SOUTH JENNI

A Floating Neighborhood

2015-08-07T08:02:00.004-07:00

On the last day we took a boat ride through this neighborhood. I can't even begin to describe what an incredible experience this was....definitely one of my favorite things we did in Cambodia. It just shows you the impoverished view of a town. Even as tourists boats are coming through their backyard while they're trying to fish and stuff they're still all waving and smiling at us coming by. I have no idea if they're genuinely happy to see foreigners or if they just know that tourism is what will build their country. Either way I love them.

While driving by I saw this little boy that was about Anna's age....maybe 2 yrs old? making his way up one of those tall ladders. The steps of the ladder were literally almost as tall as he was and he was all by himself way up high going up them like it was just stairs - no biggie. He'd seriously break his neck if he fell but no one seemed concerned!

Also so many nakey children's bums running around. So cute.

As we were leaving the village the little van that we were in broke down! But no fear because every Cambodian man in site came running to get things back up and running and everyone here is a handyman so we weren't stranded long. They're so resourceful and self sustaining.

Bye Cambodia! We flew from Siem Reap to Bangkok and then had another flight from Bangkok back to our home in Phitsanulok in northern Thailand. When we were booking the flights there was only about a 50 minute layover in Bangkok so I was thinking, perfect! Buuuuuut I failed to forget that we were crossing country borders so of course we would have to go through immigration and get to another side of the airport which takes quite a bit of time.

After purchasing the flights we had called the airline about another problem and the lady on the phone realized the two flights we had were only 50 minutes apart and she said there's no way you'll make it. You just won't. It's not enough time. So we were like crap.........but we basically decided to go for it anyways because we really didn't have enough money to buy another flight and really didn't want to take the long bus ride from Bangkok.

So luckily we know the Bangkok airport like the back of our hand because we've been there so many times. We had it all mapped out in our heads where we would go. We got on the plan leaving Siem Reap and told the flight attendants about the pickle we had gotten ourselves into and asked if there was anything they could do. Here's the deal....we would land and then have 50 minutes before our next flight would board. They sort of looked at us with big eyes and said they would try to do what they could. We had already checked in for our next flight so they took our information and called the Bangkok airport to give them a heads up that we'd be on our way...running frantically. They also let us move from our crappy back of the plane seats to some empty ones at the front. We just had our bags on our laps and as soon as we heard the ding that people could stand up we jumped up and went in front of everyone on the plane. I felt so bad trying to push past a few people but they didn't yell at me. So unfortunately our plane took off 30 minutes late and so we had landed 30 minutes late which meant that we now had 20 minutes until our next flight was boarding. We were the first people in line off the plane and the flight attendants and everyone at the front of the plane was wishing us good luck (shout out to amazing Asia Air for being the best airline ever) and then they opened the plane door and we all just jumped onto the tarmac and started running for it.

So there we went. A group of American girls running as fast as we could. I had my 15 lb backpackers backpack on and my shorts were a little too lose and falling off as I ran. Leslie had a duffle bag off her shoulder. Angie had TWO backpacks. We just ran as fast as we could. Through the crowds of people waiting to board their flights. Down the longest hallway of my life to immigration. Up ahead I could see a sea of asians and I just thought...we're screwed if that's the immigration line. Turns out they were all waiting for visas so we just got in a line and pushed our way through the asians, weaving in and out where we could and ran hard for the immigration line. Luckily there was no line! We only had to wait for like one person before we went through. No issues at immigration. Then down the stairs and ran around looking for the exit to customs. Leslie saw the sign "nothing to declare" and screamed there it is! We all started taking off through the doors and then I hear this faint, "Jeeeeeeeen!" scream and I realized I couldn't see Mallory so I just yelled, "we're this way!!!!!!" and she follows my voice and then I see Mallory's head come popping through the door and we were out in the public part of the airport running again. We ran past all hired taxi drivers holding up signs waiting to pick people up. Weaving in and out the crowds of people in one of the busiest airports around. I was a few people in our group back so by the time I got up to where the first person in our group had already ran by I could see EVERYONE laughing and pointing. Here we are the Americans for your entertainment.

Up the two levels of escalators.......down one hall and around to the other side.....down another hall to where we finally hit the security line. A guard apparently knew we were coming because without saying a word she just smiled and pointed us in the right direction. Through the security line (no issues), found our gate on the screen, and then CHEERED when we realized it wasn't the farthest gate in all the land. We kept running and got to our gate just in time. 18 minutes. EIGHTEEN minutes people. That's all it took from the time the plane door opened to get to our next gate. I would like to thank all of you Air Asia flight attendants for having our back and letting us off the plane first, every asian cheerleader along the way (because I like to think they were cheering and not making fun of us), and my shorts for not completely falling off as I ran.

We made it to the gate exactly at boarding time. Except then in true asian fashion it boarded 30 minutes late so we had time to sit and wipe the sweat off before boarding our next flight. This was our elation that we made our flight and didn't have to take the crappy 8 hours night bus back to our home.

As much as I absolutely loved Cambodia....I really missed Thailand. I realized it as soon as we got to Bangkok and the first person gave me the little bow and a hello. Thailand - you're tops in my book.

Angkor Wat

2015-08-07T07:18:00.000-07:00

Knocked another world wonder off the list! We went to Angkor Wat to explore one day and I was blown away.

We heard you have to go watch the sunrise over the famous temple so we hired a tuk tuk drive the day before and he said he'd pick us up at 4:50 am. Ouch...that was a little tough since zero people in my group are morning people but we told ourselves it was worth it.

It was totally overcast so unfortunately no sunrise happened. I did get a bit of time with hardly anyone else around though so that made it all worth it.

We just spent about 7 hours exploring and hardly touched it at all. They have a 3 day pass because Angkor Wat is so incredibly huge that you need that much time to see most of it. We just a few main places though and called it good. I know none of the history except it is obvious that this was a major and successful empire in its day.

And also I should probably see Tomb Raider now right?

This was our tuk tuk driver, sleeping in his hammock while waiting for us until we were ready to go home :) $20 for a full day of work. Except I'm sure he probably kept working after we were done because I have a feeling that a full day of work in Cambodia isn't just 8 hours.

Kulen Mountain

2015-08-07T07:09:00.001-07:00

So we really only had about half a day in Phnom Pehn before heading to Siem Reap. I'm so sad that was all we had because I ended up loving the feel of that city so much. Siem Reap was very touristy and it felt like Phnom Pehn was still untouched by all that. I'm sure that won't last too long once people start realizing how amazing that country is.

So it's a 6 hour bus ride between the two cities. That didn't sound too bad. And then you're driving down a dirt road, weaving back and forth as the bus driver tries to avoid huge holes and bumps in the road as well as oncoming traffic. Beeping his horn every few minutes to make sure other traffic - and apparently the entire world - knows he's there. So you're thinking okay pretty soon we'll hit the main highway right? Soon? Almost to the main road?

Turns out the entire 6 hour road connecting the two major cities in Cambodia is currently completely a dirt road. Not only just dirt.....but bumpy, holey, up and down, road. So that was fun. I'm sure after more tourism comes to Cambodia they'll be able to fix it but for now we'll just chalk that up as a true Cambodian experience.

The first day we hired a guide named Tra to take us to Kulen Mountain. He was the sweetest and spoke English and really wanted to teach us all about Cambodian history. He knew so much and I had a little hard time understanding his accent which was so incredibly frustrating because I had no idea how interesting the last 50 years has been in Cambodia. It was way awkward when he mentioned the US coming in and bombing Cambodia and I'm sitting there with hardly any knowledge that that even happened. Definitely should have paid more attention in that senior year world history class. He was so gracious though as he was teaching us the history and not at all bitter towards us because of what our country did to theirs.

He was the most interesting person ever. He's 34 years old. He grew up going to a pagoda where he learned English from monks. He just did that on his own free will. How smart is he to recognize that knowing English was really his ticket to any kind of future as tourism is really the reason this country is progressing at all right now. He told us how women weren't allowed to have jobs as he was growing up so his mother stayed at home. They changed that recently and his mother started a business exporting rice and was doing well until a flood came through and completely bankrupted them. He told me about how as a teenager during the 90s there was constant civil war around him. He would run and take cover when bombs went off or guns were heard. He told us about how one time he ran for cover and was stuck there until his parents were able to later rescue him. Fortunately he didn't have to fight because he wasn't 18 yet, but he had 5 uncles who fought in the war and were all killed. He said that everyone was forced to enlist and that they were only trained for a couple of days, so most of the men who were fighting didn't even know how to shoot the gun that they were given. He taught us so much about the history there and just inspired me to go learn more about it. Tra said he's never left Cambodia because a passport costs too much.

On the mountain there was this worship area. Hinduism is the main religion there. I can't remember exactly what's happening below but they pour water over that part that's sticking out and then when the water comes down they pour it over their faces because Tra says, "It means lucky."

I got a blessing from a monk again. I donated $1,000 riel which I hope isn't totally disrespectful seeing as that's like 25 cents. He says a lot of stuff, ties a piece of yarn around your wrist, splash a bunch of water all over you and then you bow because...monks. Tra told me that he wished me safe and happy travels in Cambodia that luck to my family. So, if you're in my family and something good happens to you, you are welcome.

After seeing the monks and a huge buddha we went to a nearby river. There was this girl in a hammock that was so cute so I snapped a pic but then she came running up and grabbed Mallory's hand and wouldn't let go. It was the sweetest most random thing but she completely had this strange connection with Mallory that was a highlight of the day.

This was just a random kid but I still love it. All the kids in Cambodia were BEAUTIFUL and everyone was so kind and wanted to wave at us and say hello. Such welcoming people. I just think about how Americans welcome foreigners and it makes me cringe to be associated with that.

Also there was the most beautiful of waterfalls. We didn't get in to swim but we just stuck our feet in and got a little surprise. Have you ever heard about how Asians have fish treatments where they stick their feet in a tank of fish and let them eat the dead skin off? So there were fish in the water that did just that. Free fishy massage at this waterfall.

The Killing Fields

2015-08-07T06:43:00.001-07:00

We went to Cambodia last weekend and I gotta say that it was one of my favorite countries I've ever been to. That was probably the first time where I left a country feeling so sad like I needed to experience so much more of it than I had time to. It was also probably the most impoverished country I've ever seen as well.

We flew to Bangkok Wednesday night and then our flight to Cambodia didn't leave until about 7 AM the next morning so we figured we'd save a few baht and just sleep in the airport. Geniuses.

Of the many many flights I've been on in my life I'll never forget the flight to Bangkok! It's just a quick 45 minutes from our city, but we hit a little bit of turbulence. So much turbulence that I was thinking...okay if we crash all those people who joked about me dying in Thailand are gonna feel pretty bad forever. You know who you are. There was the cutest Thai girl next to me. When the plane would drop for a second or shake really bad we'd both grab the arm rest at the same time effectively holding hands and just look at each other and half laugh/half cry. Finally we were about to land and just as we were about to touch down the pilot pulls back up and heads right back into the sky. I wanted to cry when I realized we were heading up instead of slowing down. He looped around the sky and 30 minutes later we successfully made a terrifying landing. Still alive!

We walked around the airport looking for somewhere to set up camp for the night and couldn't really find any seats that looked semi like couches so....these blue chairs are what we slept on. I used my backpack as a pillow and my sweater as a blanket but I quickly realized that the Bangkok airport is FREEZING if you're just laying there. Plus the lights were as bright as the sun so I finally put my sweatshirt over my face to shield my eyes and wrapped my towel around me for a blanket. Plus flip flops and messy bun on top of my head so....keeping up the American stereotype efforts in Asia. Then some jerk thought he should clean the floor with one of those loud machines (what are those called?) at 3 am so sleep was absolutely out of the question for me.

Finally we made it to Phnom Pehn, Cambodia! There's us in our cute little tuk tuk.

The value of the Cambodian riel against the dollar is incredibly low. They actually use dollars in Cambodia and their currency is just used as change for anything less than a dollar. $4,000 riel = $1!!!

When I first got to Cambodia we bought breakfast and I got a few 100 riel bills back so I was looking at it to see how much it was...100 riel equals 2 cents so I was looking pretty rich but...yeah. Unbelievable. Dollars is the unofficial currency in Cambodia although they do use riel in the countrysides. Even the ATMs will disperse dollars. And also you can't even exchange riel outside of Cambodia because...no one wants it.

The country didn't even have money until the 1950's and then when the Khmer Rouge (I'll talk about them in a sec) took control over the country in the 1970's. They abolished the riel and even bombed the national bank and there wasn't any currency at all. So anyone that did have money soon realized it was worthless. After Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1978 they reintroduced the riel but since there was no currency they just gave money to the people to encourage them to use it. After another period of war the United Nations finally came in during the 1990's and brought dollars into the country so now dollars are used because anyone over 30 has lived in a period of time where their riel suddenly was worthless and dollars seem more reliable.

While in Phnom Pehn we went to the killing fields. I had learned about it before and knew basically what it was, but got a much closer up look here. To make a long story short, Pol Pot was a military leader who lead the murder of 1/3 of the country in just 4 years. Anyone that was a threat to his position was killed. It's really only comparable to Hitler and his evils. Phnom Pehn was completely captured so that's where the most famous "killing fields" are but there was similar mass murders all throughout the country.

"Better to kill an innocent by mistake than to spare an enemy by mistake." - Pol Pot

That was his philosophy. He leveled the playing field of the country by murdering anyone with any education at all. Teachers, doctors, business owners. Anyone with glasses was considered educated. Anyone who spoke a foreign language or held a passport was murdered. Anyone with soft hands was murdered. Anyone who wouldn't do the killing was killed. There wasn't much distinction between who should be killed...if there was any question they just were.

So the killing fields is just an area where they brought people in by the truckfuls to be killed, just like the concentration camps in Europe. You can walk around the killing fields listening to an audio speaker telling you the history of the area and what you're seeing. This pit below was one of the mass graves.

This was a big tree that was very famous in the area just because of the brutality. Any children that were brought it were killed here. Just in general they didn't use guns because bullets were too expensive so they just used their own strength and anything that could be used as a weapon. They would essentially just beat small children to death by swinging them against the tree. When the Vietnamese invaded and this place was found at the end of all this they found blood and brain matter all over and around the tree.

They hung a loudspeaker on this tree that would play a song that was meant to be loud enough to drown out the sounds of screams as they were bringing people into the camps....because they didn't know they were here to be killed. They played the song for us and it was the creepiest thing I've ever heard knowing what it was covering up.

This little wooden house was put up afterwards as a tribute to any lost souls.

They really didn't dig the graves deep at all so bodies were just laying in very shallow graves. Any remember since they didn't just shoot them they beat them so often bones and teeth would just go flying. They said that even to this day they have groundskeepers that go around the area every few months cleaning up bones and things that surface after the rains. They say they feel it's like the souls that remain and just can't get out. So, when you walk around the pathways you will see bones and teeth all over that just haven't been cleaned up yet.

This was just a big sanctuary that they built and packed floor to ceiling with skulls. They also had notes of how the person was killed because they can tell by the damage done to their skull.

Incredibly sad and incredibly emotional. As part of the audio that we listened to there was a section where people who survived told their stories. I can't and don't even want to repeat that part.

I have no idea why I'm so fortunate that I've been able to visit so many parts of the world where incredibly tragic things like this have happened and that I've never been on the receiving end of the war like that. Visiting Auschwitz was such a personal and emotional experience for me but it also felt like such a distant thing too. This happened so recently that I can't even really comprehend that. Walking around Cambodia you look at anyone over 30 years old and you're like okay how come you were so lucky to survive? And who did you know that was killed?

I just had immediate love for Cambodia. It is very impoverished. The most tragic of histories. And the people still smile and wave as us tourists come walking through their lives. Love them.

Phu Hin Rong Kla National Park

2015-07-28T23:23:00.000-07:00

Knocked another National Park off the list! There's a gorgeous one near where we live in Thailand so we got to explore a little bit one Saturday. When we got there we had to pay the entrance fee right. So if you're Thai you only have to pay 100 baht but if you're a foreigner you have to pay 500 baht. That sounds reasonable.

There was actually cool history in the area where you can hike. There was military training there previously so there was little wood buildings for the school and places to take cover in the rocks. Pretty interesting. I thought Grandpa B would have wanted to see it!

It started raining while we were hiking around but that made it even better. The foggy mist up that high in the mountains was gorgeous.

Bangkok

2015-07-28T22:56:00.001-07:00

We spent a weekend in Bangkok since it's just a quick 50 minute flight away from where we live. We basically just wandered around the city and explored so here's snapshots from that. It was just so nice to get a big city feel after being in islands and jungles and things like that so far in Thailand. We went to the King's Palace (where the King used to live and that's what all the fancy buildings are - only the best for the King), saw the biggest Buddha laying down kicking it (called Reclining Buddha), went to a flower market, took rides down river as our metro type transportation and ate yummy food.

Sukhothai

2015-07-28T22:20:00.000-07:00

Sukhothai is a World Heritage Site with ancient ruins and buddhas for days. It's really close to the city I live in so we got to go spend a Saturday there. I can't really tell you a ton of the history about it because I started reading into it and then immediately fell asleep...but it used to be Thailand's capital in the 1200s-1300s and then some fighting happened and now it's a tourist site. Also it's called "The Dawn of Happiness". The buddhas were pretty amazing though. I was impressed.

You can rent bikes for the day for like 50 cents so we got to ride around to different parts of the park. It was a great day. I also accidentally bought a huge bamboo wind chime thing because it was only $3 and I don't know what came over me. Oh well....we all have regrets in our life right?

A Little Video From Thailand

2015-06-22T04:28:00.002-07:00

This summer is only about half over and I'm already sad thinking about leaving. There's no way I could fit all the great things in one video but these are a few of my favorite days.

Chiang Mai: Part 2

2015-06-21T22:51:00.000-07:00

We went back to Chiang Mai for one of our vacations because we definitely didn't get to do everything we wanted to. The city offers endless outdoorsy type adventures and we wanted some more. So glad we went back!

We booked ziplining with Eagle Track for the first day we were there. You know I'm not a fan of heights right so I was praying for like 24 hours that I wouldn't HATE it. We picked the longest route so it had over 30 platforms and I needed to not be crying by the end of it. When we got there and were signing our life away one of the guides saw that my last name was king and he thought that it would be a pretty good pickup line to say, "Oh can I be your queen??" Nice try but it was pretty funny anyways.

Everyone made me go first because I'm so terrified of heights. So my queen was there helping us before the leap and I told him I was pretty scared and he goes, "Don't worry...I'm here." I was thinking okay well if I fall to my death you being "here" doesn't really help. But I went anyways and turns out ziplining through a thai jungle is the funnest thing eeeeeeever!

The guide that wanted to be my queen was named Duo Duo but he wanted us to call him Darling...so there's that. He was pretty great at making me not so scared actually. He kept checking up on me at every platform and making me laugh and he did a few of the jumps with me too. He'd come swinging out of nowhere and scare me and saying, "Here's your queen!" My thai boyfriend for the day. He even gave me a leaf in the shape of a heart at the end. How romantic. This is me and him but my favorite part is Leslie's perfectly creepy photo bomb.

After that we drove up to one of the more famous temples in Chiang Mai up in the mountain, Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep. It was just yet another beautiful temple. There was a Buddhist a few weeks ago and everyone made a walking trek up to the temple, but we opted for a lift.

We knelt before a monk and he said some sort of prayer, splashed us with water, and tied a white braided bracelet on our wrists. Hope it was a good prayer.

For the second day we scheduled to do a day with elephants. We had already done a little elephant thing before by a tour that was recommended to us but we weren't really impressed. They rushed us through it and I wasn't very excited about how they were treating the elephants. It was like a place to pump tourists through. We found another company that was quite a bit more expensive (like 3x as much) but offered a lot more. It turned out to be AMAZING and so worth the money.

The company is Blue Elephant so if you're ever in Thailand...go with them. Seriously. It was worht every penny and a different experience than a cheaper tour. The sweetest driver picked us up from our hostel and took us to this little market and bought us our favorite fruits to have later in the day. Mangosteen, mangoes, and rambutan.

We always drive in the back of these little trucks. I have a love/hate relationship with them. Much better than taxis or buses but I don't love sitting sideways going 80 mph.

First they took us to Tiger Kingdom which is this famous zoo type place that houses tigers here. I'm not convinced that this is at all a great treatment for the tigers so I'll just kinda breeze through this part. I got to be in a cage with little tigers and they were out cold the whole time so not super exciting. They're beautiful though.

Then they drove us to this place where the elephants live. There's a family that lives there too and they were so so sweet to us. It was a private thing so it was just our group and they spoiled us completely.

Before we got to meet the elephants they had us change into really attractive blue outfits and then they taught us commands to use with the elephants. I talked to our guide a little bit about the elephants and he said that every elephant has its own "mahout" which is someone that takes care of the elephant for life. He said that elephants can live to around 80 years old when they're taken care of well. Many times an elephant stays in a family and a mahout might pass down the elephant to his son when he becomes too old. Coolest family trade I've ever heard of.

So we each got our own elephant to ride and its mahout came along. Good thing because as soon as I was on the elephant and he started going I could not remember the word for stop. At. All. They were huge and beautiful and it was the most incredible experience ever. We rode them around through the green jungle, through a stream, and back to the start where we got to feed them bananas.

They handed me a huge basket of bananas and said BOONE and suddenly the elephants trunk was in my face wanting me to feed it. It ate them so fast I could barely keep grabbing another banana before his trunk was up. They wanted me to put a banana in my mouth and then the elephant would grab it out of my mouth.....they took a ton of photos and I feel like that is super awkward so sorry you don't get to see me make out with an elephant.

After that we got to ride them down to this pond and bathe and swim with them. Best water fight I ever had. It was so fun I can't even remember laughing that hard in so long.

You could just really tell that they treat the elephants well here because of the way they interacted with us. The elephants were actually playing with us and you could see their personalities. They didn't rush us through at all and the elephants didn't seem tired of what we were doing either (like they did at the other place). There was a little baby who was rolling around in the water while I was pouring water over him. It was the cutest thing. And then one of the mahouts like motioned for me to come closer and then said something. Before I even knew it the elephants trunk was on my cheek and there was this huge suction. He kissed my cheek! So cute! I was laughing so hard that he had him do it over and over.

Another baby elephant kiss up there. Jealous?

One of my favorite things about Thailand is the respect people show for one another. People will bow to one another and the kids will bow to us as teachers. Love that. Even better is when an elephant bows to you at the end of the day. My heart is stolen.

After that we went to a Thai boxing match and Thailand beat South Africa so YAY!

Also Rotee is my favorite snack on the way home. It's this fried crepe type of thing with Nutella. It's probably not a good thing it was located right outside of our hostel....but how do you say no to that when it's like 50 cents??

On the third day we booked a tour to go up to the northern tip of Thailand. It turned out to be the longest day of my life. The piled a bunch of us into a van so we were in a group with other people and it turned out to be an all day driving thing....like from 7 in the morning to 9 at night. I was the lucky one that got the back left seat and there was no leg room so my legs had to be folded in half like up on the seat with my arms wrapped around my legs you know? Yikes. Good thing I have the shortest legs.

I think the amount of driving time coupled with the most annoying tour guide ever was what did it. First off they told us we were going to this place called the Golden Triangle where you can see Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand all from one spot. That sounded pretty cool. But then she said, "We need your passport." First off we didn't even have our passports and second off we can't leave the country because it will void our visa. There were other people in our group who also didn't have theirs. There was actually only two people out of our entire group who brought their passport, but for the 6 hour drive up there she kept saying over and over, "Okay so I need your passport because we're going to Laos." "I need your passport." "I need your passport." I was thinking....I'm still sitting in this van that I've been in all day. When did you expect me to get my passport???? Our exhausted glares probably got to her because then she said, "Ok I get my boyfriend to let you in for 300 baht." Okay so for $10 you're going to sneak me in and out of Laos?

Yep.

They took us on this quick little boat ride where one side of the river was Thailand and the other was Laos and then took us to this little market so that we would spend our money in Laos. Worth the 6 hour drive up there? Uhhhh....no. But I did get a couple new knock off North Face backpacks. You know I'm a sucker for that. You could also buy things like alcohol bottles filled with all kinds of snakes and scorpions and things like that that has been stewing for awhile. I stuck with the backpacks though.

The left side is Laos and the right side is Thailand.

We also drove to the White Temple. This place looks incredible but again this was not my favorite experience. It was overrun with Chinese tourists pushing like they do and a guy on a loud speaker shouting at you if you stopped to take a photo.

The temple itself is super interesting though. At the beginning it's supposed to represent hell and there are arms coming out of the ground. I wanted to take lots of pictures of hell but you're not supposed to stop there because of their beliefs so the guy with the louder speaker was yelling at me to keep going. I was thinking...yep you definitely belong in my version of hell.

Then you walk through into heaven. Turns out heaven is a room (where truly unfortunately you can't take photos) with walls completed painted in modern things like Hello Kitty, Elvis, Minnions, and much much more. Insane. I hope I don't die while I'm in Thailand because I really don't want to go to their heaven...or their hell.

There was a couple other spots along the way of our tour but basically every stop was some sort of market trying to get us to spend our money. One of the spots was a "hot springs" and it literally was a parking lot with a teeny tiny gieser with a gate around it........after living close to Yellowstone it was an absolute joke. But of course there was a market and I bought a little bracelet from this cutie.

Our tour was so bad that the entire group asked her to head back home early. We decided it wasn't worth another couple hours of driving to go to the Myanmar border and look at it. So, luckily we got to save ourselves from 2 hours of driving. Worst tour ever. The tour company's name is Journey if you ever want to avoid it.

But best trip ever. Still got lots of love for you Chiang Mai.

A Temple In The Mountains

2015-06-21T01:16:00.001-07:00

We went to Wat Pha Sorn Kaew which is a temple in the mountains a couple hours outside of Phitsanulok. I fell in love immediately. It is so gorgeous and peaceful. There are places set up all over the place around the grounds for people to sit and mediate. Inside it is completely covered floor to wall to ceiling in shards of colorful tile and glass.

Most people there were surprised to see us because they probably don't see many tourists. Not only do we live in a not heavily tourist traveled city, but the temple is out of the way. The only way we knew about it is because our amazing coordinators took us there. There were lots of monks there walking around saying prayers with people following them. One monk saw us and kinda hung back waiting and as soon as we started talking to him he was all over that. I was really surprised how easy it is to talk to a monk. I guess I had this image in my head that you shouldn't even make eye contact with them, but they really want to talk and practice their English. This guy we found out has been a monk for about 6 or 7 years, from the time he was 23. After asking who we were and why we were there in broken English, he tried teaching us about mediation. It went something like, "Close your eyes for one minute. Think about sun and moon and happiness. Travel around Thailand and be happy."

Chiang Mai, Thailand: Part 1

2015-06-08T08:29:00.002-07:00

We went to Chiang Mai which is a few hours to the north of our city Phitsanulok for an unexpected holiday. Our coordinator Van came to us on Thursday and said that there was a Buddhist holiday on Monday which means no school so she said that we should go somewhere for the weekend. So we hurried and got the last bus tickets on Friday to Chiang Mai which meant leaving at 11 PM and arriving at 4 AM. So worst bus ride of my life.

We got to our hostel around 4:30 AM and although I confirmed that there would be someone there to let us check in...there was not. So we plopped down in the lobby (shown above) and slept there for a few hours until reception opened up. I actually slept way better on those pillows than the bus so I wasn't complaining one bit.

We had booked a two day tour with a company that included some fun things and a night in the mountains. Sounded perfect. They picked us up and our group included a guy from the UK and a couple girls from France. They were are really fun and enjoyed getting to know them. They probably thought we were crazy, loud American girls...but hopefully we weren't too terrible. They drove us about an hour and a half outside Chiang Mai into the mountains and stopped in the middle of the road. They pointed towards the direction of a house type of thing and said "lunch." Because of the Buddhist holiday, pretty much everyone in the country was on holiday and when we walked in for our lunch there was a group of Thai people eating. It looked liked we were intruding on their family reunion or something but they didn't seem to mind. Hospitable as always those Thai people are. And lunch was yummy pad thai right next to a field with roaming cows. Perfect.

After lunch they took us down the road to a place where they do "elephant encounters". We got to take them down to the most disgusting of all ponds and bathe them. I'm not sure what kind of tree it is but they chop up and pound down bark and then you can use it to scrub the elephants and when it's wet this soapiness comes out of it. Also the elephants like to eat the bark so they kept trying to steal it from our hands to eat. Crazy! They're the sweetest too.

After the elephants we were doing a little hike to where we were sleeping that night. We were under the impression it was going to be like a 3 hour nature walk and it turned out to be about 7km straight up a jungle mountain. Straight up! It was the hottest and the greenest and we were blazing a trail in some parts. Luckily our tour guide was the Bear Grylls of Thailand.

His name was Bee and he was THE coolest. He's a little monkey going up the trail leading the way and then running back to the back of the group to make sure the slowest ones were making it through the jungle okay. He brought a piece of cardboard and was fanning us at every stop. It was a few seconds of cool air and I loved it every time. I was dripping in sweat because it was so hot and humid, to the point where I stopped wiping my sweat away and just let it rain.

He also whipped out his machete and cut us all bamboo walking sticks. Those things came in handy and made the trek a lot easier. I fell a couple times on slippery spots and my stick kept me from eating it hard. At the end of the trip he cut as all off a piece of the bamboo. I love mine. He carved "Jan" into mine because apparently in Thailand my name is Jan instead of Jen. I told a lady my name when she asked what it was and she goes, "Oh yeah! Jan like January." And I said, "Sure, yeah." But that's another story.

The hike was so so hard. I kept thinking okay maybe this will level out at some point but nope it just kept going up. Up, up, up. I kept hoping Bee would want to show us some other nature-y thing so that I could stop and breathe on this sauna hike. I keep underestimating the hikes here.

Bee also made us hats from the leaves. Ok so he's better than Bear. Am I right?

And he showed us a peanut plant growing along the road and pulled off a couple for us to try.

View from the top, we finally made it! I was walking towards the back of the pack during the last uphill and Bee stayed back to walk with me. What a guy. He had been doing that all day, walking with everyone in the group, holding our hands over the hard parts and making sure everyone was doing okay. He said, "I will carry you." And I laughed because I thought he was joking and he said, "The group yesterday had a hard time and there was a girl that couldn't make it so I carried her and 3 backpacks." I was like what!!!????? So I said, "No, Bee. I'm gonna make it to the top." So he smiled and started singing Let Her Go by Passenger and we did a little duet. Bee said, "I love that song. I don't like it. I love it." When we got to the top he pointed to where we were staying and he said, "You did it and I didn't carry you." That felt pretty good :)

This was the little place we slept for the night. Would you call that a hut? There were dogs and chickens and pigs all over the place. There was a guy building another little hut next to where we were sitting so we watched him cutting up bamboo to build the hut. They're pretty crafty and quick because that hut was practically built within the little time we were there.

Bee and a guy that lives up on the mountain making our dinner. Stir fry vegetables and rice. Delicious as always. Best camping I've ever done. We just hung out for the night, ate food, relaxed, sat by a fire, played some uno, and went to bed early so that we would be well rested for the hike tomorrow.

So I slept really good until 7 AM when I woke up the most horrendous sound I had ever heard in my life. I laid there trying to figure out what it was and finally realized it was the pigs next to us. I was sure they were getting slaughtered so I got up just to check. Nope, they were just running around playing. There were also roosters and chickens running underneath the floor (because the huts are up on stilts) squawking away. Remind me to never live on a farm (or in a Thai mountain village).

The next morning we of course had to hike back down. After a few minutes of walking along Bee suddenly stopped and lifted up a big rock and started poking down a hole. Of course we were all like hmm what's happening? And then he said, "Tarantula. I saw his web. He's in there.”

So Bee takes a stick and after poking around for awhile pulls out a tarantula!! They are as huge and scary as I dreamed they would be. I thought he'd just run back down the hole but he just sat there crawling slowly letting us check him out. We asked Bee if he was nervous and he said, "Yeah, he's not my friend." So that made me take a few extra steps back. After we all got a good look Bee just pushed him back down the hole and put the rock back over and we took off.

We stopped by this little village in the mountains where a lady was selling things. There's lots of different tribes in the mountains that speak their own dialect and speak about as much Thai as I do. Many of the older people have never left their village in the mountain even while younger people might go to school or sell things down in the city, but otherwise they're self sustaining up there.

Bee just climbing a huge tree of course. The next stop was this fun little waterfall where we hung out and swam and jumped until it started raining.

We stopped by a little waterfall and it felt so good to cool off and hang out.

When it rains it pours in Thailand. But don't worry, Bee macheted us some huge leaves to us as umbrellas. He cut a little hole in his and used it as a poncho.

After we finally got to the bottom of the mountain we went on a little bamboo raft ride down a river. I got to stand at the front and push the raft along with a bamboo stick. After about a minute of doing that the bamboo raft guide says to me, "Be careful." Pointing at the water, "Alligator." I was like, "Ok, ummm….."

If you find yourself hiking in Chiang Mai, don't do it without Bee. We found him through Panda Tours but that's his number there too.

That night that we got home we went shopping in a market because Chiang Mai has the best markets in all the land. This little girl was popping her head up from under a table and was cracking me up. Also I got big wooden elephant that I'm in love with. If you have requests...better let me know because I'm going back in a few days!

The next day we only had a few hours before we had to leave to go back to our city so we decided to walk around and go to temples in the city.

We didn't get very far before it started sprinkling. This guy in a taxi/tuk tuk kind of car started slowly following us and we waived at him that no we didn't need a ride. We thought we'd just sit under some shelter until it stopped raining. But he knew better. He sat there and flashed his lights at us and waited. We were like what is he doing? Then it started POURING. Pouring buckets like it does here and we couldn't resist the taxi man any longer. Smart guy. He took us to a nearby temple where we'd be able to go inside and get out of the rain.

We got there as monks were reading their rules. 227 of them. It was long but really cool to see. After awhile we walked around the temple which also had ruins. Beautiful as always.

This monk is named Tan Pra Maha Kajjana. He is an enlightened monk but not the Lord Buddha. Long story short....he is so incredibly good looking that other monks would mistake him for the Lord Buddha which was a problem. One guy even thought he was so good looking that he said if he was a woman, he would take him for his wife. That's no good though because monks can't lust so for his punishment he was turned into a woman. Wanting to avoid any other problems for monks, Tan Pra Maha Kajjana decided to exchange his good looks for a fat, ugly body which you see pictured above. So selfless.

Koh Phi Phi, Thailand

2015-06-03T02:50:00.001-07:00

The 3rd island we went to on vacation was Koh Phi Phi. This island was incredibly beautiful, but more of a party island. We got a place to stay right on the beach which sounded dreamy but was actually the worst. Our bedroom was right next to a nightly party with techno music making the walls shake and fire dancers every night. So.....I would not recommend staying at Stones Bar Hostel unless you're going to be up all night. The view was beautiful though.

We took a tour to get to see some areas around the island. The engines on the boats are huge and exposed and reminded me of something you'd see in an old war movie, but there they were just getting us around the islands.

First we were going to monkey beach where there's a little strip of beach and monkeys run around all over. The tide was up so we missed that stop. We headed to Maya Beach which is a pretty famous place because the movie The Beach was filmed there, so lots of tourists but it was still worth going anyways because it's so stunning.

This little hole in the rock below has people actually living inside it. I can't remember, but I think they said about 15 people. They make their money from growing marijuana and also from selling a birds nest (I can't remember which type of bird) to the Chinese which they use in Viagra. And apparently it's really good money so they protect the little cove with machine guns. It's crazy this little money making cove is right next to one of the most traveled islands in Thailand. They used to allow tourists to walk through but they started littering so the group of people in there don't allow it anymore. We could only drive by in the boat but you could see big marijuana plants as we drove by.

We stopped and jumped out and swam at Maya Bay. It was this huge cove surrounded by the rocks and just blue green water. The water is like bath water, so warm.

Then we rode over the Maya Beach to spend a little bit of time which is just on the other sides of the rocks. It's another cove that's 75% surround by rocks, but this one has a beautiful beach you can relax on.

The trees had the craziest roots. All of them were so unique so I had to snap a couple pictures.

The sun was starting to go down just before we left. So beautiful. Our next stop was to go cliff jumping. Okay so if you know me you know jumping off of high things isn't so much my favorite thing to do. Even standing on high things makes me kinda angry. But I really wanted to do it because I wanted to show Jordan and Chelsey that I'm not a wimp every single time.

So we get to the cliff and then I realized I had to climb up it. That was already making me so nervous. But I climbed to the top...I did. They had given us these shoes because the cliff was completely made of razor sharp rocks and yeah my shoes were too big and fell off. So, I was completely cut up and bleeding all over my feet. When you walk up to the edge all you see is the huge ocean and then you look down and wow....it looks a lot farther up than you think. Everyone was jumping from about 50 feet and I looked over the edge and immediately said, "nope, nope, nope nope" and just walked away. Who cares what Jordan and Chelsey think. I'm jumping from the lowest spot I can. So I crawled down to the lower spot and even jumping from there I was shaking so bad I thought I was going to just fall off the edge. But I HAD to jump. So I forced myself. And I screamed like a little girl for 2 seconds until I hit the water. But afterwards our tour guide told us that she hasn't even jumped from higher than where I did so......I made the right choice right.

After the sun went down we also jumped in the water where you can see phytoplankton. It's pretty cool...you just swim around and create movement in the water and these glow in the dark organisms show up in the water. Like magic.

We also did a little hike up to the Phi Phi viewpoint. You can see the whole island is this strip of land of shops and hotels and then the beautiful rocks surround it.

When the tsunami hit 11 years ago this island was one that got hit hard. They showed a photo of the destruction afterwards and the entire strip was washed out. That must have been pretty horrifying for those who were up near the viewpoint to see what was happening below when the wave came through.

Koh Lanta, Thailand

2015-05-21T07:24:00.000-07:00

Koh Lanta island was amazing. Definitely my favorite spot we went to in the islands. It's not touristy like all the other well known areas, but almost everyone still spoke English so it was very easy to get around. All the islands are incredibly gorgeous, but Koh Lanta was gorgeous and laid back so perfect for me.

We stayed at the best hostel - Lanta New Beach Bungalow. We stayed right on the beach for about $8 a night. The sun was starting to set when we arrived so we just played around and watched it. I promise that photo isn't edited one bit.

The view of our hostel in the daylight.

The first day we were there we rented scooters and rode around the island. They drive on the left here so that was a little scary to get used to but we all made it out alive. It was actually my favorite day of the trip in the islands. That's a gas station below. They basically have a sign with handwritten "gasoline" for 40 baht (a little over a dollar) and then glass bottles sitting out full of gas and you buy per bottle and they dump it in your bike.

I pretty much just took the lead because I felt pretty comfy with the craziness of the way they drive. It was the same as how they drive in China....except even a little safer. I saw a sign on the side of the road that said handmade jewelry so we decided to check it out. We just went down the road and it was the forest area with a couple houses and families hanging outside. We found the house that was selling jewelry and we stepped in to see a beautiful thai women with long dark hair and a foreigner sitting there with her. While we looked through her jewelry talked to the foreigner and found out more about her. Her name was Cookie...from Germany and she was just taking lessons that day from the lady on how to polish the stones for the jewelry. Her boyfriend was there too and his name was Klaus from Austria. They were just traveling around. It was the coolest moment to sit in this little hut and talk to them and the Thai women. Just one of those unexpected moments that only a traveler could understand.

We stopped for water at this little stand and this lady and her sweet daughter talked to us for a minute.

One of the best things about Thailand are the fresh fruit smoothies! There was quite a few Muslims living in Koh Lanta and they would do the prayers during the day over a loud speaker over the city. That was pretty cool to see.

We ate at a restaurant that turned out to be food from Myanmar they said. They weren't open yet but they hurried and opened for us and even had our food out within minutes. I ordered my meal first and it was on the table before the last person ordered. They also gave us free appetizers and fruit for after the meal. The dinner was so yummy! Super good and super spicy even though I ordered the least of the spicy levels. I'm a super wimp. On Maddie's plate she got these weird puffy chip things...not sure what they were. They did not taste good though! She put them to the side of her plate and the cook asked if she didn't like them. To not be rude she said, "Oh no they're good. I'll eat them later." And the woman goes, "Ok. I give you more. Why not?" And then she brings over a huge bowl of them for us to share. Awesome. And I can't stop saying how nice the Thai are. Seriously...the nicest.

That night rode our scooters to a nearby beach to watch the sunset again. After it set, we decided to go night swimming (and when I say night swimming I really mean skinny dipping). We stripped down and all ran in the water. About 30 seconds after we all got in Leslie suddenly shot straight out the water and started yelling and running back to the beach. I felt this sting on my leg kinda like a few bee stings and then Mallory started running to the beach too so I knew something was up. We threw on our clothes and ran to where there was a shop that had a light and looked at our skin. Leslie had big red bumps all over her torso and was itching and painful at the same time. As fast as we could (earlier that day Nicole had had a little scooter accident and hurt her ankle so she was limping through the sand to keep up with us) we got back to our scooters. We were going so fast trying to get Leslie help that I didn't even put my bra back on. I just hung it on the handle of my scooter so I was driving around with my bra just flying on the handle bar. We were a hot mess. We went to the nearest 7/11 hoping they could help us. We all ran inside and asked the clerks if they could speak English...but they couldn't. They probably thought we were crazy, American girls, soaking wet, and scanning the isles for...something. We didn't even know what we were looking for. A woman walked in about a minute after us and we asked if she spoke English. She did! Kind of. We did some charades trying to explain what happened, showing her Leslie's body and when she understood the look on her face was like "ooooooooooh no!" So that was a little terrifying. She said it was a jellyfish that stung her so she grabbed something from the medicine isle, opened it, and started rubbing it all over her body. It smelled like Vicks vapor rub or something like that. The jellyfish had wrapped all over her torso so the woman was like rubbing up her shirt, in her belly button...all over right in the middle of 7/11 in front of the cashier area. We were like half laughing, half scared to death. She told Leslie to go to bed and if it was bad tomorrow to go to the doctor. It worked! By the morning you could barely see any marks on her. #donttellcasey

Another restaurant we ate at was a little less on the clean side. We always walked by this stand this old man would wave at us to come in so one morning we decided to just go ahead and eat there.

So...this was him taking our order and then serving the food. I ordered french toast because that sounded like the safest bet. Luckily no one got sick.

The next day we did a trip where they take you to 4 islands for the day - for about $20. So glad we did that because it was awesome. Our boat driver was the radest. He didn't speak any English so we had no idea where they were taking us.

It was so fun though. They took us around to a couple cool islands and we snorkeled a little. Then on the third island they handed us all life jackets and took our snorkels away and told us to jump in and pointed towards the island. We were like uhhhhh say what? They didn't speak any English so we couldn't ask what we were doing and the water was dark and deep so we were a little uneasy. Trying to swim in a life jacket and ocean waves is not the easiest thing in the world but we made it. There was huge tour boats with ropes that led into a dark cave and just a line of asians holding onto the ropes chanting something. I can't even describe how crazy it was. All we knew was a tour group had put everyone in their tour on a rope that led into the cave and our tour guide just through us in the ocean to fend for ourselves. We jumped onto the chain of asians and swam our wave through the pitch black cave.

Eventually we could see a light at the end of the tunnel and it emerged out onto this secluded beach. SO AMAZING! We had no idea where we were going but it did not disappoint when we got there.

After that they took us to Koh Ngai and had lunch which was the most gorgeous if you forced me to pick a favorite beach.

Thanks for being the best Koh Lanta. Super impressed.

Krabi, Thailand

2015-05-17T08:55:00.002-07:00

We flew down to Krabi for the first part of our Thailand islands adventure. Krabi is insane. You feel like you just stepped into the page for the month of May on one of those cheesy free calendars. Turns out those places really do exist. First on the to do list after traveling almost 30 hours was mango sticky rice and a thai massage (for a few dollars). Both were the best choices.

This cutey below kept us entertained while we waited for our massage. Her mom worked at the store and she just kind of threw her at us when we walked in so......massage in exchange for babysitting? We didn't mind though. When a handful of us walked in I think we were more than they normally get because she immediately made some phone calls and told us to wait. After a bit some girls walked in to give us massages. Maybe she just called some friends to help out? It was good anyways.

We went to Railay beach which is the place that calendars are made of that I mentioned before. Seriously you can't make these pictures up. Its a really tiny place so we just laid on the beach, swam in the really warm ocean, drank yummy smoothies and then walked around.

So you can't go far without meeting a monkey in Thailand islands.

The next day we decided to do the Tiger Cave Temple hike which was supposed to have a cool buddha and an incredible view of Krabi. I had researched it and heard it was pretty hot and sweaty but I hike a ton so I kinda figured it would be a breeze...

Yeah so the stairs looked like that. 1260 super steep stairs straight up the mountain! We were dying. Think about doing the stair stepper in a sauna and that's basically the hike. We were dripping in sweat. It was like okay let's walk 50 stairs and then stop and take another break. And that was pushing it. Leslie even threw up twice when we had about 100 steps to go. But once we made it to the top...wowza. It was worth it.

Again monkeys were running the place.

There...proof of the 1260 steps!

In Krabi we found a restaurant that we fell totally in love with. They had both Thai food and American and were open all day long so of course we ate there every single meal while in Krabi. Don't regret that decision even a bit.

We went there early for breakfast just after they opened and the cook pretty much rolled out of bed and whipped up our breakfast in her pjs. Cutest.

The owner's name was Kitty and she spoke some English so after we kept showing up meal after meal she started talking to us. She was the best part about going there. The restaurant was just across the street from our hostel so we'd be walking by and if she saw us she'd ask if we were coming in later for food. Of course we were. You know we will Kitty.

On our last meal we told her we were leaving and she came out with a gift for all of us. They were the sweetest little money bags. The look on her face when she gave them to us was priceless...she was so happy. So glad I snapped this shot because it was the best moment. I think she liked us as much as we liked them.

Krabi you were beautiful....but our next stop Koh Lanta was my favorite. I'll give you photo overload of that island tomorrow!

Canyon Drive

2014-09-17T19:47:00.000-07:00

I took a drive through the canyon last weekend and it was exactly needed. Windows down, cool air, music blaring. The colors are already turning showing off my most favorite time of year. There's something about the outdoors that gets my head on straight. And a good song too. That does the trick.

Priest Lake

2014-06-28T14:21:00.001-07:00

The traditional family reunion at Priest Lake, Idaho was a success. Lots of sun, sailing, cutie babies, kayaks, food, and way too short as usual. Still is my favorite place in the world. Somehow I didn't get a picture of you Mom...how did that happen?

Anna

2014-05-18T12:22:00.000-07:00

Introducing my newest little niece. She gave us a bit of a scare from the start so having a photo like this of her is something to really be grateful for. To state the obvious, life is precious.

And I want one of my own. Someday. Not today. But I understand why parents blow up their feed with pictures of baby. Cause how could you not?

Back again.

2014-03-02T16:23:00.000-08:00

I've been gone SO SO long. I got frustrated with the blogging thing and lost my creativity. Its funny how I stopped feeling creative, but never stopped wanting to be creative. I just feel...stuck. I haven't been making time to do creative things. Winter blues I suppose...that happens though right? We lose ourselves. But here I am, desiring to be better, to do better, to be creative. I went to the bookstore to splurge and buy the book Creative Block (which I love btw!) and the guy working asked me if I was an artist. A million thoughts ran through my head like, "Well I want to be an artist" or "I just like artsy things" but instead I replied, "Yes, I am." Wow! That may seem a little silly but it was so nerve racking to say out loud that I'm an artist. It felt good though. And no matter how much I have fought against it, I'm just not happy not being an artist. Its just who I am.

I've gone back and forth a million ways about what to blog about. That's what I do though...I get these ideas and want to switch completely what I'm doing and start over. I've been thinking lately about just documenting things that inspire me. I don't really want to think about how many followers I can get, how to get pinned on Pinterest, or how to create an online presence. All good things, but I need this to be something that I enjoy. And I need to nurture my small inner artist which I've neglected so much.

First up is music. I've posted videos before and I want to keep this up. Music is forever going to be so inspiring for me. A good song can turn my mood around 100%. Music is the quickest way to awake my soul when I'd rather be laying in bed watching the Office for the millionth time. This song by Brooke Waggoner has been on repeat for the last 15 minutes. Love.

fav vids

2012-12-11T02:26:00.002-08:00

Since I still can't upload any photos, you're getting videos. Maybe that's a little better anyways? Here's a little semester in review of a few of my favs.

In this video there was a new student that came to class. He didn't speak any English because he was new but he was the cutest little boy with a constant smile on his face. He left early with his mom and the kids were really concerned for him because if you're not speaking English in class, then you're not getting a token when you speak, and then if you don't have tokens to use at "store"...then you're not going to get a prize at the end of class. If you don't have lots of tokens then you can't save for a big really cool prize. So the kids didn't know this new boy's name, just that he smiled a lot and had no tokens. Thus.....concern for happy boy came to be:

If you ever wondered how to play red light green light, well Ignas is here to explain it to you:

Stevie taught the kids about states like Mississippi and Indianapolis......what?

And again....Ignas explaining how to play another game. Not quite sure which game he's trying to get everyone to play though:

In other news, yesterday my meals prepared for me were noodle soup, fried hash brown potatoes and squishy potatoes for lunch and potato pancakes with pretzle things for dinner. I'm basically going to binge on vegetables and salads when I get home.

happy december

2012-12-02T11:15:00.000-08:00

I'm a bit frustrated over here because blogger is telling me that I can't add photos because I ran out of space....
Instead of figuring that one out I might just post videos. I kinda wish that problem would just fix itself. Or that someone will fix it for me. Here's hoping.
Christmas feels a little different for me this year. I haven't been home for months and our little apartment has zero christmas decorations. We've been teaching the kids christmas songs at school (hearing them randomly start solo singing what they think the words are to the right tune makes my heart light up). Being away from home has forced my focus to be on the right sort of things this year though. I could care less what i get for christmas (santa can still come though, i wouldn't turn that down). Maybe i'm finally a grown up? Maybe its because I've been sick this past month and have been in bed quite a bit which made for a lot too much "me time". But the things that are getting me excited this season are my relationships with others. The best part of my week was little Danielle coming in before school started and sitting on my lap and rubbing her little fingers over my fingernails. Or Stevie laying her head on my lap and giving her a massage. Or today, the cutest old lady at the bus stop looked me in the eyes and smiled at me. Smiled at me! NO one here in Lithuania does that. Eye contact and smiles are just a foreign concept. That little 3 seconds of a moment just made me so happy. Touch and being close to others is all I want for christmas this year. I want to be around my family. I want to hear Isla's little voice saying hi, aunt jenni (hopefully that phase isn't done yet). I want a hug from my mom. I want to talk to my sister.
I want my relationships to be better whether it be with strangers, acquaintances or my loved ones. I want to make someone's day a little brighter.
Be kinder. Be gentle. Be selfless.

Have yourself a merry christmas season everyone - december has arrived!

at the school

2012-11-23T15:24:00.001-08:00

I've been sick this week so I've stayed home from school and kinda started missing the kids. Maybe I'm crazy but they're the best. I miss their hugs and the funny things they say. I was looking at some of my videos and picked out a couple of my favs for you.

They love them some "Call me maybe".

Z was pouting in the corner because he thought he didn't have friends......but boy was he wrong.

and then we lost control...

2012-11-15T11:18:00.000-08:00

Most days at school I wonder why the kids haven't figured out yet how easy it would be to just full out mutiny. Band together and take us down. I mean....3 teachers vs almost 16 students. They could have us. Easy. They could just storm that prizes box and take what they want. But somehow, we're still in control. Except there's this one class of kids.....I think they ALMOST have it figured out that they've got some wiggle room in how much we can take from them. Some days, we just don't have the power. That's pretty much how this day went and instead of getting frustrated, me and Stevie just laughed, stood back, let it happen, and took some pics to document the craziness that is this group of kids. And somehow I still love em.

getting mail

2012-11-14T13:09:00.000-08:00

I got a package in the mail from the best mother in world, fully loaded with chocolate, brownies and macaroni and cheese. Yay! It was given to me while I was at school and I couldn't resist opening it so....I had share some of my loot since I opened it in front of everyone. Anytime we give the students candy they are stoked. But...their eyes got pretty big when I said candy from AMERICA. It's big stuff you know? It was a happy day. Thanks mom!!

seeing sweden

2012-11-11T10:04:00.002-08:00

We went to explore Stockholm, Sweden last weekend and can I just say....such a cool city! Land of the vikings. It is basically a city of a bunch of islands with roads connecting them so we were close to the water most of the time. I just loved it. It was modern, and so many design oriented shops, and everyone spoke English. Its the first city that I've been to outside of the states where I thought, yep, I would definitely live here as opposed to just a cool city to vist.

It was quite the trip to get there though. From my apartment to the hotel in Stockholm, its not that far but it took all day because the cheapest way meant taking every type of transportation available. We took a trolly, then a bus, then a plane, another bus, metro, bus and then walked a little because we were lost :) (even though the bus dropped us right in front of the hotel, awesome)

We walked around their Old Town the first day. And for lunch we had the most amazing food ever! I say the most amazing food ever because I have potatoes at every meal in Lithuania and so it may have seemed like a piece of heaven to have something different....but even still! Holy holy crap. We went at lunch to cutest candle lit place and you get to have SALAD and BREAD. And then for the meal I chose this seafood dish that was salmon, shrimp and mussels in this creamy tomato-y soup. WOW. That lunch alone just might be why I heart Sweden.

Home land of Ikea so of course we had to.

The second day we spent most of the day heading out to see the temple. I wouldn't recommend visiting Scandinavia in November because the sun started setting around 3:30. We didn't have much daylight so we couldn't get as much in. But still, such a cool city. And we had some beautiful sunsets. I'd definitely recommend coming in the summer when everyone is kayaking around the city.....swimming.....and there's a fun theme park on an island that has rides coming right out over the water.

This is how we rearrange the hotel room when all three of us need outlets. We are a technology generation fo sho.

From the airplane looking out over the Baltic Sea. Love this place. It was the most expensive place that I've been to yet in Europe (eastern), but love it still.

simple goals

2012-11-07T09:13:00.000-08:00

Although there is still 2 months before I need to start making my new years resolutions, I'm suddenly in the mood for something new to focus on right now. Maybe its because I have too much time on my hands. Maybe its the cold, wet rainy weather that's giving me cabin fever. Instead of waiting until January 1, I thought I'd start now. Actually, I'd like to make it a habit of making new, simpler goals that I can actually finish before I move onto other goals. Two months to hurry up and grow a little in 2012.

Emotional
While we're teaching here in Lithuania with ILP, I only work half the day, starting at 3 pm. Mornings are all mine. Well time to sleep in, my natural love of staying in bed cuddled up, added with the fact that all my roommates sleep in, plus the cold weather outside is the perfect storm for the habit lately of staying in bed until noon. Staying in bed feels amazing, but its doing a number on my mental state. I'm tired. I'm unmotivated. I'm sluggish. So my goal for the next 6 weeks of my time here is to get out of bed at least 3 times a week and go for a walk in the morning. Explore a little bit. Does the fact that I have to make a goal to get out of bed make me sound incredibly lazy? Eh. My next goal will be to stop caring what people think.

Spiritual
Mom gave me this 25 days of Christmas reading list a few years ago and I'm embarrassed to say that it's been sitting in my inbox, unused, all this time. I'd love to read it this year though. And since I know myself soooo well....daily goals only last about a week. So I'm going to start my 25 days now and that seems pretty doable to get that done before Christmas eve.

25 Days of Christmas Scriptures

1. JST Luke 3:4-11; John 1:1-14; 20:31 “That Ye Might Believe in Christ”

2. Luke 1:5-25 Gabriel and Zacharias

3. Luke 1:57-80 John the Baptist

4. Luke 1:26-56 “My soul Doth Magnify the Lord”

5. Matt 1:18-25 Jesus’ Birth

6. Luke 2:1-17 “Unto you is born a Saviour”

7. 3 Nephi 1:4-21 Signs of Christ’s birth appear in the Americas

8. Matt 2:1-15 Wise men

9. 1 Ne 11:1-23 “Behold the Lamb of God”

10. Luke 2:18-38 Simeon and Anna

11. Luke 2:39-52 “About my Father’s business”

12. Matt 3:1-17 John and Jesus

13. Alma 7:10-16; Hebrews 2:18; 4:15 He will loose the bands of death

14. John 8:12-36 I am the light of the world

15. Mark 10:17-30 What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?

16. John 17:1-26 The Great Intercessory Prayer

17. Matt 28:1-20 “He is not here for he has risen”

18. John 3:16; Romans 8:38-39 Love of God

19. Matt 9:27-31; Mark 7:31-37; 8:2-26 Healing the Blind

20. JSH:1-18; Matt 3:17; Moses 4:2 “This is my Beloved Son”

21. 2 Nephi 31:5-20 “Press forward with a steadfastness in Christ”

22. Helaman 5:6-12 “Remember, Remember…”

23. 3 Ne 17:5-12, 20-25 “Behold your little ones”

24. Moroni 4 & 5 Sacrament Prayers

25. Moroni 7:27-48 “Come Unto Christ”

Physical
I've been on Pinterest quite a bit lately (again with the plenty of free time). Knowing that my typical new years resolution is to eat healthier, I'm thinking I'll get a jump start on that one. I'd like to compile two weeks worth of yummy, healthy meals that I've pinned. I want to come up with a cookbook of my fav meals eventually, but I'd say two weeks of meal plans is a good start. Especially after being on an eastern european diet of potatoes, potatoes and more potatoes...my body is craving some healthy detox.

And.......that's what I'll be doing until New Years.