Law School Finals!!

Well, today, possibly even at this very moment, Shawn is taking his most difficult final! (Well, the final for his most difficult class anyway).

I'm nervous for him!! He has been studying very hard and I think he will do well. He has a few guys he studies with every so often that seem to be helpful.

He'll be all done with classes and finals next week, the 17th I believe. It will be nice for him to have a break.

We are planning to be in Mankato for Woller Family Christmas from December 28-30th! We're very excited to see everyone!


Things are going really, really well in Milwaukee. Personally, I love it!! Things at the Pfister are going really well aside from the fact that everyone's hours are being cut because the winter is the hospitality slow season.

Milwaukee is on a winter weather storm advisory tonight, so winter has finally come. I'm still not sure how I feel about it.

So, there's the update for ya!

They Might Be Giants!

This weekend Shawn & I went to a "They Might Be Giants" concert in Chicago with Lucas and Robyn! It was a lot of fun!! We were able to spend a little time at Kevin and Joy's house on the way down and also on the way back!

Shawn got a CD signed by John Flansburgh. He actually bought the CD from another guy and then handed it to John Flansburgh and said "Could you just hand this to me?" He did. Then he got his picture with him. It was pretty neat. Very fun show.

Sunday morning then we got to listen to Gabe sing in church. Pretty adorable.


In other news, we are moving to our new apartment THIS WEEK!!! We are very excited!

Ah, Employment! Finally!

As of this afternoon I accepted a full-time position at the Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee.
I was excited because I finally had a job, they clean my uniform for me, and I get a free meal every shift, but THEN I found THIS:: (You have no idea how fun this is for me!) Enjoy!

Baseball teams fear 'haunted' Milwaukee hotel

MILWAUKEE - First Carlos Gomez heard voices. Then he watched his iPod go haywire after he got out of the shower, sending him scrambling for the lobby without stopping to put on his pants and shoes.

After last year's experience, the Minnesota Twins outfielder didn't want to go back to Milwaukee's Pfister Hotel. But Gomez had to stay there when the Twins were in town to play the Brewers last month, so he brought some protection: teammate-turned-roommate Francisco Liriano and a Bible.

"Everything's scary," Gomez said. "Everything in the hotel, the paintings and pictures, it's a lot of old, crazy stuff. No good, man. No good."

The Pfister is Milwaukee's most regal address, having hosted every U.S. president since William McKinley and scores of celebrities who can take a self-guided tour of the hotel's Victorian art collection. Today, it's the place to stay for upscale business travelers and out-of-town visitors, including many Major League Baseball teams. Commissioner Bud Selig, a Milwaukee native, is a frequent visitor.

But some players don't care for the 116-year-old hotel's posh accommodations and reputation for privacy. They swear it's haunted.

Gomez, San Francisco's Pablo Sandoval, St. Louis' Brendan Ryan and several Florida Marlins all say they've had odd experiences, though Ryan later said nothing really happened. Others aren't willing to talk publicly about what they've seen and heard.

Brewers visiting clubhouse manager Phil Rozewicz has heard it all from sleepy-eyed players who would rather hang out at Miller Park than spend one minute more than they have to at the Pfister.

"There was a rookie ball player and he was back in his room and he woke up in the middle of the night and his blinds were open, the window was opened and he was panicked," Rozewicz said. "So he went into the bathroom, splashed water on his face, came back out and went to bed. Shut the blinds, the window. Woke up in the morning. Same thing. Slept on the couch in the lobby the next night. Refused to go to his room. Finally, went to a Motel 6 or whatever up the street and just stayed there."

Of course, some of this could be mischievous teammates pulling pranks. But Pfister ghost stories go well beyond the ballpark.

Allison Jornlin, who leads haunted history tours for the folklore research organization Milwaukee Ghosts, said guests have reported seeing a "portly, smiling gentleman" roaming the halls, riding the elevator and even walking his dog. The apparition is said to resemble Charles Pfister, who founded the hotel with his father, Guido.

"His ghost is thought, usually, to behave very well," Jornlin said. "But MLB players seem to bring out his mischievous side."

Why's that?

"Obviously, he's a Brewers fan," Jornlin said.

But even some of the Brewers won't stay there in the offseason.

"Even if I come into town for FanFest or whatever, I'm staying somewhere else," said Brewers center fielder Mike Cameron, who moved his family to another hotel after one night last offseason. "I mean, it's not a bad place. But there has been a lot of stories, a lot of creepy things that have gone on."

Hotel general manager Joe Kurth won't acknowledge any specific ghost stories from ballplayers or other guests, citing privacy concerns. But he doesn't shy away from the rumors, suggesting that guests interested in seeing a spirit might want to stay in the hotel's historic wing.

The Pfister does have its fans. Colorado Rockies manager Jim Tracy loves the quiet atmosphere, though the same couldn't be said for Tracy's players when he was managing the Los Angeles Dodgers.

"I was hearing suggestions, to the point that they were saying, "I've got to go to a different hotel,"' Tracy said.

That sounds familiar to Gomez, who said he hears voices and noises when he stays there and had his worst experience after hopping out of the shower last year.

He'd just started putting his clothes on when his iPod started playing with a static noise. He grabbed it and the iPod changed music suddenly before going to static again.

"I grabbed my pants and my shoes and I ran to the lobby," Gomez said.

Gomez wishes the Twins would stay somewhere else.

"I'm scared to go there," he said. "They should change the hotel. Everybody here doesn't like the hotel. Why (do) they always put us in the same hotel when you can't sleep?"

http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/jul/10/baseball-teams-fear-haunted-milwaukee-hotel/news-offbeat/

We're Home...

I haven't written in a while, because frankly nothing we do really seems worth writing about anymore. We have no beautiful children (yet!) to update the friends and relatives about. We have no fascinating or even mildly interesting hobbies or talents. No scientific breakthroughs coming from this blog, no home ownership or pets. We've got nothing.

I'll post anyway.

I've been working at the Country Inns and Suites for the last few weeks to take the financial edge off until I find a job in Milwaukee. I've really been enjoying it a lot. Almost everyone remembers me and it's fun to jump right back into the inside jokes and whatnot. I quite enjoy the staff and may even transfer to a Country Inns and Suites in Brookfield, Wi. I'll let you know.

We've been able to spend some time with the nieces and nephews, which has been delightful. It will be so nice to be able to go to more family events and just be around.

Shawn is enjoying his very last summer of freedom by being a "lay-about and do nothing" as Lucas so lovingly puts it. He'll start law school August 24th and after that he will never have freedom like this again. He's making the most of it by sleeping until I wake him up when I get home from work at noon every day. At least he's appreciative. Besides, the minute he gets a job I'm just going to start having babies and never work again. :) Right?

Well, that's about it. Love you all!

No More Blogs Until July

More Pics...

China's Walmart

Kids and Jack at Xin Xin English School

They were amazed at the concept of snitching!

Go Shawn, Go!

Smoke break during a timeout!

This is Where We Live...

Coal

Meat Market

Kids!

Sports Day Performances!

More Sports Day

Ningxia's Sights!

Yesterday we woke up very early to get on a bus to Ling Wu, Ningxia.
LingWu, Ningxia has dinosaur fossils! It was pretty neat to walk around the archaeological dig site and see a giant spinal cord half buried in the ground. There are apparently at least 8 different dinosaurs who died at this site (probably more).
After dinosaurs we took 4 separate buses and a taxi to the 108 Pagodas. It's an isosceles triangle of 108 approx. 9ft tall Buddhist Pagodas. It's located next to the Yellow River and surrounded by gorgeous mountains.

Not the Acupuncture Video...

Note: Should you experience any kind of seizure from watching this video (most likely in your occipital lobe) please contact Dr. Kev (also known as K-Dog) at Abbott BioResearch about obtaining a prescription for Depakote!

Acupuncture!!

My friend Vivien getting acupuncture!

You know... to prove I was there :)
(I know... I'm a dork)

The electromagnetic lamps above her...

The actual needles. Some looked rusty...

This was apparently the most painful part

She had to lay like this for an hour... notice the wires attached to some of the needles! When he turned that little box on some of the needles started wiggling around a bit!


A pretty good friend of mine asked me to come along to her acupuncture session with her. She was really nervous. However, she was more than willing to be a model and said we (my friend Jen went too) could take as many pictures as we wanted. Hope you enjoyed!

By the way, there is also a video if anyone is interested...

Shawn and I taught at a middle school in Yong Ning this Friday. It's an extremely poor school. Shawn taught one other time at this school, but it was the first time I had been there. This time they had called in all of the English teachers and education leaders of Yong Ning to come have a "meeting" and then observe our teaching. Shawn had to give a speech. The hilarious part is that this guy wrote the speech for him. "China is such a great country... Kong Fu is so wonderful... I have always dreamed of coming to the great country of China... This school is so great... The headmaster is an excellent leader.. etc." You get the idea. Shawn changed a few things in the speech when he read it that were the furthest from the truth, but we're pretty sure they got translated as he was supposed to read it not as he spoke it. There were also TV cameras and newspaper reporters there taking photos and interviewing Shawn and some students. It was quite the ordeal. Then they took us out for dinner and taught us some new Chinese games. It was exhausting. The kids were wonderful though. It was the leaders and the interviewers that took the most out of us! It's rough being practically famous!

I am going to be so attention starved when I get back...

Well... looks like we have an apartment!

So... a few days (weeks?) after Shawn decided to go to Marquette we found out that another couple I was very good friends with while at WLC was also moving to Milwaukee. So we started to explore living together to save on rent, etc. and not have to deal with finding an apartment while in China.
Well, they (we) found a place!
There is a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment in Milwaukee that we will be moving into with Mike and Amber (Gallun) as soon as we get back. They'll be living there a month or two before we get there, but that will be nice so not everyone is trying to get settled all at once. We're actually quite excited about the arrangement. We'll be saving a ton on rent, won't have the headache of finding a place, and it sure will be nice to live with someone while my husband is spending the majority of his time at school. They're a really fun couple who I adore. Shawn and I went to spend a day or two with them last summer while we were home and he gets along with them quite well too.
I'm sure we'll meet our challenges, but considering the circumstances this situation sure takes a lot of current major concerns out of the way! We're very relieved that we don't have to deal with finding a place while in China. I'm also super excited to be living with such a fun couple!

So... there's news for ya!

Here's the link to see the house, we're the lower level: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=3014+N+Pierce+St,+Milwaukee,+Wisconsin+53212&sll=43.05597,-87.915344&sspn=0.061837,0.154495&dirflg=w&ie=UTF8&ll=43.074264,-87.902362&spn=0.007727,0.019312&z=16&iwloc=A&layer=c&cbll=43.07331,-87.902734&panoid=ATKNgDX7HsK2k6v-hpkL0A&cbp=12,96.98139355941969,,0,-6.900000000000036

The address is: 3014 N Pierce St.

Yay for having a place!

Easter Party Take 2!

We got home Sunday night from Yinchuan, and decided to plan an Easter party for my English majors. Unfortunately, my English majors have their class with me at 8am on Monday morning. Well, I did it anyway. I boiled about 40 eggs, whipped up some brownies, and even busted out the jello jigglers. Sure some of my students came to the house at 7:30am because they woke up early, but it was a blast anyway!

Happy Easter!!

Out for Roast Lamb on Good Friday

The Lamb

Sharing the Brain

At the Easter Party

Shawn has no problem making friends

My Army (see below) playing Egg Toss

On Good Friday we all got together and had a service and then went out to a special restaurant and had an entire roasted lamb. It was a little awkward because they brought it out whole (skinned of course), but it was in a sitting position and the eye sockets were... staring at us. Teeth bared... the whole nine yards. Then they did a little ceremony, sang a song, took it away and cut it up! It was pretty delicious. Except the brain... the brain was gross. Shawn is convinced we're all going to get mad cow.

Yesterday Tim and Jen had their Easter party which we were allowed to bring friends to since no one is going to come to a party all the way out in Yong Ning... anyway. It was a blast. We played egg tosses and egg bowling, had an egg hunt, colored eggs, and more egg things. We had a little devotion and had them watch the end of a movie about Easter. I wasn't sure how many people from our study would come to the party, but of the 36 total attendees we had 18 from our Saturday class. We divided the group into two since the group was so big and Mr. Wei said, "Jes, your army is strong!" It was awesome. I got to play the egg toss game with Tony the dance instructor. He kept threatening to throw it really hard at my face. It was a good time. The party was really fun.


Also:

"Da Shan (Shawn's Chinese name),
You are so handsome and humorous. We should spend more time together to let us know more about your excellency!! Miss you!
Berlinda, Nancy, Christina"

There was a part of the note for me, too... but it wasn't nearly as interesting!!

Happy Easter! Can't wait to see you all!

Awesome Day!

In our afternoon class in the new apartment we had almost twice the students we usually have! Everyone keeps bringing their friends, siblings, dance instructors (Latin and ballet), coworkers, etc. It just keeps growing and growing! It's awesome!

After our kids class we went out with the Wei family for dinner and it was so much fun! Afterwards we went to visit their home, which is surprisingly close to where we stay every weekend and has gorgeous ceilings. Mr. Wei works at the TV station in Ningxia and is an incredibly gifted and intelligent (and hilarious!) man! His wife is really sweet too. His 11 year old daughter played us a Mozart piece and a Bach piece on the piano, allowed us to look through her very impressive sketch book, and introduced us to her hamster Pang Pang (fat-fat). Our favorite part about the night may have been when we walked into their apartment and it was not clean at all. It was messy (cluttered as opposed to unsanitary) in the "we're too busy making the most of life to clean" kind of way, and it was fabulous. We can't wait to go out with them again. I must say I love the Wei's so much I may not keep up this cleaning streak that I've been on. 

We have off school on Monday because it's the 'burn money to honor your dead ancestors' holiday. Of course it doesn't matter to Shawn because he never teaches on Monday and the 2 hour class I teach is my favorite one. We're still happy though. A day off is a day off!

Happy Birthday Anna! 

MILWAUKEE!!

Well, you should all know that I already found the perfect apartment and a perfect job for next year in Milwaukee!! Of course it's the beginning of April now and the job and the apartment will probably not be available in July, but I e-mailed them anyway. You know, just in case.

Announcement:

(even if the basketball team is a bunch of failures)

Notable alumni: Sen. Joseph McCarthy (yes that Sen. McCarthy) & Dwyane Wade (though not of the Law program and he never graduated)

Soon and very soon... but not soon enough...

Shawn caught a cold this week, but I was able to cover most of his classes this week so he's just about over it. He agreed to do the dishes since I taught for him so much. I would way rather teach an 8 o'clock class than do the dishes. He would way rather do the dishes. What are we going to do next year?!?

Tomorrow he agreed to teach at a local middle school for a few hours so the kids could have some exposure to a foreigner. It will be a lot more fun if he can shake what's still lingering of his cold. Should be fun anyway.

Yesterday some workers started knocking down the wall behind our apartment. By evening they had put a gate up, but this morning they knocked down even more of the wall. We're not sure why. It leads literally into the middle of a field. Today Shawn told me he saw a large group a students being directed into the fields through the hole in the wall single file with a bunch of shovels. We heard they were planting trees today. We are hoping they didn't knock that huge hole in the wall just so the students wouldn't have to walk around. It is possible though.

The anticipation of this final decision letter is killing me. I may actually die of a heart attack. I loved you all... you know, just in case.

99 Days Left

No word today.

Pray harder.

Sorry...

We're sorry for not keeping everyone updated more often this semester.

We know many people are waiting to hear where we will be next year, and we simply don't know yet. We will tell you as soon as we do. It's hard for me to think of anything to write to anyone when I know what people want to know and don't have anything to tell them. If we were to post everyday it would simpy say "still waiting". I guess you can just assume that.

We should know by April 1st. The hopefully I'll be able to fill you in on a lot more details a lot more often because this waiting to know where we will be bit will not be consuming our lives.

102 days left.


Matthew 11:28

Not a Whole Lot Goin' On...

I figured I haven't posted in a long time, so I should! However, there's not much happening so not much to write about...

We've started teaching again. We have about 14 hours a week of classes and the students (most of them anyway) have been much better behaved than last semester or last year! That's a plus.

We've started our "other" classes again too and that's all going well!

It was Taco Sunday last Sunday... delicious!

I started taking a Pilates class that I'm pretty excited about and hope I can keep up with!

Only about 109 days until we come home!!

Miss you all!

The Denouement of Our Excursion

In 3 hours we get on a train back to Yinchuan. Fortunately classes don't start for another 10 days. This was definitely the kind of vacation we need a vacation after.

After we left Vientiane we took a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad bus up to Luang Prabang. We got a room close to the Mekong River and basically played cards for 2 days. It was nice.
From Luang Prabang we took a GORGEOUS ride up the Nam K-something river on a long boat. There were tons of children playing on the shore or on the rocks in the middle of the river. They would all wave enthusiastically, and most of them were naked. It was pretty hilarious. Some of the kids would run along the shore with the boat as long as they could, or do flips and jumps when they saw us watching. It was easily my favorite part of Laos. The limestone cliffs, mountains, river side gardens, rapids (easily avoidable), vegetation in general, and mostly the children made for a pretty spectacular 8 hours.

When we arrived in Nong Khiew on the long boat we got to shore and saw two small villages connected by a long bridge and totally surrounded by mountains and cliffs. It was the stuff of movies. It was by far the most beautiful scenery in any town we stayed our whole trip. There was not much to see or do, but just being among the scenery was pretty neat.

The next morning we took a tuk tuk to a small town about 30km away, where there was supposed to be a bus to the China border. There was not. So, we hitchhiked in a pick up truck with a caravan of Chinese photography club members. It turned out they were guys from all over China who were just friends by their association with this photography group. One guy was apparently in charge of all of the roads in the Yunnan province, so we let him pay for lunch. They brought us all the way to the border where we hopped on a bus that was on its way through to Kunming. It all worked out fantastically. We've had to work a whole lot harder to get from point A to B on this trip, so we appreciated how everything fell into place.

We arrived in Kunming by bus around 6am and bought train tickets to Xi'an for that evening. We couldn't get train tickets to Yinchuan until the 12th so we spent the last 2 nights here finishing our souvenir shopping, with the exception of the Woller men (Dave included)... who have me stumped. Suggestions welcome.

We'll be in Yinchuan tomorrow. It's been a long, fast, slow, crazy, exhausting, fun, enlightening 5 and a half weeks.

Vientiane, Laos: Home of BeerLao

We are currently in Vientiane the capitol of Laos, but more importantly (to me) the home of BeerLao. Most people have never heard of BeerLao but it is widely accepted (by me) to be the best beer in Asia. It's better than Tsing Tao (Qing Dao, China), Tiger (Singapore), and every Japanese beer I have ever had (Asahi, Soporo, etc.) To attest to the quality of this beer, in 2002 Carlsberg bought a 25% share of BeerLao. Carlsberg experts were brought in to "improve" the beer but but were surprised to find that BeerLao consistently won blind taste tests against foreign beers. [1]

Yesterday I was able to visit the Beerlao Brewery. I got a free sample (two, really, since Jes always gives hers to me and that alone is reason to be married) and went on the 15 minute tour of the brewery. We were only walked through the bottling and packaging area and only got to see the outside of the building where the brewing actually takes place. However this tour was unlike any other brewery tour I have ever been on and I've been on a few (Coors, Miller, Anheiser Busch, Schells). For this tour we were able to walk through the actual factory. Nothing was behind glass. There was no special visitor walkway. In fact, I could have picked a bottle right off the conveyor belt. I was a cool experience but sadly no photos were allowed inside.

BeerLao is available in some parts of the U.S. but I have never seen it anywhere but Asia. If you do happen to see it, give it a try. I would prefer it to any macrobrew in the U.S. any day.

There are more interesting things to say about BeerLao and Vientiane for that matter but its time for supper and undoubtedly another cool refreshing BeerLao. [2]



[1] Source: Williams, China & et al. Lonely Planet: Southeast Asia. 12th Ed. 2004.
[2] This has not been paid for by the PDR of Lao, Beerlao, or its affiliates.

We Have 5 Different Currencies Currently

So we're in Laos now...

I kind of skimmed over Angkor Wat in Cambodia. It was really quite fascinating. We went for sunset one night and then woke up for sunrise the next. Unfortunately we accidentally set the alarm clock for 4am China time to be at our tuk tuk by 5am, and therefore sat an extra hour out on the street. Other than that, it was pretty awesome.

The next day we went out to our tuk tuk driver's home out in the Cambodian country a little bit. He has twin 3 year olds, a 4 year old, and a 12-year old girl who teaches English to 6 students in the neighborhood aged 3-8. His kids are beautiful, but picking up the little kids and playing with them sure made us miss a few kids back home.

We got in a shared taxi to the border of Cambodia/Thailand where we hitchhiked in the back of two pick up trucks to a bigger city in Thailand. Eventually we got on 2 more buses to the Laos border, and stayed in Laos for the night near the bus station. (3 countries in less than 12 hours) In the morning we got an early bus to the 4,000 Islands along the Mekong River near Si Phan Don and slept in a bungalow on Don Khon Island. We rented bicycles for the rest of that day and saw a really great waterfall. We climbed down inside and went swimming a bit. We were on our way to another beach and they were really old bikes with no brakes... and I fell off my bike. I'm an adult and I fell off my bicycle. So... I feel like a moron. A very nice pregnant lady helped me clean up afterwards though.

After that we went to the southern part of the Island and we took a long boat with one of the locals our to see the freshwater Irrawaddy dolphins. There are apparently only about a hundred or so left, and this area in Laos is their last habitat. They were a little ways away, but we did see quite a few. It was pretty cool.

We took a long boat off the island and got a bus back to Pakse, the big city where most buses go through. Tonight we're headed to the capital city. Should be fun.

We're doing so much so fast. The boys are having a great time going, going, going. Me... I'm tired. I'm loving this trip, but I wish we could stay somewhere more than 1 or 2 nights and just rest.

One month down, about 2 weeks to go.

We miss you all... a lot!

We're on a Holiday in Cambodia!

We ended up spending 2 nights in the abandoned bungalow.
My subconscious must have a been a little more nervous about the whole thing than I was admitting to myself because the first night I woke up screaming bloody murder while Shawn tried to calm me down and convince me I wasn't actually being abducted by Thai criminals in the middle of the night. It was a good 30 seconds of awake screaming... and it was loud. My voice hurt afterwards. All because Shawn was holding my hand in my sleep and I honestly thought it was someone else grabbing onto me trying to pull me out of the bungalow. We spent another night there anyway. We didn't get much rest that night either.

The last night on Koh Chang Island we spent at a real guest house so we could shower before we headed to Cambodia early the next morning.

We caught a series of buses to the border town, and met a fantastic young couple from Slovania. We've stayed with them from that night, stayed together, crossed the border together (20usd each, Eric D., although it took us a good 45 minutes of back and forth and confusion to find the legit place), getting to Siem Reap, renting a tuk tuk to Angkor Wat for 2 days, etc. Changing all this money has been extremely confusing. 7 (+ a British couple) of us rode in the back of a pick up truck for 2 hours, which was fun. Cambodia is very confusing and a bit stressful, but now that we're actually here I think we'll be able to enjoy it a bit more.

We're planning to head north to Laos next and probably skip Vietnam altogether.... FYI.

It's been a ton of fun, but I have to tell ya.... we're getting tired.

Thailand: Take 3

We're currently on Koh Chang Island in Thailand! The beach is gorgeous!! The mountains, palm trees, blue skies, etc. are definitely the stuff of posters and paradise resort ads.

The day we got here we picked up another traveller who was alone. So we turned into 4 and found ourselves a bungalow. Last night we had 3 different mosquito nets up in the tiny hut! Mike went exploring and found a half built bungalow, so we all went to go find it to see if we could camp in it comfortably enough. On our way to find it we discovered a deserted resort!! So... we explored a bit, found an empty hut that was to our liking and checked out of the other bungalow. So now we're camping in an abandoned resort! For free!! We took a bunch of palm leaves and put them down, sort of weaved the edges together, and threw a tarp over them for a bed. We're literally 10 feet from the white sand beach when the tide is in. I think it's pretty awesome.

The weather of course is amazing. The only downside of that is that the bananas around here are pretty much useless except as food. (Although, I'm sure Eric could come up with something else).

Our Australian roomie (temporary #4) didn't feel up to the camping, so we're back to three.

Next on the itinerary is Cambodia, so stay tuned!!

Thailand: Take 2

We rented motorbikes on the 13th and headed to Northern Thailand.
We spent the first night in Chiang Rai, but the next day headed to the Golden Triangle, which is where Laos, Thailand, and Burma (Myanmar) meet. It was pretty cool.
That night we headed to Mai Sai so that we could cross the border into Burma (Myanmar) the next day. It was expensive, but we got the Visa and the stamp to go in and visited a little village and did a little hiking. It was cooler than we expected. We talked to a lot of people. Burmese children = adorable.
We snagged a hitchhiker (friend of a friend of the KW's in Chiang Mai) and headed to Mae Salong, where some of the the Chinese Nationalists settled after the Communist take over. It almost felt like home again. We drove though soe moutains and found some fun hill tribes off the beaten path along the way.
After Mae Salong we dropped our hitchhiker off in a place called Fang and saw a neat little agricultural camp run by some fun "save the world" types. We just missed a pig being killed, but we watched them cut it up and ate some of the intestine.
We couldn't find the hot springs we were looking for that night, but stayed in Chiang Dao.
The next day we went to the elephant camp, where we saw a show and then ended up taking an hour and half elephant ride though the jungle and a river. It was wicked expensive, but pretty cool.
We found a waterfall in the afternoon and drove through some more mountains all the way back to Chiang Mai. We'll go to service again this morning, maybe get a Thai massage this afternoon, and then head out for another trip to check out some more hill tribes.

Thailand Update!

I should really be sending this out in an e-mail instead of posting, but this is just so much easier...

So...
We arrived in Bangkok on Thursday night. We weren't sure where to stay since our travel book was at least 7 years outdated. We got in a taxi and pointed to the address for a hostel which may or may not have still existed...
It did exist, but it was full. There were probably a few dozen hostels in the area, but almost all of them were full and the rest were more expensive than we were shooting for. Also, we're pretty sure the area of town was for a certain kind of traveller. There were quite a few rainbows on doormats, and people reflecting that.... lifestyle. The guys were glad to have me along.
We got out of Bangkok as quickly as we could. It was expensive, confusing, not walker-friendly, etc.
We could only get seats on the overnight train to Chiang Mai, so we were a bit nervous. But, the seats reclined, the train had a ton of character, and we met a fun couple from England and played cards! The train was 2+ hours late. When Mike asked a guy about it he said, "Welcome to Thailand!"
Our hostel in Chiang Mai is AMAZING! Very comfortable, colorful, cheap, etc. There are iced ovaltines across the street for only 15 baht!
We met the Kingdom Workers and went to the Sunday morning service despite the fact that it was all in the Thai language (Thailandese?). We hung out with the K.W.'s there, had lunch, went to the walking street market, played games, shared ice cream. It was all a very good time.
The boys stayed up until 5am watching the Eagles game last night since Mike (who we are travelling with) is a huge fan. I finally caught up on sleep. Now you are caught up!