Just Chillin'

Today has been nice and slack. I woke up pretty late and watched some monkeys on the front porch. Then Emily went and had some breakfast with Jane and brought me some coffee. At about noon Emily and I went down and had lunch in town and visited some of the shops and walked out to the beach that is closest to us. We got home and Emily had some ice cream and we spent the rest of the afternoon reading on the porch and admiring the view. Unfortunately it seems Emily has caught a little cold. Tonight we plan on having a little supper in town and then more extra strenuous reading before an early bedtime so Emily can get some rest and hopefully get to feeling better.
J
Sent from my iPod

Phi Phi!

We made it to Phi Phi Island today and it is really beautiful. The boat ride over was pretty magical. We are staying in a cool little bungalow. We have wireless in the little open air cafe that doubles as the reception area. Tomorrow we may go to monkey beach or just go through all the cool little shops. I have had some amazing food and really love it here. Cambodia and Vietnam have a lot to live up to because Thailand is amazing!
J

Sent from my iPod

In Thailand!!!

So we have made it to Thailand! It took forever to get here but we
finally made it. I am not sure what kind of Internet we will have for
most of the trip although we have excellent wireless here. The food is
amazing and it rivals Jamaica for natural beauty so far. Emily and I
are keeping a notebook so when I get home I can do a monster post. Our
"computer" for the trip is my iPod so as long as there is wireless we
should be able to check emails etc.

Sent from my iPod

I'll Fly Away

The bags are packed, kindles and ipods loaded and charged, sunglasses and silly straw hat set by the door with care. Tomorrow we head out! I will be gone for about 25 days, exploring Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Emily and I are super excited about it, and it was one of our big dreams when we came to China to have a chance and travel. What's weird is that China doesn't even seem like a destination anymore, it is just where we are! I may try and grab some internet time on the trip, but neither of us are taking computers (packing light, or at least we are for us!). I will try to take lots of pictures and will make sure I have a nice time at the beach in memory of everyone who is cold and in the snow right now.
Love,
J

In Time

So it has been pretty slow around here. We put in our grades and were struck by just how inefficient everything is in China. I have been fighting off a little sick for a long time, but hopefully antibiotics will take care of it. Tomorrow is Emily's birthday and I think I am more excited than she is. It has been a wonderful trip with her. She has been my best friend, my support, and the absolute greatest thing that has ever happened to me. It really seems like yesterday that I met her at the movie theater. We are going to be headed out to Thailand next week and it really just seems magical. China has had some highs and lows, but I get so happy when I think of how awesome it is that we are here doing this! Being here, teaching, helping, getting to see cool stuff and get completely immersed in a whole different culture. I have learned so much here. Mostly about myself! Going to Thailand has been a dream for a long time and going with her makes it that much more special. I'm going to eat so much food there!!!
I've been reading a lot of stuff about society and our place in it, but not really sure if it will ever turn into anything solid in the terms of living. It is so easy to get inspired by speeches or by peoples words, but so hard to maintain that fire and drive when the book/pamphlet/webpage is done. Taking it beyond being read and turning it into something you try and live is a real task.

Student Trip

Hello everybody! So it has been a pretty busy weekend here in China. It was AWESOME! Emily and I were supposed to go to some ancient library at Moon Lake with a few of my students (who were to act as our tour guides). They didn't know where they were going so we just kind of bumbled around, but what fun it was! We ate candy covered oranges, took tons of photos, snuck into an all girls school (my students are adventurous), wondered through a cool old slum (finding a calendar from 1984 along the road was my fave part of this), wandered into the most unlikely and the most friendly temple of all time (seriously, these were some happy temple people. Even my students were astonished), and ate a delicious meal. At around 5 my students had to head home, so Emily and I went to the completely legal, but very cheap, and hmmm,-this-title-is-spelled-incorrectly, DVD store and I got ALL the Star Trek films. Emily's birthday is coming up so she got the three Back to the Future movies and the first 18 seasons of the Simpsons. Sunday Emily took our visa info to Jane (who we are going on our big trip with) and I napped, ate some delicious noodle thing, and watched the Simpsons all day. It was great.

Sick and Reading

So this weekend I was sick with some stupid bug that has me stuck in bed. I managed to read a lot and wanted to share some of that with ya! I just finished David Byrne's Bicycle Diaries, and while it was interesting it was not what I expected. Byrne is a great artist and I REALLY like Talking Heads and his later solo efforts (especially the collaborations with Eno). His efforts to bring outside art and music to main stream's attention is also admirable. But the book just didn't do it for me. It seemed more a bunch of notes taken in a college bull session about cities and development and society. Like people being impressed with books you read in high school. It just didn't jibe with what I was wanting him to say. I suppose that this very rant is exactly what I was talking about, but it's late, I'm sick, and I don't care! I will happily look forward to giving anything else he writes a chance, but will be prepared not to be too disappointed.
One thing I have absolutely LOVED doing this weekend is reading a blog by a girl Emily knew in college called Going Slowly. It is really fantastic. Tara and Tyler are two people who are off on a huge cross the world trek on bikes. It is really well written and their adventures are fascinating. Reading the blog is like being there with them and I can't recommend it highly enough. If they turned it into a book I would read the heck out of it and give it to all my family as a present!
Another thing I have enjoyed doing is checking out Thailand and looking forward to all the good food I will be eating in just a month's time. Our trip to Thailand and Cambodia is all planned out, and we just need to get our Vietnam visas for that to be tied up too! I'm super excited and it's pretty much one of the reasons I wanted to come to China. China is not really all I had hoped it would be, but it certainly has stretched our horizons and shown us just what we really want/need in our everyday lives. Emily is sleeping now and I'm bored so I will watch an episode of Twilight Zone and then go to sleep.