Thanksgiving

I had 2 Thanksgivings! We went to Joel and Marvel's (the founders of Hope International Schools) and they hosted a Thanksgiving dinner for all the English and Thai teachers. I also celebrated with my C&MA family here. Here are some fun pics of the celebrations along with us making caramel apples . . . yum! My favorite parts were making green bean cassarole and watching the Thai teachers eat all the traditional Thanksgiving food that they've never tried before. They ate everything but one of my favorite comments from my co-teacher was "I miss chiles" haha. Guess they aren't used to non-spicy food.

Today

Today was an interesting day and a reminder of why I love Thailand so much – you truly don’t know what will be coming at you each day.

Weather
Today is/was Sunday. We woke up and it wasn’t hot. Crazy! It was about 70-75 degrees all day and overcast and it reminded me of a fall day in Colorado. I wore longsleeves! I enjoyed drinking warm coffee and didn’t have to sit in front of a fan while doing so. Honestly, the “cold” was comforting and made me smile and thankful to feel a little more at home today.

Church
We went to church like we do every Sunday. However, I will never ever get sick of seeing one of my orphaned students that I had last term. Usually we look for each other in the service and give each other many waves throughout the morning once we’ve spotted each other. Then, as soon as the service is over, we find each other and give each other the biggest, rib breaking hug we can muster. We talk a little bit but she doesn’t speak much English and I speak survival Thai, so we let our hugging and smiling do most of the talking. She says “God love you,” I smile while my heart melts and I say it back and we go our separate ways. This is a routine that I never want to take for granted. Here's a picture of the two of us that was taken back in the summer time at school. Buddhist Wake
One of our best Thai teacher friends had to help her family with a 3 day wake and Buddhist funeral for her uncle this weekend. Today was the 3rd day of the wake and she was working hard to prepare for the funeral tomorrow. We offered to help her and drove to her family’s house in the Thai country side where there are chicken farms and rice plantations of plenty. We weren’t too inconspicuous considering we are all fair skinned and have “Foreigner” practically tattooed on our foreheads. However, we were excited to have the opportunity to help out our friend who has been such a huge blessing to us and would “give us the shirt off her back.” We did a few things like put stickers on pens that were to be given away as mementoes, put fresh sticky rice into individual bags for the feast, and help (or at least attempt to) a teenage monk fold banana leaves for traditional flower boats. I soaked up the experience. It was very different. However, it was an awesome time to get a front row seat to traditional Thai life.

Spicy Papaya Salad & Mangoes with Sticky Rice
Two of my all time favorite things to eat in Thailand and we had them both with our Thai friend after we left the wake. We ate Thai style where we had a bunch of plates in the middle and just picked at what we want (which is great since I “dissect” and pick at my food anyway).

Christmas Kringle
My 4 roommates and I decided to make a “Christmas Bucket List” of things we want to do this Holiday Season. We want to make the most of our time here. Along with our own personal traditions, we added some service projects to the list as well as Christmas Kringle. Basically it’s Secret Santa with a twist. The twist is each day, there’s a specific guildline on each gift (not to mention the fact that we could only spend $1 usd each day). Our roommate Misty is going home to the Philippines for the whole month of December so we decided to get it in before she leaves so this coming week is Christmas Kringle week! We went to the Sunday market tonight and all split up and went around finding our gifts for our secret person. Here is what the week looks like for exchanging:
Monday – Something Scented
Tuesday – Something Colorful
Wednesday – Something Soft
Thursday – Something Useful
Friday – Something Edible
Saturday – Something Thai
Grand Finale – no restriction on type, just restriction on cost and we won’t exchange until we’re all back together in January.

Today, God was continually reminding me of how blessed I am to be living here. Thank you to all who make it possible!!!

Dear Mom and Dad . . .

Thank you, thank you, thank you for coming to Thailand and visiting me!

Dad, thank you for all the work you did around the school while mom was traveling for work. Some of my fondest memories of the week when it was just the two of us is when we played basketball in the school parking lot. We played until our clothes were soaked with sweat and we could no longer breath. I love that you brought my softball glove so we could throw the ball around (even if we could only do it for 10 minutes before overheating, haha).

Proof that you worked, hehe.

Proof that WE worked. =)

Proof that we played.
Proof that you can't stay away from the Post Office even in Thailand.

I love that you both were willing to go to a festival where fire was being sent up into the air (and unsucessfully at times which resulted in screaming and ducking). Also, thank you for letting me hide behind the both of you as random people were setting off random fireworks and I was fearing for my life.

Thanks for not complaining that I exposed you to weird food. (even though dad didn't actually eat the squid on the stick, lol).
Thank you for allowing me to be your tour guide and indulging my wishes when I would come up with crazy ideas (like getting our feet cleaned by sucker fish or flying through the jungle like Tarzan).

At the Zoo.
Facial expressions at Fish Spa.
My feet at the fish spa . . . now you know why I'm making the face.
Orchid Garden
At the Elephant Camp
Visiting Doi Sakhet, Doi Pui, and the Bhubing Palace PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE notice the awesome baby pink capri pants my dad was asked to wear while touring the Palace Gardens. The fact that he actually liked them scares me a bit.
Jungle Flight
You know how you go to the Parade of Homes and and they make you wear those booties on your feet? Well, apparently the owners of Jungle Flight got an idea . . .
Night Market friends who sweet talked us into buying clothes. "Mr. Beal . . . doesn't your wife look beautiful in this?" lolOld Chiang Mai Cultural Dinner

"Getting our grub on" as dad said right as mom was taking this picture, thus my face.
Getting our coffe fill, talking, laughing and LOVING IT! Thank you mom for all the talks . . . you're the BESTEST!

I love that you can put actual faces and interactions with names that I give you (especially with my roommates and the people that I spend the most time with). (Please note not all important people in my life in Thailand are in the pics below! :-)

Am and Ooy

Roommates

Juday Family

C&MA Family

I love that you met the kids that I have fallen in love with and were able to hug them and see their smiles. I am so thankful I was able to share my life here with you.

I love you both more than I can ever express. I am so thankful for EVERYTHING. Thank you for the generous and loving people you are. Thank you for being such awesome examples for me. Thank you for inspiring me, encouraging me, and most of all - - - loving me. I miss you already!

All my love, your FeFe

p.s. videos will come when blogger decides I can post them =)

The Mom

My mom has been here for over a week . . . but we've been having too much fun so I haven't taken the time to post anything. One of my mom's friends reminded us that I haven't put up a picture of us yet. I made her a sign like my dads but we have yet to take a picture with it, hehe. However, there are lots to choose from. Here's one of my favorites. I am treasuring the time I'm having with my parents!!! More pictures, stories and videos to come!

Power Lines

This post has nothing to do with my parents' visit other than the fact that my dad pointed out the picture op. :-) I have been searching my heart and brain for things to post but sometimes have a hard time putting all that I'm experiencing and learning into words. So, I decided to write what came to my mind when looking at this picture.

Life can sometimes be like this picture of the power lines by our school (which my dad pointed out to me - - - men notice things like that, haha). I am not sure how things ever exactly work, but there is one source of power that makes it run. I cannot fully grasp it all but know that He's there helping us iron out each problem as it comes along. Life is messy but we have the power to persevere through Him.