Catching Up!

Dear All,

Hello! I have been feeling a bit out of touch recently, so I thought I would send out a quick email to everyone giving a little update about life here in Thailand and how things are wrapping up for me here, preparing for my transition back home in July.

First of all, Happy Easter to everyone! I will have my Easter/Song Kran break starting this Thursday. I am heading to Vietnam, in the northern part of the country, near Hanoi and then we are taking a night train to the mountains in Sapa and then we will take an over night boat trip in Halong Bay. I am very excited, this is my last country to check off my list! Well..at least for now. :)

I am really enjoying my students this year, the kids are so quick to learn and easy to adapt to change. Their parents, on the other hand, are a bit of a different story, but I'm winning them over with my "Katie charm". Just kidding. But for the most part, they are okay. We are learning about storytelling and drama, two of my favorite things, I really love this unit of study.

I have a bit of a funny story to share about a couple of my students. I asked them where they were going for their break and two boys both said they were going to Switzerland. I asked the first boy which airline he was flying and he said "Thai Airlines." I asked the second boy the same question and he said "business". I chuckled to myself after that one....I'm 31 and STILL haven't flown business class.

These last couple of months I know will just fly by, and I'm really looking forward to having my last visitor come. Sara is coming to visit me the last week in June and I will get to take her around and show her everything I love about Thailand. I think it will be a very nice way for me to wrap up my time here.

Everyone has been asking me what my next steps are, and at this point I really don't know. I do know I am flying home on July 3, and will be over with Erik and Laura, well, mostly just Laura, as Erik is studying for his bar exam in July. So I am going to spend a lot of time with the kiddos, which I am VERY excited about! My "base camp" will be with my parents (THANKS MAMA AND DADDY!) But I don't actually know how much time I will actually BE there! Funny how things never change, huh?

I'm looking into doing a couple of different things next year, the first one being an opportunity to work at the Club again, where I worked in college. They are expanding their programs and will need another full time staff member, which sounds exciting to me! I'm also applying to anything that looks interesting on Craigslist, and that has been highly entertaining. Some of the job postings look great, and then when you read the fine print it's for something completely different.

Oh, and I just got back from Malaysia, near Burneo, where I did something extremely scary! I stood up in front of 45 of my teaching colleagues and talked to them for an hour about what I know about student led conferences. I got a lot of positive feedback, but needless to say I was terrified. Maybe some of you don't know this about me because I'm usually so outgoing and friendly, but public speaking is NOT my forte! I get the WORKS when I try to even THINK about doing that: shaking knees, sweating palms, fingers that don't do what I tell them to do...but it really actually went okay. Good thing my good friend Erin was there to co-present with me! But overall, it was a wonderful trip and the conference was great as well. I got to spend a lot of time with Pascale, which was great because usually I have to share her and I got her all to myself! :)


Love to you all,
Katie