This Friday, June 24, marked my first official month of teaching. This month has not been easy by a long shot. In fact, I would say this has been the most difficult thing I have ever done. The language barrier is huge, I have a hard time disciplining my students because I won't hit them, and being in the middle of no where is frustrating to say the least - and those are just a few of the problems we have encountered. But we are slowly learning how to deal with these issues as they arise. The other TTC teachers stationed here and I have been keeping ourselves busy on the weekends. After the weekend we went to the Tat Ton waterfalls, we took a bus to a city named Korat. It is the third biggest city in Thailand, and has a pretty big mall. The mall has a Pizza Hut (thats right, the real deal) and we each got our own personal pizzas to celebrate finally finding real pizza. There is also a bookstore there with English books, so of course I bought myself a new book. The next weekend we decided to stick close by and explore where we are going to be living for the next 9 or so months. So we borrowed bikes from the mine we are staying at, and started the trek into the town that is down the highway a bit. We had been into the town multiple times before to go to the Big C (the nearest "grocery" store) and the distance didn't seem too far. I died. It was WAY farther than we thought it was. By the time we reached the edge of town my legs were shaking, and I'm fairly certain I had sweated out all of the water I have ever drank. (You would think we had learned our lesson but we've biked in multiple times after that during the week.) Last weekend I was chosen to be a judge for the district's English Camp competition in Chaiyaphum City. I was honestly kind of dreading it. I thought it was going to be just like another day at school, but I was wrong. I found myself enjoying it as I listened to students from around the district act stories they had memorized for the camp. I heard at least 10 different versions of Little Red Riding Hood I swear. One student at a time came on stage and acted out all of the parts of their story, and I gotta give them props because some of them really got into it. After English Camp was over my co-teacher took me to visit the temple dedicated to "The Hero of Chaiyaphum". I participated in a ritual supposed to honor the past hero, while a man played a song on a Thai instrument (don't ask me the name, even if I knew I would never be able to spell it correctly). Next to the temple was a shrine dedicated to turtles because the Thai believe turtles represent longevity. Me and the students from my high school that participated in the English competition. Today we decided to go into town to find a restaurant we were told had hamburgers (the cravings for American food get too real), so we hitched a ride into town. When we made it to the restaurant I legit almost cried. The man who owns the restaurant is from New Orleans and has been in Thailand about 10 years now. His restaurant, named Mama's, has ribs, hamburgers, spaghetti with meatballs, and more. We all ordered hamburgers, but when it came time to bring mine out they said they had run out of buns (since they make their own buns from scratch every day, and its worth it). It was awful. They offered to make me something else, but all I really wanted was that burger, so instead I had the best mashed potatoes with gravy ever. I said I would come back in an hour when the buns were done and get it to go, and that was when the game changed.
THEY DELIVER. Angels sang. So we left after getting the owners number, with the promise that he would be hearing from us a lot from here on after. After that we continued to explore the town. I got a real cup of coffee. Bought some storage containers. Found a Thai massage and learned the meaning of "hurts so good" (seriously. I'm bruised but my body has never felt better). So yea. That was my first month. There are highs, and there are lows, but hey, thats life right? Now all I have to do is survive my next 9 months....
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So, its the start of week 3 of teaching, and I think I'm finally settling in. The first two weeks of teaching were rough, like... really rough. It had me questioning every major decision I have made thus far (I mean who lets me make my own decisions), but now I have a routine and I'm starting to enjoy the little things. I think all it really took was an attitude adjustment on my part. I was looking for the negatives because I wanted to go home, instead of looking for the positives because this place is now my home for the next 9 months. Instead of being annoyed by the kids who follow us as we run, I find it endearing when they ask where I am when I don't go running. Instead of focusing on the students who obviously could not care less about learning English, I focus on those who are truly trying. Instead of looking at my placement and saying, "Holy crap I am in the middle of bum(whoops) no where" I see it as an opportunity to leave my comfort zone and learn how to explore on my own.
I don't know if I will ever truly adjust to being in Thailand, but now I am hopeful that I can begin to enjoy my time here, doing something I believe in, with people that have already begun to seem like family. I have been in my assigned placement for full week now, and it has been full of ups and downs. Mostly downs. It started with an 8 and 1/2 hour bus ride from Lampang to Chaiyaphum. I was car sick most of the ride because Thai people are freaking crazy. They don't obey speed limits, they pass cars with other cars coming in the other lane, and driving within the lines doesn't seem to be a thing. Now to be fair, I think I would fit in driving here, but still. It's rough. Once we got to where we are to be staying for the next 10 months, I'm not going to lie, my stomach dropped. I for some reason was under the impression that we would be living in a little dorm style house, which was fine with me since the group I'm here with is awesome. We're not. We do live in a dorm, it's just in a mining camp, and we have to share the dorm with the miners. I live across the hall from one. It was a shock to say the least. This is coming from someone who has been able to live extremely comfortably in brand new lofts for the past year, so I have to constantly remind myself where I am and why i'm here. I think that everything with this job has it's trade-offs. We have to live in a mining camp, but we don't pay rent or utilities (including the all important AC). We are in the middle of nowhere but we've been told the relationships built here last a lifetime. We have no consistent access to dinner but...well I guess I'll come back skinny. The rooms are decent, with everything we need, and some things we don't (geckos, roaches, the ever present mosquitoes). Home away from home...right? Teaching has also been hard for me. I've never been very good with kids. I just don't have the patience, or enough hand sanitizer in the world to hold their hand after I watched them wipe their nose with it. I told myself that this job would be good for me. I could learn patience, how to deal with children, and I truly think that English is a skill that will carry these kids a long way (western globalization is real). I tell myself those things, but it has been a constant struggle all week not to cry in the middle class. Thai children do not have the discipline that American children do because their classrooms are not structured in the same way. If they want to get up and leave class, they do. If they want to show up late, they do. If they want to talk and ignore the teacher, they most certainly do. And we're not allowed to fail them. At all. Ever. I think that finding ways to get through to them will be harder than finding a way to get dinner. Transportation has also been a huge issue for me. I am so used to having my car and being able to go where I want, when I want, that getting here and having no means of transportation is frustrating. We live miles from the nearest restaurant, and even farther from the nearest "grocery store". It got to the point where I was completely out of Baht and needed to exchange money, and we were so done with being stuck in the camp that we rode a couple bikes into town. After biking 5 miles just to get there, we found out the bank is closed on the weekends. So we had to bike back, and I still had no money. Hell Week was ended well, however. We finally caught a bus, after it had zoomed by us the first time. We took this bus into the a neighboring city, where we caught another bus into Chaiyaphum city. There we ran into a little trouble when we thought we would be able to walk to the National Park, which was our intended destination, but found out it was definitely not within walking distance. Luckily we ran into another American and his Thai wife, who helped us catch a song tow. The song tow took us to the entrance of the national park, where we finally made it to the place we had been looking for: The Tad Ton waterfall. It was beautiful, and it felt so good to be able to swim and be outside and lounge. This trip to the waterfalls was the first time I had been able to relax and be happy since I arrived in Chaiyaphum. Even if we did have to get a park ranger to drive us back to the bus station when we couldn't catch another song tow.
Honestly, this week had me looking up the price of plane tickets back home. I am beyond homesick. And I hate to sound ungrateful for everything that TTC and the people of Chaiyaphum have done for me, but this initial period of adjustment has been hard and I want to document every moment, not just the good ones. I can only hope that the adjustment period will be short, and that I will learn to love teaching in Thailand. Riding an elephant definitely deserves its own post. I was beyond excited when I found out that we were going to be going to the Thai Elephant Conservation Center outside of Lampang, but nothing compares to the feeling of actually being there. I almost cried. Okay, I might have cried a little. I honestly did not stop smiling the entire ride. I love elephants, and getting to ride one was a dream come true. Now my goal is to go to a mahout training lesson so I can learn to ride one by myself! Getting up close and friendly Getting to go to the nursery was definitely another highlight of the day. Elephant babies are still bigger than a small pony, but compared to their mommas they are itty bitty. Like human babies, they are extremely curious about everything happening around them (they are especially curious about you if you have food). This little guy sniffed at everyone and everything, but if someone got to close he would go running to his momma's side for protection. She, on the other hand, seemed uninterested in us unless we had an ear of corn for her.
Overall this was an amazing day in Thailand :) |
AuthorGeorgia girl teaching English in Thailand Archives
January 2017
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