On Friday we had a Fourth of July activity. We taught the kids about the Declaration of Independence, and demonstrated our fight for freedom by kicking the British teachers out. The kids ate hotdogs and had a three-legged race, and my students realized that teacher Rochelle is actually kind of cool because she stuffs her face with hotdogs just as ravenously as they do.
I spent the weekend with my American friends in Kalasin, a small town in Isan (the Northeast region of Thailand bordering Laos). The people in Kalasin were incredibly friendly, and the town was surprisingly clean. Our friends teach at a school in Kalasin, and their co-workers threw a party with karaoke and Thai food on Saturday night, then let us hold a BBQ at their house Sunday. We listened to American music and made pork burgers (the meat is much easier to find than beef). The first few burgers were a little burnt but we got back into the swing of things and felt like true yankees for a day.
I have never felt much in the way of patriotism before I came to Thailand... I always saw the concept of national pride as divisive, pitting one group of people against another based on arbitrary borders. In the philosophical sense, I still feel this way. But I have developed much more sentimentality regarding my home-country since being abroad. I, along with my fellow American friends, often share feelings of nostalgia and appreciation for America that only ex-patriots can really understand. On the flipside, I've also been considering some of the aspects of America that may annoy me upon my return, and the things about Thailand that I'll miss. In many ways the grass is greener in Thailand. But oh how I miss cheese and ocean breeze.
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