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...