9 Days and counting down. It's begun. My time left in Chiang Mai has reached hitherto unheard of lows and it worries me.

I've been researching as hard as I can for my thesis, but none of it first hand as I've been sitting on my hands waiting for ethics review board approval. It came yesterday, but they only approved half the research I wanted to do. How can I compare two sets of data if they'll only let me collect one? I feel like that would make it kind of hard to assemble any sort of sound argument. I'm a little bit bitter.

In other research related developments I've managed to track down a potential research supervisor. I'm planning on talking with him tomorrow to try and figure out what I should do because I'm kind of at a loss at the moment.

I'm not actually coming HOME in 9 days by the way, I'm just going backpacking. Where you might ask? Cambodia. I'm flying into Phnom Penh on the 24th, and am returning to Thailand at some point before the 10th of May to pick up my stuff and actually hop on a plane back to Toronto, but between the 24th and the 10th, I haven't done much planning. I want to keep my schedule open so as to give me the flexibility to really do what I want, when I want. Isn't that what vacations are supposed to be all about? I may end up at a hill station in the mountains, or in a lounge chair on the beach (yes, Cambodia has beaches too!) I'd love to hit up Saigon as well because It's so close, but I don't know if I'll have the time (or the money for a visa).

In other news, I've finished work (tearfull goodbyes were enjoyed by all...I miss the students already), drove to Laos and back in a day (6.5 hours one way...that was a LONG day) and visited Kampang Phet, a province between Chiang Mai and Bangkok for a rip roaring good time of a weekend where I ate THESE THINGS

Need a closer look?

That's right, ant larvae.

This week was also Songkran, which is the Thai Buddhist New Year celebration. It's celebrated in a few ways: visiting family, visiting the temple and making offerings to monks to name a few. Oh, and also by GOING BUCK WILD IN THE STREETS WITH BUCKETS OF WATER ND SUPER SOAKERS FOR THREE DAYS STRAIGHT. The city grinds to a halt, literally. Most businesses close for the holiday, and it's a good thing too because it's difficult to get to work when the streets are jammed with people. One of the days my friend Ekk volunteered his pick up truck for the festivities and we took to the streets. I honestly don't think I can describe what it was like, but you can check here and here for pictures (there was no WAY I was taking my camera out during Songkran. Pure and utter mayhem. I had purchased a super soaker water gun for the occasion and put it to good use. People walk up and down the street with massive blocks of ice (maybe 15 kilos each) meant to be placed in garbage cans filled with water so you could not only soak people, but shock them half to death in the process.. It took us 5 hours to travel 2 kilometres and we were all exhausted and SOAKING wet by the time we got home.

I've been purging like mad but I've still got a disturbing amount of stuff to get rid of before leaving. I don't know how I've amassed this number of books (althogh I'll hopefully be able to get some cash for them at used book stores by selling them).

Bleh...home. I'm not ready. Not even almost. I think it's going to be a messy landing. I'm planning to keep updating the blog after I return home both to document all the miserable details and as a way of dealing with the reverse culture shock situation. We'll see how it goes.