Hey all!
Another great week here. I have now been here just long enough to start looking back a month. It is interesting to realize how much I have learned here. I finally kinda know the streets around my house. I know the dogs that terrorize the neighborhood at night and which ones you should stomp at and which ones will stop following you if you just ignore their barking and growling. I know my classes and what students I will have in each class almost without looking at the schedule. I know a few Thai words and phrases and I am getting a better idea of the weird nooks and crannies semi-hidden in any foreign culture. For example, respect is age-based. So every 5 seconds when someone asks you your age it is because they are trying to rank you in their internal roledex of who should 'wei' (bow) who and who's hands should be higher in the prayer position (the higher the hands the more respect, screw this up and you become a cartoon). I am also gettin better at not getting ripped off by taxi drivers and such. And, while I don't want to get ahead of myself here, the bus and transportation system here is starting to seem a little less like it was designed by a drunken german shepard. I am also getting to know the names of foods (which is incredibly helpful). This week I learned that my most favorite soup that I have been ordering at school everyday (because it is the only thing with vegetables and that is not deep fried) is not actually called "Ka-tomb" like a student told me, but "lang-gnah." Apparently, "Ka-tomb" is actually "Cartoon" and I was ordering anime everytime I asked for soup. Instead of telling me that I had been set up, everyone behind the counter just laughed at me (I thought they were laughing with me) and gave me what they knew I wanted. They didn't tell me so I wouldn't "loose face" (again, nooks and crannies).
This week at school I continued to get better at teaching. sweet. I am trying to add more games to my classes because somehow, learning about stocks and bonds in english is boring to them. i don't get it at all hahah.
This week I joined the music club at school. I get to pick a christmas song and teach it to them, which will then be performed at some big ceremonial stratching of the buttocks! cool! Anyone have any suggestions? I was thinking of doing that one "and i'm offering this simple phrase..." I kinda don't want to do one that has too much of the Jesus stuff in it for obvious reasons. When I was introducing myself to the music club, I asked them what instruments they all played. There is like 60-70 students so I was having them raise their hands for each instrument. To make it easier to understand, I pantomined each instrument. So I went through the obvious ones, guitar, bass, drums. trumpet, cello.... it is not called a cello here. the word "cello" here refers to when you masturbate someone else. So there I was, pretenting to hold the neck of the cello up high with my left hand and working the bow back and forth with my right. I knew something was wrong when the students were rolling with laughter and the teachers looked horrified. Luckily, we all had a good laugh about it after we got it all figured out. Also, to those people who said I should have learned some Thai before I came.... yes, you were right. congrats.
This week my friend Johnny and I went to go play football (translation: soccer) after school with some students. This was the same group that watched me make an ass of myself during badminton. and again, an ass i did make. It was really fun though and they are all craaazy good! They play really really hard and keep it really goofy. def good fun
This saturday I went with friends on a day trip to Ayudhya. It used to be the capital of Thailand from 1350 to 1767 and is really really cool. It is filled with ruins and really old temples and giant giant giant Buddhas. We rented the services of a tuk tuk driver who took us to all of the cool spots and waited for us while we checked them all out. It is a really really really cool town. I love old ruins and this place crawls with them. It def reminded me of living in Rome. The city was set up at the convergence of like three rivers so there are waterways everywhere. Whats better, the hour long train was about 50 cents round trip and the Tuk Tuk was like 5 bucks each for the entire 4 hour tour. Granted, I am not getting paid in American dollars here so I have to be somewhat careful when converting stuff to american dollars (cause it gets waaay to easy to spend money I might not be making). I will def put up pics of it soon. If you want to learn more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayutthaya_Kingdom cause I am too lazy to type about it.
The trains we took were pretty old school and on the way back I sat (by choice) in the stairway that you climb to get onto the train. In the pleasantly warm Thai air, I watched the countryside fly by right infront of me, backlit by an epic sunset. it was pretty freakin sweet.
Last night (saturday night) I went with a bunch of friends to a big techno party. It was in a really touristy section of town so i wasn't really looking forward to it. However, it was fuuuuuun! I really like a type of techno called drum and bass and they played some good stuff! There were quite a few westerners and australians there and I made some cool new friends that I am going to try and travel with. After partying friday night and last night, i was more than eager to rest today. I sat in the awesome park right by my apartment and it was very relaxing.
ok, thats all for now. Im gonna go relax and try to get to bed early! Much love yall
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Home
Hey all. (careful, this is a long one)
I feel settled! I feel with however much certainty is possible in this country, that I will work at my school for at least the next few months and that I will remain in my current apartment for at least the next few months. It feels good. It has even taken me a little while to really get that I am in Thailand and will be staying here for a little bit. But now, I am starting to understand the various forms of transportation, I am getting a better and better grasp of my students (including discipline), and I finally know and can almost pronounce the name of the street I live on!!!! I'm in.
and for your information I live on Ratthinatibet... street... or road.... or way..... blvd?
So, now that I live here and all, more things I have noticed.
1. gossip is important. Not to say that it is not a past time all over the world, but here it is the preferred method of conflict resolution. Instead of "losing face" (or causing someone else to) by approaching someone and saying a bit of constructive criticism, you tell a mutual friend (or several) and they do the work. It is a hard one for me to really understand, but I can see its value in avoiding conflict... kinda
2. My apartment has a bedroom, a bathroom, and a balcony. I have an air conditioner, a desk, a very firm mattress (all of the beds here are made of limestone and steel), no hot water (not that I would use it), and an American style toilet! I am the first one to live in this apartment, I tore the plastic off of my limestone and steel mattress!
3. It seems that most people eat a majority of their meals out at little sidewalk carts. They are typically very good. On the off chance that they are bad, they are baaaad. A lot of people speak english here but a lot of people speak none. I am getting very good use out of a present that my last job gave me. It is a book full of pictures that I can point to if I don't know the word for something. Meals generally range from 1-2 US dollars. Generally, with the food carts, the meat and everything sits out in the sun all day until you order it. A very common thing is for the meat to be cooked halfway in the morning, then cooked the rest of the way when you order it. Still tastes very good. There is some amount of raw-meat-dishes here where incredibly spicy chillies act as disinfectant.... but usually only can manage a small bite of those (very very spicy).
4. Work. I get to work at 7:30 every morning. I can walk there from my apartment. Unfortunately, it is already so hot at 7:30 that I am sweating for a good while after I arrive. A few times already Johnny and I have been picked up by coworkers or students driving to school. sweeeet. I teach classes in the morning and have afternoons free to lesson plan. Most Thai teachers have more classes but they teach the same one or two over and over again all week. I have several subjects (English for food and beverage service, E for communication, E conversation, E for Business Communications... etc). My classes are somewhat hard to teach cause I will have to teach terms the students haven't really heard to much and teach them in english. For example, I had to teach a class about stocks. They did not know what stocks were in Thai, and I had to explain the whole concept in English. Its fun though. The other day I went to a class and no students showed. My co-teacher did not show. Finally, after preparing everything on the whiteboard I went and found my co-teacher to ask her if the class had been canceled. She didn't know and it turns out it had been canceled. flexibility! The only not fun thing about work are meetings. Out of five days a week, the school averages 3 or 4. And, they are long. I am supposed to be done with my day at 4:30. This past tuesday, I found out at 2 that there was a meeting at 3. When we showed up to the meeting there was coffee and pastries in front of the room (so you know I was stoked at first). Seeing this made all the Thai teachers grumble because it is apparently the sign of a long meeting. 3 hours and 40 minutes after the start of the meeting I was able to clock out. and no, no overtime. Between tues, wed, and thurs, I had to sit through almost 10 hours of meetings. All in Thai. So boring. In the tuesday meeting, we had to look at slides from the directors vacation to Japan (cause he spent a small amount of time at a school and wanted to show the teachers what is different at another school... but he covered more of his vacation than the school grumble grumble). Apparently, around 50 teachers quit this school every semester because they can no longer put up with the meetings. I learned this at an around 50 person meeting for all of the new staff. Most of the meetings are lead by a woman that Johnny and I have affectionately named "monotonedragonladywithmouthdiarrhea." Also, most teachers use microphones in class, even if there are only like 10 students in the class. I only use the microphone to make the feedback noise if I have a big class that wont shut up. Other methods of quieting conversations are: 1. timeout. You have to sit in a chair facing the corner and think about what you did 2. Sit out in the hall and think about what you did. etc..
5. Transportation. There is a lot of public transportation in Thailand, and it is all really confusing. There are Taxis, they drive like madmen. Tuk tuks, are three wheeled taxis that make the actual taxis look like cautious drivers. There are public buses (some are air conditioned and are more expensive) and private buses (the drivers of which apparently don't get paid well enough so they drive crazy). There are minivans that act kinda like buses but are a bit faster. There are Songtos (Sp.?) which are trucks with benches in the back and a cover over the top. You can also pay a moto taxi to take you on the back of his or her scooter. Thai women sit side saddle on these bad boys. It looks like the sketchiest thing ever, like one little bump and there she goes.
6. Bathrooms. In general, the public bathrooms that you have to pay for are going to be the only ones that have toilet paper, well, that might have toilet paper. The bathrooms at the school don't have toilet paper, paper towels (or other hand drying system) or soap. I understand the no TP and paper-towel thing.... but no soap??? I'm all about instant hand sanitizer now.
7. From my apartment, it takes about an hour and a half to get into central bangkok. Its not that far a distance, its just a busy journey involving buses and trains.
last thing about me living here is that Thai culture is pretty shallow and very appearance oriented. This week, on of me fellow teachers asked me to try and tuck in my lip. (Ashley, I know you are lovin' this right now). Obviously I did my best to explain to her that we are all different and wonderful in our own ways and that some of us were just born with big lips.
Oh, and also. I don't know if you remember that I was thinking about maybe staying in Ban Phe and doing an online course. Well, some people did stay there (some by choice, and some cause the didn't get a position) and those people are screwed now cause the Korea thing fell through! looks like I made the right choice! (its really a bummer though cause some people are going back to their home countries cause they are so fed up).
the rest of this post will be a wrap up on my week. i hope it wont be too long:
As I wrote above this work week was filled with meetings. That was lame. What wasn't lame was getting to know my students better. I now have an ok idea when I walk to a class how many students there should be and their levels of ability. kinda. haha. One highlight of the week was going to play badminton with some students and two teachers after school. When I got there I was joking around and just kinda bein goofy (pretending to stretch, teaching my students what the word ambulance meant then telling them to call one for themselves etc..). Little did I know I was about to make an ass out of myself on the court. It is fascinating to watch people who are good at badminton play. The shuttlecock moves so fast and their reaction time is stellar. My reaction time however, is a little bit less than stellar. Ignoring the rules of physics, a shuttlecock will be moving near the speed of light one second, and dead stopped in the air the next second. If i didn't swing hard and miss, I most likely just didn't see the damn thing coming at all. By the end I was doing alright, but nothing compared to everyone else there. After the games we all went out to eat. On the table at any given time was whole fish that looked like it just accidentally swam into the fryer (its face battered and frozen in a position of "oh shit!"), raw beef, raw prawns, soup, liver, spicy papaya salad, and a whole bunch of grilled meat. It was delicious.
On friday after work, my friend Johnny and I headed down to a town named Pattaya (about 2 hours on a bus out of BKK) because the next morning we were meeting friends of ours and going out to an island off the coast of Pattaya. Pattaya is the capital of sex tourism in a country known for sex tourism. It is not a huge town but it is overrun with ODWM (i hate them i hate them i haaate them). I have been in red light districts before but this one is probably the most disturbing I have seen. It looks like at one time it was a really beautiful little beach town that became one big red light district as Thailand became a tourist destination. It is physically difficult to walk some of the streets because there will be 4 women lined up, blocking a street, and trying to drag you into whatever bar they are "affiliated" with. Its hard cause you want to be nice and just say "no thank you" but sometimes you have to do some foot work to get their hands unclenched from your arm so you can walk away. Johnny and I found a cool bar where we could watch a band, and hung out on the beach for a bit. Overall it was a fun night but I was more than eager to leave the next morning.
The next morning Johnny and I quickly checked out another beach then met up with our friends Cara and Stephanie and ferried out to an Island named Ko Larn. It was BANGIN! It is not far off the coast but it is refreshingly underdeveloped. It is not empty by any means but it is still very green. We arrived on Samae beach and took moto taxis to a place called Monkey beach. Monkey beach = BANGIN!!!! It is very secluded and while between 11 and 3 there are some people on the beach, it is not very crowded at all. Interestingly, the only people that we saw were some Thai people and a bunch of russians. The beach was all russians. And they are pale, and frequently hairy... and they loooove skimy skimpy swimwear. Monkey beach is in a beautiful cove with lots of sea life and water that is crazy crazy warm.... oh yeah, and there are monkeys! lots of little monkeys! You can feed them bananas and they aren't really afraid of people. You can just sit down and they will come up to your and crawl around on you (and if you are holding a bag of bananas, they feel no shame in trying to take them). They were a lot of fun.
The beach was so nice that we rented a bungalow on the beach and set up camp. We made friends with a pretty peculiar native dude and he took us out of an even more peculiar bar/restaurant/karaoke/snooker place. The roads on this island are dark and empty. The bar thing was also empty except for several very inebriated Thai people (our friend/guide started out tipsy and was well souped by the end of the night). After eating a bunch of fresh fish (again, fried whole with the "oh shit" expression) and fried rice, we went back and sat on the beach sipping Thai whiskey for a while. It was so peaceful. The breeze was warm, the sea was very gentle. It was a good night!
Sunday morning came and we relaxed on the beach more, did more snorkeling, fed more monkeys and headed back to the mainland and came home. It was a great morning followed by a fantastically pain-free travel home. It was a great weekend!
I will post pics tomorrow, too tired right now!
--jon
I feel settled! I feel with however much certainty is possible in this country, that I will work at my school for at least the next few months and that I will remain in my current apartment for at least the next few months. It feels good. It has even taken me a little while to really get that I am in Thailand and will be staying here for a little bit. But now, I am starting to understand the various forms of transportation, I am getting a better and better grasp of my students (including discipline), and I finally know and can almost pronounce the name of the street I live on!!!! I'm in.
and for your information I live on Ratthinatibet... street... or road.... or way..... blvd?
So, now that I live here and all, more things I have noticed.
1. gossip is important. Not to say that it is not a past time all over the world, but here it is the preferred method of conflict resolution. Instead of "losing face" (or causing someone else to) by approaching someone and saying a bit of constructive criticism, you tell a mutual friend (or several) and they do the work. It is a hard one for me to really understand, but I can see its value in avoiding conflict... kinda
2. My apartment has a bedroom, a bathroom, and a balcony. I have an air conditioner, a desk, a very firm mattress (all of the beds here are made of limestone and steel), no hot water (not that I would use it), and an American style toilet! I am the first one to live in this apartment, I tore the plastic off of my limestone and steel mattress!
3. It seems that most people eat a majority of their meals out at little sidewalk carts. They are typically very good. On the off chance that they are bad, they are baaaad. A lot of people speak english here but a lot of people speak none. I am getting very good use out of a present that my last job gave me. It is a book full of pictures that I can point to if I don't know the word for something. Meals generally range from 1-2 US dollars. Generally, with the food carts, the meat and everything sits out in the sun all day until you order it. A very common thing is for the meat to be cooked halfway in the morning, then cooked the rest of the way when you order it. Still tastes very good. There is some amount of raw-meat-dishes here where incredibly spicy chillies act as disinfectant.... but usually only can manage a small bite of those (very very spicy).
4. Work. I get to work at 7:30 every morning. I can walk there from my apartment. Unfortunately, it is already so hot at 7:30 that I am sweating for a good while after I arrive. A few times already Johnny and I have been picked up by coworkers or students driving to school. sweeeet. I teach classes in the morning and have afternoons free to lesson plan. Most Thai teachers have more classes but they teach the same one or two over and over again all week. I have several subjects (English for food and beverage service, E for communication, E conversation, E for Business Communications... etc). My classes are somewhat hard to teach cause I will have to teach terms the students haven't really heard to much and teach them in english. For example, I had to teach a class about stocks. They did not know what stocks were in Thai, and I had to explain the whole concept in English. Its fun though. The other day I went to a class and no students showed. My co-teacher did not show. Finally, after preparing everything on the whiteboard I went and found my co-teacher to ask her if the class had been canceled. She didn't know and it turns out it had been canceled. flexibility! The only not fun thing about work are meetings. Out of five days a week, the school averages 3 or 4. And, they are long. I am supposed to be done with my day at 4:30. This past tuesday, I found out at 2 that there was a meeting at 3. When we showed up to the meeting there was coffee and pastries in front of the room (so you know I was stoked at first). Seeing this made all the Thai teachers grumble because it is apparently the sign of a long meeting. 3 hours and 40 minutes after the start of the meeting I was able to clock out. and no, no overtime. Between tues, wed, and thurs, I had to sit through almost 10 hours of meetings. All in Thai. So boring. In the tuesday meeting, we had to look at slides from the directors vacation to Japan (cause he spent a small amount of time at a school and wanted to show the teachers what is different at another school... but he covered more of his vacation than the school grumble grumble). Apparently, around 50 teachers quit this school every semester because they can no longer put up with the meetings. I learned this at an around 50 person meeting for all of the new staff. Most of the meetings are lead by a woman that Johnny and I have affectionately named "monotonedragonladywithmouthdiarrhea." Also, most teachers use microphones in class, even if there are only like 10 students in the class. I only use the microphone to make the feedback noise if I have a big class that wont shut up. Other methods of quieting conversations are: 1. timeout. You have to sit in a chair facing the corner and think about what you did 2. Sit out in the hall and think about what you did. etc..
5. Transportation. There is a lot of public transportation in Thailand, and it is all really confusing. There are Taxis, they drive like madmen. Tuk tuks, are three wheeled taxis that make the actual taxis look like cautious drivers. There are public buses (some are air conditioned and are more expensive) and private buses (the drivers of which apparently don't get paid well enough so they drive crazy). There are minivans that act kinda like buses but are a bit faster. There are Songtos (Sp.?) which are trucks with benches in the back and a cover over the top. You can also pay a moto taxi to take you on the back of his or her scooter. Thai women sit side saddle on these bad boys. It looks like the sketchiest thing ever, like one little bump and there she goes.
6. Bathrooms. In general, the public bathrooms that you have to pay for are going to be the only ones that have toilet paper, well, that might have toilet paper. The bathrooms at the school don't have toilet paper, paper towels (or other hand drying system) or soap. I understand the no TP and paper-towel thing.... but no soap??? I'm all about instant hand sanitizer now.
7. From my apartment, it takes about an hour and a half to get into central bangkok. Its not that far a distance, its just a busy journey involving buses and trains.
last thing about me living here is that Thai culture is pretty shallow and very appearance oriented. This week, on of me fellow teachers asked me to try and tuck in my lip. (Ashley, I know you are lovin' this right now). Obviously I did my best to explain to her that we are all different and wonderful in our own ways and that some of us were just born with big lips.
Oh, and also. I don't know if you remember that I was thinking about maybe staying in Ban Phe and doing an online course. Well, some people did stay there (some by choice, and some cause the didn't get a position) and those people are screwed now cause the Korea thing fell through! looks like I made the right choice! (its really a bummer though cause some people are going back to their home countries cause they are so fed up).
the rest of this post will be a wrap up on my week. i hope it wont be too long:
As I wrote above this work week was filled with meetings. That was lame. What wasn't lame was getting to know my students better. I now have an ok idea when I walk to a class how many students there should be and their levels of ability. kinda. haha. One highlight of the week was going to play badminton with some students and two teachers after school. When I got there I was joking around and just kinda bein goofy (pretending to stretch, teaching my students what the word ambulance meant then telling them to call one for themselves etc..). Little did I know I was about to make an ass out of myself on the court. It is fascinating to watch people who are good at badminton play. The shuttlecock moves so fast and their reaction time is stellar. My reaction time however, is a little bit less than stellar. Ignoring the rules of physics, a shuttlecock will be moving near the speed of light one second, and dead stopped in the air the next second. If i didn't swing hard and miss, I most likely just didn't see the damn thing coming at all. By the end I was doing alright, but nothing compared to everyone else there. After the games we all went out to eat. On the table at any given time was whole fish that looked like it just accidentally swam into the fryer (its face battered and frozen in a position of "oh shit!"), raw beef, raw prawns, soup, liver, spicy papaya salad, and a whole bunch of grilled meat. It was delicious.
On friday after work, my friend Johnny and I headed down to a town named Pattaya (about 2 hours on a bus out of BKK) because the next morning we were meeting friends of ours and going out to an island off the coast of Pattaya. Pattaya is the capital of sex tourism in a country known for sex tourism. It is not a huge town but it is overrun with ODWM (i hate them i hate them i haaate them). I have been in red light districts before but this one is probably the most disturbing I have seen. It looks like at one time it was a really beautiful little beach town that became one big red light district as Thailand became a tourist destination. It is physically difficult to walk some of the streets because there will be 4 women lined up, blocking a street, and trying to drag you into whatever bar they are "affiliated" with. Its hard cause you want to be nice and just say "no thank you" but sometimes you have to do some foot work to get their hands unclenched from your arm so you can walk away. Johnny and I found a cool bar where we could watch a band, and hung out on the beach for a bit. Overall it was a fun night but I was more than eager to leave the next morning.
The next morning Johnny and I quickly checked out another beach then met up with our friends Cara and Stephanie and ferried out to an Island named Ko Larn. It was BANGIN! It is not far off the coast but it is refreshingly underdeveloped. It is not empty by any means but it is still very green. We arrived on Samae beach and took moto taxis to a place called Monkey beach. Monkey beach = BANGIN!!!! It is very secluded and while between 11 and 3 there are some people on the beach, it is not very crowded at all. Interestingly, the only people that we saw were some Thai people and a bunch of russians. The beach was all russians. And they are pale, and frequently hairy... and they loooove skimy skimpy swimwear. Monkey beach is in a beautiful cove with lots of sea life and water that is crazy crazy warm.... oh yeah, and there are monkeys! lots of little monkeys! You can feed them bananas and they aren't really afraid of people. You can just sit down and they will come up to your and crawl around on you (and if you are holding a bag of bananas, they feel no shame in trying to take them). They were a lot of fun.
The beach was so nice that we rented a bungalow on the beach and set up camp. We made friends with a pretty peculiar native dude and he took us out of an even more peculiar bar/restaurant/karaoke/snooker place. The roads on this island are dark and empty. The bar thing was also empty except for several very inebriated Thai people (our friend/guide started out tipsy and was well souped by the end of the night). After eating a bunch of fresh fish (again, fried whole with the "oh shit" expression) and fried rice, we went back and sat on the beach sipping Thai whiskey for a while. It was so peaceful. The breeze was warm, the sea was very gentle. It was a good night!
Sunday morning came and we relaxed on the beach more, did more snorkeling, fed more monkeys and headed back to the mainland and came home. It was a great morning followed by a fantastically pain-free travel home. It was a great weekend!
I will post pics tomorrow, too tired right now!
--jon
Sunday, November 8, 2009
pictures
http://www.flickr.com/photos/44422040@N02/show/with/4085779322/
hey still trying to find a good website to post pics to. Let me know if you have any ideas!
//--jon
hey still trying to find a good website to post pics to. Let me know if you have any ideas!
//--jon
Saturday, November 7, 2009
flexibility
Hey all,
So this past Monday was my first day of work here in Bangkok. There were 5 of us from my training program who got lined up to work at the same school. Arriving at the school on monday was a trip. All 5,000 students were out on the quad. The school was holding a series of announcements because it was the first day of the semester. As we were the only non-Asian people at the school we attracted a bit of attention. It is quite weird to have 5,000 pairs of eyes looking at you, and 5,000 mouths talking about you. After arriving at the school we were quickly brought into the 1970's chic office where we sat alone for a couple hours. We were then picked up by the private company that contracted us to the school (Siam Computer and Language School) and told that the very same day we signed our contracts (last saturday) the school had given the jobs to another company, quite possibly one who had bribed the headmaster of the school. I had already heard that contracts frequently don't mean very much here in Thailand.
My actual contract is with the company Siam comp/language school. As an organization they have two branches which they call external and internal. We originally worked for External, which places workers in government run schools. Internal runs a variety of private schools ranging from vocational to week long language camps for corporations. In Thailand, school is only really mandatory until like age 14 or 15 (not sure about this, I will check and report back). Most students then go to a private vocational school and from there some go on to University. On monday, after learning that we would not be working at the public school, the 5 of us visited two of Siam's vocational schools and by the end of the day had been divided up, 2 at one school and 3 of the other. The school which took two people was quite far from our apartments so no one in our group of 5 wanted to work there. After learning that I would be working in a private school and not a public school, I began to consider going back to the town I trained in and doing teaching online classes. While I really didn't want to teach online, I also didn't really want to teach a school full of exceptionally privileged students. Because of how unsure I was that I would stay in Bangkok I volunteered to be considered for the far school. After learning that this school was actually for middle class students (about the same population that I would have had in a public school) I agreed to give it a try. After my first day of work I was in for sure.
There are a lot of benefits to working in a private school. Firstly for me, they are air-conditioned. Seeing as this place is giving me heat-rash I was definitely happy to hear/feel that. All of the staff is really nice and for the most part my department (foreign languages) is really young and fun. The students are all really fun and many of them quite talented. The school has a music club, a breakdance team, a football (translation: soccer) team, and several different dance squads and cheerleader teams. Education in Thailand works on a no-fail policy. There is this idea of "saving face," which means that people are not confrontational, it is very hard to get feedback on anything, and students don't fail. This last policy is not as big at our school as others but it is still a very prominent theme in the classroom. I say this because the lack of fear of failure gives students license to come in late and not pay attention. I am still a little cautious of using the discipline thing too much cause I am still learning the school culture and I don't want to rock the boat. Over the course of the first week I came down more and more heavily on the discipline but more than that I am learning how I can make my lessons fun and interesting. I strongly feel that in any system that is the best form of discipline. If the students are engaged they don't really cause problems. Working at the school as been really fun. There is actually one weird thing with the school. My friend Johnny and I are the only non Asians at the school (and I don't think the school has had any for a while). This has produced a large amount of celebrity for us. The Thai culture is very infatuated with the west, almost all of the lotions and beauty creams have bleach in them and are advertised as helping people get "healthy white skin." It is so weird to see how this infatuation plays out in a school. We walk onto campus and we get immediate attention. Small groups of students will nervously walk up to us and talk a little bit, then run away giggling. Even the teachers here dig us way too much! This week the school held a ceremony and invited the Thai minister of education and all sorts of important people. In this big long ceremony pretty much all of the students were involved in some way and Johnny and I were dressed up in native Thai gear and marched around with some students playing these cool drums! Sweet! I think I ended up on Thai news!! There are two teachers that have been assigned to us to help us get acclimated. Students walk up to them and will speak in hyper Thai to them and then the teachers will turn to us and sigh "the students want to know if they can talk to you..." It is weird. I fully expect this celebrity to fade and I hope it does soon. Although I will admit (somewhat shamefully), that it has made leading an engaging classroom somewhat easier haha. The teachers that were assigned to us have been amazing. At school they make sure that we know what is going on and after school this week they took us apartment shopping (this new school was so far from our apartment that johnny and I had to move). They found us another amazing apartment that is walking distance from the school. I think the Thai teachers efforts are much more out of an amazing sense of hospitality verses this celebrity thing, at least I hope so. They have been soo nice. On friday night most of our department went out for Korean BBQ (a buffet or raw meat that you cook on grills at your table!) and then some of us went to a club afterward. The club was a lot of fun. For a while a live band played. It had a lot of rotating singers and one of them was a lady-boy (translation: male to female transgender) who was hilarious! She only sang a few songs but had a stand-up routine in between them. Her main bit was bringing up a young Thai guy up on stage and essentially molesting him to make him uncomfortable. It was quite funny!
Yesterday I went to one of the biggest malls I have ever seen. It is a tourist attraction here called MBK. I hope I never go back haha.
Ok, this post is getting long and i have a very important schedule today of playing guitar in a park near my house! very very important haha!
i will try to post pics tonight!
--jON
So this past Monday was my first day of work here in Bangkok. There were 5 of us from my training program who got lined up to work at the same school. Arriving at the school on monday was a trip. All 5,000 students were out on the quad. The school was holding a series of announcements because it was the first day of the semester. As we were the only non-Asian people at the school we attracted a bit of attention. It is quite weird to have 5,000 pairs of eyes looking at you, and 5,000 mouths talking about you. After arriving at the school we were quickly brought into the 1970's chic office where we sat alone for a couple hours. We were then picked up by the private company that contracted us to the school (Siam Computer and Language School) and told that the very same day we signed our contracts (last saturday) the school had given the jobs to another company, quite possibly one who had bribed the headmaster of the school. I had already heard that contracts frequently don't mean very much here in Thailand.
My actual contract is with the company Siam comp/language school. As an organization they have two branches which they call external and internal. We originally worked for External, which places workers in government run schools. Internal runs a variety of private schools ranging from vocational to week long language camps for corporations. In Thailand, school is only really mandatory until like age 14 or 15 (not sure about this, I will check and report back). Most students then go to a private vocational school and from there some go on to University. On monday, after learning that we would not be working at the public school, the 5 of us visited two of Siam's vocational schools and by the end of the day had been divided up, 2 at one school and 3 of the other. The school which took two people was quite far from our apartments so no one in our group of 5 wanted to work there. After learning that I would be working in a private school and not a public school, I began to consider going back to the town I trained in and doing teaching online classes. While I really didn't want to teach online, I also didn't really want to teach a school full of exceptionally privileged students. Because of how unsure I was that I would stay in Bangkok I volunteered to be considered for the far school. After learning that this school was actually for middle class students (about the same population that I would have had in a public school) I agreed to give it a try. After my first day of work I was in for sure.
There are a lot of benefits to working in a private school. Firstly for me, they are air-conditioned. Seeing as this place is giving me heat-rash I was definitely happy to hear/feel that. All of the staff is really nice and for the most part my department (foreign languages) is really young and fun. The students are all really fun and many of them quite talented. The school has a music club, a breakdance team, a football (translation: soccer) team, and several different dance squads and cheerleader teams. Education in Thailand works on a no-fail policy. There is this idea of "saving face," which means that people are not confrontational, it is very hard to get feedback on anything, and students don't fail. This last policy is not as big at our school as others but it is still a very prominent theme in the classroom. I say this because the lack of fear of failure gives students license to come in late and not pay attention. I am still a little cautious of using the discipline thing too much cause I am still learning the school culture and I don't want to rock the boat. Over the course of the first week I came down more and more heavily on the discipline but more than that I am learning how I can make my lessons fun and interesting. I strongly feel that in any system that is the best form of discipline. If the students are engaged they don't really cause problems. Working at the school as been really fun. There is actually one weird thing with the school. My friend Johnny and I are the only non Asians at the school (and I don't think the school has had any for a while). This has produced a large amount of celebrity for us. The Thai culture is very infatuated with the west, almost all of the lotions and beauty creams have bleach in them and are advertised as helping people get "healthy white skin." It is so weird to see how this infatuation plays out in a school. We walk onto campus and we get immediate attention. Small groups of students will nervously walk up to us and talk a little bit, then run away giggling. Even the teachers here dig us way too much! This week the school held a ceremony and invited the Thai minister of education and all sorts of important people. In this big long ceremony pretty much all of the students were involved in some way and Johnny and I were dressed up in native Thai gear and marched around with some students playing these cool drums! Sweet! I think I ended up on Thai news!! There are two teachers that have been assigned to us to help us get acclimated. Students walk up to them and will speak in hyper Thai to them and then the teachers will turn to us and sigh "the students want to know if they can talk to you..." It is weird. I fully expect this celebrity to fade and I hope it does soon. Although I will admit (somewhat shamefully), that it has made leading an engaging classroom somewhat easier haha. The teachers that were assigned to us have been amazing. At school they make sure that we know what is going on and after school this week they took us apartment shopping (this new school was so far from our apartment that johnny and I had to move). They found us another amazing apartment that is walking distance from the school. I think the Thai teachers efforts are much more out of an amazing sense of hospitality verses this celebrity thing, at least I hope so. They have been soo nice. On friday night most of our department went out for Korean BBQ (a buffet or raw meat that you cook on grills at your table!) and then some of us went to a club afterward. The club was a lot of fun. For a while a live band played. It had a lot of rotating singers and one of them was a lady-boy (translation: male to female transgender) who was hilarious! She only sang a few songs but had a stand-up routine in between them. Her main bit was bringing up a young Thai guy up on stage and essentially molesting him to make him uncomfortable. It was quite funny!
Yesterday I went to one of the biggest malls I have ever seen. It is a tourist attraction here called MBK. I hope I never go back haha.
Ok, this post is getting long and i have a very important schedule today of playing guitar in a park near my house! very very important haha!
i will try to post pics tonight!
--jON
Sunday, November 1, 2009
ok, posting photos to this website is lame
http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=923361578703%3A898089526
go here
http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=923361578703%3A898089526
go here
http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=923361578703%3A898089526
Density
Hi all,
I just read my last blog post and it seems impossible that it was less than a week ago. From Tuesday to Friday, I would to observed teaching sessions with the monks in the monastery. The Monastery essentially serves as an orphanage. Boys are placed in a monastery if they are orphans or their parents cannot afford to take care of them. Life of a monk student is tough. Up every morning at 4, prayers till six when they do breakfast. For breakfast all of the monks are given metal bowls and roam the streets asking (not begging) for food. Monasteries are generally supported by the immediate community (breakfast donations are just one of many types of donations). For the rest of the morning the students take classes until eleven when they get their lunch. This is their last meal until 6 the next morning. The afternoon is spent working around the monastery. Pulling up and moving trees, replacing corrugated-metal roofs, digging ponds and water wells; all of this is done barefoot (or maybe in sandals). Monks in general cannot own belongings, listen to music or do any number of fun things (ha). The monk students follow many of these rules with exceptions. For example, they are allowed to learn how to work computers and use the internet because after they turn 18 they graduate from the monastery and are allowed to go to university. This is a pretty amazing opportunity for most poor kids in Thailand. Most monk students stop being monks when they turn 18.
Teaching the monks was fun. I hate the teaching methods that the TEFL organization had us learn. They are very dry, stilted and repetitive beyond the point of allowing learning to the point of disengaging the student. Furthermore, being an "entertaining" teacher is strongly discouraged (naturally you can tell they loved me! haha). The dress code for teachers here is really annoying. Slacks, dress-shirt, some places a tie and no lip-rings. Lame! It feels so weird to have no metal in my lip. ah well. I say these rules are annoying cause it is so goddamned hot here. Yes, I want to look professional (kinda), but i don't think sweating through my dress shirt looks very professional.
I will try to keep this paragraph short. I strongly discourage anyone from using TEFL international if you want to teach english. They are incredibly disorganized, and they SUCK at communication. On tuesday they told the group of trainees that they did not actually expect to find teaching placements for us. Rather, we would be working on computers teaching english to businessmen in Korea (note: they knew about this two months ago). I was livid. Furthermore, getting anymore information on the subject was impossible and riddled with two lines that I have heard waaay too much here: "Don't get mad at me, that's not my job," and what might as well be embroidered on every Thai flag: "It's Thailand, be flexible." The TEFL people were/are very rude and did not seem to care that teaching on a computer was not why I came to Thailand. On the plus side, the computer teaching job is in the town that I arrived in and very much met my specifications: small and on an awesome beach!
As the week went by, a few placement opportunities popped up one by one but they all required ladies only. In Thailand, there is nothing against having a very strict hiring requirement when in comes to age, gender, disability, religion etc. When these opportunities, the TEFL people gave the girls in my training group 5 pestered minutes to decide if they would take the job with the absolute minimum of information of where they would be living, and who and what they would be teaching. Within an hour, whoever took the job would be in a van off to their site; without completing the week of on-site training. Two ladies are now at a school teaching every subject!
Midway through Friday morning, as I was preparing for a quite weekend of traveling around Ban Phe, the course director of TEFL comes the the group of trainees and says there are 5 spots in Bangkok, open to anyone under 40. Bangkok was not high on my priority list, but I would be guaranteed a classroom. Two hours later I was in a van.
Bangkok is huge, fast and very dense. The city scape stretches for miles and the apartment buildings radiate for many more in every direction. All of the roads are packed at all times. People drive fast and wild. Motos weave in and out of cars, taxis pass each other on skinny one-way alleys, and the three-wheeled "Tuk-Tuks" are not afraid of anything. There are public busses, private mini-van buses, and private big buses that (due to underpaid/undertrained drivers) are apparently the most dangerous thing on the road. There are also scooter drivers for higher. You can just jump on the back of someones bike and go wherever you want. Helmets are not very big in Thailand (people where them, but id say less than half of people on a moto have one on). In the small, sleepy Ban Phe I was blown away by the reckless driving. Here I am shocked by it. There are markets that stretch for miles and sell pretty much everything. These are tiring because of how close everything is. Lots of people, lots of merchandise in a small hot and humid space. It becomes overwhelming when the random stench floats by. (note: the smells of Thailand are amazing. There are definitely good smells, but frequently, out of nowhere, a rogue stench will pirate your nose and make you nauseous. To ward against stench and faintness, people carry around these little bottles that they huff from. I am still not sure what there are.) Most people do not cook at home but buy food from street vendors and eat on the sidewalk. The food is good, cheap and everywhere. There is a lot of fried stuff and a ton of hot-dog-like-or-filled-things. It is very common for one city block to have three 7-11s. They are frequently placed right across the street from one another, its bizarre.
I was set up with a really plush studio apartment on the northern outskirts of Bangkok. I am on the sixth floor on the south side with a pretty sweet city-scape view. The four other people from my program all have studios right next door/right below mine. In coming to Bangkok, I was effectively sold to another company and am being placed through them. I now report to a company called Siam Computer and Language School. So far they are great. Very organized, very kind, and very honest. They placed all five of us in the same government school.
Tomorrow is my first day. I will have 20 classes of at least 50 students each. How many non-UC-Berkeley-faculty teachers do you know that can say they have 1,000 students? Luckily, I get to throw-out everything TEFL taught me and go with the optional lesson plans that Siam has provided. They very much encourage me to be "engaging". As of right now, I know that I will have 16 year olds and 14 year olds. I do not know when any of my classes are, where they are or any of the details that usually accompany a job. Its ok though, it's Thailand, and I am being flexible.
I am very suprised by the open misogyny of this country. During the week, female teachers could not touch the monks, nor could they hand them a piece of paper. Rather, they would have to put the piece of paper (or chalk, or whatever) on a chair and the monk would then pick it up. There are lots of kinda general anti-women social rules (dress-code stuff and so forth), but nothing compares to the prostitution industry. I have long heard about how Thailand was a favorite destination for sex-tourism, but I somehow didn't think it would be as open and shameless as it is. Here in bangkok, a common scene at night is the old-dirty white man (ODWM) with the young pretty Thai girl in a 7-11 buying protection, and basic toiletries for the girl. These ODWM get me so angry. Even during the day you can spot them from a mile. They just walk with this posture that clearly indicates that they think that are hot-shit in a consequence-free playground. There was actually one in our trainee group. He was here to take and conquer and didn't seem to have an awareness that what he was doing might not be ok (This macho, mustache-laden used-car-salesman actually had business contacts back in Florida who he would sell the shells he would find on the beach. Next time you buy some touristy crap in florida, know you might be getting a piece of Thailand). It is so sad to me how easily these ODWM exploit financial inequality. What disgusts me is how none of them see it for what it is.
Ok, sorry to end on a downer note, but as I look at how long this post is, I bet most people didn't make it to the end anyway haha! ok, Im gonna post some pics!
--jon
I just read my last blog post and it seems impossible that it was less than a week ago. From Tuesday to Friday, I would to observed teaching sessions with the monks in the monastery. The Monastery essentially serves as an orphanage. Boys are placed in a monastery if they are orphans or their parents cannot afford to take care of them. Life of a monk student is tough. Up every morning at 4, prayers till six when they do breakfast. For breakfast all of the monks are given metal bowls and roam the streets asking (not begging) for food. Monasteries are generally supported by the immediate community (breakfast donations are just one of many types of donations). For the rest of the morning the students take classes until eleven when they get their lunch. This is their last meal until 6 the next morning. The afternoon is spent working around the monastery. Pulling up and moving trees, replacing corrugated-metal roofs, digging ponds and water wells; all of this is done barefoot (or maybe in sandals). Monks in general cannot own belongings, listen to music or do any number of fun things (ha). The monk students follow many of these rules with exceptions. For example, they are allowed to learn how to work computers and use the internet because after they turn 18 they graduate from the monastery and are allowed to go to university. This is a pretty amazing opportunity for most poor kids in Thailand. Most monk students stop being monks when they turn 18.
Teaching the monks was fun. I hate the teaching methods that the TEFL organization had us learn. They are very dry, stilted and repetitive beyond the point of allowing learning to the point of disengaging the student. Furthermore, being an "entertaining" teacher is strongly discouraged (naturally you can tell they loved me! haha). The dress code for teachers here is really annoying. Slacks, dress-shirt, some places a tie and no lip-rings. Lame! It feels so weird to have no metal in my lip. ah well. I say these rules are annoying cause it is so goddamned hot here. Yes, I want to look professional (kinda), but i don't think sweating through my dress shirt looks very professional.
I will try to keep this paragraph short. I strongly discourage anyone from using TEFL international if you want to teach english. They are incredibly disorganized, and they SUCK at communication. On tuesday they told the group of trainees that they did not actually expect to find teaching placements for us. Rather, we would be working on computers teaching english to businessmen in Korea (note: they knew about this two months ago). I was livid. Furthermore, getting anymore information on the subject was impossible and riddled with two lines that I have heard waaay too much here: "Don't get mad at me, that's not my job," and what might as well be embroidered on every Thai flag: "It's Thailand, be flexible." The TEFL people were/are very rude and did not seem to care that teaching on a computer was not why I came to Thailand. On the plus side, the computer teaching job is in the town that I arrived in and very much met my specifications: small and on an awesome beach!
As the week went by, a few placement opportunities popped up one by one but they all required ladies only. In Thailand, there is nothing against having a very strict hiring requirement when in comes to age, gender, disability, religion etc. When these opportunities, the TEFL people gave the girls in my training group 5 pestered minutes to decide if they would take the job with the absolute minimum of information of where they would be living, and who and what they would be teaching. Within an hour, whoever took the job would be in a van off to their site; without completing the week of on-site training. Two ladies are now at a school teaching every subject!
Midway through Friday morning, as I was preparing for a quite weekend of traveling around Ban Phe, the course director of TEFL comes the the group of trainees and says there are 5 spots in Bangkok, open to anyone under 40. Bangkok was not high on my priority list, but I would be guaranteed a classroom. Two hours later I was in a van.
Bangkok is huge, fast and very dense. The city scape stretches for miles and the apartment buildings radiate for many more in every direction. All of the roads are packed at all times. People drive fast and wild. Motos weave in and out of cars, taxis pass each other on skinny one-way alleys, and the three-wheeled "Tuk-Tuks" are not afraid of anything. There are public busses, private mini-van buses, and private big buses that (due to underpaid/undertrained drivers) are apparently the most dangerous thing on the road. There are also scooter drivers for higher. You can just jump on the back of someones bike and go wherever you want. Helmets are not very big in Thailand (people where them, but id say less than half of people on a moto have one on). In the small, sleepy Ban Phe I was blown away by the reckless driving. Here I am shocked by it. There are markets that stretch for miles and sell pretty much everything. These are tiring because of how close everything is. Lots of people, lots of merchandise in a small hot and humid space. It becomes overwhelming when the random stench floats by. (note: the smells of Thailand are amazing. There are definitely good smells, but frequently, out of nowhere, a rogue stench will pirate your nose and make you nauseous. To ward against stench and faintness, people carry around these little bottles that they huff from. I am still not sure what there are.) Most people do not cook at home but buy food from street vendors and eat on the sidewalk. The food is good, cheap and everywhere. There is a lot of fried stuff and a ton of hot-dog-like-or-filled-things. It is very common for one city block to have three 7-11s. They are frequently placed right across the street from one another, its bizarre.
I was set up with a really plush studio apartment on the northern outskirts of Bangkok. I am on the sixth floor on the south side with a pretty sweet city-scape view. The four other people from my program all have studios right next door/right below mine. In coming to Bangkok, I was effectively sold to another company and am being placed through them. I now report to a company called Siam Computer and Language School. So far they are great. Very organized, very kind, and very honest. They placed all five of us in the same government school.
Tomorrow is my first day. I will have 20 classes of at least 50 students each. How many non-UC-Berkeley-faculty teachers do you know that can say they have 1,000 students? Luckily, I get to throw-out everything TEFL taught me and go with the optional lesson plans that Siam has provided. They very much encourage me to be "engaging". As of right now, I know that I will have 16 year olds and 14 year olds. I do not know when any of my classes are, where they are or any of the details that usually accompany a job. Its ok though, it's Thailand, and I am being flexible.
I am very suprised by the open misogyny of this country. During the week, female teachers could not touch the monks, nor could they hand them a piece of paper. Rather, they would have to put the piece of paper (or chalk, or whatever) on a chair and the monk would then pick it up. There are lots of kinda general anti-women social rules (dress-code stuff and so forth), but nothing compares to the prostitution industry. I have long heard about how Thailand was a favorite destination for sex-tourism, but I somehow didn't think it would be as open and shameless as it is. Here in bangkok, a common scene at night is the old-dirty white man (ODWM) with the young pretty Thai girl in a 7-11 buying protection, and basic toiletries for the girl. These ODWM get me so angry. Even during the day you can spot them from a mile. They just walk with this posture that clearly indicates that they think that are hot-shit in a consequence-free playground. There was actually one in our trainee group. He was here to take and conquer and didn't seem to have an awareness that what he was doing might not be ok (This macho, mustache-laden used-car-salesman actually had business contacts back in Florida who he would sell the shells he would find on the beach. Next time you buy some touristy crap in florida, know you might be getting a piece of Thailand). It is so sad to me how easily these ODWM exploit financial inequality. What disgusts me is how none of them see it for what it is.
Ok, sorry to end on a downer note, but as I look at how long this post is, I bet most people didn't make it to the end anyway haha! ok, Im gonna post some pics!
--jon
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