I feel very far away sitting here in Chiang Mai reading about the terrible fires.

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I have been staying at a very peaceful place called 7 Fountains.  There is a laborinth here which is a kind of maize you can take a walk in.....a walk of over a kilometer!

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The girl playing the instrument (sorry I can't make it go up the right way, was at the Walking Market I went to last night, mostly set in a Budhist temple.  I will show you some of the things I bought when I get back to School on Thursday.  This afternoon I fly to Bangkok for a day.

On Wednesday we had an amazing visit to a higher education school in the refugee camp.  Many of these students hope they can come to a third country  like Australia.  The camp is very crouded and the houses are very small.  The land was so steep we had to walk up steps in the mountain to get to the school.  All the students were lined up to welcome us.

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They did an amazing dance for to welcome us.

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On Friday we went over the border from Thailand into Burma.

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We had a ride in a taxi bike very similar to the Indonesian becak.  I was sitting in one when I took this photo.  I was amazed at the chair this man had just made.

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 Now I have worked out how to post photos from my new camera I can catch up on the last few days. Today's photos will have to wait until my batteries are charged.

This is a photo of a lady selling us some fruit as we sat eating our lunch on the way from Chiang Mai to Maesot.  She was determined she should get the very best price from Australian visitors.

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 On Monday we went to this school for migrant workers children.  Most of the children live at the school because either thier parents are away working or they have no parents. We told them about Australia, and read them a story about Australian animals. Then they drew their special animal and their family.  I will show you the pictures when I get back.  What animal do you think they drew.?

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and then we played pakman with the grade 5-6 children and the whole school got together for a photo.

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This is a much bigger school we went to on Tuesday.  It has 600 students.  The lady standing next to me is the principal.  The teachers wear pink on Tuesdays to show respect to the Thai king.

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I am having a wonderful time here in Maesot but I have a new camera and I can't send photos the way I could with my old camera.  I will keep trying.  I have been to 2 migrant worker schools here, and I will go to a refugee school tomorrow.  At the school I went to today, the children learn 4 languages: Thai, Karen, Burmese and English.

I hope you have all had a wonderful start to the school year.

Ibu Jan

Thinking of you all in hot hot Victoria.  Here it is a bit more humid but not as hot.  I am in my hotel waiting until it is time to go back to the airport and catch the plane to Chiang Mai.  The first photo is of the decoration outside my room.  Even though this is Thailand it looks like a typical Indonesian rural scene.

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The second photo is of the cooks at this hotel making those lovely steamed chinese buns.  I don't think I will have time to try one.  I will need to leave in another hour.

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Not sure if those photos have worked.  I will have to check later.

On Thursday, instead of heading off for school, I am off on another adventure.  This time I am going to Thailand and Burma.  It may be more difficult to keep a blog as I am going to some places off the beaten track, where there are unlikely to be computers, but I will make an entry or two at least from the airports.

I am learning some Karen language to use in the village where I will be staying.  It is much harder than learning Indonesian.  

It would be great to have some comments to respond to.

 

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This photo was taken from my kitchen window a couple of nights ago. The gecko was only about two and a half centimeters long so I think that means it is just a young one.  I looked on the internet and I think it is a Southern Marbled Gecko  that has dropped its tail. Either that or it is a fat tailed gecko. They are nocturnal. 

What a pity I hadn't cleaned my kitchen windows!!!!

These young Willy Wagtails are just about ready to leave their nest.  I took the photo about a week ago, and now they have flown their nest and I see them outside still being fed by their partents.  The nest is just outside my kitchen window.  You can see last year's nest underneath.Young wagtails.jpg

My dogs are very naughty, but I will miss them when I go away.

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