Fucking Bangkok

Alright readers, if you're the type of person who only wants to hear about happy things, then my advice is to close this window right now.








Still with me for my rant?  Okay.  I despise Bangkok with the flames of a thousand suns.  Seriously.  If I had to make a list of 10 places I'd like to be in least, Bangkok would be number three and four.  The first is prison and the second is Cincinnati.  Bangkok gets two numbers just because it's so big.

I had a decent night running around with four aussies after I got in.  That was good.  I was feeling a little better about everything, though still pretty gutted to be away from my friends down south.

Then yesterday happened.  It started with my agency.  I stopped in to see them, and they said they had a new school for me, which was very exciting.  A Japanese school in the middle of Bangkok.  I'd be teaching kindergarden.  I was actually a little excited.  Until they let me know that I would have to stay there for four months.  Uh uh.  No way am I living in Bangkok for four months.  I'd be flat broke all the time.  They threatened me with everything from no work until November and only subbing two or three days a week.  After I told them that was fine and was already wondering when the next bus back home was, they relented and said they had another school for me, but this was kindergarden and they're not sure if I'll do well teaching kids that young.  It boggles the mind, really.  Why would they feel I'm perfect to teach at one school but not another one?  Same age, even.  Sigh.  They finally agreed to a week trial.  I'm not sure if they'll try to pull a fast one on me or not, and tell me the school doesn't like me.  They want me at the Japanese school really badly, probably money reasons.  Oh well.  I wouldn't mind taking the month of september off work.  I'm sure I could hack it back home until the next semester starts.

Then I went out to try to recreate my fabulous night from the night before.  I'll spare you the dull details, but for most of the night it was a really fun multi-culti event.  I started talking to a kiwi who is also traveling alone, and we declared a rule that no one drinks alone.  We just kept dragging in more and more people to the party.  Way fun.  Then two english guys went nuts and beat the shit out of this Norweigan guy.  I got covered in blood, hurt my arm and my camera was stolen.

I'm headed off to my new apartment in a couple hours, I think.  AYC agreed to pay for it for a week, since I'm on a week trial and all that.  It looks pretty nice, but also like something I won't be able to afford once I have to pay myself.

Oh golly, my agency just called to tell me that they didn't put my paycheck through, for some godunknown reason.  A thai person just mumbled at me about how I was doing substitute work and said something about it maybe being in my account tomorrow.

Bangkok, we are so breaking up in a month.  The last five days have been more drama than I can deal with.

Insert Clever Title Here

Wait, you mean I actually have to leave Chumphon today?

This is how I feel about that.

On the upside, a friend from Koh Tao just called and said that he, too, is going to Bangkok tonight.  The world is both a very small, and a very big place.  It's good to have friends all over it.  :)

Get thee to Bangkok!

Welp.  This will come as a shock to you, me faithful readers, but it was not to me.

I lost my job today.  It's okay, I knew it was coming.  One of the Thai teachers didn't really like me, and that is, sadly enough, a good enough reason for the school to let someone go.  Thai culture is very very different.  I was hoping I'd be able to stick around that school till October, but hey.  Life goes on.

I'm still working for AYC, they're not holding this against me or anything.  I'm to go to Bangkok this weekend and they will start using me as a substitute teacher.  This could mean any number of things.  I could be subbing for a single day at a school in Bangkok, or I could be taking trains and busses to sub for a week at a time somewhere much further away.  They'll pay for my ride and my room while I'm out of bangkok, but not while I'm in the city.  Which is unfortunate.  Bangkok is expensive.  I hate Bangkok.

After the break in October, they'll place me at another school in Thailand.  Both I and a couple people with connections at AYC are going to push for a school in Chumphon that we know is losing people.  My other thought is to just work for the month in Bangkok, get the stuff I need to apply in Korea and just head there six months earlier than planned.  It's all up in the air, I suppose.  I'm not terribly upset about what happened.  I wasn't really happy with the school.  They didn't give me a whole lot of guidance as to what to teach them.  Interestingly enough, my replacement has already quit.  AYC called me to ask if I would sub my classes for today.  I declined.

It's good, you know?  About fifteen minutes after I got home, Akki called me to see if I would come train today.  When I told him what happened, he said he would be over in 10.  We had a cup of coffee and he told me that I was going to help him at the bar for the next few days.  It's good to have friends.  Everyone seems to be sad that I'm leaving the city.  So who knows.  Maybe magic will happen and I can stay.  No matter what, I know I'll land on my feet.  I'm good at it.  I have complete faith in the idea that when one door closes, another one opens.  Sometimes another three open.  So parents, don't worry about your wayward child.  She has a very lovely life.  :)

This is what a weekend looks like in Chumphon...

Hey all.  Last time we met, I showed you what a weekday looks like.  Well, here's the weekend!

So, what do you get when you combine one American, one Canadian, one Englishman, one Burmese, one Malaysian, three Thais and four bottles of Sangsom?

From left to right that's Chris (Canada), Akki (Thai), Aoi (Thai), Lante (Burma) and of course me.  I'm from the US, in case any of you have forgotten.

There's Andy (England) and Yen (Malaysia).

And finally E.  She's Akki's girlfriend, and the two of them own the place.  It's a combination restaurant, rasta bar and Muay Thai ring.  I'm supposed to go back tomorrow for a lesson.

As you can see, Akki and I were the biggest hams.  So, how many of those pictures do you suppose I took?

If you guessed 2, you are incredibly smart!  Most of them were on E's camera and I copied them earlier today.  The ones on my camera, well I've finally figured out how to have pictures.  Take one, then leave your camera sitting around.  Everyone else will grab it and take tons of pictures for you.  Awesome, right?

Till next time, guys!

School Life

So, I finally got around to taking my camera with me to school to snap a few photos.  Without further adieu, here they are!

Random outside shots of the school.  Yup.  Sure is a Catholic school in Thailand.

One of my students.  As I was taking photos I just heard "Hello Teacha!  Teacha Bee!" so I snapped one of him.  Because the school has me speak every morning at the morning assembly, every student in Prathom 1-6 knows my name.  This makes for a lot of high fives when I try to walk to the copy room.  And to answer your question, the reason they have me speak every morning is because I'm a pretty white girl.  Thai people prefer women to teach, and they place a high value on it being an attractive woman, preferably from 27ish to 40ish.  It doesn't bother me, I actually think it's kind of cute now that the little kids have a name to call out instead of just a "HELLO!"

We were learning about parts of the body, and I sent kids up to "draw teacher's eyes" etc.  This was the result.  I didn't take pictures of the other three classes, because I didn't have my camera.  It's too bad.  One of them gave me braces.  The only thing I find alarming in this picture is that my hair is in pigtails.  I don't remember seeing the girl that drew my hair outside of school ever.  The thought that my students may see me milling around town and acting like a jackass (as I am wont to do), and not even say anything is a mite scary.  Oh well.

My 5/7 class.  These are the little monsters who drew the picture of me.  Oh well, little monsters they may be, but they're really cute and I love em to bits.

My 6/7 class.  They hadn't noticed the camera in the first shot.  Most of them were not so foolish as to miss the opportunity to pose for the second shot.  Thai people looooooooove taking pictures.  They take tons of em.  One of my students asked me to sit still for a "click click memory" once.

My 5/6 class.  These kids are really smart.  Looks like someone in the back there is doing one of the little asian symbols for love.  Sometimes they throw up "I love you" in sign language.  Sometimes they make a little heart out of their hands and hold it out to you.  Sometimes they put their hands on top of their head so their arms make a little heart.  I appreciate it any way they decide to put it.  Earlier today, one of the students stole my marker and wrote "LOUE" on the whiteboard, pointed and said "Teacha Bee!"

My 6/6 class.  These guys are like little geniuses.  Some of them don't even want to play games, which shocks the heck out of me, cause what 11 year old would rather study?  Well there's your answer.  Some Thai children.  I teach these guys all sorts of crazy stuff about the US.  When I explained to them that in the US, sometimes you had to fly a little bit east even if your final destination was out west.  They couldn't really understand the sense behind that, and I have to agree with them.  I taught them the term "bling bling" which the girls really love and comment on whenever they see anything sparkly.  One of the girls in this class bought me a really fabulous keychain with the letter B and rhinestones on it.  These guys really love learning, and to that kids, I say good job.  You will not have to travel to a foreign country with your only qualification being that you're a native speaker of a language to get a decent paying job.  Haha.

And there you have my students and my school.  The school was a little unsure about me at first, but they asked the students and the students voted me in, so they started putting my work permit through.  They're an interesting bunch, though.  Kat lives by her stickyball in her classes, and most teacher agree with the sentiment.  These kids could not possibly care less about throwing the stickyball, but they go into fits when I start handing out my markers and letting them draw and write on the board.  The newest game is making a huge circle of chairs with one kid standing in the middle, calling out for everyone who loves _______ to change seats.  This kids will say and do any ridiculous thing for the chance to run a little.  Or write on the board.  Or show off their English vocabulary.

So there you have my life these days!  School pretty much eats up all my time Mon-Fri, on the weekends the farong tend to gather.  Kat and Jacques are having a party this weekend as one of Kat's friends from Taiwan will be visiting.  I'll try to remember to snap some photos of everybody, but it's really not all that interesting.  For the most part, outside of school, we all look like trailer trash in short shorts or baggy pants.  Torn teeshirts with bad English.  And bottles of Hong Thong or Leo in our hands.  ESL is not a viable method of travel, I'm sad to say.  And Thailand just doesn't pay well enough to save up and travel.  I've entertained serious thoughts of working in Korea for a year to save up the money to take a few months and backpack around Thailand.  I've really only seen a few places here (granted, those are good places), but some time to really travel would be just lovely.  The only thing that stops me is, well... there's snow in Korea.  It snows a lot in Korea.  I really don't like snow.