i've been busy Vol. 2

[she was imitating me taking a picture]

so my other updates...

I MOVED. yes, i know that may seem a little odd but i guess my supervisor laura and has wanted the volunteers to have a new house for a long time. and as chance may have it laura herself was moving from her house into one right across the street and it dawned on her that we should just move into her old house. we made the dec

ision and in an unbelievably unthai [i.e. we actually did something fast] fashion, we moved in after only a few days...kind of. we were supposed to move last wednesday so on tuesday night my roommates and i feverishly packed up the house to be ready to go. however, the moving crew didn't show up till really late and after having spent all day at home, we were a little frustrated. so we didn't actually move till thursday and we didn't get all the rest of our stuff till this monday.

but frustrations aside our house is very nice. it's a lot newer than the other house and the biggest bonuses is that we live a lot closer to agape AND we have the internet. oh and of course we're much closer to laura which is super nice. sarah and i still share a room and there's a weird little nook where of course, i claimed my territory. i prefer small space, i've always liked the feeling of a little spot that i can really feel is my own and so far this one is proving to be a good one.

there's windows everywhere in this

house and they all have green curtains so when the sun shines through them, everything has this greenish haze. laura says by the time i leave i'm going to hate the color green, i really hope not.

work at agape has been going really well, this last week was kind of an interesting roller coaster of really bad shifts, to amazing ones. but my favorite night was when we were getting the kids settled down before they go to bed by watching a movie and a bunch of them were actually trying to say my name [an endeavor they gave up a long time ago]. some of them were

actually pretty good at it, so it looks like i won't be 'tish' after all...[i wouldn't mind that]. oh, and the best was that a lot of the kids tackled me with goodnight kisses! they've never done that before, i'm lucky if i even get one and i have to ask for it. it was just the best feeling ever.

dealing with the slow process of the children getting warmed up to me has made me think a lot about how it's hard to august to what is unfamiliar. i'm trying to get used to thailand, a place where one of the things that actually brings me a sense of familiarity is when a bathroom has toilet paper [thais' don't really use tp]. in the same way, these children stay close to the adults they know and trust so it can be hard for them when there are new volunteers. they have to test the waters, or more importantly, see what they can get away with, before they are willing to let loose and jump all over me. it's very humbling to know that i can not instantly receive their love, i have to work for it and that's surprisingly more satisfying that i ever thought it could be.