Krabi Birthday

After classes ended I was on a plane outta Bangkok...headed south to paradise...Krabi! While there I went on a sunset snorkeling trip...which was how do I say??? Absolutely heavenly. I swear sunsets over water never get old for me. I love them. This particular night we were sitting on a sandbar as the tide was low and the sunset was amazing shades of pink. Then I got to swim with phosphorescence...this beautiful greenish light organism that glows when you splash the water around. I now know with 100% certainty what my heaven is going to include...a glorious sunset over water, a million stars out at night and swimming with phosphorescence. I also celebrated my birthday while in Krabi...we climbed up to a viewpoint, we layed on the beach, we drank whiskey, we ate Indian food, we chilled at a Reggae bar and Jenn and Shannon were sneaky little monsters and surprised me with a birthday cake. It was a wonderful day! I am one lucky gal, I've made some great friends out here.

Second semester coming to a close...

I finished my second semester teaching!!! This past semester was a rough one in comparison to the first semester. Not only was I teaching an Academic Grammar English course that I disliked very much but I was also teaching overtime. Last semester if you recall, I was only teaching 2 days a week! These last 3 months I was worn out day after day. And for about 6 weeks I had some serious stomach issues that even brought about an overnight stay in the hospital. I am finally feeling better and back at 100%. And now my classes are over and its playtime (Krabi), proctoring, grading, moving (cross your fingers to the city campus), and then HOME to CHICAGO for 2 weeks!!!
So here are some pictures of my kiddos from this semester. I taught 2 academic classes and 5 sections of conversation. I had some good kids and some not so nice monsters that I could have done without but its all a learning process right??? I can say though that I sure learned my threshold and tolerance for immaturity, laziness, and rudeness this semester. But overall it was a good semester.

Camping, Planting, Rafting...oh my.

A few of us joined www.plant-a-tree-today.org for a weekend camping trip to Khao Yai National Park. We spent the first day rafting on a not so rapid river but fun and entertaining none-the-less especially with Clare and her jazz hands. In the evening we had grilled mmmmm meat by a campfire and drank the night away with our bottles of whiskey. Early the next morning we headed out to the nursery to learn about the trees we were going to be planting. Then we (a total of 30 volunteers and several plant-a-tree staff) headed to the planting site...atop a gorgeous hill with stunning views. During the 3 hours in the hot blazing sun we planted 800 trees! That's about a 30 trees each! It was fun, hot, muddy, spectacular, tiring, difficult and important. Did you know that every minute of the day the earth loses about a football field of trees?