English Class Graduation 2025!

Our English students are all government workers who knew very little or no English before they started. We met Monday through Friday one and one hour every week, then they stayed for another one and one half hour learning with a Lao teacher. They worked very hard and progressed quickly. We are very proud of them! Speaking English can help them tremendously in their jobs and lives overall, and we hope they will all experience much success. 

In our group were teachers, police officers, soldiers, and an electrician. They are all different, but everyone is fantastic! Our Lao counterparts are also wonderful. These professional teachers, Ajarn (meaning teacher) Noi and Ajarn Phai, teach grammar and reading while we mainly work on listening and speaking skills. It is a great partnership. 

We gave our students framed copies of this picture as a keepsake, and we all signed our names under our faces. Craig made this with AI and had them dressed like their professions. We kept one for us and it will be placed on a wall in our home in Idaho. I love it!

Top row: the Lao teacher Phai, Phetxay (Tom), Teevanh, Happy, Ammy (she is 12 years old and joined us late in the semester when her school year was finished)

Middle row: Suzanne, Bounkom, Kongjai (Jai), Bounthanome (Nome), Phoutsavang (Lor-it means handsome)

Bottom row: Craig (doesn't he look like Glenn Beck here 😄), Somphone (Phone), Davanh, Khamla

All ceremonies in Lao have a banner, tables for the "official" people, and chairs or benches for everyone else. One of the speakers is at the podium. The director of Deseret International Charities Lao (DIC, this is what we are called here), Tiengsack, is sitting on the right at the table in the middle of the picture, the man on the left, Mr. Kia Young, is the person responsible for the classes at the school, and the woman in the middle is Mr. Kia's boss. I got caught trying to open a water bottle 😰 

I was asked to speak for the foreign teachers. It was difficult as we have learned to love the students who have become good friends. We miss them very much already. Our students and the Lao teachers later commented on how they could tell I was on the verge of crying. They were not wrong 😢

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The obligatory group picture at the end of the ceremony

Another picture of us outside the main building

Some of our goofy students at the lunch after the ceremony 😁

Mini hearts! I need to learn how to not look goofy in pictures from these beautiful people 😜

The Swedish frog song in English  

Our class song, because THEY ARE CHAMPIONS! We sung this at the end of each class. At the end of the semester everyone knew all the words except the short part where there are a lot of words that you have to sing very fast - "you brought me fame and fortune and everything that goes with it."