Life in a Northern Town

(of Thailand)

It has been way too long... These last three months have been

very busy, very challenging and so

much fun. I love being here at The

River, it is such a great place to

serve God. In February, just before

school finished, our English teaching

volunteers, were joined by a team

from Melbourne for a special one

day English Camp at a local school

for around 120 students. We had lots

of fun! We also connected with the

local North Chiang Mai University for

the English Department’s Annual

Camp.

I had the honour of being

part of the graduation at one

of the schools, I teach at,

Baan Kuan School. It was a

special celebration for whole

school with all students taking part in the performances

throughout the night.

Generally at this time of year in Thailand everything slows down as people enjoy their Summer

holidays and other activities. Most people will return to their villages from the cities and they will

spend time catching up with family and then celebrating Thai New Year before heading back to

their homes to get prepared for the return to normal routine in early May.

Well, that is what happens for the local people, but people like me just don’t seem to have

enough time to fit everything in. During the first week of March, I was the Airport Taxi service for a

FIDA Development Conference we hosted at The River, and I made 15 trips to the airport over

the week. We also started another set of English conversation classes down at The River Café in

Hangdong town centre. At the end of March our ladies all enjoyed a few days of love and

attention, whilst us men all tried to help make The River run.

"But be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you: to love the LORD your God, to walk in obedience to him, to keep his

commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul.” Joshua 22:5 NIV

My name is Shayne Rochfort and I

am a servant of God, volunteering

in Hangdong, Thailand. I am

helping support The River Team in their work in

the local schools and community. My main role

involves everything and anything. Please consider

supporting me in my work here in Thailand.

Highlights - River Team

Women’s Retreat

.Life at The River

Concert

The River Team

Partners Confer-

ence

Completing CHE

TOT2 Course

Doing my first ever

Keynote Speech

and getting in a

Thai Newspaper

Summer School

Program SOP

Life in a Northern Town (of Thailand)

While we had all these seminars and retreats

through March and April, I was helping with a

local school’s Summer program with around 60-70

children from the local community, as well as

trying to fit in all my normal activities.

In the first week of April, I took a

couple of days to head down to

Mae Sot, where I had visited for a day last year. I went with a friend Emily and

we had a great time seeing all the things happening down there. I also had

the chance to visit Agape Orphanage and Learning Centre - a special

children’s home and school for migrant children from Burma.

As April came around, preparations for the

Thai New year got into full swing, with

everyone finding their buckets and getting

ready for the big water fight.

I had made Songkran plans to stay with friends

in the city and so on the Friday night I couch surfed with a

friend, Kevin at his place in Chiang Mai so that I would be ready

and raring to go for Day 2. Well that plan was going great, until

just after lunch I was heading back in to town to my base there

and just 100m from another friend’s house, I came way to close

to the road for riding my bike. It was all because someone

decided to walk in front of me as I was riding up the street, but

as far as motorbike accidents go, I was very lucky. So I have

had my first motorbike accident and I didn’t die!!! So blessed!

Well that put a halt on all the fun activities of Songkran, but I did

meet up with a bunch of Couch Surfers and I let them head into

the wet and wild world of Songkran. Day 3 of Songkran was just resting and recuperating at

home, before taking a few pics of some of our team out splashing the cars as they headed

home from Chiang Mai.

After Songkran, we held a Kids Camp for all the Kids Club kids and

that was a very tiring 3 days, but just great to have a chance to

connect with our local kids for more than a couple of hours each

week. The team did really well and everyone had an awesome

time. The following week, it was all go again at The River,

preparing for our annual River Partners Conference for all our

friends around Thailand. We had some great teaching from Ross

from Brisbane and everyone had the chance to be refreshed and

renewed for their next season, the harvest season.

During the conference, the first ever .Life@TheRiver concert was

held with about 300 people from the community joining us for a

night of music and celebration.

After conference was

all over, I went into a

week long

Community Health

Evangelism/

Education Training of

Trainers course (CHE

TOT2). It was great to

learn about how we can connect to the community,

we had people from 4 countries doing the course,

and there was a lot of English, Thai and Finnish

language flying around the room.

It has been way too long… (continued)

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO PRAY:

Praise for God’s blessing through The River Team and myself personally - It has just

been a very challenging few months, but God has looked after everything along the

way. We have had many people believing in Jesus and had many baptisms in our pool.

Please pray for the whole River Team - Please pray as we are all going through many

challenging situations, that we can just keep our eyes focused on God who is leading

and directing our paths. For our many different villages and communities.

I would like to Praise God and thank the people who have started to support me.

However, I still need to raise more support to continue to serve here in Thailand.

Life in a Northern Town (of Thailand)

PO Box 11

HANGDONG

CHIANGMAI 50230

THAILAND

Phone +66801202074

Email -

schoolies2@yahoo.com

Skype - shayneinthailand

The River Training and Convention Centre

Any questions please do not hesitate to send me an email, schoolies2@yahoo.com or give me a call.

Supporting Shayne

I am committed to being in Thailand and with The River Team in a full time capacity. I would like to let you know that if you are able to support me in my work, then you can do so through One Mission Society. There are many ways you can support me, through prayer as well as financially.

My prayer card with all the details is avail-able at

http://tinyurl.com/shayneprayercard .

Please include my missionary number #803833 with any donations.

You can support me financially by :- Cheque - Please make cheques payable to: OMS International, PO Box 897, RING-WOOD, Vic 3134. Include a note with my name. Direct Debit - If you wish to make a pay-

ment directly through your bank, pay to: Westpac. Acc Name: OMS International Australia- Inc. Acc Number: 733172 BSB: 628724. NOTE: In the transaction details please be sure to include your name and ROC. Credit card donations - can be made through the website. http://www.onemissionsociety.org.au OMS phone – 03 9872 4209

So after months of

camps, conferences,

seminars, training,

concerts and other

events, then just last

week, I did my first

EVER keynote speech

and I was doing it for

a group of Thai

teachers. I was asked

to speak about the

Cultural differences

between Thai and

Western classrooms, it

went really well with

all participants

enjoying it and finding

what I said useful. I

was very stressed and anxious before it

because I am not a teacher and I had

never done anything like this before. I

was relieved when it was over.

Amazing experience!!! I even got my

face in a Chiang Mai newspaper!!!

Closing statements