Off the main road in town, a side street veers off toward the neighborhood where Partners office is located. The two roads converge to a sharp corner, wedging in a community platform. I haven’t seen it used for much, but each night at 6pm, it comes alive.

For Thai aerobics.

I’ve passed it many times and enjoyed a good laugh. Everyone seems to be shuffling off beat to the load pop music.

I told Jenn about it a few months ago, and we were anxious to fit it into our schedule. We expected hilarity, and it delivered nothing less.

We managed to stay with everyone for the warm up. Jenn did turn to me a few minutes in to say, “What beat are they moving to?!” The woman in front of me was a pro, clearly coming every week, and helped me to sort it out even if it was off-beat. She even gave us a double thumbs up when we finished!

The instructor changed in the middle, and the second woman was much more advanced. Jenn and I, and really everyone, just did their own little moves throughout. One woman was particularly keen to twirling, and just added her own every fifteen seconds or so.

After about twenty minutes of following along a few beats late to the advanced crew, Jenn realizes, “I think she’s speaking English! ‘Double knee, tap out’; yeah, that’s English!”

We’ve included a short video Stephen & Chris got from the car. Please take note of the woman who comes up in the middle to point out that there are some strange white men watching us from a truck. Hilarious.

It just doesn’t get much better than doing aerobics to bad pop music and an instructor you don’t understand in the middle of a town where your glowing skin already makes you stand out.  What else would sisters be for but to join you at a time like this?

For our last day in Mae Sot with Chris and Jenn, we all took a cooking class. This was one of Stephen & I’s favorite experiences when we were in Mae Sot to volunteer in 2009.

It began at 9am this morning, and commenced around 1pm, after we had visited the market for veggies, enjoyed some Burmese tea at a local tea shop, and helped to create four Burmese specialties: samosas, dal & vegetable curry, mandalay noodle salad, and lime iced tea. We enjoyed all four items for lunch and left with a cookbook each and leftovers for at least another meal or two.

Guess what arrived in the mail this week!?

We got two humungous boxes full of dolls, musical instruments, stuffed animals, books, and more for the kiddos across the street!  This vast collection of toys were collected by two bible study groups connected to Stephen’s mom, Gena, and sent our way.

Thanks to my brother-in-law Chris’ mom, we have a basket full of toys that we’re sharing with the kids now. We leave it in our house and take it out on special days, so we can all play together and then collect everything back.  With this new set being so large, we’ve decided to give them away as Christmas presents. The sweet women even thought to include Christmas gift wrap bags to put them in.

It gets even better. We decided we’d like to invite a friend from work who could translate for us to share who the toys are from, why we are giving gifts to them, and why we celebrate Christmas. We thought this could provide a wonderful opportunity to communicate our faith and love on them.

Thus developed a party.

We then spoke with our boss, who has encouraged us to invite all the Partners staff as well. And thus, the party grew, and we’ve got big dreams for yet another Christmas party!

I nearly forgot, really.

Stephen and I had left to go to a meeting at work, on the way realizing it was Jenn’s birthday, and that we pathetically said nothing! My parents on the other side of the world got to her first by Skype, while she sat in my living room.

Lame.

But, it was a good day.

We started with an early morning bike to the market, a personal favorite. We drooled over the fresh fruits and veggies and picked up some delicious Burmese breakfast.

The afternoon? A few firsts for both of us: a pedicure here in Mae Sot and a Thai massage. The pedicure was to be expected, but wonderful; the Thai massage is whole new story. Jenn loved it; Stephen and I felt our bubbles were a little crowded. I definitely would have chosen different underclothes if I’d known the top and bottom they gave me would be a thin white fabric missing an unfortunately located button.

Either way, we then took our time to cook some delicious Greek falafel, hummus, and spice cake!

We’ve just returned from a trip with Chris, Jenn, and a few other Partners staff to some villages along the border. Honestly, I can’t be bothered to recount all the stories while they are still here in present, but here’s a few photos in an attempt to capture some of the fun.

{ready to hike.}

{headed to shower in a waterfall after a long hike.}

{while Chris was busy treating and training, Jenn & I started au naturale art projects with the kids: make pictures out of leaves, sticks, and flowers}

{waterfall one: perfect for climbing, not as good for showering. three visits in three days.}

{it was cold.}

{contemplating the conquer}

{a medic and avid tree climber. he’s after coconuts for a snack. and if the whole tree was in the photo, you wouldn’t be able to see him.}

{obligatory singing for the group; more off key than usual this time.}

{the crew: medics, Partners staff, traveling friends}

{one more suture before leaving town. this one made the rest of us a little light-headed, so we went off to town to find some sweeties for the poor kiddo.}

{waterfall two: absolutely gorgeous.}

After a long day of hiking into a village, we were all pretty anxious for showers. Unfortunately, the nearby faucet and bucket designed for bathing was being cleaned.

Option two? A nearby waterfall. Sounds beautiful, right? An experience, yes?

As gentleman, Stephen & Chris encouraged Jenn & I to go first. We put on our sarongs and headed to the waterfall with about five locals.

Take note of our get up: our sarongs are a simple tube of Karen material pulled around us and tucked in at the top. We have towels over our shoulders, flip flops on, and shampoo in hand. I also brought my razor, which I realized later was much too ambitious.

This waterfall was relatively nearby–about half a kilometer. A little further than anticipated for a shower. This short distance also included a hike through the jungle, crossing about six smallish waterfalls with a decent current, a steep vertical climb of mossy rock, and crossing a hydropower engine for the village.

It was hilarious in many ways.

Our first challenge was to simply keep our sarongs up. It’s easier said than done while standing, but hiking in a loose robe wouldn’t be my first choice. There is something about stretching out to step over rushing water and sharp rocks without underclothes that feels very vulnerable. It’s also quite challenging to climb up a vertical rock with one hand on your falling sarong and the other grasping the shampoo & razor you’re questioning was worth bringing. Let’s just say there were some close calls, and I definitely was wishing we had decided to just share shampoo for this one!

There was also the challenge of keeping on flipflops in rushing waters. I laughed at Jenn when she lost hers down a waterfall (to be recovered by a competent local), but then lost mine three times following–all to be recovered by someone more competent than I.

By the time we were on our way back, now in very wet, heavy sarongs, we had someone carrying our shoes, another someone carrying our shampoos, and someone else in charge of lending a hand when needed.  They had picked up on our inadequacies.

The actual bath was lovely. Having just finished rainy season, the water was forcefully coming off the mountain, so rather than attempting to hold tree roots in a pool of deep, swirling water, we sat on the rocks. We let this beautiful, fresh water flow over us, while we desperately grasped our sarongs. It was clumsy, and it encouraged stares and laughs.

It was funny enough that we did a re-creation for Chris & Stephen when we went to visit the waterfall the next afternoon.

And after hiking back from the “shower”, we had dirty hands from bracing on trees and dirty feet from trekking through dirt and mud. I had begun to sweat again.

The bathing faucet had been fixed by this time, and we could quickly rinse off. Again.

And hey, at least it was funny.

I’m celebrating two years of being married to this boy today.

And I’m still loving it, to say the least.