We awoke to rooster crows and the sound of sweeping outside our window, two sounds that have become quite customary for our mornings. Two sounds, one year ago, I could never have predicted becoming the norm for us.
We began the New Years weekend, expecting a great deal of down time at home, time for ample amounts of laundry, cleaning, and the opposite of money spending, given as we spent a nice amount over Christmas.
After two days attending the annual end of year conference for school directors (you know, as non-school directors), wherein we spent the better part of Thursday and Friday on a stage, picking out words like "but" "proposal" "idea" and lots and lots of "sirs and ma'ams," we were looking forward to a calm evening at home to watch the ball drop- well, metaphorically.
What we could not have predicted of our stay-at-home-weekend was a last minute phone call New Years eve afternoon from the Deputy Governor, whom we met on Friday evening at a banquet after said two-day-conference. He invited us to dinner at his home, so we resorted to actually showering and donning mid-level professional dress on New Years Eve. What began as the exact opposite of what I had imagined turned in a fun evening, eating crab and fried beef and Khmer curry, speaking about everything from the insanity of the English language to the prospect of a future trip to Angkor Wat with our new friend the Deputy Governor and his family.
?!?!
So after two hours of unexpected but quite delicious fun, we came home quite a bit more full than expected and promptly fell asleep before midnight.
You know, 'cause we're old and married and do that.
Luckily, however, we got to watch the ball drop via CNN at our 12 pm, while our families back home rang in 2012, twelve hours after us.
And then came the giggles and playing and picture taking with our host niece and nephew and the joyous acknowledgement that this, yes this, is our life.
And thus begins our full year of Peace Corps service.
How was your first day of 2012?
You're friends with the Deputy Governor?? Is that as big a deal as it kind of sounds like? We thought about you after the ball dropped and realized it was afternoon already for you guys - sort of fun to be able to celebrate it again at noon :)
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