June 4, 2006

I am taking the afternoon to email. This morning I went to a protestant service with some friends /colleagues, who'd invited me a few days back. They had these really high-tech headphones that would supposedly translate the service into English. They didn't, and quite honestly, who wants to be the dork with the headphones. But they did have handy dandy English songbooks that corresponded to the songbooks everyone else were reading in Thai. So I could sing the same songs in English! Super! I think I have some sort of invisible blinking cross on my forehead that indicates to the world that I like going to church. I get it alot. It is quite interesting to see how similar / different worship is across religions and countries. This was quite like a service in the states. The pastor was even wearing a Jesus necktie. And I'm always excited to see churches where women are able to play an active role in the goings-on. Nice though, lots of university students leading things. Kind of like 8:30 mass for you Georgetown folks.

After that, we wandered around the university a bit. It's move-in weekend, and I am continually amused by how similar it is to my own college new student orientation. Lots of kids with brightly colored name tags running around and doing silly activities while appearing simultaneously amused and terrified. Lots of concerned parents. Lots of huge packages of toilet paper being lugged out of cars (this is something that has long amused me... a college kid should be able to purchase toilet paper), along with stuffed animals, clothes, even some discreet tears. Add to all of this trucks being driven around by upper-classmen (upper-class-students?) blaring "My Humps" and "My Milkshake."

It's been raining a good deal, making outings to the market difficult. Apparently the rainy season has started a bit early (global warming!). We are planning to go to the market in a few hours, but the sky is looking threatening.