Thai Ghost Movies and Flexi Girl

It is my last week of teaching for the semester! How did that happen?!

I spoke to Jess who arrives here next Saturday and I think we will leave for Chiang Mai on the Monday night bus. We are very excited, but not very planned. I think we will have a session when Jess gets here. She is more like her mother and our grandfather than she pretends, so I am confident that we will have some sort of alphabetized-color-coded-calendar-meets-map after a few hours of work. I couldn't think of a better person to be my travel-buddy and I can't begin to imagine what our adventure has in store...Some hiking, eating, three days sitting on wood benches on a "slow boat" to Laos and a lot of sweating with no aircon in Vietnam, I think.

This friday I went to see a Thai movie. It was supposed to be a scary movie. Neuki warned me that I would need her to sleep over for a week after seeing it. Most of you know that I really hate scary movies, but since my coworkers invited me, I thought I should go to advance the friendships and because I didn't want them to know I am a baby. My bodily reaction to fright is to laugh, and I laughed the whole time, but mostly because it was so NOT scary that it was funny. It was about ghosts and karma, and that stuff doesn't usually scare me the way that murderers do. There is also a possessed "Took-Gaaay", which is a big gecko that we have here. I slept alone Friday night and did not wake up sweating in fright at all. I'm so proud of myself. One thing that I forgot to say about Thai movies when I wrote about Harry Potter is that everyone in the theater must stand for this song that honors the king at the beginning of the movie. It's like the Star-spangled Banner before a sports game, I guess. Photos of the King doing good things and scenic landscapes flash while the song plays. Another interesting window into Thai culture.   One more thing, they sell shuttlecocks and ping pong balls at 7-11, how convenient!?  I never knew why they called it a convenient store until now, but I am ALWAYS looking for a shuttlecock.  They don't sell nail polish remover or peanut butter, but who needs those things when you have odd sports paraphernalia? 

Yesterday, Alison, Mere and I went to see "Beijing Acrobatics Show." I had been under the impression that it was associated with the Olympics, but it was not. Anyways, it was really cool, sort of Circe du Soleil-ish. They had four motorcycles inside this little ball driving in circles and upsidedown. Meredith, the physisist, was not as impressed as I was because she could explain how it worked using formulas. Something about the three types of velocity. How boring. There was one girl, "flexi-girl" as Alison called her, who must have had rubber for a spine. At one point, there was a pole on stage with a soft covering on the tip, like a sock or something. Flexi-girl put the sock in her mouth, kicked her legs over her head so far that her gluteus maximi rested on her forehead. Oh, and, all the while she was spinning plates on her legs and arms so the only thing touching the ground was the pole that she had in her mouth. Shannon Traeger, I have some new moves for us to try in couple's yoga.

Tomorrow I am going with the Business English Department to the Pullman Hotel (that's the nice one) for dinner to demonstrate Western manners. My mom sort of freaked out when I told her this. It's drink on the left, bread and fork on the right, start from the inside, put your elbows on the table, chew with your mouth open and put your napkin on your head, right Mom?

This could be my last post before I head out next Monday, but hopefully I can post as I travel. Thanks for reading!