Five Year Anniversary In Bangkok and Meeting some New Friends

From the rooftop restaurant where we rang in our 5 years together!

Hello!
We hope everyone is doing well! It is yet another very tired Monday. I just taught 2 classes and Graham is teaching his third class right now. Only a couple more to go! The good news is the reason we are so tired is because the end of last week and this weekend were incredibly fun! I guess I will start at the beginning (a very good place to start...)

Last week we were invited by our new and amazing friend, Tom, to a dinner and tour of Dan Chang . We met Tom last week at the Temple and became fast friends as he is incredibly warm, welcoming, and interesting to talk to. We wrote a bit about Tom last week but just to recap: He is half German, half Thai, and while he has lived in Germany his whole life he has taken 3 month trips to Thailand every year since he was a child. He therefore has many interesting perspectives and lots of helpful information to share about Dan Chang. He has seen it change a lot over the years, although the close-knit community that he comes from has stayed very true to their traditional lives. They live on the riverbank outside of town and do a lot of fishing and cooking and small scale farming, and then sell their goods at the market. Tom was kind enough to pick us up and drive us around Dan Chang a bit. It was pretty hilarious to have all 3 of us on his moped/scooter/motorcycle. Thai people can fit 5 on a scooter no problem, but it is unusual, and might I add, a bit cramped, to fit 3 farangs on a scooter. At first it was a bit awkward, but after a while it was just cozy and we got used to all the amazed stares we got.

Some of our new friends

Tom took us to his favorite soup joint, and showed us his and his mom's amazing house. They, along with Tom's brother, built it from the ground up. It is amazing how much work they have done. His mom was so sweet, too. We hung out by the fire, got a tour of the Jungle Book river at dusk, played with their adorable puppy, chilled with the local people who all came out to see us and chat, and enjoyed a delicious dinner (made by Tom's mom, who conveniently happens to be a chef in Germany!) Graham and I were also the first white people to ever visit their house, which was kinda cool. We had a great time, we so appreciate Tom's generosity and hospitality and enjoyed feeling like locals for a night.

The next evening everyone came to our place for dinner and tons of laughs. The usual group: Katie, Jessica, Sel, Matt, Taygan, Graham and I had the best time together as we shared travel tips and reveled in the twilight :)

On Friday we went to Tom's house again for another barbecue and lots of drinks :) We had a great time hula hooping with the kids; kids here do it all the time and are amazing! I was especially inspired by two 6 year old boys, who can hula hoop while they are down on their knees... Wow! We finished the night chatting with some more locals, and did our best to integrate using the 5 phrases we know in Thai, and the locals' mostly limited English (although many are really good!). There were two girls in particular who are our age, and who don't speak English, Tan and Peetoom, who were so sweet. We were able to chat a bit with them, thanks to Tom's translation help, and got their numbers to hang out again. Tom and his mom were once again so kind, fun and generous and we had a really magical night by the river, in our town in Thailand, with the full moon and fire lighting our smiling faces. The delicious pasta and non-stop beer flow didn't hurt either. Thanks for everything Tom!

Oh, I am forgetting a very important part of this past week, Graham and I are currently taking care of a cat. Don't worry, Mom and Dad, I won't bring it home :) We found that we missed our cat, Gazette, so much. Every time I would see a cat on the street, I'd be so excited and happy to pet it. When a cat showed up at school that was sweet, but super skinny, and afraid of all the dogs and kids, after a few days of letting it suffer at school, we put it in our bike basket and took it home. We named her Angel, and she is such a lap kitty. Our plan is to keep her for a bit, get her healthy, neuter her and get her shots, then find her a home. It has been fun having a temporary pet, I miss mine so much! Angel loves to cuddle at night and has overall been a real joy for us here. It has been fantastic to have her waiting on our doorstep whenever we return home!

Last but certainly not least - Saturday was Graham and my 5 year anniversary!!!!! I slept in with Angel, then Graham came and woke me up and surprised me with a night in a 5 star hotel in Bangkok! We had been trying to decide what to do, because we wanted to do something fun, special and relaxing, but not too expensive. Five years is so big (crazy in fact!) and we cannot remember what we did for our 2 year, 3 year, or 4 year anniversary (pretty sad, I'm glad I keep a journal!) so we figured we had to make our 5 year an anniversary to remember. So Graham, in his usual amazing way, found us the fanciest hotel for a great price and we jumped on a bus to Bangkok.

Getting in and out of a city as big as Bangkok is always a bit gnarly (minivans, buses, tuktuks, taxis, trains, the sky train, metros etc are all required and used) so it took us a bit longer than we had expected, but we made it to the hotel easily and were so surprised by our room, or should I say, enormous suite? We had a kitchen, laundry room, another room, a living room and breakfast nook, a bathroom with a rain shower and huge bathtub, and a big bedroom. I had never been in such a fancy hotel, much less in such a big fancy room! We enjoyed pretending that it was our apartment, and I look forward to the day when I can live in a place like that. (Maybe it will be my assisted living apartment, but a girl can still dream!) After checking out the hotel and our room, Graham pulled yet another surprise out of his sleeve, and we went to have a fancy Mexican food dinner! We have both been missing Mexican food so much, so I was stoked. The place was kinda funny, with Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" and various funk songs blasting while the cowboy hat wearing waitresses walked around-but it was also so amazing! We had nachos, margaritas and tacos which were all so delicious, especially since we have missed them so much :)

After a couple hours of revelry, we walked over to the State Towers to get drinks at Sky Bar. Sky Bar is rated by many different publications as one of the ten coolest bars in the world, and the fact that our jaws were dropped for about five minutes before we could talk is testament to the truth of those reviews! It is on the 67th floor roof of a hotel, and is open-air with only a small glass barrier holding you back from the edge (so be careful how much you drink!)! There was a jazz band playing, and as we sipped our cocktails I couldn't help feeling that I must be sleeping and having a spectacular dream, it was just too unbelievable!!!

Graham doesn't believe in "meant-to-be" occurrences, and I don't know if I do, but if you did, there were a couple really cool "signs" that happened on our anniversary. One was a Thai woman asking if we were dating, and when we told her that we were, she said that we look like brother and sister and that it is a really good omen in Thailand when you are dating someone you look like. It means you are soul-mates she said :)! Then later at the Sky Bar we randomly started chatting with a couple after we asked them to take our picture. After a few minutes it came out that the guy's name was Graham, which was random given that there aren't many, but then after a few more minutes we found out that her name was Natalie!!! Such a crazy coincidence!! But they don't call themselves Grahamalie. Luckily we are still independent individuals, as a couple. Haha. or should I say, 555? (The word "five" in Thai is "ha," so when I write 555 it's pronounced "hahaha" in Thai. 555. lol. etc :))

On Sunday morning we woke up at 7:00, which was so exciting because it meant we had more time to enjoy our hotel and our celebration! First we went on an early morning swim, then we had a buffet breakfast (it's a buffet!) that was delicious. Graham ate maybe 1 plate, but I powered on and ate like 4 because it was so delicious. Although I'm not sure if I should be writing about that... We did work out for like 15 minutes though, so I should be good to go:) One of my favorite parts of the day was spending an hour in the spa. I sat in a beautiful indoor hot tub, with big windows looking out over the city and water spilling over into rocks around the edge. It was easily the nicest jacuzzi I have ever been in, and I really felt like a million bucks. I also relaxed and stretched in the sauna and steam room, and oddly was the only one there. After my personal spa treatments I walked out to the beautiful roof top pool so rejuvenated and relaxed, such a great feeling. We played for a while longer in the pool, then headed to a health food store for some American type food, then to the bus station to bus home, in time for Loi Krathong celebrations!

A little preview of our next post - us celebrating Loi Katron

With that, I must depart. I'm sorry to leave you in suspense, but this post is probably too long anyways. We will write about Loi Krathong in a few days. We sang in front of 5,000 people..... it was so cool...

We miss everyone and hope you are all doing great!
Massive hugs from Thailand!