For the love of Tuk-Tuks

Yesterday marked our arrival into Nakhon Ratchasima. The bus journey was pretty smooth and didn't seem like a 4 hour trip like we were initially told. Rocking up to the city in 32C weather, with the sun shining and blue skies made me instantly fall for this place. The air seems so much cleaner than Bangkok; I could certainly get used to this. We were greeted at our school by one of the Primary Maths teachers from the English program called Archna. We were made to feel extremely welcome and thanks to my curiosity on Facebook, I seemed to be already well known by other teachers on the program...wasn't quite sure what to make of that haha. (As much as I may have seemed obnoxious, I was just preparing myself!)

The school is exceptional. The grounds are beautiful, clean and spacious whilst the buildings seemed modern; definitely not what I was expecting. Throughout our tour, we were briefly shown the areas in which we will be teaching and given other useful information we needed to know. The biggest eye opener was the kindergarten department - they have an entire room dedicated to a giant ball pit!!...its making my age group seem really boring now haha. Perhaps the greatest relief was knowing that our class sizes won't be as big as initially expected. Okay, I will still have 40 teenagers to manage on my own but hey, it could be worse!

For lunch yesterday we went for western food at the Mall. Before I came here I thought it would be something I would crave a lot, but after realising how much more expensive it is compared to Thai food, it kind of left a bad taste in my mouth. It was nice to be able to talk to fellow teachers though during the meal and finding out more and more about our classes; it eased the panic a little. To actually get to the Mall, we had to take a Tuk Tuk and I LOVED IT. There is something so fascinating and thrilling about them; once you get past the obvious danger that comes with it. As I dart down the Korat streets, I almost go into deep thought about how surreal and amazing all this is; just last week I was sat at home bored in the rain, and now I'm in FRICKIN' THAILAND. I think I'm going to really enjoy my time here.

Last night a few of us made our way to SaveOne market and the atmosphere was great; I didn't feel as pressured to buy things as I have been in other markets, and there were so many cool stalls selling everything from fake designer sunglasses to puppies (Yes, little cute andrex puppies)! I ended up buying some ray bans for 300B (about £6) and you really start to realise how cheap everything is here. Weirdly though, Thais value money way different to that of Brits. For example, a 3 hour bus journey from Korat to Bangkok is cheaper than the western food I had yesterday at the restaurant. Its crazy. Thats really the only way I can describe Thailand right now. Beautifully crazy.

I would be here for days if I wrote every little thing I did everyday so for now, I'll just post mini updates and wait until I've had my first day in school in 48 hours time. Wish me luck!