1st week with the new family...

Wow, I can't believe it's been another week. 2 weeks complete in Thailand and only 13 left to go. It seems like some much longer than 2 weeks. I think it's because we cram so much into just one day that each day would be the equivalent to 1 week. For example, we went on a field trip on Friday afternoon...we went to 4 different temples, walked around them and had tours, AND went to a traditional mock village...meaning it was just a set up of what a traditional village looked like. This was all just in a few hours in the afternoon. It was pretty cool though. I've learned that if you stick near Aj Mike it's like getting a guided tour. He knows EVERYTHING about the places we go. We had a few extremely boring lectures this past week. They all kind of blended together. It was mainly the history of Thailand but it was so confusing that the teacher might as well have been speaking in Thai. No one could follow it and it was 2 hours long. The one professor we had showed us slides...on an old school slide projector, oh and with the lights out so it was the perfect time for a nap. But I stayed awake.
I have rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and tonight I also had it for dessert. It's EVERYWHERE! And I'm starting to get a little sick of it. Oh how I just want a slice of pizza. There is a pizza hut in the mall...so tempting to go there. But so far I haven't given in and gotten any American food.
The other day it was graduation at CMU. It's a HUGE event! I'll post pictures sometime soon. It was really cool. Our internship hasn't started yet so we've had the afternoons off so we went walking around campus on graduation day. It's a whole week event, but we walked around on the day of the ceremony. The Princess came to town for it, but we didn't see her. It was almost like a fair or something it was so crowded. Since it was so crowded and there was so much traffic my Khun Ma asked me to meet her at the mall after school so she could pick me up there. Me and two other friends got a rot-dang all by ourselves and proceeded to the mall. We parted ways and I looked around the mall. It's an awesome place. My new favorite store is the "Grand Export Sale". This place has all the brand names from the US (forever 21, old navy, gap....etc) in one store for CHEAP! I'm talking a Gap Sweatshirt for like $5. I got two shirts and only spent like $4 total. It was great! I just love a bargain! And then I found the movie store. I'm pretty sure these are not "real" copies of the movies, but I got the Proposal (the movie I wanted to buy in the US but didn't want to spend $20) for just $3! And it's in ENGLISH! Which is amazing! I tried it out when I got home and it works and looks legit! Which is good because it seemed a little sketchy.
Living with a Thai family hasn't been the easiest thing of my life. The beginning of the week when I first moved in was actually kinda tough. They speak English so they don't want to speak to me in Thai. And that is not helping me improve in my Thai skills at all. And it seems that they like to talk among themselves a lot, which makes it difficult to feel welcome in the conversation and in the house. It was kinda discouraging to hear about everyones great families who talk to them a lot and teach them Thai all the time. But I came to the conclusion about half way through the week that this family is going to be what I make it. If I want it to be a good situation, I have to make it that way. They may not, but I have to put all the effort I can into making it work well. This means, I have to sit awkwardly at the table and just sit there and smile when they don't talk to me. And ask stupid questions to start a conversation. Or sit in the living room and read a book until they go to bed instead of sitting in my room with the door open. And sitting at the kitchen table with my Thai book making endless numbers of flash cards just to be sitting somewhere where they can see me. It hasn't been easy, but I think we are all getting more comfortable with each other and things seem to be improving. I know a lot of you have been praying for me, especially this week and that means a lot to me. God is good and is revealing Himself even more to me throughout this. It is making me appreciate the little things. Thursday night my Khun Ma sat at the table after dinner with me for a little while and we just chatted. It felt really nice. And today she invited me to watch TV with her. We watched CSI Miami...she is addicted to that show. She likes one of the guys in it...I can't remember who though. We watched 4 or 5 episodes. I felt nice to be included in that. So things are getting better.
Tonight we went out to the Central Airport Plaza...another mall, not the same mall as the other day. This mall was MASSIVE! Like the equivalent to the Garden State Plaza or something. It was huge. We had dinner there. I was hopeful that we would eat at Pizza Hut or McDonalds, but we walked right past those American places to the Thai food section. It was ok though because we had chocolate milkshakes! Never before has a chocolate milkshake tasted so good to me. It was wonderful! We split up to look around for a little while and I found some more export stores. :) I got a target zip-up sweatshirt for around $5....the original price tag was still on it and it was like $17! What a deal!! And another shirt for like $2. It's just so great! I also got a really cute pair of black and white flats for just over $3. After the mall we went to another mall to pick up my Khun Pa from work. He works at the K Bank. So we hung out in the bank for a little while while he finished up things there. I met some of his co-workers. He made me introduce myself and I'm pretty sure I said "thank you" instead of "hello". It was funny.
It was a pretty fun evening. Tomorrow is Jaaaat (not sure how to spell his name...but he is the youngest brother), his piano recital. So that should be fun. And we are going to tiger kingdom for lunch! I'm excited about that. You get to play with baby tigers there. I'm not sure if we are just going to fun or to play with the tigers too, but it will be fun either way.