Thus Commences "Teacher Rochelle"

First day down! Many more to go. Overall, it actually went pretty well.

My very first class was the worst, but I’m proud didn’t completely lose my cool. I stepped into a classroom filled with a bunch of 10th graders (remember, they’re the class reading Black Beauty for the second time) without knowing quite what was expected of me. I asked the Thai teacher if it was time for Reader Club, and she literally stepped out of the room without a word. The students stood up and said “Gooood Moooowning Teeechurrr” to me, and then sat down and dissolved into chatter.

I tried to introduce myself, but I swear could have been naked and they wouldn’t have noticed my existence. I began with the fundamentals: the title, author and publisher of Black Beauty, but all the while the kids were yapping away. They didn't respond to “be quiet,” even when I used my sharp authority voice or walked to the problem area. Asking questions just resulted in a student staring at their desk, mumbling a one word answer if I was lucky. The only two questions that elicited responses were “What animal is Black Beauty about?” and “Is Black Beauty set in Thailand?”—I guess what one of our orientation instructors said was true: Thai students will not speak if they’re not 100% positive they know the correct answer.

After that, my classes got much better. I worked on a mystery adventure book called “Oranges in the Snow” with two fourth grade classes, and they were more behaved and engaged. Even my sixth graders, with whom I began Tom Sawyer, exhibited less of an “I don’t give a crap” attitude than my high school students.

I found that drawing pictures and acting out words from the book really helped the 4th graders follow “Oranges in the Snow.” Seeing me jump around the room like a goofball kept their interest, and made them invested in the next turn in the story. “Should Mary drink the special potion?” I asked, and some kids shouted “NOOO!!!! Don’t drink it!” while others shouted “YESS!! Drink it! Drink it!” with zest. One girl came up after class to ask me what an author was (I really felt like a teacher answering this question), and I noticed that when I bent down to meet her eyes, the student bent even lower so that she would be below my level. Definitely my first example of the respect teachers and elders supposedly receive in Thailand.

My sixth grade class was a little more chatty, I suppose it’s a tendency that snowballs during puberty (and becomes a full-time job by high school), but they still exhibited the playfulness of children. When I told the kids I was from California, one boy jumped up from his seat and began singing like a rock star: “Welcome to Hoootel Californiaaa!!!” to which I just responded “yes, that California” in an attempt not to laugh out loud.

My school campus is actually quite nice. The lunch served at the canteen was alright, definitely not the type of lunch I’m used to (glass noodles, rice and fish soup was not very reminiscent of pizza day in the states). As for the administration, everyone has been very nice, but they’re not great at telling us what we’re supposed to be doing. Myself and the three other teachers spent today pretty much stumbling our way through class—how were we supposed to know that the sing-song version of the Mancini’s "Baby Elephant Walk" was the school's version of the five-minute bell? The ex-pats from England, Australia, Canada and Denmark in the English department have been pretty helpful, but I still feel like a chimp dropped into an intensive session of brain surgery. Okay, perhaps not that bad. To be honest, I’m already getting better, and it’s only my first day.

I’m also lucky enough to live five minutes away from school, in an apartment complex with security, a pool, laundry, my own space and bathroom, satellite TV, a fridge, air conditioning, and two balconies. Yes, two! Horror stories are already trickling in from other teachers who are living in shacks with no running water, so I'm counting my lucky stars. I'm definitely willing to rough it when I travel, but I'm not sure about living that way. From what I’ve assessed, there’s not much to do where I am, but we’re only about an hour away from Bangkok, so I’ll be traveling almost every weekend!

Catch You At Kanchanaburi!

I am officially in Chonburi, where I'll begin classes at Kasetsart University Laboratory School tomorrow morning! Am I really going to be a teacher tomorrow?



We spent the past couple days finishing up our orientation in Kanchanaburi, where we rode elephants and bamboo rafts down the River Kwai. We stayed in a resort called the Pavillion Hotel, and it was pretty gorgeous. It felt nice to be away from the city for a while, in a place where we could really soak in some nature. Although the Pavillion hotel was pretty ritzy, it was only as manicured as a resort in Thailand could be (if you don’t understand what I mean, I offer an example of the countless geckos crawling across the hotel ceilings).


I was the first one in the pool at the resort, and I was certainly not the last. Our group essentially lived in the water, and it proved to be a small peace of heaven in all that humidity.



Tuesday was probably my favorite day, and began at the Taweechai Elephant Camp. My observations on riding an elephant can be summarized as follows: it was pretty neat, but I felt like a bit of an awkward tourist. The elephants were largely wandering around camp, but when I left I noticed one or two elephants with chains on their legs. The elephants also performed some jaw-dropping tricks (seeing an elephant playing the harmonica was probably one of the stranger experiences of this week), but I don’t think elephants were put on this earth to shoot baskets through hoops. We spent most of our elephant ride on a seat tied to the elephant’s back, but I tried sitting on his neck and found it to be kind of uncomfortable. I think the highlight of my elephant camp experience was being shoved by a baby elephant, born only 25 days ago. I couldn’t decide what side of the love/hate line our relationship fell, because he kept running towards me and pushing roughly against my legs.


My favorite experience was probably the subsequent bamboo rafting, mostly because it didn’t consist of that much rafting. Me and a few friends jumped into the river Kwai within minutes of stepping onto our raft, and didn’t regret our decision for a moment even though the water was a little murky. The cool rush of liquid soothed us in the sweaty heat, and we floated with the current just as quickly as the raft did. We spent about ten minutes with our legs on the raft, leaning back and looking at the rich green jungle pass us by. This was the Thailand I came here for. Our bamboo raft paddler was a friendly Burmese man who told me that he came to Thailand because it was the land of opportunity for himself and his family. Sounded like America for so many people.


We spent lunch and dinner eating along the river Kwai, and dinner was spent facing the “Bridge Over River Kwai,” a location about which the famous movie I have not yet seen was based. I learned a little about the bridge’s history from a friend, and what I learned was pretty moving.


Once we arrived back in Bangkok, everyone’s departure was confusing and hectic. People were being picked up by their coordinators left and right, and I missed by chance to say goodbye to several people.

Since my last post, many of the teachers bonded pretty intensely, and we all tried to spend as much time together as we could before going our separate ways. I developed a lot stronger interest in fostering relationships with other teachers than I expected, but I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised considering that they were also like-minded individuals interested in tackling a totally new experience. Being that we were a pretty adventurous crowd of young people, spending several days cooped up Teacher Training while the Bangkok streets awaited us proved to be difficult for some people, and our program leader had to address the issue. However, the last few days we spent relaxing, dining and riding elephants in Kachanaburi proved to be just what we needed before moving on to a position of increased cultural and locational isolation.

Now, I prepare for my first reading lesson tomorrow!

P.S. A few photos from the Prawn Volcano Restaurant in Nakhon Pathom:

Tuk Tuktastic

So as you can see from the previous post, the best word to describe the Grand Palace is probably “ornate.” Everything was covered in reflective glass, art, sparkling statues, and in some cases gold. I’m glad I saw it, although the crowds and stop-and-go tours were a little much for me. I don’t enjoy feeling that much like a tourist, or constantly bumping into people who are taking photos. I did enjoy our subsequent lunch on the river, it was nice to be by water again, albeit murky and brown.

I’ve been doing countless lessons in Thai Culture & Language, Teacher Training and other related things during the day, and at night I’ve been eating and going out with members of my program. There are a lot of us, but everyone I met has been very friendly and easy to get along with.

Last night I had a fantastic time out on the town with some friends from the program, although we were all tired this morning as a consequence. I caught a subway with a couple friends to Sukhumvit, where we ate at a Lebanese restaurant. The food was pretty good (I tried lamb liver!), and we were extremely flattered when the owner assumed we lived in Bangkok—I figured we’d come off as tourists.


After walking a bit, we ended up succumbing to our secret desire to take a tuk tuk, even though it was more expensive than a cab—it didn’t end up being too steep after I haggled the price. Our spunky driver was a quite comfortable swerving through traffic at high speeds, which was definitely a new sensation considering that there are no windows or bars to protect you from flying out of the tuk tuk. I actually loved it (see happy picture of me?). It felt like a theme park ride, with a greater element of danger that played to my inner thrill seeker. We emerged with our hair standing on end (a style I’ve decided to call “tuk tuk hair”) at a pretty touristy street called Khao San Road. We met up with over half of our program members there, and the crowd of us basically took over Club Khao San. I haven’t been out dancing in a long time, and the international hodge podge of people there made the night even more entertaining.

Moving on to academic matters, we finally met our school coordinators. They were two young teachers from Chonburi, and they joined us for a meeting, followed by dinner and a Thai dance show. At the dance show one of our coordinators noted that she could never be a dancer because she didn’t “bend her fingers back enough” when she was a girl. It wasn’t until I saw the dancers that I understood what she meant (they display an incredible arch in their fingers while dancing).

During our meeting, the coordinators tried their best to explain our teaching schedule since most of it was written in Thai. It was interesting to note that our coordinators are both English teachers, and although their grammar skills could put me to shame, their ability to speak fluently was still limited.

There are three other American girls teaching at my school, Kasetsart University Laboratory School in Chonburi, and we all have very different teaching jobs. It turns out they divided the teaching work among us before they received any information about us, so our assignments were completely random. After comparing my schedule with that of the other girls, I began to suspect I got an easy load. I’m largely covering Reader Club and a little bit of reading comprehension and assessment. My Reader Club happens in thirty minute sessions, and I’ll be working with Primary as well as Secondary students throughout the week—I believe I teach several classes in the U.S. equivalent of 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th grade, as well as 10th 11th and 12th grade.

I’m a little disappointed, although I know that we were told to expect very different job assignments (for example, some teachers working in small rural schools have their own classroom and teach from 8am to 4pm straight, with no clear curriculum… a little daunting). I can’t help thinking that if the coordinators had more information available to them, like the fact that I was an English major, they might have given me more responsibility. One of the girls teaching alongside me has no teaching experience, but she’s been handed longer classes, and is expected to teach in depth courses on English language, culture and humanities. She has advised me to count my blessings for not having such an overwhelming assignment. I’ve assured her that I will help her as much as she needs me to, partially to help her de-stress and also because I came into this wanting a challenge.

On the bright side, I love reading, and although the past teacher wrote me a note saying students don’t like Reader Club very much I’m going to try my best to make it fun. I am required to give students a midterm and final, and will be covering units on reading comprehension with grade 10. As if reading comprehension drills won’t already inspire antipathy, it turns out grade 10 is also reading Black Beauty for the second time—no wonder they hate Reader Club! I asked if I could change to a book they haven’t read, and the coordinator shook her head: “we must stay with the curriculum,” she said. We’ll see…

Our coordinator also told us that we’re not in the main town of Chonburi, and it certainly sounds like we’ll be making our own fun. There’s one restaurant, and not very much within walking distance. I’m still looking forward to arriving there and thoroughly assessing my entire situation, not to mention settling down after this exhausting orientation.

P.S. I got a cell phone, and if for any reason you'd like it: 0852172612

The Grand Palace, A Photo Post

(click photos to see a larger image)

Bangkok: A Beginning

My first day in Bangkok was completely surreal. My sleep deprivation following a 20 hour journey was already intense, so seeing water buffalo walk down the street or people riding motorbikes with babies sitting loosely on their lap was somehow even more dream-like. Bangkok is lush and green, but also industrial and polluted. It seems like everything in this city is messy and spilling into other spheres. Children, dogs and food carts spill into the street, plants and vines creep up walls and spill into restaurants, water spills and flows pretty much everywhere.

I arrived at the Louis Tavern Hotel at around 2:30 pm Tuesday, and decided to conquer my jetlag by waiting to sleep until at least 9:00 pm. In an attempt to avoid napping, I wandered the city streets and kept running into people from my teaching program (they’re pretty easy to spot in a crowd). At least fifteen of us spent a few hours just sitting in a bar and clumsily practicing Thai with our waiter.

By the evening, I was ready for some of that famous Thai street food. My dinner cost a total of $1.35 US, and it was damn good. The girl I ordered from didn’t speak English, but another Thai woman who did happened to walk by as I was ordering warned that the chicken curry dish I ordered was “extremely spicy for a westerner.” But at this point I was committed, and was curious to see what this super-spicy-southern style was all about. It was spicy, yes, but I loved it.

I stopped at a great little shack with few new friends later that night—we couldn’t read what it was called, but we called the restaurant the “lizard place” because there was a lizard on the bamboo sign as we walked in. I’d eaten dinner, but I ordered some sort of slimy tapioca desert?

A few rules of thumb when it comes to dining:

1) You do not tip in Thailand, but Thai people are obsessed with good service anyways. They’ll open your door, pour and stir the drink sitting in front of you, and stand diligently waiting for you to order the moment you sit down (rather than leave until you’ve decided—it’s actually kind of high pressure).

2) You never put your fork in your mouth. You are given a fork and a spoon, and you use the fork for cutting, and the spoon for scooping things into your mouth. We had fun practicing this with noodles...

And a little note about the weather, it changes at any moment here. It can be clear one minute, and then raining and cracking with lighting the next minute. The humidity, however, always remains. There’s something charming about sitting outside in a tank and shorts at night, or taking a comfortable nighttime dip in an outdoor pool.


Orientation: A Crash Course in Thai Everything

We were up early this morning orientation, and I felt well-rested and ready. It’s a good thing, too; I had several hours of cultural and linguistic absorbing ahead of me, not to mention that there are over 90 teachers on my program and I’m trying to meet them all.

Language training was fun, definitely an exercise in cramming a little too much information into my brain. There are 44 consonants and 5 different tones in the Thai language, all of which sound almost the same two me. For example, the word “pa” can mean throw away, forest, aunt or dad depending how you emphasize the “a.” Yikes. We practiced our greetings (“wai”) and went around saying phrases like “hello, my name is Rochelle” and “what country do you come from” in Thai.

After a delicious lunch, we got a general introductory lesson on Thai culture. We covered the importance of “gam,” also known as karma, which influences a person’s future lives. Our teacher, who was a sweet and funny young Thai woman, told us an amusing story about a woman who killed a gecko and was punished in her later life. After that, everything she taught us was kind of a blur… lucky numbers in Thai culture are 9 and 8…. unlucky ones are 4, 6 and 13… do not touch a monk… the king’s color is yellow, this is also the color for Monday… wait, the days of the week have colors? Tuesday is pink, Wednesday is green, Thursday is orange… then we were quizzed on the name of the Prime Minister of Thailand, and no one could muster it. And to imagine no one knowing the name Barack Obama!

We also got a few tips on teaching English as a second language from several experienced teachers. Along with brainstorming exercises and classroom management techniques, we covered basic ESL problem areas such as plurals and the letter “x” (neither of which exist in the Thai language). I know my feelings might change when I step into the classroom, but all this preparing has inspired a grain of eagerness to teach… who knew?

Tonight a few friends and I are going to grab a cab into central Bangkok. Tomorrow we visit the Emerald Buddha Temple and the Grand Palace, followed by more training and meeting with our school coordinators… I forgot what it was like to be this busy! It’s actually kind of nice, I’ve needed a little kick in the butt since college has ended. Goodbye from the water buffalo wandering the streets!

P.S. I'll take more (and much better) pictures soon. I've actually been trying to experience my surroundings without my eyes behind a camera, at least for the moment.

A Message from Taipei, Tawain

On the Plane, 3:00pm Monday Afternoon Los Angeles Time and 5:00am Tuesday Morning Bankgok Time

Okay, I’ll admit it, I finally had my moment of nervousness. It wasn’t doubt, but the inevitable moment of “why am I doing this again?”

It was 10:30pm in my Santa Monica apartment, and my father was napping in his room before taking me to the airport. My room was dark and silent, empty and clean, with two big bags packed by the door.

When my dad dropped me off at the airport, I watched his dark curly hair disappear in the crowd as I inched closer to baggage inspection. My shoulders already ached and my eyes were drooping. That was it. No more familiar faces, at least for a while. No more familiar beds, foods or streets.

Our flight was delayed, and I felt into a hazy sleep in the uncomfortable black leather chairs at Gate 120, too exhausted to be nervous but still feeling distinctly alone. The flight only made things worse: all I wanted was sleep, but the flourescent house lights bore through my skull while eager flight attendants attempted to serve me dinner 3:45 am Los Angeles time. Didn’t they understand that all I wanted was sleep?

I fell into an uneasy sleep to the sound of flight announcements in another language, and was awoken by a breakfast of porridge topped with some sort of egg and vegetables, a piece of sesame bread and a powdered creation called “Flavored Tuna Floss” (see left.... I wouldn’t recommend it).

Then I started reading some of the travel magazines, watched an episode of Anthony Bourdain and World’s Best Diving, and started to feel a little better. Renewed by sleep and an image of a diver petting sharks in the Maldives, my vigor was soon restored. I can usually count on myself to get excited about the future, and to allow this anticipation to pull me through unfamiliarity and exhaustion.

I’m stopping at an airport in Taipei for a few hours. I feel good, and will probably feel better once I can stretch (I’ve been sitting for almost 15 hours). I’ll be checking in soon.

Taipei Intl. Airport, around 6:30AM

I'm in Taipei, Taiwan, apparently one of the gloomiest cities in the world, weather-wise (coming from sunny California, it certainly is). Heading to Bangkok in a couple hours. I wanted to post my airplane thoughts because I think I'm going to be swept up by everything upon arrival, and the moments of melancholy are just as important to record as the moments of glamour. Ready for Bangkok!

P.S. Why doesn't LAX have free wifi? This is excellent!

Yes, I'm Leaving Tonight. No, I Haven't Finished Packing.

I'm not joking. I'm doing almost all of my packing today, the day of my flight. This is the only way to keep myself from going crazy. Now there's no chance for me to second guess myself, to add things I don't need. I'm leaving for the airport tonight, so I'm in power-packing-and-prepping mode.

Once I arrive I'll begin a one week orientation, which will include language training and cultural experiences in Bangkok and Kanchanaburi. I'll be sure to update as soon as I can! Wish me luck!

Departure is Near: Some Anticipatory Cogitation

I promise, my entry titles won't always be this pretentious. However, I intend to use this blog to keep my writing skills sharp, so I'm going to try my best to keep my wording interesting.

So, October is finally here, and I leave in almost two weeks! It was over a year ago that I decided to teach abroad after college, and I'm pretty proud that I've made it happen. I know this the right decision because I couldn't even imagine being headed on any other path.

Of course, I'm already realizing what I will miss, and what will be irreversibly altered when I return. Unlike when I studied abroad and my friends and family were all waiting for me back in Southern California, the world I know is currently dispersing. People my age are moving away, settling into apartments around the country, finding jobs, or beginning a long journey through a graduate program. Everything will be unfamiliar when I return; I will have missed the ground shifting beneath my feet.

Financially speaking, I expect to break somewhere below even. I'll be earning money, but it will undoubtedly be on a hand-to-mouth basis, most likely leaning towards a depletion of funds considering that I'll be traveling. But the most important thing is that I can do this, that I found a way to travel after college in spite of any monetary concerns.

Interestingly enough, my idea of teaching abroad rather than simply traveling was originally conceived as a way to "pay my way," but I suspect it will become a lot more than that. I have never wanted to be a teacher, although everyone immediately points out that as an English major it's the most obvious option. I always felt that teachers in America were underpaid, underappreciated, and demonstrated a degree of dedication to their children that I doubted I could ever muster in myself. Kids are loud, full of misdirected energy, and often completely irrational. I grew up as an only child, with no screaming siblings to handle, so being continuously exposed to children can sometimes drive me out of my mind. Which is why a teaching job is exactly what I need right now. I need to hone in on my weaknesses, to expose and challenge them, and only then can I force myself to become a more well-rounded individual. Not to mention, if I want to be a writer in any capacity, I need to practice conveying information articulately, in a way that is easy for my children (or perhaps my readers) to understand.

In preparation for my adventure I attempted to read up on Thailand's political history, and it turned out to be a little daunting. Being the awkward American I am, I can hardly pronounce important historical names, let alone remember them (the only one I've retained is Thaksin). If I had to summarize, I'd conclude that politics in Thailand has been a pretty complicated dance between the Prime Minister, the highly revered Royal Family and the military. The country has gone through a variety of relatively calm but monumental coups and shifts in power, but the de facto authority remains somewhat ambiguous to me.

Culturally speaking, I've learned to never insult the royal family, or wave my hand to say hello (in Thailand they use a wai as a greeting), and that I shouldn't point to or touch anything with my feet—they're considered the dirtiest part of the human body, while the head is sacred. On the brighter side, I'm going to the Land of Smiles, where fun (also known as sa-nuk) is an essential part of life. I'll be teaching at a multi-lingual language institute called Kasetsart University Laboratory School, where the children will know four languages and I will be well-supplied and supported.

I've only scraped the surface when it comes to being prepared, but I'll figure everything else out when I get there. That's half the fun, right? Now I begin the technicalities of packing and preparing for my October 19th departure... until then, laa korn (looking forward to hearing that phrase pronounced properly)!