Hello, สวัสดี (Sa wa dii), Hola

On Wednesday we had our last day of practicum, which meant games and pictures and good old fun! When we got to school we were greeted by students bearing little flower bouquets, which consisted of flowers being stuffed into the center of a bigger flower, just picked of course! They were so adorable! We then played games and took lots of awesome pictures! I was really getting attached to these kids which was sad to have to say goodbye to them but made me even more excited to meet my students! Wednesday night Pla Pak Wittaya (the school we’ve been staying at) held a “Thank you” party for us at an awesome little outdoor restaurant near the school tucked away from the road. There was awesome food, drinks, dancing and of course karaoke! Rambo greeted us as we got out of the car with a laminated 5x7 picture of the Rambo movie cover that has all of his contact information on it and at the bottom reads “Volunteer Teacher Thailand 2010-2011”. It is my most favorite thing I have received since being in Thailand and it is most definitely getting framed when I return to America. Hahaha During dinner I ate my first bug … as in on purpose! I have the whole thing documented … cricket in hand, cricket in mouth, cricket swallowed Kerry smiling. Hahaha it was very salty and kinda tasted like a potato chip … yea I said it! And despite my terrible voice I am forced into singing karaoke so this time my friend Kaitlin and I sang “Barbie Girl” and some chumbawumba … trying to figure out which American songs are available is always a treat since you have to just think of one off the top of your head and type it into the computer. In any case I will be a karaoke queen when I get home! So the party ended and we continued the party back at the school with Rambo (obviously) and another teacher at Pla Pak Wittaya whose name is Thon (he’s 24 and actually spent a few months working at a burger place in Florida recently so he knows enough English to hold on a conversation). Kaitlin and I were on a high from listening to music at the party to we sat around our computers having a mini sing and dance party with Thon which ended up being hilarious! My favorite line from the night was Thon telling me that when he was in American he worked at the grill and did not practice his English much, he said he only knew “meat” “double meat” and “pickles” hahaha to which I replied “I love pickles” and he started hysterically laughing. He knew a lot of American music so we had a good time picking out songs to listen to.

Then on Thursday everyone got picked up from orientation by someone from their school, summer camp style, as in all of our belongings were packed up by our beds in the big room we’ve been sleeping in and one by one our rides arrived and many hugs were given and tears shed. Hilarious. My roommate Michelle and I got picked up by one of the teachers from Choom Chon Nong Hee along with her daughter, nephew and nephew’s friend. Her daughter Tee-da is an English teacher at another elementary school and is 25 with a 1 year old son. Her nephew’s name is Fam and he is same same 22 like me and goes to school in Bangkok for Information Technology. They both speak enough English for us to communicate and laugh when I try to speak the little Thai I know. I asked if they like American music to which I found they do and then Fam played a Westlife cd (which I believe is an Irish boyband). Too funny! We also had to take the mattress I’ve been sleeping on all of orientation with us which was so funny because most people were just sleeping on mats that either fold or roll up and I had an actual mattress. Luckily the boys came along and they loaded and unloaded the pickup truck seamlessly. Once we got to the house we brought everything inside and decided that Michelle and I would go to Tee-da’s house for dinner. We got picked up around 6 and were met at the house by my paaw-aw who is her uncle, the teacher I will work with who is her mother and a slew of other family members including Tee-da’s husband and adorable baby boy! We ate dinner Isan style which meant sitting on mats on the ground around a hot plate with a pot of boiling water that was filling with vegetables and herbs. We used these neat little basket-like scoopers to cook meats and noodles. There were delicious spicy sauces and we could just use our chopsticks to pick out vegetables from the pot to eat. What a fun way to eat with your family! It gets so dark here so early and so quickly that it was already pitch black when we got picked up and when we got home it was around 8 o’clock and felt like 10! Fam and Tee-da invited us to go to Mukdahan with them on Friday so at 8am they picked us up and we set out on quite the adventure. All they communicated to us was that we were going to Indochina Market in Mukdahan (which is one of the cities that has a “friendship bridge” with Laos. So Michelle and I are thinking we can get a lot of errands done today and whatnot … well were we wrong or what! Hahaha I complete and awesome Thai style this day turns quickly into a sightseeing photo shoot extravaganza! To the extent that I was actually told to be like a supermodel. Seriously. If anyone every made the comment that Asian people like to take a lot of pictures … You. Have. No. Idea. Its like the paparazzi was following me around today … and I’m not complaining its just funny. Tee-da was trying to teach me Thai all day which was hilarious since I can repeat after her but then forget what she told me 5 minutes later. Also, during the car ride there was another game of do you know this American song which resulted in the entire car belting “My Heart Will Go On” … yea Celine Dion! But I digress, the first stop of the day was Wat Phra Tat Renu Nakhon (a temple in Renu Nakhon, which is in Nakhon Phanom Province, close to where I lived), then it was off to the friendship bridge even though we couldn’t actually cross into Laos, but then in order to get a picture we were directed to a lookout point which took forever to find because the signs were misleading but then we finally found it and of course it was windy so then we all imitated the epic “king of the world” scene from Titanic … some things don’t change no matter where you are in the world! We finally got our pictures and headed to Phu Pha Thoep National Park right outside of Mukdahan. There are incredible rock formations there with wild flowers growing all over. This is where the true photo shoot happened climbing rocks and posing it funny ways. The art of a sightseeing picture discriminate no race or ethnicity. No matter what language you speak the urge to take a picture pretending to push over big rocks or climb to high places does not change. Hahaha We also rented umbrellas to shade us from the sun which was hilarious to me and of course it was super windy so I felt like Mary Poppins the whole time! At the entrance to the park there are vendors selling really inexpensive handmade baskets made of plastic strands, so I bought 2. Hahaha I got one small one what will probably come home with me and another larger one about the size of a small trashcan to use in my room which has very little in it. After lunch we went to a lookout tower/museum. You had to take your shoes off to go inside, which is so funny to an American and yet so refreshing. Then after the lookout tower we FINALLY went to the Indochina market. I got a sarong that is BEAUTIFUL and an elephant bangle and best of all a tshirt that had a giant fish made of patterned fabric sewn on to it. Even Michelle knew it was trouble that I had seen it because of the colors on the fabric design. It even has little bubbles coming out of its mouth! SOOO precious!

On Saturday Michelle and I took the sawng tao from our school for the first time into Nakhon Phanom for an extensive shopping trip since we realized all of the things we needed after moving in! It was a successful first trip into the city from our new home. THANK GOODNESS! You see taking the sawng tao from Pla Pak was the end of the journey so you got on and off at the station ... from our school we must stand at a stop on the main road, flag down the correct sawng tao and then manage to take the correct route home and press a button when we are nearing our stop to signal the driver that we want to get off! The sawng taos are all similar colors and stop on the same street in Nakhon Phanom, the only differences are the writing stamped on the side, which is of course in Thai. So we had a Thai teacher write what we needed to know in Thai and brought it with us. what an adventure! hahaha ... I'll be a pro in no time!

School started on Monday, I will write another post describing that so far at another time. And of course I will upload pictures and hopefully a video tour of my house soon! Reliable internet is on my fingertips!