Sometimes I have those moments of lying awake in bed at night and wishing I could take the next plane home, get out of the city, spend time with my family, visit my favorite haunts again, listen to the laughter of old friends, and tear down the road in a madcap gallop on a sorrel horse.

I do have those moments. In no small measure. But on the other hand, I also have moments of pure joy as I experience life in Southeast Asia.

It helps to count those moments. To look at pictures of them and savor the beauty and the joy. And the laughter. I face a thousand decisions a day and one of the decisions that come up the most is whether to laugh or to cry. Or lose my patience. And when I do make the right decision to laugh, it’s always a relief. Like the time I walked into the bathrooms after naptime and caught three of my three year old male students sleepily peeing into the toilet all at the same time. Sadly, the funniest moments are usually the most difficult to snap a picture of because they come at unpredictable moments.

Below are several snapshots of what life has been like in the last month. Beauty, laughter, and just plain cuteness.

This is what life looks like for me most of the time. Minus the green and yellow. We only wear these uniforms Wednesdays and smile with relief when the day is past. This photo was taken at Wisdom Tree Home during the exercise part of the day. The rest of the day is spent teaching, playing, eating, napping, and prepping for more teaching. In my room alone, we have 20 students, age 3.

This is Peem, one of my more solemn students. And sleepiest.

We get lots of giggles, as shown in the picture above.

Sometimes its really hard to wake up from naps, even when our blanket gets pulled out from underneath us.

We do art projects, we just simply look cute with our curls, we find worms and we fall asleep at the table. A lot.

Sometimes this happens!

Going to the market on Monday night is bound to bring me some sort of joy, whether its talking to the vendors, seeing people I know, or a tasty bite of fried chicken strips.

One thing that keeps me sane is horseback riding, usually done on Saturdays.

We got to go to a Karen wedding one Saturday.

These two, a coworker and her daughter, keep me in laughter.

And these two make me smile.

We went to Maun Jam, a local mountain lookout one Saturday.

At a local village, we spent some time with the children and later watched them play this game similar to volleyball.

Sometimes just looking at the sky brings me all kinds of joy.

One Saturday we spent time with a Thai friend at a 3D Art Museum.

And when you combine rivers and coffee, life just becomes too much to handle. 🙂