Ron and Peggy Roloff

`Day Bah weaving

When Ron is with Bud over at the land I have been spending days with Neewah, her mother and mother in law at their property. We have gotten to be good friends. She knows some English that she was learning with another woman who was here for awhile. She and her husband will be returning in January from the states so official lessons can resume. Elsie took Thai classes for a year and ½ in Bangkok. That seems to be the average length to learn the language.
I’m so enjoying winding the yarn for purses and watching the three weave such fine thread into lovely items. Neewah told me she would like for me to help her with English so that’s become my new opportunity. Here we sit in a rustic courtyard home with my three ‘new best friends’ reading from a book of sentences and listening to Neewah’s English pronunciation improve with each hour.

We were able to take Neewah and Titus to town Friday where we bought a help for each of them. For him we bought a speaking dictionary for English to Thai and Thai to English. He is thrilled. He told us that was something that would help him. They don’t have a computer or dvd player. For Neewah we bought an MP4 player. She wanted me to record my reading or speaking so she can listen while weaving. They both know a lot of vocabulary but their pronunciation isn’t as clear as they would like. They are working on putting sentences together with proper structure and seem to know where they need help.

Having lunch each day with the gals has been a bonus. Some days we’ve had ‘others’ join us and sometimes Ron and Bud have come back in time. I have a video or two of her preparation of lunch so when I get it up I’ll let you know.
It’s been a real pleasure for me to have this type of thing to do. Saturday I went mid morning to bring a large world map in Thai. The girls were eager learners and were surprised at how small Thailand is! They could read so we played a game where they could find various countries in the seven continents. The older girls did quite well.
After our lesson time of geography (by the way they don’t speak or understand English) I went over a few common words. I’ll be going back on next Saturday to do more but hopefully I can be more prepared now that I know how little they know of English.
They were eager to cut and sew clothing for their Barbie dolls. We brought needles, thread and Judy bought fabric when we first arrived. What fun we had. Me not knowing Thai and them no English. BUT doing things together is another way of communication. Such a fun afternoon.
God bless you all, Peggy and Ron

Filed under: Uncategorized on November 29th, 2009