Greetings from Thailand

This is just a quick blog update from Chiang Mai in northern Thailand!

Yesterday, Jodi, Rachael, and I took 3 plane trips to get to Chiang Mai. From Nanchang we flew on Hainan Airlines to Guangzhou, China. I would say half of the people on that plane had never flown before. There were lots of passengers taking pictures of the plane and the woman sitting next to me didn't know you had to put on a seat-belt. I had to show her how.

We arrived in Guangzhou and then flew the long way to Bangkok with Thai Air on the nicest airplane I've ever been on. We arrived at Bangkok's newest airport. That airport was the one which was shut down last November because of all the protests. Then we flew on a gigantic double decker plane for the short 50 minute flight to Chiang Mai.

We arrived late--at about 9:30 p.m. because our last flight was about an hour and a half late. So our airport pick-up person from our hostel was nowhere to be found. And somewhere along the way, we realized we didn't have the address to this hostel. A taxi truck drove all around the small city trying to find this place. Thankfully we got there fine.

Chiang Mai is in far northern Thailand and is surrounded by mountains, jungle, and tropical villages. It is like out of a movie. There are a surprising amount of Westerners here, and many of them are either very ritzy looking or they look like rugged adventurers or like they are on the run from the law... It's a very exciting place.

Today we have just been resting, but we did walk around the city a bit and check in with our organization to let them know we are here. The actual conference doesn't start until Jan. 28th.

Everything is going well, I suppose. It is very warm here and it's great to feel sunshine and we have already eaten some very good Thai food. I'm glad I've had help easing into it from eating authentic Chinese food for the past four months.

There's not much else to report for now, but everyone's alive and well!