Takin' it Easy

As I sit on a beach chair on Koh Lanta staring at the Andaman Sea and the most stunning sunsets I’ve ever seen, I realize I’m really living the life of paradise; I’m free of all worries at the moment and I’m just taking in all the beauty I can for the next 10 days I have in Thailand. I’m sorry for being so absent in blog writing recently. I’ve been preoccupied travelling the North of Thailand, Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh City), and some of the Southern Islands of Thailand. I’ll first recap you on my trip Northern Thailand. My trip to Vietnam and the Southern Islands will be soon to come.

This past weekend was a weekend very different than any other weekend I’ve experienced here in Thailand. I would have to say it was one of the more special and memorable weekends yet. Katie has family friends back in New Jersey that had an exchange student live with them from Thailand in the 1970’s, his name is Ron and he is one of the nicest people I have ever met in my life. Ron came to the U.S. as a high school student with an organization called AFS and every year other people from his program get together in Thailand. This year we happened to be invited along. The get together was held at Ron’s friend Woody’s summer home in Khao Yai National Park. His home was gorgeous! I should actually say homes. There were three different buildings that housed his guests; one of which was a beautifully painted barn with bedrooms in side and a lower level where guests slept on mattresses camp style with projector screens on the walls. The kitchen in his home was huge. The detailed wooden floors in the home were beautiful. The view and landscape was breathtaking.

It was such a nice weekend to chat with all AFSer’s who had studied, lived, and travelled all throughout the United States. Talking with them made me realize how much of the States I still have yet to see. They were all very hospitable, offering Katie and I a bedroom whenever we were in Bangkok. I felt like I was at a family reunion with all the people and the food. It even seemed a little bit like Door County with the barbeque going minus the campfire. They even busted out the guitar and old school 70’s music. It was great! Things settled down a little when the monk arrived for the evening ceremony. Along with the great family feel this weekend, I experienced a lot of the Buddhist religion. Saturday morning we attended a smaller ceremony and offering of food to the monks at a near by Temple where Ron took part in his “ordainment”. Apparently all Thai men should go through this ordainment sometime in their lives. It’s a commitment of 10 or 14 days devoted to the monk lifestyle. It was a simple temple, with a small town village feel to it. We also attended another ceremony with the AFS group Sunday morning. This ceremony included a visit to the Buddha in the cave. It was pretty cool seeing a Buddha and place to worship in an underground cave. Each ceremony I attended was unique in its own way. The first one was special because I was able to see how even a toddler pays respects and practices the Buddhist religion. A little boy was bowing down and meditating just like his parents. Saturday afternoon, we went to Palio Market. It was like a mini-trip to Italy. I loved it! The Asian’s ate up the opportunity for pictures at this market. People now have to pay an admission before entering the Market because majority of the people only come to take pictures of the Italian Tuscan feel. Sunday after the Buddhist ceremony I headed to the Northeast with Katie to Ron, Peace, his daughter, and his wife’s home. Although it took about 6 hours to get to their home near Yasothin, it was a pleasant drive seeing different sights in Thailand. Ron’s home was much more than the average home in Thailand, or at least that I have seen so far. The outside reminded me a lot of a Florida style home. Ron and his family were so welcoming and openhearted. Our Sunday evening dinner seemed like Katie and I were truly part of their family. After dinner we spent the evening looking through photo albums of Peace and Art’s (his son) trips to the U.S. along with old school albums of Ron’s first trip to the U.S. That was really enjoyable. Even though I didn’t really know anyone in the albums, it was fun to listen Ron and Peace reminisce about their trips to the U.S. It really opened my mind to two different things. One being the greatness of print photos and photo albums and the other being my realization of what a great experience it is for people from different countries to experience a family home stay in a different country like Ron, Peace, and Art experienced. I remember when I was in high school my mom was considering having a foreign exchange student come to live with us, but my dad was strongly opposed. I recall myself and my brother not being strongly in favor of opening our home to a foreign student as well. It is really too bad we felt so strongly against it. After visiting with Ron and his family and teaching in Thailand for a longer period of time, it really makes me think I someday will want a foreign exchange student to come to live in my home, if possible or if/when I have children I would want them to have a foreign experience like I’ve had or like one that of Ron and his children. Monday morning, Ron and his wife took us to their school. Ron introduced us to a few of his M4 students. He was very proud introducing us to some of his “smartest” students. It was cute. Before leaving their home in the morning, Ron’s wife Tok gave me a gift. It was extremely nice and unnecessary of her and the family to do so. They gave me a pretty blue Thai silk scarf. Ron was nice to get me to the right bus station that would take me to Khon Kaen to visit Jess and Chelsea. We visited one last Temple in their town, which had the most amazing displays of popcorn string garlands. They were incredible! They hung throughout the whole Temple, some even hung from the ceiling to the floor.

It was great visiting Khon Kaen. Since the girls still had to teach while I visited them, I had a lot of down time to explore and just hang out. The city of Khon Kaen and the area where the girls live was great, I thought! It seemed like a bigger city but definitely manageable to walk to most places or take song-taus wherever you needed to go to get around town. I visited the night market the first night I was there with the girls. We ate some delicious pad thai. I was able to go to school with Jess on Wednesday.  Both her and Chelsea teach at a private primary school that is focused on teaching students subjects in both Thai and English. From the stories I’ve heard about their teaching situation prior to coming to visit, I already knew it was a lot different from my experience teaching 800 students at a government school in Bangplama. I found this to be very true especially after “shadowing” Jess on Wednesday. She was actually helping out at the Thai school’s pre-school and Kindergarten’s end of the year play. So Wednesday morning I went with her to watch her practice with the adorable little children. We got there right in time for the Flag Ceremony, which was “same same, but different” to the one I attended each morning in Bangplama except a million times cuter. The kids were soooo cute!

After the Flag Ceremony they do a warm-up dance. It was hilarious watching some of the students jump up and down and sing and dance. I fell in love with these students immediately. Practice for the play started shortly after flag ceremony. The play’s plot is a combination of International dances and songs performed by the pre-school and kindergarteners. Jess acted as the English tour guide. There were three other main characters that spoke in both English and Thai. Watching the little ones dance to the tango, 50’s, Hawaiian, and Indian music was the cutest thing I think I’ve ever seen. They even had matching outfits for each country dance that they performed. I couldn’t get over how good these young students were at dancing and performing. It was absolutely adorable!

We went back to Jess’s school just in time for lunch. It didn’t measure up to our amazing lunches at Soongsumarn Katie and I will miss so very much though. After lunch, Jess taught her 3^rd grade class that she teaches Social Studies, Science, Math, and English too. In her class there is about only 25 students. Their level of English is far more advanced than the level that my students were at. Really I can’t even compare her experience to my experience teaching in Thailand because it is very different. Her kids were great! So cute! It was hilarious watching the students chew the Double Bubble Jess generously gave some of the students who won a game the day before. It was actually a good example of why gum should not be in the classroom or even for that matter given to children at all. The boys would try to blow bubbles and it ended up all over their cheeks. I was quite entertained. Along with noticing the abundance of half white half Thai children at the school, there were a few mentally challenged students at the school. Jess had told me earlier that they lack special education school’s in Thailand. It blows my mind that that is the case. I don’t see how it is fair for the mentally challenged students to learn at the same level as their peers who are not mentally challenged. It was a great experience shadowing at Jess and Chelsea’s school! I would definitely have a much harder time leaving my students this semester if I saw the same group of adorable 3^rd grade faces that Jess does every day.