More at home in Lopburi

A lot has happened since we wrote last. We celebrated our 2 yr. Anniversary, found a home in Lopburi and moved in, started studying Thai, and made some new friends. You can see more pictures of it all here.

We Found a Home

After 10 months without a home, we were ready to unpack our stuff and settle down a little. After looking at the options, we decided to stay at the top floor (4th Floor) of the Lopburi Youth House. The main floor is a community place for students to come hang out, eat, or study. There is a kitchen, laundry area, computer, and plenty of room for people to relax. The 2nd floor has a TV and couch and has room for students to sleep on the floor occasionally. Off and Pheung (the leaders of the Youth) live on the 3rd Floor. They are our age, have been married 2 years, and speak good English.

We get the whole 4th Floor. We have a nice big bedroom with 2 little nightstands, 2 dressers, and most importantly, an AIR CONDITIONER and 2 Fans. Sometimes at night we turn the air-con down to 84degrees F, but then we start to feel cold. We have a litte bathroom and a nice open landing with a desk and some space to dry out clothes. We have wireless internet at the house as well. We have really enjoyed having a home for the last week.

2 Year Anniversary

Jonathan surprised Ashley on our anniversary by leaving the house, reserving a hotel room, and planning the day for her. Ashley went and sipped some coffee, got a nice massage, shopped a little and then we had a nice relaxing evening at the hotel. For dinner we went to the Lopburi SteakHouse and were pleasantly surprised.

Learning Thai

Fiat (yes, she was named after the car) is teaching us Thai for 2 hours a day Tuesday through Saturday. We are both finding it very helpful to have her tell us when we're pronouncing things wrong and to motivate us to study on our own. She is teaching us with the same curriculum that OMF missionaries have used for the last 30+ years, so there is a lot of wisdom in the methods. Some days it feels like we're doing gymnastics with our mouths, trying to make it move in ways it hasn't moved before. We also go home each day and practice more with the CD they give us. Then, we try to practice as much as possible at the market, basketball court, and restaurants. It's hard work to learn Thai, but it's fun also. Luckily, Thai people are extremely gracious when we don't know the word for something or say the wrong thing. Almost every interaction ends with both them and us laughing;)

New Friends

We've been going to a park downtown about every other day. Jonathan plays basketball and Ashley does dance/aerobics. Their are normally 20-25 basketball players, some of whom are pretty good and tall. Ashley dances with about 50 thai ladies.

We made friends with Dton and Goff. Dton plays basketball and Goff does Aerobics everyday. They have invited us to go eat afterwards and introduced us to lots of their other friends. They are very nice to us. They speak really slowly for us and, between their english and our thai, we can have some fun conversations.