you gotta have friends.

All day long I was kind of worrying about not having friends here and not really being able to connect with any of my schoolmates. It was really starting to bring me down around lunch when everyone was talking about driving up to the lake this weekend and no one was really inviting me. It was like being the new kid in school and no one wants to play with you and you don't really know how to tell them that you want to play because you don't want to impose and as an adult you have this self-doubt and wonder if you're just not like them and they'll never like you and you'll be all alone in Thailand for the next three weeks. Wow, that was a run-on sentence. Anyway, hopefully that won't happen.

Gina, our new classmate,  had invited me and Melissa to the pool at her guest house after class today so I went, super excited to be invited to do something. The pool ended up being closed for cleaning but Warner, who is in the teacher training and seems to have a thing with Melissa, Sarah, who is staying at Chaba and I think I might have mentioned before, Gina and I got a bottle of wine, some snacks and hung out under an umbrella near the pool for a few hours and then went to this slightly overpriced restaurant inside the old city walls to celebrate Gina's friend Jasmine's birthday. The restaurant is balled Brix and it was somewhat fancy but not that delicious. I could probably get better curry off the street for 20 baht instead of 80. But, 80 baht is still just a little over $2 so I really shouldn't complain.



While at dinner Melissa invited me to the lake with them this weekend, so it looks like I might have a chance to connect with some schoolmates and enjoy a lake in the mountains outside of town.

I'm starting to feel more comfortable being alone here. If I can just keep some friends I think I will be ok. I've never really traveled alone or stayed in guest houses. These people that I meet here are real travelers, a lot of them haven't been home in months or years. I don't think I could do it. I have too many roots. I needed to do something like that when I was young, but I didn't have the money to do it until now. Sucks how that works.

I realized when we were all done eating that I left my room unlocked. The doors are locked by these big pad locks and I keep forgetting to take it with me when I'm leaving in the morning. Usually I'll remember soon enough and am able to lock the door, but today I didn't even think about it. When I got back to my room, it was padlocked, which is nice since all of my electronics are in here. The problem with that, though, is that my key is sitting inside the room, hanging from the keycard that turns the electricity on. I had to wake the owners to get the spare key so I could get in.

We drove by the jazz club that I tried to go to the other night on our way home and there was live jazz happening. It seemed like a lot of people were there. I'm going to try to go back, maybe Sunday night if I'm up for it.

 

Melissa and Warner

 

Neil and Gina

 

20 baht pad thai from down the road