My Kingdom for a Dryer

After returning from my trip to Krabi(which I will post about *soon*..I'm waiting "patiently" for a few photos from others on the trip), and just about any other trip, I am faced with the daunting task of: LAUNDRY. And while, yes, we do have a laundry room in every building here at Champs, the problem is that each laundry room has a whopping 14 washers, and only 1 dryer. ONE. And if someone decides to stuff their comforter in there for an hour right before your clothes finish in the washer(this has happened to me several times; I don't even know what you need a comforter for here, I sleep with my AC on almost every night), you're screwed. You either have to stuff all your wet laundry in a bag/basket and cart it off to another building to find an empty dryer, or take it upstairs, hang it 'somewhere', and let it airdry. For hours. Sigh..what I wouldn't give to just have a dryer installed in my condo...

This is how we do Christmas at PTN

Christmas Eve was a work day for me, but I don't know that I can say I did any "work." Between the stage performances, game booths, endless food stalls and ferris wheel I had a great time.

*This post has a several videos, I know, but I couldn't resist. Most of them aren't that long, so if you have the time, watch them. They're adorable. :D

The HUGE jump house


Jump house #2, slightly smaller


The "topless" carousel with weird rainbow-colored animals


The ferris wheel. Yes, I rode on it.



The food venders



Me, Fa, and her enormous bear


The band, all decked out


Sister playing at our booth


Drumline!


David's students singing Jingle Bells


Melissa's adorable P1 students


Tomo's students, P2 and P4


Lily's cute P1s


Harry's P6s..til they started throwing candy..


"Under the Sea"(well done, but not sure what it has to do with Christmas)

Just for me

A package came in the mail for me from my family, and arrived with perfect timing right on Christmas Day. It was perfect. Merry Christmas to me. :D

Christmas Eve

Last night was our Christmas Eve service at ICB, and discussed how in the midst of the chaos that was, and is, the world, Christ was born. And in the midst of the chaos of Bangkok, we raised our voices by candlelight to conclude our service with Silent Night.

Caroling on the River

Last night(Saturday) was International Church of Bangkok's Annual "Caroling on the River," and it was quite a success! We had close to 100 people come out and enjoy dinner, snacks, and Christmas caroling, as well as "Karaoke Christmas songs in languages other than English."

Indonesian Christmas song


French


French, again


Swahili


Joy to the World - Thai


Silent Night - Japanese


Feliz Navidad!


The boat


The anxious attendees on the pier


Wat Arun as we floated by


The children singing


Adorable little Ethan


Me and Katie

Bust a Move

Today was the (pointless) day before Thai exams for my students, so we partied. The students provided the drinks and snacks, and gave me so many weird candies that my "this-looks/smells/feels-really-gross-but-how-sweet-of-you-to-give-me-one-even-though-I'll-never-be-eating-it" jar on my desk was overflowing! Needless to say, my 5/3 students not only had plenty of snacks, but the boys gathered 'round and decided to show off some..uh..skills. Enjoy.


In other news, this adorable jello-filled cow graced my 5/1 class thanks to First,


and Punch lost a tooth.

Hua Hin

Katie and I headed off to the beach for a stress-free, relaxing weekend, and that's just what we got. And terrible sunburns.

The beach


Italian food!


The tuk-tuks were huge!


Enjoying the beach and my book


Horses on the beach


Katie on the beach


My delicious fried bananas with ice cream


My awful sunburn


My delicious crepe for breakfast