My work in Thailand has come out of a personal journey seeking how to use my skills and passions to work alongside those working with the poor in developing countries as a means of demonstrating God’s love.

During my first stint working abroad in Uganda, my eyes were opened to the perspective of “food as fuel” in a subsistence-economy society, versus our culture’s thinking of food as a gourmet lifestyle or as a means to bragging rights.  In my year working on a farm in the US, learning to handle a machete or how to tell when my goat was pregnant, I went through similar challenges of producing food and managing land as experienced by farmers who don’t have access to water, arable land or technology.

I’ve lived for five years in northern Thailand, immersed in a community of co-workers who come from misunderstood and marginalized ethnic groups.  All of them live off the land, have limited education and consider a dollar (30 baht) a large amount to waste.  God has given me the privilege to to share everyday life with them and to learn their stories.

Along the way, I’m finding joy whilein the midst ofcultural mis-communications, workplace and relationship frustrations, green moldy fuzz in the rainy season and ant eggs in my underwear drawer. 🙂

I complete my term in 2013.