Laos has exploded in mangos.

All throughout the city Vientiane, numerous mango trees offer their flavorful items.

These tropical juicy gifts dangle by the thousands from leafy branches. They litter the streets, sidewalks and courtyards. They crash to the ground, splitting and spilling mango mush we slip and slide on as we walk

Yesterday evening, a huge wind and rain storm littered the entire metropolis with this sweet fruit. This morning on my way to the Center, I found myself maneuvering my midnight blue Honda Scoopy around so many of these littering my apartment’s access alleyway not to mention my roadway route on outer streets leading to the Center. Suher, the Center caretaker, enjoyed picking up the best of the lot before discarding the rest. This morning, he shared with me his haul. These are just 3 out of about 20 he shoved into bags to share with his friends and brother, who is studying at a local college here.

Even Winnie was intrigued by these elongated tree droppings.

Yes, Winnie is a regular at the Center. When students are here, she gets her fair share of pets.

Spring Courses About to Begin for Santi, Myself and Shaloom

Speaking of students: The Laos New Year is now over so I’ve been busy preparing for the new term. Look at my office whiteboard, full of all the things that need to be done: order a new grass roll for outside area, prepare PPTs of behavior and classroom rules, send emails about what our USA volunteer team of youth will do (more on that later), register new students . . .

I am slowly marking things off my list.

Thursday is a holiday, May 1st’s Internationl Labor Day, which means I expect we’ll have quite a few coming at the last minute to register their kids. We have a limited number of slots in our classrooms. Only one room can accommodate larger numbers, 16, and the rest are a squeeze at 8.

Today, Santi (my office manager and also a teacher for the ABC class) signed up 2.

Yesterday was 4. We are expecting a total of 34 if all come back. Cross your fingers tomorrow and Friday will have them racing to join us once again.

So far, all the 7 – 8:30 p.m. slots are fully open for adults. We’ve been advertising diligently but so far, it’s been very quiet from that age group. Last term, we had 5 with one private.

Wouldn’t that be incredible if our enrollment for these next 3 months matched the number of mangos on our trees!

One can only hope.

From Laos, here’s wishing you a fruitful upcoming Month of May.