Jamison’s Misadventures In Asia

Hello Everybody.  Thus far, my blog has been mostly dedicated to detailing peripheral events in my Peace Corps experience, so I decided this posting will give some more details about my daily life and my co-teaching project. 

Let me first start out by saying that I haven’t quite hit the stride of having a ‘typical day’.  For the past two weeks, I haven’t been teaching but have been doing teacher evaluations instead, so whatever routine I had found working at my schools has since been lost.  As far as the evaluations, I have to say I felt a little uncomfortable with my role as an evaluator of English teaching methods, since I have minimal experience in classroom education or in teaching English.  However, after sitting through one day of sample English lessons given by 25 different primary school teachers, I realized that these people need help, and though I may not be an expert, I can pass on some helpful English teaching tips.  I just hope none of these teachers come to observe my classroom–I think everyone is better off if the wizard stays behind his curtain. 

A quick side note:  On my first day of teacher evaluations, a lesson was interupted by an adolescent cow walking into the room.  Sometimes I forget that I work in a developing country, but it’s moments such as these that remind me where I am. 

Okay, so my normal weekly schedule is as follows:

Monday and Tuesday:  Teach at Anuban Thoeng School with Dr. Suchet

Wednesday:  Work at the Educational District Office with Maa Satian

Thursday and Friday:  Teach at Banhuaykrai School with Pee Noy

Teaching with Dr. Suchet is like getting the prize in a Crackerjack box:  you’re never sure what you’re going to get, but you can pretty much count on being disappointed.  I apologize for my cynicism, but basically I have no idea how Dr. Suchet has maintained employment as a teacher, and I certainly do not understand how he was selected as a teaching counterpart for this project.  He talks a good game, but he is more lazy than even myself, which is saying a lot.  He seems to be more concerned with drinking whiskey and playing cards than he is with teaching. 

For example, on my first day of school, after weeks of asking Dr. Suchet to lesson plan and being met with his assurances that we don’t need to plan, we enter the classroom together.  He introduces me to the students, and then we stand there in awkward silence for more than a minute.  I’m confused because I figure he has the reigns–he was the one who assured me that lesson planning was unnecessary.  We stand there in front of a classroom of bewildered 11 year-olds, and I finally decide to start teaching, since Dr. Suchet doesn’t seem to have that on his agenda.  And so goes the subsequent four hours: Jamie teaches and Suchet does nothing.  Actually, that last sentence is misleading–he does give away answers to students to stifle their thought and learning processes.  Good work, Doctor.

Despite the difficulties of teaching with the good doctor, I do love working at Anuban Thoeng school.  The teaching staff has been friendly and welcoming to me since the day I arrived in Thoeng, and the kids are a joy.  I teach 4th, 5th, and 6th grades, and I love working with students in this age range.  When I walk from class to class, I am met with innumerable hellos, handshakes, and smiles. 

On Wednesdays, I either catch up on work at the office (A/C!) or end up going to visit schools with my team of district supervisors, which I have reverently dubbed "The Super Group".  While I do think there are better uses of my time than to sit in on hours of meetings where I can’t understand a word, I have found these school visits helpful in learning more about the area and getting a general pulse for teaching practices. 

At the end of the week, I get to ride 11 kilometers each way to Banhuaykrai school, where I perform my duties as a human tape recorder.  At some point, I need to change this arrangement, because it comes nowhere close to accomplishing the goal of developing student-centered English teaching practices.  However, my co-teacher, Pee Noy, is one of the younger female teachers on staff at Banhuaykrai, which means that she is constantly kept busy with the crap-work that nobody else wants to do.  This circumstance leaves little time for teaching, let alone lesson-planning.  On top of her duties at school, Pee Noy and her husband have a growing trucking company and their 20 month old son was recently diagnosed with autism.  So the last thing I want to do is create a huff about my role, because the only thing that would accomplish would be to make the principal upset with Pee Noy, who is doing the best she can. 

Pee Noy didn’t even want to be an English teacher in the first place and did not want to work with me on this project because it requires more work than teaching alone.  However, the principal at the school forced her to teach with me because having a "farang" teacher brings credibility to the school.  Also, I think he imagines that I have money spilling out of every oraface and has already openly asked me to raise $1,000 from the United States to buy a new water cooler for the school.  He says that if I teach at Banhuaykrai for two years and leave, everyone will forget me, but if I buy them a water cooler, they’ll name a building after me, and I will be remembered forever.  Welcome to the Peace Corps.

As frustrating as some aspects of my life here can be, the frustration only fuels my motivation to find meaningful avenues to expend my time and energy.  Fortunately, Peace Corps affords me a reasonable amount of flexibility in arranging my schedule, and I make a new schedule every six months.  Scaling back my presence at either school can be tricky, but with some tact, I should be able to setup a weekly schedule that gives me more autonomy within the classroom and allows me to pursue secondary projects.  So for now, I bide my time and make the most of it, all the while thinking of ways I can actually put my time and presence here to more meaningful use.

Okay, so it’s been a few weeks since I last wrote, and I don’t have anything too exciting to share.  All the same, I think that consistency is important and posting every 2 or 3 weeks is a reasonable thing to do.  So… I’m stalling.  Here we go.

Last weekend I went to visit my dear friend Ryan at his site in the town of Ban Hong, Lamphun province.  When he visited me two months ago in Thoeng, Ryan tried to convince me that his site is smaller than mine and there’s nothing there.  Ryan is a lying bastard.  His town is slightly larger than mine, and it has a rocking karaoke scene.  At least it did last Saturday, when Ryan and I blessed the stage for two hours straight to an empty house, save Ryan’s Thai friend and the restaurant staff.  We burned through a blistering set that included ‘Eternal Flame’, ‘Live and Let Die’, ‘Against All Odds’, ‘November Rain’, ‘Island in the Sun’, and ‘Knockin On Heaven’s Door’.  Between songs, we would ask the staff if they we’re having fun, "Sanuk Mai?"  We were met with blank stares–not due to a language barrier, but instead a cold response to our aural assault on the staff that was happily watching television before we arrived.  Our presence was certainly not appreciated, but Ryan and I decided it was sweet justice.  Having spent the past five months listening to horrible Thai music and being subjected to countless hours of karaoke, we were giving the people some of their own karaoke medicine.  We were fighting fire with fire, and our fire won, thanks to our outstanding Axl Rose impressions. 

When that restaurant closed, we moved on to bigger and better things, namely the much cooler Karaoke bar up the street.  We squeezed in a three song encore just before closing, giving the people what they didn’t want to hear with ‘Island in the Sun, ‘We Are The World’, and ‘Knockin Heaven’s Door’.  By the time we were finished, the place was empty.  On our bike ride home, we did some freestyle biking and did a buzz through the market, where some Thai people were amused to see us at 1 a.m.  Our freestyle biking consisted of riding down three steps of stairs or popping wheelies.  Just before we got home, Ryan was feeling super extreme, and tried to make it over the street median, a five foot mound of grass with 5 inch curbs on either side.  He might as well have ridden into a wall (which he actually did one minute later). 

Back in Thoeng, things are going well.  While I continue to question the feasibility of our project model (co-teaching), I am finding motivation in other projects.  I am trying to become more involved in HIV/AIDS education, but that seems to be on hold for a little while until the Education Office has some sort of meeting this month.  I am also hoping to start working with hilltribes in the area.  See the Hilltribe Virtual Museum and Mirror Art Group links on the sidebar to learn more about hilltribes and one of the organizations with which I may work. 

On Thursday, I found out that the lack of good karaoke houses in Thoeng is being addressed.  By my neighbors.  Yes, my next door neighbors opened a karaoke restaurant last night.  Everyone in town knew it was opening, but nobody bothered to tell me.  It will be an interesting period of adjustment.

In case any of you think I’m culturally insensitive, check out Ryan’s blog on myspace.   http://www.myspace.com/ryangriffith

He makes me look like a saint. 
Also, in case anybody wants to send me a letter or stuff (new Ryan Adams CD, mac & cheese), here’s my address:

P.O. Box 52

Thoeng

Chiang Rai 57160

THAILAND

Today marks the start of my third week teaching, and I’m beginning to feel somewhat comfortable with my role as a "co-teacher".  In an effort to create a sustainable model, the Peace Corps has defined our role as teacher-trainers that work alongside selected Thai teachers in the classroom.  Of course, working out this classroom dynamic would be difficult in any circumstance, let alone crossing cultural and language barriers.  The amount of work and planning that goes into co-teaching is far more than the amount necessary to teach a class alone, but the aim is that after two years, my co-teachers will have improved their English and adopted student-centered teaching practices to share with their counterparts. 

Okay, I just got distracted and lost my train of thought.  Some quick tidbits because I have to go in a minute:

I went to Koh Samet last weekend.  It’s an island in the gulf.  It was a pleasant and fun weekend, but the island itself was nothing too spectacular.  It would have helped if we left our piece of beach and didn’t spend the entire time drinking Beer Chang out of metal buckets. 

I’m recovering from my second major bout with diarrhea since arriving in Thailand.  I never thought that pooping 20+ times in a day could seem normal;  I did not realize that it was possible to poop pure orange gatorade; and I was amazed to defecate something resembling an alien miscarriage once I recovered. 

I apologize for that last little bit–I may have crossed the line. 

In my previous postings, I forgot to mention that I electrocuted myself a while back.  I was plugging in my phone charger and managed to have my finger across both prongs as I did.  This sent a wonderful jolt of 220 volts (roughly twice as much juice as the states) up my arm.  The shock made me drop the charger, so it wasn’t too bad, but it was certainly one of the stranger sensations I’ve experienced.  I would actually recommend it to people, should one gain the courage.  It was kind of fun.

Another thing I’ve been meaning to mention is my practice of teaching my former language teacher, Chaturon, about fictitious American customs.  This first came about when he asked me why my toenails are abnormal (I’ve had minor procedures on both of my big toes to take care of ingrown toenails).  I told him that in America we have a coming-of-age ritual where seven year-olds are placed on a table and have their toenails sliced with a hot knife.  The children are not given any anesthesia, nor are they allowed to show pain or discomfort.  I told him that the ritual signifies the child growing past the age of crying and approaching the stoicism that adulthood brings.  He bought it.  Silly Chatty.  Of course this blatantly defies one of the main goals of Peace Corps: to share my lifestyle and customs with people in Thailand, but I figure I’ll let him in on it before I leave. 

Okay, that’s it for now.  I hope everyone is having a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.  The start of your summer marks the end of our hot season and the beginning of the rainy season, and for that I am thankful. 

Last week I went on a four day trip (a third of which was spent on a bus) with my Educational Office. This type of trip is called "du ngan", which translates to "watch work", and we did visit two Educational offices while on our trip–one was conveniently located near the beach, the other near a scenic river.

We left at 5pm on Saturday and many of my co-workers didn’t wait to get on the bus to start their drinking–I was a minority in my decision not to drink on the ride. As soon as we boarded the bus, the karaoke started. Over the past several months, as I have learned about Thailand and the lives of Thai people, I have arrived at far more questions than answers, but there is one thing I can say with certainty: Thai people should not be allowed to operate equipment of amplification. They simply abuse it: not setting p.a.’s, stereos, or televisions on reasonable volume levels; not understanding that when using a microphone, one need not yell; and of course, the karaoke. So a good portion of my ride to Phetchburi province was spent wearing very large headphones to avoid the aural assault of my co-workers singing and telling jokes on the industry standard Thai bus, full with p.a. and karaoke. When I bought the Sony knock-off headphones in Bangkok two weeks ago, I was feeling a little bit of buyer’s remorse, but now, several busrides later, I consider the purchase one of my wisest investments.

The busride down more or less set the tone for the trip. There was plenty of drinking and plenty of karaoke. I dabbled in both but kept things mellow. The beach wasn’t anything spectacular, but it was nice to get in the water. The river trip was certainly enjoyable. When I was told that we would be spending the night on a raft, floating down a river in Kanchanaburi province, images of a Huck Finn style raft made of bamboo came to mind. I have seen pictures of such rafts while in Thailand, so my expectations were not unfounded. However, if there is one thing to avoid while in Thailand, it is expectations, and for good reason. When we arrived at the river in Kanchanaburi, floating shacks lined the banks. I soon realized that all of these shacks were actually rafts, and there were at least fifty of them. The raft was actually two barges tied together. One barge was the sleeping area, consisting of a two level hut with straw mats on the floors. The other barge was a dining area, that doubled as a dance floor with lights and a wall of speakers. After dinner, we tied up on a bank along with 8 or 9 other barges, and the party began. Music played into the wee hours, and my Thai co-workers were not shy in showing off their unimpressive dancing prowess. It was a great time. The rest of the trip consisted mostly of a busride. Luckily the audio/video system broke, and we travelled home in peace.

Which brings me to this week, the first week of school. Things are going well, and it’s nice to be busy. I will be celebrating the end of my first week of teaching by travelling to the Island of Ko Samet.

I’m back in Thoeng for a day after being gone for more than a week.  Last Tuesday, I headed to Bangkok for a Peace Corps conference concerning our "Emergency Action Plan".  I took the overnight bus on Tuesday night and arrived in BKK at 5 a.m., having slept little more than an hour.  These buses are fairly comfortable, but between karaoke dvd’s being played at a ridiculous volume, midnight noodle stops, and the bus company feeling the need to wake us up with music one hour before we arrive at our stop, it can be very difficult to sleep.  So I arrived in BKK on Wednesday feeling a little less than chipper.  It was nice to see some other PCV’s, but Bangkok is never kind on the wallet, no matter how hard one tries. 

On Thursday, I spent the day with Chaturon, and we had lunch and went shopping.  It was good to see my old language instructor, and I now refer to him as ‘Nong Chatty’ (meaning little brother Chatty) instead of the formal and respectful ‘Ajaan Chaturon’ (since he was my teacher).  More often though, I refer to him using vulgarities and derogatory terms, because he likes to swear in English and doesn’t mind my swearing at him.  This raises more than a few eyebrows when shopping at a mall filled with foreigners. 

Thursday night was spent on a bus once again, and I arrived in Thoeng early Friday morning.  I spent a couple hours running errands and packing clothes before I headed to Mae Jan, a town in the northern part of Chiang Rai Province.  I went to Mae Jan to help pack up the belongings of a fellow volunteer who is leaving Thailand due to the loss of both her father and her boyfriend inside of a three week period.  It was a somber stop in my week of travelling. 

On Saturday, I stopped for the night in Chiang Mai, on my way to Tak to help fellow PCV Mike run a teachers’ training.  I met up with my friend Ryan, and another friend, Geneva, showed up in the evening.  Nothing too exciting to report, but my appreciation for Chiang Mai is even greater in contrast to my Bangkok visit earlier in the week.  Also, we had our first bloody mary’s in Thailand, adding tabasco and pepper to tomato juice for the mixer.  Late Saturday night, Ryan and I almost debuted our band, "Tweezer" (short for Thai Weezer), but Ryan couldn’t feel his fingers and was unable to play the intro to "My Name is Jonas". 

On Sunday, I headed to Tak and was impressed by what is Thailand’s hottest province.  Mike lives in the Amphur Muang (provincial center) of Tak, which is located along banks of the large Ping River.  Hills and mountains lie to the west, offering a dramatic sunset looking over the river.  The teacher training was hard work, but we enjoyed ourselves.  We were treated very well, given hotel rooms, and taken to nice meals.  It was a vacation in some senses, but the three days there certainly carried a bit of stress as well.   Yesterday I returned to Thoeng, exhausted from a day on the bus and a week of constant travel.  Tomorrow I head to the beach with my Tessaban (Educational District Office).  Happy Cinco de Mayo. 

I’ve realized that I will never get around to writing an eloquent and succinct summary of my first few months here in Thailand, so in true blog spirit, I give you bits from my journal entries.  I’m sorry it’s so long, but I think it gives a pretty good idea of what my life here is like.  Also, I’ve got some pictures up now, and there should be more on the way.  I hope everyone is doing well.

-Jamie

1/15:  It’s the end of our first day in Thailand.  We arrived at the airport in Bangkok just after midnight last night.  We were greeted by a pack of screaming Peace Corps volunteers, dressed in wigs, wasted, very happy to see us.  Some highlights of the travel day:

The layover at Narita airport in Tokyo:  I can’t wait to visit Japan.  Every airport worker had a different ridiculous uniform or outfit.

Japan Airlines:  On the American Airlines flight from L.A. to Bangkok, drinks were $5 a pop.  On JAL, drinks were free.  Not only were they free, every time you asked for one drink, they gave you two.  Not only did they give you two drinks every time, but they had back to back beverage services within 5 minutes of each other.  What this means is 12 minutes after reaching our cruising altitude, I had consumed four bloody mary’s, and supplemented that buzz with an endless supply of Sapporo (that is, until they ran out and I switched to Beer Singha).  Did I mention this was a red-eye flight?

1/16:  We’re in the lobby at the training center, watching ‘Napoleon Dynamite’.  Today was our second day of Pre-service Training.   On our first day, we learned how to greet people in Thai.  In the afternoon, I played some badminton with some of the other trainees and the ajaans (language trainers).  I’ve got to work on my game.  Josh (Jiggles) and I made a less than stellar team.  In the evening, we had a welcome dinner, full with karaoke and congealed chicken blood.

1/17:  We had a good deal of language class today—somewhere around 4 or 5 hours.  We learned how to count and how to say some basic phrases.  It was great getting started with the language, but my brain felt like a big pretzel at times.  After class, I played some soccer with Ryan.  We played until I realized that some people were playing badminton.  My game was a bit more respectable today.

1/21:  So.  I now have a Thai family.  It’s been interesting so far.  My longest conversation has been with the grandfather [several days later, I learned that he was not in fact my grandfather, just one of the several village drunks].  He talked to me for ten minutes straight.  I didn’t understand a lick.  He likes to drink lao kao, which is moonshine made from rice.  Mao is the Thai word for drunk.  It’s been 3 or 4 days since I last wrote.  3 or 4 days here can feel like half a month.  I live with Tsom Nuk and his family.  Tsom Nuk farms uah (cow) and blah (fish).  His wife, Ah, runs a noodle shop out of the house.  They have a 12 year old daughter named Mook and a 15 year old son, Nu.  Nu goes to school in Bangkok during the week.  They are friendly, hospitable, and generous.  The language barrier can be stifling at times, but I’m learning bit by bit.  When all else fails, Tsom Nuk’s brother, who lives next door, can speak decent English. 

1/22 (Excerpt from a letter):  I’ve absorbed so much in the week that I’ve been here.  Today I traveled with my family to the capital of the province, Nakornpathom.  We went to the largest Wat (Thai Buddhist temple) in the world.  Or at least that’s what I understood from the communication.  There were monks all around and some beautiful statues of the Buddha.  In the afternoon, I rode my bike over to one of the nearby schools and played badminton with my friend Bryn.  We bought rackets in town yesterday.  After badminton, I went with my family to the big Sunday market.  It was filled with madness.  You can find pretty much anything you want—from a pig’s face, to designer-ish jeans for three bucks.  The food has been incredible.  I haven’t eaten anything too shocking yet, with the exception of congealed chicken blood. 

1/26:  Things are starting to settle in—the days pass more quickly, and we know our way around now.  I’m enjoying bike travel, and the weather doesn’t really phase me.  We’ll see how I feel about the weather in a couple months, during the peak of the hot season.  The past couple of days, we’ve capped our afternoons off at a little snack hut near one of our training schools.  It’s nice to sit on the bench swing and have a beer, since we’re lucky to have even an hour or two to ourselves with our hectic training schedule. 

2/1:  The first day of February already!  We’re coming up on the three-week mark.  In some ways, it feels as though we’ve been here for months, yet I still feel utterly inept with the language.  I’m losing confidence in the training program, which I think is the result of the same general sentiment bubbling from the group.  At this point, our ability to communicate is inexcusably minimal, and our time in training is not managed and utilized efficiently.  Otherwise, things are peachy.  For the most part, I’m doing a good job of being easygoing, though I feel a tension building in the periphery—a white noise of stress.  We don’t have the proper freedom to release tension in normal ways (a real day off for instance).  I was talking with Maggie, a 79 year old volunteer from Berkeley, about how here in Thailand and in training, we have so much information that we’re constantly processing, so we have no choice other than to stay in the moment.  We talked about how in the States, we fill our heads worrying about things we can’t control and will most likely never happen.  Maggie told me that worry and regret are worthless emotions because they are tied to the future and to the past—things we cannot control or change.  I liked that. 

Last night was Thai Night, a cultural learning night at the training hub.  We watched the ajaans perform traditional Thai dances, ate lots of yummy food, and performed the Diarrhea Song [this was a dance and a song in English that Thai students performed when we went to visit a local school.  It was all about diarrhea and absolutely hilarious, though I don’t think it was intended to be humorous.  Jiggles brought the house down with his performance of the Thai Chicken Dance.  After Thai night, we got sauced drinking lao kao [the aforementioned rice moonshine], something I will never do again. 

2/2 (Excerpt from an email):  I am in cloudland.  I just had a 90 minute massage for $3.  It was amazing.  Things are going well.  There are some small logistical frustrations, but overall, I am very pleased.  I’m making some great friends, mostly American, but some Thai.  my best Thai friend is Chaturon, my language teacher.  He is 23, and i constantly give him a hard time.  I think that I perpetually offend him, but I’m pretty sure that he understands my humor (though he may not appreciate always it).  So, bike riding.  We ride our bikes everywhere.  I have a sweet bike:  front suspension, nice basket in the back, front and back mud guards (shocks… pegs… lucky!). I’ve gotten good at racing home at 6pm to make it home before dark.  The other day, I was riding home buzzed with my friend Bryn.  I came up to a speed bump, and tried to pop a wheelie on it.  Instead, my tire jammed against my front mud flap, stopping the tire, and I went over the handlebars.  Slow crash, painless.  Slightly embarassed, i expected to look up and find Bryn pointing and laughing.  She was not pointing or laughing; she was toppled on her side in a ditch.  She fell off the side of the road in her hysterics.  This whole scene took place in front of a Thai audience, a family sitting on their porch.  I tried to tell them ‘I am a stupid foreigner’ in Thai, but I’m sure I messed it up.  Anyways, i’ll leave you with that one.

2/12:  The days and weeks pass with increasing speed, and my life here becomes more and more busy.  Today, we visited the local wat with our language class.  We learned a little bit about Buddhism and participated in prayer.  Afterwards, I went swimming at the University.  It was a welcome recess, feeling cool and clean, without a person in sight.  Water can be so relaxing.  Tomorrow I go to Bangkok with Wi, my host cousin.  I was hoping that Jiggles would come with me, but he will be having a thrilling afternoon of asparagus harvesting.  Chinese New Year’s was this week.  We visited wats that were lit up and felt more like a carnival than a place of worship.  I saw a man riding an elephant in the street on my way home one afternoon. 

2/14 (Excerpt from a letter):  Life in Thailand is filled with more stories than I can keep up with, but I’ll do my best to remember some good ones for you.  Some of the stuff is not worth trying to explain, but each day brings small absurdities and plenty of laughs—it’s hard not to have fun here.  First I’ll give you a very brief overview of my day to day routine.  First of all, I live in a noodle shop, though I’ve only seen one person order noodles here.  Most people buy soda, candy, beer, or lao kao (rice grain moonshine, nasty stuff).  All the same, my host-mom is a great cook [a word of advice here: whenever talking to your birthmother, never ever refer to a person other than her as ‘mom’, this can create inordinate amounts of grief for many people].  At every meal, I have 3 or 4 delicious dishes from which to choose.  The breakfast dishes are the same types of food that we eat at dinner or lunch, though I suspect that I am receiving special treatment in that respect.  I think the standard breakfast is usually rice gruel or leftovers.  Enough about home.

Almost every day, I ride my bike for 15 minutes to a nearby school where I have a small language class with three other volunteers.  In the afternoon, I have a thirty minute bike ride to either of two schools.  At one of the schools, I practice teach and usually make a fool out of myself in front of a class of Thai 5^th-graders.  At the other school, our project group (25 volunteers) gathers for technical training.  Altogether, the training can seem a bit disorganized at times, but I’m confident that I’ll be fine when I’m on my own at site.  For the meantime, it helps to roll with the punches and embrace the attitude of ‘mai pen rai’, which in translation approximates ‘no problem’, ‘don’t worry about it’, ‘nevermind’, and ‘screw it’, depending on context. 

The language is coming along steadily, though slowly.  Thai language is fascinating.  Their language is far more simple in word length (nearly all words are monosyllabic), sentence structure, the lack of articles, the lack of conjugations, and the absence of distinction between subjects and objects.  That said, the nuances in tone are difficult for my English-trained ears to distinguish and for my Farang (Thai for foreigner) tongue to pronounce.  It seems like every fifth word I learn is “Maa”, but depending on the tone it can mean five different things.  On top of that, a small change in the vowel sound can bring five more meanings into play.  On more than one occasion, I’ve said a bad word to my family when trying to say something completely different.

Okay.  Now I can’t remember the funny stuff…  The other day I saw a man riding an elephant on my way home from school.  I realize this is Thailand and, for some, that may seem expected in the country, but elephants certainly don’t belong in the town where I live.  At the same time I took the sighting in stride.  It’s funny how seeing an elephant in the street can seem normal. 

On Friday, I had some time, so I went to get a haircut.  I waited for the barber to finish up with a customer and watched as he gave the customer a straight edge shave.  The barber was sure not to miss the hair on the man’s forehead nor on his closed eyelids.  He shaved the guy’s eyelids!  I was next, and with some guidance was able to spare myself a wretched haircut.  When it was time for my shave, I pointed to my upper lip and said, “Ti ni, cha cha,” which means, “Here slowly,” so he would be careful when shaving around a scar.  In shaving, he spared my forehead, eyelids, and upper lip.  So I was left with a buzz and a horrible moustache.  When I looked up, I couldn’t bite my lip hard enough to hold back my laugh.  The haircut was not over.  He cleaned my ears, snipped my nostril hairs, and massaged my shoulders.  Not bad for a buck.

So there’s a glimpse.  Emotionally, there’s always a veil of stress as I struggle with the language, try my best not to offend, and train 40+ hours each week.  I miss home less than I would have imagined, but there’s so much to process and look forward to every day that my mind never sits idle long enough to think about anything other than the immediate.

2/22:  I will be spending the next two years in the town of Thoeng, in Chiang Rai province.  I arrived in Thoeng by bus this morning and met my supervisor at the educational office, Satian.  She is a wonderful lady, and it looks like I will be calling her ‘maa’ during my time in Thoeng.  One of my co-teachers, Dr. Something-or-other, is a wacko.  He’s very enthused to be working with me, but I think things might get weird.  Not too much to say about my other co-teacher.  Thoeng is beautiful. 

I spent the last couple days visiting Beth, an outgoing volunteer from Kent, WA.  She has spent the last two years on the outskirts of the provincial center of Chiang Rai.  It was a mellow visit and a much-needed vacation from training.  I ate mac & cheese and learned the ins and outs of life as a Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand.  Tomorrow, I leave the North and head to Bangkok for a few days.

2/28:  Recovering from 3 nights in Bangkok.  Not much else to say.  Bangkok is both a terrific and horrible place—somewhere to find the comforts of life in the States, but filled with pollution, people, and prices outside of my budget. 

3/1 (Excerpt from a letter):  Almost everything about my Thai experience thus far has exceeded my expectations—the amount of learning, the amount of fun, and the wonderful people I’ve met, both American and Thai.  Every day brings new adventures, large and small, from gulping down congealed chicken blood to devising a plan to allow us to stay out past dark.  The past weeks have been filled with learning Thai, trying to put my limited Thai to use, riding my bike from school to school, attending Thai gatherings, visiting temples for Chinese New Year’s celebrations, playing badminton, trying to figure out how to teach English to Thai kids, badgering my Thai language teacher with an incessant barrage of obscure cultural questions, trying and failing to communicate with my host-family mother, escaping to the local pool whenever possible, teaching English to and playing games with the neighborhood kids, avoiding dogs that chase us on our bikes, and finding time to unwind between all of these activities.  It’s hard to explain how tiring life can be when the only time to relax is while alone in my room or if we get out of a training session early and have some time to kill.  Otherwise, my evenings at home can be the most demanding part of my day, constantly concentrating in an effort to communicate and an effort not to offend.  Taking all of this into account, in many ways my life here is very easy.  I don’t have to cook, clean, or make plans—everything is taken care of for me.  All in all, I am very happy and am sure that I’ll miss this chapter of my Peace Corps experience.

3/11 (Excerpt from a letter):  Only two weeks until Swearing In.  It’s hard to believe that two months have gone by so quickly.  Even though the time has flown, I’m eager to leave training and get to my site in Chiang Rai.  It seems like we’ve learned as much as we are going to learn from our training program, which is far less than I would have hoped.  I will certainly miss seeing other volunteers every day and will miss my host family, but I think I’m ready to move on.

3/25:  Our last day in Kampangsaen.  We’ve spent the past couple days having a conference with co-workers from our permanent sites.  I’m excited for Thoeng and the possibility which my situation holds. 

3/30 (Excerpt from a letter):  Last week we concluded our 10-week training, which means that this week I am settling into my permanent site in Chiang Rai, the country’s northernmost province.  For the past couple days, I’ve been getting to know my co-workers and becoming familiar with my new town, Thoeng.  Adjusting to life here has not been very difficult.  With some exceptions, my basic amenities are available and similar to those at home.  The food is delicious, the country is beautiful, and the people are welcoming and friendly.

4/1:  It’s Friday, the end of my first work week at site.  It’s been tough dragging myself out of bed at 7 o’clock in the morning b/c there really isn’t anything to do at the office.  School is out of session until mid-May.  I’m looking forward to a Big C (Thai version of K-Mart) visit, so I can start getting settled into my new home. Right now, it’s a big mess.

4/6:  I’m in the middle of my second week at site, and I finally am feeling more settled.  Having my own place has been great, but after the first couple of days, the novelty wore off due to a lack of clean clothes and no place to put my stuff.  I also have little space to hang my drying clothes after I wash them, so I can only clean a day’s worth of clothes at a time.  This circumstance makes each morning a little hectic when I scramble to iron my socks dry and press my shirt and pants on my make-shift ironing board, also know as a towel laid on the floor.  This week, my supervisor returned from a week-long meeting in the South, so I was able to work out some of the details of living here.  I now have a lady who picks up my laundry every day and brings it back the next, clean and pressed.  I’ve also figured out the best way to go about furnishing my home—a decision in limbo for various reasons.  So after ten days of waiting, I went and bought some furniture today and have since been able to organize my house more.  It feels better to have a home now, rather than a couple rooms, a bed, and boxes and bags spilling my stuff all over the floors. 

It’s strange how different it is being at site versus training.  There are certainly some aspects which I enjoy more, such as the increased free time and autonomy.  However, these benefits bring more opportunity for boredom and loneliness.

4/19:  It’s the week after Songkran (Thai New Year’s—a week long water fight and party), and I’m finally recovering.  Songkran officially started on Wednesday, the 13^th, though many people started celebrating much earlier.  On Wednesday, I went to a celebration with Pee Noy, one of my co-teachers, in her village.  Everyone started drinking at 9:00 a.m., but I held out until 10:00.  From there, I got a little drunk, danced with 70 year-old ladies who told me they loved me, and played with water, all while avoiding the drunk 23 year-old guy who became creepily attached to me in our nascent friendship.  On Thursday, I went to Phayao, the neighboring province, with my supervisor and her family.  We went to a grand water fight by a lake.  In the evening, I went to another community party near my home, and had to do my best to avoid the absurd amount of attention given to foreigners at these types of gatherings.  Seeing foreigners in Thailand is fairly commonplace, depending on where you are, but out in the countryside, it still seems to be a big deal to interact with one.  On Friday, I went to Chiang Mai, the epicenter of Songkran festivities.  I got an early start and arrived in Chiang Mai at 11:00 a.m and commenced to ‘len nam’ (play with water).  I bought a bucket and took to the streets, eventually joining up with an internationally diverse group of strangers, made up of folks from Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Japan.  I was the undercover Asian of the group. After having my fun with this group, I headed of to meet up with some Peace Corps friends.  After a little down-time, we headed to the Songkran parade.  The parade was great—many different Hill Tribes, dressed in their beautiful clothing, bands in the back of trucks, people dancing and playing drums.  The beauty of this parade is that disturbing the parade seems to take on as much importance as the parade itself.  The on-lookers participate as much as those in the parade, constantly squirting, splashing, and dousing the marchers.  In my case, I would halt the parade, greet them with a wai (a formal Thai bow with hands held together in a prayer position), say ‘khor thod, krap’ (excuse me), then cover them in water.  I also got in the habit of borrowing instruments from marchers, dancing alongside Thai dancers, and hitting up the marchers for lao kao.  After the first time, I told myself I would never drink lao kao again.  I lied.  But this time I mean it.  I will never drink lao kao again.

Hello and Welcome to my blog.  A year ago, I didn’t know what a blog was.  I knew it was short for weblog, and I didn’t know what a weblog was.  Now I have my own blog.  How things change in a year. 

Actually, I don’t know that things have changed that much.  I now have an idea of what a blog is, but I don’t understand what the big deal is.  The only reason why people might want to read my babble is because I’m in Thailand, and even then, I’m sure you’ll all get over that after one or two visits.  That’s all fine with me.  This whole act seems rather self-serving, and though I enjoy attention as much as the next person, I think this theater of attention focuses too brightly on me.  Nonetheless, I will press on and share the details of my life in Thailand, so you folks can live vicariously. 

Thanks for your time.  I hope not to disappoint.

-Jamie