On Sunday I got to go on an adventure to Phurin Waterfall. The waterfall is in a national park to the south of Surat Thani. To get to the waterfall Collin and I went on his motorbike and it took about an hour and a half to get there. On the way we got lost because the map only has the major streets and pictures on it, and the signs stopped being in English! We realized that we missed a turn when the road suddenly got bad. We had to dodge huge potholes and ride on the side of the road. We finally pulled over to try and get directions and the villagers kept giving us conflicting directions. So a few of them decided to hop in thier truck and escort us to the waterfall. We would have never found it on our own since you had to take about 3 different turns and drive down a dirt road. Once we got to the waterfall Collin started to laugh at me because my face was brown from all the dirt the truck kicked up.

The waterfall was beautiful! It had three levels and each level had giant pools of water. The rock looked like it was lava rock that had been hollowed out to create the pools. Collin and I spent about 2 hours climbing to each level and swimming in the waist high water. It was a lot of fun even though the water was freezing! Sadly I didn't get any pictures because the battery for my camera was dead :( but I found a picture of a similar waterfall online:

Next time I'll be sure to bring my camera so I can get pictures of the real waterfall.

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Ok since I moved to Thailand my apartment has become the home to a number of different critters. The worst one being me...but that's another story! When mom was out here in October she has a brilliant idea to bring a couple big boxes up from the trash to make tables in my living room. That night I saw something shoot out from behind one of my new tables and scurry across the wall. I followed it into the bedroom and discovered that mom had introduced a Gecko into my apartment! He's become a consant fixture so I gave him a name! This is Kirby the weird flesh colored gecko who likes to scare me when I walk into rooms!




I also have a tiny black gecko who lives in my walls but he's almost impossible to photograph. While Kirby and the tiny gecko live in the apartment with me I also have two gecko's that live outside my bed room windows. Almost everynight I get to watch them feed on the bugs that are attracted to the lights in my room. Both of them are brown I've learned that gecko's can change thier color to blend in with thier surroundings. I've decided that they are twins but I haven't named them yet!



And then we have the newest inhabitant! My inchlong praying mantis just moved in a couple days ago. I discovered him the other night when I streatched and brushed my hand against something on the screen. I kinda freaked out when I suddenly heard something fly above my head. After I calmed down I grabbed my camera and stalked him as he scurried up the wall. He's been living with me for 2 days and I hope he doesn't get attacked by Kirby!





Ok so I have a few 'pets' who need names so if anyone has any suggestions for the geckos and and my praying mantis tell me!

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Well I am finally done with midterm's thank god! I've given all my students their grades and let a few of them turn in late assignments or do make up assignments. We'll see how many stop by my office on Friday to withdrawal. My favorite part of midterms besides spending COUNTLESS hours grading Reading/Writing (like 10 times more than any other class) was seeing how the students spelled...or misspelled my name.

The most common spelling was Rebacca which was almost right, 13 students decided my name needs more A's. The next most common was either Backy or Bakky...10 students came up with these variations. These spellings were understandable....but some of the others were just bad! Here's the list that my students created...

Ones that were close but not quite right:

• Rebaca/Rebaka (similar to backy)
• Rebaccka (They like A's and i need a K in there too)
• Rebeka
• Rececca

Ones who must think I have a big nose or something:

• Beacky
• Rebecka
• Rebeaka

These students think I need an extra R in my name:

• Bearky
• Barka (Do I bark like a dog? Maybe...)
• Rebracca
• Rebraka
• Rebrakca
• Rebrekka

And spellings that were just wrong:

• Rebecgar (This student thought I need an extra R and a G just for fun)
• Repica
  
• Reebaga (Now I'm a bag lady!)
  
• Repacca (Is this a new type of Alpacca?)
  
• Ribacca
  
• Becky Apply
  
• Bekk

and my favorites

• Aebecca (The A's strike again! This time they killed the R instead of the second E!)
  
• Pecky

So it looks like Becky and Rebecca was too difficult for the students to spell....hmmm. Some of my students got the spelling perfect and even through my middle name in there too. Oh well i expected all 200 to butcher my name I was just surprised at how badly the butchered it. Now to wait and see what they come up for finals!

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For New Years I went to Hat Yai with Aj. Tor and Aj. Tim (pronounced Thim) to spend time with their families. We got there on New Years Eve and I stayed with Aj. Tor's family first. We stayed up till midnight and watched the firworks from his front yard which was pretty awesome. It sounded like we were in the middle of a war zone since everyone in the village kept shooting off huge fireworks.

Then the next morning we went to the temple to get a blessing for the new year. At the temple we participated in a ceremony where the villagers give all the monks tons of food. The monks had a small mountain of food and bottled water and thier rice bowls were all overflowing by the time the ceremony was over. I belive this ceremony was to obviously assist the monks and to gain further blessing and good fortune. That night Aj. Tor and I went into Hat Yai and went to the lantern festival they were having. The had lanterns in all kinds of shapes but my favorite part was where they claimed the polar bears and penguins live in the north pole together...silly Thai's polar bears and penguins are only in the same place when they are in a zoo together.

On Saturday I went to the sea with Aj. Tim's extended family where we had a picnic. There was a ton of food especially shrimp and fish. After we ate we walked on the beach and I played with Aj. Tim's baby and a 1 year old girl. Then we went home but since there was not room in Aj. Tim's car for me I rode with her cousin. He took us to get Thai style ice cream which was an adventure in a cup. Thai people like to put a ton of stuff in with thier icecream! My cup had icecream, 3 kinds of fruit, nuts, coconut milk, sticky rice, and white bread O_o The bread was surprisingly good but I can't eat rice with icecream it tastes funny. Then Aj. Tim's cousin kidnapped me for the evening so I stayed with them in thier new home.

New Years in Hat Yai was a lot of fun I got to see fireworks, animal shapped lanters, the sea, eat ice cream, and get kidnapped.

Lantern's

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Ok so Christmas was over a week ago but I didn't have time t
o post before I left for New Years. I had a great Christmas here in Thailand even though it didn't feel like Christmas . Something about it being snowless and in the 70's just doesn't scream Christmas to me. I got lots of fun gifts from people in the states. It finally started to feel like Christmas here when I went to a Chritmas part on Saturday with the farang (Thai term for foreigners). We had a great Christmas dinner of turkey, 2 kinds of mashed potatoes, stuffing, garlic bread, roasted potatoes, and green beans. The dinner was amazing and made it feel like we were really having Christmas. Everyone also chipped in for the turkey or brought alchohol to share since the turkey cost about 3,000 baht or $100.

Update, Collin and I are starting to get along so either he's less of an ass (doubtful) or I'm learning how to deal with him.

My Tree!

Gifts from mom!
From Left to Right:
My gift from Jen, my Christmas panda,
and my gift from Jake (he also bought me the Proposal and Transformers 2)
Secret santa gifts
My gift from Tor (Now to find a AAA battery...)

A gift from one of my students!
The decorations I made :D

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