I took two buses and approximately 9 hours to get to Lampang on Friday the 24th. After arriving I was brought to Naiyana's house to change and then we headed to a restaurant for the Christmas party. When we arrived it looked more like a Halloween party then a Christmas party. The people were wearing bunny ears and one lady was decorated in paper butterflies. I don't quite understand but it was really boring, definitely not what I expected. We stayed there for about 5 hours and then we left and walked home. I was given a Christmas gift of some key chains and a Thai decoration from Naiyana. I also was told that on the January 15th Naiyana will be picking me up and taking me to the famous mountain to spend a night there. I am so excited. On Christmas day Naiyana bought pizza for us and then we walked to buy me a new camera and we went to the grocery store to look around at all the other shops. For Christmas night we watched A Walk To Remember and Dirty Dancing. It was a great day. The next day we just hung around town and at night we went to Walking Street outside Naiyana's house and then played with her grandsons.
The next day I switched to my friends house. Her host dad is the mayor of Lampang and has a gorgeous house. His daughters house is right next to his and she normally stays in Bangkok so we got to have her whole house to ourselves. They have English television so I watched Oprah and some other movies. The next day we went back to the grocery store and bought movies. That night we went to the Winter Carnival and rode the Ferris wheel after having a delicious Chinese dinner with her host parents. Her host dad also payed for us to have a foot massage before heading home. We did about the same thing everyday and went to have pizza or pasta at least three times. We went to visit the waterfall and hot spring. It was so much fun and after hiking up about 1,000 steps it was also a great workout.
For New Year's we went to a steak house and then walked around and watched live concerts and listened to my friends host dad give a speech before the countdown. I was supposed to leave the next day but he informed us that he was going to Bangkok and we would have no one to take me to the bus station. So we stayed at my other friends house for two nights and went shopping, watched movies. Until on Monday I had to go home. My friends host mom took me out to breakfast and then helped me get on a bus. The bus was full of college students trying to get back, the isles were full of people sitting and standing so we didn't stop since there was no room for more. I got to Chiang Rai in record time. Then Ajan Paradee picked me up and took me out for coffee and to meet the newest addition to our YE family a girl from Brazil. She just arrived on Saturday and will live in Chiang Rai. I met her over iced coffee, tomato soup, garlic bread and apple pie, before heading back to the bus station for the ride to Chiang Kham. When I arrived my new friends wife picked me up and took me home. I have no school this week since my class is taking Mid-Terms so I just hung out at home yesterday and then headed to the school to teach. Only two months of school left before I am on break for the rest of my stay. I think I will be able to survive it.
Until Later, Dacotah Smith
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