To eat or not to eat...

Now that our second week and weekend are over I would like to take you with me on a tour of the wonderful place that is Isaan. Fasten your seatbelts; it’s going to be bumpy ride.

You can’t even begin to compare the Thai school system with the overall Belgian one. Since you have probably read my former posts, you already know that the lessons in which the teachers teach ‘English’ are horrible. This + the lack of communication between the teachers make this a very frustrating undertaking. With some teachers we have the understanding that we each teach a part of the lesson, so the pupils are exposed to at least 25 minutes of ‘good’ English by the volunteers and 25 minutes of ‘very bad’ English by most of the teachers. When I gave my first part of my lesson about introducing yourself in a fifth year the teacher just copied my lesson and made the pupils write it all down again.  If such things happen I wonder why I am still here. But nevertheless, we strive to look past those flaws and indulge ourselves in the fact that this entire trip is probably a once in a lifetime thing. And therefore we have to make the best out of it and don’t let a silly thing like stress get in our way (spoken/written like a real Thai).

The pupils really make our day, every day. Whenever and wherever we go, there are always children greeting us and shouting “Good Morning Teacher!” When you respond they start to giggle like crazy just because you said something in English. On Thursday it was so hot I was sweating really hard and I was having trouble to stand up straight because of the heat. A pupil immediately arranged a fan, plugged it in, offered to write down my lesson on the blackboard and asked if she could get me drink. I refused the drink and the writing on the blackboard but I was happy for the fan blowing cool wind in my face. Imagine this happened in Belgium. Do you think the pupils would react as such? I hardly think so.

Enough about school, you all want to know how we live now don’t you? To be honest, we can hardly complain. We have a western toilet, a nice bedroom (although the mattress is worse than sleeping on concrete), a shower which we can use multiple times a day and a fan which is in the ON position for the main part of the day and night. But we have to be careful. On a given morning I was putting on a shoe and I felt something crawling in it. A big toad had decided to stay the night in my shoe and was not very happy when he had to leave. On the same morning we saw millions (not kidding) of ants moving from one part of the garden to another, more sheltered, part. And when we have dinner, we almost always have a guest or two, be it a toad, a gecko or a giant flying bug, we love our new pet collection (except when they sting, then we hate them).

On Friday night an English teacher (one with whom we can have a decent conversation) invited us for dinner at her place. She has a sister who just loves to speak English and that is why she has to invite every volunteer for dinner. We gladly accepted the invitation of what was to be a very lovely night. We bought a pineapple and dragon fruit (Flashy pink exterior with a white with black speckles interior) as presents and they were immediately sliced and put upon the table. After we helped with the cooking we had a very interesting dinner. We ate flies (which are carefully bred in special farms) and drank a fish soup which housed ants. The flies were really good to be honest, especially with the dip sauce. After dinner we went for a walk with the teacher’s sister and were invited for soymilk with her brother. Every time we meet new people, we tend up eating and drinking.

On Saturday we went back to Surin to book our flights for our upcoming holiday. We are going to Phuket, Phi Phi Island and other small islands. Afterwards we fly to Bangkok and to Lob Buri, a monkey Temple. A temple full of monkeys, be honest, how exciting does that sound?

On Sunday we went for a walk to a nearby Temple (30 minutes flat) in the excruciating heat and decided to call it a day. We read a book in our room with the fan blowing at approximately 50km/h and just lay on our beds to relax and fill up our energy bars for the upcoming week.

One last thing: I have made it my personal quest to try every kind of Lays Chips Thai people eat. So far on my list:

Nori Seaweed
Pecking Duck with sauce
Lobster hot plate
Hot and spicy crab
Baked bacon cheese with seaweed
Extra BBQ
Chicken BBQ
Sausage and cheese
Cheese and Jam

Elephant Village and Surin by night

On Saturday morning the son of our guest family showed us the way to Surin, a city not far from where we live. Here we teamed up with Sally and booked a hotel room with a hot shower and a pool for 900 Baht. 1 Baht = 1 Belgian Frank, so do the math and decide for yourselves whether or not this is a total bargain. The only downside (and I’m not kidding); it was rather cold (22°) that weekend. But we decided not to keep the "cold" from getting in our way and so we did what we came here to do: relax and enjoy the scenery.

On Saturday we went to Ban Chang (Elephant Village). People actually live in this village with their pets: the elephants. And when I say pet, I mean pet. They feed them more than three times a day, bathe with them, go for walks, ‘chill’ with them and so on. Even though the animals are chained up for public safety, the thought of mistreating them horrifies teh trainers. This we knowfrom another foreign teacher at our school, whose sister used to date an elephant trainer.

The elephants also provide a show for the many onlookers. They dance, paint, play football and even massage spectators. Of course Nele couldn’t escape the watchful eye of the host of the show and she got her first Thai Massage…from an elephant. Sally decided to tempt fate and let an elephant walk over her and a few other people. Luckily, she lived to tell the tale.

We decided to leave the elephants alone and went back to Surin. We dined in a grill restaurant where we tried various sorts of meat and fruit and of course, ice-cream. Then we went out for a drink in a reggae bar where the table was made of an old bathtub in which swam small fish. Strange but oh so amusing. After a very busy day we scaled the stairs of our hotel, dropped down on or beds and enjoyed the soft mattress beneath our exhausted bodies.

School - Week One

Our first week at our new school is completed and now we more or less know something about the school itself, out English lessons and the pupils. In Thailand, pupils aren’t divided in ‘studierichtingen’ but they are put in groups according to ability, 1 being strongest and 8 the weakest classes. To get in a 1-class (or special class as its being called), parents pay extra money. These special classes get English Camps, extra guidance and so on. Hardly fair is it?

The English lessons aren’t organized at all. The teachers don’t communicate, even if they teach in the same class, so every teacher decides what she (all female English teachers) will do without consulting the other English teacher. They don’t follow the curriculum and if they want to pas their exams to go to a university they have to pass their O-net tests. One week before those tests, pupils are tutored in the big hall. The tutors drill the content and pupils sit down and take notes for an entire day.

During the first week of ‘training’ I got to work with several English teachers. I teach in a second, third and fifth year. Some teachers prepare one lesson for all of their classes (doesn’t matter if its in the same year) and use this preparation for an entire week. An overview of an English lesson:

-          1 certain pupil: ‘Stand up; please!’

-          All together: ‘Good morning teacher!’

-          Teacher: ‘Good morning, you may sit down now’

-          All pupils: ‘Thank you teacher!’

It really is funny to hear this conversation every lesson, especially because those are in most cases the only full sentences they can produce. Why is that? Because they are all very shy. Whenever someone has to speak in front of the classroom they start to giggle, when someone succeeds in producing a good sentence they all start hooting and clapping, ah well, at least Thai pupils are enthusiastic when they do a good job.

In Thailand children first start with English classes at the age of 8 or 9. With that knowledge, it’s frustrating to know that pupils in their fifth year of high school don’t even know the difference between ‘When’ and ‘What’. That’s why during a lesson I have to repeat myself at least a dozen times before I get an incorrect answer…

If you are reading this, you are probably wondering why we haven’t fled the country. To be honest, you’re frustrated for 1 minute, you see a pupil lighten up when you tell him he did a good job and your frustration is gone. You really can’t blame the pupils for the flaws of their teachers. The English of some of the English teachers is so bad; we can’t even have a conversation exceeding 3 sentences. That’s why the pupils hear 80% Thai and 20% English in the English lessons.

Luckily, everyone is super enthusiastic when they spot us. They greet us with a Wai and say: ‘Good morning teacher!’ Getting this much respect from pupils is hard to get used to, but we’ll manage.

For a detailed description of the school architecture, daily schedule and much more, check Nele’s blog: http://nele-in-thailand.blogspot.com/

A busy weekend

When we said goodbye to the pupils at camp, P’Mook took us to the province town of Surin. Here Nele needed to buy some skirts which are required for teaching. We treated P’Mook to lunch in Surin: Spaghetti with Black pepper sauce (no rice! But still very spicy…) and we had an ice-cream. Being an ice-cream fan myself, I wanted to try the local flavours, coconut it was! After we paid for the meal (about €7, 50 including ice-creams and drinks) we drove back to our guesthouse. It was then about three o’clock in the afternoon and we decided to get some schoolwork done. Working on a bench in a little garden filled with tropical trees is really stimulating.

When we were a bit bored, we asked if we could help with some chores. I tidied the garden by raking leaves together and throwing them out while Nele was cutting some vegetables for dinner. Later, I was asked to skewer the meat and roast it over a small barbeque pit. Do I need to say we ate it all with rice and that it was spicy? We decided to turn in early and slept like logs.

 Breafast was served at 9 o’clock so we were able to catch up on some sleep. Nevertheless, our neighbour thought he would wake us at 6.30 with some fine Thai music. Goodbye peace and quiet! When we had breakfast P’Nee asked us if we would want to go with him to our school. He had some business to attend to and we could walk around and explore the vast grounds of the school. When walking we noticed some pupils were here, on a Sunday! They were chatting here with some friends, listening to music close to a temple,…

It was fun to see that the school was actually a place to hang out in weekends. While we were walking, we spotted many buildings and around them were big palm trees, all sorts of flowers, big nicely trimmed bushes,… We even saw a blue gecko!

When P’Nee’s work was done, he showed us around the ‘town center’. Nothing more than a few shops but he did show us two very beautiful temples. Nele and I decided to visit the South temple after we were dropped off at our guesthouse. When we arrived we didn’t feel really welcome. Everyone was glaring at us and we were just going to leave when a nice man called us over. He started asking questions and we were eventually invited for lunch! We couldn’t’ refuse this offer so we gladly accepted. It seems that every day, another family from around the temple cooks for the monks and then eats at the temple. The man and his wife, who invited us for lunch, work in a hotel in Bangkok so their English was quite good. After lunch the aunt of the man summoned the master monk to give us a blessing for our projects in Thailand. The master monk was a very friendly man who laughed all of the time. Except when he blessed us, then he was almost chanting and literally pouring liters of waters over our heads and backs. When the blessing was over he even asked for a picture with us Farangs (= foreigners).

When we got back home we read a book in the garden and P’Phen, the mother of our family, chopped up a fresh coconut for Nele and me. We almost inhaled the coconut milk, it was that delicious!

English Camps

Only 5 hours of sleep and the alarm clock woke us. We got dressed, had a shower and had breakfast. Rice covered with water, meat and vegetables. My stomach tried to flee. After half an hour, we got picked up by P’Deng and Tanja. We got a special camp T-shirt we had to wear for the next two days. When we arrived at the camp site there was one thing we immediately noticed: how beautiful the place was!

At 8 o’clock the opening ceremony began and we were asked to introduce ourselves. All of the children were very curious and we were slightly nervous. We managed to give a short speech, but we were asked to speak very slowly because otherwise the children wouldn’t understand us.

Another thing that drew our attention was the fact that all of the children greeted us with a Wai. This is a sign of respect. It is also used to greet people because the Thai don’t shake hands.

After the opening ceremony the activities started. I could guide the ‘dramatic reading’ activity. I printed out some easy to read chapters from various children books, but they proved to be too difficult for the pupils. So I adapted my activity to the level of the pupils and put in some games. I ‘taught’ this lesson together with a Thai English Teacher Trainee. She was in her fourth year (a Bachelor takes 5 years in Thailand). Together I think we managed to let the pupils have a good time while reading and speaking in front of the rest of the group.

After lunch (rice, meat and spicy salad) the activities continued. When all pupils had done all of the activities, we had dinner (rice, sweet vegetables, spicy pork, long beans, soup, spicy salad,…). I’m getting used to the spicy food but I only hope my stomach will keep helping me digesting all of the rice.

After dinner the Thai Trainee Teachers organized an entire show for the pupils. Songs, dances, fun activities… There wasn’t much to do for us so we took some pictures.

At 21.00 all of the pupils went to bed, including me. Tired but satisfied I went to sleep, and sleep I did.

The next morning I was up pretty early (5.30) and decided to take a stroll on the camping grounds. Every pupil that I came across greeted me by making a Wai and saying: “Good morning teacher!”

After the other teachers were awake, we had breakfast. The chemistry teacher saw my troubles with the early bowl of rice and offered me a chocolate brownie instead, which I gladly accepted.

At the end of the camp they held a closing ceremony. All of the teachers were asked to come to the front of the room and suddenly all of the pupils began to sing a song for the teachers. But not just any song, it was more like they were chanting a prayer. The other teachers explained us that this is a Thai tradition. It is the pupils’ way to show respect for the teachers.  

Bangkok at last!

After 13 hours, we finally arrived in Bangkok. We made a quick pit stop in Frankfurt and there we had our first international meal: McDonalds :)

After waiting an hour or two, we got on a huge plane that would take us to Thailand. We thought we would have some extra room for our legs, but guess again, heavy spasms in our legs after only three hours of flying. All in all, time flew, before we knew it we were in Bangkok International Airport.

When we reclaimed our luggage, we were welcomed by a delegation of seven very friendly people. When our luggage was loaded we got ready for a 7 hour long trip in the mini-van.

The first thing we noticed was the abundance of flags in this country! National Thai Flags, Yellow flags to praise the King, Blue flags to praise the Queen,… And in the center divider of the road there were often large statues which represented Buddha. We stopped at a local fruit market and there we were immediately asked to taste a variety of exotic fruits like Guava, Pomegranate and Jujuberry (they were all very good by the way). When we were browsing the market, it suddenly started raining. The owners of the fruit stands quickly pulled out their plastic covers and there wasn’t much left to be seen. So we decided to drive on and about an hour later, we stopped for dinner. We had rice with fish, spicy salad (you’re going to read this very often), chicken and soup.

After dinner we still had a four hour drive ahead of us, so we sped off. We all slept like rocks on the way to our guest family, but when I was awake (for a very brief moment, mind you) we almost crashed upon a buffalo crossing the road.

After a total of 20 hours we arrived at our destination. P’Nee (father), P’Phet (mother) and Nongh’Pete (son) will be our hosts for the following month. They’re nice people but their level of English isn’t that high. We were shown to our room (it’s actually the son’s room) which holds a desk, a wardrobe and a double sized bed. Luckily there is a fan because it was still about 26°. We were given some water and went to sleep. It took a while to fall asleep because of the many strange noises we weren’t accustomed to.

The countdown has begun!

More than six months of preparations, and it has finaly come down to this: only six days left before the biggest adventure of my life up till now begins.

Checklist:
- Pack my bags.
- Make sure I don't forget any important documents.
- Say goodbye to my closest friends and relatives.
- Pack my 'Thai for beginners'
- Make sure I don't stress out...

I've always dreamt of undertaking a journey like this, but now that it has come this close, it truly is quite frightening...

If you want to know what I'll be doing for the next four months, don't hesitate to check this website:
http://www.fund-isaan.org/

Laakohn!