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Nikki's World Travels
Ok im now in chiang mai for the 3rd time as we finished the project yesterday - sob!:( but now embarking on new adventure alone!
Ok well during the last two weeks we've been finishing off the work at the school, bridge and the watertank ie rendering, painting etc so we left leaving three new wonderful structures! Also we started a lil side project of building a mini brdige and two mini water tanks for edd and hannah's pressie m- they were fab made from cement and everything - such talent we all have - hehe!!
But more importantly last friday i had my birthday. It was a lil strange waking up in a bamboo hut and eating rice and fish for a birthday brekkie but nice and different. Everyone signed a card for me which was lovely - thanks again for that! Then in the evenin we all headed to chiang mai then went straight out to the chiang mai saloon for some dinner and the start of the bday drinks. It was great fun - they got me a saloon t-shirt for me as a pressie and sung happy bday plus the owner gave me a drink on the house - not bad huh! During the meal i was rather amused by 4 bristish peeps seating together as the 2 guys were so hittin on the girls but one of them wasn't havin any of it - body language is so entertaining! Well it made me and the 2 hannahs giggle.
After we went to that bar that some of us found lat week and played pool, chose whcih music we wanted etc and generally took over the place - good stuff. We all had buckets (maybe a few too many)! Then, towards the end james happened to knock over a fan and kinda break it - so he did what any over respecting english gentleman would do and legged it!! All of us in hot pursuit as we had the lady runnin out tellin us to pay. So the next part was like a bit out of movie as we all jumped into tuk tuks (some of us still hanging out of the side!) and told the driver to put his foot on it! Tres drole! After that we went to some random club called Spicy and danced the nite away til about 4 when i decided that i was gonna die! So all in all it was a fab birthday!
This week we worked on monday for a bit then went to a spa - it wasnt like your ordinary spa it was a big tub that you could sit in but the water was piping hot so v relaxing.
We had the opening of the school dining room and the bridge on wednesday which was a wonderful but sad day (as it meant that it was the end)! We had pictures taken for the local paper and were presented with gifts then drinks. The kids dressed in akha, lisu, lahu, karen and thai costumes representing each\ of thier cultures. Ati (mine and beth family kid) was one of the ones dressed in the akha clothes - see photos so it was extra special. We then opened the bridge and the kids did different dances again ones from their respective cultures. In the evening we had the party with some drinks - the kids were playing and takin loads of photos (with my camera!) so it was a lovely end to the project. It was really sad leaving the families and mine and some of the other kids were crying - i would love to go back and visit next year to see how it all looks and to see what has changed but most of all to see the families esp the children.
So i said goodbye to the rest of the team last night before they got their night bus to bangkok and i stayed in chiang rai til this morn when i got the bus here. I had one of those really annoying people in front of me who insist on putting their seat right back so you have no room to breathe let know see what your reading - so i asked him to put it forward and i bet he thought bloody falang!
Anyway im off to vietnam on monday so my dot on the mpa can finally move position.
love to all
me
xxx
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