Are you listening, Sony?

I've had a bit of a cold this week, which is never fun and is particularly not fun when one doesn't have one's mommy there to bring home ice cream and parmesan goldfish and trashy magazines. It's not like getting up at 6:45 is EVER a good thing, but it is not helped by a stopped-up nose and lack of speaking voice. Teaching is also made a good bit more difficult when one lacks speaking ability.

Graeme, my partner in crime hereabouts, thinks I'm just overtired because I've been working twelve-hour days. I think the excess of intoxicating substances this weekend probably didn't help. Either way, my evening class meets for the last time tonight, which means when I finish school at 3:30 I'm really and truly DONE for the day. Which even I can't complain about, although I'm sure I will find a way.

I'm settling into the routine here, which is HARD. A routine of hardness. I'm hoping it gets easier, especially as Graeme is going to move on sometime in the next month or two and I don't know WHAT I'm going to do without someone to listen to me bitch and moan while we watch pirated British comedy and drink too much whiskey and Coke. NOT that I'm advocating piracy. It's BAD. Whiskey and Coke with someone who will listen to you bitch and moan and thinks your dog is adorable, now that is GOOD. Especially if that someone has an adorable northern British accent.

No Wonder I Like It Here So Much

I always turn on BBC in the morning, not because I'm at all interested in world events (my my, ANOTHER car bomb in Baghdad. How scintillating.) but because who doesn't like a little British accent with their corn flakes? (Okay, okay, warm Sprite and Pringles. Lay off it, I'll get healthy next week.)

This morning, though, the news put me in a really bad mood. It took me nearly until noon to figure out why. Nothing PARTICULARLY bad had happened. Why had the usually interesting and somewhat innocuous morning BBC broadcast left such a bad taste in my mouth?

IT WAS BECAUSE I HAD TO LOOK AT GEORGE W. STUPIDHEAD!! I haven't had so much as a glimpse of that detested man for a month AND THEN THEY SPRUNG HIM ON ME AT 7 AM!!!! That's just cruel and unusual.

But that's what weekends are for!

We are talking CRAZY CRAZINESS this weekend. PREPARE FOR MUCH ABUSING OF THE CAPS LOCK.

I won't go into the dirty details, not because this a family blog but because my mother AND my father read it. Honestly, IT WAS THAT KIND OF WEEKEND.

Highlights include a 3 am motorcycle ride, several smashed whiskey bottles, an in-depth conversation about illegal acts with a Thai policeman, a drug dealer with a ponytail, lipstick messages on people's cars, and a really bad make-out episode. (I'm sorry, dude, but it is totally relevant to the story. Just be glad I didn't mention your name.)

Oh, AND THE WORST HANGOVER I HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED. And I have been to Amsterdam AND Oktoberfest.

Let's just put it this way; I did not behave in a manner befitting a teacher of innocent little children.

Hump THIS

Anyone who knows me knows I have a serious aversion to working. 9-to-5 (or in the case of this week and next week, 8-to-8) has never been my style. I don't have that kind of staying power.

So I've decided to invent side-effect-free crack. Admittedly, I'm no chemist and so maybe this is a way off, but I need an injectable, smokeable, or pill-formable substance that is going to give me unlimited amounts of energy, ambition, and drive, without the brain damage, ulcers, liver damage, etc, and I need it NOW.

Getting myself out of bed to go to school this morning, on this, only my THIRD day of working full time, was quite possibly the HARDEST THING I HAVE EVER DONE. I'm only exaggerating a tiny bit when I say it took nearly forty minutes to shame myself out of calling in sick/injured/tired/crazy. Because I'm an Adult, and I have Responsibilities, and I Need To Be Mature, and anyway it was too early in the morning for me to think of a truly plausible excuse.

Of course, it's not just the getting out of bed. If I had to get out of bed at 6:30 am to, say, go to the beach, I'm sure I would moan and groan a bit but I certainly wouldn't seriously consider telling someone I sprained my toe. (Speaking of which, is it possible to sprain your toe? Because if it is, I totally have.) But KIDS? Who don't speak English? Teaching 5th graders who may or may not give a rat's ass about hearing what you have to say, and if they do care it's only because they've never seen a farang woman up close before, IS NOT ANYTHING LIKE GOING TO THE BEACH.

Teachuuuhhh is wary byuteefull

Welp, I've begun teaching children. Little whippersnappers. No, just kidding, they're cute as hell. It's harder than teaching adults, a lot harder, but in some ways I like it better. They're so easily impressed, and they have enormous amounts of fun just, like, coloring. You can make them laugh hysterically by simply drawing a purple cow, or something. They're also very fond of the phrase "Teacher is very beautiful" which I know is just a sign of limited English but never fails to bring a smile of true pleasure to my face.

Surprisingly (or maybe not), kids are the best at saying my name (although they prefer "Teachuuuhhhh!"). With adults it's hit or miss. They sort of roll the L into an R and swallow the middle part. Imagine someone saying Roarah and gargling at the same time, and you've got my Thai name. It's not as bad as Graeme's though. They've got real trouble with that one. It mostly sounds like someone is shoving a cockroach down their throats.

It's hard work right now, mainly because I've also got an evening class of adults so I'm working from 8 am to 8 pm, but that class will end next week and then it'll get a lot easier. It's tiring and they are quite fond of the sink-or-swim approach. Either that or they get some kind of evil pleasure seeing a look of total panic and confusion cross my face.

It's cooled down quite a bit, as winter sets in. Of course, "winter" only means "just cool enough that you can walk ten feet or so before you start to sweat." I don't know how (or, honestly, if) I will make it through the summer.

P.S. This is my 80th post on this website. That's either an important milestone or a sign that my social life is in grave danger, and has been for awhile.

Team America: Rayong Division

Yay for America!! I know I wouldn't normally say such a thing, as a good Bush-hating liberal, but right now I'm feeling very pro-America. There's a new kid on the block, another American girl called Kristin, and it's LO-VER-LY. It's great having another female around, and one who understands the way an American mind works, which, I've discovered, is very different from the mind of, say, a Britisher. Although the poor thing is set to start tomorrow and she only just got to Rayong this afternoon. And she'd only been in Bangkok 3 days. She's got to be reeling, and you can just bet your booties I am enjoying the role of wise teacher, educating her in the very foreign ways of Rayong and Thailand in general. I think Graeme isn't at his happiest, feeling a bit neglected, but he can just stuff it. We're attached at the hip normally, it's nice to have someone female to hang out with.

I've decided to give in and get a cell phone here. I really need one, and I'm kicking myself that I didn't bring the one I had. Once I've got it organized, I can send and receive text messages for pretty cheap, and phone calls too. One will just have to get an internatinal calling card and locate the five or so minutes in each day that we'll both be awake, and presto chango! I'll be able to chat on the phone. I'm dyyyyiinnnnnngg to talk to home. Sid especially.

Here's Something That Will Just Blow Your Freaking Mind, Dude!

Stick this in your lip and chaw on it for awhile-- It is only by pure, dumb, blind and random LUCK that we are healthy, happy, comfortable Americans and not gangly Thais with rotting teeth living in shacks made of corrugated metal in a ditch by the side of the road, subsisting on the few pennies we get by catching fish to be made into ban plo.

LUCK, THAT IS ALL IT IS. PURE STUPID LUCK.

Samet day, different shit

Hello all, sorry for the long delay. Graeme and Bill and I decided, spur of the moment, to go to Ko Samet for Sunday and Monday. It was HEAVENLY. Mom and Jack, whilst deciding which foreign-based child to visit, take note; white sand beaches, clear water, sun 24-7, cheap fresh delicious seafood AND I spent a grand total of $55. The entire weekend. That includes the ferry, lodging, food, EVERYTHING. There weren't a lot of farangs there, mostly Thais from Bangkok down for the weekend and Japanese on vacation, but still more white faces than I see in a typical week. On Sunday night we found this restaurant. . .I don't know if I can put the wonderfulness into words, but I will try. Picture low wooden tables , with cushions to sit on, on the actual sand. Yards from the water, which is waveless but makes that incomparable ocean noise. The only light is candles and torches, and it's about 80 degrees at 8 pm. For 300 baht (about $6) you get a heaping plate of fresh seafood. Clams, crab, enormous prawns, a tuna steak, squid, mussels, and a uniquely Thai thing like a miniature lobster. HEAPING. Plus all the beer you can drink and soft Thai music. THIS IS WHAT LIFE SHOULD BE, PEOPLE.

Coming in a close second for most excellent moment of the weekend was on Sunday afternoon, when all three of us (yes, even the boys) got pedicures on the beach. Life does not get much better than sitting in a lounge chair on a sunny white-sand beach, drinking a cold beer and getting a pedicure. I can tell there will be many more weekend Ko Samet excursions.

I was a bit under the weather yesterday. Slept through the entire day, which I haven't done in a long time. I think it was just too much sun, too much heat. If I ever get skin cancer (knock on wood), I will be able to trace it to this weekend.

Today is chore day, I've arbitrarily decided. Laundry, cleaning of the room, grocery shopping. Things that I was disappointed to discover have to be done, even in Thailand. I've adjusted really well, I think. I feel almost at home here, so it's somewhat of a shock to realize I've only been in this country for two weeks! Seems much longer.

And my Thai vocabulary is growing every day. I'll leave you with this; sue-ai! (That's my Roman alphabet equivalent of something I can say but not yet spell.)

In other words, you're beautiful!

Exhorbitant? Exorbitent? Exhorbetant?

Today I had one of those awesome days that starts out like crap. So you're dreading it, going "Great, this is going to be a shitty day because it started out like shit and those sort of days always continue to be shit." And then it turns out to be a great day and it's like a bonus, that it's a great day and that it's a great day that you thought would be shit.

One of the ECC girls, Lek, called me this morning at 9:30 and asked me to fill-in for a private lesson today at 1. I'm embarrassed to admit, but I'm sure you're not surprised to hear, that I was asleep at this particular moment. So I was all foggy and thinking I might still be in the dream I was having about a religion based around unicorns, and couldn't think of an excuse not to. So I said I would. And then I was like, shit. I was going to go on a long walk this morning and clean my bathroom and get some bug spray for the trail of microscopic ants leading from my similarly microscopic balcony to the trash can wherein reside two empy Sprite cans. Now I have to prepare a two-hour long lesson for a Basic-level student, which means she knows about as much English as those ants. And I don't know what the regular teacher has been teaching, so I just have to hope he's been following the book, which he probably hasn't just like I haven't been, because the book is crap.

But then things went uphill. The motorbike taxi dude tried to charge me 40 baht for what is a 30 baht ride AT MOST, and I had the cojones to say "mai, mai" and give him 30. He accepted 30 meekly and drove of, probably thinking "Wow, I sure picked the wrong farang to mess with today!" Either that or "Cheap farang bitch."

And the private lesson wasn't bad because the teacher HAD been following the book, and the girl was smart as a whip, so it was a relative breeze. I came out of that lesson at 3, and Fao told me my regular lesson (which was to have featured 3 new students of unknown abilities tonight, a fact I found out yesterday at 4:30) was canceled. A free evening! No icily air-conditioned, dead silent drive home! No lesson plan to arduously prepare!!

So I did the only thing a California girl could. I went shopping.

Just to Tesco, and I only bought a bath mat, some hangers, an alarm clock and a bit of food, but still. More shopping than I've done in a while. Exciting. And it was (again, relatively) cool this afternoon, threatening rain, so I walked back to my hotel quite comfortably with grandiose plans of redecoration. Some chicken fried rice (delicious, if a little heavy on the onion), and now Graeme and I are at an internet cafe where you get 35 minutes for 10 baht. Ten baht is about a quarter. That's awesome.

Don't know what we're going to do tonight, but I'm in such a sunny mood it doesn't really matter.

Oh, AND I found another English station on my t.v. That makes 5 English channels, which I positively exhorbitant. Is that how you spell it?

Yuck, feel like crud today. Tired and weak and my hands are doing that overly-caffeinated shakey thing. Of course Bill (a fellow American teaching here, a Seattlite actually) is needling me about it being bird flu, which I know it isn't. But unamused regardless. The last thing I need is to get sick! Today I went to get a physical, required to get my teacher's license and work permit. It was perhaps the most perfunctory examination I've ever encountered. Not that I'm complaining. But it took all of five minutes and involved nothing more complicated than a stethoscope, so I can't help feeling that it would be almost impossible to fail. And I have to admit, there's a lazy little part of my brain that wishes I'd failed. "Maybe I've got a heart murmur!" says my little brain-part when he doctor lingers over checking my heart rate. Because then I could go home where it's easy and cool, without feeling like I'd given up or given in. Because I could never dream of throwing in the towel* at this early stage. I've hardly given in a chance, and I know it'll get easier. But if it wasn't my fault. . . . Not a productive way to think, really. And I like teaching, I really do. I'm just feeling lonely and more than a little overwhelmed, etc.

Great, this blog is supposed to be funny and I've turned it in to slop. Sorry. More funny Thai anecdotes to come.

*I learned the origin of "throw in the towel" today. Apparently, if a trainer or manager felt that a boxer was taking too much of a beating and wanted to withdraw him from the match, the trainer would throw a towel into the ring to alert the referee. Interesting, huh?

No, it's not ping-pong road. . . .

The only serious problem I've discovered so far is that this place is somewhat boring. Bangkok was awful- sweaty and smelly and crowded and very, very dirty. But at least a lot of people spoke English and there were other farangs around, so you could go out at night or go shopping or sightseeing, etc. Rayong, not so much. There's the beach and there are a few okay bars around- including one that shows English soccer games, specifically ones in which Newcastle United is playing, which is a necessity of life to my British friend Graeme- but they get a bit repetitive if you can't meet anyone new. We're tired of beer and guessing at the menus and listening to Thai bands attempt to cover American classics.

Yesterday Graeme and I went to the beach and enjoyed freak-show status. They're much too shy here to wear regular western-style bathing suits- even the guys often go in the water with shirts and pants on. (Seems pretty funny for a country with a huge sex industry- which, by the way Kelly, is based on Patpong Road in Bangkok, so you were mostly right.) G and I attracted celebrity-style attention- including people asking to take their pictures with us!! The kids especially seem absolutely fascinated by us, asking our names over and over since they know little other English. Graeme conducted a class on the finer points of the Newcastle Untd. defense, in the water, with a bunch of awe-struck little buggers. One of the funnier things I've seen in a while.

I've taken some pictures, but I can't seem to locate my camera cord to load them on to a computer. If I find it or get a new one or whatever, I will let you all know.

I still trip out on the fact that I live in Thailand. I mean, Thailand.

Necessities of life; beer, water, air conditioning

Hey everyone! Found an internet cafe (somewhat) near my apartment, so I don't have to go all the way to the ECC office for internet. The office is about 10 minutes away by motorcycle taxi, which is the main way of getting around Rayong. Scary, but it gets you where you're going with a minimum of sweat.

Got over my homesickness of the other day with some nice 7% alcohol Thai beer. Feeling much better. Taught my second class last night, which was considerably easier than the first one. I'll just have this one class, which is three very low-level grown men 6-8 every night, until the school year starts which is in ten days or two weeks. Nobody seems very sure, and so I just go with the flow. Then I'll be teaching in a school from 8:30 to 3:30 every weekday, with weekends off. I'm feeling okay about teaching. Nobody seems to have very high expectations, and there are lots of people to ask for help. It's kind of fun, even, to know stuff that other people are so desperate to learn. This area is very, very poor, so I feel like I'm doing some good, as well. Nearly all of the residents of Rayong are Thai- a farang, or foreigner, attracts some attention. It's an industrial and service kind of area, with a lot of residents commuting to Pattaya or Ko Samet or Ban Phe to work in the big resorts with lots of westerners. Opens your eyes.

And it is bloody hot, as my new English friend Graeme would say.

I live in a hotel/apartment complex thing, arranged by ECC. It's basically just a bed and a bathroom with a fridge and a closet and a tiny balcony, but it'll do. It's only 5000 baht a month, which is about $115. And it's clean and centrally located and has air conditioning, so I've got everything I need.

Culture shock seems like an understatement. Thai customs and culture, especially once you get out of Bangkok, are EXTREMELY foreign. They avoid confrontation or disagreement at all costs. I mean, ALL COSTS. An ECC advisor called Tely told me she's heard of people being fired but not being told about it. Nobody wants to cause anyone else to lose face, so they'll go out of their way to agree with you. Sounds nice, but really it can cause problems to have a taxi driver smile and nod when you tell him where you want to go, but not really know how to get there. You get the idea. I've picked up a few words as well, thank you and hello obviously, but also delicious and the name of this yummy spicy soup I had for lunch the other day, etc. Food is a big hurdle because everything is fucking spicy, pardon my bad language but that's really the only word to use. I'm adjusting, though, and that is what's important.

Miss everyone very much, but I'm making friends and it's not so bad.