School Vacation

Yes, I'm on vacation, already. Yes, I have vacation for two weeks. No, I do not have any activities. Yes, I am rather bored. Being bored is something I was warned about. Rotary asked us, now what will you do when you get bored?
I replied, "I'll go down to the mcdonald's and laugh at the Ronald McDonald clown waiing."
THERE IS NO MCDONALD'S in NAKHON PHANOM!! Yes, that's a good thing, but it means that my clever response, or so I thought, is actually, not an actuality. Well, if I lived in a city of more than 80,000 people, then I could find a mcdonalds to laugh at. But I live in a very small country town on the border of laos.
All my thai friends are either out of town, or taking college entrance exams, all day. Which leaves me with Emma. Although I love Emma dearly, I worry that she's getting sick of me.
I have to get out of the house. That's just who I am. I cannot stay home, alone with a computer and a tv. Otherwise I get depressed. So I bike outside my house, I venture into town. I go to Emma's house. I'm at Emma's house probably more than I should be. Her host parents have started making jokes about how I'm their second daughter from North America.
This morning, I went to pick up coffee from the CO-FF, my favorite coffee shop. I knew it was closing, but I didn't expect to see a moving van and the entire place dismantled. So I settled for coffee flavored bubble tea from the place next door. Bad choice, when choosing bubble tea flavors, ALWAYS go for fruit. ALWAYS.
Anyway, I went to Emma's house, woke her up at 11:30, gave her some bubble tea (I bought her Kiwi flavor, a much better choice) and after she went back to sleep did a sudoku, straightened my hair and experimented with liquid eyeliner.
Emma got out of bed, we ate, we watched a movie, we ate some more. We went out and bought food and watched another movie. I taught her how to knit.
Now I'm home. I'm thinking about a shower.
And THAT my friends is a typical day of school vacation.
Tomorrow, I hope, is different.

Noises

Cockroaches make SO MUCH NOISE! Oh my, it is creepy too. they chitter and chatter and hiss and scurry. You can hear their every movement. The kitchen is now a place I will not go at night.
That's all.

A bit of home

Today, after much frustration due to a lack of information, I went to dinner at the house of an english tutor of a friend of Emma's. Confusing, no?
His name is Tony. He's about 60 years old, originally from England, spent 25 years in Canada and is now living in Thailand married to an extremely educated thai woman. We were invited over for steak.
Tony is obviously from the upper class of Britain ( you can tell by his accent) and reminds me of Penny (my violin teacher) in so many ways. It was comforting to be around him.
His wife had traveled in Oregon and knew where Portland was and asked if I had been to Astoria. She actually had been to OREGON! It was so nice to be able to talk about the mountains and the ocean and skiing and be around people that actually knew what I was talking about because they had been there.
The steak was great, and there was salad and steamed vegetables. Tony promised us cheese as a dessert. After dinner, out came the cheese and during a conversation about karaoke, Tony heard that I was a fan of stefan grapelli. The next thing I know, he's going upstairs, and finding cd's of music for us to listen to.
He puts in the cd and we're guessing which singer is on now, ella, billy or sarah. We go back in time to Bessy and Ida. I'm in heaven.
Emma's friend from school has to go home to eat dinner with her family (after eating a GIGANTIC steak) and Gale, tony's wife drives her home. On her way back she picked up a "treat" for us. I assumed the white box holds a cake, but as it is opened I gasp in disbelief. There are roast chestnuts inside.
Tonight was blissful, it was western culture that I appreciate. Although I love eating crab, sardines, sticky rice, bamboo, mint, curry and chili powder while listening to thai music, a bit of home was welcome.
The great thing about Tony's house is that it has... an oven. Emma and I are welcome to use it to bake or cook whenever we like, as long as we give them two or three days warning. After I complained about my inability to make kugel due to a lack of cream cheese, Tony asked, "you mean philidelphia? Or cottage cheese? "
Emma is the one to gasp this time. I am simply speechless.
Emma: "You HAVE cream cheese?!?"
Me: "............"
Tony simply stands up, walks to the fridge and pulls out a package. "I'm sorry that I don't have any bagels, but here are some more crackers."
I shouldn't have eaten so much, but when you haven't had cream cheese, chestnuts, cheddar or decent crackers for 6 weeks, it was feast now or miss it later. So emma and I both ate until we almost felt sick. We both decided that tomorrow is a no bread day. Probably the whole week. I'll be eating a lot of soup.
I was also given an Ian McEwan book that I can't wait to read. My reading material has been the same book for the past 5 weeks. I have actually memorized some parts simply because I've read it so many times.
Tomorrow, I don't have any classes at all. I hope I can leave school and run errands. I need to make a trip to the bank, the post office and I also need to buy gifts for the holidays. The ground shipping takes three months so I need to find my father that Rolex fast.

English Camp

I'd like to start off by saying that with the exception of Rob and Sara, YOU PEOPLE are REALLY bad at commenting. My last post has been up for 5 days and nobody has commented. Now I KNOW people have read it. PLEASE, comments (and letters) make my day. So get to it, comment or on wednesday (for those of you with facebook) my blog will be the only note you will see all the way down. I will upload EVERY SINGLE ONE, unless you take the time and comment here. Because I KNOW you'll comment on facebook.

Alright, now that's over with, on to the main point.
Bai See Su Quan. It's the string tying ceremony. I did it for a second time on saturday night and this time have pictures, but am too lazy to upload them. Teachers and students told me they loved me, or wished me good luck, or even that I find a handsome boyfriend, as they tied my strings. I was given so many roses, eggs and a banana leaf dumpling (that's the closest english word there is, they called it banana bread, but it isn't). I'm keeping the strings this time. I think they might make a nice addition to my blazer, along with the feather mask on the back and the fairy wand on the front.

So on friday, I went to the english camp to help out with Emma. I'm pretty sure these children (teenagers really) had never seen a white person their own age. They must think all white people are fat woman and middle aged men because they were so excited to see us.

Emma and I are celebrities here. I should change the title of th eblog to My Life as a Superstar. Thse kiddies not only wanted pictures of us, and with us, they wanted autographs, our names, our skin, to touch our cheeks. They wanted our phone number and our e-mail (BIG MISTAKE) and they wanted us to remember them. Two days later and I get eight phone calls from the same girl. I can't understand a word she says because she doesn't even speak thai. She is speaking another dialect. I handed the phone over to a friend and it turns out her name is Fa. I think, "which one was Fa?"

I have a new friend named Poopey (yes that is actually her name, no, she doesn't think it's funny) and I gave her my cell phone number because I actually liked her. I have six text messages from her. They are all cheesy and they all RHYME! After talking to Emma, it turns out that she got the same messages.

Oh, the aftermath of a great experience.
During the camp I learned so much. I learned a tongue twister in poothai (the strange dialect of the region) and I learned the thai version of the chicken dance, the banana dance, and the row your boat song. Look at Emma's blog and you'll find the chicken dance lyrics. It starts out with "CHICKEN IS DEAD!" There's a lot of bongo drumming involved.

On the last day, we had a closing ceremony for the english camp.
The students one by one, got up, waied to us, and shook our hand. One girl got up the courage to ask if she could hug us and the next thing I know, Emma and I are in the midst of a giant group hug with people fighting to get to the center. Girls are kissing my cheeks and I'm kissing theirs. "Magic Kiss," they say. They all want pictures. I gave over two hundred hugs in thirty minutes. I almost cried from happiness and just from the sheer amount that these girls cared for us after three days together.
"Don't Forget! Don't Forget" they cried.
I'm trying not to.
Because of the huge success that we were, Emma and I are invited to join them on a trip to Chiang Mai in January. We both gleefully accepted the invitation.

Days Like These

There are good days, there are bad days, and then there are days like these, that make up for ALL of the bad days. Today was simply wonderful. Sure, I was late to school, had plans cancelled on me and had math class, but I also met people, remembered names, learned new words, laughed, sang, danced, bicycled, took pictures, drank tea and went to a party. It doesn't get much better.

I'm sorry Dad. I thought I was getting better at being punctual. I realize that what made me late to school every day in corvallis was a fundamental fact about teenagers. We like to sleep. Even though I'm in a foreign country, that fact about me does not change. Tomorrow, I will try to get up earlier because I have an appointment! There are two boys in class 5/2 and 5/3 that live in my "village." I am in 5/1, which is the english program, so because neither of these boys are in the english program, they know about as much english as I know german, i.e., nothing. Which is good, because I'll learn thai. I was riding my bicycle home yesterday when I recognized one of them and then the other showed up about five minutes later. Both have been asking me if I have a boy friend almost every time I see them. I tell them I can't. THANK YOU ROTARY!!! I like these boys... as friends only. Thai relationships between teens are very platonic, even when dating. If a boy and girl are dating there is no touching, no hugging, no kissing, the only difference between friend and boyfriend is a long late night phone call every night. That and sometimes eating lunch together at school. Having a boy friend here (considering that a long late night conversation is impossible at this point in my year) seems rather pointless and I'm glad to have an excuse.

I should be going to bed earlier, but tonight I had a rotary meeting. Emma and I thought that is would be a normal meeting that consists of sitting at a long conference table and eating fruit. It wasn't. Instead it was a party in the banquet hall of the hotel with karaoke dancing and a full buffet dinner. There were also three young men only too ready to fill my class of water or hand me a new one. Once, when I was trying to prolong their actions (I tried to drink my water as slowly as possible because having them reach over my shoulder every five minutes was slightly embarrassing) they came and replaced it even though I still had half a glass. One in particular kept ogling me (he does this every week) and although he was trying to be discreet (looking through mirrors and around other people etc) it was still rather obvious.
When a person sings Karaoke it is perfectly normal to receive roses, even if your voice is absolutely terrible. Thai people like to make each other happy. I get a lot of compliments. There is one woman in the rotary club that always leads a thai line dance. We do the same line dance with a slight variation in steps again and again and again. When we have a regular rotary meeting, this same woman shows up with false hair around her head in a twisty braidy headband/headdress thing. I'm not quite sure what it is, but it puzzles me, because this woman is not bald...

So emma and I dance with her and with every other woman. They have couple dancing, but consists of standing opposite your partner and waving your hands around in thai dance fashion and well, I'm anything but good at the hand motions. You'd think that since I play violin it'd be easy, but no. Imagine drawing a circle with one hand and drawing a rectangle with the other. That's how hard it is.
There were also women at the rotary meeting/party that run a yoga center! And, yet another perk of being a rotary exchange student... the classes are absolutely free. All I need to do is buy a ridiculously expensive yoga mat ($15). Mom or Madeleine, will you be in need of one in a year? I already know that you have a blue one Dad.

Before the Rotary meeting, I had extra classes. I had a math class which, unfortunately, I'm not doing so well in. It's in english, but I haven't really reviewed because we don't have a text book and my teacher will simply say, "you know? Just use Pythagorean theorem." and I feel like I should know how to verify that tangent of theta multiplied by secant of theta minus one all over tan of theta minus sec^2 theta cos theta equals something else equally confusing, and in america I feel like I would have been able to do it without a problem. Here, my mind goes blank and I find myself trying to figure out if the new words I've just learned are thai, isan or lao. I try to learn thai, but everyone here speaks isan and lao and I end up with a mish mash mixture.
I think I'll ask for private tutoring, or get my friends to tutor me in math so that I can catch up.I have to remember that I arrived mid-semester, without having done math for two months.

After the extra classes I thought that I would be having dinner with my new friends Nam tip and Nam tan. But, they were busy doing something else and Emma called me and asked if I wanted to go to the Chah yen place (thai tea place) and the Night Market with kate and khlou. I said yes, but I needed to ride home, shower, and change for Rotary.

That's when I ran into Tum and Brees on their bicycles. Although it's nice to ride bikes with other people, those boy ride SO SLOW. I tried to get them to ride faster and ended up in a race with Tum ( I won). Tomorrow morning we'll ride to school together. Mosquito repellent is now acquired. As you probably have heard, I had a police escort one day, a postman escort the next (this one asked for my phone number) and when some twenty year old men on motorcycles slowed down beside me the next day, I was at my limit and I told them to shove off. Now, I'll be riding with two classmates and I wonder if it will be any better. I hope so. I even managed to explain to them that men liked to honk at me (in thai "Doop!").

When I arrived at home, my host brother was on the computer. Success is near. I had a WHOLE conversation with him. He gets excited when I receive letters (maybe...they are from a boyfriend). This letter was about 8 pages long front and back with an enclosed CD and picture of creepy frog from non other than BREE BREE ( who despises me when I call her that). I read the letter while listening to the CD and almost died of laughter. I love that girl so much. The picture of creepy frog was a nice touch. This friend of mine, has a colossal collection of stuffed animals, among them, creepy frog. Creepy frog is disturbing to me for some reason, I can't explain it, but she enclosed a picture of him holding an "I miss you" sign. Well, I don't miss creepy frog, but sometimes I wish BREE BREE were here to gossip with.

And so I read the letter, showered, got dressed, told pee-harp where I was going and asked him what he thought of my clothes. He looked me up and down and said, "okay." I have approval, sort of. Next time I'll try for better. Maybe by the time I leave this host family, I will even heard, "suay." I'm working on it.

So, I went to the tea place and met up with kate, khlou (twins) and Emma. We took pictures and then got on out bikes (to all those from corvallis, there's a new "bike gang" in the world) and rode to the night market. Emma and I found the COOLEST T-shirts for a dollar each. I bought three (I couldn't resist). One says (Suspect winners) and has four pac-man characters on it, another has weird monsters coming out of a boom box and says "Calm down soundtrack" and the third one has a picture of a TV, inside the TV is a Vespa and is says something, but I can't remember.
Emma bought the pac man shirt too. By the end of this year, our matching wardrobe will have grown to a size that even I don't want to think about. We already have matching shoes and sunglasses. The other exchange students on the trip won't know what to think of us with our wonka sunglasses, yellow pac-man t-shirts and pointy toed plastic flats. I think we'll rock the look.

Tomorrow, Emma and I are going to an English Camp is a province 50 km away. I'm not sure who recruited us to help out, but we're going. I'm a little excited, I get to meet more students.
Today was marvelous, I was busy, I learned and I even have new shirts. Not much could be better.

Anyway, Love to all, and SEND ME SOME MORE LETTERS! (It's the best conversation starter I have with my host brother so far... plus I love reading them (even the very long rants)).

Random experiences and advice

Although one month late, I did in fact, introduce myself to the entire school this morning. I stood up at the front by the flag pole and told 1500 students my name, my nick name, where I'm from and what I'm doing here-- in Thai. I'm sure that all of the students were already aware of my name and where I was from and that I was an exchange student. Hey, I've already been here a month.

Yet, after being here a month, I still have new learning experiences. For instance, yesterday, I made it through an ENTIRE Aerobics class. That's one hour nonstop dancing outside in the humidity and heat. I even stayed through the cool down. I had promised my host father that I'd be home before dark. The class ended ten minutes after the sun had set, so I rushed home on my bicycle. I've never peddled so fast in my life.

In the last post, I mentioned my prized cheese. I paid 200฿ for that cheese and when I looked in the fridge last night, some one had tasted it (which I don't have a problem with) but they had forgotten to wrap it in cling wrap. So my cheese was molding and dry on all sides.
I rescued my cheese. I cut off all of the bad spots and placed the cheese in a plastic bag. I was not about to lose my precious cheese. I' m possessive about my farang food. I shouldn't be, I know. But here is is very expensive and it's not as versatile as sticky rice. My British English teacher bought sausage and bacon in Khon Kaen. He has no room in his freezer, so placed it in the freezer in the teacher's room. To save energy the school shut off the power to the freezer, leaving Martin's special sausage and bacon to defrost. He was not happy.

Emma and I have started making bubble tea at home. We are learning how to perfect the bubbles. Our first attempts were disastrous. Last time we made a big vat, but left it in the pot too long and now they all taste burnt. Blending ice is not a good thing for the blender, just like it's not a good for your teeth (I've stopped chewing ice, I promise). I asked my friends for the word for crushed ice so I could buy it at a seven eleven. Nam kang bhot. I could not say bhot the way they wanted me to. I said it over and over and over again while they laughed and laughed. Granted, I was laughing too. One has to, otherwise you end up embarrassed at your lack of language skills. But when I finally got it, I turned around and said, "well then, tell me the difference between chair and share."
They couldn't hear it. It's a slight change that most English speaking people don't even notice. But the Thai people can't hear the difference. I had to try and explain how the mouth makes the sound and where your tongue goes. In the end, I taught my friend Pooh some tongue twisters and got her just as frustrated as she had made me.
To Sara, Rob, Charlie, Craig and everyone else on the rotary circuit, this is my advice for the next year's exchange students.
"Unless you speak the language flawlessly (which you won't because we're all American), you will have an accent. You will have trouble with some sounds or pronunciations and your friends will laugh at you. You will repeat the same sound a million times while they try and correct you and you can't tell the difference between what you said and what they said. Laugh, enjoy the moment, think of it as free language tutoring, but when it's over turn it around on them. Find what sound they can't say in English. Use that weakness to your advantage, exploit it. Teach them tongue twisters in English and suddenly they are laughing at their own incompetence and you feel much better about your accent."

You can change it, but this tactic has helped me so much. I even told it to my friend in China. Yesterday my friends and I were rolling on the floor laughing because of our accents in thai and english.

I'm rather exotic here, as most of you predicted. I have had at least 3 perfect strangers ask for my phone number. I answer with a "Mai dai!" and a smile. It means can't. They are normally fairly young men, but much older than me, punks on their motorcycles. They're the ones that honk at me on their motorcycles, although older men honk too. The men seem so happy with themselves, it's as if they think they are the first people to EVER honk at me or Emma. Some days I laugh, other days I get really annoyed and wish it would all stop. But it won't so I'll learn to deal with it.

This is the Tally of free stuff I've been given because I am an exchange student.

Som tam (spicy papaya salad)-- from a friend of my host mother's who runs a shop in my neighborhood.

Green tea-- from the women who run the coffee shop that emma and I are very loyal to.

Fruit-- from the women who run the bubble tea shop right next to the coffee shop. We are also loyal to this shop as well. And even though we are making our own bubble tea, we bought the ingredients from these women.

Coffee-- from the english teacher who teaches the kids that are not in english immerision. Sometimes he give me cake too.

2 polo shirts-- from my rotary club.

2 T-shirts-- from the Rotary Youth Exchange program in District 3340.

1 Backpack with a Rotary 3340 thailand exchange patch (I rather like it) -- also from the Rotary Youth Exchange District 3340.

Ice Cream-- from my Rotary Exchange counselor. He also owns the nicest hotel in town, on the same level as the Salbasgeon in Corvallis. I have a feeling that he would give discounts to my family should anyone come visit (not probable, I know and not necessary either) but in case anyone would like to know, a room in the Riverview Hotel (named so because it is on the Mekhong River and has a stunning view of Laos) is about 1500฿. That's during the height of the season and is roughly $45 a night for a double bed room.

That's it, but I've only been here a 5 weeks.

Ahan Falang

Ahan= food
Falang= foreigner/ guava

Wan nee, kulap gap sai tam ahan falang. (Today emma and I cooked foreigner food)!!
It was exciting. Last weekend I went to both Khon Kaen and Ubon Ratchatani (two big cities both at least 4 hours away). Because I live out in the boonies of Isan ( I love it here, but it's very thai, no foreign stuff to speak of), I took the oppurtunity to buy some neccessities.
1. cheese
2. more cheese (feta for emma)
3. PEANUT BUTTER
So, today emma came over to my house after I slept at her's last night. I'm not sure whether sleepovers are common here, but our host parents seemed okay with it.
After we woke up got dressed, ate the food emma's host mother made for us (even though we weren't hungry and we didn't ask for it) and went to the fresh market. This place is incredible, it is massive and has huge amounts of fresh produce. I had heard from the english teacher that potatoes were sold across from the smelly meat market. Sure enough, we found potatoes directly across from the pig's head sitting on a table next to (I'm assuming) the late pig's intestines. Emma took a picture to commerorate the moment.

We found the potatoes, and GARLIC, bought the two vital ingredients and went on our way to my house. Together we are quite a sight, two 5 ft 9 blonde girls on bicycles. WE rode out back to my house, past the trees, past the rice paddies and turned onto Ta-U-Ten road to find my little development of houses, 100 houses all place within 10 ft of each other with the same blue and gold iron rod gates and red roofs. The men at the exercise park waved at us as we rode past.

Once at my house we had a bit of a dilemma. What do you do with potatoes if you have no masher, oven, grater, peeler, or pot big enough to boil in? We decided on using the Wok, Margarine, garlic and salt. It worked well enough and they were fairly tasty. I even got a small cooking lesson from Emma.

Unfortunately, we could not figure out how to turn the stove on. My host parents were at a funeral and my host brother was at soldier camp. I had to go over to the next door neighbor and ask. I first got the cleaning lady who couldn't speak any english. I know the word for fire, cooking, help, friend, and many others, but I didn't know how to say stove or how. There were a lot of charades on my part trying to show a stove.

I finally got my host uncle (married to my host mother's sister--they live in the house next door). He spoke a little bit of english, but didn't understand stove. I finally convinced him to come over and show me how to work it. He asked what we were cooking.
Since we didn't know the word for potatoes we showed him. He muttered under his breath, "oh, ahan falang."

Wildlife Kingdom

Lizards, cockroaches and snails, OH MY! Yes, I see these everyday. The lizards are like little black or pink mice. They scurry around the kitchen and through the walls and ceiling. In fact, one rather large pink lizard lives in the trash bin in the kitchen. I'm sure he is friends with the cockroach that lives behind the stove. I've decided to name him AI (shy in thai). The cockroach is very shy, I turn on the light, and he scurries away. There are many cockroaches in Thailand. I just saw one climb into the printer. I tried to take a picture but my friend was too fast. The snails live on my shoes, on windows and on driveways. You can find them anywhere if you look hard enough. There arealso cobras, but I haven't seen any yet.

I have seen quite a few toads though. They come in all sizes, big at least 6 inches wide, or small, less than 2 inches wide. I even touched one in my front yard. This big mouthed frog jumped at least 5 feet away from me.

The other animals that I have seen a lot are stray dogs and cats. Neither are neutered or spayed. The males look so uncomfortable as they waddle around the school, the mall and the night market. The females have nipples that are so englarged, they touch the ground. Some looks so pathetic that you wish they could be given a home and a decent vet. But this is the third world. No such thing exists.

We do have policemen though. Many policemen. In fact, I was given a police escort this morning on my bike ride to school. He honked as I made a right turn and slowly came up behing me on his motorbike. Soon he was side by side with me trying to amek conversation. Most of it i didn't understand, but I did understand that he was asking me where I lived and where I went to schoo. He showed me his badge. I tried to answer in thai. He had seen me with Emma exercising on monday. He asked me how long I would be in thailand and how long I had ben in thailand. When we ran out of conversation he rode behind me-- THE WHOLE WAY. Apparently, blond girls need to be kept safe here. I understand, but when I pointed to my school and said goodbye, he drove off.

There is a korean soap opera witha girl who wears pants under her school uniform because she rides a bike to school. Once she gets to school she runs around trying to find a place to pull them off. That was me. I made it to my classroom just in time to pull off the exercise pants and run to roll call. While at roll call, I asked my friend Thanks what classes we had today. Since I'm not enrolled in any of the thai classes, I don't have class until the last period. It's an english biology class which might be cancelled because we have a visitor. Again. As I have mentioned to others, I never have class. Transferring credits is going to be a serious problem. Maybe I will try and sign up for private tutoring. It can't be that expensive.

I'm signing off for now, send me a letter or an e-mail if you have questions. Please be specific though, the general "How is thailand?" normally recieves a one word answer. If you want more than that, try to be creative.
Love to all,
Suzanne