ellie's world

I am fourteen.

I’ve just spent a year in a poverty stricken area.

It is impossible to come out the same.

Being in Thailand for one year, working with and loving the Burmese refugees here, has shown me what state my world is in. Having grown up in Canada, one of the richest countries in the world, I didn’t really know what people here lived like. I’d never seen what it looked like to live in a refugee camp. I didn’t know what it was like to live in a country that you don’t belong to. I had no idea how horribly, people just like me, were being treated. It shook my world to see how good I really had it.

While being here in Thailand, I have got to experience things that most people my age haven’t had the chance to. For example, I got the chance to be a teacher, at fourteen, for a preschool class every week. It was totally amazing to hold a little kid in your arms and know that you just made their day by doing the simple task of loving them through Jesus.

oxcart ride to a hilltribe village

Also, I got to live in a refugee camp for a few days. It was incredibly heart wrenching to see the hopelessness of that place. And yet the people were so loving and accepting and beautiful. I couldn’t believe how strong they were; how much they had faced as a nation and as individual people.

friends at a refugee camp

I’ve also been able to get to know my family in a deeper way. This year, we’ve been closer than ever before. We do school together, we eat every meal together, we share rooms, and we work and serve together. It was hard at first to get used to being with each other 24/7 but in the end, I know every single person in my family in a way that is so much better than in Canada.

Another opportunity I had while being in Thailand was experiencing and immersing myself in someone else’s ‘world’. I tried their foods, I started speaking a bit of their language, and I even started to adopt their culture a little. Staying in Canada never would have showed me how beautifully unique God made us all or stretched me to live differently and see my world with new eyes.

making Songkran snacks

Although I had many homesick and frustrating days, God called us here and helped me through it all. All in all I am so happy that God gave me this opportunity to show his love to some of the people who need it so desperately.  Living here has challenged me to use the gifts God has given me in incredible ways for Him. I’ve been able to develop my strengths, work through my weaknesses and love God more for it. I wouldn’t trade this year for anything.

Thanks, God!