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Published: September 16th 2010
Best In Town
Tom Yum soup with shrimp. Otherwise known as spicy amazingness!So here I am, done with teaching. Crazy! This morning when I arrived at school P'Nid invited me to sit in the same makeshift, removable van seat couch in the main office of the school that we sat in four months ago when we first met. As our conversation carried on the reality of how much has happened really began to set in. This past Friday night she had James, Karen and I over to her house for an early farewell dinner. At one point in the evening she asked us what we had learned during our semester at Phadungpanya. I said learning to let go of control. From day 1 to today I'm constantly reminded of how little I control in my world here. I chuckled a few days gto when, during my last class, a typical afternoon storm rolled in. I had rushed out of my office so quickly that I forgot my umbrella. So, there I stood for 40 minutes watching as the flood waters rose and students sought refuge under covered gazebo-like structures. Eventually they were standing on the benches as the rainwater rushed around them. No one was upset, on the contrary they were laughing and
Thanking the Monks
It's customary to be on your knees as you approach a monk. chatting away. Eventually a small break in the storm arrived and I joined a steady stream of students trying to make our way across the flooded campus to our next destination. Just another afternoon of thinking I was going to do one thing and that not happening. I've truly adopted the "mai pen rai" (no worries) attitude here.
Other things I've learned here...I don't love all Thai foods and how to live with insect and rodent friends. A teacher was in our office last week when I was getting ready to go home for the day. I was going about my business when all of a sudden she gave me an inquisitive look and asked what I was doing. I explained that I was just putting my work shoes in a box for the night so that the rats won't eat them. Last Monday morning James and I were the first ones in the office. Our routine consists of opening the windows to let out the smell of rat and turning on the AC to start the cool down. After about a minute we heard a loud flapping and a subsequent squealing. I knew instantly what it was so
Blessed Water
The head monk blessing the students. I dashed over and flipped off the power. A partially ground up a rat barely escaped with it's life to the ceiling tiles above us. On the third try the AC powered up and life went about as usual. Mice are everywhere in our house too. Jumping out from under our single gas burner in the kitchen, out of my bed sometimes when I lay down to go to sleep, not to mention the weird assortment of worms that somehow end up mostly in our bathrooms. The really interesting ones can devour the unlucky cockroach that happens to fall into the water storage bins within a few hours. Maggots hatch within 2 days in our trash can. That's a constant battle here with the heat and humidity.
As for unliking some foods here, let me tell you about the most interesting thing to pass over these lips has been. Two weeks ago a co-teacher cooked a home-made meal for us to share at lunchtime. It's a pretty big deal for people to cook and share food, as many Thai's just eat out. It's cheap, easy and amazing food. Many people don't have a burner to cook with and I
Dance Competition!
Traditional Thai dancing haven't seen a stove since moving here. Anyway, I had forgotten that we were going to eat lunch together. I'd just stuffed myself with a late breakfast about an hour and a half before our lunch. But, I couldn't not eat! That would have been blasphemy. She was so excited and told me how her husband and she had gone to the early morning market, purchased all the food and cooked it prior to school starting. I dished up what seemed to be a reasonable amount and thought "I can get through this." Then a special soup came out. She told me that when her officemate heard about our lunch she and her husband cooked a soup just for the occasion. Now, I will give my co-teacher some credit, she asked me a couple times if I wanted the soup. Each time I replied with an enthusiastic yes. Saying how wonderful it was for them to cook for us. As soon as she poured the soup into my bowl I knew something was up. The specialness of the soup was that it contained about every organ present in pigs, chunks of intestine making up the majority of the "meatiness." An
The Fateful Moment
of breaking the umbrella! added bonus was that it smelled (and tasted like) rotten pond water. That was by far the hardest meal I've ever had to eat. Two days later I was invited to eat lunch in the local teacher run snack shop at the school. As I was waiting for the meal to arrive I was taught how to stock the shelves and eventually was running the cashbox selling food to students. Since I was busy the ladies made a bowl of soup for me. As I was the guest I was served an extra helping of the delecacy in the soup, congealed pig blood. If I never eat that again I won't cry. Hours later I was still there though, surrounded by stacks of photo albums and laughing so hard I'm sure that was the cure to digesting such a lunch.
Highlights of the past week...The school's 88th birthday was last Thursday. In the morning nine monks came to bless the school and all of us in attendence of the special ceremony. For 45 minutes they chanted. Their voices seemed to pass through and fill each pore of my body. I sat in silence, pleading with my eyelids to hold
Don't Judge a Book...
This was my crazy, super hard to control class. They turned out to be some of my favorite students! Not that I have favorites... back the dammed tears behind them. Where and how all those came from I have no idea. I didn't understand a word they were saying. Perhaps it was just a mixture of emotions and the simple directed synchronization of their voices and energy. I managed to not cry and fell into a deep solemn relaxed state, fully aware of my surrounds and oblivious to the passing time. The rest of the day the seniors partook in a dance competition. The thing that struck me the most was how different this competetion was to what one would most likely be like in the states. There are no fans and definetly no AC in the outdoor gym. In the hour and a half that I watched, two girls flat out fainted and many other students barely made it to the arms of their waiting teammates before collapsing from heat. It's just so hot and humid that even though they only danced an average of about 6 songs, their poor bodies were just overheated. No big fuss was made, their team took care of them and the music kept playing. That's the difference. No yelling parents, no freaked out kids and panicked faculty,
Please, Please, Anything
One of the many partially wild dogs that live on campus. they did what they could do and made the best of the situation. Other highlights: motorbiking in the rain, finding the best Tom Yum soup in town, walking around alone late at night taking in the streets of Tak, early morning runs, weekend morning coffee and poetry reading on my porch and recognizing how blessed I am to be in this place right now.
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Hathaichanok
non-member comment
Pig s blood
I hate pig s blood, I couldn t eat it since I was young!