My Thai

Even though I am hot, sweaty, sleeping on the floor and have no flush toilets I cannot help but feel overwhelming gratitude everyday that I am here in Thailand. My fellow volunteers and I are already like a family, I have to say I will be very sad to be apart from all my new friends at the end of the month when we move to our schools. Our days are growing busier, we are now involved in our TEFL training and Thai lessons. I am hopeful that by the time I move to my school I will be able to communicate on a basic level. (I also bought a speaking Thai/English dictionary which has been a life saver!)

Oct. 14th we went to the town of Nawa to see some silk weavers and traditional Isan instruments being made. We travelled in a special van the district provided that included a Karaoke machine and most importantly AC! Sadly the Karaoke was all in Thai characters but we were able to watch the hilariously dramatic music videos that accompanied each one.
When we reached the village we were shown around a silk weaving factory, were the women were infatuated with our “farang” (foreigner) looks and wanted to take MANY, MANY, pictures with us. One woman kept hugging my friend Haley and touching her “phom” (hair), which is incredibly curly and thick.

After the silk weaving we moved on to the local Wat (temple) of Nawa which was absolutely

beautiful. The Wat also has a school so we were able see some novice monks though they hid from us and our cameras. The Wat was beautiful; I love the use of color everywhere.

After the Wat we went further into the village to watch Isan instruments being played and got to try them out ourselves!

When we returned back to our orientation headquarters I was went into the main house to do some work with a fellow volunteer, Alix on a TEFL presentation we had to give. While we were working Meaw (our hostess and wife of the man we are staying with for a month) began to scream, shout and point under the table we were working at. You know it’s a big bug if a local starts freaking out about it, there are bugs everywhere here and not many of them seem to bothers the Thais. Sure enough there was a HUGE stinging centipede running under our chairs and heading straight for our feet. We jumped up screaming and ran to the other end of the house while Meaw and the two other Thai girls who live in the house beat the centipede to death with brooms. Later that night while walking to the bathroom to wash our faces and brush our teeth my friend Patty and I came across another centipede and ran screaming through the yard back to our room. Needless to say our faces didn’t get washed and our host questioned us about all the screaming that went on that night…

Oct. 15th I took my first Tuk-tuk ride! While in town we needed to get to the hospital for a friend, Kaitlyn, to check and see if she could get more anti-malaria medication and were under a time constraint. As usual a Tuk-tuk pulled up beside us (at least 15 try to pick us up each time we go into the city) and this time we got in, six of us! (They’re are made to hold about four people) The Tuk-tuk was a little weighed down and held up traffic due to its inability to go faster than 15mph with all of us in it, people couldn’t help but stare at us all crammed into the little vehicle and I am sure we were the topic of many stories this evening as there were lots of fingers pointed at us and giggles directed at our clown car exit from the Tuk-tuk. I can't wait for the next adventure!