess is that this farm is about 6-8 acres. This is the first fish farm built by SDRF and it grows talapia, which it sells to consumers and fish breeders. This is the future vision for the MRI fish farm in Koh Yao. On this field, there are about 10 ponds similiar to this one. Each net contains hundreds of talapia, which the farm uses as its brood stock.

The female talapia carry their eggs in their mouths. The man in black goes to each net and removes those eggs from the mouths of the fish.
Some of the eggs.

Ja explaining one of the floating fish farms.

Once they pulled up the nets, you can see all the fish.

The eggs are placed in these baskets where the fish are grown. There are literally thousands of little baby fish swimming around in each basket. There were about 50 baskets similar to these. Talapia are easier to grow.

Here is a picture of a brood stock talapia. These fish are used to breed new stock.

These baby talapia are about a few days old.

The local workers bagging up baby talapia, which the farm sells to fish breeders. Unlike the MRI farm on Koh Yao, the Isan Aquatics Farm employs locals from the surrounding communities thereby providing employment opportunities. My guess is that the farm employs close to 50 workers whereas the MRI farm only employs 4. It is the hope of SDRF that the MRI farm will be fully operated by locals.

The bags in the last 6 rows contain 8,000 baby talapia each whereas the first 4 rows of bags contain 5,000.

At the farm with Ja and Khun Mon, the director.

After the fish farm, we headed back to the SDRF headquarters to have lunch.

Before eating, we got a crash course about "New Buddhism." The man at the head of the table goes by the initials BP and he explained how SDRF is using "New Buddhism" as a bridge to bring Christianity to Thailand. Him and the man to his left have been Christians since they were 16 and 18 years old. According to BP, there are five Buddhas in Buddhism. Four of these Buddhas have been fulfilled and the fifth Buddha is expected to be come anytime. These men preach that the fifth Buddha is Jesus Christ. Once someone is convinced of this idea, BP will then reveal the real Gospel message. Religion is very sacred in Thailand and western religion is seen in a very negative light. Therefore, it's important to incorporate Christ into Thai religious beliefs.

BP praying for the food.

We got to eat talapia for lunch. So good.

After lunch we went to the Udon Language School.

At the school, we met the director, Khun Wan. The school provides free academic tutoring for children in the local communities. The school also provides teaching resources and funds for struggling schools within the community.

Next, we visited the Ban Kaonoi school. This is one of the poorest schools in the area, which the Udon Language School is supporting.

Here is Khun Wan (left) and P'Noi (principal of the school) talking to us about the struggles of the school. Ban Kaonoi is a government school; however, the government doesn't provide enough funds to support the school. For example, the government only provides 100 Baht per day for food to feed the students. The school has about 70 students and it costs about 10 Baht each day to feed each student. In addition, the school does not have enough teachers. The school needs about 4 more English teachers. P'Noi told us that the students get really excited when American students come to teach. P'Noi also told us that at one point, she paid the salary for an additional teacher out of her own pocket. If anyone is interested in teaching at this school, please leave us a comment. For those of you from Newsong who know Sally Park, this is the school that Sally taught at.

Ja translated most of this for us.

Some of the students.

Here are the classrooms.

Here is the nursery for the younger kids.

This is one of the classrooms, it has about 30 desks. They also need more desks.

This is the library.

Here is the nursery.

Here are the kids playing outside the school. After visiting the school, we flew back to Bangkok for our last day in Thailand. We arrived in Bangkok around 6PM and checked into our hotel. Please pray for the school and that the Lord will send workers and funds. If you are interested in helping to support this school, please leave a comment on the blog.