Josie turns 23

I apologize for the lack of writing in the month of February (not that anyone has been sitting around waiting for this post) but the end of January was pretty relaxing with not a whole lot of excitement. We decided to take the weekend after Koh Samet off and just hung out in Bang Plee. We did make a trip back to our favorite buffet: Moogato--not to be confused with Mugatu of Zoolander fame. Our waitress remembered us from the time before which was really cool and even remembered that Ryan does not like ice in his San Miguel! She earned a worthy tip. After some good food we ventured down Teparak to a place called Mello which turned out to be a great find (referred to us by the other Ryan and Michelle). It's a low-key place with a/c and a live band inside and a bunch of couches/hammocks and a pool table outside. We had a couple drink and some hookah and just enjoyed being able to hang out after a long week of teaching!

Thurs. Feb 4:
Today is Josie's birthday and we decided to head out to one of our favorite restaurants, Satani Bai Mai (Leaf Station), to celebrate. All 7 of the Americans went which was really fun and made for some funny stories/good food choices. We ate everything from Pineapple fried rice, Tom Kah Gai (coconut/curry/chicken soup), Venison stir fry, Sweet and Sour Chicken and deep fried frog (not just frog legs, but the whole frog--actually pretty tasty although the little bones are kind of annoying!) We tried a new beer that is breaking into the Thai market called Fedebrau which was pretty good: they called it bronde (which I think means Blonde). We closed off dinner with the Thai version of the Birthday song from the band and a birthday B-52 for Josie. It's a layered shot that they light on fire and you suck through a straw which we ordered to all take together in honor of the birthday girl yet, because they light them on fire, they brought them out one by one so we all got to awkwardly stare at eachother and watch eachother take them solo. Pretty funny though seeing everyone's face...oh and I accidentally swallowed fire! We made our way back to Mello since we were already out and hung out there shooting some pool and talking. Some Thai guys approached us playing pool and wondered if we could tutor them in English so we exchanged information. I started laughing as the guy introduced himself as KERWIN but when he wrote down his name he spelled it KELVIN...I think we might start with learning his name at the first lesson :)