Goodbye Bangkok, Sa-wa-dee-ka Chiang Rai!

Updates:
Since I haven’t written in a while, I thought I would give a quick recap of my last few weeks here in BKK. Last weekend we went to Kanchanaburi, which is about 3 hours (West?) of BKK. What a wonderful and beautiful place it was. We did an organized/guided tour since the city is pretty stretched out, and it was definitely worth it. We saw the infamous Bridge Over River Kwai. Although the original bridge no longer stands, I’m assuming that the replica looks exactly the same. The Bridge over River Kwai (also a famous movie) was built during WWII by allied POWs. Thousands died trying to build this bridge and railway in order to connect Thailand and Burma by rail. We also went trekking on an elephant, bamboo rafting, and the highlight of the trip, the National Park which has 7 different waterfalls (or 7 “levels”). Absolutely beautiful. I didn’t make it all the way to the 7th level, because I’m completely out shape, but the 5 waterfalls that I did see were magnificent. Here are some pictures:

At our hotel, which was ON the river (on a giant bamboo raft!)

River Kwai

Thai style posing! At the restaurant

Elephant rides!

With the roomie :-) on the Death Railway

This past week we also had the chance to do some co-teaching at a local school in BKK. This was a chance to get our feet wet; get accustomed to teaching before we head out to our provinces. I co-taught with Marketa, and I think we did a really good job. Our students were adorable and seemed to enjoy our lessons. Since students are off for the month of October, TUSEF had to pull students out of their winter break to come in so we could teach for five days. It was kind of like an English camp. On our last day, we taught them about Halloween, had them make their own masks, and then went trick-or-treating to the other ETA classrooms. The students loved this! Thanks Kru Jamie for the idea! Although it was sad to say goodbye to our students, they were so sweet and got Marketa and I small gifts. In addition to the little things individual students gave us, as a class they got us scarves, one for me and one for Marketa. How thoughtful! Not that it will ever be cold enough for me to wear it here in Thailand (although I will be teaching in the Northernmost province, and the North is known to get pretty cool). We did teach them about seasons, and they know that we are both from NYC, so perhaps they thought we could us the scarves when we go back home.


Goodbye Bangkok


Tomorrow we head to our provinces!! I cannot believe it’s been a month already! I’m really sad to say goodbye to the group, since we’ve literally spent every waking moment together for the last 4 weeks. How will I survive without them? Luckily, my housemate in Chiang Rai is American (from New Orleans) and there is another American English teacher at the school. Woo hoo!! So I’ll have at least two people to talk to when I’m having a frustrating day and need to vent about my students. Yet it’s still going to be weird not having 11 other people around me all the time. The good thing is that I’m not alone in Chiang Rai. Caitlin and Sadie are my province buddies; Caitlin is an hour North, while Sadie is 45 mins away. In addition, Marketa is 3 hours away in Chiang Mai, which is supposed to be a fun city, so I already plan on visiting her often. So I won’t be totally alone. Plus, I met my host teachers last week when they came to observe us on Wednesday, and I have, hands down, the best teachers out of the group. They are hilarious, and seem like great people to work with, so I’m really excited for the upcoming year. That being said, do I feel fully prepared to teach alone? Nope. But I’ll get it together. I’ll probably suck at first, but I heard from a lot of teachers (including my own host teachers) that your first year is your hardest because you are developing your teaching skills, and thus you’re kind of a hot mess and all over the place. That’s what the first semester is for, right? J As long as I stay positive and try to have fun with it I think I’ll be okay.

Thai Home Stay

So this past weekend we had our Thai homestays. I was a little nervous for two reasons: For starters, I lived with a host family for four months when I was abroad in Denmark, so I didn't think one weekend would be enough time to get to know someone, nor enough time to get over the initial "awkward phase". Secondly, aside from some of the high-rise condos I've seen in Bangkok, I haven't really seen many actual homes or apartments. In our neighborhood of Chula (short for Chulalongkorn University, which is where our classes are held) the apartments are more like tenaments. On the first floor is the family buisness, which is usually either a silkscreen shop where they make shirts, or a restaurant, and the top two floors consist of the actual apartment. Mind you, these apartments look extremely grimey from the outside, so who knows how nice they are on the inside. The point is, this left me wtih little knowledge on what a "typical Thai home" looked like.

We got picked up by our host families on Friday afternoon. My host parents spoke abosolutely no English, but their daugther, Bua who is 16, spoke perfect English, so right away I knew I would be speaking English for most of the weekend. Within 5 minutes I basically exhausted all of the Thai that I knew ( we didn't really get up to conversing in Thai in our langauge class). I introduced myself by saying, "Hi, my name is Leah Werner-Evans, I'm from New York, I'm an English teacher, and I like pinneapple and banana." Done. My host parents did laugh and think it was funny. Or maybe they were laughing because they thought I was an idiot... oh well.

We drove back to their house. Although Bua attends an all-girls school in Bangkok (the same school I will be field-teaching at for the next five days), they live about 40 minutes from the school. Kind of like living in the suburbs of Bangkok. We had to cross a river to get to their house, so I guess it would be the same as driving from my high school to where I live in Astoria, or maybe even a little farther like to Forest Hills or something. Yeah, it was more like driving out to Forest HIlls or maybe even Jamiaca, Queens, as we did pass through coconut and banana fields to get there. To my surprise, they live in a gated community, in which the houses were almost identical, and looked very American. I felt like I was in Florida or California, not Thailand. Their house was a modest size, small and compact, but they have three cars. As soon as I got settled in they offered me food. Thai people are all about the food (my kind of people!) and one of the first questions they always ask a person is, "have you eaten yet?"

My first night, Friday night, they took me to Black Canyon Coffee for dinner, one of the restaurants in their local mall. It's a coffee shop and an 'international Thai" restaurant, but American-style. I think they took me there because I'm American and they probably assumed that my palate wouldn't be able to handle real Thai food. Of course all of the main entrees on the menu were served with french fries. Why do non-Americans assume that Americans like to eat french fries at every meal or with every type of food? I certainly do not crave french fries all the time nor feel the need to eat them with everything. Also, if you tell Thai people that you like to eat a certain dish, be prepared to be served it quite often. When asked, I told them that I like Som Tam (papaya salad), kao pad gai (chicken fried rice), pad see ew, and pad thai (of course). So naturally at dinner they ordered me Som Tam and even ordered me pad thai to go even though I ordered Salmon for dinner. Maybe they thought I could get hungry later that evening? Or for the rest of the weekend?

The rest of the weekend was pretty great. It was filled with relaxing, shopping, and of course, lots of eating. On Saturday I hung out with Bua and her two friends from school. They also spoke perfect English; one girl had actually spent a summer in California taking classes. They took me to a Wat and then we went shopping at JJ Market, which is a huge outdoor market in a park. I bought a new bag and a skirt for work, both of which were really cheap. We ended the day by going to Swensons (an ice cream chain here in BKK that's apparently an American chain). Perfect.

On Sunday, my day started by eating a big meal for breakfast. Thai's eat regular food for all meals, which includes breakfast. They don't do the cereal or yogurt-thing for breakfast. Instead they eat soup, rice, chicken, etc. My breakfast consisted of brown/whole-grin rice, fried fish, and ham sauteed with bok choy. At 8:30 in the morning. It was delicious, but I mentally had to prepare myself the night before so that I would be able to eat fish that early. Off we went to a floating market, which i was really excited about because I had been wanting to go for a while. This market wasn't like the famous picture of Thai women with those straw hats rowing down a river w in a canoe filled wih fruits, veggies, or flowers. This was more like a boardwalk type of set-up with a narrow-brown river running through and around it. Still pretty, still awesome, and still got tons of cheap stuff for work. My host mom bought me these awesome print pants. I didn't know she was going to get them for me, but when I stopped to look at them and then walked away to look at another stall, she showed up with them in her hand just for me. I tried them on when Igot back to my dorm, and they're really big on me, which is a huge dissappointment. Instead of fitting me, they look like MC Hammer pants, so they'll have to be pajamas until I work up the courage to wear them outside. AFter more shopping and eating, we went back to their house to gather my stuff so they could take me back to my dorm. I had to get them something (in addition to the lame snacks I gave them on Friday) because they were so gracious to me all weekend, so I got them a flower plant from the market. When we got back to the house they had me plant it. They kept saying, 'its your plant, you put it in the ground, and it wil be here forever". Ahh, so sweet, I almost cried! To top it off,they gave me another gift: a book of Thai fruits in Thai and English to help me with my Thai vocabulary (we talked about fruits a lot that weekend, since it's one of the only Thai words I know) AND they even gave me the host stay money that Fulbright had given them for the weekend. Their explanation was that I would be in the country for a year and would need it more than they do. WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY!

Even though I didn't really practice my Thai that much over the weekend, I had a fabulous time with my host family and hope to keep in touch them throughout the year here.

An another note, I start field teaching tomorrow, eek! Wish me luck!!

Two Weeks In

I can’t believe I’ve been here for two weeks already and that I only have two more weeks left in BKK! The latter is really sad. I’m really enjoying my time with the other ETAs, and right now I can’t imagine being shipped off to our various provinces and not being surrounded by each other 24/7. L I’m trying not to think about it, and on a positive note, thank goodness we have three more weekends here!

How is Thailand? Life is good! I’m truly loving every minute of my experiences so far. I used a squat toilet for the first time ever this past weekend and only managed to pee on myself juuuust a little bit J (that was for you, Victoria). It was surprisingly a lot easier than I suspected! Haha.

Our little group of 12 is really coming together, which is fabulous since we will be each others support system for the rest of the year. We went out last Friday, which served as some much-needed group bonding time. While half of us went to the Grand Palace together on Saturday, all of us went to Auyttaya on Sunday. Even though our trip was poorly planned on our part, it was great to all be together, which made the experience a lot better. Sometimes being in a larger group is comforting. We’ve definitely started to become a family. Last night we went out for Caitlin’s birthday. We had a great dinner, did some karaoke, which was a blast (I performed “The Boy is Mine” with Ari), and ended the night at Swensen’s for some ice cream. Food + Karaoke + Great Company = A Fab Night. The Karaoke was good practice, because not only do Thais love karaoke, but apparently as Americans we will be asked and expected to perform songs at people’s beck and call. Good thing I have an awful singing voice and that karaoke isn’t something I have much practice at. Oh well, I’ll just have to channel my inner-Beyonce and do the best that I can. I mean, with Beyonce on my side I can’t really fail.

The focus of class this week has been on lesson planning. Although I’m thankful to finally have class on this subject, I feel like it’s made me anxious and nervous about teaching. I only see my students once a week for a 50-minute period. And if my students are the ones traveling from classroom to classroom, apparently they are notorious for showing up late, because a) they have to travel and might be coming from a different building, and b) their previous teacher might have let them out late. Assuming that they are 10 minutes late to class, plus five minutes to get settled in, that leaves me with 45 minutes once a week to do a lesson. How am I supposed to be an effective teacher? I feel like I should have class three times a week. Another issue is my students themselves. If I have 50 kids in my class, with Thai names, which are notoriously long (I’m serious, every Thai individual has a nickname for this specific reason), with three to five classes, how am I going to learn 150-200 names, let alone build a relationship with them? The lecturers we have had have all said that learning all of your kids’ names will be virtually impossible. Great. Ugh, I’m so overwhelmed by this. The name thing doesn’t bother me as much as the time issue. I hope I’ll be able to be productive and use my time wisely and efficiently so that my students can get the most out of the time we have together.

On a happier note, here are some random facts about Thailand:

--Thailand is a monarchy, and it’s present King has been in rule for over 50 years. Crazy! But they all love him. Oh, and he was born in Boston, MA. Random.
--Thailand is one of the few countries where speaking badly about the royal family is a crime. Because of this, people don’t talk about the royal family openly.
--Thais don’t say “bless you” when someone sneezes because, as my Thai teacher jokingly stated, “they don’t believe in health.”
--Even when I try to speak in broken Thai, Thais willingly speak back in English, even though I don’t ask them too. This is kind of like a slap in the face, and it’s making it harder for me to practice my Thai L.
--Thai people always smile. It doesn’t matter if they are happy or sad, angry, or frustrated, they will smile. I guess that’s why it’s called the Land of Smiles.
--Their lotion has whitening cream in it. A common saying here is “Black is good, but White is better”. Yet it doesn’t have the discriminatory connotation that it would have in the U.S. I think what this means, is that it’s okay to naturally be dark, but that Thais do not strive to get tan or to get darker. Unlike in the U.S. where people go to tanning spas and lay out in the sun without sunblock to get a nice tan. I’m sure this has something to do with social status, as farmers who work in the rice paddies are naturally going to be darker than an office worker.
--I do get stared at (we all do). It’s funny, and sometime’s strange. Some days people point.
--As I’ve said countless times before, everything is super cheap here. The movie theater near our dorm is 60 Baht. That’s 2 dollars.

Exploring

On Thursday we got to meet the previous ETAs (the ’09-’10 batch). We had a whole afternoon together and got to spend even more time with them at the Welcome Party TUSEF threw for us. It was at The Royal Turf Club, which overlooks a golf course and racetrack, so we had a nice view. Delicious food, good wine, and wonderful company. I sat across from my ETA Allison and got the inside scoop on what life is like at Princess Chulabhorn College (PCC) in Chiang Rai. It seems like I’m pretty lucky. Since PCC is a boarding school the students have to take a test to get in, so they are relatively intelligent and usually pretty motivated. I have two scholarship classes, so those students are extremely motivated. We were told that in Thai culture, students often are not motivated and don’t like to learn. This means we are going to have to figure out fun and exciting ways to engage our students in class. Ali also said that my students are pretty well-behaved, so classroom management won’t be a big issue. I’ll also be the third American at the school (my housemate is from New Orleans, and another American teacher lives off campus with her boyfriend) so I won’t feel too isolated or lonely. I also won’t have to pay for any of my meal, as eating in the school canteen is free for teachers. Although I’m sure I’ll get sick of the food and will want to eat off-campus from time to time, it will help me save my money for traveling. My only issue will be my unwanted and unwelcomed house guests: bugs. I hate bugs and insects. Aside from the cute little lizards or geckos, I apparently have large geckos that seek shelter in the corners of my living room ceiling, as well as spiders, some even as large as my hand! Eek! I’m trying not to think about it since there’s obviously nothing I can do about it. Mai bpen rai as the Thais would say.

Today was a blistering hot day, and I mean HOT. This is scary because it’s the cool season, yet it felt like we were walking through the middle of the freaking desert. Since it’s so hard to explore Bangkok during the week (we get out of orientation at 4pm and most things aside from stores close at 5pm), we went to the Grand Palace and Wat Phra Kaew (Temple of the Emerald Buddha) today, “The number one destination in Bangkok”. Once inside we made our way to the Wat Phra Kaew first. Words honestly cannot describe how spectacular the whole complex is. The Emerald Buddha complex was breathtaking. So ornate; everything was made out of gold, with green, red, and blue jewels. And in such perfect condition! Wat Phra Kaew is the most revered temple in Thailand and it’s easy to see why. In addition to the Emerald Buddha, the complex includes a repository for Buddhist sacred scriptures that are inscribed on palm leaves, a miniature replica of Angkor Wat, statues of elephants (homage to the white elephants acquired during the reigns of the various kings of Thailand), a scripture library, other Buddha images, lots and lots of murals, galleries, etc. The actual Wat was of course beautiful and has an interesting history. The Emerald Buddha was first discovered in 1434 in Chiang Rai (my province!). At that time it was covered in plaster and just thought to be an ordinary Buddha. However, an abbot later discovered that the plaster on the nose had flaked off, revealing green stone beneath (jade). The abbot mistook the jade for emerald, and hence the name of the Buddha as The Emerald Buddha. (Thank you guide-book and Grand Palace pamphlet). Funny fact, the Buddha’s outfit changes according to the season, so he has three “season-appropriate” costumes. The costumes are changed three times a year by the King. This is also where corrupt politicians come to seek repentance and forgiveness. They go to the Emerald Buddha to swear their innocence. I honestly cannot begin to describe how beautiful the Wat and the whole complex is, so I won’t try. I will try to post pictures, which also won’t do justice to the beautiful architecture.
After the Emerald Buddha we made our way to the Grand Palace, but didn’t spend much time there as it was SO hot and we were slowly dying from the heat. We headed off to Chote Chitr, which we were told by one of our speakers has the best Thai food in Thailand. It’s a little hole-in-the wall restaurant, a mom-and-pop type shop, and the food was out of this world. We ordered a bunch of dishes and just shared everything: pan-friend salmon with mango salad, paenang curry with chicken (I think it’s called massaman curry in the states), coconut curry with shrimp, crispy noodles with chicken and shrimp, and glass noodles with mixed vegetables. Delicious! This place along with the vegetarian restaurant we went to last night have been my favorite places so far. So freaking good. I’ve learned that aside from street food or night markets, hole-in-the-wall restaurants are the place to go for phenomenal food. So far I’ve lived up to my promise to eat my way through this country! Did I mention that our entire meal ended up costing 5 U.S. dollars a person? I love this country.

Learning Thai

I could not have been more wrong when I thought I could learn Thai through osmosis. Doing so is nearly impossible, and thus if I didn't have TUSEF I would be totally and completely lost. Bangkok is not an English-speaking city; not like in Copenhagen where everyone spoke English, so it's been a little hard to communicate with people. Luckily, we have three hours of Thai class every morning, and after just three days I've learned a lot. Our Thai teacher's name is P'nan (that's her nickname, everyone in Thailand has a nickname) and is such as sweet lady. I love her and she makes learning Thai less difficult. I wish I could stick her in my pocket and take her with me everywhere because learning Thai is a constant reminder of how much I suck at learning languages. Yet trying to stay positive, so far I can say: sa-wa-dee ka. Chan cheu Leah nahm sagoon Werner-Evans. Bpen kon A-me-ri-gun. Bpen kruu pasa ank-krit. The last sentence says "I am an English teacher". We have also learned Thai numbers, which is essential when ordering food; key phrases that will be helpful in our classrooms such as "fang dee dee!" (please listen!) "ngiep ngiep noi" (please shut up), "pheut dtam na ka" (it's okay to make mistakes" as well as other useful phrases. We have also learned clothing and food dishes. So slowly, but surely, I'm getting there, and I already feel more confident when I'm out and about and need to speak to people.

Settling In

It's Monday, which means I've been in Thailand for all of 3 days. We arrived Friday at midnight and finally settled into our dorms at 1am on Saturday. Today was our frist day of orientation in which we met the Fulbright-Thailand staff including Porntip who is the Executive Director of TUSEF. She is the sweetest lady, and gave us a 3 hour presentation on Thai culture and customs in addition to describing the ETA program and our role and responsibilities as ETAs in Thailand.

I've had two days to roam around Bangkok. So far it's been extremely interesting. Bangkok is somewhat grimy and reminds me a lot of Chinatown in NYC. Walking around and trying to cross the streets is an adventure in and of itself. Not only because they drive on the left side of the road here, but everyone speeds and there is a variety of vehicles to watch out for in order to make sure you don't get hit. In addition to regular cars and taxis that speed by (and I do mean speed), there are tuk tuks, which are three-wheeled motorcars, kind of like a fancy rickshaw. There are also mopeds or motorcycles, many in which do not provide helmts and their drivers are not insured. So basically, a death trap. Pedestrians do not seem to have the right-of-way here, so each time I cross the street I pray that I don't get killed.

Things seem to be relatvely cheap here. Street food and cheap restaurants cost an average of one to three dollars for a meal, which is really really nice. Today I ate lunch at the cafeteria of the University for less than one U.S. dollar! While I haven't been that adventurous yet with my eating (they say you need to give your stomach time to adjust to the food) everything that I have had has been delicious. Even the fried rice here was fresh and not greasy at all like it is at home. Although I'm not sure if I'll ever get comfortable enough to try fried crickets, red ants or worms on a stick. Doesn't really sound that appealing to me.

What else can I say about my time here so far? There are 12 of us here, of course 11 of us are girls. Everyone seems super nice. Four people have been here before, and at least two or three others don't know a lick of Thai, so I don't feel that alone. We are staying at the international house which is part of Chulalongkorn University. Our dorms are clean, air-conditioned, AND we have an American toilet! Woo hoo! We even have a green refrigerator in our room, so my roommate and I have stocked up on breakfast foods to save time in the morning and a bit of money. What's really funny is how much of a small world it is: my roommate Lana, did the same study abroad program in Rome as Sophie, so they know each other!

Other random things:
There are lots of stray dogs and cats here. Not my favorite.
The internet situation is not the greatest. We are not allowd to use the internet in the dorm we are staying in as we are not "official" Chulalongkorn Unversity students. The internet is also slower at night then it is in the morning because at night everyone is using it. Reminds me of the days when we had dial-up and on a Friday night it would impossible to get online. Oh well, this isn't worst thing that could happen.

Well that's it for now. I should probably go back to my dorm and practice my Thai. Right now the only thing I can say is "Sawadee ka" which is "hello". :-)