Fourth of July Festivities!

Class parties are so fun. I nearly forgot.  All of the English teachers were sporting our finest red, white, and blue today and handing out oreos with peanut butter-as American as we get. I started class today by teaching This Land is Your Land (well, actually just one verse), and a few kids got really into it with hand motions, but in the end, the Thai teacher was the only one as interested as singing it as me.  Typical.  But I brought in my banjolele for the first time and they loved it! I think it will have to make special party appearances.  I tried playing some J Biebs, and they caught on right away. Instant success.  For the rest of class, we made 4^th of July hats, sang some more, and then everyone busted out insane amounts of kanom (i.e. snacks)! I brought in oreos, but they were nothing compared to the bags and bags of chips, boxes of cookies, dried squid, and seaweed that all the students brought. They take their parties seriously.

Tonight, we will continue the celebrations at our house! We are attempting to host a Thai potluck, but we’ll see a) who ends up coming, and b) what kinds of food turn up. Last night, I told our friend P’ Benz that we were having a party (and by that I meant a dinner party), and she got so upset because her shift at work was scheduled for 4 pm to midnight. She wasn’t about to miss the farang party though, so she called her friend, told her she was sick, and offered her 600 baht (around $20) to take her shift! Such a dedicated farang friend. 

This weekend, we are headed to the big city: Chiang Mai! It will be a long, windy bus ride, but I’m looking forward to visiting the other PiA fellows and my old host family.