sweet summertime

Summer here seems to mean bring on the rain, which from what I hear drastically different from hot and dry Tejas right now.

So many things have happened since the last time I graced you with my voice :)

Including
-Finals for my 1st years
-Graduation for the 2nd years
-The rough road to job searching begins
-School became very quiet; almost all the girls went home
-LYNDSAY arrived
-Oh ya, and we saw the world in its many forms of beauty

So, I was dreading Finals, terrified of how the girls would do and I put quite a bit of questions inside, and had to add a bit more after Sr. Leeza looked at it, but YAY all passed English!!

We took our finals about a week and a half before school let out, so the time after was used for practicing our songs, skits and things for graduation and also we studied a bit more English and Computer.  Although the English classes are split differently from their actual classes, so I continued with only my girls but in two different groups, felt weird to say goodbye to my girls in two different groups and not the entire class altogether.  I really loved those few days though.  They received a notebook for journaling over the summer and nice stack of worksheets including sentence structure and comprehension, mean, mean teacher I know.  Also, showed them one last movie and hey, don't judge it is actually very inspiring and the girls love him anyways.  Yup, I showed Never Say Never, they loved it.  We were singing You smile, I smile for the rest of school and one of my girls even pointed out Sean Kingston in the movie, I had no idea what he looks like, but she did.  Youtube is an incredible thing.  So I now know that JB and I share a birthday, are both left handed, want all their dreams to come true and to NEVER SAY NEVER.  Really, it was a good to show, for this setting at least. :)

We worked a bit on grammar, but really did alot of speaking and so fun to watch how the class has come together, so concerned and connected with each other, and I believe their English has improved a bit!
 I know, I know its not the world if they don't know every word in English, but there are days where I think about it and how I don't know any language but English more than a few sayings and words.   It frustrates me so much sometimes, how so many people learn 2 or 3 languages so that they can communicate and then us, big, dumb American just squawk our English at everyone, yes the Brits, the Aussies, Kiwis and many others use at well, but why does everyone have to study English?  Lyndsay says its because of our triumphs in the Cold War and WWII, world super power, which is prolly true.  She joked about hey we might all be speaking Russian if things ended differently, don't want to think about what else would be different too.  BUT back to the point.  Languages, I admire them all so much studying their English, some Chinese and Thai also and want to be more like them in that aspect and so many more,  be more studious with languages, Khmer I am still catching more and more words but hey, this language only covers so much ground.  Spanish, Indonesian would be fun I think....maybe one day! (mom and dad, don't worry I am coming home)

Graduation was beautiful, the three Sister school of Cambodia had the ceremony together and started at 8: 30 and finished around 11:45.  Each school had songs, we performed a skit called Hope for the World including a song by Michael Jackson, that girls translated into Khmer, Battambang, because it is a sewing and life skills, had a fashion shows with some of their finished products, several Khmer dances, a speaker and the distribution of certificates.  After we took pictures for hours and their families gave them roses or pooh bears or any other gifts of affection.  Carolyn and I went to eat lunch with the Sister and priests in attendance, which ended with about 45 minutes with one of the Bishops of Cambodia strumming on the guitar and the several Spanish-speaking Sisters singing many of the countries' songs.  Then we rode our bicycles back to our school along the way met several others that stayed with us for a while to practice their English and then to finish the day with a beautiful farewell and dinner with the 2nd years, they cooked a feast, reallly.  Ah  pretty cool and inventive for a grill it looked like they used a rain gutter, and then strung wire along the top and then coals in between.  Pretty impressive, right!  Then after dinner, we dance for a good 2 hours and drank strawberry cola.  It's just one of those days I hope I never forget, so many different cultures, languages from us and the sisters and the girls and the family we become with them all.

The school became pretty quiet but luckily, just in time Lyndz arrived!  I, two sisters and about 5 of the girls greeted her at the airport.  It's a big to do at school, going to the airport.  Many of them have never seen it and we were a few minutes early so we walked around trying to explain what it all meant, but of course many just wanted to see the planes which are of course blocked behind the building. :(

We sang Lyndz the welcome song, and I quickly remembered how fast Lyndsay did speak and how much my speaking has changed in the past 7 months!  We stayed in Phnom Penh for a few days seeing the sights and hitting the markets and then took off for Chiang Mai, Thailand where we left our wishes on bells outside a temple, explored underground prayer tunnels used by monks, drove a moto, chilled in a hot spring, paid to swim in a pool more than once, but so totally worth it, went to this temple way out of the way where at one point ( in my imagation, mostly) I thought they might want our heads (really don't know if it is worth explaining), rode and bathed elephants, checked their poo too, gotta have a healthy elephant, hiked, rafted, shopped-a bit too much, they literally had a different market every night of the week and had some of the best food.
Then continued our journey to the border of Thailand to catch the 2 day slow boat to Luang Prabang.  The border crossing was very unique.  We rode in a bus to the Thai side of the river, then took a long boat, with about 7 people and all of our bags across the river and began the visa process and then shipped in another bus to our slow boat.  We met a wonderful group of people from many different parts of the world, we even had a song written!  The slow boat was an incredible journey, I'm sorry I don't have many pictures of the journey, definately one of those times where my pictures will never really show you how truly beautiful the views were, so I dwelled in it and thought all of you, I'll share several of the ones I did take too.
Luang Prabang was a huge change from fast pace Thailand but went right with the mood we took on from our slow boat.  This town has many beautiful temples, waterfalls, art and people. We explored the temples, tried the famous Mekong riverweed, had a Laos BBQ which consisted of us cooking own food for the night, which was a bit overwhelming to be honest.  Tried to cook, eat, drink and keep up in the conversation luckily three of us were trying it out together.  We ate several nights within a market or a Asian food court if you will, where we paid 10,000 kip (roughly $1.25) for our plate and fill it with as much as we could.  Lyndz and I took a natural dyeing class, we got to keep a scarf we dyed ourselves as well as cook or chop or cut our plants to get our colors.  So much fun as well as the conversations with the staff who were of course wanting to practice their English, we talked about the usual; Justin Beiber, Taylor Swift, university and they shared a bit with us about being monks!
Then we moved on to Vang Vieng, which gets a bit of a bad reputation but you didn't explore enough if you didn't enjoy Vang Vieng.  Many people only tube, the river and scenery is beautiful and there are many bars covering both sides of the river,  but we did and had a great time, but could see how it could be a bit much for some, but my favorite part of Vang Vieng was a bike trip in the morning, we wanted to go see this area called the Blue Lagoon, near some neat cave and the water stays this aqua blue color, but we got a bit side tracked and lost, we thought.  We went to another cave first which included some messy biking in the mud, don't worry I fell more than once and was looking real good by the end of it, then paid our money to enter where we received torches or headlights, to reach the cave we walked through the rice fields, over several fences and a stream, along another little lagoon and over a bamboo bridge to be greeted with this tiny crack in the side of this cliff...OUR CAVE.  To keep it short,  I got spooked, we made it about 10 minutes in and the turned around and opted to swim and jump from trees.  Then we continued on our bikes found the Blue Lagoon, and to ourselves.  We swam, swung on the swing into the water.  I did a back flip for you, bub.  And then jumped off a pretty tall branch.  BACKSTORY, I had left my swimsuit in one of our rooms earlier, we had been swimming at night and I put my suit up to dry and guess I left it, but I have gotten pretty used to swimming in my clothes, Khmer style,  so I bought the tourist, Vang Vieng tubing shorts and was swimming and jumping in those.  So, the tall branch I jumped in and it was great, but suddenly my shorts felt a bit looser, so got out to see that both sides of my shorts have ripped all the way to the waistband....great!  I ignored it and continued the rest of my day including tubing and all :)  No shame at all.  We passed many rice fields, beautiful mountains, looms with girls out weaving and selling and a nice little shop with some more authentic pad thai along our trip as well.
The next several days consisted of nothing but trains, buses, cars, and several other forms of transportation to get us back into Cambodia.  We had a bit of a sad story in Siem Reap with our hotel and lying tuk tuk drivers, but all worked out in the end.  We visited many beautiful temples, did a bit of relaxing and fought the infamous Cambodian heat!
I know just short splurts about our travels but Lyndsay did a great job of writing during the trip, so if you want a bit more, please go check out her page,  http://lyndsayrae11.wordpress.com/

Now I am back at school, doing bit of things for next week, relaxing, practicing English with those who are around and enjoying a bit time with the Sisters where they are not running in every direction.   As well as adjusting to their new duties, each year they have their obediences.  Where they can change houses within Cambodia and positions as well.  So, in Tuol Kork we gained three in this community and lost one who went to Battambang.

Next week I am going to visit many of my girls in Battambang as well as see a camp put on by a group of Spanish volunteers.  Then we have a week of interviews for the new year of girls.  Then I will get to see two of my favorite people, MOM and DAD!! I try not to think too much about it now, because it still seems so long, but really 3 weeks compared to the last 7 months, I can make it!!

Went to visit our secretary who had a beautiful baby girl

beautiful girls before Graduation begins

 

Sarem and I after

With Raksmi, Sin and some of her family

my new "kong"  (bicycle)

Our celebration after graduation

See look at the grills, I had watched them put them together

Mom, they loved their bracelets :)

so apparently this is the Thai buddhist flag, very funny story attached to this flag.  It was at the top of the temple we were a bit afraid, out in the middle of nowhere and absolutely nowhere, and the traditional Buddhist flags looks very different, so we didn't know what we would find at the top!  I believe I made some comments about if we find heads on sticks at the top, we run!

ready to go!

Doi Suthep temple, Chiang Mai, Thailand

hang a bell with your wish and everytime the wind blows and you hear the bell, dreams are coming true.

Lyndz observing the monks

ziplining...thailand

me and grandma...thailand

Me displaying my beauty and grace

and she gets to look like she is in the circus :)

eating some bananas

nice little back rub

i think this picture describes the ENTIRE day...giddy, giddy glee

i love how she is hiding her camera like it is food or something

baby, found the banana I kept to give to grandma

candid photo, crazy shot though!

crossing over from thailand to laos

slow, slow, slow boat to Laos

always fun....welcome to laos

After we ditched the cave, i believe

our morning walk.

Luang Prabang, Laos...cover page of Lonely Planet, check!

trying the Mekong riverweed

"Are we dyeing tomorrow?"

Some of the many colors  they can create with dyes from cooking up plants!

prep for my color

Bael fruit tea.

ceiling of a temple

Cambodia

shopping in Phnom Penh

beauty

Wat Phnom