WE ARE HEREEEE

From Catonsville, Maryland, to Dulles airport in Dulles, Virginia, to JFK airport in New York, to Taipei, Taiwan, and finally to Phnom Penh, Cambodia (with a few questionable airplane meals thrown in there) WE MADE IT!!! WE ARE HERE IN SOUTHEAST ASIA!!! CHELSEA IS SO EXCITED!!!!

 Immediately as we step out of the airplane in Cambodia we are met with a rush of hot air. I mean hot. I honestly forgot what it felt like to be drenched in sweat considering Maryland's winter seems to be continuing until April, but I was reminded pretty quickly.

This was the moment Chelsea finally decided she in fact did not need the four pairs of jeans she brought.

We spot the man holding a sign that says Language Corps who is there to pick us up and he takes our suitcases and loads them into a tuk tuk (basically a carriage with a motor bike attached) . We then pile into another tuk tuk with a few other people from our program and off we go on the most terrifying ride of my life. Picture the game Frogger where you try to get from one side of the street to the other side without getting squashed by a car. That is how people in Cambodia "drive". Streets filled with motos, tuk tuks, no sorts of stop signs, speed limits, or even identifiable sides of the road you are supposed to drive on. There actually aren't even roads, it's mostly a dirt ground. We did see one intersection that had stop lights but people did not pay any attention to them. I believe they are mostly there for decoration.

The first thing I noticed about Cambodia was the smell. Nothing will quite prepare you for the smells that greet your nose. Imagine rotten meat, mixed with month old trash, mixed with how my hedgehog's cage smells after I don't clean it for a week, and then multiply that by three. Those were some of the smells that greeted my nostril. Just taking it in like a fine wine.

The next thing I noticed about Cambodia was that my feet looked like I was on my third trimester of pregnancy. They were so swollen from the heat and from flying that it hurt to even wiggle my toes. Thankfully that has gone away now.

Here's a pic of Chelsea's pregnant feet. It looks like she has webbed feet like my brother.

After a few years of my life were shaved off with the tuk tuk drive, we made it to the hotel we are staying at. We settled in and decided to fight our jet lag by exploring, even though all I desperately wanted was a beer and to go to sleep and never wake up (even though I'm technically still unemployed, I already miss being able to lay in my bed all day and watch Netflix. Forget I said that, Mom.)

View from our hotel room!

Our tuk tuk driver told us about a museum we should visit, and since we knew nothing about Cambodia, we agreed. After another tuk tuk ride and a loss of a few more years of my life, we had reached our destination.

The Killing Fields of Cambodia.

Well that was unexpected.

Not entirely sure what we are getting ourselves into, we step into the museum and get an audio guide. 

Wow.

Two of my friends here actually wrote an amazing blog post (click here) explaining the history of 

Cambodia, and the genocide that occurred here less than 50 years ago. It is definitely worth the read, and I think will surprise most people reading it. All I can say is, while I was not expecting to be walking through killing fields in the first hour of being in Cambodia, where there are still places you can see bone and teeth sticking up from the ground, it was such an eye-opening experience and explains so much about the culture and the people here. Being in Phnom Penh for the past two weeks, I noticed that most people are under the age of 30, which makes sense considering 25% of the entire population was murdered. However, every single person I have seen and interacted with has such a happy and genuine aura about them, even though they have almost nothing compared to our standards of living. It is amazing to see people be so happy and full of life, with having so little. Their smiles are so infectious that you can't help but smile back, even though neither of you know what the other is saying. I'll get into more of the culture of Cambodia and why I love it so much in later posts, but if you ever have the opportunity to visit, I highly recommend it!!! It is an amazing and wonderful place.

                                                                                                                                                                   

Once we got back to the hotel we realized we hadn't eaten anything all day, so we ventured out in search of sustenance. After walking for over an hour past multiple questionable looking food stands, with Megan McCawley's warning ringing in my head, "DON'T YOU DARE EAT DOG. DON'T YOU DARE", we finally wandered upon an actual sit down restaurant with an English menu. Naturally we all ordered fried rice, sans any meat. It was our first meal, give us a break. The rice did have black specks in it that I was convinced were fried bugs, but I just had to reassure myself that they probably weren't. Probably.

After dinner and a quick hour walk back to our hotel in the blazing sun, breathing in the lovely smells of Cambodia, we got back to our hotel room. Lo and behold, ants. Everywhere. And you know what ants love? MY ALMOND BUTTER. I already lost my beloved peanut butter to the still really hot peanut butter hating TSA agent, I couldn't stand to lose my almond butter too (honestly Laura how many nut butters did you need to bring? Three. I brought three) Thankfully I had sealed it in two plastic bags, but those little shits were still crawling on the outside of the bag, just waiting to get their little feelers in there. After spraying almost half my bottle of mosquito repellent on the ants (does this even help?) and contemplating carrying around my almond butter in my purse so the ants had less chance to sneak in there, I put it in the refrigerator, thinking they definitely would not be able to get in there.

By this point we had been up for almost two full days and karaoke was calling our name. We finally met the director of Language Corps, Rick Barnes, who Chelsea had emailed non-stop every day every hour every minute making sure we weren't getting scammed again a few times. I'm not sure why we pictured we were corresponding with a late twenties frat guy when in reality we were corresponding with a sixty year old bald man with a gnarly beard, but at least he is not PHILLIP DUNNE FROM ISLAND TEFL.



After a few one dollar beers and some sloppy rendition of pop star Britney Britney's Hit Me Baby One More Time, we finally stumbled up to our rooms and fell into a deep slumber.

^Chelsea tried so hard to be a part of the group

^lead singer right there

Extra Crunchy

I can't believe it's been over a week and a half and this is the first time I'm even opening my computer (not for lack of trying...the WiFi here leaves something to be desired). Let's go back to those 30 wonderful hours of us getting to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

After saying goodbye to all of our parents and reassuring my mom that I did in fact have everything I needed, we proceed to check our bags.

"Identification?" the JetBlue employee asks as I shuffle through my purse looking for my ID. As I frantically go through my wallet for the third time, racking my brain for what bar I presumably didn't close my tab out at, I remember. My license is ironically sitting on my scanner at home because I wanted to "be prepared". Welp guess I won't be needing that. Now time to weigh my bag.

*places suitcase on scale and holds breath*

A whopping 64 pounds. 

At this point a line is forming behind me, I am starting to sweat at the thought that I probably have a full 7 pounds of peanut butter in my bag that I will inevitably have to throw out, and I'm pretty sure all of my "undergarments" are at the top of my suitcase.

After shoving ten pounds of who knows what in my carry on, taking out my jar of Jif and placing it in my purse, and holding my suitcase up slightly off the scale to take off the last two pounds, I can finally let the ten plus people who have formed behind me in the otherwise empty airport get on with their lives.

Now comes the time when I try to sneak past security with a full tub of Jif in my carry on. 

"Is that a full jar of peanut butter?" asks the extremely attractive TSA agent before I even get through security. "Yes" I try and say in my most seductive voice, hoping he will have a passion for peanut butter too, and we will bond over our love for peanut butter, fall in love, get married, and tell our love story to our three beautiful children who ironically will have peanut allergies.

"You can't bring that through."

There goes my love story. 

Even though "creamy spreads" are technically not allowed through security, this peanut butter is extra crunchy, so it should not be a problem. He took it anyway. I just stared at my poor jar of peanut butter, sitting in it's little tray. 

Look how sad and lonely it is.

After leaving my peanut butter and a part of my soul (okayyyy I'm being dramatic) at the Dulles airport, we were finally ready to start this 30+ hour trip. 

And here's an ugly picture of us.

Rhymes with schwe schwere schwammed

*picks mic back up off the floor*

Back to me getting a job and earning an income. What better way to do that than to work at the most magical place on Earth?! Yup you got it! I worked at DISNEYLAND MACY*S!!!! Don't worry, I wasn't a salesperson like some sort of peasant. I did go into the interview trying to get a re-stocking position in the warehouse (who am I?!) but for some reason they thought that wouldn't be a good fit. Maybe it was the nice dress and blazer I was wearing. Maybe it was the fact that I could speak English and have a college education. Anyway, I ended up being the scheduling coordinator for all of the seasonal employees which turned out to be pretty interesting. And who doesn't want to make Macy's magic every day? I know I do.

(Side story. Every year my mom gets my brother, sister, and I a different Christmas ornament that will remind you of something that happened that year when you look back at all of your ornaments. For example, this past year my brother bought two jet skis so my mom got him an ornament with a picture of him riding a jetski on it. Pretty cool. My sister moved to Texas last year so my mom got her a Texas boot ornament. Fitting. What ornament did I get?

The Macy's red mailbox. I guess that was my big accomplishment of the year. Not that I graduated college or...yea no that is about it. Everyone laughed and laughed and laughed. I had to be at work the day after Christmas so I was, in fact, not laughing. End side story)

Back to Thailand. If you weren't sure why you are reading this, I'm going to Thailand to teach English for seven months, (that probably still didn't answer your question of why you are reading this) so here is a motivating quote to set the mood.

....yea. Tell that to my depleting bank account which definitely signifies that I am, in fact, not richer.


Planning this trip to Thailand has really made me grow into a responsible, mature young adult who can't wait to explore every corner the world has to offer and open my mind to different people and cultures and life as we live it made me want to stab my eyeballs out with a hot fork.

I'll try and make this story "short", but feel free to skip to the end, or just probably skim it and laugh at the gifs.


Chelsea Farrall, my roommate from college

^notice the hemp choker...

(she's like really pretty) and I heard about teaching English in Thailand from one of our college roommate's friends. We thought it sounded like a convenient way to put off getting a real job an amazing and culturally stimulating idea, especially considering my other option: living at home for the rest of my life while simultaneously getting rejected from multiple entry-level jobs, listening to my employed friends tell me to be thankful that I have absolutely nothing to do all day. every. single. day. Or I could just go back to making Macy's magic.

Chelsea's friend Emily Pfeiffer also wanted to join in on the fun, because who doesn't want to prolong having responsibilities for as long as possible?

^she's also really pretty

So we "researched" the company our friend was going through, and after nervously telling our parents that we were traveling to the other side of the world to teach English to children who know less English than I know Spanish, with no other income to support ourselves and no savings, as well as not entirely knowing where Thailand is (call me cultured!), we placed our deposit with..........Island TEFL (insert the fiery flames of hell here).

Two days after we placed our deposit (I repeat, 48 hours after we placed our deposit) Chelsea received these encouraging words of wisdom from John, who had been in Thailand doing Island TEFL for about a month:

A few things should have tipped us off about Island TEFL's authenticity, including but not limited to:

- our program price kept *magically* getting reduced, to a price so low who could say no!
- we sent money to Philip through PayPal without ever signing a contract
- there is an entire blog dedicated to how Island TEFL is a scam *face palm*

Here are a few highlights from said blog:

• First, Island TEFL is not an officially registered company in Thailand, but exists solely on the internet as a web domain.
• It certainly has no offices of its own, either in Thailand or USA, and is basically just a one man show, Philip Dunne working from a room somewhere. 
• There's no company in the true sense of the word and it’s certainly not audited. 
• It’s not registered anywhere for tax purposes and any mention of accountants, attorneys, secretaries, etc. is fabricated. 
• However, this situation has only occurred since about four or five years ago, when the original Australian owners sold Island TEFL to Philip Dunne.  Up till then it was properly managed and was a reputable company with premises on Koh Samui. In fact, many of the website pictures come from that era.  Island TEFL’s decline has only occurred since then primarily due to Philip Dunne’s mismanagement.  He has decided to manage from the USA trying to sell branches as franchises, rather than relocate to Thailand and establish a permanent base and grow organically.  There are many reasons for this.  However, the main one seems to be that he may be wanted by the police for an alleged statutory rape case (see under Philip Dunne tab).
• The course book for the Island TEFL course is quite good and comes from that earlier era.  However, the course is in no way accredited.  There will certainly be no visits or monitoring by any accrediting organisation.  None of the organisations Philip Dunne mentions on his website have any authority to accredit courses.

After reading all this we thought, alriiiiight. Someone is a little dramatic. I think we can go to a foreign country sans job without any certification or teaching degree and still get a job even though it is the middle of the school year there and why would they hire someone with zero teaching degree, on top of the fact that I have never taught English or anything for that matter (I have taught arts and crafts...so...) in my entire life and only passed grammar in high school because I sat next to Lea Desrosiers who I may or may not have maybe cheated off of my whole freshman year once or twice as well as the ironic fact that this is most certainly a run-on sentence (is that right Lea?!)?

Then my friend Hannah sent me this encouraging message from her friend who is currently in Thailand through a different program:

Oh goodie! Glad I just gave the equivalent of 120 nights of cover at Bents (ugh reliving those glory days) to a man named Philip via PayPal.

Fast forward to us telling Philip we have to drop out of the program for "personal reasons" (aka you're a DOUCHE), and asking for our money back. He said no, *shocker*. Since we are poor recent grads, we decide to make a claim through PayPal to see if we can get any of our money back. In total we paid a little less than $600, with $200 going towards a deposit on the hotel we would be staying at during the TEFL training (I'M TAKING BACK MY "LIKE" ON FACEBOOK, BAAN NATACHA BEACHFRONT GUESTHOUSE!!!!!). We made two claims, one for the $400 course deposit, and one for the $200 hotel deposit. We messaged the hotel, asking if there was a cancellation policy, and if we had to pay a fee to cancel our stay. Their website says they will reply to all messages in 24 hours, yet unsurprisingly we are still waiting to hear back from them three months later.

Then one magical day we woke up to $200 in our PayPal account! We are unsure if this was taken from Philip, since he never mentioned anything about $600 mysteriously vanishing from his bank account, or if PayPal just gave us the money so we would stop harassing them. Either way I immediately wanted to go spend my newly acquired $200 on alcohol put that money in the bank so it can collect a paltry amount of interest over time.

Now we were only out $400, which to people with actual incomes you probably think, eh, you live and you learn. But to people who worked at MACY*S (*~macys magic~*) post-grad as a SEASONAL EMPLOYEE....this was a lot of money. I digress.



This is probably the point of the story, if it hasn't already happened yet, where YOU probably want to stab your eyeballs out with a hot fork. It's almost over!

^Squidward is apparently an octopus not a squid. I'm not sure why I'm including this fact in my blog.

Chelsea decided to make a claim through her credit card company to see if she could somehow get the last $400 back. She sent in the entire blog dedicated to tearing Island TEFL to shreds, our email correspondence, and our PayPal transactions. Philip was less than thrilled.

*kind regards*

Chelsea did not provide the contact information for her attorney, and did not respond to the email. About three weeks later Philip must have remembered that he was in the process of suing Chelsea.

Meanwhile, while Chelsea is being sued, we decided to roll the dice again and go through a different company. We chose Language Corps, and have verifications from a few reliable people one person who has already completed the program that it is definitely legitimate and worth giving away all my money.

We again went through the process of sending a large sum of money to a random person we have never met, with flashbacks of Philip Dunne and our stupidity lingering in our head. So far everything has gone smoothly! *famous last words*

Back to Chelsea being sued. After three months of her bank looking over her claim against Philip...drumroll...(did anyone do a drumroll in their head? no? just me?)

 SHE WON!!!!

^ Chelsea

v Philip with half an ear

He actually kind of looks like that...

Okay enough pictures of Philip.

Chelsea won her claim so she is $374 richer!!! Think about how many drinks she can buy me with that kind of money!!!!!

We officially leave TODAY and will be arriving in Cambodia a quick two days later on Saturday, where we will spend two weeks in training, and then move to Thailand for the remainder of the training. Once we are done training we can go anywhere in Thailand to find a job! (I have flashbacks of arriving in Paris earlier than anticipated when I was abroad, and having to roll my suitcase on the cobblestone streets of Paris at six in the morning to the utter joy of the Parisian residents, only to sit in a laundromat for a few hours so we didn't get hypothermia. The good days)
Now as long as our airplane doesn't mysteriously vanish mid-flight (too soon? too soon.), we will be on our way to becoming teachers! Let that sink in...little Thai children at the hands of my teaching skills. God bless.