We had a four day weekend for Buddhist Lent Day this past weekend. My friend Katie and I traveled to the second biggest island in Thailand, Koh Chang, which is on the eastern side of the country, close to Cambodia.
The holiday was characterized by rain, rain, bugs, rain, power outage, water outage and a lot of naps. I managed to get a ridiculous looking sunburn in the few moments that it wasn't raining. But actually, for all that the biggest thing we did was eat grilled corn and we spent most of our hours hanging out on the porch of our beach hut, looking out at the waves, it was a pretty perfect weekend. It was absolutely relaxing.
Now I'm back at work and we're learning the letter I this week! Tomorrow is English Day at school and apparently I'll be performing in a "Fable Puppet Show" which has no script for two hours. The head of the English proram has already warned us that the day will be "utter chaos." I'm excited.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Monday, July 5, 2010
Pictures from an awesome weekend!
(I apologize for them all getting a little bit out of order...)
the view off our porch/raft
at the waterfalls
waterfalls!
waterfalls!
feeding elephants!!
petting elephants! (their skin is so rough, kindof leathery)
elephants have impressively long eyelashes, apparently, they never stop growing
so big!
working hard to cut down the elephants' food
hauling grasses (no, I'm not super skilled at it)
back at the elephants, where it is also pretty much paradise
my hand is magically covered in butterflies
swimming with elephants
(I apologize for them all getting a little bit out of order...)
the view off our porch/raft
at the waterfalls
waterfalls!
waterfalls!
feeding elephants!!
petting elephants! (their skin is so rough, kindof leathery)
elephants have impressively long eyelashes, apparently, they never stop growing
so big!
working hard to cut down the elephants' food
hauling grasses (no, I'm not super skilled at it)
back at the waterfalls.... absolutely idyllic
back at the elephants, where it is also pretty much paradise
my hand is magically covered in butterflies
swimming with elephantsSunday, July 4, 2010
This past weekend may well have been the absolute best 48 straight hours I've spent in Thailand. The only part that wasn't perfect was that it ended.
With 8 of the other English teachers I know here in Bangkok, we went to Kanchanaburi for the weekend (a little over an hour west of Bangkok) a little hippy-ish town on the banks of the river Kwai. It was a perfect town, with delicious restaurants, outdoor bars, easy access to amazing adventures AND I got to sleep on a raft floating in the river!
On Saturday we went to see the waterfalls that the area is known for; seven waterfalls of varying sizes all along one upward trek. Each one has a pool to swim in and rocks to clamber about on. There are fish in the waters that nibble the dead skin off your feet (something you can pay for in Bangkok as a tourist attraction!). I slid down a natural rock slide and spent about an hour tanning on a fallen log over the waterfall, while butterflies walked all over me. One butterfly literally sat on my nose for about 10 minutes (they didn't love on any one else, just me. it was awesome.).
We didn't make it the entire way up to the 7th waterfall because clouds rolled in and it started to pour. We hiked back down the mountain, splashing in mud, getting soaking wet (but we'd been swimming, so getting wet wasn't much of a problem) and marveling as the entire path seemed to turn into one long, muddy waterfall.
I was starving by the time we got back to town, so a friend and I went out to dinner and found a tiny little cafe serving thai food and white wine. I hadn't had a glass of wine in weeks, so that, accompanied by an amazingly delicious massaman curry made for a pretty fabulous dinner. Which was followed by drinks with more of our friends and the chance to make new friends at a couple of the little outdoor bars around the main road.
The next day was even better. I woke up early-ish to find a group of my friends getting ready to go on some elephant adventure. They weren't quite sure what they were getting into, but we'd met a Thai guy the night before who told us all about this place and said he could take us there. So of course, without knowing what on earth I was getting into, I went.
Five of my friends and a Spanish guy we met on the way all climbed into the back of a pickup truck with our Thai friend from the night before. We drove about an hour into the countryside, past fields of grasses, herds of skinny cows with big ears, surrounded by the rounded peaks of gorgeous green mountains. Turned out we were headed to a place called Elephant World which is a refuge for older elephants who used to work but have been injured or simply gotten to old. It is not a tourist destination, its more of a non-profit do-good magical place. We were not only the only white people there, we were the only people there who didn't work/live there. It was paradise. There were five elephants in the field and Day, our guide, led us to each one, told us a little about them and let us feed them bananas. the elephants would reach out to us with their trunks and take a banana (still in its peel) out of our hands. But I also put a banana in an elephant's mouth and got to feel how remarkably rough its big pink tongue is!
We did a little bit of work (which was more fun than actual work) going out into the fields to chop down the grasses the elephants would eat that day - with machetes!! and then delivering and feeding that glass to the elephants.
After the elephants had eaten, we went swimming in the river to cool off.
AND THEN the workers brought the elephants into the river, so they could cool off too. So I swam with the elephants. And I got to climb up onto them as they swam in the river. I brushed the dirt off their faces with a scrub brush. I held on as they swam underwater.
The elephants seemed to love the water. They squirted it out of their trunks, and on the command of the Thai guys who live/work there they would try to buck us off their backs, going under water and flipping around. Attempting to cling to an elephant's head using only my knees and my hands on its ears as it rolled into the water is officially one of the most difficult things I've ever done. And one of the most fun.
When the elephants were done swimming they all went for a walk in the woods and we dried off, packed up, and headed back to the city so we could eat and then catch a bus back to Bangkok. The van ride home was pretty tame, but it was fun to meet up with the rest of our friends and hear about how they'd spent their day (with tigers!). There is no doubt in my mind I'll be headed back to Kanchaburi again, I want to do it all over again and more.
I'll try and get some pictures of it all up later this week, but suffice it to say that this was an absolutely splendid and magical weekend. And it only got better when I got home to find two big wonderful packages of goodies waiting for me at the front desk of my building.
Thank you!!
With 8 of the other English teachers I know here in Bangkok, we went to Kanchanaburi for the weekend (a little over an hour west of Bangkok) a little hippy-ish town on the banks of the river Kwai. It was a perfect town, with delicious restaurants, outdoor bars, easy access to amazing adventures AND I got to sleep on a raft floating in the river!
On Saturday we went to see the waterfalls that the area is known for; seven waterfalls of varying sizes all along one upward trek. Each one has a pool to swim in and rocks to clamber about on. There are fish in the waters that nibble the dead skin off your feet (something you can pay for in Bangkok as a tourist attraction!). I slid down a natural rock slide and spent about an hour tanning on a fallen log over the waterfall, while butterflies walked all over me. One butterfly literally sat on my nose for about 10 minutes (they didn't love on any one else, just me. it was awesome.).
We didn't make it the entire way up to the 7th waterfall because clouds rolled in and it started to pour. We hiked back down the mountain, splashing in mud, getting soaking wet (but we'd been swimming, so getting wet wasn't much of a problem) and marveling as the entire path seemed to turn into one long, muddy waterfall.
I was starving by the time we got back to town, so a friend and I went out to dinner and found a tiny little cafe serving thai food and white wine. I hadn't had a glass of wine in weeks, so that, accompanied by an amazingly delicious massaman curry made for a pretty fabulous dinner. Which was followed by drinks with more of our friends and the chance to make new friends at a couple of the little outdoor bars around the main road.
The next day was even better. I woke up early-ish to find a group of my friends getting ready to go on some elephant adventure. They weren't quite sure what they were getting into, but we'd met a Thai guy the night before who told us all about this place and said he could take us there. So of course, without knowing what on earth I was getting into, I went.
Five of my friends and a Spanish guy we met on the way all climbed into the back of a pickup truck with our Thai friend from the night before. We drove about an hour into the countryside, past fields of grasses, herds of skinny cows with big ears, surrounded by the rounded peaks of gorgeous green mountains. Turned out we were headed to a place called Elephant World which is a refuge for older elephants who used to work but have been injured or simply gotten to old. It is not a tourist destination, its more of a non-profit do-good magical place. We were not only the only white people there, we were the only people there who didn't work/live there. It was paradise. There were five elephants in the field and Day, our guide, led us to each one, told us a little about them and let us feed them bananas. the elephants would reach out to us with their trunks and take a banana (still in its peel) out of our hands. But I also put a banana in an elephant's mouth and got to feel how remarkably rough its big pink tongue is!
We did a little bit of work (which was more fun than actual work) going out into the fields to chop down the grasses the elephants would eat that day - with machetes!! and then delivering and feeding that glass to the elephants.
After the elephants had eaten, we went swimming in the river to cool off.
AND THEN the workers brought the elephants into the river, so they could cool off too. So I swam with the elephants. And I got to climb up onto them as they swam in the river. I brushed the dirt off their faces with a scrub brush. I held on as they swam underwater.
The elephants seemed to love the water. They squirted it out of their trunks, and on the command of the Thai guys who live/work there they would try to buck us off their backs, going under water and flipping around. Attempting to cling to an elephant's head using only my knees and my hands on its ears as it rolled into the water is officially one of the most difficult things I've ever done. And one of the most fun.
When the elephants were done swimming they all went for a walk in the woods and we dried off, packed up, and headed back to the city so we could eat and then catch a bus back to Bangkok. The van ride home was pretty tame, but it was fun to meet up with the rest of our friends and hear about how they'd spent their day (with tigers!). There is no doubt in my mind I'll be headed back to Kanchaburi again, I want to do it all over again and more.
I'll try and get some pictures of it all up later this week, but suffice it to say that this was an absolutely splendid and magical weekend. And it only got better when I got home to find two big wonderful packages of goodies waiting for me at the front desk of my building.
Thank you!!
Thursday, July 1, 2010
It is the end of our first week of midterms, and honestly, I'm surprised how well it went. I was complaining a lot last week about what I considered to be the absurdity of giving a midterm to a three year old, but it turned out to be pretty interesting. This week was the first chance I've had to be one on one with any of my students away from the distractions of the rest of the classroom. It was actually amazing to find out how much some of them get.
I can show a picture card of the letter A and ask "what is this?" and they respond "A!" I can show them a picture of a cat and ask"what is this?" and they say "cat!" or sometimes "c! cat! me-ow" because thats how they've learned it and I think thats an acceptable answer. If I tell them to stand up, they stand up. If I tell them to clap, they clap. Granted, they can't all do all of it, and some of them don't seem to understand anything, but a couple students in each class have more than aced their midterms so far. I'm so impressed with my students. And I'm a little excited to have had this opportunity to really find out what they can do.
One of the highlights of the week was a little girl who, when I said "touch your mouth" put two fingers into her mouth and stretched it into silly faces at me. Of course, I responded in kind. One of the low points was a little boy who was crying even before I called him out to take his test and could only keep crying while I asked him questions. So I wiped the snot off his face and gave him a passing grade (side note: they all get passing grades)
Next week we will finish up the speaking and listening and do "reading and writing" which will be tracing letters and matching letters and pictures. I still think the concentration on the alphabet is probably not the best way to learn a new language, but even so, it seems they are learning something!
I can show a picture card of the letter A and ask "what is this?" and they respond "A!" I can show them a picture of a cat and ask"what is this?" and they say "cat!" or sometimes "c! cat! me-ow" because thats how they've learned it and I think thats an acceptable answer. If I tell them to stand up, they stand up. If I tell them to clap, they clap. Granted, they can't all do all of it, and some of them don't seem to understand anything, but a couple students in each class have more than aced their midterms so far. I'm so impressed with my students. And I'm a little excited to have had this opportunity to really find out what they can do.
One of the highlights of the week was a little girl who, when I said "touch your mouth" put two fingers into her mouth and stretched it into silly faces at me. Of course, I responded in kind. One of the low points was a little boy who was crying even before I called him out to take his test and could only keep crying while I asked him questions. So I wiped the snot off his face and gave him a passing grade (side note: they all get passing grades)
Next week we will finish up the speaking and listening and do "reading and writing" which will be tracing letters and matching letters and pictures. I still think the concentration on the alphabet is probably not the best way to learn a new language, but even so, it seems they are learning something!
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