Valentines Day

Yes everyone, its that loved and hated holiday, Valentine's Day! Even though I am in a different country and lacking the boyfriend, this day was actually really fun. One of the things that children do in Thailand on the day is to cover their friends and loved ones in heart stickers, and when I say cover, I mean cover! Unfortunately, being in a college, the students that I know have grown out of that fun tradition which is a shame as I would have loved to be covered in stickers. We gave out stickers in our department though and we all gave stickers to our teacher friends. One of the most funniest parts of the day was in the morning when I had a lesson to teach. We had to go outside as all the classrooms were full and one of my students gave me some flowers. It was so funny as the class is full of boys and they were all laughing as I was given the flowers. For some reason also, I was also given a flower by a random student I passes on the stairs. In the afternoon I had another class but I was doing their final exam with them so I wasn't expecting anything to happen. You would think that in an exam you would keep quiet and not copy. Well, they didn't follow the normal rules of a test. First of all they came early so the only room free was the tiny room at the end. Cramming in 30 students to do and exam into that room was not the best thing as the were all sat right up against to each other. Even though I had no talking and no copying written down in Thai so they could read, I still had to go around taking away books and telling people to stop! They weren't very good at keeping quiet either. When ever I would shush them about 10 seconds later they would all start talking again. What didn't help was this one student who had hardly turned up to lessons always chatting and trying to copy and trying to get me to speak Thai. In the end I said 'I love you' in Thai which got quite a big cheer from all the students and then that one student tried to get my number! They all managed to finish their tests though with some copying and I was even given a sweet from the only girl student there as well. All in all, a pretty good day.

“Danger Will Robinson!”

No, unfortunately I haven't recently watched Lost in Space, even though its an awesome film, but the quote refers to the recent fighting along the Si Saket boarder with Cambodia. I am not sure of the details but the fighting means that local villagers have been evacuated for their safety. Quite a few of the villagers where staying in a school temporally so a group of us represented SISAT and went to give food and other objects to them. When we were there, we gave out some cake to the children and objects like, soap, toothpaste and toothbrushes to the adults. Also, as it is still quite cold over here at night, we gave blankets to the elderly. Once that was over and everyone went for dinner we had a look around. Everything seemed peaceful until the Director was giving some form of speech to a camera when in the distance, we could hear some bombs going off. We were 20km away from the boarder so there was no danger what-so-ever but it was a bit weird to hear them from all that way.

On the way back we stopped off for dinner and then had a relaxing journey back. I am so glad that we could help the villager and I also hope that the fighting stops soon so they can return home too.

Exhibition

Due to the fact that it is the summer holidays here soon, SISAT did a special activity for all the new kids who will be coming up next year to start the college. It was a bit weird as SISAT doesn't always do all of this fun stuff but it was fun so oh well.

To start with we all looked around the different clusters and at what they had to show. In one of the clusters the students were showing everyone their robots that they had made which is pretty good as the robots were very sophisticated. The most amazing one was one with sensors that drove its self around picking things up and putting them down following special tape in the floor. After we carried on looking around it was time for a break so all of us English department girls went on stage to do some language stuff. We took basic phrases and said them in a number of different languages. P-Boom spoke Thai, Yok Soyai and Fah Sai spoke Chinese, Jing spoke Philippine and Clem spoke English. What was I doing? Well I was the (un) lucky one to be given Laos to speak as I am very good at it! I spent most of my time asking P-Max to repeat what she had just told me as I couldn't get it. Everyone found it funny though and I even managed to speak some of it correctly which is always a good sign. I think next year I shall go to Laos for some time. After that interesting break was over, it was time for lunch. As we weren't that hungry though, we went to Swenson’s for an ice cream as it was 'buy one scoop, get one scoop free'. A pretty awesome lunch.

In the afternoon straight after lunch, both myself and Clem had to judge the aerobics competition. Unfortunately, when it was supposed to start, we were still in the car on our way back. As we arrived at the hall, our approach was announced so we could begin and it was funny to see everyone staring at us (like usual) as we walked in. The aerobic was really good and looked so much fun. After we had judged that, we watched the fashion show. Some of the clothes were made by SISAT students and they all looked quite good. The activity ended with the Director giving out some prizes to the younger children. A fun fun day.

A Rather complicated/exciting/guilty/hilarious journey back home

This also happened on the Nakon Sawan (I know a lot happened that weekend). We got to Bangkok and as Clem's dad was in town we went off to meet him. It was an adventure let me tell you. It took us ages to get there but we made it. We had a drink and then walked back to the bus station. Unfortunately, the way we went back was a lot longer than the way we went. Basically it got to 9.30pm when we were supposed to be getting onto the bus and we were still a bit away from the bus station. So we got into a taxi thinking we would be Ok as Thai time means that the bus would arrive maybe half and hour late. The only problem was that even though we knew that we were still really nervous. We managed to get to the station and we ran (a very un-Thai thing to do) to where our bus was. Once we were there, there was a bus there waiting which looked like our bus but when we showed our tickets to the bus guy but he said that it wasn't our bus and that it was the next one. We were so relived. All the people were smiling as they could see that we had just been running all the way there and that we were so happy that we hadn't missed the bus.

When the next bus came along we were told yet again that it wasn't ours and it was the next one but when the next one came along and we showed our ticket again to the bus guy but this time the guy took our tickets away and ran off which brought two worried looks to our faces. For the next few minutes time seemed to go really slow as we waited for something to happen. The bus sat in the parking bay at that point in time was a gold plus bus so a bit more swanky than the bus we were going on so we were really confused when the guy got into the swanky bus and started talking to the driver and hostess and talking on the phone and the next thing we knew, we were told to go into the front cockpit of the bus and made to sit down. Then the bus started to leave with us in the front. We were so confused and so were all the other Thai people who saw us arrive as we all thought that we hadn't missed our bus but now we were leaving on a different one. After a few minutes and a quick phone call to the hostesses sister who spoke some English, we found out that the first bus that was there when we first arrived was our bus and the bus guy made us miss it so they were trying to sort something out as it was their fault. We found it hilarious but we couldn't sit there for 7 hours. Luckily we were going to travel with them for one hour and then meet up with our bus. We spent that hour giggling our heads off and so where the driver and hostess as they had never had this experience before. It would be silence and we would just hear the driver chuckle next to us. The people in the bus were really confused as well as they didn't know why there were two 'farang' in the front of the bus as every so often, they would just see these pair of eyes look through the window at them. When we met up with our actual bus, we managed to wake everyone up as the walkway was really small and I had a plastic bag with me which didn't make the usual rustle, but loud crackling. We managed to get into our seats and we were on our way. Not the usual way back home but an eventful one I shall never forget.

Teaching the Novice Monks

This past weekend has possibly been on of the best so far. Earlier on in the year two of the Thailand Volunteers made the unfortunate mistake of going home which meant that some novice monks were left without an English Teacher. One of the past volunteers from a few years ago lives there now and invited us all over to do an English Camp with them. Lets just say that we didn't hesitate to say Yes.

We left Friday evening and got a bus to Bangkok and then a van in the morning to Nakon Sawan where the English Camp was help. Due to the distance, we arrived a couple of hours late and missed the debriefing. We just arrived at the temple and then started teaching straight away. The only problem was that because we were the last to arrive, we were left with teaching stationary which is actually quite hard. We managed to think up some games though and the novice monks did really well. They were very shy but we managed to get them to volunteer to come up to the board to do the tasks. It was weird though at some points as the monks cannot touch women and this includes novice monks but when they wanted picture with us, they just came right up to us and we were all touching shoulders and we were all wondering what we should do. Should we move away or not? Also we cannot pass anything to them directly or let them pass anything to us. We have to put it down for them to pick up but they kept on just putting their books into our hands or taking them out with confused us as well. We did the lesson eight times to the different groups and they all went really well which was good. Near the end, we had a small class which had monks who were lady-boys! We didn't understand how they could be monks but poor families send there children to be novice monks as it means that they get free accommodation and food. So they must make a small exception for lady-boys. They were so much fun as when they had to run to the board they did it so womanly and lightly placed their hand on it instead of running and hitting it. We also played a few games with all of the novice monks together in a big room. When we played 'hand to hand, cheek to cheek', there were these two really small novice monks who were so cute and had the cheekiest grins on their face.

That evening we all went into the main town area to watch the parade for Chinese New Year. It was perfect timing actually as Nakon Sawan had the biggest population of Chinese people in Thailand so its the best place to go. The parade was immense. It went on for ages and included Chinese dancing and costumes and everything. We also went down to the river to watch a show which included a shadow dance, Chinese dancing with the really long sleeves and a dance where the dancer takes away loads of faces. It was an amazing day even though really tiring. 

Thai Boxing

Thai Boxing came to Si Saket and it came to SISAT. They set up a boxing ring in the sports hall and we were able to get free tickets to watch. It wasn't what I expected. It wasn't some nice show with pretend fighting to show of the moves. It was actual boxing. It was quite scary at times especially as they started off with children! Watching two Thai children fight each other was not what I had in mind. When it got to the adults it was even scarier as they hit each other into the rope and at some points it looked like they were going to go over! We didn't stay for all of it as it finished at 3am. So an interesting experience but not the best.

Sports Day....... well Week

Just like in England, SISAT has a sports day. Unlike England, this sports day lasts a whole week. I think they need to change the name.

For the first three days Clem and myself helped out with the petanque (sounds like patonk) where there is a small ball thrown up a court and the two teams have to get their balls as close as possible to it without touching. I think there might be something like that in England but I'm not sure. For those three days, we helped out by being the referee's which was quite fun as at the start when we didn't know how to score the game, the students were all helping us so it was quite relaxed. Thursday we had to ourselves and then Friday came along.

This was the main day on the big field. The whole school was split into five different teams and they all had different colours. The teachers were the colours of their form groups but as Clem and myself don't have a form, we got to choose a colour. We decided on green. So, on Friday we dressed up all in green, after a night of no sleep and they were setting up all night with very loud music right outside our house, and went outside. It was amazing. They all had different areas which they had decorated and their colours and it looked so cool. The first thing we did was to go watch the parade and walk in it with our colour. It was quite funny as we chose to be green so the teachers and students all wore faces of 'why are the freaky white people green?'. 

We then went and sat in the green stand and found out that Hula-Hoop was next. Unfortunately, the greens didn't have anyone to do the event as they needed 15 people so they asked Clem and myself to join in. As we were going to the centre of the field, we saw that out of the 15 people needed, 4 of us were teachers roped in to so to make up the numbers. So we had the right amount of people, we didn't have any routine though. We just did some random stuff looking like complete fools as other teams had a routine and such. Once it was all over, we knew that we were not going win that event in any way. After that had finished we watched some sports and then the cheer leading. Let me tell you, it was amazing! Each colour did so well. They started off with a Thai dance followed by amazing fun cheer leading that you see most of the time. It was so good as they did acrobats and picked each other up. Green was the best though. They were amazing. It was mainly because of Am who is a lady-boy student who put everything into the dance and just looked amazing.

At the end after eating and dancing we all got ready for the awards and such. We did quite well. We won the cheer leading and also came first in two other events. We also came second in quite a few other events including hula-hoop! I'm not sure how that happened and still cannot believe it. It was such a fun day. I think we chose right colour too. It was by far the best.

We are going to Tha Ruea...... 'Huh?'...... Tha Ruea......'Erm. Oh Yes (In a slightly different way) Tha Ruea'....... Yes. That's what we said!

To fit in with the lack of free weekends we decided to travel to visit someone when we had the chance. We left Friday night a got a cheaper bus to Bangkok to try out a different company. It was good so we will probably use that one more often except it didn't have a toilet. We got into Bangkok in the stupidly early hours of the morning and went to get a small bus to the train station. When we finally found the right bus we got on and went to the train station. It took around 1 hour to get there and in all that time we were the only 'farang' on the bus at all. All the others use the really expensive taxi's.

Once we got to the train station, we went to asked someone where to go to get the tickets. This is where the title of this blog comes in. First we said where do we go to buy tickets for Tha Ruea. Over the next few minutes, we had two people trying to figure out where we were saying and eventually when they realised what we said, they said the same thing with only a tiny difference. If you saw our faces, they would have said, 'That's what I have been saying for the past 5 mins'. We eventually managed to get onto the train and then arrived in Tha Ruea and met up with Frances and Jelley.

Once there we spent the day walking around being shown the place and relaxing watching films. In the evening we went to their food market and had some food before going back to their house and watching some Chick-Flicks. We started off with 'Leap Year' which I had never seen before and it was amazing. I absolutely loved it. If you are in need of a Chick-Flick, watch 'Leap Year'. We then eventually went to sleep.

The next morning we all went on the train to Ayuttya. It was fun to start with as we sat on the steps in the train until we were told to move. When we got there, we first went to a bus station to buy tickets back to Bangkok for later but the song-tao driver took us to the wrong place. Thankfully, as he was in the wrong, he didn't charge us and then he took us to the floating market which is such a good place to go. It's really beautiful and is full of everything you would ever want, thankfully I didn't have much money on me otherwise I would have bought so much. Once we had finished there, we got some pizza and ice cream and then went back to the train station and went our separate ways. A really good weekend as we got to see Frances and Jelley and we saw some really beautiful places as well.

The last days at the Primary school

This last week we had our last two days at the Tesseban 1 Primary School. Let me tell you, they were actually the two hardest out of all the different weeks. The main reason was that we joined up our two classes and all went outside. A big class of around fifty 11 year old kids outside was an idea, but I could never figure out if it was the best one.

On the Tuesday it was a bit of a hit and miss as it was our first time. We started off with parse the parcel which was good except there were a lot of kids and no music. It managed to work though and it took up a lot of the hour which was even better. The next game was very unsuccessful though. We tried to play the numbers game where we shout out a number and the kids have to get into groups of that number. They weren't very enthusiastic so we had to scrap that game and move onto the final thing which was giving out the chocolate. One of the most scariest moments of my life! We tried to get them into some form of orderly line or group but as soon as they saw the chocolate, they rushed at us. They even resorted to trying to snatch it our of our hands! We just about managed to give all the kids one each though so it was all good. At least it meant that on Wednesday we knew what to do and what not to do.

Wednesday came along and we had changed our plan a bit. We started off with parse the parcel again and this time it worked better as the kids sat closer together and there were less this time as well. Afterwards we played Teacher says (Same as Simeon says) and then to give out the sweets we bought, we got them all to answer questions in English. All in all, I think Wednesday went better than Tuesday.

Even though sometimes the kids drove me nuts, I will miss that School and the kids. Bring on the next Primary School though.