Random Story of the Day!

The blogs will come less often as homework, school and everything start to pile up and being back in Thailand is not such a "new" thing again and normality sets in. So cherish them while they last. haha!

Last night as I was up working on a paper, something dark goes across my floor!!! What in the world is it??? Any guesses? Well, last year if you remember, we had a pet in our shower. As if that wasn't enough, somehow it decided to move in my room. It was a frog!!! A frog in my room. I guess it's Thailand's little welcome back present. I guess Thailand hasn't gotten the memo that I'm really not a fan of critters in the bathroom let alone my bedroom. haha! The geckos in the house are now just part of the decor and that's fine and dandy, but I'm still not a fan of other critters. After my frenzy of figuring out what it was, I decided I wanted it to leave my room. I couldn't find it to take it outside. Oh well! It would probably find it's way back in my room anyway.   At least it's not a mouse, which was my first thought. While, I'm not a fan of frogs in the house, a mouse would be way worse! :)

Of course having a frog in my room made me think of the 10 Plagues. Oh man am I glad I wasn't an Egyptian in those days. Frogs everywhere... I might have just died. haha!

Update on the Baking Soda/ Baking Powder debacle... we did get some Sodium Bicarbonate. We just had to go to the right store. It was just ironic that Macro didn't have any. My cookies will again be arroy. Although the students didn't seem to notice the difference.

Lainy J.

Baking Soda? Baking Powder? Ahhh!

Erika and I decide we need to add some leavening back to our kitchen so we can bake since it was all tossed out during the Days of Unleavened Bread. It may seem like a simple enough task, however in Thailand this proves to be more difficult. We head to Macro, which is like a Costco or Sam's Club except that it is cash only and you don't have to have a membership. They had to go for our school and it seemed like an ideal place to look for leavening agents. We search up and down the isle looking for Sodium Bicarbonate/ Baking Soda and Baking Powder. We find what claims to be baking powder! Yay! Sadly though, no baking soda. We call a friend to find out how to say it in Thai to ask someone there and they lead us to the bags of baking powder. We realize this is all we are going to get at Macro. 

This just doesn't work since we wanted to bake cookies for the students as a Sabbath treat and it calls for, you guessed it baking soda! We look up baking soda and baking powder conversions on trusty google. Baking powder can be used in place of soda, but not the other way around. We decide to go ahead and try it. Well, the "baking powder" looked like soda and tasted like it too. We went ahead and decided to bake them as if we were using powder as a substitute after much deliberation. The students still loved them, but they weren't just right. A little on the salty side. Not bad, but not right. 

We still have a dilemma... not sure whether we were sold baking soda under the pretense of baking powder. Or if in actuality, it is baking powder. We will buy baking soda when we finally find and see if they are the same. 

It made me laugh pretty hard just the fact that you can't purchase something and trust the label to be correct. This confusion is increased by the fact that the Thai word is the same for both baking soda and baking powder. 

Ahhh... the joys of living in another country. :) 

Hope this brought a smile to your day as it brought lots of laughing to ours. 

-Lainy J.

Home Sweet Thailand

Sa wa dtee Kha!


Heading back to Thailand was bittersweet. Saying goodbye to everyone was tough, but I am happy to be back. Seeing my students after two months was nice. Being greeted by their smiling faces as well as Erika and the staff was so nice. They were quite the welcoming party.  


Upon returning, Erika and I made a trip to the market that's about 10 mins away. The lady who I typically buy fruit from was happy to see me. She and I attempted to have a conversation in Thai. It was fun. She said she hadn't seen me in a while and I told her I went home to America. Simple conversation, but exciting when you're trying to learn the language and be part of the culture. 


It has been nice to see familiar faces around the village. The smiles and nods make me feel at home. Perhaps the familiarity of the geckos, mosquitos, power outages and the town crier are not appreciated as much as the people. However, all these things make up Mae Sa Luang, which add to its charm. Our house has the same smells as when I left, which I have to get used to on top of the lack of water pressure and taking shower 2-3 times a day being necessity.


Other than fighting jet lag combined with the heat and humidity, which leaves me with this compelling urge to sleep, things seem to be "normal." This week Erika and I have been organizing, cleaning and getting odds and ends ready for school. The first day isn't until the 14th of June, but there is much to be done before hand. Before Legacy starts, I have two more papers to finish and then this semesters classes will be over and I'll start my new ones in July at the APU Campus in Azusa. 


For those of you who have been worried about the political situation here in Thailand, everything seems okay where we are. When I came back from the airport, nothing had changed too much since I'd left except that there were more police and military stationed places. Things have calmed down in Chiang Mai and seem to be improving in Bangkok. Thailand could still use your prayers for this situation. 


That's all the news for this week. Nothing too terribly exciting, but that's what's going on here. Thank you to my wonderful family and fantastic friends who made my visiting home so great and hard to leave. I'll miss all of you a ton, but I'll be back in July for school so hopefully I'll see  some of your smiling faces before I head back to Thailand. 


Please continue to pray for Legacy- the teachers, staff, students, the Sextons, and the work that is being done as we are preparing for our new school year. 


Lots of Love,
Lainy J.