White Strings

After fifteen years together (in Thailand, kindergarten lasts three years), it's really hard for the graduating students to say goodbye to one another, especially at a school as small and close-knit as the one where I teach.

As the school year comes to a close, it's time for an annual school tradition: the M6 (senior) farewell trip. School life in Asia is quite different from that in the United States. Much of the students' lives revolve around their school, not just their studies, but the social aspect of school life is a huge part of their lives as well. The annual farewell trip is the last time the entire graduating class will be together (except for graduation), and is a chance for the students to say goodbye to the friends they've known for their entire lives, and to their teachers.

Petchaburi Beach

We boarded our three big busses, and, with a highway police escort, set off for the southern beach resort town of Petchaburi, quite close to Hua Hin. Again this year, we were staying at the officer's hotel directly on the beach.

I've been on the trip every year. Each one meant something different to me. The first year I just went for fun. I didn't teach M6 that year. My first year in Thailand, I was the main teacher for the M2 students, and only taught M1-4. While James and Ryan had meaningful goodbyes to say to their students, mostly it was just a fun time for me to hang out with my friends from work.

Last year was a little different, since I actually taught the M6 students, although only for one year. I made a point of saying goodbye and wishing luck to each of the students in my class.

But this year was really special for me. I've written so many times about how great class 46 is. I've been their teacher for three years now, and I was their main teacher last year in M5. I only got to teach 14 students in my writing class this year, and although I have taught most of these kids at one time or another, I have one core group who has been in my class for three years in a row. They're the ones who made me feel very welcome and encouraged as a teacher, and helped me decide to come back to Thailand for multiple years.

After a fun day on the beach (although I did end up getting baldly sunburnt), the students and teachers gathered together in the evening for the white string ceremony. It's the final farewell. Some of the teachers had prepared goodbye speeches to give. Although I hadn't prepared anything (because the entire ceremony is in Thai, so I really didn't think I would be asked to speak), they handed me a microphone, and I had to wing something. I think I did a pretty good job though!

Then some of the students spoke. Though most of them spoke Thai, two of the guys said their goodbyes in English, which was definitely directed at me, since I was the only foreigner on the trip who taught them. One of them was the student who told me they were very kind. I'll never forget that! Then the students circled up. The room was darkened except for the light of the small tea candles each student had in front of them. We teachers were given a handful of white strings, like the ones monks give at temples, to tie around our student's wrists with a final message and a wish of good luck. I didn't have enough for everyone... but I made it a point to speak to every student from my class this year.

goodbye ceremony

The next morning, we stopped to tour a wetlands on the way home. It's one of the royal projets, and is a place where they study natural filtration through mangrove forests. Really intersting! Luckily our friend and fellow English Teacher, Mo, was there. She's been with us at the school since I started, and is back this year after teaching abroad in Hawaii last year. She was our translator for most of the trip!

Royal Project wetlands

Then, just a week later, it was graduation day. This year was different than in the past. This year, all four schools (kindergarten, primary, secondary, and vocational) graduated at the same ceremony. Our assembly hall is kind of small, so only the new teachers, really important teachers, or ones winning awards had seats. I was lucky! Instead of sitting through the long graduation, I got to hang out with my Thai coworkers in the office, eat snacks, and watch the ceremony on TV!

It's the end of another successful year. It's been a good one overall, although I would be lying if I said I wasn't happy that the semester is at an end. I'll be ready to get back into it in May. Until then, best of luck to my graduating class! The day after graduation, I'm off to the USA via Japan. See you soon! 

Chinatown

I'll be honest, I like to eat!

If you are looking for delicious food in Bangkok and an experience that's a bit out of the ordinary, look no further than Yaowarat Road.

Yaowarat Road

One of Bangkok's oldest, wealthiest, and most storied neighborhoods is Yaowarat Road - Chinatown. Yaowarat feels nothing like the rest of Bangkok. While some of Bangkok's neighborhoods have rapidly modernized, and others are still developing, Yaowarat seems to intentionally hold on to the past, reliving it's mid-century glory days. Busy, chaotic, and at times otherworldly, Yaowarat Road never fails in being an experience for the senses.

A Chinese-style shrine at the hospital

I don't often go to Chinatown, mostly because it's on the opposite side of town and a 40-minute subway ride from where I live.

This trip was all about trying some of the unique foods that Chinatown has to offer, including bird's nest soup and stewed fish stomach!

An old-style herbal pharmacy

The spiritual center of Bangkok's Chinese-Thai community is Wat Mangkorn. Besides eating, our visit to Chinatown wouldn't have been complete without a merit-making ritual at the Chinese temple to wish for good luck in the new Year of the Monkey.

Wat Mangkorn

Bird's Nest Soup and Stewed Fish Stomach in Chinatown:

Suan Pakkad Palace

A note to my family: Hey guys! I found somewhere cool to take you next time you are in Bangkok!

 

When you come to Bangkok for the first time, you will inevitably want to visit the Grand Palace. As its name suggests, it is definitely the grandest, largest, busiest, most golden, and flashiest of all the palaces in Bangkok. But it's far from the only one. Now, the other palaces may not be exactly what you expect from a palace. One such example of a minor palace in the Dusit area (off Phayathai BTS). Suan Pakkad Palace is a calm oasis in the heart of downtown. Not so many people visit, and it's a quiet and peaceful spot for some sightseeing and a look at traditional life.

 

Suan Pakkad (meaning "Cabbage Garden Palace") is really more of a traditional-style wooden home than the palaces one might expect. It was the home of a minor prince, a relative of King Rama V, and his estate has now been converted into a museum of traditional Thai art and antique pottery. It's a fascinating look at old royal life in Bangkok.

Entry is B50 for Thai and 100 for foreigners (much less than the B500 entry fee at the Grand Palace!) and the atmosphere is very laid back. Although it's technically royal grounds, the typical royal dress code (long pants, no sleeveless tops) is not enforced, so you are welcome to dress comfortably and casually.

 



Besides the traditional art and old pottery, the palace museum also houses a "music room" full of traditional Thai instruments and several buildings which serve as a sort of geological museum. It's a really interesting place to spend a few quiet hours. Besides that though, the grounds are unbelievably peaceful and quiet, despite the busy road and Airport Rail Link train just outside.

Senior Dinner

Now that final exams are over, it's time for the best month of the work year. You see, school ends for the students at the end of February, but the graduation ceremony is in late March. So although the first week of March is incredibly busy and hectic with grading exams, entering grades (everything is done by hand in large ledgers), double-checking other teachers' grades during departmental and school mark checks, etc, etc... after that, we have a few weeks to make lesson plans and prepare orientation material for the incoming new teachers. There's just not much to do in March, but we're still getting paid, so we have to keep coming in to do small tasks here and there. It's great, because that's the month that I can really dedicate to studying Thai, which I've been lapsing on recently. It's also a fun month, because there are several exciting events for the graduating M6 students (seniors).

The first such event took place last week. It's the annual "Thank You Dinner", an event that the M6 students hold each year to say "goodbye" and "thank you" to their former teachers. After school last week, we teachers gathered in the "banana field", a small courtyard near the student's canteen that has a number of, you guessed it, banana trees.

hanging out before the dinner

We were greeted by a student who presented each teacher with a Thai flower garland like the ones we are given on Wait Kru Day. This is a day for the students to show their appreciation and thanks to their teachers before they graduate, so they served us a dinner as we watched the evening's festivities.



native English teachers at the Senior Dinner 



The big event of the evening is the Teacher Awards, which are basically like the Academy Awards for teachers. But not just for teaching; the awards are things like Best Dressed, Best Lipstick, Best Hair, Teacher With The Best Catchphrase, etc... In the past, all the nominated teachers have been Thai teachers, which makes sense, as they are the ones who have taught these students for six years.

I was surprised and honored when the students called my name as a nominee for the "Jai Dee" Award; the Kind Teacher Award. I was one of five nominees (including our department head), but in the end, they chose me! They brought me up on stage and had the whole school sing "Happy Birthday" to me as well (the award ceremony was actually on my birthday this year). It really made my day!



Kru Jai Dee, the "Kind Teacher" Award 

My boss, Geoffrey, also got an award. We could tell when a foreign teacher was about to be nominated for an award, because the two student MC's were suddenly speaking in English. He was nominated for, and won, the "Everywhere Teacher" award, because he likes to wander around the school and everyone knows who he is. It's sort of like an award for a teacher who is very involved in school activities.

Geoffrey receives his award

There is one more big event for the students this month before their graduation, and that's the Senior Farewell Trip. It was a good time last year, and I'm quite looking forward to it again this month.

I'm not normally a very sentimental or emotional person, but I feel really touched and honored to be recognized this way! I am quite fond of this year's graduating class, since they were my first class to teach three years ago, and it makes me really happy to know that they think I'm their kind teacher!

the Everywhere Teacher and the Kind Teacher

The (Third) Last Week of School

Well...

Here we are again.

It's time to wrap up another year. The final exams are finished, and it's almost time to send another class on to university after the graduation ceremony in March.

I would like to take a few moments to reflect on my first week in Thailand. It's a bit of a long one, but I find that I have a lot to say today...

Nearly three years ago I, a young, untested, and untrained English teacher stepped into my first classroom. "Don't worry," said Jessica, a teacher who worked at the primary school a few years before I started and who was administering my orientation, "you are just there to help the Thai teacher. You'll never actually be alone in the classroom. All you have to do is help with conversation, pass out papers, and help grade workbooks."

2013 - my first week at school

Boy, was I in for a shock that first afternoon at work! Mo, one of my Thai colleagues, a globally-minded world traveller and now a good friend, took me to my first class- M4 Reading... and then she left. At that moment, standing in front of my class of twenty-five Thai students sitting politely and looking at me expectantly, I realized that the education of these students was actually my responsibility, and that I would not, in fact, have a counterpart or co-teacher.

2014 - we still had no idea what we were doing

That was not the best moment to have that realization. Here's an excerpt (edited because my writing was much worse back then) from my post three years ago about my first day at work:

"The Thai teachers made sure that we Americans get the best students in our classes. Not only is this good for us, as we have little to no teaching experience, it's also good for the kids. These are the students who are the most motivated and have the most to gain learning from a native speaker. Unfortunately my first class just felt awkward. I think the students could tell I had no idea what was going on. The Thai teachers kept coming in and switching students in and out of my room as I tried to introduce myself. The M4 students are sophomores, and know English very well. They are a little shy though, and don't want to speak up in class. I haven't had much time with them yet though."

So here's the full story of my first class, which I've alluded to, but never told in its entirety. I fumbled around awkwardly in front of the class. I don't really know what I expected Thai classrooms to be like - maybe like the classrooms I had when I was in school - but what I found was in no way what I was expecting. In the front of the class, in front of the chalkboard, in a large stage raised a few inches off the floor. That's where the teacher stands so that the students can all see you. The rooms are open-air, and (as I'm sure you know) Thailand can get a bit hot. Therefore, there are a number of oscillating fans mounted on the ceiling. This and the open plan makes the room a little loud, so there's a microphone and a speaker system for the teacher to use. I didn't know what to make of that, and felt weird using a microphone (I've completely embraced that now!) so I just kind of paced around the stage trying to get the students to talk to me. It was May, the hottest part of the Thai year, and I was grossly drenched in sweat in my long-sleeved shirt and tie (I hadn't yet begun to adapt to the tropical heat or humidity, nor had I learned of the wonders of baby powder).

I specifically remember two things from that first fifty-minute class. First,  I actually admitted to the students something along the lines of, "guys, I really have no idea what's going on...". One girl in the front row gave me this sympathetic smile that was probably meant to convey something like "what is this weird foreigner doing trying to teach a class?",  and laughed, which somehow encouraged me a bit. I guess I figured that I was at least somewhat amusing to them.

Second, one of the boys in the back piped up in response, "it's OK, we are very kind!" This in turn made me laugh and really lightened the mood.

Here's another post from later that week:

"On Friday I had a second chance with the M4 Reading class what had gone so poorly on Monday. It had been my first class and I had no idea what was going on. I wanted to make a better impression with my students, and I worked really hard on planning out our next meeting. By Friday I had completely over-prepared, and it turned out to be one of my best classes yet."

So things really turned around.

Over time I got to know that class quite well. My first year, I only taught M1-M4, so that M4 class was my oldest group of students, therefore my most proficient group, therefore the group that I talked and chatted with the most. After teaching M4 Reading and Listening/Speaking, I requested to change my schedule my second year to take over M5 Main from Teacher Rachel who would be returning back to the States. That class was great. I found over time that they are not in fact shy as I was lead to believe my first day! They are all happy to speak English, and to be honest, the English level of this class is probably the highest at the school (at least in my experience). Amongst the teachers, this class is known for being delightful - overall smart, polite, helpful, and eager to learn.

2015 - my M5 Main class

So that brings us to this year. My writing class was quite small, only about 14 students in total. I feel very lucky to have gotten to be their teacher for the past three years. This class is the one I consider "my" class. They are the ones who taught me to be a teacher by being incredibly patient with me as I learned through trial by error. They are the ones who I went to when I needed someone to explain Thailand to me when I was confused. We have already had the last day of class. They have finished their finals. Yes, there were tears (not mine), even when some students came to my office to turn in their final projects to me. There will be more, I'm sure, since the Senior Trip and graduation day are coming up soon. I am so proud of them as they are going off to university! I hope I've taught them something, even just a fraction of what I have learned from them.

2016 - my M6 class; the first group of students I ever taught

Yes, it's a long one... if you have been patient and sat through to the end, you can watch this video of me trying to drink concentrated chicken drink in Thailand: