Advertisement
Published: August 12th 2007
Where are you from?
My finger is drifting into the Pacific Ocean, but it's close to my roots: Southern California. Saai is more on target with her finger on Thailand.Order has been restored.
As many of you know, the travelblog web site crashed in early August. This was quite a shock to me as the crash wiped out all of my blogs over the last several months. Thankfully, I've recovered the data and re-uploaded it (with a few changes in photo selection) to travelblog.org's web site.
Life goes on...
Over these last two weeks, I've been in school. I am taking a 6 week TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) course offered by Text & Talk Academy. The intent is to prepare myself to teach before I apply for an English teaching position here in Bangkok.
Text & Talk has been around for quite a few years. It was founded by an American but most of the trainers/teachers appear to be British. Text & Talk has locations in several cities in Thailand. In Bangkok, classes are held in a building fairly close to my apartment (approximately 15-20 minutes away with a walk/bus combo). Classes for the 6 week course are 10-4 Monday-Thursday.
How big is my class? It's a small group, but very diverse. There are only 5 students, consisting of a Canadian, Kenyan,
Saai
Another Saai with flowers shot... Belgian, and 2 Americans. The instructor is Australian. Ages range from 23 years old (the lone female, who is also American) to around 50.
This course isn’t easy. I've already had 3 in-class presentations and 2 exams (these exams are essay by the way, not multiple-choice). Another in-class presentation and 7 more exams to go! Next week I also begin my student teaching. This will include six teaching lessons (55 minutes each) to Thai students in the evenings after class. It adds up, especially the prep time outside of the classroom. Still, I'm glad I'm taking it.
What else has been happening? Saai's church had its 15th anniversary last weekend so I joined her for service there. Saai and her friend Si were in charge of the kids care during the service that day so I helped out. Most of the young kids in the church are the children of the American pastors so not knowing Thai wasn't a problem for me.
Yesterday (Saturday, August 11), Saai was an M.C. (master of ceremonies) for a band competition hosted by a mobile phone company (AIS). Around 10 bands were part of the competition held at AIS' store in
Battle of the Bands
AIS Future World Band Contest Winners. Siam Paragon. Saai was asked to do it on Thursday (nothing like planning ahead!), and it was a long day (10-4). I was there for moral support and, surprise, surprise, taking pictures. Although I was the only foreigner in attendance, I did run into one Thai staff person who lived in America for 13 years (good grasp of English too as you would expect). Saai was pretty worn out afterwards...dealing with introducing the bands, interviews, promos for AIS, awards, poor organization, etc. I actually enjoyed a few of the bands (all Thai, and mostly youth bands).
Today, Saai joined me at ECB (International church I am attending). It was a good mother's day service (mother's day coincides with the queen's birthday in Thailand; national holiday tomorrow). Afterwards we went to Crepes & Co, a restaurant off Sukhumvit Rd. It's a French/Mediterranean restaurant with an emphasis on...can you guess? Crepes. Wow. I loved this restaurant. Everything we ate was excellent. I can't say I've had a better meal in Bangkok. The only negative is that it gets quite loud and tight in their small, kid-friendly space. Still, we'll be back.
That's about it for this update...I'm glossing over a
Let's Talk about Noah's Ark
Sunday School with the American pastor's kids at Covenant Church where I found myself teaching the lesson. lot but time is a bit short these days because of school.
Look! There goes Dave!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.208s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 19; qc: 64; dbt: 0.1154s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
