California Dreamin

This past week I had the privilege to spend some time with family and friends in Central and Northern California. I had a few days with my friend Holly and then a few days with my Aunt Leona and Uncle Dave. Holly and I taught together at ICS before she moved to Central California a year ago. We started our trip in San Jose, traveling down the coast through Monterey, Carmel, and the Big Sur area, before catching the sunset in Cambria and finishing our drive at her home in Paso Robles. The drive was absolutely stunning, as was the company. We had a great breakfast with Holly's family the next morning and then we spent Friday in Paso Robles and San Luis Obispo and had oceanside apps and cocktails at Avila Beach before another beautiful sunset. It was so good to spend time with Holly after just talking via Skype for the last year!

On Saturday, Dave and Leona joined us for wine tasting in the Paso Robles region. With most of my wine tasting experience coming in deep Argentine reds and Malbecs, it was a lot of fun to taste a variety of wines from small vineyards in the area. At the end of the day, We ended the day at my uncle's favorite brewery, and then I head back to San Jose with them

After a lazy Sunday morning, Dave, Leona, and I went for a beach walk and tide pool exploration in Carmel. The sunny weather was perfect and it was a refreshing change to be on a gorgeous beach that wasn't 95 degrees and humid! We explored the charming town of Carmel a bit before heading to the Monterey Aquarium for their summer live music evening. The aquarium itself was amazing, and that much more fun for the evening atmosphere (and lack of hoards of children). For my last day we drove north to Napa for a couple of tours and tastings, fulfilling a lifelong dream of mine to visit Napa Valley. It lived up to everything I imagined, and more. We had a special dinner at home that night before I flew out the next morning. 

It was a wonderful week that left me asking, can I do this every year? 

New York!

This past weekend I got to go to New York to visit my brother.  I love NYC, but I've been several times in the last few years so we decided to spend some time outside the city and rented an Airbnb in the Catskills for two nights.  I got some time in lower Manhattan on Friday before while Matt worked and then we drove north with his girlfriend, his dog, and his roommate's dog.  It was a crowded car, but it worked.  Like any good up north trip, our activities primarily consisted of hiking and discussing, planning, preparing, and eating great meals.  Our cabin was next to a pond near the small town of Walden, NY.  Almost like being at Walden Pond, almost.  The cabin had a screened in porch overlooking the pond that we found was the perfect breakfast spot. And appetizer spot. And dinner spot. 

Saturday was cold and a bit wet so our hike got cut a bit short and we had a nice big lunch in town before heading back and going for a long walk in the woods behind the cabin.  On Sunday afternoon we hiked in Harriman State Park on our way back to the city.  It was a beautiful day, gorgeous hike in the hills, and perfect ending to the trip.  On Monday I got my city fix with a visit to the Tenement Museum, Central Park, the MET, and a cafe while Matt worked and then a great evening with dinner and drinks in the Lower East Side.  Tuesday I got time in Matt's neighborhood, Ridgewood, which I really enjoy, before flying back to Detroit.  I can't wait to go back next year!  

Saturday hike to the waterfall in Minnewaska State Park 

Wildflowers and woods behind the cabin. 

Start of the Sunday hike in Harriman State Park 

Lunch in Central Park 

Ten Years Ago

Ten years ago this week I went on a "once in a lifetime" trip to Argentina to visit my brother at the end of his study abroad semester.  Over the course of the two weeks I was there I fell in love with the country and rekindled the love of travel that I had discovered on my own study abroad semester a few years earlier in Aberdeen, Scotland. Those two weeks I spent in Argentina drastically changed the last decade of my life, leading me to move to Buenos Aires myself two years later, and then on to Bangkok a few years after that.  I never could have imagined this international teacher life- that someone would pay me to teach in a Christian school in a foreign country where the perks include introducing students to Christ and traveling on weekends.  I never imagined as I struggled with caring about high school and college German classes because "when would I ever use a foreign language?!" that years later I would speak Spanish and even a little bit of Thai (and spend a week in Austria during college really wishing I'd paid attention in German class!).  

My life in Bangkok comes with a great many sacrifices, but it also comes with much joy, great adventure, and a daily life that feel amazingly normal to me now.  The more I travel and live, the more I leave pieces of my heart scattered around the globe.  The more people and cutlures that I encounter the more beauty and suffering I see in the rainbow of faces around me.  I love being a part of this global community, love living as an ambassador for Jesus in a land where his name is barely known.  I hate the unknowns, the how longs, the what nexts.  But I love the present, the todays.  I love summers in Michigan and around the US, connecting with friends and family around the world.  

In the ten years since I stepped off that flight at Ezeiza airport (to a baggage handlers strike and a swarm of angry Argentines, I might add) I have changed in ways I never could have predicted, shaped into something new by both the beauty of it all and the pain that accompanies.  So the next ten years? I don't think I can even begin to imagine.  

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end...

I've spent most of my teaching career in a middle school classroom, despite my dual certification in elementary and middle.  From Lincoln to BAICA to Derby to ICS, I've found a home within the strange structure and nuances of the middle grades.  So it not without sadness that I pack up my boxes and move them to K4.  But even as I say good-bye to my 120+ students this week, I still know it's the right choice.  I'll miss my older students. I'll miss their ability to do things on their own. I'll miss their humor.  I'll miss solving equations with them. I'll miss that they instantly know what The Look means and why they are receiving it. But, I am ready.   

I spent my morning sorting and organizing in my new classroom and beginning to envision more concretely what my coming year will look like.  It's fun and exciting to think about the joy and delight in four year olds as they discover and experience the world around them.  Even when that joy gives way to fatigue and tears, I love the honesty of kids that age. They are who they are, even when you might not want them to be :)  I love watching them learn, seeing them master new skills, and the sense of accomplishment they feel when they do that.  I love the small class, and really getting to know each student and family. I love that I get to exercise a muscle I haven't used in a number of years and put to use the full range of training I got at Hope and The Discovery Center.  

I am thankful that ICS has given me this opportunity. I'm thankful that I could change teaching positions and do something new without changing jobs.  In a field that has very few opportunities for professional growth (though the personal growth is unending), making lateral moves keeps things fresh and interesting.  And I am thankful that I have six weeks in the States to see people (and buy classroom stuff!) before the transition is official.  Two and a half more days middle school!  

A hole in my door: Not your usual Friday night

Sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction.  Or at least crazier.  Especially in Thailand. 

It started like an ordinary Friday evening. I finished work and walked home, looking forward to a relaxing night, thinking I would put the baseball game on while I folded and put away clean laundry.  My helper comes on Fridays, so I would come home to a clean house and a drying rack full of clothes.  And then I went to put my key in the door. 

I should back up.  My front door has always annoyed me greatly.  Most doors in my apartment complex have a door lock and dead bolt.  Mine doesn't have a deadbolt, but instead it has a metal gate/screen door that has the potential to be padlocked shut.  My landlord thinks it keeps me safer.  I think it's ugly, and it gets in the way.  I call it The Stupid Door. One of the worst things about The Stupid Door, and it's a bit hard to understand this without seeing it in action, is that if you leave your key in the lock and push the door and Stupid Door open simultaneously, The Stupid Door will move across the lock in a such a way that it bends your key or worst case scenario, break it off in the lock.  You have to remove your key from the lock before pushing them open, or just reach through The Stupid Door to push the big door open before opening The Stupid Door.  

I've bent a few keys in it in my day, and two years ago when people were staying here over the summer, one broke off in the lock.  But at that point, the door is open, since it happens as you walk in. They called a locksmith, the door knob was replaced, no big deal.  

Which brings me back to today when I arrive home and go to put my key in the lock and discover it has a broken off key in it.  

I knock because I assume that even though my helper's shoes aren't outside the door, she must still be there if the key is broken, right?  Wrong.  I frantically start calling her, my landlord, and my friend- just in case I need a place to sleep tonight.  No one answers, though I do hear back from my friend quickly so I know at least they are home.  I eventually get through to my helper, who speaks rapid fire Thai at me, of which I understand roughly 10%.  She arrives back 5 minutes later and tells me that she didn't realize what had happened until I called and told her.  I want to give her the benefit of the doubt because I know she's not the most observant person in the world, as evidenced by some clean-but-not-so-clean issues I've had with her lately, but I'm really not sure how you can break a key in a lock and not notice.  

At any rate, I'm in a bind, and she feels bad.  I post a picture of my door knob pickle to a community Facebook page in hopes that someone will know something about picking locks, or breaking into Parkland apartments, or at least the number for a good locksmith.  Meanwhile, my next door neighbor has a couple chaangs (maintenance guys, workers, technicians, etc) working at her place and my helper asks one of them to help.  He comes over to take a look, poor sap.  

For the next 45 minutes he tries to pick the lock, break the knob, drill holes in the knob and chisel/pry the knob out of the door.  None of it is successful, in part because, you guessed it, The Stupid Door is in the way and they can't get to the door knob well.  The entire time, I'm standing there quickly melting into a puddle of sweat in my work clothes while my helper frets about.  The building guard comes up to see what's going on since he can see what we're doing on the security camera.  He hasn't got any brilliant ideas either, at least as far as I can tell, since I haven't studied a word of Thai in 18 months and don't understand anything anyone is saying.  

After about a hour, the chaangs (another guy from next door has now joined us, and the neighbor comes out from time to time to try and help) and the guard communicate to me via charades that they think our best bet is to drill a large hole in the door and reach in and unlock it that way.  But they want to be really sure that I know what they are doing and give the okay before they do it.  Truth be told, I had no idea if that was the best plan and had no one to bounce the idea off. My landlord was still not answering her phone and no one around me spoke English. I know nothing about locks and nothing about what to do  in such a situation. So I took deep breath, nodded, and gave the okay to drill. 

At this point, though very frustrated, I'm also slightly glad that it's this hard to break into my apartment. Maybe I don't need that deadbolt after all. 

Ten minutes, a drill, and a hammer later, we make it through the door. The chaang reaches through the door but the inner part of the knob is no longer intact so it won't unlock.  

I reach through and try- no luck.  After much hammering and banging we eventually get it done and the door swings open.  

End of story?  Nope.  

We make it in the door and straight away my helper starts cleaning up the pieces of lock and door and piles of saw dust. I go next door and pay the guy for his help.  When I get back, my helper closes the door to sweep behind it.  And then she realizes.  A piece of the lock is still in the door, and now it's locked shut. With no door knob. And no way out.  

She starts panicking.  Oddly enough, I'm not overly worried. If there is one thing I have learned from being caught in bad/strange/whatever situations, it is that they always end somehow.  I grab my IKEA toolbox and start trying to pry the bit of lock out, hoping my helper doesn't have a meltdown. She calls her family and tells them she's locked in on the 6th floor and can't get out.  

A bit earlier, I received a phone call from a kind friend/neighbor who had seen my post on the Facebook page and wanted to make sure I had found help and was getting in.  At the time we were nearly in, but I was still grateful for his kindness in checking. Now though I called him back and told him the situation. Within minutes he was outside my door with better tools than I what I had, talking with me through the hole in the door, and working to get the bit of lock out.  Which he did.  We were free.  

After he left my helper apologized profusely, while sobbing and hugging me. I really think she thought she'd be here all night.  

And now, a piece of paper covers the holes while all the inside bolts are done, and The Stupid Door is latched shut.  I feel plenty secure for tonight, and tomorrow I will get a padlock and finally make use of the padlock option on The Stupid Door. 

A different chaang came just now with my landlord, declared the large Hulk-like hole completely unnecessary and will get a new door this weekend and install in on Monday morning. While I had no trouble holding it completely together (and even say a few mai bpen rai's) through the entire ordeal, I definitely lost it after my landlord and the new chaang left. These are the moments when I just want to live in a country where I understand people, where I know how the system works, where my parents or brothers or uncles are just a phone call away.  But instead I'm here, in the middle of a circus, sometimes flourishing and sometimes floundering. 

Fluttering on Fences: missing places

How hard it is to escape from places. However carefully one goes they hold you- you leave little bits of yourself fluttering on the fences- like rags and shreds of your very life. - Katherine Mansfield 

Some places just stick with you, even if your tenure there was brief. They come to you in your dreams, or spring up when you least expect it, give you pause, take you back, and leave you longing to walk their streets or hills one more time.  Lately, Argentina and Scotland have been doing that to me.  Even though Michigan is my home and is more deeply rooted, it doesn't cling to the corners quite so much because I am able to visit so often.  

Last week the cobbled streets of my San Isidro neighborhood sprang to life in a voice text sent to me by a dear friend there.  The sounds of Spanish, and not just any Spanish but Argentine Spanish and her voice. I wanted to see her, I wanted to be there, from a place deep within me.  A few days later I saw a picture on Facebook of an aquaintence hiking in Scotland and the damp hills and sharp breeze caught me off guard.  It's been nearly 13 years since I left, and I was only there for 6 months. You'd think I'd be over it by now!  

Some days, when the intense Bangkok sun beats down or I navigate the piecemeal sidewalk that separates my apartment complex from ICS, I am tempted to think that I just want to get out of here, I remind myself of those longings for the places I no longer call home.  I remind myself that someday I will feel that way about this place, too. Someday I will miss the dilapidated elevator in my building or the pounding of my upstairs neighbor making som tam for dinner, again.  Some day I will miss the small things that make up life here. So I take a deep breath, wipe the sweat from my face, and let a piece of me flutter on the fence as I walk by. 

A day off during a busy season

One of my favorite things about living and working abroad are all the random days off that are sprinkled throughout the year.  I'm not sure if Argentina and Thailand really have that many more of these days than the US does or if I just notice them more since I don't expect them, celebrate them, or have anything I need to do on them.  I love Memorial Day, for example, but it doesn't have the same time of freedom that a random Tuesday off does.  As much I miss the family gatherings on such secondary holidays, not having anything to do and having them fall in the middle of week makes them such delectable little treats.  

Today, in honor of Coronation Day, I slept in, had a lovely tea and quiet time, cleaned and organized my house, went out to lunch, bought groceries, made granola, and had afternoon tea with a good book. I'm even getting a change to blog, and it's still just 4:00! Like I said, delectable little treats, they are :)  

It is a welcome repreive from the May Madness that settles over international schools each year.  In the weary last month of a school year we cram in concerts, banquets, visa appointments, graduations, a clothing exchange, and any number of end of the year events in addition to farewells for those who are leaving, garage sales for us to buy what they're leaving behind, and the general wear and tear that is a part of the end of any school year.  I usually board that plane in early June completely exhausted to the core, but this year I am bound and determined to have something left in the gas tank at the end.  I'm being more proctective and selective with my time and energy than usual. We'll see how well it works...

At work I've been busy with all the usual middle school stuff, as well as doing everything I can to get things done for K4. I've scoured the garage sales for gently used toys that the room needs, in addition to some teaching and organizational supplies.  I've got some of my things ready for Open House and the first day of school.  It's been a lot of fun, and has confirmed to me that I made the right decision in the switch. 

Coming home from garage sales last Saturday. We filled my front basket with stuff, hooked the baskets on bought onto the front and bike of the bike, threw everything else into a huge Ikea bag for Karly to carry, and we were on our way!  Intending only to go a few blocks to the nearest moto taxi stand, we were having too much fun and I drove us all the way to Karly's house.  

The start of the rains has meant lots of really impressive sunsets, which I've been able to enjoy while getting down time on my nights in. 

I ordered some things, including the cute shirt he's wearing, for my nephew a while ago and had them delivered to my mom's house.  My mom and sister opened them with me via Facetime while they were there this past weekend.  Little Man is growing so fast that I thought she better open them before I get home (one month from today)! I simply adore this solemn little guy and can't wait to meet him!