This Job is Thai-aring

As I'm writing this, I'm sitting in my office passing the time until my next lesson and struggling to stay awake. Okay, it is my own fault - because I really should learn to go to bed sooner than 11:30pm (which has been the earliest I've slept for a while) but this job is also incredibly tiring. Granted, this week hasn't necessarily been as hectic but the school week has still been filled with hard classes, big events, and last minute schedule changes we have to deal with. Honestly, you could be the most organised teacher in the world and still be unorganised in this environment! haha. This semester, the school is hosting a lot of events so the students and staff need to prepare for that. On this week's calendar, we have been having 'cheerleading' practice for Sports Day. This has seen us been split up in groups and essentially watch the students perform cheers and chants for their team in preparation for Sports Day on the 28th. Also yesterday, the school was on its best behaviour for an inspection as they are up for an award; there were displays all around the school showcasing Thai Culture and the talented students that Assumption has to offer. It almost didn't feel real yesterday - the school was too quiet and everyone seemed to be paranoid that they would be randomly inspected in their classes - I for sure was! Finally, to mark 'Brothers Day' this morning, another ceremony was held which meant another free period for the teachers and students! It is incredibly eye opening to see how respected the Brothers are here. They are treated like kings and students kneel to them when approaching. You would think they were kings.

I would say that the most tiring and stressful aspect of this job is the language barrier...I know, I know , "I'm in Thailand and can't speak a word of Thai so what do you expect?" right...which albeit is true but we were told that we didn't need to know any Thai and were advised not to speak it in class. However, I have come to learn that in a lot of my classes this is a great disadvantage. While most students can't be bothered to listen (can you blame them if they know they are going to pass..?), the ones that actually want to learn just look at me completely confused and lost. I have made many efforts to simplify things; I've slowed down my speed of speaking, I now speak very basic sentences if not just key words, and have even resorted to drawing on the board what I want them to do like I'm playing Pictionary or something. The struggle is real.
But it is all trail and error; I definitely did not come into this job expecting them to speak fluent English but it is all about working out what skills each student needs to work on more, whether it be listening, speaking, or writing. This is a difficult task though as although the year groups are in sets, like I said before, that does not necessarily indicate their level of English. Some of the other English teachers here have assistants to help them with the Thai and sometimes I just think how different it would be for me if I had one myself...hmmm...I guess we will just see how it goes.

Petrified Wood Museum.

Unfortunately, the tiredness has been spilling over into the weekends, so because I try to catch up on my sleep during that time, it does cut my weekend short of going out and exploring. However, this weekend was the first time since I've been here that I felt I did something rather productive. On Saturday, I went to a Petrified Wood Museum about 20km from the city (really not as boring as it sounds...) with my friend, Aloy. Apart from being small, it was actually a really cool exhibit; there were fossil displays that were discovered in the local region of Nakhon Ratchasima so it was really cool to see some local artefacts such as dinosaur bones, elephant tusks, and trees that had been crystalised/petrified over millions of years. I really want to check out more museums and exhibits like that around the area because it really interests me to learn the local history and culture of this region. It was nice just to walk around and relax after the week (but as always the weekends go by much quicker than the weekdays!). That evening, the 'farangs' all headed to the Check Inn bar to watch the rugby (Wales vs. Fiji) yet this time, no one seemed as interested but me to cheer on the home team (Cymru am byth!). Knowing that my whole family were there at the Millennium Stadium watching the match whilst I was in a tiny western in the middle of Thailand somewhere really put things into perspective. I really do miss my family but I am so blessed to have been giving this opportunity and do something I have wanted to do for a long, long time and right now, I really wouldn't have things any other way.

The next day yet again was filled with pointless lounging around and hanging out with my hungover colleagues after what seemed like an eventful time they had just the day before. Once again, I convinced my friend Aloy to take me exploring so we travel about a 45 minute drive north to Phimai (pronounced Pee-my) Historical park which I had seen on google when researching Nakhon Ratchasima before I arrived. Phimai Historical Park is a protected site of Khmer (or Angkor) temples and looks very much like a pocket-sized version of Angkor Wat in Cambodia. It was a beautiful site and luckily for us not too busy as it was nearing the end of the day. What is crazy (and the same in Malaysia) were that non-Thais (or non-Thai speakers) had to pay 100 baht whilst my friend went in for free. I can see the attraction to that, but I would have been nice to go in for free too. Regardless, I was able to take some great pictures and have another location ticked off my list.

Selfie at Phimai.

I've also been preliminary planning Christmas holiday plans. I wanted to do it now as I know that flights will get a lot more expensive and unfortunately due to the changing nature of our schedules at Assumption, time isn't on my side. So I've decided to go to Cambodia for 3 days and explore, then heading down to Kuala Lumpur once again and spend New Years Eve with some Keele friends (like I promised ;) haha) and go down to Singapore and explore some more sights that I didn't get to in June. As much as I'm going to be visiting friends, I want to use this time to go exploring by myself which I haven't had the opportunity to do previously. Might be an expensive trip...but so worth it!

Until next time.