What a night!
The Suntisouk Language and Vocational Center here in Vientiane, Laos, had its first ever Deck the Halls activity evening with the students. After a surprise road construction and alleyway paving closed us for a day, we had to delay this night from last week to this week. As you can see below, our 2 weeks of road prep and then the final paving left the staff and myself not in the best of holiday spirits. Driving our motorbikes on this was very precarious.
My lovely, well-thought-out, spot-on schedule for Christmas lessons, all-day staff hall prep and the final big night of decorating went out the window. Adjustments were made, however, and the results were outstanding.
That includes the road, which finally allowed the students to come to their Christmas lessons unencumbered, and with clean shoes!
Learning About Christmas
Last week, Shaloom (my Global Mission Fellow from Pakistan) and I led all the students in Christmas vocabulary lessons so all were well prepared. Junior High received both the religious and the traditional symbols using my tried and true vocabulary Christmas sheet I used in China for over 20 years. It proved just as perfect in Laos as it did in China.
An All-day Friday Preparation
Friday had the staff, Shaloom and myself setting up the main hall for Monday’s evening of decorating Our 3 craft stations were: make ornaments, create paper chains, and snowflake cutting. We hauled over all the tables from the classrooms, set up chairs, set the basic decorating foundation for the night by wrapping the trees with lights and putting up festive wall hangings. (Those hangings were my Walmart bargains from 2 years ago: 10 cents each holiday door panel — I bought 15 and brought them all with me.)
Our Deck the Halls Night
We began at 4 pm and ended at 7. These Laos students had never decorated for Christmas before, even though the city has exploded in lighted trees along with hundreds of shops selling Christmas outfits, tinsel roping, lights, ornaments, holiday window decals, wreaths and everything else associated with Christmas commercialism. What a treat to participate in and experience their joy as well as our own. As you can see, this was a spectacular holiday event, worthy of the effort and time put into it. (Note: The below is a slideshow. Click on necessary arrows on the first picture to proceed.)
With our night completed, now students can continue to enjoy the hall until the closing certificate celebration to end the semester on Thursday. Thank you to all my staff who helped me spend an entire Friday preparing for this event and then manned the stations, plus helped the students on Monday (along with clean-up afterwards) to create a special festive atmosphere. Merry Christmas from Laos, from us to you!
connie's space 