It's been raining for the last few days and as one of Maggie's students said this morning, "the sky is crying because maggie is leaving." Maggie left Mae Sai this morning and is heading off to the States in about a week coz she's finished her term after being here for a year. She was often the voice of reason in the midst of conflict and she was a really cool to hang out with outside of work. It kindof sucks that she's gone. It's only recently struck me how much the other volunteers make staying here as comfortable as it is. There's only a few of them fulfilling a term at one time and they're the only people I interact with on a daily basis without hearing or saying "I don't understand" in English or Thai every third or forth sentence.

One of the older girls on site, Popeye, helped Judy walk down the hall and back yesterday. Her arm was clutched around Popeye's waist the entire time and her face was red and wet with drool and tears. She still can't eat without a tube, she sobs a lot and she can't speak or walk on her own, but at least she's making some sortof progress when the doctors in Chiang Rai were certain 4 months ago that she was going to die. She's a trooper.

*ja