Nerding out.

So I have kind of turned into a Youtube feen. At home I usually fall asleep watching Netflix or reading, but here in the jungle (when the internet works) youtube has filled my Netflix void. I think I am about 10 years behind everyone, because I just realized people have there own channels, you can subscribe, and yada yada. Also the more you watch a certain “youtuber” you realize all of the “youtubers” know each other in real life, and they appear in each others videos… it is kind of like a cult… that I am getting great entertainment out of. I figured since I am now an avid youtube user, I can share some of my favorite videos. I also realize that most of you might never watch these videos, BUT there are lots of freezing cold, rainy days when you will have nothing better to do :)

If you are looking for a youtuber to subscribe to:

My go to girl on Youtube goes by the name of Zoella. She is from the UK and posts anything from beauty tutorials, hanging out with her friends, favorite videos, lookbooks, etc. Her accent is awesome and as of recently in my head I am speaking in her accent hahaha, creepy I know. Well anyways she is quite funny, and around the same age as me and we have similar interests. Below is the link to her channel in case you find yourself bored.  http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWRV5AVOlKJR1Flvgt310Cw 

If you feel the same way about Taylor Swift as I do:

This is from when she recently received the Pinnacle award! It goes through many of Taylor's accomplishments, and you get to see how proud she is and rest of the world is of her. Obviously it goes without saying that I am Taylor obsessed, but don't worry if you cry when you watch it, I did of course. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7b9e1dAtN-Q

If you love hearing other people laugh:

Literally that's what the commercial is haha, but considering I love to laugh... it is one of my favorites. Simply a good message, and a really cute old man. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PR_UYx4vSPs

If you love a good proposal:

So this guy went totally above and beyond, way over the top.. and it's awesome. This girl obviously was so happy. Yes, I know it's long and some parts are cheesy..but just watch the whole thing. This guy just earned brownie points for life. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uz_s8ThT6oc

If you liked the couple above:

Here is their story. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khUVJwbneWs&feature=c4-overview&list=UUxcSTXNsoAClNhPfT3blhlA

If you need to hear someone who knows what they are talking about:

Ashton or should I say Chris Kutcher, makes an awesome speech while accepting an award at the Teen Choice Awards. It makes you feel good to hear his speech, and it is very motivating. I absolutley loved this. Also if you need a little "kick in the pants" it seems pretty alright to have a hot Ashton Kutcher tell you if you ask me. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNXwKGZHmDc

If you need another reason to love Jennifer Lawrence:

In my eyes she is one of the funniest, most down to earth celebrities. Literally you can watch any interview with her and crack up, she just seems so normal! Also, I saw Catching Fire this past weekend... AMAZING. You should also check out any video between Jlaw and Josh Hutcherson. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ACQpZW-eTg

So I realize as I am writing this that I look like I sit on my computer and watch youtube all day. I swear I actually do real life things in Thailand and love it. Enjoy.

Living a parallel life?

Somehow while going from website to website, I found this list. It's a list of 100 things you learn while backpacking. At first I thought I might write my own; but the more I read, the more I realized how many similar experiences this author and I share. Also I love her wording and the way she writes! But seriously when I was reading this, I felt like she must have been traveling with me (besides when she talks about Europe haha). Enjoy :) http://www.travelettes.net/100-things-ive-learnt-while-backpacking/

Welcome (back to) the jungle!

Here I am, back in the jungle! After going home for about 6 weeks, I am here again in Thailand and loving it. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous about returning after being home and seeing all of my friends and family. Turns out, six weeks at home was exactly what I needed to recharge my batteries.

Once I landed in Phuket I was so excited to see the kids, I could barely stand myself. Unfortunately I didn’t get back to Yaowawit until after 11pm, so I had to wait until the following day. The next day seeing all of the kids, meeting the new volunteers, and seeing the staff was the Thai staff was the best! It felt almost as if I never had left but everything was exciting and new again. Also the Yaowawit volunteers welcomed a new volunteer who is a friend of mine from home, Riley! Having someone from home here in Thailand can make a world of difference. I am so excited that she decided to take the plunge and join me in Kapong.

Su brushing her teeth after lunch

So far teaching has picked up right where it left off. I think the month of October was just what everyone needed. The students and staff are all in high spirits and ready to take on second semester. This semester along with the other volunteers, I am taking a thai class from one of our teachers K. Tak. Of course we aren’t expecting to come out of it fluent, or anywhere close; but maybe after this term I will know more than how to order food!

Rainy season is FINALLY coming to a close. It was a longgggggg few months, and I am very much looking forward to some sunshine and a good tan. Right now it is kind of in-between seasons, so in the transition we are getting a little rain every evening along with crazy thunder and lightening. Luckily we haven’t had any power outages yet! We were able to fit in some beach time a few weekends ago, and we will be in Phuket this weekend…And FINALLY will be seeing catching fire!

I hope all is well at home and everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving! Do me a favor and don’t post toooo many pictures of your delicious turkey dinner. I’m not kidding at lunch we shredded chicken and I pretended it was turkey; I even convinced myself it smelled exactly like it.

Home Sweet Home!

After about 9 ½ months in Thailand and being away from home, I came back to the US for some much needed friends and family time. Before going home, I feel like I was counting down the days and the time was creeping along so slowly. Somehow I was home for 6 weeks and it FLEW by! Although I was very busy in my time I had at home, I would say I spent a fair amount of time curled up in bed with my boyfriend…Netflix. I don’t know if I have ever been so appreciative for things like my bed, shower, guacamole and turkey sandwiches before; but let me tell you I will never take them for granted again! Anyways here is glimpse at what I was up to while in Seattle…

Part of my very patient welcoming team!  Due to a mix-up with bags, it took about 2 hours for me to get to my family.

I was home just in time for one of the final M's games of the season. Thank you Chrissy for getting the group together and Jenna and Brii for surprising me in Seattle!

BEEzys take Seattle!

 

Linfield Homecoming 2013

Alzheimers walk for Papa with Georgie

Seahawks game, Thank you Chrissy and Steven!

Dani and I went to Spooner Farms pumpkin patch this year. It was such a cool place, tons of pumpkins, pumpkin slingshots, food, corn mazes, etc. After all of our hard work, we decided a very festive hard cider was deserved. Also I learned that if you let pumpkins roll around your trunk for a few days, eventually the stems will break off...

My mom, dad, grandma carved pumpkins together this year. Grandma and my mom successfully made these cool pinterest inspired drilled pumpkins. Everyone ended the night with awesome pumpkins and (barely haha) all of their fingers.

Celebrating Jennifer's 24th birthday, so nice to see these ladies! Where were you Mal?

Finally got to see Bridge! What did we do? Oh just get Chipotle, shop, and end the night taking home a dozen Krispy Kreme...each

They see me trolllllllin. Halloween with Chrissy Baum!

I am so sad I did not get a complete picture of the full meal deal. Here is my grandma making tending to the turkey for our "Thanksgiving Dinner". Since I am going to be in Thailand on actual Thanksgiving, we celebrated in October this year... Don't I have the best family ever?! Thank you grandma, LOVE YOU :)

So happy I got to witness the first of many Smith "wrestling match" between Georgie and Levi haha. I just love them.

Dad and Levi our little Thai :)

As I look through all of these pictures again, I am once again reminded how lucky I am! No wonder I love to home, look at all these people I get to see when I do. It also make me realize how many of the things that happened that aren't pictured, so here it goes.

1. So mid-way home on a layover in Dubai, I was texting my sister. She was talking about being at school, and I am so happy she is loving it so much... but of course I was a little sad I wouldn't be seeing her upon arrival in Seattle. Apparently after we finished texting, she called my mom.. hopped on a plane, and beat me to Seatac. SURPRISE there she was at the airport, sister of the year award! I can't believe we don't have a picture together!

2. I got to see two of my favorite little babes Kyson and Aniya, who have both grown up so much since I last saw them! I can't believe they are both 1, and cruising around on their own.

3. We celebrated my friend Michelle's birthday by going out to dinner! I also got to see Michelle and Molly's new house, and catch up. AND MICHELLE IS COMING TO THAILAND IN JANUARY!

4. I went and saw Captain Phillips with my parents and it was such a good movie. Talk about being on the edge of your seat for 2 hours.

5. Sweet little cousin Levi is... WALKING! I could not be happier that I was home for him to start walking. Let me tell you he is on the move and he is fast. Also he was the cutest little elephant for Halloween and Georgie was a perfect Snow White!

I am sure I have left out about 4,000 things, but long story not so short I had an amazing 6 weeks at home! A huge thank you to everyone for making it so great, seeeeee again soon(ish) USA!

Selfie Sunday

Cambodia part 1 (Phnom Penh and Kep)

 

My first stop in Cambodia was Phnom Penh. I flew in from Bangkok, and I was super excited because that night I would be reunited with Anna! I rode from the airport to the hotel in literally one of those carriages that takes you around Central Park. Okay not literally, but just imagine that carriage but the horse be replaced by a motor bike. 

We stayed at the Fancy Guest House, which in fact was not so fancy. The guesthouse was though right around the corner from the river and where all of the restaurants were at. Of course right when got there, our first thought was we need food! We found a pizza place and yes we each ate a whole pizza to ourselves. Anna if you are reading this... here is to a night of eating a lot, funny/ scary/ embarrassing moments, and a whole lot of tv hahha :)

Wine with ice, or maybe the other way around

We decided to go to Kep next, which was a spot near the water known for their crab! Kep is a French influenced town and it was beautiful. Anna and I ended up spending a good amount of time here due to weather, trouble with buses, and it had good food and wine. Here we were able to rent a motorbike and explore. A few of the places we went were the pepper farm, the crab market, Rabbit Island, and a temple. Rabbit Island was just a 25 ish minute boat ride away from Kep and was supposed to have a beautiful beach to lay at. We thought about staying here overnight, but then we found out there is no electricity... needless to say we changed our minds. I don't like to think I am high maintenance but the though of sleeping without even a fan in the middle of hot season sounded miserable. This was a day when you just couldn't help but laugh. When we arrived at the beach we found "chairs" to lay on which were just wood boards. We decided to get a massage at the beach to treat ourselves, but poor Anna had the most painful, sandy, unenjoyable massage of her life. Soon enough it was time for our boat ride back...it began DUMPING rain... like there was monsooning. 25 minutes that felt like 45 minutes we arrived back at our guest house looking like we swam back from rabbit island. At this point we were exhausted and couldn't go anywhere due to the inability to drive a motorbike in torrential downpours. So this resulted in us watching Harry Potter with dinner, dessert, and wine delivered by room service. We deserved it right?

The way home from Rabbit Island

Rabbit Island

The next day there was nice weather, and we wanted to go up to this temple Anna spotted up on the hill. As we were driving along the road toward the temple, this Cambodian woman begins screaming to us, "TEMPLE?! TEMPLE?!" and pointing at the temple. Hesitantly we say yes, and she pulls over and motions for us to do the same. Thinking that maybe she had some insight or was going to give us directions, we pulled over. She abruptly jumped behind me on the bike and told Anna to "GO, GO!" This woman is laughing and screaming and pretty much insane. Anna and I exchange looks that pretty much are reading what the hell should we do. So what did we decide? Oh to continue driving to the temple with her on the back. When we got to the temple she is giving us a tour, taking pictures for us.. and then begins to tell us how she has no money and has sick kids etc. Then it clicks, we are being scammed but at this point there is nothing we can do because we are stuck on a hill with her. We go back to our bike to find a man waiting there, we are pretty sure he was there to make sure we gave her money. So we got back on our bike, yes with this woman on the back. Before we got on the back Anna had handed me pepper spray to get this lady just in case she started going crazy. As we are on our way back to her bike she begins yelling at us to pull over, we are at her house. Anna stops, the lady jumps off and is telling us to hold her kids and come inside. Anna and I look at each other and in unison yell GO! We were off, free, and still very confused what had just gone down in the previous 30 minutes. But we are alive, got the tour of the temple, and yes mom we learned our lesson :)

Anna in one of the hammocks at our guest house!

Upon leaving Kep to go to Siam Reap we booked bus tickets and caused quite the ordeal. Right before we were loading the bus, our very nice hotel receptionist drove to the bus station to hand deliver my debit counter. Yes, I had left in on the counter. Thank goodness for nice people!

Oh the people you meet on a visa run

If you aren't prepared to read a rambling novel about my day, exit out of this page now. Somehow this post turned into a book.

I remember arriving in Thailand and hearing other volunteers talk about going on visa runs. To me this just sounds plain illegal, but here I am nine months later adventuring out to do a visa run of my own. Pi Jew the driver at Yaowawit booked the whole trip for me, he showed me the plan also but it was all in Thai. We left at around 7 am this morning so I forgot to ask him any questions haha whoops my brain was still in sleep mode.

I was picked up off the side of the road, Pi Jew exchanged some words with the driver and into the minivan I went. After about an hour we got to a 7-11 and a restaurant for breakfast, where we had a meal that we had already paid for...news to me haha so it felt like a free meal. We continued to drive on and on until we arrived in Ranong, Thailand which shares a border with Burma. We went through immigration and were asked to hand over our passports to this Thai man. I was only slightly freaked out because the man was wearing a whit polo that said New York Police Department... he must be legit right?!

We were then herded (we were literally walking around like a group of lost sheep) in the direction of about 15 boats. We needed to get on the furthest one away of course. So there I am laughing to myself thinking this is not real life. Literally I was crawling across boats of all heights and sizes as they are rocking back and forth and drifting apart from one another. I basically had to do a pull up to get into the boat, don't know where the arm strength came from... maybe from the fear of falling into the mud water below me. Anyways, it was a nice boat ride because the weather was great. Finally we arrived in Burma and were directed into some office, our passports were stamped and once again we were back in the boat on our way to Thailand.

We loaded back into the minivan and about 10 minutes later we stop outside of a nice hotel. Our driver just opens the door and points inside and showing me through hand motions we are going to eat. (I will quickly tell you about the group dynamics before I continue with the story...)

On this trip there were six people including myself:
Person #1- Me
Person #2- "The Sleeper" This guy I don't think had his eyes open for more than a minute of the 5 hour drive. He was snoring and drooling, and must have had a crazy Sunday night because he reeked of alcohol.
Person #3- "High Heels" This woman came in a tight dress, high heels, full face of makeup, and a prom hairdo knowing she would be sitting in a van all day. I am sure she regretted this decision when she had to climb across all of those boats. Who knows though made it worked and she found herself a hottie.
Person #4- "The Lady Boy" Lady boys are common here in Thailand and some of them actually make quite beautiful women. With this person it was not the case. Imagine if you were to put bright pink and blue eye shadow on your dad and he hasn't shaved his chin in a couple of days. So I'm not sure what was going on, if this transformation was new or what. But along with the makeup was a dress and more cleavage than I could ever have in my life.
Person #5- "The Contortionist" This woman could make herself in the tiniest little ball on her chair. It was beyond weird because she faced all different directions throughout the trip.
Person #6- "Elvis" This was a self given nickname. He was the Chatty Cathy of the group and for some reason he chose to share all of his bizarre stories with me. He started with "Do you know who Elvis is?" Um, yes... "People tell me I look like him, they say it's a good thing" Oh... "Do you think Elvis is good looking?" I don't know.. (awkward) Anyways this man looked like Voldemort from Harry Potter aka nothing like Elvis.

BACK TO THE STORY..

So we arrived at the hotel to eat. We walk into find a nice family style meal at one table for all of us. We all awkwardly stared at each other, ate in silence, and ate as fast as we could. Everyone got up from the table the second they put their last bite in their mouth. I of course couldn't stop laughing, I tend to do this is in awkward situations and had to keep looking at my phone pretending something funny was happening on the other end.

All in all my visa is good until I go home without any overstay charged... successful first visa run.