Days Like These

There are good days, there are bad days, and then there are days like these, that make up for ALL of the bad days. Today was simply wonderful. Sure, I was late to school, had plans cancelled on me and had math class, but I also met people, remembered names, learned new words, laughed, sang, danced, bicycled, took pictures, drank tea and went to a party. It doesn't get much better.

I'm sorry Dad. I thought I was getting better at being punctual. I realize that what made me late to school every day in corvallis was a fundamental fact about teenagers. We like to sleep. Even though I'm in a foreign country, that fact about me does not change. Tomorrow, I will try to get up earlier because I have an appointment! There are two boys in class 5/2 and 5/3 that live in my "village." I am in 5/1, which is the english program, so because neither of these boys are in the english program, they know about as much english as I know german, i.e., nothing. Which is good, because I'll learn thai. I was riding my bicycle home yesterday when I recognized one of them and then the other showed up about five minutes later. Both have been asking me if I have a boy friend almost every time I see them. I tell them I can't. THANK YOU ROTARY!!! I like these boys... as friends only. Thai relationships between teens are very platonic, even when dating. If a boy and girl are dating there is no touching, no hugging, no kissing, the only difference between friend and boyfriend is a long late night phone call every night. That and sometimes eating lunch together at school. Having a boy friend here (considering that a long late night conversation is impossible at this point in my year) seems rather pointless and I'm glad to have an excuse.

I should be going to bed earlier, but tonight I had a rotary meeting. Emma and I thought that is would be a normal meeting that consists of sitting at a long conference table and eating fruit. It wasn't. Instead it was a party in the banquet hall of the hotel with karaoke dancing and a full buffet dinner. There were also three young men only too ready to fill my class of water or hand me a new one. Once, when I was trying to prolong their actions (I tried to drink my water as slowly as possible because having them reach over my shoulder every five minutes was slightly embarrassing) they came and replaced it even though I still had half a glass. One in particular kept ogling me (he does this every week) and although he was trying to be discreet (looking through mirrors and around other people etc) it was still rather obvious.
When a person sings Karaoke it is perfectly normal to receive roses, even if your voice is absolutely terrible. Thai people like to make each other happy. I get a lot of compliments. There is one woman in the rotary club that always leads a thai line dance. We do the same line dance with a slight variation in steps again and again and again. When we have a regular rotary meeting, this same woman shows up with false hair around her head in a twisty braidy headband/headdress thing. I'm not quite sure what it is, but it puzzles me, because this woman is not bald...

So emma and I dance with her and with every other woman. They have couple dancing, but consists of standing opposite your partner and waving your hands around in thai dance fashion and well, I'm anything but good at the hand motions. You'd think that since I play violin it'd be easy, but no. Imagine drawing a circle with one hand and drawing a rectangle with the other. That's how hard it is.
There were also women at the rotary meeting/party that run a yoga center! And, yet another perk of being a rotary exchange student... the classes are absolutely free. All I need to do is buy a ridiculously expensive yoga mat ($15). Mom or Madeleine, will you be in need of one in a year? I already know that you have a blue one Dad.

Before the Rotary meeting, I had extra classes. I had a math class which, unfortunately, I'm not doing so well in. It's in english, but I haven't really reviewed because we don't have a text book and my teacher will simply say, "you know? Just use Pythagorean theorem." and I feel like I should know how to verify that tangent of theta multiplied by secant of theta minus one all over tan of theta minus sec^2 theta cos theta equals something else equally confusing, and in america I feel like I would have been able to do it without a problem. Here, my mind goes blank and I find myself trying to figure out if the new words I've just learned are thai, isan or lao. I try to learn thai, but everyone here speaks isan and lao and I end up with a mish mash mixture.
I think I'll ask for private tutoring, or get my friends to tutor me in math so that I can catch up.I have to remember that I arrived mid-semester, without having done math for two months.

After the extra classes I thought that I would be having dinner with my new friends Nam tip and Nam tan. But, they were busy doing something else and Emma called me and asked if I wanted to go to the Chah yen place (thai tea place) and the Night Market with kate and khlou. I said yes, but I needed to ride home, shower, and change for Rotary.

That's when I ran into Tum and Brees on their bicycles. Although it's nice to ride bikes with other people, those boy ride SO SLOW. I tried to get them to ride faster and ended up in a race with Tum ( I won). Tomorrow morning we'll ride to school together. Mosquito repellent is now acquired. As you probably have heard, I had a police escort one day, a postman escort the next (this one asked for my phone number) and when some twenty year old men on motorcycles slowed down beside me the next day, I was at my limit and I told them to shove off. Now, I'll be riding with two classmates and I wonder if it will be any better. I hope so. I even managed to explain to them that men liked to honk at me (in thai "Doop!").

When I arrived at home, my host brother was on the computer. Success is near. I had a WHOLE conversation with him. He gets excited when I receive letters (maybe...they are from a boyfriend). This letter was about 8 pages long front and back with an enclosed CD and picture of creepy frog from non other than BREE BREE ( who despises me when I call her that). I read the letter while listening to the CD and almost died of laughter. I love that girl so much. The picture of creepy frog was a nice touch. This friend of mine, has a colossal collection of stuffed animals, among them, creepy frog. Creepy frog is disturbing to me for some reason, I can't explain it, but she enclosed a picture of him holding an "I miss you" sign. Well, I don't miss creepy frog, but sometimes I wish BREE BREE were here to gossip with.

And so I read the letter, showered, got dressed, told pee-harp where I was going and asked him what he thought of my clothes. He looked me up and down and said, "okay." I have approval, sort of. Next time I'll try for better. Maybe by the time I leave this host family, I will even heard, "suay." I'm working on it.

So, I went to the tea place and met up with kate, khlou (twins) and Emma. We took pictures and then got on out bikes (to all those from corvallis, there's a new "bike gang" in the world) and rode to the night market. Emma and I found the COOLEST T-shirts for a dollar each. I bought three (I couldn't resist). One says (Suspect winners) and has four pac-man characters on it, another has weird monsters coming out of a boom box and says "Calm down soundtrack" and the third one has a picture of a TV, inside the TV is a Vespa and is says something, but I can't remember.
Emma bought the pac man shirt too. By the end of this year, our matching wardrobe will have grown to a size that even I don't want to think about. We already have matching shoes and sunglasses. The other exchange students on the trip won't know what to think of us with our wonka sunglasses, yellow pac-man t-shirts and pointy toed plastic flats. I think we'll rock the look.

Tomorrow, Emma and I are going to an English Camp is a province 50 km away. I'm not sure who recruited us to help out, but we're going. I'm a little excited, I get to meet more students.
Today was marvelous, I was busy, I learned and I even have new shirts. Not much could be better.

Anyway, Love to all, and SEND ME SOME MORE LETTERS! (It's the best conversation starter I have with my host brother so far... plus I love reading them (even the very long rants)).