Incorporated

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