Thailand Conference

Did you know that we were planning a trip to Thailand? Our company has a mandatory conference every year in the northern city of Chiang Mai.


Purpose: Getting all 500 of us together from Mongolia, China, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia for business, encouragement and professional development. Families take advantage of the inexpensive and quality medical and dental care. We will at least have our annual teeth cleaning, see a prenatal doctor, and get Titus caught up on some standard immunizations.

Why Thailand? Not only is it very traveler-friendly, it's a central location and it's a very open country compared to those I just mentioned.


Our Itinerary:
1/22
--- 7:30am city bus to train station
--- 8:00am airport shuttle to airport
--- 9:30am flight to Shenzhen, near Hong Kong
--- 12:30pm land in Shenzhen, airport shuttle to city center, rent a by-the-hour hotel room for naps

--- 6:10pm airport shuttle back to airport
--- 11:30pm flight to Bangkok

1/23
--- 2:30am arrive in Bangkok, cab to hotel, crash, rest, recover from the trauma of taking a red-eye flight with a 16-month old
--- 4:00pm shuttle back to airport
--- 7:30pm flight to Chiang Mai

... to be continued


If we do anything cool, we'll try to snap some pictures and let you know. Mostly it's just meetings. And enjoying the warm sun in between. And the clean-ness (everything seems spotless compared to China!). And the western food. Pizza here we come.


Drew, Rach, & Titus

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D-group, etc.

Here's the group of guys, minus one, who make up Drew's D-group. They're using DTB [Discovering the Book] as they meet every Saturday night for supper and then their meeting. This week they came to our house for the meal and an amusing discussion about various English cuss words.

Backing up. Saturday morning we talked for hours on skype with both sets of grandparents, a great-grandma and one auntie. Then we hurried to lunch with some co-workers and national partners in town. We're working with them to lead an Alpha-course English corner at the Sunday meeting place. Boy is it ever rewarding to come alongside something that is national-lead.

After lunch my (Rachel's) wallet was stolen while walking to the bus stop. Total loss, including value of wallet: $8.70. Titus and took the bus home while Drew stayed at the aforementioned English corner.

On the way home we met an eleven-year-old girl who asked to come home and play with us. She stayed all afternoon.

D-group came over for supper.


Sunday morning Drew and I went to the Chinese meeting together while our teammate babysat Titus. After a major house cleaning, we rested. This semester we've been designating Sunday as a day of rest and family-togetherness, no email or working on the to-do list.

In less than a week we leave for Thailand, where our company has a mandatory annual conference! So much to do before then...gotta go.

Thanks for reading.

Rachel for all


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Third-Culture Kid

He's 16 months old next week, already eating noodles with chopsticks.

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Parties

Bros-n-Sistas Party for those university students who we've worked with. Here we have a couple students warming their hands by the TV fire.




Force Scholarship Students have been awarded their scholarships on the basis of hardship and leadership potential. They've got mentors/sponsors in Hong Kong. Our role is to touch base with them (like this party), and reserve weekly office hours just for them.


Colleague Party - just some friends who teach at this university too. Singing carols in English and Chinese sparked good discussion. Here's our buddy Wade, and his wife, soon to be first-time parents. Wade's cookie has a frosting speedo.






Christmas Eve dinner with our boss, the Foreign Affairs Officer! (nice guy.)




Christmas Day brunch.

Ultrasound

Especially for the grandparents, aunties and uncles, and all lovers of our baby #2 ---

pictures of baby #2!


These are camera phone shots from our ultrasound on Christmas Eve, at about 12 weeks. In China it's not standard for the Moms to see the TV. I was lying on the bed, unable to see the screen, asking Drew "what do you see? what do you see?" So finally I wiggled down to the very foot of the bed and turned 90 degrees, to see my small child. "Hi baby! It's your Mom and Dad! We love you!" (Actually we said it in Chinese.)

The ultrasound tech was cool with this for about 30 seconds and then warm-heartedly said, "Alright! Enough playing around. I've got work to do!" I scooted back up to the blind spot and she finished up measuring and checking everything.

So turns out that I am in fact pregnant! I can't fully believe it until I hear that baby's heart beating or see her little body on the screen. Ok. I'm pregnant.