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.