Travels to Chonburi with my students

Two weeks ago Sunday, I left on a field trip with 130 students and about 20 teachers for 4 days. The students were all EP (english program) and while I don't specifically teach them, as an English teacher in the school, I was invited along on the trip (all expenses paid!). The plan was to leave at 5:00 or so from the school so everyone was to get assembled here around 4:00. All was going well until one of the buses failed to arrive. We waited for about an hour and a half until the third bus arrived and we were on our way! I was on the 2nd bus with M. 3 and M. 4 (the equivalent of 9th and 10th grade in the US). I sat next to a student named Mod (pronounced Maud) who was very quiet but very sweet. We listened to some English music together on my iPod and she shared her snacks with me. We must have stopped about every two hours and arrived in a province called Chonburi at about 7:30 a.m. Monday morning. (Chonburi is the province that is home to Pattaya, which is known around the world as being a major "red light district"/ beautiful beach travel destination in Thailand).  Matt (another volunteer) had brought me some of his Tylenol PM when he was last in town and, I have to say, it saved me during that bus ride. We would stop and I would groggily wake up, stumble to the gross gas station bathroom, stumble back up the steps to the 2nd story of the bus, and promptly fall back asleep. 

view from outside our bungalow

 Our Buses! Mine was that first one, the really blue one....at least it was easy to find! I was amazed at the amount of huge buses like this that are all over the roads here. It's a fairly normal way to travel.

Sunset on 'our' beach. 

I had no idea what our accommodations would be like and assumed they would be similar to those we had in Ubon - 30 people sleeping on mats in a big hall. To my (pleasant) surprise, we ended up staying at a naval base about 30 km south of the major tourist destination, Pattaya. It was called the Sattahip Naval base and is the largest base of the Royal Thai Navy. It was, in one word, incredible. We had a caravan of 3 huge double decker buses and there was almost no security when we drove into the base. Our driver talked to a soldier for a minute or two and we were on our way! Completely unfathomable in the US for sure.  It must have taken at least 15 minutes to actually get to where we were going to stay and then we found that it was directly on the water. It was gorgeous and every day we could see the sunrise and sunset....definitely above and beyond my expectations. As well as a beautiful setting, everyone got their own beds! Students and teachers alike. I stayed in a little bungalow with 7 of the other foreign teachers and we had a good time.

Three of the Thai teachers on the trip with us...all are among the smallest people I've ever met in my life.

It was a busy trip as we must have spent as much time on the bus traveling to different destinations as actually being tourists/ sleeping at the naval base. That first day, we had some time on our hands as everyone had to 'ap-nam' (shower), especially since no one was able to the night before. At this naval base they also have a Marine Turtle Conservation Center which draws tourists and it was about a 1-2 km walk from our accommodations. I went there with some of the thai teachers and they told me that to touch a turtle brings good fortune and luck. The Sattahip Naval Base is also within quick boating distance of a few islands. Unfortunately, we didn't make it there, but they looked great. I did some research and I guess you can take day trips to those islands from the Naval Base. This base is also home to the Navy's only aircraft carrier, which must have been to our left of our accommodations as there were several piers. 

 Rope bench on the way to the Turtle Conservation Center....would sit here with two of the Thai teachers every morning after breakfast and chat....it was so relaxing!

Despite being on the water and assuming that this field trip was so that we could go to the beach, we only made it there one day. We got to a lot of other travel destinations though, including the Pattaya Floating market, the Princess's Royal Herbal Gardens, Ban Phe (absolutely amazing seafood restaurants/market), and a museum called "New Siam" which had replica's of every major sight from around the world. They had a statue of liberty, an Angkor Wat, major temples from all over Thailand, the Eiffel Tower, and the Tower of London.   My favorite place we went to may have been the beach, just because the beach is one of my favorite places anyways. And it was sunset and I got to take great pictures. But Ban Phe was really interesting and had some of the best food I've had in Thailand so far. It's a seafood port as well as a ferry port for getting to nearby islands. I met a vendor there and chatted to her for a few minutes...in Thai! It was great. (Of course, I had to buy something after that). But she asked what I was doing and spoke slowly enough that I could understand her. She even let me take a picture of her, shown below. 

The Pattaya floating market was really interesting too, in that it was set up like a mini tour of all areas of Thailand. To the left you had the northeast and central thailand, and to the right you had southern and eastern Thailand, or something like that. Depending on the route you took, there were different souvenirs or food. I refrained from buying anything, despite wanted to buy it all up. I have to remind myself that I'm living here for another 7 months or so and I can buy presents/ souvenirs later! But I do plan on going back, or at least going to the one that is outside Bangkok. 

I don't think it was very busy when we went. A vendor/ boat driver was taking a nap underneath one of the bridges...his boat must have floated out into the open.

 

Some more vendors in the market...mangoes and sticky rice is among my favorite food here! It's soo good, though while I eat it for dinner, I think it's usually eaten as a dessert.

 

Some pictures from our travels: 

We passed a vineyard called Silver Lake and were told that it was some of the best wine in Thailand (though I'm not sure how true that was or how good wine from Thailand actually is). It had a gorgeous lake and amazing land but of course, we drove right by it to a golden buddha carved into the side of the mountain so that we could take pictures. This elephant was just outside the Silver Lake orchard and part of some touristy thing, though I couldn't really figure it out. I did find out that they were from Surin, which is where I went for the elephant festival back in November. 

The big golden buddha - I think it was lasered into the mountain. Those are two of the teachers at our school - one is the Chinese teacher and the other a Thai English teacher.

At "New Siam" they even had Mickey and Minnie! That's Venus and Alan, who take care of Kara and I like we're their children. They're Filipino, and have three kids back in the Philippines. They said they can make better money here than anywhere in the Philippines but I know they miss their kids a lot.

Part of the "New Siam" complex. It was huge and I admit, I didnt get down to this part of the museum as it was brutally hot and being a white foreigner, was pretty burnt by this point. The sun isn't that hot (yet) up where we are, and I had forgotten how harsh it is down around Bangkok.

We only spent a few hours at the beach but it was well spent time by the students. Most of the teachers stayed under tree cover as they didn't want to be in the sun, but I was right there in the water with the kids! I'll take all the sun I can get. One thing about going swimming here is that everyone went in their clothes. I brought my bathing suit but it would have been completely inappropriate to wear it, so I too went in with all of my clothes on. As it's seen as 'scandalous' to wear a spaghetti strap tank or really short shorts up in the Northeast, it makes sense that bathing suits wouldn't be okay. 

Some of the more adventurous teachers (and one student) on the beach! Once they saw I had a camera, everyone wanted a picture. It was a ton of fun to be a photographer for a day :)

M.3 students with a teacher. can you spot her?

A jumping picture...we did this many many times before we actually got it right. 

One of the M. 4 students taking a rest.

With the students and the Chinese teacher on our 'boat'

I felt like Christmas but that was the only shirt I brought with me to the beach...oops.

 

 

At the herbal gardens, one of the Thai English teachers.

As well as great accommodations at the naval base, we had great food. Every morning we had rice and this rice porridge for breakfast and a whole bunch of stuff for dinner. Lunch was usually on the road or snacks at 7-11. We stayed there for 2 nights and both nights turned into parties especially for the teachers, though for the students as well. They played some games, in which I participated in on the 2nd night and sang loooots of Karaoke. I had no choice as I was called my by my director over the loudspeaker... "teacher Alix! you sing English song for us now. NOW." haha. I made another teacher come with me and we sang a couple songs for the kids. It was all in good fun and I had a blast. On our way back to Nakhon Phanom on Wednesday, we stopped in Khon Kaen, as they have a new supermall, which is a tourist attraction to the students apparently. I was able to get some English magazines (impossible to find in Nakhon Phanom) and the students got to go shopping in a real mall! Of course, what was supposed to be an hour stop turned into over a 2 hour stop. We made it back to Nakhon Phanom at about 1 am. Most of the students didn't come to school the next day, but as I teach in the general program. I was back at school at 7:30.  Some of my students were actually upset with me for leaving on the trip, which I can understand, and some of them told me that they missed me and wished I had been teaching them earlier in the week, which was so sweet. It was so gratifying to have the students say that they actually wanted me to teach, espeically after some of the harder weeks I've been having. 

Now, two weeks later, I'm finished teaching for the semester!! M.3 ends earlier than the rest of the students because it's like they are 'graduating'. I had my last classes on Friday and was so excited as it means I get to do some traveling around now. It was bittersweet though, as 2/3 rds of my students won't be returning next year. they will be going to new schools or dropping out completely. Either way, they have exams this coming week and I plan to take a lot of pictures of them. One of my students asked for a picture early in the semester, and of course I complied. Well, on Friday, he presented his 'friendship' book to me (basically a book that the students decorate for each other and write messages in), and it had a page with the picture of me on it! He wanted me to write something so I wrote my name and said who I was (kruu asasamak --volunteer teacher) and wrote some encouraging words in English about his work this year. It was really sweet. One of my Thai teachers also went and got her hair curled because she said she liked my hair! So much of the time it seems like nothing I do here is appreciated but I think it's more because most of the students/ teachers don't know how to actually say so. So instead, I get pictures in friendship books and curled hair as an indication that they approve/ like what I'm doing here.

This week will be spent tying up loose ends and getting all of my materials together for the coming school year (it begins in May). I'm planning on traveling extensively around Thailand...a few weeks I'll be traveling alone as my school finishes earlier than most, but I'm confident that I'll be okay and plan to do a bit more studying of Thai before I go. Then it's off to southern Thailand for Songkran (a big Thai new years festival) and after that, Vietnam and Cambodia with two other volunteers. I'm really excited, so expect stories and pictures soon! 

'Over n out' from Nakhon Phanom.