Forever pruney

SONGKRAN

If you are any sensible thinking human being, you, along with I, know that New Years is the WORST holiday (Valentine's day coming in hot in second place, but at least there's the discounted chocolate that my mom buys in bulk on February 15th) But in Thailand it's different. None of this wearing a skin tight black and/or gold dress (seriously those are your only options) that shows off just how many cookies you snuck while grandma wasn't looking, convincing yourself that it's the holidays and you deserve it dammit!, while stumbling around in the sub freezing temperatures in heels that you bought specifically for this occasion but that you ultimately end up hiding in a bush while your friends promise you they will come back later for them having your boyfriend carry around for you because walking on two little sticks after pregaming for the $120 open bar *in case there's a line* is HARD. And then when the clock finally strikes midnight and you look around and see everyone getting a New Years kiss with the person standing closest to them their significant other, all you are dreaming about is making out with a jumbo slice of extra cheesy pizza and, if the planets are aligned, even some mozz sticks.


Or maybe that's just me...

^^^^^^^

Anyway.

The Thai New Year (Songkran) is way better. It falls sometime in mid-April and is basically a country-wide WATER FIGHT. 

^Chelsea with her first watergun...I think she ended up buying three in a four day span

You get to walk around drinking $1 beers while spraying people with water until you are shriveled up like a prune, and then drunk eat crepes and questionable looking meats on a stick and pass out. WHAT IS BETTER THAN THAT?!?!? NOTHING

^lost little boy I found on the street, or Chelsea Farrall?!? (water gun #2)

^no water gun for Chelsea

^water gun #3...

^Embracing the snaggle <3 <3

Strangers will also come up and rub white powder on your face/arms/body and I wish they wouldn't

^Why does this happen? I don't know

We celebrated Songkran in both Bangkok and Chiang Mai! However after four days of water constantly being poured on our heads, drinking every Chang 7/11 has to offer, and random people rubbing our faces with white powder (seriously stop doing that), we decided to retire our waterguns and hide out in our hostel until Songkran was over. Call us cultured!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESdtsVfxHho 

Peace Pattaya

Once our two weeks of student teaching and Thai culture class were over, we took a final Thai test and were officially TESOL certified!!!!! Meet your newest teachas!!!

                                                                  ^Jam aka my best friend

Aaaaaaand guess who was the only one to get 100 on their test?!

*hair flip*

WE WERE FINALY FREE TO LEAVE THE HELL HOLE THAT IS CONSIDERED PATTAYA, THAILAND!!!!!! We could not get out of there fast enough.

We didn't haaaaate Pattaya. We would just never ever go back there ever again. But we made the most of our two weeks there!

^sweat seeping through my shirt

^happy the memory of this is foggy

^becoming famous street performers...people actually gave them money?!? LOOK AT HOW MANY PEOPLE SURROUNDED THEM!! WHY?!?!

^aaaand then Chelsea chipped her tooth. So much distress in the 7/11

^these Turkish men got the bar workers to bring out the American flag...so great but also why were we hanging out with 60 year old Turkish men

^better yet why was Chelsea dancing with one...?

The only reason I would come back to Pattaya is for this lady right here.

She's the real MVP.

GOODBYE PATTAYA SEE YOU NEVER!

Teacha Teacha

Our final two weeks of training consisted of student teaching in the morning, and then two hours of Thai class in the afternoon followed by two hours of lesson planning (yaaaaaaaaaayyyyyy there is nothing more fun than lesson planning). When I first got the email from Jam telling me that I was placed in a Baptist Church where I would be teaching 20-60 year old housewives, I was not happy. Maybe I have been living with Chelsea for too long, but real tears were involved. Thankfully a couple days later Jam emailed me saying I actually had a group of ten 7-10 year olds and even more tears were involved, but this time happy tears.

After taking ten hours to plan a two hour English class (apparently I procrastinate more as a teacher than as a student) I was finally ready for my first day of school! I walk into my classroom and patiently waited for all my little students to arrive.

By the time class was supposed to start, I had a single student staring at me, void of any emotion (probably the way I look at Jam when she tries to teach us Thai). I guess I should start teaching now...? We ended up going through my entire two hour lesson plan in less than 45 minutes. Needless to say my first day was a little rough.

Over the next two weeks teaching became much more fun, but I definitely would not say it was easy. Each day more and more students would show up, which was both a blessing and a curse. One or two of my students could speak full sentences almost fluently, while others stared at me the entire class not saying a single word.

Even if you ask the students if they understand, they will all say yes no matter what. I found that to be the most frustrating part of teaching, because in Thai culture yes=yes and yes=no. Saving face is a huge part of Thai culture, and it makes teaching extremely difficult. Even when I knew some students didn't understand something, they would never admit to it because that would cause them to lose face. Some students didn't even like to participate in games because they were afraid they wouldn't know an answer, so I always had the same students playing the games, and those were always the students who knew the material already. You also can't force them to do something they don't want to do, because that would cause them to lose face as well. Overall while I loved teaching, some of the cultural differences are definitely going to be frustrating, but I am excited to see what lies ahead!!

*Highlight of teaching* my students didn't know that a "c" can be pronounced as either a hard or soft "c". Imagine ten little Thai children trying to pronounce "faucet"...

"Teacha teacha what so funny???"

So. Great.