Abroad Trip Day 4

I did not sleep well at all last night. Despite the fact that I was running on 4 hours of sleep for the past 3 days, I woke up after about 3 hours, and continued to wake up every 20-60 minutes after that. I woke with a headache that stayed with me for most of the day.

Breakfast was eggs, tomatoes, toast and coffee. It was delicious and exactly what I needed.

We started off the day taking seelaws to ISDSI. Seelaws are red pickup trucks with tall toppers over the bed, and benches in them. They're a mix between busses and taxis. You flag them on the side of the road, haggle a price per person for where you want to go, and then hop in the back. However, you may not be the only passenger, because they stop to pick up more people if they have room.

Anyway, ISDSI stands for International Sustainable Development Studies Institute, which is a group which studies development and sustainability through agriculture and education. We had a lecture from Amanda, a PhD candidate from Cornell, who talked about citizenship in Thailand, and why many people who have lived in Thailand for hundreds of years are not recognized as Thai citizens. They then brought in lunch for everyone. I am not entirely sure what I ate, but there were many delicious greens, overcooked bacon and congealed blood. ...Yum... (it actually wasn't bad. Liver-ish).

Then we went to an elementary school to learn how schools function here, and explore how schools deal with students who don't have citizenship (all school is provided for free from 1-9^th grade). The talked with the principle of the school and a professor from CMU. Two girls brought everyone coffee and a snack for everyone. It was awesome. We played with the 6^th graders, and we taught them songs and they taught us songs.

After, I went to the mall. I needed shampoo and conditioner. I bought some for 70 baht each. They're dark purple in color, which is weird to me. I also bought a nice green Thai shirt. One thing I learned about Thai culture at the mall is that when people walk past each other, they walk toward their left, not their right. They drive on the other side of the road as well.

I ate dinner with a few people at the restaurant in front of the organic vegetables restaurant. We don't know its name because I can't read Thai. 30 baht for a good sized and good tasting sweet and sour chicken.

After that, homework and bed! Awesome.