After our training at the Yonok Foundation in Lampang Thailand we all split up to go to our respective provinces. I was placed in a rural district in the province of Chaiyaphum with one other teacher Monique. I have a feeling that I will be talking about Monique quite a bit in my blog since she is the only other person who speaks English on the mine we live on. She graduated from Mercer University in Georgia in May and is from Trinidad and Tobago. Some other cool stuff about her is, “she was almost born in Cypress, she lived in Pakistan for three years and was evacuated to the US after 9/11 where she resided in Orlando Florida until college”.
Our first weekend in our new home: I have almost settled into my new home, which seems like it is really in the middle of nowhere. Allison (my roommate from college) is teaching in Uttaradit, which is about a 6 hour drive away and an 8 hour bus ride even though its really only about 140 miles away. We have rice paddys and tapioca fields as neighbors. One funny thing is that for the amount of rice that surrounds us, we still can’t buy it at the market only the tesco express, which is like a Safeway. Oh yeah I live on a mine. Its pretty much like a compound with 24/7 security that walks the perimeters every 2 hours (supposedly). I think there are some places were not supposed to go, but since no one speaks English its hard to tell. There is one other guy who lives on the compound and he is, I believe a geologist for the mine, he likes to plant trees or play soccer in his free time so we rarely see him as well. We can't pronounce his name so we just call him Mr. T.
Friday (6/1/12) morning we got up early to visit our new schools before beginning on the following Tuesday. Monique and I both teach at two different schools during the week. We were introduced to our school directors as well as the rest of the teachers. We thought we were going to go to Korat (a major city) on Saturday, but apparently that changed. So instead we did nothing too exciting, we just slept in and took the day pretty slow.
Sunday – Monique and I tried to walk to the “camping” or intersection aka the stop light, which has a Seven (seven eleven – but just referred to as seven here) an Amazon Café and a Tesco express. We were told it was too far by the guards as well as Mr. T so we walked to an open market instead, which only took about a half an hour. We considered it our big adventure, which really only involved walking down a straight road with tapioca fields on either side of us. 
Monday – Monday was some sort of holiday so there was no school. Monique and I were taken to Korat (the second largest city in Thailand). The drive was just over an hour and we hear that the bus only takes an hour and a half. The mall itself was bigger than any mall I have been in before. With four levels you could find anything, even McDonald’s and Pizza Hut, but really only being two weeks into Thailand we decided to stick with the Thai food court and I had traditional kaaw phat mu (pork fried rice).
School Life: I work at two different schools. Monday – Wednesday I am at a school called Hue Ta Le, which is smaller and goes from kindergarten to 6th grade. The school itself practices Buddhism (every morning there are prayers I just don’t know what they are ever saying, but they are the same ones everyday) as well as farming. On my first day of teaching I was given khaaw niaaw mu ping aka sticky rice and pork on a stick cause they heard I liked it. So far they bring it to me every morning that I come to school. They also gave me mangos and some fish / shrimp concoction to eat it with (but I gave that to the maids when I got back to the compound) and literally 30 eggs from the chickens that they farm here. There are also ducks and fish. I haven’t seen anything else yet. They also feed me lunch everyday. My second school is kindergarten – 9th grade on Thursday and Friday. I was told I was going to teach 6-9th grade so I prepared for it then they changed their mind so I now have 30 first graders (in one class), 30 second graders, 30 3rd graders and 30 4th graders each day. Compared to my other school, which has 19 students max in each classroom. Lets just say its hard to control the entire class especially when they have no idea what you are saying because this is their first English class ever….
I have come to learn that most Thai people feel that whenever possible they should drive in the middle of the road instead of in their respective lane.
Are all your students in uniform?
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