This is Jay,” Lorena Mayhugh said as she introduced the Thai-Chinese man beside her to a colleague at the Baptist Student Center in Bangkok, Thailand. “He’s Dr. Jay now,” she added with a big smile.
Mayhugh, a 94-year-old English teacher, has invested in the lives of thousands of students during her 10 years as a volunteer English teacher at the student center. Jay Juntasa, however, has become like a grandson to her, and she like a grandmother to him.
Mayhugh, a public school teacher in the United States for about 33 years, is a sharp-thinking storyteller who tosses out funny quips with ease and loves sharing personal anecdotes. She’s also a pretty good encourager, of sorts.
To persuade Juntasa to learn to play guitar for worship during the small group Bible study she had encouraged him to start, she made a deal: If he learned to play guitar, then she’d read his doctoral dissertation — which she later did read.
Mayhugh met Juntasa several years ago in one of her classes at the student center. From university students to government officials to senior adults, anyone can enroll in the classes.
‘Conversation corners’
Lorena casts her net even wider at “conversation corners” once or twice a week. Fighting off mosquitoes and enduring brutally hot evening temperatures, she sits at a table outside the center and waits for students. They can drop in any time during a three-hour period for casual conversation practice.
“You can stay awhile,” she said to a middle-aged woman. The woman sat and Mayhugh continued conversation corner by telling how God created the world.
The students practiced new vocabulary from the story, and, to help with their listening skills, Mayhugh asked questions about the story.
Bible stories aren’t the only way Mayhugh gets to the gospel. She’s a natural at weaving stories from decades of life experience into her English lessons.
She tells how God provided for her family during the Great Depression and how they were able to send milk and chickens home with the pastors who traveled through town.
Students like Keng Meesang, who call the 8 million-plus city of Bangkok home, are especially partial to the Missouri native’s narratives about growing up on a farm.
Farm life
Meesang’s favorite Mayhugh stories are the ones about milking cows, raising chickens and picking wildflowers in the forest.
Mayhugh delights in answering questions from students, especially the ever-popular and expected inquiry about her age.
Not far behind is this question: Why would she leave her son and her grandchildren in California to live in Thailand?
Mayhugh tells them she’s a Christian, and God told her to come to Thailand.
Mayhugh can no longer drive a car, but in Bangkok she gets around just fine using taxis and the Skytrain, an elevated rapid transit system reached by a stairway.
“That’s 66,” she declared triumphantly and stepped up on the last step to the Skytrain platform.
“She’s so stubborn,” Juntasa teased about his former teacher’s never-ending drive to remain a woman on-the-go.
While she may have a stubborn streak, something more keeps Mayhugh going — a fortitude grounded in her passion for others to know God.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Names changed for security reasons. (BP)
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