Kim and Jeremy in Thailand

The end of the semester, that is. It's hard to believe how fast time is passing here. We only have two days of school this week, because Wednesday through Friday we are doing the ICEC conference. It's going to be huge-almost 700 people are coming, mostly staff of other international schools. Then two more weeks and a week of final exams. It's going to be over before I know it. On the one hand, the prospect of being caught up on my grading is very exciting to me!!! It will also be nice to have time to see more of Thailand than just our immediate surroundings. But on the other hand, a lot of people will be gone, and it's the first time I'll have ever been away from my family for Christmas. So in some ways I'm not really looking forward to the break.

One thing that makes it easier is the weather. It still gets above 90 degrees almost daily. Everyone is in shorts and t-shirts, and downtown Chiang Mai is perpetually full of tourists. So it's easy for me to think that it's still late August, and it's not really time for the holidays. Even though I know that this week is Thankgsiving, for example, I don't feel like I'm missing Thanksgiving because it still feels like summer. I think in that respect it's easier for us than for our families when we're away for the holidays.

We'll be going to SoJo's for Thanksgiving. It's a restaurant run by one of the baptist groups around here, and they feature mostly southern food. We've got a group of 9 going, and they'll have turkey, dressing, sweet potato casserole, pumpkin pie-most of the traditional dishes. It won't be the same, but I'm excited that we will get to celebrate with friends here.