Sports Day!

Sports Day and Weekend 

This past Thursday and Friday (Jan 10&11), I got to witness one of the largest events in the Thai school year – Sports Day (or in my school’s case, days). For the past week or so, the students have been rehearsing and practicing various routines for Sports day. The teachers were divided into different teams – I was placed on the pink team. Naturally, I spent most of the week joking around with my students, saying things like “You’re on the blue team? Boooo! Pink is number 1!” and so on. 

On Thursday, I got to school at the usual time I arrive (around 7:40am or so – need to get my internet fix). To get to the English office, you have to walk through a classroom. When I walked into the classroom, I felt like I had walked into an episode of “Toddlers and Tiaras”. If you are unfamiliar with this show, it is about little kids in beauty pageants. Each team had a few groups of dancers who represent their teams, and the pink team was getting ready in this particular classroom. The students were all made up and wearing...moderately scandalous outfits, including fishnet tights, black boots and big hair. I didn’t even recognise my students at first. 

 We were told the events started around 9am, so a bit beforehand I made my way down to the stadium (a large building beside the school). I joined my team’s area and sat around, not really knowing what was going on. At one point, I heard two of the Thai teachers talk about the farang. I was like, “what?”. Then, the 3.2 teacher said to go with her, so I did. We walked out of the school and turned towards the market. I asked where we were going but got no response. So I just followed her, with not a clue where we were headed. We walked through the market to a temple near the end of the market – I was then told that we were meeting the students here before the parade. Parade? Alrighty then. Eventually the rest of the students showed up. While we were waiting to head onto the road, I was looking at the signs the students were holding. I’ve been trying really hard to learn Thai and the alphabet, so I was trying to sound out the sounds. One of them, I thought, “Wait! I know this phrase!” – it was “it’s nice to meet you in thai”. I was really excited.

After a while of waiting, we made our way onto the main road. I walked along the road with my team, which also included my 4.1 class. It was fun being in the parade! I was also the only foreign teacher in it, so I’m sure I stood out a lot. S’all good. The parade led back to the stadium, where the students joined their teams, and the “opening ceremony” started. The ceremony consisted of speeches (in Thai), a flag dance thing, and other choreographed dances. It was pretty cool. Then, each of the teams dancing groups did their dances and cheered and whatnot. 

 After lunch, the some of the students played sports, while others were part of the dancing and cheering contest (some of the students sat on the bleachers the whole time. That kind of sucks). But anyway, in the afternoon, the students were playing basketball. In the stadium, they were playing a game called “Chairball”? I think? It basically involved 2 teams trying to throw the ball into their baskets, held by one of their team members standing on a chair. It seemed like fun. 

 Flag Routine

 Dance Contest

 Team Pink!

 Basketball

The next morning, Anna, Phi Tuk and I went to the labour office and immigration to get the rest of our documentation sorted out. We were able to pick up our work permits and get our visa extended. Yay! Everything seems all official now... We went back to school in the afternoon for the rest of Sports day. There was more dancing and the students played volleyball and soccer aka football. Medals were also handed out for the top 3 teams in each of the sports, and there was a basketball final. It seemed like the students had fun. It was fun to watch, I could have joined in for volleyball, etc! 

Friday night, Laura (one of the foreign teachers) and I went out with some of the Thai teachers, Bank, Deaw, Deaw’s girlfriend and Golf. It was an adventure and a half to get to the bar/restaurant. First, Laura and I caught a cab – we had Bank on the phone and he talked to the cab driver. After about 5 minutes, they were still talking and we seemed to be driving around randomly. Then the driver handed us back the phone, and Bank said we had to get out because the driver didn’t know where to go. We had no idea where we were... Fortunately, we were able to catch another cab and this one knew where to go. He took us to the other side of the river (the east side I believe) and dropped us off at a 7-11 on some main street. We still had no idea where we were so we called the other teachers again. After a couple minutes, Deaw came to pick us up... on his motorcycle. We were only slightly terrified; I was definitely white-knuckling the back grip. But we made it to the restaurant in one piece – it was basically a neighbourhood place, which was quite nice. Full of Thai people. We sat in their patio and drank/ate. At one point, we went to dance where the band was playing, and attempted to communicate with some of the other people there. Good times were had. 

Saturday I went into Bangkok to meet Karima. We met on Sukhumvit soi 11, and went to one of the many Indian restaurants in the area. It was SO GOOD. I had chickpea masala. It was nice eating something other than Thai food, and the curry and naan was very tasty. Later on, we met up with Thomas and Anna, more foreign teachers at my school, and some other OEG people I know. We went back to soi 11 to a bar called Cheap Charlie’s – the cheapest place to get drinks in the area. It’s very popular among the expats and other tourists. After a bit, we went to another bar called Nest. It was nice but a bit quiet. We decided we wanted to go dancing, and figured the best place to go would be Khao San road. Oh Khao San... Once we arrived, we found a club... called “The Club”. It was a good place to dance. 

So a pretty fun few days – definitely feeling tired now. I’ve come down with a bit of a cough and sore throat today, so I think I need to take things easy for a bit. Hahaha... no such thing in Thailand apparently... 

Purple Monkey Dishwasher... AKA The Teacher's Retreat

Teacher Retreat

Anna, Erin, Me, Bank, Laura, Thomas, Madame Chong, Phi Tuk

So last weekend, January 5-6 was the Amnuayvidhya Teacher’s Retreat. This happens every year to celebrate the New Year, and to thank the teachers for all their work. This year, it was being held in Khao Yai, a famous national park a few hours northeast-ish of Bangkok. Beforehand, we were given a booklet outlining the weekend: itineraries, a seating charts, descriptions of where we were going, and what not. Of course, it was all in Thai. We tried to get the Thai teachers to tell us what was going to happen and when, but we largely resigned to the fact that we would have no idea what was going on the entire weekend. I spend about 80% of my time having no idea what’s going on in general. I was quite excited for the trip, even though I was still recovering from New Year’s...

On Saturday, we all met at the school around 6:30am. I realised as I was walking to the school that this was the second sunrise I had seen that week. Ugh. We waited around for quite a while for the buses to arrive. There were about 120 people going: teachers, administrators, and other various school employees. The buses eventually arrived, and I think we left between 7 and 7:30am?

After an hour-ish, we stopped at a Thai “service station” for breakfast. This was basically a large open air building with a multitude of food stands. It was too much to take in at 8:00am and while being sleep deprived.  I decided it was too early to try to decipher what was being served where, so I just ate my 7-11 banana bread (which is actually quite delicious). 

We then stopped at a temple called... (looks at booklet)(tries to sound out Thai script) Wat... Noon...Gum? Anyway at said temple, there is the largest monk statue in Thailand – I believe that’s what the teachers said anyway, although we were told it’s not an actual temple but more like a “chapel”. The temple itself was very beautiful. It had lovely grounds, with walkways decorated with flowers and fountains. Inside the actual building was a very large golden monk statue. It was pretty impressive. I still wish I knew more about Buddhism, or at least the various rituals, as there were several occurring at the time. Oh well.

On the way out, Laura and I joined in the Thai teacher photo shoot that was happening on the walkway. So far, I’ve noticed that Thai people take A LOT of photos. Was good times. A couple of the younger teachers had already started to get into some beer, which was entertaining. Many of the teachers on the trip I had never seen before...

Laura, Me, Deaw, Bank, Thomas, Erin

Laura, Bank, Me

From there we got back on the bus – I slept most of the way to our next stop, a placed called Palio Khao Yai. This was probably one of the strangest places I’ve been in Thailand. Basically, someone decided to built a Tuscan-style town thing in the middle of nowhere. I think it’s attached to a hotel maybe. Seriously though, it felt like we stepped off the bus into Florence or Verona. It is mainly a shopping location, but they also had a haunted house. We wandered around the narrow streets, taking pictures of the alleys, buildings, and gardens. I think my pictures can explain what it was like better than I can. 

We finally arrived at the hotel/resort around 4pm or so. As usual, we had no idea what was going on but one of the Thai English teachers said she would go get our room/key sorted. Most of the male teachers were sitting at a couple of stone tables (which would later be dubbed the “man cave”), so Laura, Anna and I decided to join them. A couple of younger teachers that we (the foreign teachers) are friends with were there: Bank (PE) and Deaw (English). The rest I either only recognised, or had never seen before. They had already started drinking, and one of the older teachers handed me a whiskey soda when I sat down. When I had finished that drink, he immediately poured me another one. And so it continued. At one point, I tried to stop him by saying “Oh, I think we’re going to our room soon” but he just kept pouring... He even started pouring more whiskey in my glass when my glass was half-full. Oh my. So we all sat around and hung out. They had a set of bongos, a Thai flute/recorder thing and a guitar. I tried out the flute and was able to kind of figure it out. The Thai music teacher started teaching me a song with solfege, but we abandoned that pretty quickly. There was also large chunks of pork (still on the bone) that we were picking at. Classy. At one point, we were talking about boyfriends, Bank and Deaw asked where my boyfriend was. I said I didn’t have one. So, immediately, they started yelling “We will find you a Thai boyfriend!” Hahaha. 

Around 5:30pm, we went back to our room to cowboy-ify (cowboys being the theme of the evening). Laura, Erin, Anna and I were staying in the second story of a bungalow, and the room was VERY nice. Well, compared to the rooms I’ve been staying in so far. After getting dressed, we went back to the field (where the man cave was) for dinner. Cue drinking more beer. The head administrator gave a speech in Thai, I think mainly thanking the teachers for their hard work and whatnot. After dinner, there was karaoke and dancing. I sang a couple songs with the other foreign teachers. It was a lot of fun seeing the Thai teachers being able to relax... and also in the cowboy outfits. Some certainly went all out! We spent the rest of the night basically dancing, and when the music had to stop, just hanging out and chatting. Drank a fair amount of beer. For whatever reason, two of my students were on the retreat. I really hoped they wouldn’t notice me, or at least, wouldn’t tell their friends! 

No Thai party is complete without Gangnam Style

The next day, we had to get up early for breakfast. It was quite cool in the night and in the morning – it was nice to be able to snuggle up in an actual duvet over night. I was glad I brought my jeans and a sweater. After breakfast, we slowly got our stuff together, and piled back on the bus. I definitely had a moment where I remembered “Oh yeah! I took pictures last night!” (best feeling after a night of drinking). 

We left around 9:00am or so. The plan was to first stop at an outlet mall, but when we arrived, it was closed. So we continued on to our next stop – a cornfield. I kid you not. It was very scenic though: there was a lovely garden and a shop to buy goods from the farm. We had a nice time walking around and taking more pictures (naturally). Funnily enough, we didn’t see much of the younger male Thai teachers – they were passed out in their van.

From there, we went to a Thai vineyard. There was a shop where you could buy wine, grapes, juice, cookies and other wine/grape type products. They also had a grape...field you could walk through. That was very beautiful and made for some very nice pictures. I also bought my first bottle of Thai wine – I have yet to open it.

 Madame Chong, Laura, Phi Aey, Me

From there, we drove back to the school. We also stopped for lunch at some point – nothing exciting. At that point, I was exhausted: I slept most of the bus ride. We got home around 2:30pm, I think. I then went back to my apartment to relax. Even though I was super tired, I had a great time over the weekend. I really enjoyed spending time with the Thai teachers, even though we couldn’t understand each other for the most part. I remember trying to have a conversation (after lots of whiskey and beer), and it involved English words, Thai words, and lots of miming. Story of my life in Thailand. But good times were definitely had! We have English camp coming up in February, and I hope we are able to have just as much fun!

Ps I played Telephone with my grade 3s for the first time the other week. And this post is about teachers. Hence the title.../I just wanted to use that quote

What happens in Phuket stays in Phuket...

(Except for this blog post)

Phuket/New Years Eve/Night of Ridiculosity

On December 31, Karima and I got up around 8am...after about 4 hours of sleep. Was VERY tired. We packed up our stuff, and headed out the door pretty quickly – the plan was to catch the 9am ferry to Phuket and we were worried it was going to be very crowded. Phuket, from what I’ve heard, is one of the top New Year’s destinations, as well as destinations in general, in Thailand. It is a large island on the Andaman coast that is known for its beach resorts and moderately ridiculous parties. We had decided to stay in Patong, the hub of said parties. Patong is described in Lonely Planet as a seeming mix of the carnivalesqueness of the neon lights in Khao San road in Bangkok, the seediness of the red-light district in Pattaya, and the craziness of the all-night parties in Koh Phi Phi. Clearly, we felt it was the place to be on New Year’s Eve. It did not disappoint. (And yes, I do hope you are enjoying all the made-up words I’m using). 

On the ferry, I had ramen noodles for breakfast, then slept basically the entire way to the island – about 2 hours. It was much needed. We arrived in Phuket town at around 11:30ish (I can’t really remember) and battled through the throngs of people to find a minivan to Patong beach, on the other side of the island. We bought out tickets, then hopped into probably the ricketiest minivan I’ve been in yet. It took about 40 minutes to reach Patong, including the 10 minutes we spent in the town driving around in circles. Eventually, we were dropped off at our hostel, Blue Sea Hostel/Guest House. We had made a reservation, but they must have lost it – fortunately they still have space for us. I had stayed in a hostel once before, when I went to Berlin back in high school. Only we were in 4-person rooms with the other the people from the exchange. So this was my first time staying in a proper shared hostel dorm. The hostel did remind me of the times my family and I have done hut-to-hut hiking in New Hampshire. There, you stay in dorms also full of random people – but this hostel was just a bit nicer. Well, it was a lot nicer actually. We were in a room with 6 other people (versus 30) and the facilities were quite nice: air conditioning, a clean bathroom, and a common area. It was a bit more expensive than you can expect to pay at other places, but I think it was worth it.

When we arrived, there were 3 other people in the room. They were speaking French, so we asked where they were from. The 2 girls, Marie-Pier and Mariam, were from Quebec City (woo for more Canadians!) and the guy, Tongay, was from Belgium. (I should start keeping track of the Canadians I meet here, and try to find one from every province!) We chatted for a bit (I really need to practice French more – although between the French people in Khao Sok and the Canadians/Belgian in Phuket, I got a fair amount of practice), then decided to head to the beach. Believe it or not, I had not actually been to a beach yet to just relax/lounge. So the five of us made our way to Patong Beach. Our hostel was maybe a 10 minute walk from the beach, so we got the chance to walk through the town. This included hotels/bars with massive tiger statues, stripper poles (empty for the time being), and lots of clubs (no doubt preparing for NYE that night). It kind of reminded me of Niagara Falls – basically a fixed carnival. Was slightly ridiculous.

The beach in Patong is very beautiful – Patong itself a bay that is quite separate from the other surrounding beaches. Like all the beaches in Thailand, the sand was super fine and almost white. Even though this is a big tourist destination, the waterfront wasn’t completely taken over by resorts and giant hotels (unlike Hua Hin). In fact, there were lots of trees, even by the main road. The rest of the bay was also very green, and also a bit mountainous. It was quite nice. It was still fairly overcast and chilly, so we didn’t stay at the beach for too long.

We returned to the hostel around 4pm, and I decided I needed a nap if was going to make it through NYE. I fell asleep right away, which is unusual for me, and slept for about an hour and a half (the Canadians and the Belgian were also napping). Once I woke up, Karima and I decided to have our beers in the common area – the plan was to all go out at 7:30pm for dinner. In the common area, we met two of the other people in our room: two brothers from the Netherlands, Rik and Roel. Eventually, everyone was ready and we decided to wander in search of food. We also met the final member of our room: Jakob from the Czech Republic. We had dinner at a restaurant on the main road, at a restaurant with these ridiculously heavy wooden chairs. After dinner, Karima and I went to change, and prepare our drinks (DIY buckets from Koh Phi Phi). We also got a call from a friend who had found themselves in Patong for the evening, and tried to coordinate meeting them. 

We met back up with our group and decided to head to the beach. There was a large beach party happening with a crazy large stage, but we didn’t want to pay 2500B for a ticket. Especially because there was an equally good beach party happening just down the beach for FREE.

*This is the part of the story where things get insane. I feel like a lot of it I can’t even put in words. So you will have to do your best to imagine the ridiculousness. I think it’s best to take what I say and multiply it by about 7. And yes, some details have been... edited*

On the beach, it was nuts. There were fireworks going off sporadically, some I think were official, but a lot were just from people who bought some and had set up randomly on the beach. Some were quite close... There were also tons of lanterns going up into the air, which are always beautiful. Karima decided to buy one of the flashing mickey-mouse ear headbands – it was actually a fantastic idea as it made her easy to find! After wandering and drinking, we claimed a spot on the beach and started to dance. There was a stage set up with a DJ and video show? Thing? (Lots of flashing pictures) going on. We all kicked off our shoes into a huge pile – my flip flops (which were already in rough shape) had fully fallen apart on the way to the beach, so I abandoned them. I spent a good deal of time thinking how cool it was to be dancing in the sand at a beach party for new years. There were so many people, and they were all hammered. Something about being on vacation and in Thailand makes people let loose a lot more than they would at home. I also drank A LOT. We had a great time dancing, and even managed to find our other friend. At one point, I remember joining a random group of Thai people and dancing (wildly) with them. Somehow, our group from the hostel managed to stay mostly together. After a while, Karima and I decided to go to the bar (read: table on the beach selling alcohol) and split another bucket (this was probably a mistake). At the bar, they finished making our bucket, but we decided we wanted more alcohol so Karima took one of the bottles of whiskey and just poured more in our bucket. No one said a word. I’m still laughing at that now... Then cue more crazy dancing and awesomeness.

At some point (quite late), we realised our teacher friend was quite messed up, so we took them back to our hostel to find a bed. To do this, our friend had to walk with Tongay and myself on either side. They could barely stand, so it was quite a process. But we eventually made it back to the hostel, only to discover it was full. So we sat outside for a while. Gradually, the others from our group trickled into the hostel. A few decided to sit outside with us and chill/get eaten by mosquitoes. Rik and Roel had somehow acquired a really creepy monster mask, so that entertained us for a while. After a bit, we gave our friend our key so they could go lie down for a bit. Around 6am or so, we decided to head inside. We discovered our friend had misplaced our key, so I took them outside to find a taxi. At this point, the sun was rising. After a while, our friend went to find a way back to the beach they were staying at, and I went up to bed. It was now around 7am. I also felt bad for our hostel mates because of all the commotion. That and our friend decided to sleep in one of the Dutch guys beds. SIGH...

The next day, Karima and I had to get up around 11 to prepare to checkout at noon. It was not an especially happy time, as we were both exhausted and hung over. We said bye to some of our hostel mates who were semi-conscious and headed to the beach. The sun had finally decided to come out, so the beach was gorgeous. Most of the beach was taken over by beach chairs that you have to pay to sit in, but we managed to find a little square to lay out our towels. The water was lovely – not too warm either so it was actually refreshing. Later on, the wind picked up a bit, so there were some half decent waves to play in. For one wave, I must have somehow jumped at the exact right time (completely by accident, of course), and I managed to body surf (read: was stuck in the wave and had no idea what was going on) onto shore. It was awesome.

Around 3:30pm, we went back to our hostel to grab our things, then back to the main road to catch a bus back to Phuket town. We had to wait quite a while for the bus: it seems transportation in Thailand is either really great or really lousy. After about 45 minutes, a swang-tao bound for Phuket town pulled up, and we leapt on. The driver decided to start driving away as I just stepped on... and I had my backpack on. So I came THIS close to falling out the back. Phew! The attendant then took my backpack and tied it to the metal frame on the back of the truck with a piece of string. I really hoped it was secure as my bus ticket was in there... The sawng-tao was very crowded, and I spent most of the time standing awkwardly under a fan, trying to keep it from eating my hair. 

Waiting for the bus...

It took us about an hour to get into the centre of Phuket town. I was happy we gave ourselves lots of time to get to the bus station. Once we got off, we were taken by a motorcycle taxi to the bus station. And yes, by “we” I mean Karima, myself, and all our stuff. It was just silly but we somehow managed to fit. The whole time I was pretty sure we were going to die. Karima had attached her water bottle to my backpack in the motorcycle’s basket, and it started to slowly fall off. Naturally, this was my thought process: “Oh no! It’s going to fall, then we’re going to run over it and go flying, and then we’re going to die!”. Karima was having similar thoughts, so when we finally reached a red light, we were able to take it off my backpack.

The other lumps in the front and basket are also backpacks. You can also see the waterbottle lol

After a while, we reached the bus station, and paid the inflated fare (I didn’t even care at this point). We had about an hour and a half before our bus left, so we tried to find some food. For whatever reason, all the food places around the bus station are closed by 6:30pm (when we arrived). And that isn’t considered late for Thailand. We ended up eating ramen noodles from one of the shops. Dinner of Champions. Could be worse! On our bus were a few other people from our orientation. When we asked one about their new years, they responded, “I don’t want to talk about it”. We felt similarly. At this point, the phrase “What happens in Phuket stays in Phuket” came up. It is so very true. 

Our bus left at 8:00pm, and I was very happy to be on it, as it would provide 12 hours of quiet and sleep – more sleep than I had had in the past 2 nights. I was out for most of it. It was glorious. We arrived back in Bangkok in the morning, and we went our separate ways on the bus home.

And so concludes the tale of my New Years in Thailand. It was fantastic. We definitely squeezed as much out of our trip as possible – and more and I probably would have died. But it was totally worth it. I’m also glad I was able to visit Khao Sok, and have a relaxing time there before the insanity of Koh Phi Phi and Phuket. Normally at home, I’m not big on New Year’s, as I’ve been to too many parties that end badly. But this year, I was in the mood to party, even though people got even more drunk than back home. It must have been the beach that put me in the mood. Best New Year’s Ever!