Picture time!

I've been hearing that everyone wants to see more pictures, so here they are! I'm not a great photographer and rarely remember to bring my camera but here are some of my favorites.

A few pictures of my village.

Traditional hill tribe clothing from the Mong tribe. The women make all of this by hand and it takes them months to make one item because the needlework is so intricate. I am going to work with one of these groups to try to help them sell products in the market to tourists.

On Sunday my family took me to a temple at the top of this big hill. They all went on a motorcycle to get there and I biked behind them. 

My host mom cutting up a banana tree for dinner. I was about to offer to help and then decided I would rather not end up in the hospital again after I lose a finger from that huge knife.

My host dad walking through his cornfield. He owns two acres of land that he grows corn on half the year and rice the other half. When it's harvesting time I'm going to be working in the field "helping" them.

Anti-drug bike rally I participated in. Drugs are a big problem in this area because we are on the border of Laos and drugs are trafficked across the border. A couple hundred people participated in the ride.

To get to the other side of this river I have to walk across those bamboo pieces tied together that roll when you step on them. My paw and I decided that I wasn't quite up for this yet, I've only been here for a little over a week and everyone already knows how clumsy I am.

Meeting with over 400 women that I had to speak at. I had no warning that this was about to happen I just heard my name on the microphone and then was put on stage, handed the microphone, and told to speak... in Thai of course. Oddly enough I was not nervous at all. If this had happened and I had to speak english I would probably have had a panic attack. Thai people love that I can even say hello so any mistakes I make don't really matter. Oh, and no one told me about the pink shirt dress code either so of course I was wearing a nice baby blue polo to help me stand out even more.