My First Free Weekend

      Now all my posts before this have been about some trip or important part of my travels... This post is a look into what I can do normally when I have no Rotarian or Family functions. This is about my first free weekend to hang out with my new friends from Udon Thani.

     It started with an awesome badmitten tournament among friends. I have found out that I am not so bad at badmitten, but with that said I didn't make it past the 2nd round.

I found out that bare feet gave me more traction while playing.

One of the better players after a hard game. You can't see it but there is a fan right above his head.

My friend just scored on me...

   After the tournament was over my friends and I went to the biggest park in Udon Thani and played some football (soccer for the Americans) while we waited for lunch to arrive. After the game was over we went for a little walk through the park, because the food still hadn't come. We went to one of the bridges and goofed around like good teenagers. Then headed back to eat.

The football game was a lot of fun. I don't think anyone really one.

Just hanging around being a good teenager in the park.

My friends on the bridge.

   After we ate, I went back home and took a shower. Then I went out with another group of friends, and I went back to the park. This time, however, my friends and I rented bikes and circled the whole park (about 3 Kilometers, I think). I think I crashed once, but that was to be expected. After the bike riding my friends and I went to a little shop where you can buy a little clay statue and paint it. Then they glaze it for you and you can take it home as a souvenir.

In Thailand they take bike riding to a whole new level. They have an additional seat for passengers. I had never seen that before.

My attempt at a backwards shot from a moving bicycle

This girl was very articulate about her painting. I don't think I could have matched her in skill if I'd tried.

       After the park we went to UD town, one of the two major hang out spots at night. There my friends and I met up with John, the guy from Brazil, and Fabio, one of the guys from Venezuela, and we just had an overall all good time. After UD town I went home and had a great night sleep.

John, Fabio, and I all on a swinging bench... I am surprised we didn't break it.

     The next day, Sunday, was spent at a pool in an exchange student's house. The exchange student's name was Martina, and she is from Lichtenstein through the AFS exchange program. Also there was Carla and her friend Georgia, both from Italy and through AFS, John, the Brazilian, Raul, the Mexican, Luis, the other Venezuelan, and Avery, the Canadian. So, in other words, we had a foreign exchange student get together at the pool. It was awesome!

Carla and Georgia...

Martina pointing out important places of the house, such as the bathroom.

    After we finished swimming I got to go home and make a part of the dinner for my host family: Hamburgers!  I think they really enjoyed it. I even got to drink a nice cup of cold milk to go with it.

Ahh, ground hamburger... Not as easy to find here in Thailand as it was back home.

Me cooking the hamburgers (I know it is kind of scary).

My uncle Bomb eating his with ketchup. He liked it so much he asked if he could have another one.

Ahh... A hamburger and a cold class of milk, the only thing missing is some oven baked french fries.

   After the meal I relaxed and recuperated after the long and fun filled weekend. Then I went to bed and that pretty much ended the free weekend.