Eco-Tour Dinner

Ok so the other night we all went out for dinner, and by all I mean the 26 odd staff and their families. The staff all work on the Eco-Tour project. Colleagues also went, I am a colleague. We went to dinner at a BBQ place, vegetarianism went out the door (I am a confused vegetarian), never in my life have I eaten so much meat. I feel really bad saying that, but next year I will go back to normal. But I have been vegetarian for 9years so one year off, isn't too bad.

I sat with Surachai and his family (and my son), Stuart, P'Nu, Sakura, Rima, Tae and Win.

Surachai is the god of all farang (foreigners) and he looks after the Outdoor Program. Stuart our IT Guru for England, he also helps myself to look after the volunteers and support them. This is his family, he was off getting food when I had my camera out. But this is his 2 youngest sons and his wife. Arsaw is my son and I will be kidnapping him when I leave, he said he wanted to come to Australia... Arsaw is in the 2nd picture.

P'Nu run the Youth Project working mainly with teens from the local villages and he works on organising the schools and supporting the volunteers. Sakura and Rima are Japanese and Sakura runs the Japanese side of the Eco-Tour Project. Rima is like myself, she supports the volunteers and works on other projects as well. This is a picture of Rima and myself...

Tae is Akha (Hilltribe) works on a day-t0-day basis with the Outdoor Volunteers. He will also answer to Kha-dtoy... la la la

Win is Akha as well and works with the Japanese Volunteers, he takes them on their homestays and to schools etc. Below is Win, Sakura and Rima (L-R)

Overall it was such a fun night out, and good to see everyone of the Eco-Staff together. I actually didnt realise how many there is of us, and may next year we grow and prosper and better ourselves and the world.

Z.

Mirror, Mirror on the wall...

I know I've not done too much lately in keeping this updated but I will promise I will try to do better...

Mirror ATM.

As usual everyone is running around, we have Christmas coming up and New Years which is then followed closely by Children's Day. Currently we have only a few volunteers here, a small group but with a large intake coming in a week. Its Saturday here now and I have a Trekking Orientation that I will do with Stuart this morning, then off to do our normal work. Stuart is our IT Guru. You hear his name a lot especially if the Internet has gone down.

Today is a chilled day, the volunteers are currently playing games with the local youth who come from 3 main villages. They play for an hour and then our Indoor Program Volunteers teach English for an hour. Today they are focusing on Christmas. After that then the kids learn Japanese with the Japanese Volunteers.

The lunch! We had stick rice with custard for brekky this morning with thai donuts and 3 in 1 coffee. Can I just say that 3 in 1 coffee or milo or ovaltine is like the best invention ever. Its coffee, creamer and sugar all in one little convenient packet, perfect size for a cup! YUM!!

Anyway then the Outdoor Volunteers have there time in the spotlight with the kids for an hour. They usually do some type of craft thing with the kids. I think today they will be making Christmas Decorations. After the lessons are all done the volunteers can go get ready for town, and packing their bags...

Today is a sad day, we are losing 3 great volunteers, Patti, Melissa and Sean. They have been here for quite a long time and will be dearly missed after they leave. Melissa I think will come back and work on a Project as an Intern. Which would be awesome fun, as I will hopefully be back here next March, to work for Mirror under the Ebannok Handicrafts Project. I am so looking forward to coming back and working, I know I will be able to make a difference here.

Well that is today in kinda a nut shell, Stick Rice for brekky, teaching and trekking, leaving.

Cheers,

Zoxo

Aftermath of Friday 13th...

THE PLANTATION

We survived the ordeal of Friday the 13th to enter today. And what a crazy day, today has become.

At Mirror Saturday is hectic, the local children from the surrounding villages come to play games, learn English, Japanese and some sort of activity. We also teach local guide which we thought was cancelled, everyone left for the activity. 30mins later we find out the guides are here and need their lesson, Stuart and I had to teach with no preparation and lesson plan. We winged and think it came out all good, luc

ky for us I knew one of the boys and the other was a friends brother.

The activity was banana tree planting with P'Pi. The volunteers went down to Baan Leepa to plant the trees when disaster struck. Firstly Zoe (boy) dislocated his arm, Stuart tripped on a rock and basically opened his toe, it looks like a puppet now with its little flap flapping away I have decided to call it Edward, Adrianne earlier had come off a bike and hurt her leg and knee she's hobbling around on her crutches, Stacy with her infection of BORK (Buddha Only Really Knows), Pam with her foot injury, and little old healthy me trying to stay that way. Ok that was all in the past week but hey whatevs...

Another thing that has been coming up with me is my iGoogle BGs (Backgrounds), for people who use iGoolge I don't know if you love it as much as I or get as much excitement as I do from it. Some say small things amuse small minds, but I think small things amuse mindful minds. Through constant mindfulness you can see more and appreciate more even something as simple as a girl climbing a giraffe at a bus station BG on my iGoogle account. But now I have, yet again moved on from tea house to the bus station with a very interesting girl to some "i'll ninja kick your ass" ninjas! Who doesn't love ninjas!? Pure awesomeness. I could even say pure Dankness!

Tonight we go into town to Big C an do a lil' shopping and dinner and off to the Saturday Walking Market. Should be fun. Then tomorrow we have P'Ao's (one of the most influential and inspirational persons in my life) birthday. I hear a BBQ being started. Yum! So with that note I'm off for tee ang gin kow (Lunch in Thai).

Z.