These are a few of my favorite things. . .

Just FYI for those of you at home, J and I officially booked our flights back to the US! We'll be touching down on the Seatac tarmac the night of December 8th. Our teaching contract ends in a few weeks and then our much anticipated tour of SE Asia begins! Our plan is to head over to Laos through one last stop in Chiang Mai, then spend about a week in Vietnam, about a week in Cambodia, fly down to Bali, back up through Malaysia and finish with a couple weeks of island hopping back in southern Thailand. We are SOOOO excited. (I mean. . .duh)

However, there will be plenty of things I will be missing about good 'ol Lampang, Thailand; a place that we've called home for the past 4 1/2 months. As it usually happens, I feel like I am finally getting the hang of teaching and settling in quite nicely to our apartment right as we're about to take off. So allow me to reflect on a few things that will stay near and dear to my heart. . .

Our rides to school: Back home my commute to work usually began with the realization that my tank is on E and I have to make an annoying stop for gas. Then I'd head off to make the slow merge onto I-405 only to crawl through the awful traffic, turning the 5 minute trip into a 25 minute trip. Here, however, I saddle onto my red bike, ding my bell and wave goodbye to our neighbors and cruise all the way to school, no gas stop necessary. Not only do we keep a nice even pace, we get to see some pretty spectacular views. Here are a couple pictures of the scenery I get to enjoy every morning while we ride along the river to school and cross the bridge.

Coffee stops: Back in April I was under the impression that we wouldn't find a Starbucks here so I downed about 4 Americanos everyday for a month before coming, just to make sure I got my fix. It only took us a day in Bangkok to realize there are Starbucks on just about every corner. However, there are zero in Lampang. Luckily there are enough coffee shops, stands, and machines in our little town to help distract us from our "usual". Our favorite shops include Wawee Coffee, I Love Coffee, and the one we just call "the crack coffee place". Our favorite little stands are just about anywhere and everywhere and every once in a while we venture in for a machine coffee inside the 7-11. . .however we usually end up with about 20 minutes of crazy hyperness followed by an awful stomach ache after those. Here we are enjoying a nice "to go" iced coffee. . .which in this case meant drinking it out of a plastic bag. Markets, markets and more markets: People always talk about how delicious the street food is in Thailand but I had no idea how amazing it tasted until I got to Lampang! We have a handful of outdoor markets. Our favorite ones include Asawin market which opens just in time for us to cruise through on the way home from school everyday. We eat our favorites: salad, pineapple, banana muffins, chewy bars, apples. . .There are tons of fresh fruits and veggies along with tons of other goodies we've tried. We haven't quite been adventurous enough to try the fish that are still flopping on the table or the shish-kebab of frogs but the rest has suited us just fine. There is also a Thursday night market and the weekend market which has more of the same. . .but way too many deep fried treats so we usually have to keep ourselves away from those. The best part is that whichever one we go to we can get completely full for about $1.50. Here's Alex, Alistair and Lauren enjoying some fresh juice from the weekend night market (again the "to-go plastic bag")

Clip of the weekend market. . . .

Clip of Asawin Market. . .

Bike rides in general: As I'm sure you might be able to tell, I have become quite fond of my bicycle. But the task of hauling our huge backpacks around for the next few months seems daunting enough as it is, without the addition of a big red bike. So being the generous, kind, loving, wonderful, thoughtful, caring, considerate. .. oh sorry. . .people that we are, we decided that we will donate our bikes to the school on the last day. I must say we have enjoyed some pretty great rides on these things. The first day we bought them you would have thought we were 9 year olds on Christmas morning. Since then we have enjoyed countless rides around the town, always exploring and finding new and exciting things along the way. And just about every person we meet here says "Oooh yes. I see you when you ride bicycle". Here are a few shots/video of our bikes and a few of the many things we've found while cruising around, thanks to the bike's lasting hold (even though a 24-year old was riding it as opposed to the 12 year-old its frame is meant to withstand)

Came upon this random but gorgeous temple one day. . .
Just cruising by some cows. . .The walls of Lampang. . .
Enjoying an evening ride. . .

The people: I feel like I have had the opportunity to meet some fabulous people since living here. Most have welcomed us into their town and we have been fortunate enough to share many laughs and smiles with all of them. Actually that's the only thing we shared with a lot of them because of the language barrier. But their smiles could always make me happy. These include the wonderful teachers both farang and Thai, Tuk our hairstylist and friend, our favorite coffee girls, Moo the guy who copies my worksheets for school, the other girls who copy my worksheets and laugh everytime I try to say the numbers in Thai, our favorite bike shop guys who blow up our tires for free, the policemen who sat down with us one night to offer up a few rounds of their whisky, the vegetarian restaurant owner who opened up a few hours early just for us, the flower shop owners who give us a big hello everyday on our way to and from school, our landlord Yao who has so patiently dealt with our house issues, our neighbors (mostly for their dog Piggy), our salad, pineapple, and banana muffin ladies, our spa lady who actually lived in Marysville, Washington for 7 years of her life. . .as well as many more. They have all been a part of my experience here in Lampang and I feel so lucky to have met them!

I'm sure I will have more to add for my last couple weeks here but thought I'd at least get a head start. I can't believe our time in Thailand is starting to wind down. . .but like I said before, we are SO excited for the next few months and can't wait for many more adventures!!!!!!!!!

Like Mother Teresa always said. . .

. . ."Patience Achieves Everything"

Funny how living in a country where 95% percent of the population is Buddhist, I have found the words of a Roman Catholic nun to be so fitting. In addition to my entry on our Mother's Day adventures with Ju I wanted to include pictures from the school's celebration of the holiday, along with a little story about patience; something we're practicing a lot of here. So mothers and patience= Mother Teresa I guess.

Of course we weren't told anything about the ceremony going on at school but discovered the surprise upon our arrival Tuesday morning. The undercover gym area was filled with the 6th graders and their moms, along with various displays of the Queen. In front of one of the displays was this massive arrangement. . .that looks like flowers but is in fact a ton of fruit and veggie carvings done by students.

These "flowers" are made out of papaya. . .

This one is out of a watermelon. . .

And this one is made out of a mango.

The stage was done up with more displays of the Queen and various decorations. A few of the teachers gave speeches and then this group of girls put on the cutest dance show with traditional Thai music, dancing, and costumes.

Later in the day each grade level came down to the undercover area to present the money that their classroom saved up. It is tradition to donate money to some sort of charitable event. Each class made these stands to hold their baht and then presented it to a monk that visited the school from a local temple. Here are some of my 2nd graders. . .

Here they are presenting their money to the monk while he wishes them good luck.

Here are just a few of my students. . .

The teachers invited Aoife and I to join in presenting the 1st grader's money to the monk.

Last week there were a couple extra announcements made as well as longer assemblies in the mornings. It's all in Thai so we never know what is being said. I walked into one of my afternoon classes right after one of the longer announcements was going on. I waited for it to finish before beginning the usual classroom routine.

One of the students always stands up and just as he or she has been told to do by his homeroom teacher, says "Stand up please".

The other 49 kids stand and in perfect unison say "Good afternoon teacher". (yeah it's not creepy at all)

I then say "Good afternoon. How are you?" and they say "I'm fine. Thank you. And you?"

Side note: before I knew that this is the routine I was supposed to follow, I said "Good afternoon. You may sit down" and all the kids looked at eachother awkwardly and said "I'm fine thank you and you?". . .so basically all they're doing is repeating what they're told to say and really have no comprehension of what they're saying.

That's when I usually go through a few other emotions like "I'm happy", "I'm sad", "I'm hot", "I'm sleepy" and act out each emotion. The kids love doing the action part but I always have to say the word first and they simply repeat it. So I never really know how much they're actually understanding.

Before I could get to all this on that particular afternoon, I realized that there were a few kids in the room that were crying. With all the chaos that goes on it's not surprising to see a couple of them crying. Usually what follows is another kid blabbing to me in Thai trying to explain what happened. Their teacher stopped me on the way in and said that it had something to do with the announcement and Mother's Day but with the language barrier I couldn't get the full story. Before I began our little routine one of the boys points to some of the kids that are crying and says "Teacher. Sad. Sad."

I couldn't believe it. Without having to give any sort of prompt, action, or hold up a picture, one of the kids spoke ENGLISH. My mouth literally dropped and my eyes widened. "Yes! Sad. Sad. You're right! Good job!" Refocusing for a second I turned to the kids crying, gave them a pat on the back and a look of sympathy. I couldn't help but look back at the boy and give him the thumbs up though.

A couple entries ago I talked about how frustrating the teaching can be and how I never feel like I'm accomplishing anything. It's moments like this one that make it worth it. And it reminds me that I just have to patient with all of it. I mean I don't know if "patience can achieve everything" but the kid knows what "sad" means and damn it, he can say it english too!

Adventure!

August 12th was the Queen's Birthday which meant Mother's Day for Thailand. There was a special ceremony at school on Tuesday and then we got the day off of school on Wednesday.

One of the Thai teachers, Ju, invited us to go to her village for the day. She is one of our favorite people at school. She is just a thoughtful, energetic, happy person who has really reached out to us. She loves to practice her english so she talks to us all the time and we love it!

Of course we didn't know what "going to her village" entailed but we knew it would be an experience. She drove us about 30 km outside of Lampang where we had the opportunity to meet her friends, see where she grew up, visit her school, and go on a hike. Afterwards we spent the afternoon with her back in Lampang and then she treated us dinner. Here are some pics of the day. . .





We started off the morning by accidently getting our favorite iced coffee drinks called Birdy. It feels like drinking about 8 Red Bulls. The three of us used to drink one every morning before school. . .which turned into drinking 3 every morning before school so we officially cut ourselves off about 2 months ago. And for some reason decided to buy one that morning. Whoops.

A few kilometers before we got to the center of the village Ju pulled the car over to show us the rice fields around the area. It was a beautiful day.
The area behind Ju and me is the rice field that belongs to her. Her family takes care of it for her and sends her two bags of rice per year.
When Ju realized that J and Georgie didn't bring hats for the trek she was very concerned. Her friend was nice enough to loan them these Marlboro hats. Lookin good girls.


We stopped by to visit Ju's aunt and cousin. Her aunt is in her late 80's and J put it perfectly when she said "I bet that woman's got a lot of wisdom in her."
This is Ju and her childhood friend in the back of the truck we rode in. They were neighbors and did everything together as kids. She doesn't speak any english but even without the common language we sensed her kind heart immediately. We made a stop at Ju's school. Because of the holiday all 28 of the school's students and their mothers came to school for a ceremony. They asked Ju to say a few words and without hesitation she got up and spoke for about 10 minutes. We have no idea what she was saying but she spoke as if she had been practicing the speech for weeks. Of course they called us up to the mic immediately after and told us to speak about "The students, their mothers, and love". Again we have no idea what was said but I'm pretty sure we didn't sound like we'd practiced for weeks. We did however round it out with a couple versus of "You Are My Sunshine" and the crowd seemed to enjoy that!

Before the hike we all took a rest to enjoy the picnic Ju brought. Thank goodness for that. Between our coffees and the heat we were in no shape to go hiking just yet. We felt like we were about to pass out. Ju's friend and husband poured us glasses of coconut water straight from the coconuts they brought from their house. Delicious!

Ju went above and beyond in preparing our picnic. It was full of noodles (that come wrapped up in banana leaves), tons of fruit and yummy banana treats.

At 58 year old, Ju and her two friends just about topped the three of us in toughness. We were in awe of their strength! Ju just kept repeating "Adventure!" as we marched through the jungle. On the way back down the hike we had a Thai lesson which ended up being pure entertainment. The language has 5 different tones so a word said in a high tone can mean one thing while the exact same word said in a lower tone means something completely different. I've learned a little over the past few months but it is just about the most confusing thing to pick up on. Here we are. ..the three amigos! Officially Thai with our peace signs in our pictures now.

We stopped by to visit another friend of Ju's who owns a few cows. . .they apparently weren't too happy with us passing through. The one in the picture gave us a hard core stare down and there were three on the other side as well, all huffing and puffing at us. Ju's friend was nice enough to guide J through. After swinging by a temple and a market on the drive home, Ju said she would take us to her house back in Lampang and then out to dinner. We were exhausted and it must have shown because Ju mentioned resting at her house. Right when we got there I headed off to rinse off my feet and when I came back into her living room area I see Georgie on the floor with a bunch of blankets and pillows spread out. I give her a look like "What's going on?" and she just says "We're having nap time" with a slight grin on her face. Apparently Ju insisted that we stay in this room and take a nap. Next thing I know Ju's comes in with mugs of water and sweet rolls, says "You take nap," and leaves, closing the door behind her. The three of us crack up and began making jokes that we're 5 year olds who need their nap time before Aunt Ju can take us out to dinner, otherwise we might throw a tantrum.

After our little rest Ju took us to the most famous temple in Lampang called Wat Phra That Lampang Luang. We felt really lucky to have Ju show us around and tell us all about each building, the various customs, how she prays to the Buddha and what everything on the grounds represents.

We each got to bang the huge gong!

There are many things in Thailand that revolve around luck and superstition. If you walk under the elephant then it brings you good luck!

If you ring the bells with this stick, more good luck!

Ju wanted to take us to another Wat down the road to show us where she does her aerobics class. She does it a few times a week and loves staying in shape. And this is what we found to be her aerobics instructor.

Her aerobics class! They invited us to join but we decided to go eat dinner instead!

Yet another fabulous day in Thailand!

Perspective Check

I haven't really talked much about the actual teaching part of my experience here. And that's probably because it's not my most favorite part of living in Thailand. We met a retired teacher who said "I've been a teacher my whole life but 1000 kids a week, 50 per class, you don't speak the same language. It's impossible". He speaks the truth. The teaching environment here is really frustrating. One of the reasons I came here was to teach English, but just getting basic ideas across is a struggle. Most days I don't feel like I'm accomplishing anything.

My classes are challenging to get through (to say the least) however, I have one in particular that I have deemed my "worst" class. It might be because they are the first class I see Monday morning and I'm never too thrilled to be starting another week of work. But I've given them the benefit of the doubt plenty of times, tried to muster up every bit of positive energy I can before entering this cave of doom, but every single time I seem to walk out of their class feeling defeated. Completely warn out, hair a mess, nun outfit demolished.

Even though I've pretty much become numb to the noise level in all my classes, I swear that each student is speaking through a megaphone in this one. The volume is a collaboration of kids fist fighting, smacking their rulers on the desk, spitting at eachother, crying, throwing things across the room, crashing their wooden desks together, running up to tattle on eachother (in Thai of course). And this is all within the first 10 minutes I'm in the room.

So one might understand the feeling I get when I look at the little terrors and want to rip their little devil horns right out of their head. I mean let's face it. When you look at a kid, tell him to "Please be quiet" and he looks you straight in the eyes, spits, then yells "Quai" (meaning "buffalo" which is just about the most offensive thing you can call someone in Thailand) it takes a lot to bring my boiling blood back down to normal and remind myself he's just a 7 year old.

The other morning I gave myself the usual peptalk while heading towards the class from hell. "You can do this Kel. Don't give up. Focus on the one's that are trying. Take a deep breath and remember your patience". Just as I made it to the top of the staircase I noticed one of the students standing in the corner of the hall, tears streaming down his face. One of the teachers stood next to him with eyes of feary, ruler in hand. From day one we haven't been ignorant to the Thai teachers ancient form of physical discipline. I hate to admit it but I'm actually not even phased anymore when I see a kid getting smacked across the back, swatted with a ruler, or pulled by the ears. But this situation in particular gave off an auora of much higher tension.

I made my way through the doorway just as the classroom teacher headed out to team up with Ms. Ruler in Hand. I began unpacking my materials and barely caught a glimpse of the scene that took place in the hall. Like I said, we've seen the teachers get physcially angry with the kids before but this went beyond what I'd yet to see. I turned away and began taping things up on the board, trying not to listen to the smacking and crying that took place right outside the door. Eventually the three of them moved their way into the classroom, the boy hysterically crying by now trying to wiggle his way away from the teachers. One of them smacked him with the ruler and the other yelled in his face, finger pointed right into his eyes. The tone of her voice alone was enough to freak me out and I didn't even know what she was saying. The poor kid sat there squirming on the ground trying to break away from them, literally sobbing. I tried to fight back tears as best I could but my heart just broke. After a few minutes the scene ended when another teacher came in, grabbed the kid and left.

I took a deep breath, wiped off the tears, and tried to gain a little composure. When I turned back around to face the class, they continued in the chaotic manner they usually do. Papers flying, banging sounds on the desks, kids screaming and punching. But there was something a little different. For a moment I saw them sans their devil horns. Yes they're loud. Yes they're obnoxious. Yes they can be freakin' punks sometimes. But they're kids.

That's when I began to see the class from their perspective, as a learning environment. They're stuck in the hot classrooms all day. The noise level is high for them too. They're having to learn with 49 other kids. They have to fear the discipline from the Thai teachers (aka the ruler). And when I'm in there they have the added frustration of trying to understand someone speaking a completely different language who can't understand anything they're saying.

I let my guard down for the rest of class that day. The kids seemed to back off a little bit too. On my way out I usually wave goodbye and say "See you later", trying to get them to repeat me but usually only get a few mumbles. Same routine for class this day except just as I was out the door one of the rowdy boys who sits in the back, usually ignoring me or shouting things at me in Thai, ran up to me on my way out. Without saying anything he wrapped his arms around my waste and gave me a huge hug. He can't speak English for the life of him but he made me feel like I accomplished something that day.

Oh. Well, yippidy do dah!

Let me just start off by saying everything that was supposed to happen on Monday didn't, yet so much ended up happening. Allow me to explain.

After another fabulous weekend in Lampang (our friend Bridget came through town to celebrate her bday, we went on bike rides, had some coffee, ate delicious food yadda yadda yadda) we would normally get up on Monday morning dreading another long week of work. However, our department head invited three of us to miss school and go to Chiang Rai for a National Open House for over 20 schools in the country. Never wanting to miss a fabulous opportunity for a little Thailand adventure (aka pure hilarity), we eagerly accepted their offer. Of course after accepting the invite we were told we'd still have to re-schedule the classes we'd miss and oh yeah, we were going to be leaving at 5am. What do you know, duped again.

So by 5am Monday morning we were waiting at one of the many 7-11s in Lampang until the 15-person van full of our favorite Thai teachers and one director pulled up honking. Regardless of the fact that the sun hadn't even risen yet, our teachers were in full effect, bantering away in Thai and breaking into song about every 5 minutes. J, Georgie and I, all piled in the back, began our church pew giggles about 10 minutes into the 3 hour ride. There were a few times that the teachers did turn around to speak to us in English. However, like I've said before, sometimes there just isn't anything else to say. After awhile responding with "oh great!" and "oh that sounds nice" gets a little old so at one point J decided to reply in the most hilariously sincere tone "Oh. Well, yippidy do dah!" And so it became. . . our slogan for the day.

Now let me preface the rest of the story by saying we've found that some things in Thailand run in a fairly unorganized fashion compared to what we're used to. Hence the need for slogans like "Thai Time" since most things are done later than expected. Or "TIT" (This Is Thailand) that our HR director told us to use anytime we feel like getting frustrated, to remind ourselves that it's just the way things are run here. And we're usually left out of the loop until someone realizes that we have no idea what's going on when everyone is speaking in Thai. It's become a guessing game for us. But for the most part we've learned to just run with it. That's why we found the rest of the day to be so amazing. . .

After surprisingly only three stops, we show up to a school in Chiang Rai where J, Georgie, and I assume the open house function is being held. The teachers pile out of the van, everyone speaks in Thai, then everyone gets back in the van. We follow suit. We show up to a hotel where we now assume the function is being held. The teachers pile out of the van, everyone speaks in Thai, then everyone gets back in the van. We follow suit. We show up to the school, again, where we assume the function is being held. The teachers pile out of the van and finally we are greeted by what appears to be an important person at the school. We sit at a huge table with this woman, everyone speaks in Thai. Then we move to another building, sit at another table, everyone speaks in Thai. We move to what seems to be the director's office, sit at yet another table, everyone speaks in Thai. Eventually we are shuffled back to the original table to sit and chat, in Thai. Finally, Georgie decides to ask when the main event is happening and when the other 20 schools are arriving. And that is when the three of us are informed that the big open house is in fact being held. . .on Wednesday. As in two days from now. As in we drove 3 hours north for an event and showed up on the wrong day. Apparently someone missed the memo that they changed the date.

But in true Thailand "mai pen rai" form ("not to worry") the ladies decide to embrace the opportunity and use it to go. . .shopping!! They begin to tell us about this great market with lots of cheap goods from China. When we ask where it is they all say "Myanmar" (aka Burma) and laugh. Now I must say our Thai teachers have a pretty great sense of humor so the three of us laugh along assuming the joke, don't ask any questions and get back in the van. Next thing you know, we're at the Myanmar/Thailand border and the teachers are asking for our passports. Um. . .I'm sorry, where are we going?

Unfortunately it was going to cost the three of us 500 baht each to walk about five feet farther and actually cross the border. (Not to mention the fact that we didn't have a re-entry visa into Thailand and had we decided to pay that 500 baht to cross over, we wouldn't have been able to come back to Thailand. Could have been a problem). So what do our teachers do? Pretty much say "See ya later! Wait in van if you tired" as they cross over. Amazing what a few women will do for a good deal on pirated DVDs. Luckily for us there was a massive market on the Thailand side as well (where all the Myanmar rejects, ourselves included, are allowed to shop) and we moseyed through the goods o'plenty before the teachers came back.

At this point it was around 3:30pm and the three of us made bets for our arrival time back in Lampang. . .immediately followed by bets for how many stops we would make on the way home. First stop (a screeching halt on the highway) for some pineapple at a fruit stand. Obviously. Next stop (a screeching halt on the highway along with reversing for about half a mile and then making a U-turn down a side road heading into the mountains) for a stop at a Chinese Temple. We of course weren't told why we were stopping so after speeding through the back roads for about 15 minutes Georgie asked "What are we doing?" about 8 times with absolutely no response (J and I were in histarics). After deciding to change her question to "Where are we going?" we finally got an answer of "temple". It turned out to be beautiful and set right in the mountains. Next stop, dinner on a lake in this cute town during a gorgeous sunset. One more pineapple stand stop and one last bathroom stop before finally arriving back in Lampang at 9:30pm. Georgie won the bet.

By the time we got back we were exhausted. Our eye lids could barely stay open and our stomachs were sore from laughing all day. Definitely not what we expected but when is it ever in Thailand? We decided without a doubt that if we could do the whole day over again we'd do it in a heartbeat. So yippidy do dah to that.

The Little Duck hotel. Notice how no one else is here. Not until Wednesday that is.

Lunch time!!

Didn't quite make it through here. . .Union of Myanmar . . .but at least we got here. Yes, that would be The Northern Most of Thailand

Market (Thailand side of course)
And so the goods o'plenty begin. . .cowboy hat anyone?

. . .perhaps a basket?

. . .maybe a purse or 10?

. . .new pair of sunnies? . . .why not just a creepy doll?
. . .or do you need a new clock?. . .maybe a windchime? . . .how about some nuts?

. . .or mushrooms rather?

. . .fancy any fruit?

. . .or mabye just another cowboy hat?

Ajarn ("teacher" in Thai) Ju showing us her market purchase. . .underwear.

Ajarn Tip passing out some fruit to us.

This pretty much sums up the day.

Insane sunset where we ate dinner.

The Farang teachers wai-ing it up.