I'm lovin' it.

As of late I have been spending a lot of time at the local MeDonald's studying my SAT book, I feel like I’m 16. I am not a fan of either, but one provides me with free wifi, while the other provides an income. Last night I made it back to Bangkok after a four-day trip to Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai is the second largest city in Thailand; very similar to how Concepción is in Chile. The city was more laid back, cooler and walk-able in comparison to BKK, allowing it to make the cut of places I could live in the future. I took the night bus up on Thursday, had most of Friday to recover at the hotel and then went to the ACE office to meet the staff and do a “walk through” of Monday’s events. Mike, my new boss met me there and gave me a better picture as to what the weekend was about. He is an energetic, classy Singaporean businessman in his early 40’s, it’s nice know who my boss actually is and being able to communicate with him.

Saturday morning we built check dams. Basically they are small dams set up along the course of a river in order to better regulate the flow of water between the wet and dry season. There were four groups involved in the project; students from University of Calgary, Fulbright/Princeton/ACE interns, and then two local high school groups. It was really nice spending most of the day in the middle of the nowhere, breathing fresh air, meeting new people, and of course- building a dam with my bare hands.

Sunday was a free day, so I took advantage and did some sight seeing in the city. Being able to walk until I was tired instead of until I was overheated was great. The cooler season has arrived! (it’s still in the 80’s). That night we all went to a welcome cocktail party for the new American Consul General to Chiang Mai. After hearing the life story of a 65+ man from Utah, I opted to float between my five new friends instead of “mingling.” Cocktail parties usually have great food, and of course the free cocktails, but aside from that they usually involve a lot of surface conversation.

Monday was a day long English conference at one of the local high schools. There were workshops on SAT, TOFEL and how to apply to US universities. The best part was the entertainment- Thai high school cover bands singing songs ranging from the Beatles to Oasis to Blink182. The cherry on top of the weekend events: a Thai high school dance troupe (3 girls, 4 “guys”) dancing to some new Beyonce song. Oh yes they dropped it several times, inspiring young Thai’s to learn English and study in the land of pop music.