Second Honeymoon

As I said in the last post, John went back to the US last week for Roman's wedding. He spent 3 days traveling and a little less than 3 days in the US, but he was so happy to be able to see his best friend get married and to see his folks and some of our friends. I stayed here in Bangkok and enjoyed some nice girl time (with friends and also by myself). But 5 days is the longest we've spent apart since we got married, so when John got back at 1 am on Tuesday night, we were VERY VERY happy to see each other! :)

Believe it or not, tomorrow is our three year wedding anniversary. Those of you who were at the wedding are probably wondering where time went, and we are too, but I can honestly say that the past three years have been some of the happiest of my life. John and I have both grown and learned so much, and we have had so many wonderful times together. We have seen God carry us through some really hard times and provide for us financially, emotionally, physically, and spiritually (and mentally, I left that one out). So many people go through life looking for their soulmate, and somehow, God saw fit to bless us with ours at the age of 18. We are so lucky to be married to our best friend, and we look forward to many more joyful, full years together. Anyways, Friday and Monday are Buddhist holidays, so we got a four day weekend to celebrate our three years, so John treated me to a short second honeymoon!!! Here's what we did:

After work on Saturday, we drove into Bangkok to spend two nights in a four star hotel downtown (because where else in the world can we afford to do it?). Here was the surprise: we were staying at the Baiyoke Sky Hotel, the tallest tower in Thailand, in a superior suite on the 65th floor!

The entire wall was windows looking over the Northern part of town. It was amazing to look out and see landmarks we know; we could even see the neighborhood where we lived last year!

Let's see if I can give you a little perspective about how high up we were... The Baiyoke Tower itself has 84 stories and a large portion above the highest story: it's about 10 feet taller than the Eiffel Tower. It's the 48th tallest building in the world. Our room was in the dark blue section on the right. Crazy, right?

We loved going up to the observation deck on the 77th floor and looking at the signs that explained what everything was.

We've been into Bangkok enough times to have a pretty good idea about the city, and we were finally able to connect the dots and put it all together. The 84th floor is a revolving deck outside that was really impressive, especially at night,

but honestly, the view from our window was our favorite!!

God was with us because we showed up without either of our Passports or our credit card. The ladies at the desk were really mad at us and had to call their manager to see if they could accept my US driver's licence and fortunately, they did. On Saturday night, we got dressed up and headed out to one of our favorite restaurants in Bangkok: Beirut. It serves incredible Lebanese food. We came home full and happy and sat on the couch watching the lights move down below.

Breakfast was an International buffet on the 82nd floor. They had everything from bread products, to omelets, to salad, to Indian food, to Thai food, to baked beans and sushi. It was incredible to listen to all the different languages in one room. We shared the elevator with a woman in full burqa and a teenager with a see-through shirt and "underwear" shorts.

We had a relaxing day on Saturday exploring the hotel and enjoying our room. We ordered room service for lunch and although the food wasn't that incredible, the view sure was!!

On Saturday night, we dressed up for a fancy meal at the restaurant on the top floor, only to find out that it was a buffet (and a very expensive one at that).

In a spur of the moment decision, we decided to take a taxi to our other favorite Bangkok restaurant: Crepes and Company. We had an incredible meal that I'm sure was better than the hotel food, and were amazed at the flexibility we have learned since we've been in Thailand.

We woke up Monday morning in the glow of not having to teach on a work day, and enjoyed another amazing breakfast. During our stay, we tried to enjoy as many aspects of the hotel as we could. We got a complimentary 20 minute foot massage, took showers in our really nice bathroom, ordered room service, and had fun in the elevators. These are some smoothies we got at one of the restaurants. This is only the 18th floor, but it's still a great view.

There was a driving range on the 19th floor, and we couldn't resist making fools of ourselves trying to hit some balls...

We had a delicious lunch at an Iranian restaurant on Monday, and then drove home. Neither of us had ever had Iranian food before, but our co-teacher who is from Iran has been telling us about it, and it was really yummy!

Here is a great picture of the streets of Bangkok that we took from our room.

I cannot believe we drive on these on our bike! Mom, try not to think about that too much... :)

It was an amazing weekend of luxury. Now it's time to head back to the real world..

School Uniforms

I thought Saint Francis was strict as far as dress code went: all female teachers were required to wear a dark skirt and a light dress shirt. It took me a long time to adjust to wearing a skirt every single day, I've never been that much of a skirt/dress person, but I guess it is more comfortable with the hot weather. I now realize that the Saint Francis dress code meant freedom.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Kasintorn has a uniform which I am required to follow every day. And unlike Saint Francis were we often bent the rules a bit, if I don't follow dress code here, I get fined! At the beginning of the year, ladies had to wear black and white (no color), and of course always a skirt and dress shirt. But they gave us two months to buy the uniforms (we have to foot the bill), and the two months are up. Fortunately some of the fabrics are cute, and I got to design my own clothes, so I could make them cute. Here they are, except that I don't have a picture of the Thursday dress yet.

Monday and Friday:

Tuesday:

Wednesday:

In truth, it's not that big of a deal (although you all know me, I like to dramatize everything). Actually, the part of irks me the most is that guys have to strict rules to follow. They just have to wear pants, a button-up shirt, and a tie. Just like last year. No black and white only. No solids only. No black pants only. Which means the guys are always more colorful and varied than the ladies, and somehow, that just doesn't seem fair to me... Oh well. :)

Prayer

John is heading to the US this weekend for his best friend Roman's wedding. He will leave Bangkok very early on Friday morning and get back late on Tuesday night. Please pray for safe travels for him, and that he will be able to enjoy the wedding despite jetlag. He will have to teach on Wednesday, so please pray for that as well.

Please pray for our health. We have both been sick with the same thing for more than two weeks now. We just finished one antibiotic treatment that didn't make any difference. We will go to the doctor this week to hopefully get something else to help. We are so sick of being sick!!

Thanks a lot!

The Fourth of July

Hello all, and happy Independence Day to our fellow Americans! It's hard for us to believe that it is summer there for most of you now, and that means it's time for vacation, camps, barbecue, and air conditioning. It's strange because it's always summer for us, so I guess we assume that it's always winter for you, but I'm sure you're glad that's not true! :)

After church yesterday, we were actually invited to a real, honest to goodness 4th of July BBQ at some friends' house. We had amazing burgers with bacon and homemade guacamole, stuff we haven't had at all in the past year. We ended up watching some of Miss USA 2011, which was funny, but appropriate in a way, I suppose.

Tonight, after work, John and I came home and crashed, had dinner and watched a movie, and then decided to be spontaneous (a pretty rare thing, recently). We jumped on our motor bike, grabbed some yummy Magnum ice cream bars from 7-11 and went for a drive. We found a construction site at the end of a road and enjoyed dessert and good conversation atop some large cement blocks. We saw some amazing lighting that filled the whole sky, and when it got too close for comfort, we left the natural fireworks behind and headed home to get some sleep. Tuesday tomorrow. Yikes!

Sorry I have no pictures...