Wednesday, January 26th

Today there was no school. Instead all the kids some for "campign day." something like a field day with games and then the kids eet up tents and spend the night at the school. We got to school early to help set up. Pen had to leave before the festivities began since her sister was having some sort of minor surgery (indicated by cutting motions from chin to belly button, and the words "hospital" and "small"- hopefully smaller than her charade.)On took me on as her charage again. Sweet. We painted all the kids' faces with a smelly concotion of babypowder and red food coloring that had been mixed in a bowl with some leftover mushroom paste in it. The combination made it smell like death. Since we used out fingers to do the painting, our hands also smelled like death and were stained a bright red possibly eternally. We also made up some awful smelling (and from the kids faces, tasting) bread. On thought it would be funny to make the kids eat it and laughed when she made them chew and swallow the bread coved with mushroom paste, lods fo black papper, and butter smeared on top. I thought making kids practically gag was cruel so when she turned her back, I gave them silent permission to spit it out. Most of them dutifully chewed and swallowed the whole thing with horrified looks on their faces and no complaints.
The station I was sent to run for the day ( I couldn't figure out what the others were but ours looked liek loads more fun) was a tunnel of low branches over a trench of mus and water. It came out at the end ina wooden painted cutout of a tiger and the kids exited through his mouth after they had army crawled through the whole thing. We used a hose to spray through the tunnel walls and them and they shrieked when they got doused with baby powder at the end. It stuck nicely since they were already wet and completly the mess. A bunch of the kids wanted to go twice. A few of them raced to the hose and sprayed off, hating the dirt and eager to wash up. I planned on incorporating something similar at summer camp this year for messy olymipics. American kids ALL loved getting muddy.

Pen and I cooked noodle soup togetehr for dinner and then she dropped me off at a campout at the schoo. I didn't realize she wasn't staying. The campfire hadn't started yet so I sat down at a table with a bunch of teachers that were finishing dinner. They all tried to feed me but I had learned my defnese! The thai word for full- im. They were impressed though I had to keep repeating it every couple of minutes as someone new offered me food. Thai people are on par with italians for how much their lives revolve around food. I wished I had a bigger stomach.

We painted up a few kids for a fire dance. On alternated black elctrical tape and white masking tape on their stomachs while I used the same terrible pink concoction that had turned my hands pink earlier to cover their faces. I'm fairly certain they woudl have used somethign similar traditionally. The kids danced aroudn the would be fire with sticks alight, then lit the fire with them. They sang a bunch of songs and did some skits the kids all laughed through but I coudln't understand a word. It seemed something like closign campfire at shady brook.