We made it!!

We made it here without any major problems! We made all our flights, got to sit together on each one, and didn't lose any of our baggage. We've been here for five days now and have finally adjusted to the time difference (12 hours.) The first few days we were falling asleep at 7pm and waking up around 4 and 5 am. Last night we stayed up playing cards with the other volunteers and actually slept in until 8:30 today.

On Wednesday when we got here, we just unpacked and got familiar with our neighborhood. Our house is definitely a local Thai house: it is very open, with mattresses on the floor, there are cats that walk in and out as they please, and it is made out of wooden planks (thus there are lots of holes in the walls.) On Thursday we went to volunteer at a orphanage for Hmong Hill Tribe children. There were about 25 kids and they were so sweet. It was a rough day though because it was basically the first day of the rainy season and the kids were very restless. On Friday the kids at the orphanage were going to a school, so we had the day off. We explored all around Chiang Mai (where we are staying) and tried to get our bearings.

I think my (Maggie) favorite day so far was Saturday because we went to the Chiang Mai zoo. It was...AMAZING! It was only 3$ each and we spent about four hours there. I actually fed a leopard that was 4 feet away from me. Later, we saw this elephant that was awfully close to the edge of his habitat, so we approached it. We fed it and it kept touching us with its trunk!! It tried to eat Robbie's clothes. There was only a 2.5ft fence between us and he started to climb over it!! He got 1/2 way over before he backed off, it was awesome. The Chiang Mai zoo put a new twist on the tortoise and the hare fable: there was an exhibit with lots of turles and white rabbits in the same habitat! Weird...! I was so shocked by the camels. They are such bizarre animals!!! They made the strangest sounds.

Our volunteering program starts tomorrow, Monday. We will be in a local school helping with English lessons. We're still working on uploading pictures, so be looking out for those. We miss you all!! Love,
Maggie and Robbie