Wow! These past few weeks have been crazy and now I feel sad. I will not lie I am lonely and I guess I say this out of desperation. I need something fun to do or look forward to or just someone to sit and watch a movie with me. I know I am supposed to be here and that He has a greater plan it is just so hard for me to see. I want the common comforts and a drive to motivate me but literally He is the only thing motivating me. I guess He is my drive and that will suffice but I miss my friends back home and just want a friend. Thanks for those who chat with me from time to time on Skype and those who write or e-mail. I wouldn't have made it this far without you!

My internal battle

Shells released
From their cacoon
The hermit crab
Never ceased
Coming out so soon
The pain but a dab
A night with a full moon
The hidden beasts
The ground my slab
Full of kee foon( dust in Lao)
Around and about watch them feast
The golden retriever and the lab
Sinking amidst the heat in this avenged sand dune
The fingers all creased
As I watch the baboon
The teeth but a stab
And then released
How inoppurtune
The chemistry lab
And yet still sits the high priest
My life a monsoon
Oh what a drab
Thinking of whats deceased
Yet still I hear the tale of the harpoon
Knowing that greatness comes from the scab
Healing but the smallest and the least
Seeing the seeping color of maroon
The blood but a tab
Yet to be greased
In the painted typhoon
The world sits ready to backstab
My heart decreased to be increased
How do I weigh the meterlogical balloon?
As I enter the cab ready for the grab
I feel my heart the brewers yeast
These emotions becoming my signature tune
Yet I always move on with a little jab
Knowing this is the last but not the least
This world is this world and I am, yes, I am ,but part of a silly frigatoon
Entering the aintab
The southeast
I eat off the greased spoon
Knowing the beginning Ninth of Ab
We will all be released
Is all too close and yet so far from this loon

March Madness

Dear Debbie,

So let me begin with last thursday it took me 2 and a 1/2 hours to catch a ride to get home from language school. Friday I was super excited to get a new bike! I got it during rush hour and it was too late for them to get an alarm put in so I have to do that sometime this week. It was also raining but I made it home safely. Anyways, since then a few things have happened.

First, on Friday I spent the night with a friend and put my bike inside her house. Coming home I toppled over but no damage done to the bike just one scratch. I am not good at getting into our gate, but the saddest part is that both of my roommates and their boyfriends were there and no one heard me yell "Help" I didn't want to burn my leg on the boiler. I managed to get out fine. Lately, I am home a lot by myself and even when I am not people don't hear my cries which leads me to the next thing that happened.

Secondly, yesterday, I had a Lao friend help me drive again and I learned how to better stop and start and how to turn better. I was nervous about these things so I wanted confidence and I got it. Well around 4:30am or 5:00am I hear my roommates bike going off. I run down the stairs to my roommate yelling at two men shimmying up a tree and jumping the fence. Then I go to check my bike the lock is broken(they had to break two gadgets to break the lock). Then I go inside to get the keys. They are gone I wake up my third roommate and it becomes a fiasco All our keys were stolen and two bike locks broken and one the seat lock broken. All of our house locks were changed today and we have to get our bikes fixed tomorrow.

Thirdly, I will get an alarm installed inside but the sad part is it is a $100 more dollars. I also have to take it in a tuk-tuk and ask for all this stuff in Lao. What have I gotten myself into! I love my bike even if I have only gotten to drive it one day. My roommate bought two locks plus I'll have the alarm. Hopefully that'll be enough. Please uplift my talking and driving. I also have to get keys replaced something I have never done before I don't even know how to find a place. I wanna go home! Not really but there are some things I will never understand.

Searching for strength,
Suzzie

Drivng a motorbike

So hopefully soon I will be getting my own motorbike. I have practiced so many times with my gracious roommate S who let me drive it home from a friends in town tonight. Once I have my own I will have to drive it from their house once a week. This may sound like not a big deal but I have to shift gears and the whole process is nerve racking. WHat should have taken 45 minutes took me a little over an hour. However, I would rather it have taken me to long and be safe than my rushed home to beat a record. It was so scary, not going to lie, but for a third time driving not bad. Once I drove for about 15 minutes being followed by S and her boy on a bike. then I drove to and from the ATM about 5 minutes away(close to the school). The irony is that I told myself for the first two weeks of having my bike I will only drive to and from school except for our meetings on Wednesdays and I have not even made it to the school yet. Ha ha ha.... I may not be the best driver, a learner in the process, but I know with the father on my side. Ill be okay. Please continue to uplift my driving. Thanks!

Loves and hates

I love me some mangosteens. They have been in season since about December but I haven't had a chance to eat as many as I thought I would. I also like jujubies, kumquats, and strawberries. Can't get enough of that fruit!

I also love V8 and corn but V8 is so expensive here $4 a can I got it for $1 in Thailand I had to enjoy it. Fresh corn is so good.

Lastly I love making new friends.

Things that I don't like. Being yelled at by Lao people saying "Falang", two sided washing machines, walking home in 104 degree weather, teaching in the heat and hurting others when I am trying to help because I don't know how to act.

The age I live in

So wow this year has been trying but good. I dont think I have ever encountered so many people with so many problems before or known truly the extent I have been blessed. I have I guess that is what they say "You never know joy until you have had sorrow." This week some of the SP teachers had a friends child die. Between knowing little Lao and being a foreigner I wasn't completely sure what was going on.

I went in to ask for more hours to teach because I only have 8 right now and after some talk between them I came to realize that there were none so I proceeded to hang out only to find out 5 minutes into it my favorite teacher M was bawling. I didn't know what to do. She is so sweet she even has a sweet cry! I then proceed to hear M's mother who also works there and speaks little English tell everyone what happened. Someone then turned to me and said "baby die." I think that she said in Lao they were on a motorbike and a car hit them and if the baby had been in the other arm it would have lived. They were taking a bus to go to the funeral. I tried to hand M a pack of Kleenex as she walked out the door but all I got was "Thanks, no worries"(in Lao). I didn't mean to make her lose face if I did oh well. I wanted to leave but ended up sitting there till lunch a whole hour I had not planned and then leaving after that.

I had spent the whole weekend with some of these teachers at another city(same as the funeral). I thought maybe I had met a relative(everyones related here it is crazy). I was angry at first but all that kept popping into my mind is that he has a purpose. I cannot help but think this is going to be used in their lives. Leading them another step closer. Please be uplifting them! Also when I left yesterday one of the teachers daughters M didn't know. Ask that I can know how to be there for them and this culture that is so different from mine!

Holidays in Laos

So I have been bad about writing in general. There is so much going on sometimes I feel like I don't even have time to take it all in. By the end of the day I just want to crawl into bed and there is always more work to be done, this is all part of being a teacher who is not allowed to have a schedule because of society demands in a foreign country confused or feeling helpless 90% of the time.

WHen I say helpless I mean being ripped off because I am a foreigner all the time or not knowing the culturally appropriate thing to do till it is too late. I am coming to accept this and starting to figure out decent prices and not buy things if they are more than that.

The other day I was on a tuk-tuk and at first I got angry because I understood what they were saying and they told me a higher price than they were paying. You see they told me 5,000 kipp and there were 4 of us the total was 15,000 kipp. I can understand way more than I can speak so at first I was angry and then a few minutes later my father drew me back. I took a look around and listened more, the lady sitting next to me had a sick child and the other two were paying for her to go to the hospital because she could not afford it. It always costs at least between 3-5,000 a person and the more people the less it costs. How selfish was I being I can afford to spend less than a dollar.

OFten when I look around I am either left saddened or angry. There is so much hurt but I expected this. I think the worst things I have seen or have happened have been on the bus that is part of why I want my own transportation.
That and a lot of my friends live on the other side of town. It is a 45 minute bus ride one way and 1 1/2 hour bike ride. I live with two people but they are often not home so it is me and a big house all alone, so fun!

Now for why I really wrote this you see I taught on Christmas day and spent a great deal of it with people I don't know. Then this week Monday classes were cancelled I find out oh Monday morning, not uncommon here. WHy? Because my students are lazy and had a party where they didn't invite me.How rude! They have all their classes together so this has happened before and I waited 15 minutes and no one showed up.

So tommorrow I have no class unoffically. Apparently New Years is now the 2nd in Laos. Why? The university decided to offically close then in celebration. They want a 4 day weekend. Hahah..Whatever....Welcome to my world...eventually nothing will phase me but these holidays I think I hate them being away from home. Eventually it will be better but starting off it is so hard and lonely. I am thankful to all of those back home who helped to make it a little brighter and even in the midst of things it is good to know I am not forgotten. Thanks again and Happy New Years!