Miss:  Low Cost of Living and Entertainment.  The last item on my list is how cheaply I live here.  I have already talked about how little I pay for food, but did you know I can go see a movie in the theater for $4 (add another dollar for 3D)?  Continue reading →

Miss:  Fresh, Delicious “Street Food”.  I mentioned a lot of food when I was writing about the people I will miss.  It may seem that all I do is eat.  However, I have actually been able to LOSE more than 20 pounds in my time living in this country.   This is a combination of hitting the gym regularly for 3 years and also avoiding western foods (except for the occasional cheat).  When I first got here, I started drinking a lot of Coke and Fanta and eating Snickers (familiar foods).  I also had no bike and didn’t really know how or what to order, so I ate mostly Pad See Ew (saucy fried noodles) from the lady in the restaurant downstairs (in Songkhla) or Mu Ping (pork on a stick) from the man I passed on my way home.  When I moved to Hat Yai, I bought a hot plate and started making pasta at home a lot.  Then I made the change.  I was wasting money on terrible food.  Time to start eating like the Thais (sort of). Continue reading →

Won’t Miss: People.  Now hold up before you get your panties in a bunch about this.  While there are lots of specific people that I will miss, Thailand is a country of contradictions.  They can be nice as pie while simultaneously talking smack to their friend about you (because they don’t think you understand them).  Sure, this happens at home, but we have recourse in our home countries where we speak the language and don’t have to worry about someone “losing face”. Continue reading →

When I started this journey, I only expected to be here for two years.  Three maximum.  Every time someone asked me “How long do you plan to stay?” I would answer them with “I just take it one year at a time.”  I never felt any compulsion to move home and even when I would visit, the trips became shorter and shorter each time.  However, over the last year, some unknown force has slowly been pushing and gnawing at me to move back.  I don’t know if it is loneliness.  Possibly being tired of missing out on important events in the lives of my friends and family.  Perhaps a need to get back to a place of logic and structure and Chipotle.  Whatever the reasons, it’s time for me to get back to the “real world” and start adulting.  I mean, I AM nearly on the wrong side of 35… Continue reading →

INTERACTIONS WITH LOCALS—

                Although I have lived in Thailand for more than three years, I have actually done very little travel within Asia.  I went to Japan, I have been to Malaysia, and I have traveled and lived within Thailand.  Therefore, I pretty much compare all interactions with a new SE Asian people to my experience with Thais.

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LANDSCAPE—

                One thing I can say for Vietnam is that it is a gorgeous country.  Saigon being an exception.  As we were driving along the coast from Cam Ranh Airport to Nha Trang, I noted that the landscape very much reminded me of driving through New Mexico along Interstate 25 (other than having a shoreline).  Lots of mountains and scrub brush.

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So, to start… I realize that I actually haven’t written a travel journal entry in more than a year and a half.  For that, I am truly sorry.  Not that I haven’t traveled.   I have gone back to the States and done a bit of travel here and there in Thailand.  Also, I made trips down to Penang and Langkawi in Malaysia on a couple of occasions this year.  Just nothing that I felt was worthy, really, of a write-up.

It has occurred to me that living abroad can actually start to make casual travel a bit ho-hum.  For me, hopping on a van for a few hours and spending a weekend on a tropical island has become commonplace; flying up to Bangkok for a day or two as middle-of-the-road as driving to Denver (assuming you live an hour or so from Denver).  Unless I get a new stamp in my passport, it doesn’t really occur to me that anyone would be interested in reading about my travels.  I know, I sound like a snob.

I will now attempt to redeem myself by regaling you with tips and tales of my travels in Vietnam…

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It is an encouraging time to be living in Thailand.

Most of the world heard about the government shutdown that occurred in the US in October.  Politicians unable to agree on how to allocate the imaginary money for the next budget.

Thailand’s political woes aren’t hitting the international media in the same way, so many people are unaware of what has been transpiring in Thailand for the last few months. Continue reading →

I have been working for the same agency at the same school for the last three terms.  At the end of the first term of this school year (October 2013), we parted ways, to put it nicely.

At the end of last school year, the agency opened a new office in our part of the country and installed a new Director there.  Again to put it nicely, we had something of a personality conflict.  I suffered through the first term of this year, keeping my head down and trying not to make any sudden moves.  However, the day I left on holiday, I received a phone call saying that the school (not the agency) had requested a new teacher.

Side note: I found out later from teachers, the academic director, and the owner of the school that this was entirely false and they had no knowledge of a replacement teacher until the second term started. They had been told I quit. And the owner has asked me to attend the Christmas party.

At first, I was a bit flabbergasted.  This was exacerbated by the fact that I received the call while on a shuttle bus on the way to my hotel in Bangkok the day before I was set to fly home for the three-week holiday.  However, I quickly realized that this was a blessing in disguise.  I had not been happy at my job for the last four months.  That being said, I wouldn’t have quit a solid, good-paying job on my own.

I had a mini panic attack about finding myself suddenly unemployed, on my way out of the country for vacation.  Whatever would I do when I came back to a foreign country without gainful employment secured?  This panic lasted all of about 10 minutes.  After all, this is Thailand. Mai bpen rai.  No problem.

Even if there weren’t a full-time school position available to me right away, there would be extra work.  Private classes, tutoring, conversation partners.  And I have a great group of friends and fellow teachers willing to send work my way and distribute my resume for me, even while I was still in The States.

I was able to have a nice, boring, uneventful, and relaxing time at home.  Oh, by the way, this trip was a complete surprise to everyone except three people.  Bought the ticket four days before leaving and was able to arrange to have my sister-in-law pick me up from the airport.  Although, my brother ended up surprising ME by meeting me at the gate as I deplaned.  He had just arrived home from a business trip, so he was already behind security.  I don’t think I have had someone meet me at my gate since 1999.  Wonderful surprise.

Back to Thailand.

I arrived back in Thailand to find that I had an email from a teacher in Hat Yai who had received my resume from a mutual acquaintance and a new agency was interested in interviewing me.  Chuffed that I already had a lead as soon as I arrived home, I agreed to the interview and sat down with them a couple days later.  It was a Thai agency that, until recently, had only been doing math and science tutoring, but was branching out in to English.  They had a pending contract with a government school in Namom (about 25 minutes from my door to the school, by bike) teaching mathayom students (junior high and high school).  I realized about halfway in that this wasn’t so much an interview as it was them describing my new job to me.  We set a time to go and visit the school later in the week.

Bear in mind that up to this point, I only had experience with “college” kids.  I kept being told that these new kids were naughty.  And I kept having flashes of junior high and high school kids back in America.  It would be safe to say I was slightly terrified and apprehensive.

The visit to the school went well.  It consisted of me sitting in a room with about seven Thais while they discussed (what I assume was) the contract.  In Thai.  It lasted about 20 minutes.  When it was finished, everyone wei’ed and thanked each other.  I busted out my “yin tee dee dai ru jak ka” (nice to meet you) and wei’ed.  I think I impressed them. *brushes shoulder off *

I have now been at the school for almost a month.  And. I. Love. It.

Aside from the usual Thai complications (when I will actually start, getting my schedule sorted, language barriers, miscommunications), it has been a fantastic change.

Don’t get me wrong.  Some of my students at HIC were wonderful and I miss them.  But in general, most of the “kids” there were way too cool for school.  Literally.  Attendance was very poor and if they did bother to show up, it typically just felt like I was spinning my wheels and going through the motions without having an impact.  Blank stares from the students, no enthusiasm, rude comments, no respect, pulling teeth to get them to participate.  It always just felt like doing the busy work in triplicate and anything but the academics were the things that the school worried most about.

Thammakosit School is SUCH a 180.  Every day I walk between classrooms and my office and have to respond “good morning” or “good afternoon” at least a dozen times.  The kids engage with me in the classroom and have fun and are excited.  If I ask an individual a question, they answer.  I don’t have to prompt them and they don’t look at their friend and say “alai wa?” (what is it?).   They ask permission even to step outside to sharpen their pencils in to the trash can and then ask permission again to re-enter.  They stand at the beginning of class and say “Good morning, Teacher!”  and wait to be told to sit down.  I never encountered this level of respect at my last school (I didn’t even know that the standing and greeting were things that were supposed to be done).  I even let them go in twos to the restroom or to get a drink of water because I know they will actually return to class, and in a timely fashion.

My favorite classes are M1 and M2 (mathayom 1, 12/13-year-olds; mathayom 2, 14/15-year-olds).  I never thought I would enjoy teaching junior high so much, but they are so fantastic!

Side note: More than half of my classes are electives.  The students have actually CHOSEN to take English and aren’t being forced in to it.  They also electively participate in English club on Mondays.  You know what we do? Play Scrabble for 50 minutes!  The kids LOVE Scrabble.  My kind of English club. 

The first day of school, one of the Thai teachers escorted me to my classes and sat outside observing for a little while.  Originally, they had said I would have a Thai assistant for my classes (mostly to keep the kids in line).  I think she realized on that first day that I wouldn’t need one.  The woman at my agency asked how I get them to behave without an assistant.  I told her, “Mai bpen rai, these kids are wonderful!”  She was so shocked that I could conduct classes with teenagers and not have issues.  They really have no idea what “naughty” means…  Of course I still have to shush them sometimes and sort a couple unruly ones out, but NOTHING like I had to deal with before.  My classes at Thammakosit fall just shy of the “perfect” mark.

Other than having to sometimes drive through monsoons on the highway to school in the morning, I am having a brilliant time teaching at Thammakosit School.  I also have more requests for private classes than I can handle.

I’m finally having fun!

We certainly do tend to let life get in the way of things, don’t we?  I mean, maybe not YOU, but I certainly do.  It’s so easy to get distracted by this, that, or the other and then the next thing you know you look up and it’s November. 

It has been a hectic year, thus far.  Moved to a new town.  Long, long holiday to America, Japan, and Chiang Mai.  The passing of my Grammy while half a world away.  A new term with a new director at my agency.  No longer working for said agency at the end of the term.   A surprise trip to America for the October holiday.  Back to Thailand with no job. 

I will say that when I found out that my contract would not be continued in to the next term, I mostly felt relief.  The new management and I had, let’s say, a personality conflict.  It resembled the Cold War.  That said, I wouldn’t have left on my own because (as an American) I’m not going to leave a high paying job (ABA pays about 8,000 THB more a month than most places) with nothing to fall back on. This flashed through my mind as I was listening to my former manager chirp in my ear while I rode the bus from the airport to my hotel in Bangkok.  And then I remembered.  This is Thailand.  Not America. 

Being a fair-skinned, blue-eyed, American female in my early 30s with a TEFL certificate is like having a golden ticket to the chocolate factory here.  People back home were saying, “I can’t believe you are going back to Thailand without a job! Why don’t you just stay here?”  

Here is why.

I secured a job within the first week of being back with almost zero effort.  I was actually contacted via Facebook about the job by a person I didn’t know who had been given my name by another teacher in town.  In addition, I have now been approached about various extra classes and conversation groups (all paying).  The job I had before I moved to Thailand took me almost a year to get with me applying to an average of 10-12 places a WEEK. 

I never had qualms about going back to Thailand without a job.  I took measures to ensure that I wouldn’t be stranded in the country should NOTHING work out (raised the limit on my credit card, budgeted so that I could spend three months in the country without a job and without a problem).  But mostly, I just knew I couldn’t give up because I lost ONE measly job.  Plenty of people move to Thailand without a job ahead of time.  I was actually one of the rare cases of a person who gets a job outside the country.  I was not ready to throw in the towel.  And I now feel a huge weight lifted off of me.  I look forward to the next year, possibly two, in Thailand with optimism and hope and a more adventurous and trusting spirit. (And look forward to a Foreign Income Credit on my tax return.)

Viva Thailand!