"I decided that adventure was the best way to learn."

This morning I returned home from ten days down south in Isaan with Aon and Ya. It was a trip full of adventures and eye opening experiences from which I learned a lot (did you know that chickens sleep in the tops of trees?). The girls both grew up in small villages where life is absolutely and completely different from the life I knew growing up. Living in Thailand for the past four years has taught me that my personal world is minuscule compared to the actual world that I live in. But this trip taught me that I still have no clue how the world works!

As I write this I have been awake for about 35 hours and I honestly don't know how my brain is functioning so instead of going into details, I figured I'd share the high and low points of the trip as well as a couple photos.

High Point: I had the chance to visit the school where Aon attended when she was young. The day before we bought new shoes and were going to drop them off for all the students. At the last minute, Aon informed me that the teachers wanted me to present the shoes in front of the students. For those of you that know me, you know that this is not my thing. My comfort zone lies somewhere between hiding behind my camera and organizing paperwork, I am an introvert and love being behind the scenes. So the idea of standing on stage and presenting shoes did not bring a smile to my face. But I went anyway (praying for God to calm my nerves) and upon arriving realized that this event was much bigger than I thought. Word had gotten out that a farang (foreigner) was going to be at the school and pretty much the whole village showed up. Apparently they had never had a farang visit before so I was quite the headlining news. As soon as I arrived, people lined up to take photos with me. The students put on a show where each class got up on stage and danced. I presented the shoes and the teachers had me present each student with a medal around their neck. There were games and a big meal was cooked, it was a big party. By the end of the day, my face hurt from smiling so much in photos and I was exhausted. But I had an amazing time! It was such a cool experience that I will never forget and I feel so lucky to have been there. How many people have experience something like that? :)

This is me with some of the staff at the school.

This is me presenting the medals after the presentation.

This is me with a portion of the students and staff.

I had to stick this one in here because this girl was just so happy and adorable while she was dancing!

Low Point: Later that night I started to feel nauseous and around 9pm I got really sick. I'm talking projectile vomiting all over the outhouse at the farm, I've never been sick like that in my life. About ten hours later I was lying on the ground, in the mud, in the outhouse, next to the squatty potty, covered in vomit and I couldn't even get up because my body was so weak. Aon and Ya had to basically carry me out of the outhouse and help me clean up. That was definitely the low point of the trip and possible the past year of my life. :(

Be happy that I don't have any photos to share of that experience...