Cambodia

Wow. So much has happened in the last week. I'm in Cambodia now and for the next 3 weeks, I'' be staying at the MAD (make a difference)for good House. It's a house owned by the Starling family who decided to move to Cambodia and adopt orphans. There are 8 orphans and I teach them English in the afternoons with Sofi, the Starling's 17 year old daughter. It's very different than what I thought it would be, but I'm having a lot of fun!

Backtracking to Thailand, it was awesome! We took an overnight train to Chiang Mai (in the north). We stayed there for 2 nights. During the day, we went to a Thai cooking school where I learned how to make Cashew Chicken, Spring Rolls, and Coconut Milk Soup. We all went to the local market and got ingredients and learned abou the local fruits and vegetables. I tried a silkworm. It was disgusting! That night, we went to a Thai Boxing match. It got really intense and a little bloody, but it was cool.

After Chiang Mai, we drove into the mountains in the back of a pickup truck, which was definitely an adventure. Then we stopped at a local place for lunch and the trekking began. Since it's the rainy season, there was so much mud! Going uphill wasn't so bad, except for my poor calves! But on the downhill I was slipping and sliding everywhere! Over the three deays of trekking, we swam at a waterfall, rode elephants, and went bamboo rafting! We slept in these really cool huts in the hilltribe villages and our guides made us real, authentic thai food for dinner and sometimes lunch. When we got back to Chiang Mai, we took bikes all around town and then hopped on another overnight train back to Bangkok, where I met up with my parents and had dinner with them. Then my parents and I flew to Cambodia and now I'm here!

Later on I'll post pictures of the past week!