Sunday, February 18, 2007

Only 10 more days until I return to the homeland. I got a great deal on my ticket, only about $150 more for a roundtrip ticket than I paid for my one way ticket to Thailand. I'm just coming home to visit for about a month and then returning to Thailand to teach again. I honestly love it in Thailand and could get used to living here. Everyone is always asking when I'm going to go home and I honestly don't have a good answer for that. I guess I'll just know when it's time to go home. I do miss my family, friends and of course my cat but I also don't want to deal with looking for a job or applying for grad school. Life in the U.S. just seems so much more stressful. Just the thought of not having health insurance when I go home is enough to make me not want to stay. And what about cheap massages? I don't know any place in the U.S. where you can get a good massage for under $10.

In preparation for going home I've been shopping like crazy for gifts. It's fun to actually have the money to do this and to browse through the enormity of goods that are available in Bangkok for cheap. It makes me realize to that the quality of life in Thailand is actually probably a lot better than in the States. Even though I only make a little more than $1,000 every month, I have no bills and can live a pretty extravagant lifestyle off of $500 a month allowing me to save $500 which is better than most people in the States I would venture to say. It's not mind blowing or anything but if you factor in things like the fact that I don't have a commute then its not too shabby.

And I think I might have finally straightened things out with the crazy nun. I think we have reached an understanding that if she just leaves me alone I'll do my job. But then again, you can't really predict what crazy people will do so we'll just have to wait and see. I love my kids and I'll have the same ones next year so I won't have to relearn how to manipulate the group dynamics to my advantage; I've already got them right where I want them (evil laugh).

Unfortunately, I won't be able to be home in April to see Bjork but I will be able to eat some carne asada fries, sweet corn tamales, tofu mushroom burgers etc etc. Although strangely enough I'm starting to develop new food fetishes for Thailand, i.e. salad in a bag, chicken satee with spicy peanut sauce. Food in a bag isn't nearly as weird as I used to think it was. They even drink soda out of a plastic bag, just a plain old little plastic bag with handles and everything. Not strange to me anymore but strangely efficient. I am afraid of the reverse culture shock that I'll experience. For example, will I freak out at home clean everything is? Or how orderly? Most likely I'll freeze. I'll be wearing mittens and scarves while other Californians are wearing tank tops and flip flops. I don't know but we'll find out in 10 days!