It's Tuesday of week 2. Yesterday went by really quickly. I guess it's because I only had three classes and then went to bed at 8:30 due to a nasty cold. Hopefully it'll go away soon...

I had a class 1st period this morning, but 20 minutes into the period the room was still empty. It's normal for kids to be late, since there's no built in passing time between classes, but 20 minutes is extreme. Finally, my co-teacher came in and told me that they were taking a class photo or something. It would have been nice if someone told me! On one hand it's nice to have an extra hour off today, but on the other hand, how the heck am I supposed to catch them up to the curriculum? I still haven't truly figured out how serious this school is. Compared to what I'm hearing from other teachers around Thailand, I have a lot more guidance and rules. I definitely appreciate that, but I'm hearing from my co-teachers at my school that there's quite a lot of wiggle room. Do I have to make sure that every single class has grades for each unit, like I was told? It's not my fault if they take away class time for a week or two in a row. Last Wednesday I had no afternoon classes because the students were building krathongs for the holiday. This Wednesday I have no classes. At all. Now they'e two weeks--a whole unit--behind. What do I do about that? Oy..

Anyway. This weekend was pretty spectacular. Even the storm that brought major flooding to my street was a kind of fun, authentic experience. Check it out:

This wasn't even the deepest part of the water

This is the face of unsure positivity. That's the same thumb that got me in the back of this pickup

I made my way to Kanchanaburi where I met up with Katrina, Jade, and Sam; friends from orientation. There were also four boys in our group: Mike x2, Scott, and Seth. The boys were in the other hotel during orientation, so the girls and boys didn't know each other. It ended up working out nicely! The first night we spent at a really charming guesthouse ON the River Kwai. I really mean on--the rooms were on docks. I was oddly lazy about my camera so I don't really have many of my own photos to show. I only brought my 50mm lens with me and I was more focused on living in the moment than capturing it for later. Luckily, everyone else seemed to take a lot of pictures, and one even had a GoPro that caught a lot of footage. Here's a view from our room porch in the morning:

View of the River Kwai from our guesthouse porch in Kanchanaburi

How gorgeous is that?! Our crew went out surprisingly late (for me) on Friday night. The first bar we stumbled in was a really, really awesome reggae bar. I literally didn't even sit down or get a drink or anything for probably about 45 minutes. The live band gestured to the various percussion instruments and microphones and I hesitated not. I even took the liberty of handing out maracas and cowbells to others. It was great fun! We happily ran into two other CIEE/OEG friends, Morgan and Kristen. Here's a video I stole from Sam of everyone loving on each other and singing Country Roads. I, surprisingly, was not on stage at this point in the night:

After the reggae bar, we found ourselves in another bar almost by accident. Katrina and I were looking for some vegetarian noodles (as I've said, it's hard to come by, especially late at night) and finally found a place that would make them. They took at LEAST an hour to bring us our food, so we hung out there for a while. We had fun playing Connect Four and Jenga, with our own There-Are-No-Rules rules. We were also entertained by a very enthusiastic ladyboy with pretty much zero inhibitions. That was fun.

The next morning we woke up pretty early (a little earlier than necessary...boys are bad at getting up in the morning). The plan was to head out to Erawan National Park around 7 or 7:30. Yeahhhh we didn't end up catching a bus there until 10:30 and we got in close to noon. Not to worry! We climbed to I think five or six tiers of breathtaking waterfalls. The water was so incredibly clear. And so incredibly full of fish. If any of you know me well enough, you'll know that I am stupidly terrified of fish. I can look at them and then can be far away, but they sure as hell better not touch me. And these fish were huge. And the ones that weren't huge were the ones that sucked on your feet. No. Thanks. But I ended up facing my fear and getting in the water via the most direct way to a giant rock I could stand on. Friends are awesome and made big splashes to scare the fish away before my entrance. Bless them. I ended up taking a couple jumps off the rock! I'm so glad I did. Thanks, friends, for helping me face my fear and allowing myself to have fun :)

Tier 1 waterfall

FISH. Even just looking at this picture makes my heart rate go up

We found a spot at another waterfall where we sat atop the falls (fish free!) and even set up a hammock! That was awesome. Good call Mr. Spielman on the hammock. Here are six of the eight of us sitting on said ledge:

New friends at Erawan National Park.
Photo by Scott Moll, stolen from Seth Berry

That night we camped out in the park! I'm really glad I brought my own Thermarest, I heard the mattresses the others rented weren't so great. We had a lovely view of the lake, despite the tents practically being on top of each other. Not a whole lot of privacy. I spent a while (definitely over an hour) reading to the crew. That was awesome! I read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn and The Name of the Wind obbbbviously by my boy Patrick Rothfuss. Please read these books if you haven't already. Please. Pretty please. I actually bought copies of Pat Rothfuss' books to send and lend to my friends (that is awesome rhyming right there). I'm sending The Name of the Wind to its first recipient today! Hopefully it makes it to Northern Thailand okay. If you want to be on my loaner list, let me know :)

The school day is coming to a close soon and I think I'm going to take it really easy again tonight. Stupid cold. Maybe try out my new blender and see if I have any smoothie skills. 

Until next time, friends.