More tales from vacation- Burma

A lady I met at the end of our trip said this to me:

" Wow, you spent a lot of time in Thailand you must of seen some animals or gone to the zoo?"
"No," I responded. "We took the kids to Burma".

And we did! We took about an hour drive from the first hotel we stayed at and ended up in Mae Sai, Thailand. Here you are able to pay some money and walk into Burma. So we did that one day.

Above is one of many Buddhist Temples we saw.

Once we crossed the border Joab and I quickly learned there was not much to do for kids! So this nice store took us in. Gave the kids snacks, juice and could speak Chinese so helped us find a driver to drive us to some of the main sites in the town (you can walk into this Burma town but can not leave the town without a visa).

Their very funky green chairs at the computer place.

Us at the border - Asa is not thrilled. Overall, it was not as fun or easy to get to as a zoo. But it was fun to show the kids another country and culture. Joab Meyer loves a good adventure and in the end we all did too.

More tales from vacation- They layover

When you go from winter in Shanghai to summer in Thailand it is hard to dress your family for the plane ride. We dressed in lighter winter clothes and then I packed our summer clothes on the top of one of our suitcases. So that when we landed in Bangkok for our six(!!) hour lay over I would be prepared with new summer clothes and lots of snacks. But here is what happened when we landed...

-We get off the plane- kids start whining as they are too hot. So am I! -We go through immigration- but have the wrong forms so have to re-write the forms before we can go through. -We get through immigration. My kids are now hungry and tired and hot. -We have to rescan our carry on luggage. (not sure why since we just got off an airplane) -All bags scanned but they ask me to open Asa's backpack. At this point I start feeling nervous. As I realize I never looked at what Asa packed in his bag! It kept the kids busy for about two hours picking out what they were going to take that I told them as long as I did not have to carry their bag they could pretty much take whatever they wanted! - The security guy pulls out a pie server from Asa's backpack. I have to bite my lip from laughing! Asa then comes up to the security guy and says he really needs his pie server to dig up treasures while he is in Thailand. The security guy tells me it is "very dangerous" to bring such an item on board an airplane- but he will not take it away from Asa.

After all of that I was really so excited to put some shorts on! However, we did not know that our luggage was checked all the way and we would not see it until we landed in Chiang Rai. So we waited and waited and played in the airport in our winter clothes for six hours.....

The first picture is of a Buddhist monk. They are highly regarded and given VIP treatment in Thailand. Also fun is putting your two year old in a luggage cart and racing around the airport!