Loy Katong is essentially the Thai Thanksgiving and is celebrated during the full moon in November (if it happens to be a month with two full moons, I guess it happens on the first one). This is when people give thanks to the rivers for the water and way of life they provide.
There are several parts to the celebration, but the big one involves floating lotus-shaped banana leaf constructions with candles and incense on the river, to be done with loved ones ("loy" means float and "katong" is the lotus-craft). Many people make their own katongs, and they range from pretty simple (like the one I made) to ridiculously elaborate.
The other parts of the celebration are the sending off of kom-fei (paper hot air balloons), which looks awesome when everyone does it together and you have a full moon for a back drop; a parade where each village in the area decorates a truck and has a girl (or girls) sit on it who participate in the ensuing beauty contest; and the parade ends at a festival with drinking and singing and dancing and the afore-mentioned beauty contest.
Just thought I'd do a quick little "cultural sharing" post to fulfill that third goal of the Peace Corps mission statement (to share the cultures of other nations with Americans).
E
Friday, November 6, 2009
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Laying down the law
And lay it down thick, I did.
So yesterday, a few neighborhood kids came by. They are kindergarten or first grade students at one of my schools, and they come by to see what the heck I am doing and get me to play with them every now and then (more often lately since they've been on bpit term).
It started out typically enough, with a little banter in our mutually hard to understand Thai, then proceeded to a game of checkers (Thai rules are far superior to American). One girl, however (who wasn't as familiar to me) was being a punk though. At first, she kept stepping on my feet. In the beginning, it was funny and I didn't mind. But then she kept doing it. And I told her to stop. So she started pinching me and pulling my hair. I told her to stop and go away. She kept doing it. I tried to distract everyone by getting out my frisbee, figuring if we all played together, she'd leave me alone. But then she started poking me in the butt (which Thai kids apparently like to do). I told her to stop again, and when she ignored me, I grabbed my toys, walked in my house and shut the door.
They stood outside calling my name for a couple minutes, but I just ignored them. Apparently fearing that I had gone deaf, they opened the door and came inside to yell some more. I walked over, told them to leave, then locked the door.
Then I got out my mandolin (which has sat gathering dust for far too long) and started trying to tune it. And the kids started banging on my window and door yelling my name, asking if I could hear them over and over. Now, tuning the mandolin is hard enough for me, but it was next to impossible with all the interfering noise. And when they didn't stop after about ten minutes, I started to get frustrated. My first inclination was to yell at them, but I quickly decided continuing to ignore was better, but I really didn't want to sit in my fish bowl with them staring and banging and yelling, so by a stroke of strategic brilliance, I went upstairs.
I finally gave up trying to tune the instrument (I don't know if I'm just inept or if the strings warped or something from sitting too long, but as soon as I would think I had it OK and tried to strum, it sounded more like the local dog pack than a purty li'l chord) and just hung out in my room. After a total of twenty or thirty minutes, the kids gave up and went away. Score one for patience.
Now I just hope they have made the connection between my initial decision to go inside and the one girl being naughty and not stopping when I asked her to.
Calm like a bomb.
E
So yesterday, a few neighborhood kids came by. They are kindergarten or first grade students at one of my schools, and they come by to see what the heck I am doing and get me to play with them every now and then (more often lately since they've been on bpit term).
It started out typically enough, with a little banter in our mutually hard to understand Thai, then proceeded to a game of checkers (Thai rules are far superior to American). One girl, however (who wasn't as familiar to me) was being a punk though. At first, she kept stepping on my feet. In the beginning, it was funny and I didn't mind. But then she kept doing it. And I told her to stop. So she started pinching me and pulling my hair. I told her to stop and go away. She kept doing it. I tried to distract everyone by getting out my frisbee, figuring if we all played together, she'd leave me alone. But then she started poking me in the butt (which Thai kids apparently like to do). I told her to stop again, and when she ignored me, I grabbed my toys, walked in my house and shut the door.
They stood outside calling my name for a couple minutes, but I just ignored them. Apparently fearing that I had gone deaf, they opened the door and came inside to yell some more. I walked over, told them to leave, then locked the door.
Then I got out my mandolin (which has sat gathering dust for far too long) and started trying to tune it. And the kids started banging on my window and door yelling my name, asking if I could hear them over and over. Now, tuning the mandolin is hard enough for me, but it was next to impossible with all the interfering noise. And when they didn't stop after about ten minutes, I started to get frustrated. My first inclination was to yell at them, but I quickly decided continuing to ignore was better, but I really didn't want to sit in my fish bowl with them staring and banging and yelling, so by a stroke of strategic brilliance, I went upstairs.
I finally gave up trying to tune the instrument (I don't know if I'm just inept or if the strings warped or something from sitting too long, but as soon as I would think I had it OK and tried to strum, it sounded more like the local dog pack than a purty li'l chord) and just hung out in my room. After a total of twenty or thirty minutes, the kids gave up and went away. Score one for patience.
Now I just hope they have made the connection between my initial decision to go inside and the one girl being naughty and not stopping when I asked her to.
Calm like a bomb.
E
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Bpai Tiao!
Just gonna point out that today officially marks the completion of my first third of my service as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Thailand. If I'd had a bun in the oven when I left the states, it'd be about done by now, what what?
Anyhow, "bpai tiao" is when you go somewhere for fun (as opposed to for seriousness). Sometimes I bpai tiao when I wander around my village, sometimes I bpai tiao when a Thai person says a bunch of stuff to me in Thai, I smile and nod, then am ushered into a car (we call that being "Thai-napped"), and sometimes I bpai tiao when I intentionally decide that I want to travel somewhere and then I do.
During bpit term (the month-ish break between semesters), my fan (that's Thai for "sho'ty") and I did some touring, hitting three points of interest: Ayutthya, Sukothai and Pai.
Ayutthya and Sukothai were pretty amazing. Sukothai was the first official capitol of Thailand when Thailand became Thailand (though they didn't call it Thailand at the Thaim, I mean time), like 700-ish years ago (I think, you might want to wikipedia that, I can't be bothered to fact-check all my claims). The king (or I suppose one of the kings) from that era is responsible for developing the written alphabet. Eventually, a king decided to move the capitol to another big city more centrally located (called Ayutthya) and Sukothai just got old, until it got old enough that people wanted to come see some history and they started to charge money to see it.
Ayutthya was cool to visit for many of the same reasons as Sukothai (old stuff is awesome, and the US doesn't really have anything comparable). In the 1700s, Ayutthya was attacked by the Burmese, and so the ruins are in shabbier shape than those in Sukothai. I don't know a lot of details about this conflict (sorry), but apparently the Burmese were repelled (or shortly thereafter booted out), since Thailand is Thai today. The destruction of Ayutthya prompted the relocation of the capitol to Grungtep (or Bangkok for all you farangs out there).
And now I will take this opportunity to rant for a moment. There is a fairly common practice at tourist attractions to have different (higher) prices for foreign tourists than Thai tourists, like anywhere from 3 to 20 times the Thai price. Usually, the signs announce the entrance fee in English with Arabic numerals, and then in Thai, with Thai numerals, it tells the native entrance fee, so probably many foreign tourists don't realize there is a different price. A small part of me understands this practice, but for the most part, I really don't like it. I think it reflects poorly on the Thai character. It brings the assumption across that all foreigners are rich and that Thai people just want their money. Bah. I have more feelings on the matter, but it's difficult to articulate. In any case, upon becoming a PCV and receiving our Thai ID cards, we were told that by showing those cards, we could expect to pay the Thai price for things, and it has worked at the zoo and national parks, but it did NOT work to see the ruins. Just to let any other volunteers who might read this know. And doing the chicken dance did NOT convince the lady that I was sufficiently Thai, though she did laugh.
After the old stuff, we headed to Pai for a couple days. Pai is a beautiful area in the mountains a few hours north of Chiang Mai, and it made me kinda sad. We stayed at a very nice guest house a few kilometers outside of the town of Pai, which I was quite happy about, as the town of Pai is a perfect example of everything that is wrong with tourism. Fortunately we were not there at the high season (as far as tourism goes) when the population of the area is approximately 90% farang, and it was only 60-70%. Heavens know, when I go visit a foreign country I'd hate to see local people doing anything besides selling me stuff and taking me on ATV tours. There were signs advertising "Go where most tourists don't go!" So everyone who wants to go see "real" Thailand will go there, and then someone will build a 7-11 and a pizza place there, and then they will have to find a new place to take people where "most tourists don't go!" Just a series of rapery until Pai is lame and people don't want to go there, and the tour companies go find a new place to exploit, and then the local people who have centered their economy around catering to tourists have an empty town full of guest houses and farang restaurants (because I hate eating local food when I travel). And I couldn't help but think that probably ten or twenty (or five, I dunno) years ago, Pai was just a quiet farming community until some businessman from Bangkok or Chiang Mai (or a farang businessman is just as likely) happened to wander through and say, "Boy! This would make a great tourist destination!" But our guest house was very nice and we had a great view.
*sigh*
Anyhow, traveling was fun, but it was definitely nice to get back to my site where I'm more than just another farang with money that I need to leave in Thailand.
Eli OUT!
Edit: So, I just clicked the publish button, and I felt kinda bad, like this might sound pretty harsh, and I suppose it is supposed to be a little harsh, but don't let it fool you. I still love this place, and y'all should definitely come visit. I just encourage everyone out there to practice responsible tourism.
Anyhow, "bpai tiao" is when you go somewhere for fun (as opposed to for seriousness). Sometimes I bpai tiao when I wander around my village, sometimes I bpai tiao when a Thai person says a bunch of stuff to me in Thai, I smile and nod, then am ushered into a car (we call that being "Thai-napped"), and sometimes I bpai tiao when I intentionally decide that I want to travel somewhere and then I do.
During bpit term (the month-ish break between semesters), my fan (that's Thai for "sho'ty") and I did some touring, hitting three points of interest: Ayutthya, Sukothai and Pai.
Ayutthya and Sukothai were pretty amazing. Sukothai was the first official capitol of Thailand when Thailand became Thailand (though they didn't call it Thailand at the Thaim, I mean time), like 700-ish years ago (I think, you might want to wikipedia that, I can't be bothered to fact-check all my claims). The king (or I suppose one of the kings) from that era is responsible for developing the written alphabet. Eventually, a king decided to move the capitol to another big city more centrally located (called Ayutthya) and Sukothai just got old, until it got old enough that people wanted to come see some history and they started to charge money to see it.
Ayutthya was cool to visit for many of the same reasons as Sukothai (old stuff is awesome, and the US doesn't really have anything comparable). In the 1700s, Ayutthya was attacked by the Burmese, and so the ruins are in shabbier shape than those in Sukothai. I don't know a lot of details about this conflict (sorry), but apparently the Burmese were repelled (or shortly thereafter booted out), since Thailand is Thai today. The destruction of Ayutthya prompted the relocation of the capitol to Grungtep (or Bangkok for all you farangs out there).
And now I will take this opportunity to rant for a moment. There is a fairly common practice at tourist attractions to have different (higher) prices for foreign tourists than Thai tourists, like anywhere from 3 to 20 times the Thai price. Usually, the signs announce the entrance fee in English with Arabic numerals, and then in Thai, with Thai numerals, it tells the native entrance fee, so probably many foreign tourists don't realize there is a different price. A small part of me understands this practice, but for the most part, I really don't like it. I think it reflects poorly on the Thai character. It brings the assumption across that all foreigners are rich and that Thai people just want their money. Bah. I have more feelings on the matter, but it's difficult to articulate. In any case, upon becoming a PCV and receiving our Thai ID cards, we were told that by showing those cards, we could expect to pay the Thai price for things, and it has worked at the zoo and national parks, but it did NOT work to see the ruins. Just to let any other volunteers who might read this know. And doing the chicken dance did NOT convince the lady that I was sufficiently Thai, though she did laugh.
After the old stuff, we headed to Pai for a couple days. Pai is a beautiful area in the mountains a few hours north of Chiang Mai, and it made me kinda sad. We stayed at a very nice guest house a few kilometers outside of the town of Pai, which I was quite happy about, as the town of Pai is a perfect example of everything that is wrong with tourism. Fortunately we were not there at the high season (as far as tourism goes) when the population of the area is approximately 90% farang, and it was only 60-70%. Heavens know, when I go visit a foreign country I'd hate to see local people doing anything besides selling me stuff and taking me on ATV tours. There were signs advertising "Go where most tourists don't go!" So everyone who wants to go see "real" Thailand will go there, and then someone will build a 7-11 and a pizza place there, and then they will have to find a new place to take people where "most tourists don't go!" Just a series of rapery until Pai is lame and people don't want to go there, and the tour companies go find a new place to exploit, and then the local people who have centered their economy around catering to tourists have an empty town full of guest houses and farang restaurants (because I hate eating local food when I travel). And I couldn't help but think that probably ten or twenty (or five, I dunno) years ago, Pai was just a quiet farming community until some businessman from Bangkok or Chiang Mai (or a farang businessman is just as likely) happened to wander through and say, "Boy! This would make a great tourist destination!" But our guest house was very nice and we had a great view.
*sigh*
Anyhow, traveling was fun, but it was definitely nice to get back to my site where I'm more than just another farang with money that I need to leave in Thailand.
Eli OUT!
Edit: So, I just clicked the publish button, and I felt kinda bad, like this might sound pretty harsh, and I suppose it is supposed to be a little harsh, but don't let it fool you. I still love this place, and y'all should definitely come visit. I just encourage everyone out there to practice responsible tourism.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Conflicted!
So I recently figured out why there is a perpetual stream of red ants run the length of my house, up my kitchen counter, around my sink and off to who-knows-where. The answer presented itself in the form of what I had previously thought to be a snarl of leaves of the viney plant growing up the side of my house next to the kitchen window, but upon closer inspection revealed itself to be a nest serving as the terminus for the endless parade of Hymenoptera.
My first thought was, "Swell! Now I can get rid of these guys!" But then I started thinking a bit more. These guys have been around for a decent while now, and while I don't really like them, they bite me very rarely and aren't causing any real problems. Besides, to get rid of them, I would be committing an act of genocide and would surely be attacked in response.
The conclusion that I've reached for now is to let them be and see if I can find someone who really likes kai mot dang (red ant eggs) to come make a meal out of them. That would sit much better with me than simply exterminating them.
Hm. A nice short post about a single topic that isn't just a running narrative. I kinda dig this.
Cheerio!
My first thought was, "Swell! Now I can get rid of these guys!" But then I started thinking a bit more. These guys have been around for a decent while now, and while I don't really like them, they bite me very rarely and aren't causing any real problems. Besides, to get rid of them, I would be committing an act of genocide and would surely be attacked in response.
The conclusion that I've reached for now is to let them be and see if I can find someone who really likes kai mot dang (red ant eggs) to come make a meal out of them. That would sit much better with me than simply exterminating them.
Hm. A nice short post about a single topic that isn't just a running narrative. I kinda dig this.
Cheerio!
Monday, September 21, 2009
If blog entries were library books, I'd own this one by now!
I'd like to say that the reason I haven't posted anything in over a month is because I've been oh so busy. In fact, there have been numerous opportunities, but not much to say until these last couple weeks (and then, opportunities these last couple weeks HAVE been rather scarce). And there came a period where I just didn't feel like writing, and then I started and slowly I dragged this out of myself.
I think I'll start filling y'all in with the sanook sanaan (I'm going to translate that as "party") I attended at one of my schools in honor of myself and another new teacher. I arrived at school around five in the evening and met one of the head monks from the temple next to the school. He was a big jolly guy and greeted me by shaking my hand (which I later learned is- well, not taboo, but un-traditional). At that point, the paw-aw (principal), a few other teachers and a couple older men were the only ones there. They had the new teacher and myself sit in front of a great big centerpiece type thing made out of rolled up banana leaves and flowers (I'm not sure if I have pictures of one or not, but they're pretty common at any sort of Thai ceremony) and a man (not the monk, I think he was a retired monk) recited the long chant to welcome us and bless us and give us good luck. By the time he finished, some more folks had started to show up and people started tying strings on our wrists. By doing so, each person is drawing bad energy out and putting good energy in, and you end up with a massive torque of string wrapped around your arm.
People continued to arrive, and as I understand, they were various important people from the village, though aside from the elected guy, I have no idea who they were. There were also a lot of mee-baans (housewives) in attendance, and several of them thought to mention to me that they had daughters (one actually said, "I have a daughter your age, but she is not beautiful"). The best part of all of this was definitely when Wandii, my counterpart's wife and my mother told me in English, "You are my son, you are part of my family, I love you, I will take care of you." (That's paraphrased, but that was the general spirit of her words). This was especially touching because prior to this I had only heard her say "My name is Wandii, I speak Thai, I don't like to speak English," and a few random words here and there. It made me feel very good.
After a while we were told to take seats at tables and food and whiskey started to flow. The physical education teacher decided he wanted to drink with me and started pouring whiskey pio pio (straight). And didn't stop. I believe I have noted before that drinking with Thai people is dangerous because it is common practice to refill someone's glass for them whenever it is empty, or less than 2/3 full, making it difficult to gauge how much you actually consume (this is anytime, not just with alcohol). I had an idea of what this evening would entail in advance and had decided to allow myself to consume to the point of intoxication. And so I did. I sat at all of the tables, toasted everyone, and eventually sang the Thai song I've been practicing when the karaoke got going hot and heavy. In the end I walked home and regretted my actions in the morning.
MOVING ON!
Shortly after my sanook sanaan the other school I'm teaching at hosted a science exhibition. This was probably one of the coolest things I've seen here. Seriously.
The day began with a lot of that old time religion (it was a wan prat, and this school takes Buddhism pretty seriously) [right now is the Buddhist Lent and every full moon, half moon and new moon is a wan prat, or "monk day," and involves going to temple and making of merit]. On this wan prat, the temple came to the school. Four monks and most of the community came for a morning of prayer and bestowing food and gifts upon the local temples. Naturally, as soon as I arrived my paw-aw (principal) had me come up in front of everyone to sit with him (I'm getting used to this kind of treatment, though I still feel weird about it, but it's kinda fun sometimes). After the chanting and speeches and whatnot were over, the science extravaganza began. Began with some kids from another school in the area doing a sweet dance with drums and cymbals and play-fighting! And then some grown-ups from the area who are into model remote-controlled airplanes showed off their stuff. It was pretty cool, but what really struck me was how excited people were about this. It also made me realize that in my time here at site, I haven't seen any machines in the sky. Would an airplane flying over be a big deal out here? I am pretty sure the majority of my neighbors have never flown. Anyhow, I really appreciated the purity of the audience's wonderment. Not jaded at all.
When that was over, the students spent the rest of the morning going around and looking at projects they had made. A group of my matayom 3 (that's like 9th grade) boys built a 3-person bicycle that people were riding around (of COURSE I went for a ride!). In the field, students were blasting off water rockets they had built from soda bottles. There were a few other stations with pretty typical experiment things, and a math and science fact contest in the cafeteria. And that was it (aside from the snack and drink vendors who showed up). It was simple, it was mellow, and it was fun. The students got to show off some really impressive work they had done (I'm still amazed by the bicycle, and the water rocket launching contraption was super sweet). But most of all, like with the planes, it was the atmosphere that made the day for me.
My next destination was the Youth Conference. I'm pretty sure I have mentioned that I joined the Youth GIG (I'm pretty sure that stands for Global Initiative Group), and our primary responsibility is to host this conference each year. In addition to us, 12 volunteers from all around the country came, each bringing one Thai counterpart (mostly teachers) and two students ages 13-18. The conference was hosted at a little place in the woods (although the "log" cabins were in fact made of concrete) a couple hours outside of Bangkok. The theme of the conference was "Dream, Believe, Achieve," and for 3 days we ran activities designed to get students thinking about their future, setting goals, and thinking about the things they need to do to reach those goals. Which means they built models out of random household items to represent their dreams, played team-building and problem-solving games, did some journaling and debriefing, talked with a panel of Thai professionals and danced silly dances.
I feel like there's a lot more to say about what we actually did at the conference, but to really understand you would have to have been there.
In any case, I feel it was a lot of fun and pretty durn successful. And it's got me thinking about what we'll do next year. There are definitely a lot of things that I think went well that I would like to emulate, and a few spots that I think we could improve upon. But I don't really wanna think too much about that right now. I'll just say that many of the volunteers who were there (myself included) have made comments to the extent that participating in that conference is/has been one of the most fulfilling parts of being a volunteer. This is because it is specific in whom it is targeting and applies to and works directly with those people, and because the benefit is so obvious and visible. A lot of the things that we do as volunteers are questionable as to whether or not they have any real value, and even if there is value, it may be hard to see, or may not show itself for a long time.
The last stop on this whirlwind blog entry will be Doi Tung, the home of the king's now deceased mother. It is located on a small mountain in the north of the province of Chiang Rai. The location is significant because one of the queen mother's (I THINK that's how you refer to her) big projects was to reduce drug trafficking in the Golden Triangle, and she had a lot of projects working with the hill tribes doing things like introducing alternative crops to grow instead of opium. Anyhow, we drove up this mountain and parked. Around the base of the peak (does that make sense? The house was right on the top of the mountain [and by mountain we mean really big hill], and the area just below that is what I'm talking about) is a pretty nice flower garden. I'd love to say more, but I'm really not that critical and couldn't rate it any more specifically than that. I'll post some pictures and you can see for yourself. Then we headed up to the house.
I had no idea what to expect. Pa had used the word "palace" when describing it, and I was kinda dreading something big and gaudy and western-styled. To get up to it, I had to borrow some pants (shorts weren't kosher), then we walked up a long driveway. And I was tremendously relieved. The palace was a big wooden house. We took a tour (the tour was in Thai, but they gave me a pamphlet in English to read with information about the house). The style was a fusion of Thai and Swedish (sounds odd, but the king went to school in Sweden when he was a boy and ma had a place in the mountains), so the aesthetic style was alpine cabin, but the form was more typical of Thai buildings. And all the pine paneling was from recycled packing crates, and on the ceiling of one room, the lights made a scale model of the solar system with everything positioned at the time of the queen mother's birth (astrology is kinda a big deal here). But we weren't allowed to take pictures inside. Then we got to check out the awesome views that she enjoyed and it was time to head home. I would say it was a really good trip, as it bolstered my opinion of the Thai royal family (not that I have any issues with them), as this "palace" could have been as over-the-top as you could imagine, but was actually incredibly modest (a ridiculous house by common standards, but considering royalty had lived there for 10 years, very humble indeed).
And I'm going to call myself caught up for now. There's ALWAYS more that I could say, but I'd say that's enough. I'd like to do some journaling in my personal journal (which I haven't been doing at all), so I think I'll make a date for some forced introspection, say tomorrow evening on the balcony? Great, see you then!
I think I'll start filling y'all in with the sanook sanaan (I'm going to translate that as "party") I attended at one of my schools in honor of myself and another new teacher. I arrived at school around five in the evening and met one of the head monks from the temple next to the school. He was a big jolly guy and greeted me by shaking my hand (which I later learned is- well, not taboo, but un-traditional). At that point, the paw-aw (principal), a few other teachers and a couple older men were the only ones there. They had the new teacher and myself sit in front of a great big centerpiece type thing made out of rolled up banana leaves and flowers (I'm not sure if I have pictures of one or not, but they're pretty common at any sort of Thai ceremony) and a man (not the monk, I think he was a retired monk) recited the long chant to welcome us and bless us and give us good luck. By the time he finished, some more folks had started to show up and people started tying strings on our wrists. By doing so, each person is drawing bad energy out and putting good energy in, and you end up with a massive torque of string wrapped around your arm.
People continued to arrive, and as I understand, they were various important people from the village, though aside from the elected guy, I have no idea who they were. There were also a lot of mee-baans (housewives) in attendance, and several of them thought to mention to me that they had daughters (one actually said, "I have a daughter your age, but she is not beautiful"). The best part of all of this was definitely when Wandii, my counterpart's wife and my mother told me in English, "You are my son, you are part of my family, I love you, I will take care of you." (That's paraphrased, but that was the general spirit of her words). This was especially touching because prior to this I had only heard her say "My name is Wandii, I speak Thai, I don't like to speak English," and a few random words here and there. It made me feel very good.
After a while we were told to take seats at tables and food and whiskey started to flow. The physical education teacher decided he wanted to drink with me and started pouring whiskey pio pio (straight). And didn't stop. I believe I have noted before that drinking with Thai people is dangerous because it is common practice to refill someone's glass for them whenever it is empty, or less than 2/3 full, making it difficult to gauge how much you actually consume (this is anytime, not just with alcohol). I had an idea of what this evening would entail in advance and had decided to allow myself to consume to the point of intoxication. And so I did. I sat at all of the tables, toasted everyone, and eventually sang the Thai song I've been practicing when the karaoke got going hot and heavy. In the end I walked home and regretted my actions in the morning.
MOVING ON!
Shortly after my sanook sanaan the other school I'm teaching at hosted a science exhibition. This was probably one of the coolest things I've seen here. Seriously.
The day began with a lot of that old time religion (it was a wan prat, and this school takes Buddhism pretty seriously) [right now is the Buddhist Lent and every full moon, half moon and new moon is a wan prat, or "monk day," and involves going to temple and making of merit]. On this wan prat, the temple came to the school. Four monks and most of the community came for a morning of prayer and bestowing food and gifts upon the local temples. Naturally, as soon as I arrived my paw-aw (principal) had me come up in front of everyone to sit with him (I'm getting used to this kind of treatment, though I still feel weird about it, but it's kinda fun sometimes). After the chanting and speeches and whatnot were over, the science extravaganza began. Began with some kids from another school in the area doing a sweet dance with drums and cymbals and play-fighting! And then some grown-ups from the area who are into model remote-controlled airplanes showed off their stuff. It was pretty cool, but what really struck me was how excited people were about this. It also made me realize that in my time here at site, I haven't seen any machines in the sky. Would an airplane flying over be a big deal out here? I am pretty sure the majority of my neighbors have never flown. Anyhow, I really appreciated the purity of the audience's wonderment. Not jaded at all.
When that was over, the students spent the rest of the morning going around and looking at projects they had made. A group of my matayom 3 (that's like 9th grade) boys built a 3-person bicycle that people were riding around (of COURSE I went for a ride!). In the field, students were blasting off water rockets they had built from soda bottles. There were a few other stations with pretty typical experiment things, and a math and science fact contest in the cafeteria. And that was it (aside from the snack and drink vendors who showed up). It was simple, it was mellow, and it was fun. The students got to show off some really impressive work they had done (I'm still amazed by the bicycle, and the water rocket launching contraption was super sweet). But most of all, like with the planes, it was the atmosphere that made the day for me.
My next destination was the Youth Conference. I'm pretty sure I have mentioned that I joined the Youth GIG (I'm pretty sure that stands for Global Initiative Group), and our primary responsibility is to host this conference each year. In addition to us, 12 volunteers from all around the country came, each bringing one Thai counterpart (mostly teachers) and two students ages 13-18. The conference was hosted at a little place in the woods (although the "log" cabins were in fact made of concrete) a couple hours outside of Bangkok. The theme of the conference was "Dream, Believe, Achieve," and for 3 days we ran activities designed to get students thinking about their future, setting goals, and thinking about the things they need to do to reach those goals. Which means they built models out of random household items to represent their dreams, played team-building and problem-solving games, did some journaling and debriefing, talked with a panel of Thai professionals and danced silly dances.
I feel like there's a lot more to say about what we actually did at the conference, but to really understand you would have to have been there.
In any case, I feel it was a lot of fun and pretty durn successful. And it's got me thinking about what we'll do next year. There are definitely a lot of things that I think went well that I would like to emulate, and a few spots that I think we could improve upon. But I don't really wanna think too much about that right now. I'll just say that many of the volunteers who were there (myself included) have made comments to the extent that participating in that conference is/has been one of the most fulfilling parts of being a volunteer. This is because it is specific in whom it is targeting and applies to and works directly with those people, and because the benefit is so obvious and visible. A lot of the things that we do as volunteers are questionable as to whether or not they have any real value, and even if there is value, it may be hard to see, or may not show itself for a long time.
The last stop on this whirlwind blog entry will be Doi Tung, the home of the king's now deceased mother. It is located on a small mountain in the north of the province of Chiang Rai. The location is significant because one of the queen mother's (I THINK that's how you refer to her) big projects was to reduce drug trafficking in the Golden Triangle, and she had a lot of projects working with the hill tribes doing things like introducing alternative crops to grow instead of opium. Anyhow, we drove up this mountain and parked. Around the base of the peak (does that make sense? The house was right on the top of the mountain [and by mountain we mean really big hill], and the area just below that is what I'm talking about) is a pretty nice flower garden. I'd love to say more, but I'm really not that critical and couldn't rate it any more specifically than that. I'll post some pictures and you can see for yourself. Then we headed up to the house.
I had no idea what to expect. Pa had used the word "palace" when describing it, and I was kinda dreading something big and gaudy and western-styled. To get up to it, I had to borrow some pants (shorts weren't kosher), then we walked up a long driveway. And I was tremendously relieved. The palace was a big wooden house. We took a tour (the tour was in Thai, but they gave me a pamphlet in English to read with information about the house). The style was a fusion of Thai and Swedish (sounds odd, but the king went to school in Sweden when he was a boy and ma had a place in the mountains), so the aesthetic style was alpine cabin, but the form was more typical of Thai buildings. And all the pine paneling was from recycled packing crates, and on the ceiling of one room, the lights made a scale model of the solar system with everything positioned at the time of the queen mother's birth (astrology is kinda a big deal here). But we weren't allowed to take pictures inside. Then we got to check out the awesome views that she enjoyed and it was time to head home. I would say it was a really good trip, as it bolstered my opinion of the Thai royal family (not that I have any issues with them), as this "palace" could have been as over-the-top as you could imagine, but was actually incredibly modest (a ridiculous house by common standards, but considering royalty had lived there for 10 years, very humble indeed).
And I'm going to call myself caught up for now. There's ALWAYS more that I could say, but I'd say that's enough. I'd like to do some journaling in my personal journal (which I haven't been doing at all), so I think I'll make a date for some forced introspection, say tomorrow evening on the balcony? Great, see you then!
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
6 Months in the Peace Corps
As of today, I have been in Thailand for 6 months.
I can definitely say that my experiences are not at all what I expected. Then again, I also tried really hard to come without expectations, so I can't say if that is good or bad.
I don't have anything specific to write about right now, so maybe this is the perfect time to just ramble a bit. It just seems kinda like a momentous occasion, and I really ought to say something.
More than anything, I am impressed by the Thai people. There is a near universal sense of genuinely caring about the well-being of others. Sometimes it can come across as nosy ("Why these fools all up in my business?!"), but it's important to remember that the concern/interest behind the question is legit.
There is also a feeling that everything has value. There is no sense of futility, and nothing is wasted. This means that work is done efficiently and with care. Priorities might get in the way of some projects, like road work but put on hold indefinitely, but others, like planting rice fields and building houses rally the community to roll up their sleeves and help one another.
No cut of meat cannot be turned into dinner (I can't emphasize that enough), and no one is to poor to smile, dance or sing a song.
I'm sure this country has it's share of lazy, ne'er-do-wells, but they just don't stand out here.
On a less positive note, I am becoming more and more disenchanted with the role of English teachers on a continuous basis, especially in the countryside. If one of my students works very hard and learns English well, they can... go to one of the cities and sell crap to tourists? Yes, they could do other, better things, but the likelihood is exceedingly slim. And really, what's wrong with being a farmer? I feel like I'm supposed to think there's something wrong with the way the people in my community live and that I'm here to make everyones' lives better, but I just can't do that. They have been fine for a long, long time without me, and they will continue to be fine after I am gone.
So I have more or less decided to not care if my students learn English or not. Instead, I will spend my required time in the classroom, and try to build my relationships with my co-teachers to develop teacher trainings for non-English teachers. I have posed the idea to my teachers and they sound interested, so now I need to do some brain-storming and planning and keep pushing this. I also have some other ideas, but I think I've talked about these before. And even if I haven't, I want to keep my mind rolling right now.
I am very aware of there being a LOT of things that I WANT to do, and a lot of things that I am NOT doing. But, I need to remember that it's important to take things one step at a time. For example, I have just decided to take a walk around the neighborhood when I'm done writing this. It's something I did a fair amount when I first came here, but I've stopped doing lately. Yes, I've been busy(ish), and after a first meeting, I don't have much to say with my Thai, but, SNAP. It's the effort that counts.
So now I'm antsy to go out for a walk. I will finish with some general thoughts on the Peace Corps.
Does Thailand NEED the Peace Corps? Of course not! Peace Corps is here because Thailand has requested our presence. That is WHY the Peace Corps sends volunteers to countries. Am I going to revolutionize teaching practices and cause a dramatic improvement in student performance in my area? Probably not. It IS possible that I will find one project that will have a positive, lasting effect, and that is my current goal, probably something with a youth group (or maybe agriculturally related). But what I DO know is that when I leave, a few hundred or thousand people will remember a farang who lived with them for a few years. And he didn't come here to find a Thai woman to take care of him, and he made efforts to learn the language, and... I don't know what. That's the part that I think matters. That's the part that I can count on happening. The rest is valid and worthwhile, but whether or not anything actually comes of it is highly questionable.
While I was out of site for the second round of training and everything, we watched the movie "Volunteers" from the 80s, starring John Candy and Tom Hanks who play Peace Corps volunteers in Thailand (though I like to say the ended up in Peace Corps Generic Asia). I don't know that I'd recommend it to anyone who wasn't in the Peace Corps (in Thailand, gah-dai), but it did kind of strike a chord. The project they were sent to their village for was to build a bridge over the river. In the end, they have to blow up the bridge to save the day, and when Tom Hanks apologizes to the villagers, he is informed that nobody cares, because they never really wanted the bridge in the first place! This really emphasizes the need to align your goals. I may come up with the most brilliant project idea ever that will revolutionize and improve everything around me, but if nobody wants what I'm selling, it doesn't matter. And again, who am I to say that my "improvement" will actually make anything better?
We also got the line, "Lying, malignant stink-infested yankee Peace Corps! Ptui!" from the communist contingency in the movie, so that was good, too.
OK. Time for that walk.
PEACE CORPS OUT!
E
I can definitely say that my experiences are not at all what I expected. Then again, I also tried really hard to come without expectations, so I can't say if that is good or bad.
I don't have anything specific to write about right now, so maybe this is the perfect time to just ramble a bit. It just seems kinda like a momentous occasion, and I really ought to say something.
More than anything, I am impressed by the Thai people. There is a near universal sense of genuinely caring about the well-being of others. Sometimes it can come across as nosy ("Why these fools all up in my business?!"), but it's important to remember that the concern/interest behind the question is legit.
There is also a feeling that everything has value. There is no sense of futility, and nothing is wasted. This means that work is done efficiently and with care. Priorities might get in the way of some projects, like road work but put on hold indefinitely, but others, like planting rice fields and building houses rally the community to roll up their sleeves and help one another.
No cut of meat cannot be turned into dinner (I can't emphasize that enough), and no one is to poor to smile, dance or sing a song.
I'm sure this country has it's share of lazy, ne'er-do-wells, but they just don't stand out here.
On a less positive note, I am becoming more and more disenchanted with the role of English teachers on a continuous basis, especially in the countryside. If one of my students works very hard and learns English well, they can... go to one of the cities and sell crap to tourists? Yes, they could do other, better things, but the likelihood is exceedingly slim. And really, what's wrong with being a farmer? I feel like I'm supposed to think there's something wrong with the way the people in my community live and that I'm here to make everyones' lives better, but I just can't do that. They have been fine for a long, long time without me, and they will continue to be fine after I am gone.
So I have more or less decided to not care if my students learn English or not. Instead, I will spend my required time in the classroom, and try to build my relationships with my co-teachers to develop teacher trainings for non-English teachers. I have posed the idea to my teachers and they sound interested, so now I need to do some brain-storming and planning and keep pushing this. I also have some other ideas, but I think I've talked about these before. And even if I haven't, I want to keep my mind rolling right now.
I am very aware of there being a LOT of things that I WANT to do, and a lot of things that I am NOT doing. But, I need to remember that it's important to take things one step at a time. For example, I have just decided to take a walk around the neighborhood when I'm done writing this. It's something I did a fair amount when I first came here, but I've stopped doing lately. Yes, I've been busy(ish), and after a first meeting, I don't have much to say with my Thai, but, SNAP. It's the effort that counts.
So now I'm antsy to go out for a walk. I will finish with some general thoughts on the Peace Corps.
Does Thailand NEED the Peace Corps? Of course not! Peace Corps is here because Thailand has requested our presence. That is WHY the Peace Corps sends volunteers to countries. Am I going to revolutionize teaching practices and cause a dramatic improvement in student performance in my area? Probably not. It IS possible that I will find one project that will have a positive, lasting effect, and that is my current goal, probably something with a youth group (or maybe agriculturally related). But what I DO know is that when I leave, a few hundred or thousand people will remember a farang who lived with them for a few years. And he didn't come here to find a Thai woman to take care of him, and he made efforts to learn the language, and... I don't know what. That's the part that I think matters. That's the part that I can count on happening. The rest is valid and worthwhile, but whether or not anything actually comes of it is highly questionable.
While I was out of site for the second round of training and everything, we watched the movie "Volunteers" from the 80s, starring John Candy and Tom Hanks who play Peace Corps volunteers in Thailand (though I like to say the ended up in Peace Corps Generic Asia). I don't know that I'd recommend it to anyone who wasn't in the Peace Corps (in Thailand, gah-dai), but it did kind of strike a chord. The project they were sent to their village for was to build a bridge over the river. In the end, they have to blow up the bridge to save the day, and when Tom Hanks apologizes to the villagers, he is informed that nobody cares, because they never really wanted the bridge in the first place! This really emphasizes the need to align your goals. I may come up with the most brilliant project idea ever that will revolutionize and improve everything around me, but if nobody wants what I'm selling, it doesn't matter. And again, who am I to say that my "improvement" will actually make anything better?
We also got the line, "Lying, malignant stink-infested yankee Peace Corps! Ptui!" from the communist contingency in the movie, so that was good, too.
OK. Time for that walk.
PEACE CORPS OUT!
E
Monday, July 13, 2009
Big cities.
So I've been out for a while, no joke. About 3 weeks. And now I'm back.
I began by heading over to the neighboring province (up in the mountains) to help out with a fellow volunteer's English camp. On the bus ride over, as the bus wound through the mountains, with the grinding of gears and the brief backwards slides when the driver changed gears, I gained some new insight on the practice of slash 'n' burn farming.
When I first visited my site back in March (jeez, I've almost been here for 6 months!), the air was super hazy, and it was explained to me that this was a result of the hill people burning the mountainsides for some free farmland. My initial reaction was, "Man, that sucks. Look at all this smoke. This is bad for the environment, makes the area less beautiful, and it hurts my lungs. Slash 'n' burn is bad."
When I returned to my site a month later to stay, it appeared that the season's burning was finished, as the air was much clearer. At that point, I stopped thinking about the slashing and the burning, as there really wasn't anything to make me think about it. Out of sight, out of mind, no?
And then I took a bus ride through the mountains and witnessed the results first hand.
As I watched a woman holding onto the slope with one hand, surrounded by neat rows of young green shoots, hacking at a stubborn root with a machete, I decided that I could no longer simply say, "Slash and burn is bad." It's just not that simple. Certainly it is not ideal environmentally, but how can you NOT respect and admire the effort, love and tenacity that it takes to clear, plant and harvest a slope that would be difficult to simply walk on, let alone make a living from?
And then I was through the mountains and my thoughts returned to myself. I became more disillusioned with English camps, but I had some good ice cream, so I figure it all balanced out. I've probably said this before, but it seems to me that there are two values to English camps: as a mini-teacher training (where teachers can see some fun activities to maybe use in their class, or course this is completely undermined when they teachers just use the time to hang out and don't observe, which seems to happen as often as not), and to give kids a chance to have FUN speaking English (because they certainly aren't going to learn and retain much from these). It's just frustrating that so much of the focus seems to be on show and ceremony, and knowing the tens of thousands of baht that are spent on these instead of a new computer or something that could have a more practical and long-term benefit. But I'm not going to be able to change that, so I will have to do my best to find ways to add some value to these camps I find myself involved in.
Oh yeah, apparently Michael Jackson died around here, too. It was a weird feeling. He was definitely an important part of my childhood, and I still admire what he did, it's just really too bad things got as weird as they did those last-- 15 years or so? But yes, America, Thailand noticed.
After the camp, my associates and I headed to Khorat for PST2 (the second round of training, still called pre-service training, though we were sworn in a few months ago...). On the way, myself and a number of other volunteers (about a dozen of us) went to check out a national park, intending to camp there for the evening and hike around before 2 weeks of meetings and whatnot.
We made it to the park, but did not end up camping when we found out that campsites were some 20-ish kilometers inside the park, and it was starting to get dark and rainy. So we hitch-hiked a few kilometers back up the road (hitch-hiking is WAY easier here, and feels way less sketchy) and ended up staying the evening at a resort.
The next day we hitch-hiked into the park, checked out a waterfall, became very glad when we saw the campsites (since there was no place to get food or beer which I guess had been expected) then spent the rest of day traveling back to the site of our training. Oh, and everyone got a tiger t-shirt (a sua sua, if you will, the words for tiger and t-shirt being identical except for a difference in tone), except for me, I had a lion shirt (because I'm a rebel) and we entered our first session of training chanting "sua sua sua!" to the tune of "Eye of the Tiger." Because we are awesome.
And then we had training.
Things started out with a second counterpart conference where we went through essentially the same activities as we did at the end of the first round of training, though with a different counterpart. Of course, my counterpart didn't show up (she'd had some recent drama and decided not to come, and I supported and defended her decision), so I got to do a lot of brain-storming and whatnots by myself, but I came out of it with some good ideas for projects (recycling, AIDS, and trying to find a way to get enough water to produce two crops of rice every year, if you have any ideas [besides damming the river], HOLLAH!), and questions about the actual value of teaching English instead of working on community projects. But I'll work it out. I think as far as my work with the schools go, I want to get involved with more teacher trainings and get a youth group going. Anyhow, yeah.
Then the counterparts went home and we got some more language instruction, which was awesome. We also got to go into Khorat (it's a big city, I heard the second biggest in Thailand [no, Chiang Mai is NOT the second biggest, it's just famous and stuff] though I can't say for sure), which was a pain to get to from the hotel we were staying at (we were kinda in the middle of nowhere), a LOT of people got sick (I had a pretty nasty bout of food poisoning), and we took over a local bar called Hank Over (the 'g' and 'k' final consonants are pretty much the same in Thai, and I'm assuming that's where the name came from, or maybe it's actually something more meaningful). Which was awesome. We went over there on the 4th of July after our No-Talent Show at the hotel and danced to American music for a bunch of hours. The place filled up with Thai people watching us, and I went around putting American flag stickers on them (the Thai people, they got a kick out of it). Then an awesome Thai band came out (there are some really good musicians here, but the consensus is that the music itself isn't very good). They played "Happy Birthday America" for us, took requests for the few Thai songs we knew, then went into their set. We stuck around for a bit longer, but we'd been there for a while already and were pretty tired and headed home.
And there really isn't much more to say about training.
When training was all over, about twenty of us headed back to the site of the FIRST round of training to visit the ol' host families. It felt really good see them again and speak slightly better Thai and show them pictures of my new home. I also felt really guilty as they pointed out that I don't call and I tried to explain that I don't like talking on the phone in general, and it's REALLY hard to try talking on the phone just in Thai, but I think I'll be making an effort to drop a line every now and then, tell them what I've eaten and tell them I miss them. It'd be worth the effort.
Then I spent a few days in Bangkok, as the Peace Corps medical staff decided I should see a doctor about my food poisoning. I still don't really like Bangkok, but this was definitely the most enjoyable visit I've had yet. We stayed at a guest house located right next to a BTS (the sky train) station, so it was really easy to get around, and I just feel like I'm getting a slightly better handle on the city. It was just nice to feel a little more in control. There were also some folks from 120 (the PC group who've been here for a year already), and they're fun to hang out with, and they know fun places to go.
And then the doctor told me I'm fine and I headed home.
Did I mention that right before I left site (at the beginning of all this), my computer crashed and I had to format my hard drive? I got a bunch of music from other volunteers, and I still have most of my favorites loaded on my ipod, but it's a little sad that there is a lot of good music I like that I won't be able to hear again until I get back to the states. Ok, you can stop pitying me now. It really isn't a big deal. But this DID prompt me to get a external hard drive in Khorat to back up stuff. When my computer initially crashed my biggest concern was that I would lose all of my pictures, but I managed to get into safe mode and copy those before it stopped letting me load at all. So that was good.
So now I'm back at site. I just did a load of laundry and now I'm just going to chill out for a while. I definitely am taking today to recover from being gone for so long. Do some reading, maybe nap a bit. This evening I'm going to go help my counterpart coach our two champion speech kiddos (the regional competition is sunday!), and then I guess tomorrow is back to normal.
It's kinda reassuring how life just keeps on going, isn't it?
Eli OUT!
Oh wait, my Prathom 1 (first graders) can't say Eli, so they call me Kruu Arai (basically that means Mr. What?)
Kruu Arai OUT!
I began by heading over to the neighboring province (up in the mountains) to help out with a fellow volunteer's English camp. On the bus ride over, as the bus wound through the mountains, with the grinding of gears and the brief backwards slides when the driver changed gears, I gained some new insight on the practice of slash 'n' burn farming.
When I first visited my site back in March (jeez, I've almost been here for 6 months!), the air was super hazy, and it was explained to me that this was a result of the hill people burning the mountainsides for some free farmland. My initial reaction was, "Man, that sucks. Look at all this smoke. This is bad for the environment, makes the area less beautiful, and it hurts my lungs. Slash 'n' burn is bad."
When I returned to my site a month later to stay, it appeared that the season's burning was finished, as the air was much clearer. At that point, I stopped thinking about the slashing and the burning, as there really wasn't anything to make me think about it. Out of sight, out of mind, no?
And then I took a bus ride through the mountains and witnessed the results first hand.
As I watched a woman holding onto the slope with one hand, surrounded by neat rows of young green shoots, hacking at a stubborn root with a machete, I decided that I could no longer simply say, "Slash and burn is bad." It's just not that simple. Certainly it is not ideal environmentally, but how can you NOT respect and admire the effort, love and tenacity that it takes to clear, plant and harvest a slope that would be difficult to simply walk on, let alone make a living from?
And then I was through the mountains and my thoughts returned to myself. I became more disillusioned with English camps, but I had some good ice cream, so I figure it all balanced out. I've probably said this before, but it seems to me that there are two values to English camps: as a mini-teacher training (where teachers can see some fun activities to maybe use in their class, or course this is completely undermined when they teachers just use the time to hang out and don't observe, which seems to happen as often as not), and to give kids a chance to have FUN speaking English (because they certainly aren't going to learn and retain much from these). It's just frustrating that so much of the focus seems to be on show and ceremony, and knowing the tens of thousands of baht that are spent on these instead of a new computer or something that could have a more practical and long-term benefit. But I'm not going to be able to change that, so I will have to do my best to find ways to add some value to these camps I find myself involved in.
Oh yeah, apparently Michael Jackson died around here, too. It was a weird feeling. He was definitely an important part of my childhood, and I still admire what he did, it's just really too bad things got as weird as they did those last-- 15 years or so? But yes, America, Thailand noticed.
After the camp, my associates and I headed to Khorat for PST2 (the second round of training, still called pre-service training, though we were sworn in a few months ago...). On the way, myself and a number of other volunteers (about a dozen of us) went to check out a national park, intending to camp there for the evening and hike around before 2 weeks of meetings and whatnot.
We made it to the park, but did not end up camping when we found out that campsites were some 20-ish kilometers inside the park, and it was starting to get dark and rainy. So we hitch-hiked a few kilometers back up the road (hitch-hiking is WAY easier here, and feels way less sketchy) and ended up staying the evening at a resort.
The next day we hitch-hiked into the park, checked out a waterfall, became very glad when we saw the campsites (since there was no place to get food or beer which I guess had been expected) then spent the rest of day traveling back to the site of our training. Oh, and everyone got a tiger t-shirt (a sua sua, if you will, the words for tiger and t-shirt being identical except for a difference in tone), except for me, I had a lion shirt (because I'm a rebel) and we entered our first session of training chanting "sua sua sua!" to the tune of "Eye of the Tiger." Because we are awesome.
And then we had training.
Things started out with a second counterpart conference where we went through essentially the same activities as we did at the end of the first round of training, though with a different counterpart. Of course, my counterpart didn't show up (she'd had some recent drama and decided not to come, and I supported and defended her decision), so I got to do a lot of brain-storming and whatnots by myself, but I came out of it with some good ideas for projects (recycling, AIDS, and trying to find a way to get enough water to produce two crops of rice every year, if you have any ideas [besides damming the river], HOLLAH!), and questions about the actual value of teaching English instead of working on community projects. But I'll work it out. I think as far as my work with the schools go, I want to get involved with more teacher trainings and get a youth group going. Anyhow, yeah.
Then the counterparts went home and we got some more language instruction, which was awesome. We also got to go into Khorat (it's a big city, I heard the second biggest in Thailand [no, Chiang Mai is NOT the second biggest, it's just famous and stuff] though I can't say for sure), which was a pain to get to from the hotel we were staying at (we were kinda in the middle of nowhere), a LOT of people got sick (I had a pretty nasty bout of food poisoning), and we took over a local bar called Hank Over (the 'g' and 'k' final consonants are pretty much the same in Thai, and I'm assuming that's where the name came from, or maybe it's actually something more meaningful). Which was awesome. We went over there on the 4th of July after our No-Talent Show at the hotel and danced to American music for a bunch of hours. The place filled up with Thai people watching us, and I went around putting American flag stickers on them (the Thai people, they got a kick out of it). Then an awesome Thai band came out (there are some really good musicians here, but the consensus is that the music itself isn't very good). They played "Happy Birthday America" for us, took requests for the few Thai songs we knew, then went into their set. We stuck around for a bit longer, but we'd been there for a while already and were pretty tired and headed home.
And there really isn't much more to say about training.
When training was all over, about twenty of us headed back to the site of the FIRST round of training to visit the ol' host families. It felt really good see them again and speak slightly better Thai and show them pictures of my new home. I also felt really guilty as they pointed out that I don't call and I tried to explain that I don't like talking on the phone in general, and it's REALLY hard to try talking on the phone just in Thai, but I think I'll be making an effort to drop a line every now and then, tell them what I've eaten and tell them I miss them. It'd be worth the effort.
Then I spent a few days in Bangkok, as the Peace Corps medical staff decided I should see a doctor about my food poisoning. I still don't really like Bangkok, but this was definitely the most enjoyable visit I've had yet. We stayed at a guest house located right next to a BTS (the sky train) station, so it was really easy to get around, and I just feel like I'm getting a slightly better handle on the city. It was just nice to feel a little more in control. There were also some folks from 120 (the PC group who've been here for a year already), and they're fun to hang out with, and they know fun places to go.
And then the doctor told me I'm fine and I headed home.
Did I mention that right before I left site (at the beginning of all this), my computer crashed and I had to format my hard drive? I got a bunch of music from other volunteers, and I still have most of my favorites loaded on my ipod, but it's a little sad that there is a lot of good music I like that I won't be able to hear again until I get back to the states. Ok, you can stop pitying me now. It really isn't a big deal. But this DID prompt me to get a external hard drive in Khorat to back up stuff. When my computer initially crashed my biggest concern was that I would lose all of my pictures, but I managed to get into safe mode and copy those before it stopped letting me load at all. So that was good.
So now I'm back at site. I just did a load of laundry and now I'm just going to chill out for a while. I definitely am taking today to recover from being gone for so long. Do some reading, maybe nap a bit. This evening I'm going to go help my counterpart coach our two champion speech kiddos (the regional competition is sunday!), and then I guess tomorrow is back to normal.
It's kinda reassuring how life just keeps on going, isn't it?
Eli OUT!
Oh wait, my Prathom 1 (first graders) can't say Eli, so they call me Kruu Arai (basically that means Mr. What?)
Kruu Arai OUT!
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