December 10, 2010
Alice's blog:
When I got off the bus, I was really scared because geese were protecting their goslings. They chased us until a nice kind woman chased them away with her broom. Then we went up to all the good fruits vegetables and fish they had. We saw the farm where they grew good for the Thai restaurant. They grew red chili, carrots, kang kong (like spinach), peanuts, and long beans. And, even if they didn't grow rice, they had wonderful fried rice at their restaurant. They put eggs in the rice. They looked bad but tasted good.
At the fish farm, I saw kids going out on a short dock with a man catching fish in a net. He was putting them in a big bucket. When we looked inside, we couldn't see well because the fish splattered water in our faces. When I got off the dock, everyone was going back out to the buses. We were about to get on the bus when a teacher said, "Turn around! Class photo!" After she took the picture, they fed us fruit on long sticks, including papaya, but I didn't take the papaya.
On the bus ride home, I sat alone. But, on the way there I sat with Jamie. I learned a new hand motion from Ms. Thompson. It was "Say a sailor went to sea, sea, sea, to see what he could see see see, but all that he could see see see was the bottom of the deep blue sea sea sea!"
Colleen addendum:
Whenever I join Alice for class trips, I'm a celebrity to Alice. She usually clings to me. When in line for the bus trip to the Fish Farm, a boy named Jamie in her class eagerly said, "Alice, can I sit with you?" I patronizingly smiled, thinking, "Oh, you're in for your first of many rejections by girls, young man," then heard Alice say to me, "Mommy, you need to sit by yourself, I'm sitting with Jamie." See first photo above. Bewildered, I sat in front of them thinking, "I guess my work is done. Jamie, I wish you and Alice a long, healthy, happy life together." They sat together playing a series of intense, giddy games with each other. I felt like I chaperoned her first date at age 6.
