Christmas!

I definitely enjoyed a little heaven on earth this last week. Phuket, pronounced 'poo-khet' was PHENOMENAL.

Our entire day plan while we were there was pretty much survive for as cheaply as possible, relax to our maximum potential while still seeing everything on the island and getting to hang out with some friends. Our first day we just crashed on the beach until we decided we should find the bungalow we reserved to stay at for the week. The girls all got the bed and the guys camped it on the beach and just used the shower and porch...we had a fantastic view of the city!! 

Day 2 We got a Thai driver for the day for really cheap and had him take us to all the sites he thought were the best on the island, he showed us this great swimming spot, a giant buddha monument, a village of sea-gypsies and some temples before taking us home where we spent sunset swimming on the beach again.

Day 3 We scored another deal and got to go to Ko Pi Pi, a great island with some epic cliff views and really good snorkeling. I identified all the characters of finding nemo but couldn't tell you the real names of all the fish. I've never seen a coral reef in the wild before, it was sooo beautiful!!
Day 4 Spent the day on the beach

Christmas! Found another beach and bummed it there, later managing to score MEXICAN FOOD! Yay! Everyone devoured the food and we even got to spy on a live Christmas concert next door, jamaican singers? It was a definitely island-christmas. 

Fon To

For the King.

This picture didn't quite make the Klong look so trashy...

Did I go to Italy? Somehow this doesn't feel like it belongs in Bangkok.

{Some pictures from a boat ride I took on the river last week down near the kings palace.} 

I'm watching Avatar in Thai with Goi, it was on t.v. and we jumped in half-way. I'm having a hard time trying to describe why Jake Sulley is a blue creature in a loincloth but also doubles as a bearded human in a wheelchair...? haha. I'm having a hard time distinguishing between Avatar language and Thai sometimes in the dubbing...

I got a package today from a church youth group in Santa Rosa, WOW! They baked Christmas cookies and just sent a tin over. I've never devoured cookies faster. We shared some around the office, but after that I took the tin and set it between Andrew, Goi and me. Goi wasn't so sure they were 'wan' or 'sweet' enough, and usually prefers salty food. So basically that left the rest of the batch up to me and Andrew. I'd say we polished off a good seven cookies a piece...plus crumbs. I'm going to have to go on a diet cleanse.

We had our last Thai class for December, kind of nostalgic its fun being able to just try and chat in Thai for a couple hours a day. I'll have to harass some Thai's on the beach into talking with me. P. Ma'm (our teacher) did leave us with homework though of "Kien ha prayok tuk-wan, lago puak-rao ja an gap Phuket, choc dee!" translation:"Write five sentences every day, so later we can read about Phuket, Good luck!"

Athid Na

SO. I've basically been gearing up for vaycay next week, thats pretty much the story of my life. It seems like in ORDER to leave or go anywhere you have to kind of get your vacation desk in order and your fun-face on, haha. Being new to the 'real world' I think its probably something everyone feels like they go through, probably not unique to Thailand, just my life.
Today I got a fun chance to hang out with an SM from Bogota, Colombia named Brenda. I was so worried my Spanish would suffer when I came here and I looked at Spanish speaking options for countries to go to when I finally realized I would "go" somewhere. Amazingly I've made so many Spanish friends I haven't had the option to forget it yet!
We went to this Christmas program at the Ekamai International School Church and got to listen to a lot of the students and teachers sing carols, not helping the NOT-home-for-the-holidays-syndrome thats for sure, but it was cute. After we grabbed a bite to eat at this Thai restaurant Green House that Brenda hadn't been to yet and met up with Andrew to go to Lumpini Park in the center of the city. After looking at a map I kinda realize its a lot like Golden Gate Park, kind of a city community hub/activity park. As luck would have it we ended up going during an International Street Show! Basically there were about fifteen mini-stages set up all around the park and different street preformers from different countries at each one. We saw a CREEPY puppet show from Laos, a Thai clown, Aussie Kangaroo's on stilts and some Scandanavian acrobatics!!! The only downside to the day was the heat...so intense today. I think humidity had to be 90% it felt like breathing water...
Our park day ended with a Christmas bon-fire at the Venns and some amazing lentil stew and guava fruit. How is it that all I can talk about is food when I think of Thailand?

Laos

We survived!! 
Talk about the most amazing/insane adventure yet here in the continent of Asia. 

The run down: basically, every 90 days the governement of Thailand requires all 'farang' or tourists to go renew their visas if they're spending another 90 days in the country. So Andrew, Sandrina and me had to make a Visa run and leave the country to one of its many bordering nations in order to get a stamp in our passport that says something like "welcome back!" 

So we went to Laos for (what we thought) would be just an over-night stay. **You have to leave your passports for at least 24 hours at the Thai embassy in your destination country. So we get on this bus on Tuesday night, and drive 10 hours north to a city called Nong-Khai. Now the bus was first class, but here in Thailand when you pay for first class anything there's an a/c fee...apparently we were the FIRST of first classes because we were refrigerated by the end of the ride...it was sooo cold!! They give you a snack, and coffee in the morning and one pit stop on the ride there (probably smarter in the long run not to drink the coffee).

Once we arrived in Nong-Khai we had no clue how we were actually going to cross the border, but we asked around and found out there was a bus heading to the capital every couple hours or so. Upon arrival at the border or "friend-ship bridge" as its called in Thai, we realized I had a multiple entry visa and didn't have to go through all the paperwork the other SM's did anyway. Surprise! So I was just along for the ride after I got my stamp. When we got into Vientien (the capital 'village' of Laos) we were bombarded immediately by tuk-tuk drivers wanting to scam us off the bus, we managed to barter one down to a reasonable price and get a ride to the embassy after 10 mins though and didn't have to wait that long for Andrew and Sandrina's paperwork.

After the embassy we had to drop off a package at the Adventist Mission in the city so we found the school next. They were so nice to us and one SM named Rachel even took us out to dinner at an indian place near-by. We learned a lot about how Thai-Lao culture is similar and different. We could basically speak Thai everywhere and be understood, but the Lao people have a different accent and a few different key grammar elements...sometimes frustrating, English was almost easier for once. Most of the city was a mix between dirt roads and minimal pavement, poverty and tourism, super different from Bangkok. I immediately realized how modern Thailand was compared to Laos, I even saw my first domesticated elephants right in the city!!

We found out our second day we were supposed to leave Laos was actually a Lao holiday so we ended up having to stay another night. I was THRILLED because I felt there was so much more of Vientien I wanted to experience first! We had a crazy day of looking around, it felt like the city was a lot bigger, but actually its almost physically impossible to get lost. They have one mall, no 7-11's (unlike Thailand) and they have dozens of national landmarks, temples and tourist sight-seeing locations. It felt like we saw pretty much everything in one day though. That night all the shops started to close early (its a communist country and curfew is at 10:45) so we grabbed french bread loaves, peanut butter and jam and had a "picnic" in our room.

The next morning our fun vaycay took a slightly more sinister tern however when Andrew knocked on our door asking if we had been in his room the night before. O.O! He was robbed in his sleep! Someone had walked into his room, taken his wallet and iphone sometime during the night while he was sleeping! We were just happy he was alive but it kinda put a dark cloud over the rest of the day...we had to file a police report but of course the only police station we knew was the hut on the street corner with 4 motorbikes parked under it.

So after a long and tiring day, we managed to get some church members to translate to the police at a slightly more legit station, to get a report, to file a claim...ugh. While Andrew completed the depressing run-around, Sandrina and me had to go to the Visa office to claim their passports before three and grab food for our bus ride (which we hadn't bought tickets for yet O.O)

No worries! Everything worked out fine, we managed to get our Visa's just in time, picked up lunch from these super sweet Lao ladies that practiced some Thai with me, and Andrew walked up just as we were ready to buy bus tickets. We managed to get on the bus leaving the city in the next half hour and I was thrilled that my passport was all good and I managed to leave Laos without hassle (I was secretly still scared I might need another type of Visa).

So all's well ends well...we're back safe...I'd still ironically reccomend Laos as a great several day tourist destination (the city was fantastic) just watch your stuff...

Happy *Belated* Thanksgiving!

I figured that Thanksgiving deserved a blog-post right? Sorry its been so long! It's been an interesting several weeks...! To catch you up:

1. Health Expo was a success!! The banners went up and looked gorgeous, and my posters were miraculously finished on time...it was a race to complete the website however, but we did finish by Opening day. During the event I worked the kids table and ran eye exams on these machines that showed if you were near sighted or far sighted. The machine was a fairly simple process, you aim for the iris then click this button and try and get everything to zooom in...

2. Almost immediately after the Health Expo ironically I was sick. And I mean IMMEDIATELY. That night I had a fever and a cough and the next day Goi and me went to a clinic to get meds for it. Its interesting being sick here because everyone thinks they have the cure for you. The Thai's I work with rarely get sick and seeing me be sick for a while has defnitely inspired them all to try and fix me, haha. I've been randomely handed, fruit, herbs, medicine, you name it.
Two weeks and two doctors visits later I'm still trying to kill this Asian virus but I definitely don't think my body was used to it. Hahaha, I looked at a calendar though and realize...I only have two more days to be sick. So, I plan to be well on Monday :)

3. Beginning part 2 of sick week I went to a festival called "Loi Katong" (sp?) basically its a Buddhist holiday where people send these homemade flower rafts with incense sticks and candles down any body of water nearby. The rivers are flooded with them and lots of times people play music and have carnivals to celebrate. Apparently the holiday is to give thanks to the water for giving them life.
I went with Goi to her University in Ramkhamhaeng and we got to see their school carnival, music, talent show stuff and even send off a little raft of our own!

4. Holiday blues...I'd not reccomend being abroad over major holidays like Chrirstmas and Thanksgiving. Luckily for me, its the tropics so it rarely feels like the holidays anyway. It just seems like summer extended itself and the holidays will be back home for me waiting. Unless of course you look at a calendar, go to a mall thats all decked out, get invited to a Thanksgiving party...like me.
I didn't quite realize I was missing the holidays until I walked into the Venn's house (the family of the pastor I'm working for) and heard Natalie Cole singing Christmas songs and helped cook mashed potatoes and gravy in the kitchen...ooooooooh boy I need to be on an island for Christmas! Thanksgiving was bitter-sweet and Christmas I imagine will be the same.

Next stop Laos! Tuesday we're going on our visa run, we have to get to the border, get our passports stamped for another 3 months, cross back over, get checked again, then we can come back *crosses fingers* Wish me luck! Choc dee!

Rot-fi-fah

 Today was back on the job...
After crashing last night from the weekends adventures I woke up to another very full day :)
I worked the morning hours on the Presidents "Quinquennial Report" believe it or not that IS correct. I'm having to make this backdrop for some stand they have at the Asian Conference Meeting coming up. Andrew and Goi have been slaving away on the video for the same project so we all kept each other company today a while.
We snuck down the road to J Nu's for lunch (AMAZING!) I wish this restaurant was in the states. Its a hole in the wall but run by one family, they live upstairs and work downstairs and the food is great and very reasonable. Everything basically costs 30b a dish.
After lunch we had Thai class. I learned today that theres a reason to every part of a word in Thai. Trains here are called "rot - fi", cars are called "rot" so today I asked the teacher what "fi" was?
She told me that back in the day they used to run trains by wood & fire (not by coal) so they called trains "fire cars" essentially...hahahahaha! I dunno why it felt just like I'd reached some nirvana state of learning or something, everything just clicked! And the BTS Sky Train is known as "rot-fi-fah" or "car-fire-sky"....KABLAM! Just blew your mind right?
PS. Pictures are posted from Mission College this last weekend, enjoy!

I've just returned to Bangkok!! Believe it or not I just spent my first weekend out of the city since I arrived! Goi wanted to take Andrew, Sandrina and I to visit her friends in Mission College for a weekend and get to experience where she went to school for a couple years.
It was great to see the Thai countryside and get to compare life there to life in the city a bit. We set off in these vans and I swear they were going 120 mph! Then I realized the fastest I've gone due to traffic in the city has been on motorbike and still probably only about 30 mph, haha. Even so, it took us about 3 hours to get there so we arrived late. We stood on this street corner like, "What now guys?" but Goi called one of her friends who drove her scooter over and we all spent the night at her house off campus.
Houses here almost make living feel like camping, you basically have the basic structure of a house (beautiful and Thai of course) with tile floors, a bedroom, and a bathroom. The kitchen is always outdoors and you ALWAYS remove shoes before entering. Near this persons house in particular is a bunch of chicken farms, her family and all the neighbors work as chicken pluckers/meat cutters etc. It was a little shocking to wake up and see 20 people massacreing chickens in the backyard, not gonna lie, haha. Oddly enough two of the comforts I hardly realized I'd missed so much were found at this place, I got my first hot shower in 2.5 months (WOW...just WOW) and I got to hold this kitten for about an hour solid. This kitten this family had ran over on accident. They're Buddhist and I think because they DIRECTLY contributed to harming this creature and it had done nothing to bother them before they felt like they should care for it. (Completely different than in the city, animal rights activists would have a heart-attack if they saw Bangkok) They broke its back legs and tail so it was just pathetic to watch. Apparently they've been taking it to a vet though and it should be able to fully recover. I slept like a rock because it was about 10 degrees cooler up there, there were no city noises and it was just so PEACEFUL.
The next day Goi took us to the campus church and after we went to her Sponsor family's house for lunch. After some great Thai food we went to nature parks nearby...one was basically mini-Niagra Falls. There were tons of these water falls and people could just swim around in them and slide off the edges because they were low enough. We braved walking across some of the bigger ones even though we had no swimsuits and made it across relatively dry. I was a little freaked out because before we started crossing about 3 girls told me they didn't know how to swim (not uncommon here, only about 50% of women swim) and if they fell I'd have to rescue them O.O. Being the queen of dog-paddle I was seriously concerned! After that park we went to this giant white buddha in the mountains that you had to seriously hike to. I'm still sore but it was totally worth the effort for the view.
That night we went out to the town by scooters and got food and came home around 10pm. I think I need a weekend to rejuvinate after my weekend, haha.

Bobae

Wecome to Bobae market: Basically the fruit market capital of Thailand, doing your months groceries in 5 minutes under the tarp covered alleyways here would not be difficult. In my short time walking through in the past I've always seen people throwing pinapples over passerby's heads and loading them onto a truck, rhambutan salesmen, fishermen, etc. Yesterday however I was blessed with a more revealing look...
I guess we weren't quite as done with Health Expo as I would have liked. The day before yesterday I got a call from the Hospital design team and they were wondering if I could put together some backdrops for these boards we're using at the mall. (There's 7 and they're massive) So I did about 3 and thought they'd work pretty good but then met with them again and found out they were looking for something completely different. Doug calls it "managing expectation" lots of times people we work with here want EXACTLY what they have in their heads, but with the language barrier and different design tastes it seems like several re-do's are always in order until they're satisfied. Anyway, I ended up having to redo the a lot of the work and it took me all night, I came back from the office at 6am and slept for an hour before hopping on a boat (yes, a BOAT to get to work) and going to the Hospital to drop off the files because they're so massive. It takes about 45 minutes with all the traffic to get there so several hours later I was back at the apartment, exhausted. I started to close my eyes BUT my phone rang! Apparently the hospital had forgotten to copy ALL of the 7 files and only had 3. So, I hopped back on a Song Tao, that took me back to the boat, that took me back to Bobae market and back to the Hospital where I dropped off the rest of the files.
The second time walking through Bobae market I noticed SO much more than the first time. One of the fish salesmen was chasing a trout down the street, somehow it had flopped out of its box. A woman was selling rats on a stick....NEVER seen that before. And I totally saw a guy steal from the dragon fruit lady!
When I was stepping back onto the boat to come home finally after the second trip, I got another phone call. Guess what?! We had more documents to pick up at the Hospital. So I stepped back onto the dock and walked back through Bobae market and back to the Hospital!
Needless to say, I got home at 4 in the afternoon and was TIRED. I slept until dinner, had dinner, then woke up this manana!
People who think design isn't a difficult job or a true Missionary position...please read above. haha

Who you gonna call?? ... Design-busters!

Did someone call for a graphic design hero? While cheesy...its officially time to celebrate! I'm done with Health Expo banners...I think? Haha. Or project one down...5 million others to go. We got this!
Ps. This is also my halloween costume...

Klongtan

So today was a semi-productive day. As much as I love Thai class its so much easier to be productive on Fridays when we don't have it because I have the entire morning to work. I had to finish the Health Expo banners today, woot woot! Home stretch!
I got home late however and was just hanging out with Goi in the room when we got a phone call at 5:30. Two weeks ago we went to the church plant at Klongtan because some teachers werent able to be there, basically on Friday evenings they give Bible studies to some of the local kids that all come because the teachers play games and give out candy ;) They also teach a little bit of english which always pleases the parents to know their kids are learning. I would never have found this place if Goi hadn't showed me, its like Narnia. You seriously have to go through several tight alleys and doorways to find it. Goi and me last time went and prepared a lesson and had fun teaching for about an hour. (This was all 2 weeks ago) The next week we get a phone call, "Hey are you coming today?" and so we jumped on a song-tao and headed over. Today we got the phone call, same thing..."Where are you guys?!" haha. We showed up late not just because we forgot but because we picked the one bus headed to Klongtan that happened to be breaking down, its only like 4 blocks away but we grabbed a bus thinking it would be quicker. Of course not right...? To easy. The bus BARELY made it over the bridge and sounded awful the whole way. When we finally got over the bridge we got stuck in traffic again and Goi and me got out and ran the rest of the way. Andrew almost beat us there walking but we were in the door first! Ha! After the students leave every Friday its great because the pastor there always buys pizza for the teachers and gives us the rest of the chocolate milk juice boxes. The pizza surprised me the first time, here they always serve ketchup packets with pizza (Thai's like to add it on top along with hot-sauce) and if you get vegetarian it has corn! Everything is also Thai size, so when they order a "family size pizza" its like the size of an American Small. Amazingly there's always enough to go round.

Wan Sowe lae Wan A-Tid

Contrary to popular belief I'm standing on a turtle, not a rock.

 

Welcome to the weekly-weekend post! I figured it was time to check in again. Yesterday was a fairly spectacular day. Mouewan sanuk sanuk! (Yesterday fun fun!) After church I was invited to Jair Parada and family's house for lunch along with Andrew and Bronsen. Apparently he was good friends with Tim Wolfer in Mozambique and we chatted on Facebook before I came here but never officially met in person until this Sabbath. It was great to finally see him and his family and get to know them better. Turns out he is Bolivian and speaks Spanish but studied English in South Africa where he met his wife. His two children speak Africanse and Spanish to their parents but Jair and his wife only speak English to each other. It was fascinating just to watch the sort of language-ping-pong going on.
After lunch we all went to Lumpini park so their kids could play with another families kids and the boys and me took a crazy walk around where we befriended some people from India, watched the regular 5 o'clock aerobic routine, found giant swimming lizards and I petted a turtle!
**Side note: I've just witnessed a cockroach at my coffee shop. It's official, no where is safe O.O**
After the park I had to take off because I was meeting Goi at Tomburi about an hour away by BTS for dinner and shopping with some of her friends. It was really fun to experience their dynamic and just kind of join in on a typical Thai fun day to see what they would do. The day would have been almost perfect but I was reminded on our way home that I am still NOT Thai. We took a ride on a tuk-tuk back "home" to drop her friends off and as we were hopping off I smashed my knee into the rail because I'm not Goi-size and my legs are a little longer hahahaha. Man I was in so much pain I fell off the tuk-tuk and the driver felt so bad he wai'd me (the traditional greeting not really exchanged unless its an officially meeting or apology). You know when something instantly bruises that its gonna look blue the next day...so this morning I have a rather colorful knee. 

They say pictures say a thousand words, this one should say 2,000 haha.

Suk san wan Sabato!

Yesterday was pretty amazing...I'm not gonna lie. I got to sleep in a wee bit, skype the padres and some friends *you know who you are ;)* all before heading to church! After the service some friends were headed out to a potluck so another group of us decided to go get lunch somewhere else, but on our way out the door we got invited to a different potluck (or so we thought). When we opened the door tho, we realized that the couple hosting had asked different people, the wife had invited our friends earlier, her husband had grabbed us on his way out the door. Politics aside, we had AMERICAN FOOD! We pretty much chatted and hung out all afternoon, by the time we left it was 6pm.
Later that evening we went out to get ka-bobs and went swimming this apartment complex's pool after. I don't know WHY I expected the water to be heated...I totally walked the whole way there thinking "heated pool" possibly hot tub. Lies! Its like AZ no one needs to heat the pools, you want it cooler if you swim at normal times of the day and not at 10 at night, hahaha. Needless to say we froze so made it a quick half hour swim. We headed back to Bronsen's apartment and Andrew J. decided to bake bread! We realized it was gonna take until midnight to finish though, so decided to pass the time watching Hot Rod (hahahahahaha, wow...just wow.)

FYI

For all of you trying to click that link to my website...dont!! The website's undergoing some serious overhaul every spare minute I've got, soooooo in order for you not to think badly of my creative genius PLEASE ignore the link.

No news is good news...honestly.

I know this sounds like rather american/super-size-me thing to do...but I can think of no better way to describe my day than to tell you what I ate for breakfast lunch and dinner.
Goi woke me up this morning with the smell of home-cooked Thai food. She'd made rice and already had the wok simmering with some vegetables and told me that I had to "eat eat eat!" because we'd need strength today. We sat on the floor as always and she pretty much insisted I finish half a box of rice by myself before we headed out the door.
So the last two days I've put designing the Health Expo on hold and been helping the office clean out the downstairs warehouse. Basically the entire building quit work and has been working 9-5 cleaning the warehouse so our language school can expand soon. I've pretty much been up to my elbows in mildew, cockroach and termite carcasses, and rotten paper products. LOL. The bright side however, is we've gotten to know the office team a LOT better, even the Mission president goofs off and lends a hand.
The highpoint: LUNCH. Everyone had brought lunch to work...CRAZY! Potlucks here would be incredible, just fyi. Basically this guy brings out a basket of sticky rice and everyone just dips in, grabs a handful, rolls a ball and starts dipping in papaya salad, fish, peanut sauce and stuffs their face. It was fantastic.
After another 4 hours of dirty work we headed back to the apartment and Goi said she was "too hungry for restaurant food" and wanted to cook again. We made a feast and decided we needed Andrew to help us eat it. So we met at the office and put all our dishes across one of our co-workers desks (which will go anonymous) and watched a movie while eating, as luck would have it that co-worker decided to stop by the office on the way home aaaaaand caught us eating on his desk. Woops!
He laughed at catching us but luckily didn't do much.
**Oh! Dinner menu was: more rice *what a shock! jk* stir fry, fruit that I still cant translate from Thai, a soup from herbs I've never before seen, grape juice and cake O.O all for a grand total of 1$ each**

The Procrastination Station

I'm sitting in the little coffee shop I found yesterday called "Sometimes". True to its title, it is open only...sometimes, haha. I have to finish the health expo website tonight (deadline crunch!) aaand you cant get much better than a cozy couch & book covered place that serves coffee/chai yin, has free a/c and wifi. I wonder if they'd let me just MOVE in?

Normalcy?

My Fellow Americans,

Its been the first time I HAVEN'T had something interesting to report in a while. Who'd know that having a semi-normal week was possible here right?

I sat through a meeting yesterday which pretty much sucked the productivity out of my Thursday. It was great watching the dynamics of everyone trying to decide things and the Thai culture come out as everyone talked. Its just SO different here, being direct and to the point about anything is considered rude, so you have to go about discussing things in a very round about way. Asking for money from someone is considered rude, but asking how much someone makes is almost the second thing they always want to know. "Sa  wat dee ka (hello), coon chu ari? (whats your name?) coon ayu tow rai ka? (how old are you?)" being the first. The age one caught me off guard, apparently I can ask pretty much anyone that question and they wont get offended. Its not like in the states where if you ask a middle-aged looking woman how old she is, you get a look, a slap or "I'm not telling!"

Thai class is paying off a bit. Our teacher is Pee-Ma'am this week, next week is Pee-Oh. Pee-Ma'am is a sweetheart, she's really patient with us and never falls back on English. *Harder than you think! While most Thai's don't speak too much English, even if I ask a price in Thai, they want to respond in English because they know numbers or a couple phrases* So far its been easier to compare Thai to Spanish than English, the back of all my flash cards are mostly Spanish because of the similarities. I do run the risk of speaking Span-thai however…I keep saying "Si" instead of "Chi". The result of a third language is either going to be, I loose both, or create a new and fantastic hybrid that no one understands?

Boy I'm screwed. Haha.

MBK

The down-low on design here:

Day 1 - On the job here at Hope 4 Bangkok I was made aware of an upcoming health expo that needed design. The event is a giant health awareness seminar complete with booths activities and information taking place in MBK, one of the biggest malls in Thailand drawing crowds of over 150, 000 people daily.
Week 2 - I was told that the hospital PR department here in Bangok would be heading up everything but the website, they asked me to do that. I finished a prototype and got it approved.
Week 3 - Hospital sends S.O.S. distress call to Hope 4 Bangkok saying they have no design ideas. We met up and I brought some sketched out themes for possible poster design ideas. They liked one idea in particular and then decided I should do all the poster designs as well...yikes!
Week Now? - Hospital asks to meet again at the mall just to look at the site and get a better idea for event/stage layout and design. Turns out they were having a meeting with the actual staff administrators of the MBK mall! We showed up 40 minutes late due to traffic..sorta...and I'm wearing jeans and tennis-shoes. They tell us the meeting is on the 8th floor, we get in an elevator (which promptly goes down instead of up, making us even later) and arrive to a stunning office section of the building. MBK staff are milling around in their perfectly ironed outfits and heels and we're sent to a giant confrence room. After a meeting they tell us they're moving the health expo to a different side of the building, changing event layout and design. We meet for several hours more exploring the site and...ta da! You are now looking at the ONLY designer for the event....panic mode? O.O Not being able to speak Thai is a danger in the working community because they basically just vote that I do everything and I sit there until they translate that "Congratulations, you're now doing...." hahahaha.
The PR staff at the hospital is great and really nice, they're still doing tons of work for the event and will be helping with Thai translation and text in several areas later so I'm not completely on my own. Todays' meeting however was a bit overwhelming...*crosses fingers*
The bright side is that we have 3 weeks until the event, and none of the other projects I'm doing come due around that time...so this aint no Senior Year...yet.......! (Shout out to all you PUC design slave seniors...good luck! I love you guys!)

Ayer

The EIS Church in Bangkok **more pictures on Facebook**

So yesterday was pretty sweet, but will have to be crammed into one paragraph because I'm feeling pretty hungry. The smoothie lady wasnt at her usual station (its the weekend) and I missed breakfast on my way to mooch good internet at the office for a bit and skype some of you people...you know who you are ;)
Sabbath I decided to go to the "farang" church, (foreign) church, they speak english and its a very westernized church service. Really great actually, I'd love it in the states but it's nice to be a part of the thai culture and the church plants here around the city too. So when I walked in a missionary friend of mine, Bronsen (Spanish teacher here at the school) told me there was someone I needed to meet. He introduced me to Damaris, a girl from Spain. She spoke some English but we talked mostly in Spanish. Damaris told me that she had just gotten married and her and her husband had come to Thailand on her honeymoon and they had been separated at the airport when they landed. He was originally from Romania but lived in Spain, so needed a special visa. They had let her through customs though, so now SHE was stuck in Thailand and he was in Malaysia getting a visa to come to Thailand (with all their luggage). So she was luggage, and husbandless in Thailand for the last 3 days and had come to the church because she was Adventist.
We ended up spending all day together and a group of us went to the MBK mall here so she could make some international calls to her family (they didn't know about the honeymoon-disaster yet) and then we took her to dinner and a night market. Damaris said there was a tour guide taking her on an outing every day the rest of the week but she has my number just in case she needs a buddy ;) Amazingly she's only 21!!! I kinda flipped when I realized, Christine will be getting married at 21 too! I was standing there thinking, if this was my sister, stuck in like Fiji on her honeymoon alone and not able to speak ... fijian? or whatever language...I'd be so worried!!
It was really fun being able to speak Spanish in Thailand of all places though, "its a small world after all!" Terrible that she had to come meet us without her husband though :( She was super brave to have made it even to the church on her own, apparently the taxi driver helped her find it! Amazing considering the size of Bangkok and small amount of Christians.
Later after we dropped her off, Andrew, Toshi (a japanese student here at Mission College) and me went and did Cosmic Bowling and got ice cream. The bowling alleys here are FANTASTIC, its basically Cosmic Bowling only, all day long, black lights and stuff. They also had a DJ on staff who mixed English and Thai songs (she was super good).
Pretty much the end to a perfect Saturday...I'm definitely enjoying a weekend off just to figure stuff out on my own. Seems like there has always been a plan the last couple weeks (not a bad thing, I totally appreciate it) but it was really cool just to see how we survived on our own for a day in the city. I'm getting a bit more confident with my limited Thai and navigation skills. I may not be able to find new places but I know I could always make it back home...

The Bomb? (no pun intended)

So before reading this everyone must PROMISE me to read the whole thing before freaking out. I'm totally okay and everyone here is fine!!!!!! (Mom I'm looking at you....haha)

Yesterday night we had a bomb scare here in Bangkok. I was out shopping for video gear with Andrew, John Wood and Pastor Doug. We were at the MBK mall getting ready to head home when Pastor Doug gets a phone call from the mission president. Apparently there was a bomb rumored to be found in a 7-11 in Bangkok so we should stay put and not go anywhere. This wasn't a laughing matter but we kind of chuckled to ourselves anyway because 7-11's here are as common as stop signs or bus stops. A bit later we hear back from the mission president and find out it was the 7-11 attached to my apartment building. WHOA!
So my first thought was "GOI!" while we weren't near any blast radius (I didn't think) we live on the top of the building, 6th story, she had been home sick all day with a bad cold. We got ahold of her and told her not to go out (I was more for Plan B of taking a bus to Chang Mai and getting out of the city as fast as possible, but apparently she was supposed to stay put). We had a nervous dinner together and headed back to the apartment.
We took the BTS (train) to our neighborhood and in the Song Tao (its a truck with benches in the back that you pay 6b for, very common) Pastor Doug questioned some of the other Thai's that were riding with us.
One of the girls said, "Oh! I heard about that, its actually 2 blocks down, its not the 7-11 on Soi 42 (my street) its on Soi 45!" We get off the Song Tao at my street and it looked like she was right at first, no one looked any different than usual…street vendors were out, 7-11 was open, nothing had changed. So the video guys decided they wanted to see some of the footage and action actually happening at the site. We got to Soi 45 but nothing looked different there either. So confusing! Doug asked a old man standing on the street corner about it and he said, "Oh! Not this 7-11, different street!" No one knew! Apparently it was all rumor.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief and started back to the mission. The guys decided to drop me off at the apartment for good measure and just to make sure we asked a fish sales-lady in front of 7-11 about the bomb scare. She said,"UGH, yea that was here! I didn't sell anything all day! Bomb squad wasn't hungry! It was at the bank next-door." Relieving? I think not, still next to my apartment building! She continued to give us more details though and we found out that the bomb wasn't 'a bomb' EXACTLY… it was a bottle of oil that someone had left at the bank. While purposes could have seemed sinister, more than likely it was just a street-vendors cook fire.

SO everything is fine. Kind of anti-climatic actually, it's kind of ironic that it had to be THIS street of all places, next door in fact, haha. Out of the BILLIONS of streets, people, 7-11's in the city it was THIS one. I'm so thankful for the friendly turn of last nights events, we are WITHOUT A DOUBT being watched over.

Hello Strangers

 Figured a new post was a wee-bit overdue. I have come to realize that there IS no normal when it comes to graphic design in Thailand. I haven't worked with the same person for more than a week, the same projects for more than a few days, and definitely haven't been in the same place for more than a few hours...hahaha. It's been pretty crazy.
So everyone reading this seriously missed out on THE weekend and should consider investing in plane tickets for the next weekend in case of further lost opportunities :) haha. Basically (if you could sum up an adventure with one word, HA!) it went something like this...
Saturday: I ended up doing powerpoint slides for the Burmese church. I was definitely groaning about going but dude, it was SO rewarding!!!! I asked the pastors wife (who would have adopted me if I was for sale, but its okay mom!) who told me to show up at 9:30 for church the day before, BUT her husband the pastor said, "WELL....church doesn't actually start till 11:00 but Sabbath School is at 9:30." So I'm thinking, "Hey hey hey! This girl is sleeping in!" Goi and Andrew left early that morning because they had to go film a baptism at the church near the SDA Hospital and took my time getting ready, but couldn't force myself to procrastinate longer than 10:15 because I'm still working off jet-lag...haha.
So, I showed up at 10:15-ish and walked into the church and the entire Sabbath School STOPS in the middle of the lesson and is like, 'NICOLE! So glad you made it!" I felt awful for being late. They all scooted down a row of chairs and I was stuck front and center, THEN the person who had been giving the sabbath school in Burmese looks at this other guy sitting near me and nods. This random person gets up and starts translating everything the Burmese guy says into English, JUST FOR ME. O.O
I set up the powerpoints after that, but everyone in the church had to stop and talk, "Ma-te-abue Nicole! (hello in burmese)" Talk about a church you just want to put in your pocket and take with you everywhere.
Goi and Andrew showed up later to film 6 baptisms that happened at the church that day, and after the pastors wife had watched us all eat and was pleased with the amount of rice/noodles/fruit we all consumed let us leave for the day.
We went to the park for the afternoon, chased pidgeons, played cards and watched this hackey-sack-volleyball game that was really incredible! I'll have to attach a video so you can understand better.
Then Shannon (sp?) this crazy Australian guy that helps us with video sometimes called us up and asked if we wanted to go to an upscale vegetarian buffett. We all said sure and got in this taxi heading towards China-town (how is it that every city has a Chinatown? what happened to Mexican-town?!)
It was kinda interesting actually because we had to go through a really touristy section of BKK and ended up getting mobbed by salesmen, odd...because the white people seemed to out-number the Thai's there.
We finally got to the restaurant and besides being also a tourist hotspot it was REALLY FUN. Its seat-yourself, and we chose floor cushions on the balcony level. It wasn't "upscale" looking, it actually resembled the ideal hippie-pad. Tapestries, rugs, lights, incense everywhere. They had Thai dancers (Goi says that every person, even boys, have to learn cultural thai dancing in high-school). The food was REALLY good, but apparently the cafe here serves dishes that are pretty similar for half price, I haven't eaten at the mission school enough yet to know.
After that we caught a Thai movie called "Hello Stranger" if it ever makes it to foreign film sections in Blockbusters near you...RENT IT! It was adorable. Definitely going to win a foreign film/indie film award soon. You laugh, you cry. It was about two Thai teenagers who go to Korea on vacation (apparently Thais revere Koreans almost as much as white-foreigners) and get dumped. We learned a LOT about Thai culture and Korean culture from the film actually. SUPER CUTE!
On the way back home I bumped into a mannequin and Shannon got me to "wai" it (its the typical Thai greeting where you do the "prayer hands" and bow at each other) he swore it was super impolite...the saleslady must have thought I was crazy!
Looks like I'm saving Sundays events for a later date...hahaha. Saturday was just too cool. Love ya guys!

Vespas :)

Fridays here are usually half-day's, not just because of the Adventist system but the Thai weekend starts Friday. This doesn't exactly mean I have time "off" because when you're on the film crew weekends are required and your free time is completely changing. I happened to get off a few hours though and ran back to the apartment, threw my wash into one of the three machines I saw and ran back up the stairs (6 floors, yes...i am the stair-master) and cleaned our room. It looked like the room hadn't been cleaned since the 80's but in reality it had only been a week since Goi scrubbed the floors. It kind of felt like I was punishing myself scrubbing the bathroom floors with a toilet wand but apparently thats the norm around here, haha. When I finished the room I ran back to get my wash and the adventure began:
The washmachine I had chosen was apparently designed for the smallest load size, hence the cheaper price. Woops! My load was definitely over that after 2 weeks of intense sweating in 70% humidity. Sooooo it finished the spin cycle, then started filling up with water again, then pouring out the top! The lady that lives in the bottom of the apartment came out yelling something, then appeared to dial 911 on a telephone and gesturing at me. She runs back and unplugs the washer then this Thai girl (the person she'd been calling) comes out and starts translating...apparently my load was too big, the lady gave me a bucket for my sopping wet laundry and told me to come back tomorrow to try again in the bigger washer if I wanted. I felt awful but she was apologizing to me the whole time. I got my laundry back upstairs *way heavier than before* and managed to hang it up on the mini-porch thing we've got out our window. I have no hangers yet because we have to go to a market to get some, so its all just massed on the bars of the window...probably be dry by next Thursday if theres no rain :/
I managed to make it back to do powerpoints for vespers tonight at the church the Evangelism meetings have been taking place at, of course our one clicker belongs to the conference president who needed it this weekend, so I'm clicking every slide from the back on my computer. Woohoo! *obvious sarcasm* The church here is SO sweet though, everyone wanted to talk when it was over and I even remember lots of names from this last week. It was great too because I got to see these teenagers taking photos in front of the backdrop I made "myspace style", made me feel kinda cool, hahaha. Sometimes its good to step back and see how what we're doing actually effects people.

Ode to A Sis

So Christine my dear...I MISS YOU! You need to figure out how to use skype, and a video cam. Even the parents figured it out before you, haha. Mom and Dad are internet pro's right now, and even showed Aunt Ruby and the cousins, you're a bit behind the times my love :) haha. For all of you reading this, harass Christine into internet connectivity por-favor!
Besides my need to talk to my sister, things are winding down a bit over here. Last night was Wednesday night "missionary time". Every Weds here all the SM's get together and hang out for an evening just to relax and chat about how the rest of the week went. The latest tradition has been roasting marshmallows on a rooftop :) Someone missed smores and got the idea to roast marshmallows over this small pit-fire on the roof where we all meet. Thing is, Asian marshmallows are smaller and no Jumbo-fluffy-thing. They all come with filling too. So we've been roasting tiny blueberry, strawberry and chocolate puffs the last two weeks, haha. Everytime different missionaries seem to be able to make it, and some have other things going on, so the group is always different.
One of the missionaries is a spanish speaker so it's been great to "practicar un poquito", and it seems like most are from Walla Walla so we all have friends in common. Can't wait to do it again guys! :)

Long Time No See!

Hey all-who-read-this-blog,
I just got off of skype with my parents, Aunt Ruby, Forest, Drew and the cat and I was reminded that I hadn't posted in a while. Woops! The evangelistic meetings have been a little chaotic lately, lots of late nights and lots of work. I feel kind of useless in the video department, but if they need anything in graphics or just moral support I'm here :) Doug has enough design projects for me to keep busy till NEXT December should I so choose haha, so theres always ways I can keep productive next to these busy bees. This lady at the Burmese Evangelistic Meetings keeps feeding me! I ate yesterday, but she didn't SEE me eat so she made me eat again! (It's very impolite to refuse food here) She even made a special plate of chicken curry and watched me eat it, hahaha. Adorable.
I'm including a photo of what it's like designing here lately...enjoy!

The Home Stretch!

So I've been working on this project now the full week since I've been here. An evangelistic seminar starts this Sunday and began with revival meetings that started tonight (Friday). Andrew, Goi and I were in charge of production, design, etc. for the whole event. This means that I had to convert 300+ powerpoints into Burmese in three days, in addition to creating a backdrop for the video gear that matched the pastor's sons flyer design for the event. Tonight we had the first mock-up and filmed the whole thing to find all the glitches (of which there were many) and fix the backdrops, etc. So two more days until the event, hopefully all goes well. I'm attaching a very candid photo Doug took of the backdrop & me and wished me to share with all of you....(no I did not pose like this) enjoy!

A Typical Tuesday?

I showed up for work just like every day so far. Showered in the morning, picked up fruit and a juice from a local street vendor on my 4 block commute to work from the apartment. Started Thai worship at 7:30am sharp and started work at 8:00am after that. To my surprise however, we were picking up another missionary from Germany today, Sandrina.
Pastor Doug, Goi, Andrew and me all rode the skytrain to the airport, picked up Sandrina and took her for a "Welcome to Bangkok" tour of the city. We even got to go to the top of the tallest building in Thailand with a revolving observation deck to get a better view of the city.
After we finished some Mango smoothies at the restaurant in the skyscraper Doug had to go to a meeting at the SDA Hospital and we took Sandrina to the church plant in Tomburi, Bangkok where she would be staying. It was more of the historical section of the city, had some beautiful Wats and architecture. The Tomburi church plant was where the old Hope for Bangkok headquarters used to be (the mission office that I'm working at now) some of the past missionaries designed a beautiful mural for the wall of their vegetarian restaurant. We are a good hour plus from there now so Sandrina will have a commute to see other missionaries :/ she'll have to jump in quick!
After leaving her there we got back at four (an hour late) and went back to work. The Burmese Pastor had finally arrived with his family to help set up and answer questions about the upcoming Evangelistic Series. So Andrew and Goi set up the stage and video equipment while I asked questions about what posters they liked and if my burmese was correct. After a powerpoint nightmare and some progress on the staging we finally left work at around 7:30pm. LATE.
**BONUS! Today was nature week: I saw a snail with a shell the size of my fist AND my first cocroach crawled across my pillow tonight. O.M.G. I can't say I hate them because in Thai Goi says that whatever you hate will "come to you". Probably wise advice..**
On a positive side I ran into two more student missionaries tonight from Walla Walla, another Andrew and...I want to say Julia? Ops, I forgot. We all had dinner at the Greenhouse today, yummmmm more pad thai!

Today we went to one of the Kings Palaces in Bangkok. HUGE gardens complete with a maze (thanks to PUC I do know the difference between mazes and labyrinths now, haha) It was my first time using public transportation actually, ever other time we've gone out to food we've just hiked and the mission has a car. We took a bus and hopped in the back of two trucks O.O at first I thought I was hitchhiking but it doesn't count because we actually paid 7 baht to do it…hahaha. 
We tried to go kayaking on the lake next to the palace but it wasn't allowed because of the thunderstorm, we met some people from South Africa that heard us playing UNO in the lobby while we were waiting (thinking it was going to clear up, which it never did).
We then also decided to wait until 5:00PM because Goi and Andrew had seen the Thai aerobics/dance class that took place in the gardens and wanted to watch again. SO much fun! It was interrupted at 6:00 however by the national anthem, kind of eerie because anyone that hears it STOPS in place and everything they were doing. Almost like M. Night Shamalan's "The Happening". I'm completely exhausted and over-exercised and need to catch up on my jet-lag so this is all for tonight folks :)

Wat?

I just had the most AMAZING day. Goi told me yesterday that we were going to "Iceland" and I kept asking her if we were going ice-skating, getting ice-cream, should I bring a jacket? She just smiled and nodded at me, obviously I didn't make sense and we had an English/Thai misunderstanding, haha. I copied what she was wearing just to be safe and threw on shorts and a tshirt grabbed my purse and we walked to the mission college much to my surprise. We had breakfast with the pastors family (thai breakfast rice, pomelo, and pineapple juice) then they all started packing up to go to the ISLAND…we were taking a trip to an ISLAND not ICELAND, haha. Goi didn't know that the "s" was silent.
The Island as it turns out is not someplace off the coast of Thailand, its actually an island in the city on the river. FUN FACT: Thailand is in fact sinking several inches a year, the entire city was built on a swamp. We arrived at a Wat (Buddhist temple) somewhere in Bangkok, and had to take a ferry across the river to get to the Island. Once we had crossed we rented bikes for several hours and started on a concrete sidewalk. The sidewalk was several yards above the water level and we were completely surrounded by buildings on all sides at first, they even had tarps draped across the pathway which made it feel almost like going through caves but seeing inside peoples homes/stores at the same time. It was actually a really good thing the tarps were up because it was raining for the first bit of the ride. After a while it opened up a bit and you could see the houses more clearly, everything was raised on stilts and completely open. Every now and again there would be a Buddhist temple sandwiched in between the houses, also raised up on stilts but extremely ornately carved. Apparently the Island is the countries major source of terra-cotta pot-making because the earth underneath the houses is red clay. We saw some random giant pots on the sidewalk occasionally but otherwise I didn't get to see any potters. The entire time there were other bikers and people walking on the path but there were also scooters, so dodging traffic was difficult sometimes. The thing that shocked me the most was everything GROWING everywhere. It seems like if you sneeze here some how your snot would grow a banana tree. No joke EVERYTHING grows in the craziest places. There were trees growing up out of the water in between houses, lotus flowers, random vines and fruits I have never seen before. You name it, it grows there. And I don't think there is such thing as a "weed" either, everything is edible.
While flora and fauna is abundant, livestock is as well, I almost ran over a flock of chickens and ducks, and it was near impossible to avoid hitting a dog. FUN FACT2: Dogs are the lowest form of society here in Thailand. Buddhists believe that if your bad deeds outweigh your good deeds when you die you reincarnate in the next life into a dog. Thus, almost every dog is seen as more of a rat. They're scrawny, bones and skin mostly, flea bitten and often injured creatures here. If someone owns a dog, they're most likely non-Buddhist practicing people. Amazingly there are still tons of them, the only reason they survive is because no one is going to spay or neuter the unwanted animals so they just multiply anyway.
We just got back and I'm prepared to sleep away some more jet-lag, miraculously I've made it till 4:13PM today without crashing. Very impressive...We finished off our day with some amazing pad Thai from street vendors below the apartment and I'm stuffed...
I promise pictures WILL come of the grand day, I was completely unprepared though and didn't bring my camera, I borrowed the pastors and will get photos up very soon :)

Land HO!

I'm here, safe and sound! I'm sure I look like a deer in headlights right now everything is SO different here. I have a small apartment about two blocks away from the office I work at, my room mate Goi is pretty much my life-line right now. I'm learning a lot from just watching her live here. Our room is about the size of my dorm room in college (shout out to Kayloni!) and has a queen size bed that we share with a big fan pointed at us. I've learned to sleep with no blankets and just a silk sheet if I get cold. The heat I was warned so much about but so far lots of the buildings and offices have AC and its up so high I actually appreciate the warmth when I go outside! The shower and toiled is interesting. Pretty much the "bathroom" is a giant shower with a toilet in it. The shower head only has one temperature COLD, haha, and most people here don't use toilet paper they use a hose to 'rinse off' kind of like the Buvet in Argentina except standing up. We have a giant window overlooking the city view, they don't have screens here either so you can just hang outside of it. This can be REALLY fun when it's raining which it usually does every afternoon in a downpour. There IS lots of traffic which can make it hard to sleep sometimes but I'm still trying to figure out WHY…there is a city-wide curfew at 1:00 AM and anyone caught on the streets can be arrested. I take it cars are exempt from this…

Work is getting busy lately, they have lots for me to do but are nice and give me afternoons off for right now because I'm so jet-lagged. I hear it lasts about two weeks, ugh. I keep trying not to fall asleep in meetings that are in Thai…I really now possess the potential to sleep ALL day. It feels like 3 AM after lunch here, so then I fall asleep and wake up when its dark, then fall asleep again. Work I hear is really going to pick up though in the next couple weeks and I'll have to be fully conscious then, lol. I'm basically working with the same 4 people every day, Goi (my roommate) Andrew (Student Missionary from Southern) and Doug (the pastor) give or take any Thai people we talk with about doing films with or that need posters, brochures or some other designed material. We can end the day whenever we want to really and then the afternoons are ours… Goi is a mean badminton player and although I slept through yesterdays match I hear I'll be playing in the future. We eat dinner in the room, I was shown several promising street vendor locations to find great noodles, pad thai, fresh fruit (DEF not American fruit) and a SMOOTHIE VENDOR! YEYA!

I hear theres LOTS of SM's in Thailand and 4 that are in Bangkok also, but we're all kind of spread out in pairs so I haven't met anyone else yet. Andrew and me were assigned to this location on the Design Team and the others were assigned to church-schools around the city to teach English. Hopefully we'll be able to do a weekend outing or something when Goi, Andrew and me aren't working.

I have internet at work but I'm trying to get it here in Goi's apartment too because being disconnected from you guys is hard :( The time change is kinda rough but if any of you are awake in the mornings…hopefully I'll see you online :)

Fail

So...I've been telling people I'm leaving September 8th for about a month, this last week I've just been saying, "Yea, I leave Tuesday." Things feeling like they're winding up and getting closer, I decided to send out a mass email letting all my friends and family know my address and internet contact info for the next year, also saying, "Don't text me after Tuesday!" Not one hour after I send this email my mom and me decide we should check my ticket info and make sure I'm flying out of Akron airport and not Cleveland...
Little did I know Tuesday is NOT the 8th of September, it's the 7th! I'm leaving Wednesday! Fail.

My Address

I just found out my address for while I'll be there, so for anyone who's interested :) here it is! Nicole Pidoux, Hope for Bangkok. 12 Soi Pridi Bamonyong 37 Sukhumvit 71 Road

Klongtan , Wattana , Bangkok 10110

Learning Thai

I've been practicing some more Thai, and just learned a VERY useful phrase..."pom chau nuat mai" OR "I like Thai Massage". I may be too cheap to get American massages, but for the low cost of several Baht...I am NOT too cheap for Thai! Lookout Southeast Asia!

ENGAGED!

My sister is engaged!
Holy cow! For those of you that know her, my sister is the perfect specimen of a little woman. Gorgeous, talented and a Junior at SAU in Tennessee. Congrats future Mrs. Turner!! They're waiting for 2 years thank goodness...I want to be back from Thailand so I can help! Whoo hoo! SO cute.
My life is a little more immature right now, haha. I'm hanging out in so-cal visiting Zach one last time before I leave :( We went to the beach yesterday and he taught me to boogie-board. Fun stuff! I'm not sure I could ever get up on a surf board but boogie boarding is great for us amatuers. And I only really got a little roughed up by one wave, the rest was fine and dandy for the most part.

Photo Cred: The Lovely Christine :)

07.11.2010

So I'm reading up on my Thai, I can officially now say: sa-wat-dee-ka (hello!) & sa-bai-dee-ru-ka (how are you?). In the event of an emergency, local Thais may report a white american tourist running down the streets saying "HELLO! HELLO! HOW ARE YOU! "

Please keep your ears peeled for signs of amateur Thai speakers in your area.