Holiday in Thailand

For winter vacation, Jeremy and I ventured south to where the warm weather was beckoning us, Thailand.  Complications with vacation schedules caused us to minimize our time there, but after spending a week there, I have decided it is definitely a place worth visiting again.  We took so many pictures and experienced so much that Jeremy and I decided to split up the work- I wrote the blog post and Jeremy posted and labeled the pictures.  For those stunning pictures, go to doctormanislost.blogspot.com and on the top of the page are the pictures.  If you click on them, it will take you to his Flickr account where all of our pictures from Thailand and also South Korea are. 

For Thailand, we skipped from China to Bangkok arrived late in the evening on the first night.  After waking up in our hostel, the very friendly owners cooked us breakfast before we headed out the door.  We congregated with some fellow English teachers that we met in Korea.  All four of us headed off to explore the amazingly warm and bustling area, after consuming a morning snack of coconut milk- chopped right before our eyes.  Tuk-tuk was our preferred form of transportation.  If you don’t know what that is, you have probably seen one and just didn’t know what it’s called.  

Inside the tuk-tuk

It is a motorcycle with a bench seat behind it for passengers and covered on top. 

First stop was the Grand Palace.  

One of the many stops in the Grand Palace 

We walked around and gawked at all of the buildings covered in gold and jewels.  Aside from being worn down from the immense heat and wear and tear from the high tourist frequency, the buildings and art surrounding it were kept in good shape.  They had men working on touching up the paint and tending to the grounds. 

After the Grand Palace, we scrunched back into a Tuk-tuk and scurried back to our hotels.  The heat was already affecting us.  When we left Korea, it was about -12 Celsius, so the temperature was a drastic jump from what we had been used to.  We all re-grouped before meeting up for dinner. 

A stall in Chinatown selling just about any type of dried products you could ever want

Flattened duck.  A delicacy in Chinatown?

Dinner in Thailand mostly consisted of walking down the street and choosing what looks most appealing from the street vendors.  Price was of course a major factor.  Haggling is how Thailand operates.  Dinner was an array of different Thai cuisines from different stands.  While looking for a place to eat, we browsed in Bangkok’s China Town as well.  The roads were packed and the sidewalks were crowded with tables set-up outside of restaurants and workers trying to lure in customers.  We haggled to get cheap Thai leg massages, which I didn’t know were supposed to be so rough until about 5 minutes in. 

The next day, Jeremy and I left to head up north.  We arrived in the city of Chiang Mai.  The weather was a little bit breezy and the streets were much calmer compared to Bangkok.  After arriving we were immediately taken to a Thai cooking class that we booked in advance.  We arrived to find ourselves welcomed by the hosts, Nancy and Pot (both spoke English well).  We chose 3 meals (appetizer, main dish, and dessert) to prepare and cook ourselves.  

The ingredients for making curry paste- a tough task. Men choose wives depending
on how well they can make curry paste, something that takes a lot of muscles.

Nancy would tell us what to use, and show us how to prepare the ingredients before throwing them into the wok.  The hardest part of the meal was preparing the curry paste.  I think that’s something I will leave to the experts from now on.  The food we prepared was indubitably the best Thai meal we ate all vacation.  The taste was on point, and creating it ourselves was even better.

Carrot flowers we made during our break between our
appetizer and main dish.  Can you tell which ones are ours?

After the cooking class, we headed home and relaxed before heading out to the famous night bazaar which was just a short walk away.  There were stands lining the sidewalks on both sides of the street for miles. This was our first taste of Thai markets, soon would we find out that most of the things sold all across Thailand are the same (they even sell t-shirts that say “same same, bit different.”  We made our way through the stands and collected some interesting souvenirs. Dinner consisted of grilled prawns and Pad Thai at a large seafood restaurant. 

The next day, we rose bright and early to be escorted to an elephant farm located in the mountains.  This isn’t any old elephant farm- it’s highly acclaimed and even Samantha Brown did a piece about this place on her show.  Patara Elephant Farm was where we would be elephant caregivers for a day.  We arrived and hopped out of the vans in front of an area where a 3-week old baby elephant and his mom lived.  We fed them bananas before we headed down to meet the other elephants.  The morning started off with some introductions, information about the farm itself, splitting into groups (about 15 people in our group), and getting dressed for the day ahead (they supplied clothes for us to wear over our own).  The day was full of exciting events and once in a lifetime occurrences.  

Jeremy and I's elephants drinking water before getting baths in the river

The first task was to check the elephant’s health.  There were certain steps for this which included: checking for flapping ears and tail (good sign), seeing if they had slept on their sides during the night (checked for dirt on their sides), counting the number of droppings they had (6 or more is healthy), and actually smelling and touching their poop.  Elephants are constantly eating so their bodies chew up and spit out their vegetarian diet quickly- meaning the poop smells like wet hay, not bad at all. 
Fun fact: Elephants only excrete sweat from one part of their body- their cuticles.  We crouched down to feel the moist skin around their fingernails which concluded our health check. 

Jeremy and I by the waterfall where we swam with the elephants
(wearing our caretaker outfits)

After the health check, we dusted the dirt off their backs (which they threw on themselves to keep cool in the heat) with palm leaves- which we fed to them after we finished, led them to the river, and bathed them.  After they dried, we mounted them with no saddle, just a rope for support.  We stomped up and down hills by steep mountains and through the forest before we arrived at a waterfall.  Lunch was situated on the rocks by the water, which was some of the best food we had in Thailand (aside from what we made ourselves of course) filled with fruits and scrumptious homemade croquettes and pastries I have never seen or tasted.  After we finished, the clean-up crew came in.  The baby elephant trudged over and slurped up everything he could before the rest was given to the other elephants.  We spent the rest of the afternoon swimming with the elephants in the river, riding them back to camp, and saying our goodbyes.

Us and our group who camped on Maya Beach

That night, we skipped down to the southern beaches via air.  We arrived late at night and went straight to our hotel after grabbing a midnight dinner of street vendor kabobs.  We woke up early the next morning the grab the morning ferry over to a small island named Koh Phi Phi.  The morning was spent walking the crowded streets, basking in the sun, and wading out to sea.  Mid afternoon, we clambered onto a Rasta-colored boat with about 20 other people.  We were all headed to a one-night stay on the island where Leonardo DiCaprio’s movie “The Beach” was filmed.  We started off with a little snorkeling, exploring the beach, 
and playing games before the hosts treated us to a fire-throwing show and a couple full meals.  They used flaming sticks and nunchuck-like balls- one of their younger (probably about 12) family members marched his chubby behind out and did a couple of tricks himself.   We broke out some sleeping bags and pillows, for the night ahead of us would consist of a blanket of stars and the soothing sounds of the waves to send us to sleep. 

On the beach just before leaving.  An extremely beautiful place.

 We woke in the morning to a quick breakfast before the other tourists arrived.  It seemed to hit 8 o’clock and about 10 boats puttered onto the island at the same time.  We headed off to sneak a peek at Viking caves- occupied by islanders but are not allowed to be entered by anyone else and another snorkeling spots filled with jellyfish big and small.  This wasn’t enough to coax Jeremy and I out of the boat.  From there, it was a straight shot back to Koh Phi Phi island- where we spent all but 20 minutes picking up our luggage before getting onto another ferry to take us to Krabi.

Aonang was where we ended our trip around Thailand.  We arrived at our hotel from the Krabi pier in the afternoon and hung around there for the rest of the day- Jeremy was feeling pretty sick from what we think was the chicken liver he so bravely ate in Bangkok.  

A lantern being sent into the sky at sunset

Jeremy and I at the beach on the last day's sunset

The next day we ventured out into the city.  We walked up and down the streets shopping and eating before going down to the beach for some more much-needed sunning.  The small amounts of rain didn’t deter us from staying there for the afternoon.  

Sunset off the coast of Aonang

We spent the night walking the stand-filled streets before retiring to our comfortable hotel room.  For meals, we ate some delicious western food that seemed to be the only thing we were craving after having Thai food all week. 

We couldn't resist getting some grilled corn from one of the many people
walking the beaches trying to sell things.  This was so cheap yet so delicious!

 During the day, when we weren't on the beach, we would walk the streets and look at the shops lining the sidewalks.  Every building was either a restaurant, souvenir shop, or pharmacy (like in Korea, there can never be enough pharmacies).  The last day was more beach lounging before packing up and leaving for the airport.

The main road in Aonang at night

We set up our trip perfectly.  Large amounts of activities in the beginning of the week and ending with some relaxing on the beach.  If we were to ever journey back to Thailand, the northern cities and the southern beaches is where we would spend our time.  One week in Thailand definitely was not enough!

Farewell celebration, again!

Monday started a new week and more travels.  Janggi, my main school, was holding their English Winter Camp and I was one of the main teachers.  For the first day of the week, about 50 of the students and 2 teachers, me being 1 of them, we all headed to the big city of Daejeon.  We hopped on a charter bus and arrived at the Daejeon English Center in less than an hour.  Students filed out and sat in the auditorium.  A small Korean man walked out and tried his hand at speaking English when introducing himself.  He went over rules in English but translated for himself when giving detailed information. 

Students working hard

All of the students split up into three groups depending on their skill level.  I took the 2^nd group, the middle level, and we started our day.  There were three stations that we were to visit- food, dance, and science.  All consisted of an activity where only English was to be spoken.  The teachers of the classes were native English speakers like me and they were all from Canada and America.  They taught the children different activities like how to make hot chocolate by explaining each of the directions individually before performing them.  The dance station was a charades activity that involved conjugation of verbs.  The final activity was a science experiment which was basically mixing baking soda with vinegar.  The students seemed to love it all and really learned some new English words – simple ones that you and I would not even imagine would be a problem like mix, fizz, and scoop.  After leaving the English Center, we went to dinner- a popular Chinese food meal made with noodles and a black sauce.  We all skipped back onto the bus and went back to school before I even knew the day was over. 

My higher level class- some of them were hiding 

The rest of the week, one of the other teachers and I taught English camp.  My camp was winter themed so I taught them different vocabularies, watched movies, and played games.  I think the only reason they offer winter camp is for those parents that still work and don’t want their kids to be at home alone.  It is basically a week of fun- and that’s exactly how I made it.  Thanks to the candy that my Mom sent me, my class was a hit.  They were very attentive knowing that when they answered a question correctly, they would receive a sticker or a piece of candy.  The camp was only for 4 classes in the morning and then we were allowed to leave at 12:10.  At 12:10, everyone was completely gone- no where to be found which showed me that these Koreans are strictly business.  Wednesday to Friday, all of the teachers that worked that day went to lunch.  I was treated to spicy soup, duck, and fish soup each day. 

Thursday evening for dinner we went to a farewell dinner for the two teachers that were leaving.  I was picked up by one of the teachers and we all met up at the restaurant.  There was a huge selection of food ranging from sashimi to soups to caviar rolls and so much more.  Basically, anything related to seafood was plopped on our table that night.  Korean meals are set in groups of 4.  They bring out food for each group of 4 and when it is a big celebration, they celebrate by serving/eating more.  Well, this restaurant must have thought this was a very special celebration.  They did not skip out when it came to the amount of food they served.  Plate after plate after plate came out and they didn’t wait for us to finish the previous rounds.  I was full off of the first round but the other teachers insisted I eat more, so I did. 

Our side of the table

Sashimi, octopus legs, corn, and fried fish

I got food poisoning from this night, and I think this was the culprit! 

Caviar and rice

I was sitting at the table with the administration workers, the science teacher, the principal, and the vice principal.  All of them love to drink soju.  In Korean culture, if someone offers you a drink, you take it and then return the favor by offering them one.  Well, when in Korea, do as the Koreans do right?  So, I couldn’t deny any of the offerings of drinks.  We found ourselves at least 15 bottles deep in soju before we all decided to leave. 

Shells, pumpkin, and clam soup

Soju bottles

As I walked outside, I was told that many people would be going to a karaoke bar, called a Noraebang (노래방) in Korean, and that I should attend.  So, I did.  It was my first time going to a noraebang but it was a lot of fun.  There is a huge U-shaped couch wrapped around a table for everyone to sit at and some room at the front of the table for a makeshift stage.  The teachers that sang were really good, but honestly, I don’t think I’ve really heard a Korean that was bad at singing.  I didn’t plan to sing anything, just watch, but the science teacher insisted I get up and sing the only two English songs he had memorized in high school- both 80’s love songs.  He prepared me by singing it when we were walking to the noraebang with the lyrics “nothing’s gonna change my love for you.”

Singing some songs

We sang for about an hour and then headed to our next stop, bowling.  It’s the same as in America, and my skill level was also the same as in America, low.  I think they were all expecting me to be good since they know I like to play sports. My team was pretty disappointed when they found out bowling is one of my weak spots.  Precision is something I always have problems with when it comes to games.  Well we played 4 vs. 4 and my team didn’t do so hot.  That didn’t stop the crowd from moving on.

Making teams

It was about 9:30 at this time and as we walked out into the cold, they explained to me, one more little drink, so I agreed.  We went to a bar down the street and all sat down at a large table.  Most of the bars in Korea are sectioned off with half walls for your own private area.  With that, you also normally have to buy some sort of food to go along with it.  So, we ordered a bunch of beers, some soju, and a plate of dried squid, nuts, and fish chips.  These seem to be a staple of what people eat when they go out to bars so I am used to these things by now, and have actually grown to like them.  Some of them at least. 

The science teacher brought his kids to the bar

We stayed there for about an hour talking about family and anything else they could muster to tell me in their broken English sentences (mind you none of these teachers spoke English well).  After a while we all split up and 4 of us caught a cab.  I thought they were going to just drop me off but one of the teachers, my Korean father, insisted he meet Jeremy.  So, they came to Jeremy’s apartment with me to have some coffee.   They stayed for a few minutes for introductions and some small talk- then they headed out the door.  It was just about midnight when I went to bed.  It was definitely a night I will not forget. 

Mollie Teacha!

Before I left for Thailand:

            In Korea, all teachers, administration, and principals are not allowed to stay at a school for more than a certain number of years (4-6 depending on the position).  Two of our administrators are transferring to another school.  One, being the "numba one driva," in his words, and the other being the executive mechanic, aka the Gardner.  They are both pretty funny- both short and stumpy and are hilarious to watch when we all play volleyball together (they sometimes try and spike the ball but completely miss because they are too short to reach over the net).

The only picture I got from lunch- half devoured plates of seafood and only
chopped up sea dwelling creatures were left  

We all went out the week before I went to Thailand to celebrate them leaving and also to celebrate a successful end of the school year.  We traveled to a city about an hour away to have a big sushi lunch.  They love to drink soju here, which if you have heard of it before, is pretty good.  Everyone explains it as a lighter vodka but I don't think that's a good comparison.  It is definitely like nothing I have ever tasted, but it is much easier to drink than vodka and much better tasting than sake.  Well, they drink it like water here.  So when we went out to lunch, they insisted on serving me a bunch. 

They pride themselves on telling people how many shots they have taken- so they kept asking me while they were giving me drinks but honestly I could not even remember since they were coming from every direction. 

After many cheers, chatter, a sashimi/seafood filled lunch, we all hop in the car to leave.  As we are leaving, the other teachers tell me that one of the drivers is "happy."  I asked if that meant he was drunk and they agreed. 

So, the drunk driver (school bus driver, not the actual driver of the car), made us follow him to a special place he knew about that was nearby.  We pulled up to a Migratory Bird Sanctuary down the road.  

About 8 other teachers and I climbed a tall tower and relaxed at the top while looking through high powered binoculars for these so called migrating birds. Now, it's in the middle of December in South Korea, so there weren't many birds to see when we were bird watching.  After we left the tower, we turned left and walked up the hill more.  There were a group of cages outside so we went to look. 

This brings me to the way Koreans handle animals.  There were a bunch of cages side by side, and all of them had birds in them.  One cage had 4 huge buzzards waddling around, definitely not enough space for all of them.  The owls were in the next cage- no place for them to hide during the daylight and not many places for them to perch themselves.  The rest were all smaller animals but all of them were outside and no coverings!  It was really cold there- the pond we walked by later was frozen!  It made me sad to see all of the animals just sitting out there in the cold. 

After ogling at the birds, we went to the souvenir shop for some much needed coffee.  All the other teachers insisted that I try and guess, who of the 4 men, were the oldest and youngest.  Unlike Americans, age in something everyone knows, no matter what your age is.  They even post it at the bottom of the screen when interviewing people on television!  This is because everyone is addressed depending on their age- if you are older, you are spoken to with a sense of politeness and higher respect.  If you are younger, an entire different kind of sentence structure is used, more casual.  I personally think that most Koreans, and most Asians in general, look younger than they really are- and sometimes they even fool each other with their age, so people always ask each other.  Well, when I guessed, I was completely wrong.

I guessed that the youngest guy was the oldest and the oldest was the second youngest.  I then tried to explain that the youngest man acted older because he was so devoted to his job and stern when it came to working (which is completely true).  I didn’t, though, say that since he was the only one balding, that that swayed my opinion.  Yes, many Koreans have great genes here when it comes to old age and hair.  They keep their hair color until well into their 50’s, maybe even later, and it’s rare to see them balding. 

The group of my co-workers

While drinking coffee, we all talked about age and children.  A couple of the men told me that they have children around my age so they now call themselves “Malia teacher’s Korean father,” but it comes out at “Mollie teacha Korean whot-taa.”  They have trouble pronouncing “f’s” and I guess it’s easier to say Molia instead of Malia- the shortened version being Mollie.   

Sitting in front of a "love" sign

We all got back into our cars and started our hour travel home.  Well, if you know me, I always fall asleep during car rides- it’s something my Mom trained me to do when I was little and I have never grown out of it.  When I awoke, the teachers were all frantically chatting and pointing to things on their phones.  One proceeded to tell me that we had gotten lost. We were now on the road heading towards Seoul, a 2 hour trip!  We then swerved off the highway at the next exit and onto a country road which took us through a bunch of small cities.  

About an hour later, an hour longer then what was expected, we arrived back at school.  This trip was a lot of fun, and it made me closer with a lot of the teachers.  It was also when I was supposed to teach Winter English Camp at my rural school so I got out of doing that as well and had a day off!

I added a couple of new posts so check them out!  I will be adding more in a couple of weeks but right now Jeremy and I are off to Thailand from 1/7 - 1/15!  Pictures from that later on!!

School Festivals!

Each year in October or November, the schools have different festivals to show off their dancing, singing, English, and other skills to parents and different schools in the area.  I got lucky and was invited to 3 different festivals.  Each of my schools had their individual festivals for the parents at their schools and then both of my schools, along with another native teachers' two schools, had an English festival.  At both of my schools' individual festivals, I could not pull myself away from taking pictures of all the students (and it was hard to decide which pictures would make the cut to be in my blog,there were so many choices!).  

The school festival at Janggi Elementary School

The 4th grade class performing a skit in English- the Grasshopper and the Ants

All of the students sitting and waiting for the opening ceremony to begin

Kindergartners performing with fans

Kindergartners lining up to leave after performing

They were all so cute standing up on stage performing- and it was nice to see how they acted outside of the classroom.  These festivals seem to be a big deal.  They rent costumes for the students to wear- sometimes even two different costumes for different acts, and they practice very hard before the big day.  A few of my classes were cancelled due to practicing for the festival.  

At the festivals, some of the students would sing, dance, do Taekwondo moves, jump rope, or role play.  It was a really fun time. 

Kindergartners role playing

TaeKwonDo presentation

3rd graders waiting to perform

 Kindergartners walking off in their funny costumes

Kindergartners waiting to perform- this was the best act for sure
the played the drums so well and they are only 6 years old!

1st and 2nd graders dancing together

3rd and 4th graders performing a song with bells- they practiced so hard for this!

6th graders doing the "Roly Poly, " a famous Korean song/dance
while wearing school uniforms/military fatigues costumes

After the school festivals, all of the parents would walk around the school looking at all of the art on display that was made by the students.  A group of the 6th graders herded me around to show me all of the different things they made and what their siblings made.  I snapped a few pictures along the way. 

These are upside down stools, one just says "boyfriend" in English 

The English festival was a competition between 4 schools.  Grades 3-6 from each school were present.  They showed off their skills through English role plays and songs first.  Second, they recited a dialogue they memorized- they were the dialogues at the beginning of each lesson for the 6th graders.  After this, they had the "Golden Bell" contest.  Each school sent 10 representatives to the front of the auditorium.  They sat on the floor in rows and were given individual pens and white boards.  A question would pop up on the screen and yours truly would recite the questions.  They would have to write down the answer on the white boards and hold it up.  They had three chances to be incorrect before they were out of the running and had to go sit in the audience.  There were only two students left at the end and they were from each of my schools!!  It was pretty exciting and fun to be a part of it.  

These are the wands that parents buy for their children after the festivals-
they are filled with candy and can be used to hit your friends with them

Later on in the month, all of the teachers were cleaning the school after all of the children left for winter break.  The gym teacher came into the teacher's lounge holding one.  He took some of the candy I was eating and shoved it in the top and handed it to me.  How friendly those Koreans are. 

My Schools

As I said at the beginning, I work at two different schools- Janggi and Uirang Elementary.  They are both about 20 minutes outside of town but my classes at Uirang are about 1/4 of the size that they are in Janggi.  Uirang is pretty rural, with only 50 students in the entire school.  I like having the small classes because it helps me get to know them better.  There is a wide range of English skill levels depending on grade and student.  

The banner at Janggi of all the 4th and 5th grade students 

My 4th grade class seems like they were sleeping the last two years that they were in English class because they barely understand the materials that I show to my Kindergartners.  I think this is because the Art teacher teaches them English when I’m not, which doesn't seem like it is helping.  I struggled with them at the beginning of the semester because they didn't seem to understand anything and really were not interested in learning- then I discovered their weakness: stickers.  If there are stickers involved, they will do anything to get one.  They also love games, which almost all of my students do except for the 1st graders- surprisingly, they act like they are too good for games or something.  They don’t even seem to care for videos!!  What kind of child doesn’t like to watch TV!!

My 4th grade class busy working on their English lesson

Both of my schools are set up the same composition wise.  There are two floors, rooms on only one side of the building and the hallway on the other.  Janggi, my primary school (as in the one I go to 3 days a week), has an attached gym, English hall, and a second building for Kindergarten and extra classes for science, health, etc.  Uirang, only has two floors- and no gym, just a very small auditorium.  In Janggi, my desk occupies the English library aka the “English Experience Room.”  It's very nice, I have my own classroom that no one really comes to unless they need something from me....or if they are playing hide and seek with some friends and need a place to hideout (which is about everyday).  

My desk and seating area for the English library

The curriculum is the same at each school, they have books depending on their grade.  The teacher uses those along with CDs and an English notebook for writing.  All subjects have these materials- so the students have science books, Korean books, Math books- and they all look the same!  I can only imagine how heavy their backpacks must be when they leave. 

There is a Korean teacher that uses all the materials to teach English and I just make up my own curriculum.   It has been hard getting used to it but over time I have adapted well, I think.  From co-teaching with the English teacher and some other teachers, as well as what I do in my class, I have noticed that the way students learn is extremely different from America.  In Korea, elementary learning is all based off of memorization.  They are given books to use, follow along with, and do the same activities in each lesson.  They are to memorize sentences and use those within the entire lesson.  This means that in English class, they do not necessarily understand what they are saying when they say it, they just know that is what the lesson is about.  Also, if I switch up the sentence when speaking to them, they have no idea what I am saying.

Beautiful flowers they had lining the entire school- they smelled so sweet

This concept just tends to get frustrating because their comprehension level is low even though they have had years of lessons.  This way of learning is enforced by the government so it cannot be changed.  I guess it is my job to do things with them that involve speaking and comprehension outside of the textbook.