Well, things have
been busy since I got back to Thailand. It was actually more of an adjustment
than I was expecting, getting back into the swing of things. It has been great
reconnecting with friends and spending time with Sophie. Our new house is
awesome and just the right size for us and any friends who want to come over.
We are planning to have a housewarming party on Sept 1 and do a prayer
dedication with some Thai, Akha and foreign friends. Should be a lot of fun!
I have had just one
Thai lesson with my fantastic Thai teacher, but I think I will have to switch
teachers because Kru Niti needs to split her time between here and Chiang Rai,
so I think she will not have time to teach me. I am planning to start having
lessons with Napapon at Taw Saeng. My goal is to pass the O-Net exam in two
years. This is the exam given to students graduating from the 6th grade.
She has an American student who just took the exam for graduating high school
seniors, so now she basically has a GED from Thailand as well as her degree
from the US. I don’t know that I am that ambitious! But, I do think it will
help me learn faster if I actually have a goal in mind. I am excited to start
lessons and need to get some books to prepare for all the different subjects.
Even math! I know 6th grade math, but if I can’t read the
directions, it won’t help me much!
I got to spend some
time with Ning and Faa as they helped me move house on August 1. Ning is also
going to be helping me with the adoption lawyer and hopefully continue to help
get Sophie’s Thai ID. Right now, the plan is to file guardianship paperwork
this week. Then, there will be a home visit in September and a court date in
October and then I should have official custody of her! Then it’s another 2
years before we can file for her US citizenship. That is why we need to get her
Thai ID before then. If she has no Thai ID, she will not be able to study past
the 9th grade, and if she does not yet have her US citizenship, it
will be harder to get her into an international school to continue her
schooling. So complicated!
In other Sophie news:
We had a really fun Mother's Day (it's on August 12 here). We have been
planning to go to the SnowDome at the zoo for about a year, but we just never
had time. Finally, we decided we would go on Sunday after church. Well, when
she talked about the SnowDome, I envisioned something like the huge indoor snow
playground they have in Dubai, especially after Sophie described it. I figured
we could spend a couple hours there and have a great time. Ha! We had fun, but
it was not exactly Dubai style snow. First of all, you don't get an indefinite
amount of time, they sell about 25 tickets for each time slot, and you get 20
minutes inside for $5 a person. This is because it is a very small room. First,
you line up outside with the other ticket holders, sweating in the sweltering
humidity, despite the fact that it is pouring rain. Finally, they open the
doors and people file into the air conditioned building, past a sign that warns
of the low temperature inside the SnowDome (-7C or about 18F). You go into a
room where they hand out rubber boots more effective for surviving the rainy
season outside than for walking on snow or ice, and a large red snow jacket
that closes with Velcro (most of which has worn off over the years). Finally,
they pack you into a tiny room with a huge door just like a walk-in freezer.
The excitement in the air is palpable, and you can tell that this may be the
first time some of the little kids will see snow in person. The door opens and
people rush into the SnowDome eagerly anticipating the joy of snow play.
However. Rather than
the huge hills that mimic actual ski parks that you see in the Dubai area, this
place has the following: a small slide for little kids that at one time was
covered with hard packed snow, but after years of being used, is now just a 3
inch thick sheet of ice. Then there is a fake snowman you can take pictures
with and a fake igloo you can crawl into and stick your head out the top.
Finally, the big draw is that it has a large hill that runs about 3/4 of the
way around the room that you can slide down with inner tubes. Again, the snow
has completely disintegrated and now it's more like what I imagine a waterslide
would look like in the winter months if the temperature dropped suddenly and
the water froze. Super slippery and fun though! They also have a couple random
snowboards and skis sitting around, but what the purpose is, I am not sure, as
they do not come equipped with ski or snowboard boots. I did not realize how
much I totally missed snow. It has been about 2 and a half years since I went snowboarding
last and I hadn’t thought about it much, but now I am dying to take Sophie to
see real snow and teach her to snowboard!
After our 20 minutes
were up and we were dumed back into the summer humidity and rain, we headed up
to look at the big cats, like snow leopards and Asian cats. Sophie decided to
go shopping at the little market they had nearby but I stayed under the shelter
out of the rain. When she came back, she presented me with the cutest hand-made
purse for a Mother’s Day present. I love it, especially since I really needed a
new purse; mine is all fallen apart and sad.
After we left the
zoo, we went to the walking street to pick up some photo frames and vases for
the house, but it started POURING rain just after we got there, so we ended up
meeting some friends from church and hiding in a restaurant for dinner instead
of our usual cheapo street food Sunday dinner. We failed to do any actual
shopping, but had a good time in the rain anyway!
