Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: A Christmas Message

Last week Clay and Trista flew back to the States to be home for the holidays. It left me feeling pretty lonely here in Bangkok. I would have continued on with my travels but I have been waiting for the package from home with my new ATM card (after losing it in Indonesia). Without access to money I've been living very cheaply and I haven't been able to do much to overcome my homesickness.
Christmas here is an interesting thing. It's a Christian holiday, but the majority of the poplation is Buddhist, so the only ones who really celebrate are the retail shopping malls. I've heard more Christmas music here in the malls than I ever imagined. Of course they are all songs about Santa Clause and presents and no one thinks twice about the true Christian message of the season. (I just love the giant fake pine tree set amidst the native palm trees.) So I made an extra effort to get to church on Sunday knowing it was the meeting just before Christmas and I needed to get my heart in the right place and stop moping. I'm glad I did because what I felt there was just what I needed. The Bangkok international branch is an eclectic mix of people - when the primary got up to sing I wish I could have taken a picture - the first two kids were blonde-haired and blue-eyed, the next girl was Chinese and wore a red silk Chinese dress, and the next two were a boy and a girl from Africa wearing traditional African clothes. The rest of the group was just as varied - and yet they all sang together about the miracle of Jesus' birth. I thought of this again when we all sang Far Far Away on Judea's Plains and one verse says: Hasten the time when from every clime men shall unite in the strains sublime: Glory to God, Glory to God, Glory to God in the highest, Peace on earth goodwill to men. Peace on earth goodwill to men!
In Sunday School the teacher played a video that told the story of the Christmas eve armistice between the soldiers who were fighting the battles of WWI. As the story was told and the Tabernacle Choir sang Silent Night in German and English, a man sitting behind me from Africa started to cry - possibly thinking of the wars in his own country. In Relief Society a sister from Sri Lanka asked if anyone had any coats to donate to her family since they were moving to Canada and didn't have anything. The people were so friendly and welcoming to me and a couple even offered to let me ride with them back to the metro station.
Despite all the good feelings of that day I still woke up the next morning sad and feeling a little sorry for myself. My ATM card still hadn't showed up in the mail and I had just dropped and broken my Mp3 player which leaves me without any music to listen to the rest of the trip. I sat down on a chair and ordered some food from a street vendor. While I was waiting her daughter came riding out on a small dirty tricycle and had the biggest smile on her face that I just couldn't feel sorry for myself any longer. I'm always amazed at how it is not the big things in life that make us happy but rather the constant string of little things. And at the end of another day in this big dirty city I turned around and caught a glimpse of one of those little things that makes a day great - so I took a picture.

Merry Christmas!

p.s. My ATM card just arrived today . . . .