Pictures from Thailand

So I know I promised more updates and pictures sometime last week. Sorry for the delay! Last week was the first week of school and it proved to be much more exhausting than I remembered - after traveling and just hanging out for two months, it was quite the adjustment to going back to teaching and staying in school for 8 hours a day. To top it all off, it was perhaps the hottest week (at least it felt like it) and there was little to no relief. I think I ended each day with some amount of heat exhaustion and to top it all off, I got sick on Friday. Either a long and painful case of food poisoning or a nasty bug that just wouldn't go away. In any case, I went to the local pharmacy and the owner (who speaks English) asked me about my symptoms and then just handed me some antibiotics and anti-spasmatics, as well as some rehydration packets. This cost me a grand total of 115 baht! About 3 USD. Amazing.  Today (Wednesday) marks the first day I've felt myself in over a week so here are the those pictures I promised. Bear with me, there are a lot of them!

One of the first places I went to in Chiang Mai was  'Tiger Kingdom'. I went with a group from my hostel and we were able to hang out with the large tigers, as well as the cubs. They large ones were awesome and the small ones, well they were adorable.

6 week old tiger cubs!

The owner of Spicy Thai Backpackers Hostel, Noom, took a group of us to Doi Suthep, a reknowned wat on the top of a mountain. It's quite high and we were told that it is one of 5 temples that Thai people try to get to within their lifetime. This picture is of a part of the temple where you can pay a certain amount of money and be immortalized into the stone of the temple when you die.

This is the 'old city' in Chiang Mai, which is bordered by a wall. The picture doesn't do it justice though, as the wall is quite immense.

Ko Phi Phi! It's a gorgeous island and had some of the most beautiful landscapes I saw when I was in Thailand.

While Ko Phi Phi boasts beautiful sandy beaches and terrain, it also boasts one of Southeast Asia's biggest (free) beach parties. There are three bars on the beach and each one has it's own promotions as well as it's own fire show. This is one of the Thai men doing the limbo (we're talking about a foot and a half off the ground) and lighting a cigarette. Astounding. And something I would never do.

While on Phi Phi, I went with a group from my hostel to Long Beach, which was about a 45 minute walk from the main pier. It was much more calm and quiet, really peaceful. This was on our way there, passing all the boats rolling into Phi Phi.

Monkey Beach! Notice how this guy (I called him Grandpa Monkey) has a pepsi bottle.

Cliff jumping! Such a rush :).

Sunset on the boat after going to Maya Bay, where the movie 'The Beach' was filmed

I took a day off of the beach parties and craziness to go rock climbing on Railey Beach after several days on Phi Phi. It was a wonderful decision, and I ultimately ended up going back to take a rock climbing course. The area is actually one of the top 10 rock climbing area's in the world, which I didn't know when I started.

One of the cheapest ways to travel between islands in Southern Thailand is to take night ferries. Basically, they are cargo ships that cram as many beds/ mattresses on the top floor as possible. They generally leave around 9 pm and get to the islands at 4 or 5 am. I can't say it's one of the most comfortable things, but it's definitely an experience. Each boat is a little different too, so you never really know what you are getting into. I think on this boat there were 60 people lining each side. I was traveling from Surat Thani to Koh Phangan

I was on Koh Phangan for about a week which gave me plenty of time to explore. Just one of the beaches on the other side from where I was staying.

I met a really great group of people in Phangan, and some of us rented a Jeep for the day to see the other parts of the island. That's Justin, Mijke and I hanging on in the back!

My own little secluded beach! Okay, not really, but it was fun to pretend. In any case, there were hardly any people out here.

Of course, we ran across some elephants. It's a strange thing when seeing elephants wandering around doesn't surprise you anymore. This happened to be an elephant camp of sorts that one of us knew about. They let us take pictures and feed them (for a price of course).

Travel pals in Koh phangan! There was a group of 8 of us or so that got food and went out together every night which definitely made the week.

 Mijke and I traveled together for about a week and a half and had a blast. She and I were both traveling alone and wanted to make sure we knew people on Ko Phangan. Turned out to be great - we had our own room (with A/C) and didn't have to do the dorm thing.

 

The full moon on the night of the full moon party on Koh Phangan!

After Koh Phangan, I went to Koh Tao, just a couple hours north. This picture is from a viewpoint on an island right off of Koh Tao.

To get to the viewpoint, I kayaked out with two guys I had been traveling with. It took longer than I thought it would and was much farther than it looked. But we made it and it was well worth it.

After a few days on Koh Tao, it was back to the other side of Southern Thailand to go rock climbing again on Tonsai!

Rapelling out of a cave.

The view from the cave - you can see both Railey West (right) and Tonsai beaches.

Climbing...notice there is no rope above me!

Sunset on Railey West...I don't think I will ever tire of taking sunset/sunrise pictures.

This was something called Deep Water Solo - you climb on cliffs above the water with only climbing shoes and chalk - no rope. It's relatively safe. I had taken a pretty hard fall a few days before so I only went up a couple meters but this guy in the picture is hanging off of that stalagtite in the picture. He was an amazing climber and a little nuts.

Viewpoint on Tonsai

The group I spent most of my time with on Tonsai (minus a couple key people). My and Linda (on the left) did the rock climbing course and then would meet up with the others for dinner and drinks afterwards. Every night we went to a bar called Small World to hang out. Incredibly relaxing and a lot of fun.

This is Songkran - Thai new year. I was under the impression that it lasted for 3 days in Phuket but it was only one day so I got all of two pictures. This was the view from my van as I arrived in Paton Beach. It was, in one word, insanity. But the best part was that it was a holiday celebrated by Thai's and foreigners alike. Everyone had supersoakers and was just tossing buckets of ice water on each other. 

So if you didn't read the captions, hopefully you enjoyed the pictures. More on Vietnam and Cambodia in the next few days, as well as school life.  I'm off to lesson plan. Goodnight!

Profile Placement

We had to write up a profile placement for WorldTeach so I thought I would share it with everyone. It's a pretty comprehensive view of what I'm doing here.

**I also want to add that I AM SO INCREDIBLY HAPPY AND GRATEFUL THAT MY MOM AND AUNT MADE IT TO NAKHON PHANOM LAST WEEK. SEEING THEM WAS BETTER THAN TRAVELING FOR TWO MONTHS......okay maybe not :). BUT. seeing you guys made my month! And just think, you got to be a part of history by seeing all the happenings in Bangkok! For those who don't know, KK and Mom came up here for just three days, but I was able to show them everything of importance. They were able to meet most of Haley's host family (who has become like my family), eat some wonderful Thai food, see my humble abode, and just hang out with me. We stayed at a hotel on the river and got to walk in the riverbed of the Mekong, as it's still fairly dried up...we are just now hitting the rainy season. Thanks for coming guys and see you in about 5 months!

Community

I live in the capital city of Nakhon Phanom province in Isaan, Northeast Thailand. There is a population of about 30,000 people living in this city. The ‘downtown’ is fairly small and just 1 km walk or bike ride from my living arrangements at the school. Despite being classified as one of the poorer provinces in the area, we have electronic stores, restaurants, hotels, and all kinds of convenient stores. There is also a bus station, a police and fire station, as well as numerous government halls and a provincial library. Most of the shops and restaurants are within a few square kilometers and border the Mekong River, which Nakhon Phanom resides on. It’s a beautiful place to go for a walk or hang out with the locals and it’s always much coolor on the water. While Nakhon Phanom literally means ‘city of mountains’, the land here is quite flat, with the mountains actually being across the river, in Laos. Many of the people here are store owners or have food stalls in the nightly night market, which is a central attraction for the town.There are also a lot of local farmers who come in daily to sell their goods in the town. It’s a big enough town that I haven’t explored all there is to explore, though it is also small enough that I run into at least 10 people I know when going to the night market or running errands in town. It’s an incredibly friendly town, and wonderful place to live.

Host School

I work at Nakhon Phanom Wittayakhom (high school), which has about 2500 students this year. There must be around 100 teachers, though I’m not sure of the actual number. It is one of the bigger schools in the area (perhaps the biggest) and draws a number of students from the surrounding villages.  Our school boasts the first English Program in the area, complete with English immersion and foreign teachers, though I work in the general program.  In the general program, there are 10 Thai teachers, Kara (another WT volunteer) and I, and Vince (a foreign teacher from Australia). On campus, we’ve got three three-story academic buildings, and one four-story academic building. There is also a swimming pool as well as a driving range that is open to the public when school isn’t in session. Many of the teachers live on campus, and the teacher housing is on the periphery of the campus. There are also two free standing buildings devoted to the English Program.  We’ve got running water and a somewhat reliable internet connection. There is air conditioning available in the English Program office and in the administrative offices. The food on campus is quite cheap and very good. Besides lunch, the vendors in the canteen sell food for breakfast and snacks throughout the day.

Teaching Assignment

I have anywhere between 30 and 52 students in my classes this year. Last semester I taught Mattayom 3, which is the equivalent of 9th grade in the US. This year, I’m teaching M. 4 (10th) and M. 6 (12th). The curriculum was changed this year, so I’m only able to teach my M.4 students once a week but I’m able to teach my M.6 students twice a week. It gives me a total of 19 class hours per week so I’m usually teaching 4 classes a day. Our school day goes from 8:00 to 4:00 and I’m generally finished teaching by 2:30. Every morning we have morning assembly in which we sing the school song, raise the Thai flag, and pray to Buddha. Any announcements that the school has are made at that time and the English Director takes this time to translate the announcements as well as let us know of any upcoming events. The semester’s generally last about 4-5 months with the first day of the Thai school year occurring on May 17. There is a month break in October, and the second semester begins in the beginning of November. The end of the school year usually falls in mid March. The levels of the classes differ significantly between grades as well as within the grade. Most of the students are advanced beginners and the higher grades are at an intermediate level. However, interspersed in each class are several students who still don’t know how to read or write. In each class I teach, I’ve got a Thai co-teacher with me, which helps immensely. In the beginning, we had some trouble with the Thai co-teacher’s actually staying in class with us, but it’s gotten much better this semester.

Living Arrangements

I live in a house on campus with another volunteer. It is a one story house that is divided into two separate rooms. They aren’t connected, so we each have our own front door and our own (western) bathroom. Our kitchen is outside, with a sink, refrigerator, and a propane tank to serve as our stove. We don’t have hot water, but it’s really not needed as most of the time the weather here is hot and humid. We do have a western toilet that flushes though, which is a luxury here. Our rooms came furnished with a bed, two desks, and a dresser. We are located on the outside edge of campus, but right next to one of the EP buildings and the girl’s bathrooms. It’s just a minute walk to get to our office and to the academic buildings on campus. We also have several water filter systems on campus, which we use to fill up our water supply. School is considered to be in town and is just a kilometer outside of the main cluster of stores and restaurants. It’s also about a kilometer to get to the hospital/doctor, in the other direction.

Language Issues

For the most part, learning Thai has been a lot of fun. Fortunately, there are a fair amount of teachers at my school that speak English well enough, and my English Director speaks great English. When I arrived in Nakhon Phanom, I knew a couple key phrases, but that was it. I was an absolute beginner. Thai is a tonal language so it takes a little while to get the hang of it and you will undoubtedly make a few mistakes. There have been many times in class when I’ve attempted to say something in Thai and I hear a collective gasp go through the room as all the students go ‘ohhhh, teacher!’ – then I know I’ve said something wrong! At this point, about halfway through the year, I know enough Thai to get by in daily life. I can talk to the market vendors and have brief conversations with my students and teachers. I know about half of the letters/ the writing system, so I’m working on that more these days. I find that the more I try to speak Thai, the more receptive (Thai) people are of me. Just making that little effort to speak their language goes a long way.

Greatest Challenges

During my first semester here at my school, we didn’t have class on a regular basis and that was possibly the hardest thing I’ve had to deal with here. The students were practicing for something called ‘Dream School’, which took up almost all of their free time and class time. Dream School is an achievement/ recognition that looks at all aspects of the school and is judged by officials all over the country. We had several dress rehearsals, and preparations could take weeks. Needless to say, both the students and the teachers (myself included) got stuck in a cycle where we weren’t used to actually having class. Weeks would go by when I wouldn’t see a certain class because of practices and holidays. It was difficult to motivate myself to make lesson plans and worksheets when 50 % of the time, the students wouldn’t show up to class. I also hadn’t taught before this year and felt a little out of my element.To top it off, about half of my students were not going to be returning to school the following semester, so they had the mentality of 2nd semester seniors. Despite this, it was a great year and I enjoyed my students. Their graduation day was harder for me than I anticipated and I found I was going to miss them much more than I thought!

Greatest Rewards

It’s hard to say what my greatest rewards are, because the smallest things make the biggest difference. One of the things that Thai students learn at the beginning of their education is that when someone asks how you are, the response is always “I’m fine, how are you?” The first lesson I taught last semester focused on greetings and synonyms for the word ‘fine’. When I came back to school this semester, my old students came running up to me and thought really hard about what they wanted to say before shouting out, “I’m great! I’m wonderful!”. It’s such a small thing, but we worked on that for a long time and I was always correcting them. When the students remember what we’ve worked on, it’s such a wonderful feeling.

Another thing that’s been wonderful about living here is realizing that I have my own little family here. Whether it’s the students, the teachers, or other volunteers, I know that I’m taken care of.  While it’s not a direct reward of teaching, it’s certainly a reward of putting my time and effort into living here. In just 7 months, I’ve made a life for myself.

Backpacking SE Asia: Thailand

It's been about two months since I last posted...did you miss me?? Despite my best intentions to keep up my blog while traveling, I found that I was too busy or just didn't want to pay at internet cafe's. I had assumed at most hostel's that there would be free internet, but when you're on a backpacking budget for a couple months, free internet becomes a thing of luxery.

After Chiang Mai, I went down south to Phuket which took me about 48 hours. The overnight train to Bangkok was amazing and incredibly comfortable - completely exceeded my expectations. I then bought a plane ticket to Phuket from Bangkok as it was not much more expensive than the 12 hour overnight bus ride. Regardless, I had to wait around in the airport all day. I have to say it was nice to be in air conditioning for all that time though. I spent about 3 and a half weeks total island hopping in the South. It's very easy to get around - ferries can take you absolutely anywhere. I was in Phuket twice (at the very beginning and the very end of my trip) and I can't say I love it there, it's just too skeezy in some parts. I spent time in Ko Phi Phi, Ko Phangan (home of the full moon party), Ko Tao, and Krabi province. I was in Krabi twice and I loved it. It's definitely a place I would go back to. It's home to one of the top 10 places to go rock climbing and one of the most beautiful beaches I saw while traveling. Tonsai beach, the rock climbing mecca, is a strange mix of laid back hippies rock climbers and partying backpackers who managed to find their way to this little known beach. I fell somewhere in the middle being a backpacker and also being interesting in rock climbing. I ultimately decided to take a three day course and spent about a week on the beach. It was relaxing to have some sort of schedule after a month of traveling.  Each morning I would wake up and go down to the 'chicken lady' for a hearty breakfast of muesli, fruit, and yogurt and then make the half hour hike to the other beach for a day of rock climbing. It's an amazing feeling to be so high up and eventually I was leading my own climbs, which was such a rush. I met a great group of people on Tonsai which was the icing on the cake. I was reluctant to leave but had made plans with others to meet up in Phuket. If I hadn't, who know's how long I would have stayed down there!

Ko Phangan was another great place to visit and a place I would recommend it to anyone. While it's got a reputation of being a major party island as it hosts the full moon party every month, it is also a gorgeous place to explore. Up in the North, there are many secluded beaches and areas to check out. I truly lucked out while traveling and managed to find great groups of people wherever I was that I ended up traveling with for a week or two.  Usually it was a mix of solo travelers and those traveling with just one other person. 5 of us rented a jeep on Ko Phangan and explored for the day. We hit up the local markets, secluded beaches, sandbars; it was a wonderful day and one of my best memories. While I loved meeting everyone and completely enjoyed sharing stories with other travelers, some of my favorite moments were exploring the islands.  They were all beautiful in one way or another. Ko Phangan had beautiful white sandy beaches, Tonsai had these huge rock cliffs, and Ko Phi Phi is home to some of the craziest limestone rock formations you can imagine. Ko Tao is also great as a place to chill out a little after the partying on the other islands. It's also home to an incredibly amount of diving schools. I toyed with the idea for about a minute, thinking I would stay awhile and get my scuba diving license but ultimately figured I wouldn't be using it anytime soon. I guess it just means that I've got to go back!

After playing on the islands for those weeks, I made it up to bangkok and had an unexpected mini reunion with some of the other volunteers! I had just left Haley down south to meet up with Matt, Caitlyn, and Steph as we were traveling Vietnam and Cambodia together. Turns out that Val, Tricia, and Kate were stopping by bangkok for the day. I rolled into BKK at about 330 am (after having 3000 baht stolen from me on the bus, about 100 USD) and promptly crashed as soon as I got to our hotel.

I don't want to overwhelm with pictures or stories, so more on Vietnam and Cambodia in the next few days! I meant to put up pictures (I easily took a couple thousand....), but my internet connection isn't strong enough. I'll try again tomorrow.

As far as being back in NKP after traveling, I'm finding I am enjoying myself. For the first few days after getting back, things were very quiet here as all the students were still on vacation and I missed the hustle and bustle of traveling and meeting people. After two months on the road, it was strange to be back in one place for a prolonged period of time. I can't imagine how it would feel to those who are backpacking for 6 months or more. I returned to my little house with an incredible number of ants, spiders, and various other bugs waiting for me. As the hot season literally heats up, bugs seem to be taking refuge in my house! It's become a necessary to always have a can of bug spray near me. I've alos become used to tiny bugs hanging out with me while I'm on my computer or eating dinner. It's just a way of life now but I can deal with them as long as I'm not getting bitten.

It's quite hot up here and there isn't much relief. While we've got a pretty substantial 'city' with dozens of convenient stores and electronic stores, etc, air conditioning isn't something that is normally installed. I'm slowly adapting, though not without some miserably sweaty days. It's best to stay inside, and when my room (which acts like an oven) is too much, I head to the one coffee shop, that is air conditioned.

Today was the first day of classes and it was great to be back. I was a little bit apprehensive as last semester was incredibly frustrating, but I've got a different group of students this semester. I also teach my students from before, but they have switched up the classes a bit, which brings some relief. I've also been assured that class shouldn't be canceled nearly as much as it was before. I had a great day, a fun day even, talking with the students and having broken english conversation with teachers. Returning to NKP after two months away made me realize how much of a life I have up here. Just biking to the market today I ran into a few teachers I know from other schools as well as Haley's host family. Turns out they had bought me dinner tonight! We sat and ate dinner at the table outside their house and just had a blast. One of the police officers in the night market loves to call me by my Thai nickname (gulaap - rose) and then start talking to me, though Ive got no idea what he says. The school supply store is great and it's run by a very sweet family who always gives me a discount. Simply put, I love it here, and love the friends I've made in just this short time. Already we're halfway finished with the year and I can't imagine leaving. (Don't worry family, I am actually coming home in October!).

On another note, the political situation is heating up here as many of you have heard.  Bangkok is a 'urban guerrilla warfare zone' but only in certain places and I've heard from some that the rest of the city is moving around as usual. I'm living in an area of Thailand that is almost 100% red shirts, as most of the population would be classified as the rural poor. The provinces around NKP have been put under a state of emergency, but we aren't there yet. Even if we were, it just means increased security personnel in the streets. I feel safe, but I do worry about what will happen elsewhere in Bangkok if the situation continues to deteriorate. I've been keeping up with the news, but that doesn't exactly paint the most accurate picture. It's not really talked about up here, at least not with us foriengers, though we do have our very own little red shirt rally in front of the goverment buildings. There's maybe 100 people that just set up camp and sit watching the news and wearing red. You can see support elsewhere such as red flags on tuk tuks and outside homes. Some of my students did mention wanting to go down to Bangkok and be a red shirt, which I didn't quite know how to respond to.

That's about it for now, pictures and other stories soon!
ra tri sa wat, goodnight!