You get... I get...

You get snow days… I get political unrest days.

Due to the uncertainty of the political demonstrations and the chance that these may spread beyond the current protest sites, ICS decided to cancel all classes for Monday.

Please be praying for Thailand...

Praying for Thailand

Please be praying for peace in Thailand. This weekend (and possibly into the beginning of the week) is supposed to be a big weekend of protests, as people from various parts of Thailand (specifically Northern Thailand) travel to Bangkok to participate in "The Million Man March" that takes place on Sunday, March 14. Protests in the past have been quite peaceful, and that is what the Red-shirts promise again, but things can always quickly get out of control. And so that none of you worry (particularly the 'rents), we are actually quite removed from the situation, living about 25+ minutes (in good traffic) to where the protest is being held. Additionally, despite how peaceful protests have been in the past, we aren't even venturing downtown this weekend... better safe than sorry, folks.

We don't know what the solution is to bring peace to this political unrest (who should be leader and why etc.), but we know that we can pray to a God that hears us, and that He is in control. So please join us in praying for Thailand.

Below are some pictures of the current situation as people flock to Bangkok, as well as an article taken from BBC News that helps to explain the reason for the political unrest.

FYI: Motorcyclist has a mask on due to the pollution...not for any other reason; it's very common here.

Article taken from BBC News:

For more than three years Thailand has been gripped by a paralysing political crisis centred on former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

Mr Thaksin was ousted from office in a military coup in September 2006, and the tug-of-war between his supporters and opponents has continued ever since.

Neither side can accept the other's view of who should run the country, and each has staged long-running protests to push their cause.

When Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva was chosen as prime minister in December 2008, some Thais hoped the protests had finally come to an end. But it appears the crisis is far from over.

Who are the pro-Thaksin protesters?

Mr Thaksin still retains widespread support among the rural poor, who benefited from the populist policies he framed during his five years in power.

Mr Thaksin is out of the country but speaks to supporters via video link

His supporters call themselves the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD), and are known for wearing distinctive red shirts.

The UDD says Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva came to power illegitimately and is a puppet of the military. It wants Mr Abhisit to resign and call fresh elections.

The protesters' tactics, though less dramatic, are similar to those used by anti-Thaksin protesters last year, which eventually led to the change of government.

How effective are their protests?

Since March 2009, the protesters have held sit-in protests outside government offices, and have occasionally prevented the cabinet from meeting.

They also forced the cancellation of a summit of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) in April. They stormed the venue in the seaside resort of Pattaya, causing huge embarrassment to the government.

A day later, tens of thousands of protesters broke into the interior ministry, blocked busy roads in Bangkok and camped around Government House.

Occasional large, and largely peaceful, demonstrations by the red-shirts continued throughout 2009, usually featuring a video-link address by Mr Thaksin - who is in self-exile, mostly in Dubai.

Mr Thaksin has called on his supporters to keep fighting for the fall of the Abhisit government and for his own return to the country.

Who are the anti-Thaksin protesters?

The opponents of Mr Thaksin call themselves the Peoples' Alliance for Democracy (PAD), and wear yellow shirts to proclaim their allegedly more pro-monarchist stance.

People in Thailand often wear yellow to show their allegiance to the king, and one of the protesters' key claims is that Mr Thaksin is not as loyal to the king as they are.

The PAD protesters helped bring down two PPP governments

The PAD is a loose grouping of royalists, businessmen and the urban middle class, led by media mogul Sondhi Limthongkul and Chamlong Srimuang, a former general with close ties to the king's most senior adviser, Gen Prem Tinsulanonda.

The PAD accuses Mr Thaksin of corruption and nepotism during his time in power.

PAD protests were instrumental in setting the scene for a military coup which removed Mr Thaksin from office in 2006.

They repeated these rallies in 2008, to protest against the party in power at the time - the People Power Party (PPP), which was widely seen as a reincarnation of Mr Thaksin's banned Thai Rak Thai party.

The protesters took over Government House for three months, and engineered a week-long siege of Bangkok's main airports in December 2008, crippling the country's vital tourism industry.

Together with several court rulings against the PPP, they are credited with bringing down two of its governments - firstly the administration of Samak Sundaravej and then that of Mr Thaksin's brother-in-law Somchai Wongsawat.

Now that a pro-Thaksin government is no longer in power, the PAD is keeping a close watch on the rising anger inside the UDD camp.

How did Mr Abhisit become prime minister?

Amid the turmoil of the airport blockade in December 2008, a Constitutional Court ruled that the PPP was guilty of electoral fraud and barred its leaders from politics for five years.

The red-shirted protesters want Mr Abhisit to resign from office

There seemed to be no way forward, but then a few Thaksin loyalists changed sides to join the other main party, the Democrats.

This enabled Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva to form a new government and become the next prime minister without calling elections.

The Democrats are not openly allied to one group of protesters or the other, but in the past the party has been closely associated with elements of the PAD.

Mr Abhisit has been criticised for his choice of foreign minister, Kasit Piromya - an open supporter of the PAD movement and its airport blockade.

Where is Mr Thaksin now?

Mr Thaksin describes himself as a citizen of the world, and he is often in Dubai, China, the UK or Hong Kong.

If he did come back to Thailand, he would face two years in jail after being found guilty in a conflict of interest case.

His long-term aims are unclear. In the past he has said he will not re-enter politics, but he has also said he is needed to lead Thailand out of the economic crisis.

He created tensions in November 2009 by accepting a position as an economic adviser to the Cambodian government, angering the authorities in Thailand.

He remains actively involved in politics, through the rallies of his red-shirted supporters. These rallies have prompted a vague offer of talks from the Abhisit government, which he has so far rebuffed.

Never enough

Mike could never play enough basketball. I think he craves it in the same way that his lungs crave air or in the same way that fish NEED water. :) Being at TLO and having open gyms several Saturday mornings per month was great for Mike... but being here in Thailand with so many athletic male teachers who want nothing more than to play as often as their aging bodies can handle, is like heaven for him.

They play every Saturday morning from 9-12. Sunday afternoons were once reserved for soccer, but it has now morphed into basketball playing. This weekend was the big kahuna or something because they had basketball on Thursday after school, on Friday (which was PD day so there was no school), Saturday morning and probably tomorrow as well. :)

These pictures are actually taken from a student vs. faculty game sometime back in February. To make it a little bit more fair and challenging for the teachers since they would otherwise dominate the students (these kids are soccer players, not basketball players), they decided to change the point value system. The kids still got their regular points (3 for a 3-pointer, 2 for other shots and 1 for free-throws), but the teachers had to work a bit harder to win since 3-pointers were worth 2 points and every other shot was worth 1.

Despite the change in scoring value, the teachers still won 52-46, though it did make it an intense and awfully close game. I think everyone had a lot of fun playing... though I wouldn't doubt that the teachers had more fun since having a student vs. teacher faculty game is really just another excuse for them to play more ball... since they just can't seem to get enough of it. :)

A shaving lesson

My Spanish 1 kids are learning reflexive verbs right now. In case you may not be a grammar nerd like me, a reflexive verb is verb that one does to him/herself. :) Anyway, I asked them to translate the following sentence: He needs to shave (himself).

My students were eager to give me the answer "Necesita afeitarse" or "Se necesita afeitar." Albeit being correct, the sentence could technically be even better if they stuck the subject pronoun "he" beforehand. So consequently, I asked them what they could do to make the sentence even better, to which someone said "Add the word he!" I applauded them, but was interrupted by one of my students asking, "Mrs. Karly? Why do we need to put the subject pronoun 'he' beforehand? We already know that it's a he; a girl doesn't shave so it would never be 'she'!"

I held back my giggles and calmly told my little freshman boy that many women do shave their legs and their armpits. In the midst of corrupting their innocent minds, I received a lot of groans and "You shave your armpits and legs, Mrs. Karly?" Apparently I gave them a little too much information. One of my students then piped in saying, "Hey guys, at least she's being honest with us!" This started a ripple effect of "Yeah, Mrs. Karly is always honest with us, isn't she?" "Thanks for being honest with us, Mrs. Karly."

They never cease to make me laugh.

The big two-eight

Guess who turned the big 2-8 today? This face...


I just wanted to take a moment to honor Mike on his 28th birthday.

I often have other teachers or parents come to me and say something along the lines of: "That Mr. Mike is just a great teacher! He gets those kids involved and seems to just love what he does." It's true. My husband is man of many talents and does indeed love his job.

Mike wakes up every morning around 5:00 (or 6:00 on the weekends)and spends about an hour reading his Bible and another devotional book or two to jump-start his mornings. He is intentional about trying to start his day off on the right foot.

Kids adore Mike. When we see kids after school or at school functions, they gravitate towards him and constantly want to touch him, say hello to him, jump on him, hug him, or just smile at him. At the end of the day, kids tell him that they will miss him, and he got even got a rose from one of his students on Valentine's Day.

My high schoolers love Mike even though they don't really know him very well; they just know that he's my husband and that he loves sports/is good at sports (and that's enough to make them adore him). Sometimes they will just start talking to me about Mike and say things like, "He is so good at basketball!" "I've never seen someone so fast." "He's good at everything he does!" "Is there even a sport he isn't good at?"

Yes sirree, I have a talented hubby. I will admit, sometimes it can be downright annoying that he is good at almost everything that he does, but I praise God for how he is gifted and particularly for how his athletic talents help students to love, adore, and respect him... thus he develops these relationships with students where he can speak truth in their life and share the gospel with them.

Mike not only speaks truth into the lives of his students (and mine), but he speaks truth to me as well. He is good at pointing me back to the gospel when I need it most, praying with me through situations, and unconditionally loving and serving me. Needless to say, his students (and mine) aren't the only ones that adore, love and respect him.

Happy birthday, Mikey. You are a blessing to all of those around you and I thank God for you every day. May Jesus continue to work in your life and overwhelm you with his goodness and grace.

Is it possible?

Is it possible to have spring fever when it's never cold?
Is it possible to have reverse spring fever where you crave cold cool weather?

Itchin' for spring break
Itchin' for a little break from school and my kiddos
Itchin' to go hiking in Nepal and experience 70-80 degree weather and get away from 90-100 degree weather for a week

Being Mrs. Mean

I came down hard on my level 3 kids today. I told them I was frustrated because they are in an upper level Spanish class, have sufficient vocabulary, are capable students... yet I hear them speaking in English WAY too much. So I put my foot down. I have had this talk with them before and they usually shape up for part of the class, but slowly, they somehow manage to go back to being lazy and putting forth minimal effort.

The "transition year" is always hard. I came in with different expectations, different rules, different ideas, and different teaching methods than the previous teacher, which resulted in a) my students getting frustrated because of the changes I was trying to implement and b) me getting frustrated because I expected more from them than what I was getting. I started out being perhaps a little too gentle and accommodating to my level 2, 3, and AP students in this year of transition, trying to keep my expectations more or less the same as the previous teacher, but that's impossible when we are different people/teachers; it's hard to be someone you're not!

So I took a stand today to rid my classroom of their former ways and I decided to start giving them a grade each class as to how much Spanish they speak in class. Needless to say, they stared at me with wide eyes, complained, and thought I was being Mrs. Mean because, heaven forbid, I was making them actually speak in Spanish 99% of the time. But it's almost 4th quarter and it's time to for them to spread their wings and give it go. Besides, how can you possibly learn a language without consistently hearing it and speaking it? Additionally, Bangkok isn't quite the happenin' place to find people who speak Spanish, so really class time is the only time where they will consistently speak/listen/read/write in the target language.

So how did the class go? Well, after they got over their initial shock and being completely terrified of me, it was stinkin' awesome. I heard SO much Spanish... to be honest, I don't think I even heard one word of English the entire time. They were actually readily volunteering answers instead of me taking "victims" because they wanted their points so badly. They were thinking so hard and putting forth so much effort; it was amazing! And even better, at the end of the class they didn't think it was that hard to get their full points, so we all walked away happy.

I'm disappointed that it takes receiving a grade to motivate them to consistently speak in Spanish, but if that is what it takes to turn my classroom into what I hope for it to be, then I will gladly do it. Unfortunately, kids don't seem to want to learn for the sake of learning... I guess that's something that just comes with age?! I'm also disappointed that I didn't implement this grade earlier in the year... I let it go on waaaay too long in the hopes that it would improve by itself, but they definitely needed extra motivation to change their ways.

Fortunately, my AP kids got this talk early in the year since I expect a lot from them simply because they are AP students. But they also are really motivated to take in and produce as much as they can because they have an exam to pass. My level 1 kids are also very good... they consistently speak in Spanish because that's what I expected from them from the start and they don't know anything different... granted, there is often some Spanglish as they have limited vocabulary, but they definitely use what they know. My level 2 kids unfortunately might need the same talking to that I gave my level 3 kids today... hopefully I will get the same response/result.

Whenever I have done teacher evaluations, one of the most common things that students say about my teaching is that I always speak in Spanish no matter what the level. [I don't, because I do a lot of difficult grammar explanations in English, but it seems like I do to the kids]. Sometimes it is very frustrating to my students because they just want immediate comprehension/instant gratification... I completely understand that because I have been there before. But I know that I wouldn't be where I am now, doing what I'm doing if it hadn't been for my Spanish teachers doing the same thing to me... not to mention having a complete immersion experience in Spain.

So sure, my students call me Mrs. Mean because I make them speak in Spanish 99% of the time because I can take it [as long as they say it in Spanish]. :)

Just call me killer...

Well, it's official. I killed our little friend.

Obituary:
Little dude was sadly (and accidentally) maimed by a blow to the head and arm with an avocado. Little dude loved to hide behind kites and in garbage cans, scare his people friends by jumping out of random places, and eat his fair share of creepy crawly bugs and mosquitoes. He is survived by his people friends. Flushing ceremonies occurred around 7 pm on March 2.

Wanted ad:
Wanted: New little dude to eat the creepy crawly bugs and mosquitoes. New little dude needs to NOT use the garbage can as a hiding place. Not having such a strong aversion to avocados would be helpful too.

Politics

What's going on in Thailand as of late?

On February 26, ousted former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was accused of abusing his power as prime minister, causing damage to the state and favoring Shin Corp (the firm controlled by his family before it was sold to Temasek Holdings of Singapore) by implementing policies which benefited it through five measures when he was the government leader.

The Supreme Court thus made the decision to seize 46 billion baht ($1.4 billion) in assets from him on the belief that he and his wife owned the Shin Corp shares up until they were sold to Temasek. The court found his personal holdings amounted to about 30 billion baht before he gained ''unusual wealth'' while in office, so the court left him with 30 billion baht in assets.

In response to the Supreme Court verdict regarding the disposition of former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's frozen assets, small explosive devices were discovered and/or detonated outside five separate banks in metropolitan Bangkok. In the lead up to the expected March 12-14 demonstrations and rallies, it is anticipated that more of these small explosive devices may be planted.

How do we feel about this?

Well, no matter where you live, there are always dangers and problems of different sorts: tsunamis, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, lack of food, drug trafficking, kidnapping, people trafficking, robbing, gangs, mafias, nuclear bombs, murder, domestic violence, school shootings, international terrorism, prostitution, war etc. So really, no one is ever safe at any point in time.

We live in a fallen world, friends. So all we can do is just put our hope and trust in God and pray that He would keep us safe in this life that we live here on earth. Obviously we need to be cautious, careful and aware of the world around us too, but Christ is our rock and our salvation and so we will fear no evil, for nothing can separate us from the love of Christ.

Note to self...

Remember THIS little dude? Okay, well I maimed him the other day when I threw an avocado into the garbage. Apparently, aside from hiding behind kites, he likes to hide in the garbage too. He was limping around at first and I also think I blinded him in one eye. Sadness! I am particularly sad because our little dude eats mosquitoes and other little bugs that get into our apartment and bite me during the night... and now he probably can't even see clearly/doesn't have balanced vision. :(

Note to self:
1. Don't hide in garbage cans... it can be hazardous to one's health.
2. Throwing things into the garbage can with too much force might take an eye out.