Unfortunately, there’s a bug that’s been going around the
house which has prevented several people from being able to work this week (and fortunately, it hasn't hit me yet!).
Because of this, I travelled to my third school in three weeks to teach
English. I’m an optimistic person, so I like finding the silver lining in
essentially being a substitute volunteer teacher. This silver lining in this
particular situation, however, was very obvious: I got to teach with Shawney.
That’s right; the Dream Team was formed on July 2nd, 2012… a date
that will live in infamy.
But really, we had a blast teaching common English commands together,
like “stand up,” “sit down,” “look,” and “listen.” We quickly discovered that:
1. We’re awesome team teaching together (I don’t think I’m biased at all) and
2. These commands also work wonders for classroom management. As soon as
students started misbehaving, all we had to say was, “Look at Shawney,” or, “Look
at Meghan,” and they were all ours again. It was brilliant!
On Monday night, we decided to play my new favorite game, “Secrets.”
To play, everybody writes a secret on a sheet of paper and then everybody takes
turns reading them out loud. You never know which secret belongs to whom, so it
makes the game really exciting, hilarious, and intense. I’m not sure who
decided this, but on Monday, we plotted a secret during Secrets against Rob,
one of our country directors. In this particular game, everybody wrote a secret
that somehow included Rob in it. (For example, “I like riding in the
cab of the truck next to Rob, but hate when the stick shift gets in the way,”
or, “Sometimes, I picture Rob in skinny jeans… and I like it!”) It
was hilarious to see how creative everybody’s “secrets” could get, even more
hilarious to see Rob’s reactions, and we quickly discovered the added bonus –
that we get to learn Rob’s secret! Thankfully, he was a great sport about it
and found it funny also. Phew!
On Tuesday, we began working on our projects with the hill
tribes. We started it off by meeting with the president of a local NGO that
works with the Lahu people in Thailand. He had several projects in mind for us
to help with and answered all of our questions about the tribes, specifically
about the culture and their way of life. Then, I went with two other volunteers
to a tribal village located about 45 minutes away from our house. We literally
drove through the jungle and across a couple of unsteady-looking bamboo bridges
to get to this village. It was terrifying! After the very bumpy car ride, we
had the opportunity to walk around this impoverished community and sit in the
one-bedroom house of a family. Here, we were able to “get to know” some of the
members of this community. When I say this, I really mean that we asked a girl
in our group questions in English. She translated them to Thai to ask the man
who drove us (his name? Supachy. SO fun!) Supachy translated this into a
northern dialect of Thai so that the 23 year old man, who was only one of three
people in the entire community of 80 people that can speak some Thai, could
understand and answer appropriately. In other words, we “talked” to him for an
hour or so. We learned that this particular tribe doesn’t work as a community.
Because of this, they don’t have any goals for the tribe as a whole and don’t
know how they want us to help. Essentially, every man is for himself and as
soon as they can find a way to get out, they leave. Everybody else is stuck in
this community until they can get to this point also. We’ve been brainstorming
several things that we can do to help the tribe as a whole, but I’ll talk more
about that once we actually start putting some of these plans into action.
Today, we had the day off because it was the 4th
of July. (If you’re anything like Ben, please let me clarify that no, Thailand
does not celebrate America’s birthday; however, there are 20 American
volunteers in the country, so WE took the day off from work.) Naturally, we went
to the Queen’s Garden in Chiang Rai to celebrate (Shawney’s mom worded this
perfectly when she said, “Wow. That’s so patriotic, that I’m almost getting
emotional!”). In all honesty though, this place was BEAUTIFUL. We got to see
the Hall of Inspiration, which is basically a museum for the royal family, the
Queen’s villa, and then the garden itself. It was very interesting to see just
how influential the royal family is in Thailand and how hard they have worked
to make a difference among its citizens. The current king has been in reign for
60 years and has literally travelled all over Thailand to find problems and to
not just fix them, but to teach his citizens how to help themselves. This
mindset is because Thailand is grounded on ten important and essential
principles which are literally requirements for the king in order to best
fulfill his role. Because he has vastly changed the country for the better
during his reign, he is very highly respected and regarded here. His flag hangs
everywhere and there are pictures of him in literally every restaurant, store,
and house. If you ever have a free moment, you should look up some information
about the king in Thailand. I guarantee that you will be amazed!
When we returned, the other volunteers were all decked out
for the 4th. They decorated our truck and our three bicycles and we
had a parade down our little street. Then, we paraded straight through the town,
got a lot of laughs and stares, and had dinner at our favorite restaurant
because it sells “western” food (and although Thai food is great, sometimes,
you just want a burger and a shake!). The owner went out on a limb for us and
made us hot dogs on buttered toast, French fries, and root beer floats. It was
fantastic! Then, we paraded back home and set off fireworks. For awhile. With
that being said, the town of Thaton may or may not hate all Americans now.
Because most people who are reading this ARE in the country,
I hope that your 4th of July is as hilarious and memorable as mine. Today,
be thankful for the fact that our country provides public education and the
freedom of speech to represent yourself in any way you want. Happy Independence
Day!
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