#nakae

Today marks six weeks that I’ve lived in Thailand. Yesterday I woke up at 4:30 a.m. in order to board a van that would take myself and other teachers from my school to a teachers’ conference in Ubon. It felt strange to wake up while it was still dark. I sat on my porch and drank coffee and listened to what seemed to be all of the roosters in Na Kae talking to each other. I have grown accustomed to the rooster who lives in my yard. His cock-a-doodle-do has become as regular as the sound of construction I used to hear almost every morning from my bedroom in Brooklyn. While I sat outside I heard roosters that seemed like they were miles and miles away. Some of them were very close. Their callings were loud and sharp. Others were further away, more muffled and softer. They were all talking to each other and there I was, sitting still and silent. That was the one benefit about waking up at such an ungodly hour. I was able to experience something I otherwise miss out on everyday.

This past week I attended a going away party for the husband of one of my teachers. He was the director of a school here in Na Kae. The dinner party took place at the school. Dozens of tables and chairs were set up in the grass and the attention was focused to the front where there was what one may describe as a ground-leveled stage. The whole dinner was focused around the director and his wife standing in the center of the stage, opening gifts that people had given, posing with the gift and the person who gave the gift, and then having their photograph taken. There were children running around, little girls who looked to be five years old and younger with make up caked on their round faces. They looked like little clowns. There was an announcer screaming into the microphone the whole night too. He stood in the center of the stage and commented on the gifts that people brought. Or at least that’s what I assumed his role was. I did not understand what he was saying as it was all in Thai. Myself, and my two co-workers, as the foreigners, drew a lot of attention. The announcer brought the microphone to us and we had to stand up, introduce ourselves, and tell every one where we were from. When it was my turn to speak he asked if I liked Trump and I told the whole party that I hated him. The entire evening felt very surreal. That’s what a lot of my experiences living here have felt like. As if I’m constantly dreaming.

Today marks one month that I’ve lived in Thailand. I am slowly but surely getting more used to teaching. The students are very sweet and respectful. Every Monday the foreign teachers have to stand at the entrance of the school and greet the students. They have to wai (Thai greeting) to us but because there are so many of them we cannot wai back, we just send a nod of acknowledgement. Every morning we are expected to attend the morning assembly where the country’s flag is raised as well as several smaller flags. The students and the teachers sing the national anthem as well as the school anthem. All 2,000 students line up in the central field to take part in this morning ritual. All of the teachers line up in front of all the students. After we sing the two anthems we turn around and pray to the school Buddha. Then the students turn to face us, the teachers, and they recite 11 statements, promises that they will work hard and take advantage of the effort and dedication we give to educating them. It is very intense. 

I am slowly getting used to feeling like a celebrity in my village. In this part of Thailand there are no tourists and so as a white female, I receive a lot of attention. Everywhere I go there are always students calling out, “teacher, teacher!” The only privacy I can find is within my home, my small cottage shielded by gigantic lush greenery, and which I’m extremely thankful for. My schedule consists of about ten classes, each with forty or more students. I teach about 4- 5 classes a day. One of my biggest improvements thus far is projecting. In Thai culture, constant chatter is normal. Unlike in American schools, a teacher in Thailand cannot expect all of their students to sit quietly listening during the lesson. The trick I have found, is to constantly walk around the classroom so that those who are talking to their friend shift their focus to you. I have also started calling out students, asking them questions individually so as to force them to pay attention. 

As of right now I don’t consider myself a “good” teacher. I am afraid that my students will not perform well once I asses them. As the saying goes, I am afraid that what goes in one ear will go out the other. That said, I cannot allow myself to get caught up in worrying and obsessing about being the best teacher I can be. I have never taught before. All I got was two weeks of teacher training and then I was thrown into Thailand. I feel almost as if I’ve been plopped into the middle of a deep, dark, ocean and have been told to swim. In order to feel as if I’m not drowning I have to remind myself that no matter what the students are benefiting from my presence because I am a native speaker. One problem within the Thai education system is that students are taught by Thai teachers who themselves speak very little English. As a native speaker conducting classes only in English is in and of itself immensely helpful because students are given the benefit of hearing English spoken correctly on a daily basis. Every day has been filled with teaching from 7:30 A.M until 4:30 P.M. Once I’m home my agenda consist of lesson planning for the rest of the day. It’s interesting to switch from the life of a student to the life of a teacher in only four months. I’ve always loved school. I find that I enjoy lesson planning more so than I enjoy teaching itself. This may change. Or it may not. As a student you are mentally exhausted but as a teacher you are exhausted both mentally and physically. And so, TGIF- “Thank god It’s Friday” has risen to a whole new level since I’ve become a teacher. This past weekend I went to visit two friends- fellow volunteer teachers in a large village, or one may call a small city, called That Phanom. That Phanom is about twenty minutes away from where I live. There is not much to “do” in rural Thailand but to eat and enjoy conversations with those you surround yourself with. We did however manage to find what seemed to be the one bar in the entire city where all the hipsters seemed to hang out. I had never seen a Thai hipster before but sure enough they were all at this one bar. It had a great vibe. My favorite part about it was that the walls were covered with Thai written in chalk. So far, what I love most about my experience in Thailand are all the seemingly absurd things that happen so often. For example, the waiter at the bar was dressed in a full Pikachu pajama set. He was just walking around serving drinks and food in this pjs, as if that is something one always sees at a bar. While we were sitting down we also had a middle aged man come behind us and start massaging our backs without any warning or question as to whether we wanted a massage or not. We have learned to say small phrases such as “I do not want” and so we used the little, broken Thai we know to politely deny his services. Although we had never come across that yet, it seemed expected that in Thailand it would be someone’s job to approach strangers at a bar and offer massages. On that note, I have to add that in That Phanom there is a car wash that is also a massage parlor. You can go to wash your car and get a massage at the same time. It seems so funny to us as foreigners but I can just imagine that if I told that to a Thai person they would say something along the lines of, “well yes of course you can get a massage at the same time as you having your car washed. Why wouldn’t that be a thing?” 

This weekend we also went to a famous temple that tourists all over Thailand and all over the world travel to see. It was breathtakingly beautiful. We also sat along the Mekong River. We were not facing the sunset but we sat and looked across at Laos and watched the sky fade from a deep purple, to a bright pink, to a soft blue. What a beautiful thing it is to be able to sit in one country while looking at another. Somehow, everything seemed more possible. When Sunday came and it was time for me to return to Na Kae I was literally pushed onto the most crowded bus I had ever witnessed in my life. My arms and legs and back and hands were touching the arms and legs and backs and hands of strangers and we were all sweating but I knew that at least for the locals, this was normal. As more and more people were piled into the bus, I laughed with the people around me because although it was somewhat normal for them, it was nevertheless funny and ridiculous. I couldn’t help but think, “there is no way this is legal. “ And that is the beauty of Thailand. There is no way that was legal but that was the last bus of the afternoon and we live in the middle of rice fields and everyone at the bus station had to get home so, the bus driver made it work. I smiled to myself when I thought, “this, is Thailand.”