Happy Holidays from Myanmar or....ပျော်ရွှင်ဖွယ်အားလပ်ရက်မျာ!

So we have been here for five months and have received all our furniture, clothes, bikes, and toys.  We have experienced rainy season where it is 98 degrees and 90 percent humidity with heavy rains almost daily and the cold season where is it 70 degrees until about 10am and then 90 degrees with 70 percent humidity and no hope for rain.  I think papa is desperately missing the cold weather so he cranks the air conditioning in the house down very cold so he can wear fleece vests and sweaters during the holidays.  We continue to keep a packed scheduled to stave off the home sickness from being so far away from friends and family, but we have made some really great friends here in Myanmar.  We are also expecting our first visitor in the coming days, Mr. Collin, followed by Aunt Christine, and then Mookie and Opa!  We have been saving some big tourist trips for these visitors so the next few months should be fun and adventurous.   Here is a little update from the last month, which you have probably seen glimpses of on mama's Facebook acct or papa's Instagram acct.

At the annual holiday party at the Ambassador's residence, Santa trotted out his local sleigh given that his reindeer really do not do well in the heat and humidity.  This is Santa's SE Asian land assault vehicle of choice.  All the bells and flash is to help scare away the feral dogs so they do not eat the feet of his Burmese reindeer. 

This is the our fake plastic tree (like the Radiohead song) but when it is decorate and has gifts under it you can hardly tell.  You can tell papa got what he wished for Christmas beer (case of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale) made with hops rather than rice.

The last day of school we had a performance, that is me Lael front and center in case you could not pick me out in the crowd.  I really like to sing and perform and dance and basically have all the attention on me, in case you were wondering.

Gingerbread cookies......you know you can have these for breakfast too.  They are probably the closest cookie to a healthy option.

 On Christmas Eve we went to our friends' house, Dominique and Elodie and had bbq sausages for dinner outside while the grown ups had Moroccan couscous with lamb and chicken under the moon and stars on a wonderful evening. 

Christmas morning we splurged and went to the Melia Hotel for Christmas Brunch.  Pretty much every expatriate who celebrates Christmas and who was still in Myanmar was there.  The ticket sales alone from this deluxe brunch was almost twice the total GDP of Myanmar's legitimate economy!  This head chef at the Melia is German and he does an amazing job every Sunday, but really pulled out the special items for this brunch: braised venison, ostrich (quite popular in South Africa and amazing), French and Irish oysters flown in, sushi bar, roast beef, ham, pork chops, an array of amazing deserts.....it was never ending.  They also had free flowing champagne, wine, and beer.

Just to show that deer can survive in Myanmar, the Melia hotel flew in these communist red deer from Russia, though they were on strict guidelines to stay in doors where the AC was on most of the day in between power outages.  Like most things Russian, the exterior was quite impressive, but inside things were not quite as solid as you originally thought.  Still none the less, seeing a deer in Myanmar was indeed impressive.

Do you think anybody would notice if we slowly dismantled this gingerbread town???

A big Christmas tradition in Myanmar is face painting.  You actually do it on all occasions.  This is my friend Piper and we are local Junoniini butterflies native to Myanmar (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae)

Tell you the truth, after seeing that local sleigh and rein-horse who was dressed up like a Hindi wedding chariot I was not sure Santa was going to make it.  In fact, I began questioning the validity of this whole Santa thing.  But I guess Santa truly is magical, just look!