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Published: December 6th 2011
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Remembrance Sunday
After the service, with the wreaths at the monument, very moved by it all. I didn't intend for it to take me so long to write another blog entry, but time just slipped away from and now here I am, nearly a whole month later...sorry to keep you all waiting!
So, let me try and fill you in on what I've been up to, I paid a visit to the British Embassy on Remembrance Sunday and attended their service with three other friends I met over here. It was really beautiful and a lovely setting to hold it in. A few of us then decided that we needed to do something that wouldn't cost us too much - despite still getting paid for the month of November, the money doesn't go very far when you are paying rent on an apartment that you're not living in and paying, instead, for hostels on beaches (I'm not complaining, I realise I have been lazing around on beaches while you're all cold and working at home!). Several people who we met at the orientation are working down in Chumphon and said we coul stay with them for free, which was lovely of them. Claire and Hannah both have small bungalows so they housed two of
Jomtien by Night
Beautiful sunset on the beach, a perfect end to a perfect day! us each and we were very comfortable. We didn't do much other than explore the area a bit and have a couple of nights out once the girls had finished work. One of the other girls down there, Chelsea, celebrated her birthday while we were there so we went out for a meal and a few drinks.
The weekend, as usual, took us all back to Bangkok, thinking we were starting work on the 21st...no such luck! Instead, I took some time out with Holly to go to Pattaya. Except we go there and realised it was a million times seedier than any reports suggested and we felt dirty just looking at the place. A little further along the coast is a (very slightly) nicer place called Jomtien. We headed there and hit the jackpot over accommodation, paying 200 Baht (£4) a night for a large room with bathroom, free wifi, a fridge, air con and Satellite TV. For 50 Baht (£1) we even got a decent breakfast on our first morning there. We were only there for two nights and our plan was to enjoy ourselves and get a suntan - well we definitely did that!
Jomtien by Day
One of the views from our spot on the beach, it's a tough life! We treated ourselves to nice meals with cocktails and spent all day on the beach, only moving to get into the sea or because we needed something from the 7/11 just across the road! It was pretty much the perfect way to spend a few days.
The rest of my time since then has been spent in Bangkok, doing shopping, catching up on chores and meeting up with whoever is around at the time. I've sent a few parcels home, that I really hope arrive in time for Dad's birthday and Christmas - I'll be so disappointed if they don't! Abi stayed with me last week as her money was running low and she also hadn't started teaching. We had a lovely time together, getting out Christmas shopping done and - much to our excitement - watching a British man beat a Thai man at their national sport, Muay Thai Boxing! We happened apon it completely by chance, had no idea that a Brit was one half of the headline fight and had an absolutely amazing time. The five fights beforehand warmed us up nicely and by the time we got to the main event we were
Muay Thai
England v Thailand, a very exciting experience! cheering away with the rest of the crowd (well, we were in the minority cheering for the Brit, but we weren't the only two there either!).
This weekend was the King's 84th birthday so yesterday, Monday, was a public holiday across Thailand. It meant that there was a huge crowd of people back in Bangkok and we spent three nights partying like we were all back at uni! Despite not going to bed before 4am all weekend we had a fantastic time and it was awesome to see everyone. We did actually make it to the Grand Palace yesterday, which was another spontaneous decision. We took the boat up the river and got off thinking we would just go and sit on the grass outside and soak up some sunshine. But, when we got there, we were told it was free to get into the Palace (normally 400 Baht) and we thought we'd make the most of the chance. We were just sitting around having a lovely time when we were told to shuffle up on the grass and make way for everyone because the King was coming through. We had no idea and got quite excited,
England!
Danny the boxer. but we're not overly sure if it was him or not. The Prince was definitely there but the King, who has been in hospital for three years and has to go around in a wheelchair, was either well hidden or absent! As much as that was a disappointment, it was nice to be part of the occasion. However, saying goodbye to everyone when we got back from the Palace was not fun...I'm useless at goodbyes!
And then we get to today...my first day of teaching, finally! I got my timetable before lessons started, which I guess is a bonus, but noone thought to tell me what to teach or where to get the schemes of work from. That's Thai organisation for you! I winged my way through two lessons of 100 students each, introducing myself and then getting them to introduce themselves. As an idea of the level of these students, both those lessons were doubles so 1 hour and 40 minutes long and it took them all of that time to learn four sentences about me and then copy them about themselves. I don't think my lesson plans will take too long to write! I also
Celebrating for the King!
As the King couldn't go out and celebrate, we thought we'd do it for him - this is just a few of the 20 people that hit the town! had a 50 minute lesson with the whole of Pratom 5 - they are 10/11 year olds and were probably about 100 of them as well. Usually there would be three Thai teachers with me but today they were busy. I was told that this lesson just needs to be fun...I started by seeing how far they could count (pretty good, they got up to 100, mainly to kill time) and then we sang '10 Green Bottles'. Again, it took the whole lesson and was more like '10 Tree Bottom' but we got to the end of it and survived! At the end of the day I asked my head of department, what the difference between the lessons were - the same classes have a mixture of Basic English, Intensive Class, Group and Camp, which is when he got the books out, told me we were at unit 5 and I have to get to unit 8 by the end of March. Not going to lie, would have been nice to have that at the start of the day so I could have done something with my free lessons!
I have 24 50-minute lessons in a week, but think I'm only going to need to plan for 10 or 11 as some of the classes can do the same lesson. Now I know what I'm doing a bit more I'm really looking forward to tomorrow, today was quite stressful! They are a very friendly department though and seem to want to go out of their way to make sure I'm happy.
Anyway, this is probably getting long and boring for you to read by now so I'll leave it there and promise not to leave it so long before I do the next one - there is another long weekend coming up and we are planning to meet up again so perhaps I'll write about that and how the rest of my week went!
Love to you all xxxx
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