Adventures in Thailand & Teaching: July 2013

A brief update with lots of pictures!

This week is midterms, which is again blowing my mind. I am on less than the final quarter of my time here in Thailand and still hilarious miscommunications are happening! Last week I worked laboriously to prepare and copy midterms for all of my five hundred students, only to find out today, Monday, that I won't be giving midterms and do not even need to come to school except to sign my names in the morning. Just a typical example of how I don't know what's going on, but luckily now I just know how to accept it and smile!

My newest endeavor is becoming a Thai traditional dancer. Last semester, I helped out with the dance team and this semester I am IN the dance team. Oh my. Our grand premiere is coming quickly too! July 22nd is Ubon's famous Candle Festival, where tourists from all over the country flock to see the immense handmade candle floats and parade. Every lunchtime I try to hustle over to the stuffy dance room after slurping down some noodles and remember the intricate movements my students have been patiently drilling me on. I feel better when I see beads of sweat dripping down each of my student's face. Whew. I'm not the only who looks like the just got rained on.

I'm not sure if it's even legal to have a Farang (foreigner) dance in this national holiday event, but I am stoked to make my debut appearance as a ram thai dancer. One of my students, a talented dancer and ladyboy extraordinaire, recommended that I soak my fingers in hot water every morning to make them more bendable. 'Soft-soft hot' though. I would take her up on her advice, but I don't think three weeks will quite give me the edge that a lifetime of training, soaking and general cultural understanding has given all the other students. I will just have to make do with my ruler-straight fingers this time!

Lately I have been busy and things are picking up speed even more in the coming days. Last week I judged an English competition for the city schools and listened to some fluent English speakers, which came as quite a shock as compared to the 'how are you, students?' followed by blank stares that I experience daily. I also prepared students for an English 'debate' that was the next day, in which we placed second (out of three schools)! Hurrah, we weren't last, the students said! This past weekend I road-tripped to the Laos border and saw one of the most spectacular temples, located behind a waterfall in a cave. Stunning. However, on the way back to Ubon, our teacher's car gave out in the middle of nowhere. We proceeded to push it to the nearest roadside snack shack where everyone called their friends who called their friends until we had a nice crowd staring at the car. The best solution was deemed to be tie a string from the car to a pickup and pull it to the nearest mechanic shop. Naturally. The string came off many times, but eventually we reached the mechanics who generously opened their shop to us and spent five hours working away until 11:30 pm to replace the offending clutch.

While the mechanics worked under the car, I spent time standing in an abandoned field, watching heat lightening over the horizon and talking to God. It was one of those moments I will never forget. Where time stands still and all there is is nature and you and stillness. Utter stillness. Nowhere to be and nothing to do. I saw how with each strike the whole sky was illuminated, showing beautiful cloud formations that I never knew where there. It made me think, how many times in our American culture do we experience that? Or even let ourselves near an experience like that? Our value is represented by how much we produce and progress. Although I still appreciate those values in many ways, I have come to enjoy and sink into just being. Sitting and lounging is an event here, an activity, a purpose. In America, it is judged and condemned as lazy. But it is also life! I want to give myself the freedom to just be, without my multitasking and goal-oriented western brain driving me crazy, and I hope you give yourself that sometimes as well.