MONSOON!

Well readers,

I’m sitting at the office. Power’s down, and there’s a torrential DOWNPOUR outside….we may die of drowning here, and I just want my mother to know that I love her. My siblings may evenly disperse what little I have saved, and my car may be donated to the Free Burma Rangers to use in Thailand once it’s paid off by my life insurance policy.

Ok, so it’s not that bad. But I have to walk a bit in the mess before catching a song-taew to take me back to the road that I will, once again, walk back to my apartment on. I’m gonna get soaked. But ya know what? It’s so stinken hot, that I just don’t care! It’s a beautiful thing….oh? Did I explain what a song-taew was? It’s an open, multiple person taxi. It only costs about thirty cents in American dollars for it to take you wherever you want to go….that’s on its route, anyway. But the fun part? Flagging one down….I walk about a half a mile every day down the village road to the main road, where I wait for a song-taew, while being entertained by numerous Thai construction men that come up and offer me rides. They’re just excited to talk to someone who isn’t native Thai, and I laugh and pretend I know what the heck they’re saying….even though I absolutely do not. HAHA! I know very little Thai….many phrases, and I can understand the subject matter being spoken about, but nothing exact.

On that note, I am supposed to start Thai lessons again tomorrow. I have to say, I’m a little nervous. But I was promised that my teacher, Khru Deeng, would not be as pushy as the last time. She was wonderful, but since she only had two weeks to teach me all of the Thai that I know, she overwhelmed me daily. I could count to 100 by the second day. Why? Because I had a thousand Thai things running into my head, and as happy as I am to know how to successfully (somewhat) count to one hundred, I’d rather take things slow and “Simmah down nah.” Haha….

Well I’m back in the apartment, watching U.S. Marshals with Thai subtitles and enjoying as they say in Italy, "Il Dolce Far Niente”, or the sweetness of doing nothing. J