In Green Bay

We had a busy day today!

We got off to an early start with a continental breakfast at the hotel. It pretty good too. They had a waffle iron and waffle mix, so the kids got to cook their own waffles. They also had cereal, fruit, English muffins and juices, so it was a pretty filling breakfast. I had wanted to start them off at 8am, but we ended up eating breakfast at 7am because the kids were already bouncing off the walls at 5am. The night before I had warned them about jetlag and how they should sleep when it was dark out, but being kids they had to find that out for themselves. For our stay in Green Bay, I had booked three hotel rooms, so the girls all slept in one room; Tong, James and I had the connecting room; and the rest of the boys had the next room (I'm not foolish enough to allow teenaged boys and girls to share connecting rooms ;-). The girls stayed up late playing with their dolls and talking while the boys stayed up late being boys (wrestling around and getting into trouble). Only Tong and James got any sleep and that's because they were in my room, and I wanted some peace and quiet, haha! I checked in with the other kids periodically through the night, but no amount of shushing would get them to settle down, so I decided to let them experience jet lag for themselves so they'd learn that lesson from experience. So by 7am they were up and ready for breakfast. I could see a few zombie faces already, but I figured a busy day might wear them out and help them to sleep in the evening. Gam looked very tired, but she insisted that it was just her face looking tired, but that she had plenty of energy!

The first thing we did was walk over to the County Seat to take some photos. After that, we got on the bus and went to Bay Park Mall in Ashwaubenon. One thing I need to start doing on this trip is keep a running total of the money I'm spending. America is A LOT more expensive than I planned and I'm going to need to keep track of my cash very closely. For example, the bus ride to the mall was $18 for all the kids!! So that was nearly $60 spent on bus fares for the day. Ouch!

Bay Park is one of the biggest malls in Green Bay, but compared to the malls in Bangkok, it's pretty tiny. I think the kids were a little bit disappointed in their shopping options, but this is a city of only 100,000 people after all, they can't expect to find a Siam Paragon here! Since the mall was only one floor and relatively small, I decided to let the older kids wander off by themselves. It's important that they get a bit of freedom to explore things on their own, so after some instructions on what to do if they got lost and when to meet back at the food court for lunch, they set off to explore the mall on their own. I kept the 5th graders with me, and we went in search of a Radio Shack because I forgot to pack an adapter for my video camera charger :-P, duh! After looking at the extremely limited options (which probably wouldn't work anyway), I decided to see if I could charge the camera off it's USB connector rather than pay $40 for an adapter. However, while at the Radio Shack, Tong decided to do a little shopping for himself and he bought a Nintendo DS. Jet, Jump and Sea arrived while Tong was looking at different models and they confirmed that the price was about 50% less than what Nintendos sell for in Thailand. Wow! I took some great video of Tong talking with the sales clerk. He's doing a really great job using his English. He's not shy about talking to people and he speaks very clearly so people understand him very well. Bravo Tong!

We had agreed to meet at the food court at noon for lunch, but since the mall was pretty small, all the kids showed up around 11:30, so we had an early lunch. Jump found some T-shirts that were actually cheaper than similar ones in Thailand, but overall he said everything was too expensive. He also said that his head felt like a calculator, so looks like this trip is not only improving their English but also putting their math skills to good use! Most of the kids picked A&W for lunch, but a few kids got pizza or Chinese food. The size of the meals here is really amazing. Everything is so big! I guess I'm used to eating smaller portions over in Thailand, but even so I'm a big guy and even I couldn't finish half of what they gave me. The kids loved the food though, and even though I paid for everything, I made them order their own food so they could get practice speaking clearly and loud enough for other people to hear them.

After the mall, we went over to Lambeau Field for a tour of the stadium. I realize that Packer football is a HUGE deal to people in Wisconsin, but the story of Vince and Curly was a bit boring to my students. Heresy, I know, but American football just isn't that well known in Thailand. Over there, "football" is played with a round, black-and-white ball, and David Beckham is a household name, not Brett Favre.So the kids found the tour guide a little bit boring and they probably didn't get the same thrill out of running out onto the field from the player's tunnel as most Packer fans might, but they did have a great time taking photos in the stadium and shopping in the pro shop. However, I think next time I won't bring the kids to the stadium in March/April. If I can get tickets to a game in October (UNLIKELY, but possible), then that would be an awesome experience, but in March, Lambeau is just a big empty bowl filled with bone-chilling winds. Impressive, but not exactly "fun". On the way back, we missed the bus because the kids were lolly-gagging around the atrium. So we had a bit of a talk at the bus stop about how we're not in Bangkok with regular skytrain and bus service. Here, if we miss a bus it's an hour-long wait in 5'C weather, so when their teacher says "Time to go", it's time to go. Period. But we did manage to have a fun time waiting for the bus in a gas station's convenience store. The kids tried out Beef Jerky for the first time. Some liked it and some didn't. Also Sea and James seem to have become addicted to Doritos :-).

The bus dropped us off near the hotel and on the way back we passed the public library, so we went inside to read some books and get some blogging done. If you haven't checked out their blogs already, please look at them:
Jump: http://jump-yamong.blogspot.com/
Sea: http://sea-cc.blogspot.com/
Jet: http://jet-lover.blogspot.com/
Tong: http://blackmagic-magician.blogspot.com/
James: http://jokerjames11.blogspot.com/
May: http://may-dangerous.blogspot.com/
Gam: http://suvanprakorn.blogspot.com/
Jan: http://jannythejan.blogspot.com/
Gird: http://am-gird.blogspot.com/
Sky: http://supersky-sky.blogspot.com/
James: http://i-james-james.blogspot.com/

(Parents, I know you're going to be tempted to correct spelling and grammar mistakes, but please try to avoid that because it may discourage the kids from writing anything at all. Instead focus on positive praise and give them encouraging feedback. Ask them questions to stimulate them into writing more detailed posts).

After the library, the kids were pretty wiped out, so we walked back to the hotel and got ready for bed. I actually feel asleep in the lobby so I was tired too! Around 8pm the kids woke me up to go get some food. I walked down to Subway with Jump to order sandwiches. Jump was trying to prove he's tough enough to withstand Wisconsin weather so he walked down to the Subway wearing shorts!! Hahah! It was around 0'C, so he got a good taste of winter weather, but his teeth were chattering by the time we got back so I don't think he'll do that again! Hahah!

The kids ate sandwiches in my room and then just as I predicted, they all went straight back to their rooms and quickly fell asleep. Of course, they all woke up again at 5am, but we're making good progress on switching their body-clocks to American time.

After we pack up this morning, we're going over to the library again for a little bit to let the kids blog again. Then we've got to check out around noon and the bus will arrive to take us to Valders. So tonight they'll be staying at the parsonage in my home town. I'm not sure what our internet/phone connection will be like, so communication might be a little bit spotty at first. Don't worry though, we'll figure something out.

Well, it's about 7am now, and I've got to get upstairs to make sure the kids are all packed up before we go over to the library. I'm getting a little better at making these blogs, but adding photos in blogger is still a pain in the butt, so it takes a long time to type out one of these posts. I've been working on this one since 4am, so that's an improvement, I guess (the first post took me all night to make), but I'd wish there was an easier way to add photos to these blogs. Oh well, I'm happy to see that the kids are getting the hang of it. Hopefully they'll continue blogging when they are with their host families (please encourage them to do so!).

Have a great day!