This morning I woke up to birds chirping on my windowsill as sunlight streamed through the windows rousing me from a great nights sleep. As I drowsed under a light sheet I dreamed of waking up during a beautiful summer's day on Cape Cod and wandering downstairs to find my family lounging on the porch with fresh brewed cups of hazelnut coffee while my dad cooked up a batch of pancakes. I dreamed of the normalcy of life at home and a day spent with family. All I wanted was a day lounging on the beach collecting sea glass, teaching my niece to swim, and spending time with those I love. After waking up and shaking of this nostalgia for home I stumbled sleepily downstairs and got ready for the day.

Instead of the day at the beach I imagined, I spent the morning teaching English to High School students. They were crazy and out of control, but somehow we made it work and ended up learning and having fun at the same time. On days when I miss home, spending time with the kids and being surrounded by their enthusiasm and excitement keeps me going. It's been a slow few weeks at site as I try to get a few more projects started. It's very hard to begin planning projects here, so at this point I don't know if any of the projects I have recently proposed will actually happen. It's a waiting game as plans get approved and budgets agreed on. But if I simply sit back and wait I will go crazy with boredom and the projects will never happen. If I've learned anything in the past year it's how to be pushy. I write meeting times on peoples calendars so they can't say they forgot, call people to remind them to be somewhere, talk to the boss myself, and force people to get things done. If I didn't do this I can guarantee I would not have completed a single project in the last year. To keep myself busy I've been spending more times at the schools and health centers. I even have two new projects I hope to plan with one of the schools and new projects with the health center. Now I just need the green light on one of my proposals so I can get to work.

In other news, two weeks ago I spent a week with the newest group of Peace Corps Thailand trainees. I couldn't help reminiscing about my 10 weeks of training last year and how many things have changed since then. They are excited, energized and ready to go. It was great to be around them, teaching them about life in Thailand and leading some sessions about teaching English and Sexual Reproductive Health. They reminded me of what my group was like last year and made me miss language classes, biking home with friends, and the craziness of PST. Fortunately, my group will be reunited in Bangkok next month for our midservice conference and medical checkups.

I'm planning on writing a few blog posts about more specific topics like food, temples, and family life so if you have any suggestions or anything you would like to learn about life in Thailand let me know! I also took a few videos of the kids learning to make s'mores with some marshmallows I found in Bangkok, so maybe a video will be appearing one of these days if I can figure out how to shrink the size.