As one sun sets a brighter one rises

I left Thailand but Thailand never left me. I wear my thai pants everywhere and I bite back so many “This one time in Thailand…” stories so I don’t sound like that ‘Gap Yah’ kid.

The summer of 2013 was a nice one, the soundtrack of my flashbacks consists of geckos chattering, tuk-tuks honking and monks chanting mixed with ‘Thrift Shop’ and ‘Get Lucky’. I had the time of my life counting fireflies, sheltered from a monsoon under a bamboo hut with my new friends, strangers I had met that day, laughing at each others accents and hiding from the co-ordinator whenever she came to yell at us for still being out, or being so loud (sorry Nikki… it was too much fun!).

During my time there I ate over 54 bowls of rice and had some of the most absurd, hilarious and enchanting moments- where do I start?

There’s the evening where torrential rain spontaneously burst upon the nightmarket and I, along with Trip, Aisling and Karan-my new friends found ourselves dancing with the locals until the monsoon weather stopped, an hour later and our clothes had soaked to our skin, rain leaking out of our shoes.
Or being woken up at 5am at the temple by teachers who, as it turned out, weren't joking about compulsory morning exercise for staff and pupils.
Last summer was something I laugh about a lot still. Because jumping in a waterfall in your best dress is a memory that can’t be over-replayed.

You can’t explore the world if you don’t open your front door. My experience only confirmed my initial optimism- that most people are good. The kindness shown to me- teachers giving me lifts, locals inviting us over for lunch and waitresses making note to stock my favourite cake as I told them I would return on the weekend, has made me determined that other young people should have the opportunity to experience a new culture while giving something back. So my advice to any young people reading this is to dream big, work hard and take the jump to go to far out places, because my only regret was that July had to end.

Those of you who read this blog last year will remember that while I was teaching English in Thailand my sister was doing an Internship in Washington DC (http://nikitagoestotheothersideofthepond.blogspot.co.uk/). This year…the adventure continues! It seems we will be spending the summer on different continents again, crossing over as I head over to the East Coast to teach Adventure at a summer camp and while I trace her footsteps she will continue mine, doing education and outreach work in China. (I made a cool map, above, which shows how we have crossed over!)

If you like travel journals, are thinking of being a camp counselor, here’s the blog I intend to keep while I’m over the Atlantic: http://i-like-to-be-in-america.blogspot.co.uk/

Thanks for reading guys, I feel like you've travelled with me, really. 1470 hits? Woah!

Georgia xx

This is what goodbye looks like

my scrapbooked journal: now an inch thick with travel stories

traveller bands: the yellow stolen from southern belle Lucy, the pink and yellow made for me by girls at the orphanage, the white and red, some string I found on Mod's porch and fashioned into a band

the brown books: messages from everyone at foundation. We all wrote in each others and vowed not to read them until on the plane home. They have quotes from funny happenings here, contact details and just funny things to read. There are so many beautiful and hilarious messages in those pages, testimony to my amazing and hilarious new friends!

thank you cards: from kids at my last placement: a reminder of the children, the lessons, the songs, the games...

I want to say thank you, lastly to so many people- those who started this journey with me- who sponsored me to come out here and the teachers and friends who inspired me to travel. Those who listened to this blog which now has almost 1000 views, that's so cool to see, thank you! And to the wonderful volunteers and travellers who I shared this experiences with, thank you guys. This summer has gone beyond words (coming from someone who writes a lot...). Anyone on this webpage must fall into one of those three categories, so THANK YOU ALL!

Lastly, my wish for anyone reading this page is that they travel. If you can't get on a plane this summer, get a bus and see your own hometown- go to new coffee shops, talk to strangers, get involved in local culture be it temples, theatres or bookstores nearby. Go out and see the world (well, a bit of it...)

Above 1: A quote I found on the wall in Peace Bar (Chiang Rai) and loved instantly
Above 2: Playing my favourite game- how many people can you fit round a table in Doi Chaang

 

Until next time
"Goodbye"
Georgia <3

Thai Culture

FOOD!

Not gonna lie. The thought of eating something other than rice has me excited all week long. Because there’s only so much comfort given by Oreos. So while people around me plan temples to visit and daytrips, I create menus in my head. Tonight I had a cocoa frappe (a week without dairy products made the arrival of a cream-laden chocolatley drink to my table worthy of whooping) tomato soup, fries (A CARB THAT ISN’T RICE!) and a Dragonfruit (try it) and Kiwi smoothie. I’ve literally been walking round the town making food plans for tomorrow “So breakfast can be pancakes and then it’ll be pizza for dinner…”.

On weekends we volunteers tend to gorge ourselves on western food- fries, pizza, milk, cheese, chocolate, waffles, pancakes. Obviously the rich, oily, sugariness came as a shock after a week of rice so a lot of us spend Saturday night feeling ill. But I have no regrets

This is half the volunteer group at Doi Chaang, the Asian version of Starbucks. So far I’ve had around thirty bowls of rice. Rice is good. Rice is constant. It’s the side dishes- the mushy dark green, foul looking vegetables that I’ve taken to avoiding. Ew. Hey, I tried them. My first week I tried every dish but I kept making this face, every meal. So I soon gave up.

 

PANTS!

I don't know if there's an actual name for these type of trousers but we all just call them pants. Perfect for this climate: loose fitting, pretty pattern cotton pants. We all wear pants. We all love pants. Pants! That is all.

 

SA WAT DE KA!

This is the standard Thai greeting (for girls, for guys it’s Sa Wat De Krup). You cannot buy anything at the shop, ask a question or say hello without saying SA WAT DE KA!  And wai-ing. (Smiles are also obligatory :D )

 

MOSQUITO NETS!

SQUAT TOILET!

Urgh. Not so glamorous. There’s not really much to say about squat toilets, except that they are everywhere and they are not my favourite thing.

 

MONKS!

The Monks here are just Thai men who happen to wear orange robes. They own iPhones, have tattoos and go to cafes around town.

 

SHOES!

In Asian culture it’s polite to take your shoes off before entering any temple, classroom ands some cafes.                   

 

THAI TIME!

Everything runs late. I call it “running on thai time” because if you arrange to meet up at 8.30 and show up at 9.15 you’re not considered late. Similarly, last week my first class of the day started at 9am but the school didn’t collect me until 9.15am.

Above: Chiang Rai clock tower that lights up on the hour

 SKIN WHITENING!

It's funny how at home everyone wants to be more tan and here girls lather themselves in skin whitening products...

 

STREET VENDORS!

For those brave enough (so far Emily and Sam) there is a variety of fried insects to buy and eat. That’s right. People PAY to eat bugs here. Mealworms and Crickets and other winged beetle things.

 I was quite excited about getting street food, which is world class here. Here I am, getting a dragonfruit smoothie. I think my excitement shows…

 

 

 



 

 

Pre Weekend Adventures!

Not only did we make our driver make 3 detours on the way back from placement so we could stop at the Dam, White Temple (again) and a 7/11 but we also made him camera man, shouting the one phrase that seems to transcend language barriers “PHOTO! PHOTO!” at him at each location. This is group B at the Dam.

 

Note: These photos on this blog really aren't the best. But this isn't facebook and I'm here to see the world, not for the world to see me...

We also spend a couple of hours in what I guess the closest thing a tiny village in the mountains has to a pub- a shop that sells alcohol and has bamboo mats to sit on. As Lisa noted, playing Chinese whispers with 10 different accents is hilarious.

 

On Saturday morning a group of us went to the Orphanage for a few hours just to play with the kids. It’s so cute- when the Songtao pulls up outside the building the kids (knowing the songtao is full of young adult foreigners carrying baskets with toys and games) start screaming. As soon as I got out of the songtao one girl ran over and grabbed my hand and pulled me into the building. The same thing happened to Nicole and Tom. Aww.

 

The kids were so sweet. I don’t know what I was expecting, I knew modern day orphanages aren’t like ‘Annie’ or workhouse style ‘Oliver!’ full of skinny, depressed children. It was also a great excuse to act like a kid- teaching the Hokey Pokey, making bracelets and “What’s the time Mr Wolf?” (in my lessons yesterday teaching ‘Time’ to Grade 3 we played “What’s the time Mr Snake” as I thought it was more culturally appropriate, paha.

This photo shows the gorgeous views and dust cloud experience of song tao travel (well, the romantic view. Others see it as dirt track riding down potholes without seatbelts or air conditioning…)

Open your eyes and the world will open up to you

Note: This blog is basically yesterday's journal typed up with some photos slotted in because I know people back home like to 'see' stuff. I'm having a great time, but I want this blog to be a real reflection of this experience- not all saccharine and twee. So I'll leave the stories of massages and gold temples for another blog. Here's a very different story-

"I knew I was volunteering in a third world country. But the poverty is hard to understand. I was angry at first to see skinny cats wander round the foundation. I pointed this out to Momo and she said “that’s what a cat’s supposed to look like Georgia, that’s how they look in India too; you feed them too much in England”. And I wonder which is true?

Then there’s the stories Thai staff told us about stray dogs in Chiang Rai getting driven to Vietnam and sold as meat. Wait, what? Cute fluffy stray dogs… but then I remembered horsemeat and Tesco and I wonder just how similar or different the East is from the West.

We were told in Orientation that we’ll be teaching in the poorest parts of the country. You don’t see that when the classrooms I teach in are pastel painted and decorated with children’s work and paper flowers. But the kids sleep on blankets on the floor in their homes and the nearby stream I’ve seen the hilltribe kids play, bathe and dive in is a murky brown. It could hold any number of diseases or snakes. But they are happy.

It’s hard to say what I really want to say here. It’s fascinating, for sure, this world so far from home. And weirdly, I’ve felt calm all the time I’ve been here- I’m happy to leave all my valuables in the back of a taxi for the day and trust the driver will return when we phone him, or dance in smoky clubs all night with people I met that morning.
If that’s one thing I’m learning, it’s that people are people. And however crazy it sounds, trust everyone you meet, everywhere you go; you’ll never be lost, alone or bored."

 

 

Weekend Adventures!

We get time in the evenings and weekend to do what we like. It’s fun- the girls on my last placement were English, Irish, American, Australian, New Zealand and India so dinnertimes sitting round talking about gun crime felt like a UN meeting with all our different accents. We’ve been visiting 7/11’s (like a corner shop) and stocking up on oreos and things. Oreo is now a food group in my diet.

 Visiting the White temple (Chiang Rai). It is, like it's name suggests, a white temple.

 The Night Bazaar in Chiang Rai. Here's where I bought some pants we all wear out here and it's full of Asian food to try (Sam, Lisa and I got some deep fried banana. You should try it)

 Lilly and I out in Chaing Mai (everyone went out to celebrate Kate's 20th birthday). I didn't know the cocktail matched my dress until it came over. Cute!

We stayed out until 3am. I told Kate in Britain it's still technically her birthday so we should keep celebrating. So we all (Josh, Tom, Alex, Martin, Lauren, Kate, Lucy, Laura, Arthur and I've forgotten a name...) went to nightclubs and rain dances in the street.

 10 of us in a songtao (pronounced song-toe). You can also have two people hang off the back on rails. There's no safety standards in Asia.

 

Behold: This weekend's hostel. It costs 400baht for two nights (almost £9! And it's gorgeous!)

My Senior Prom Night

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytBR7ET_6uU

Tonight, back in England it's my senior Prom.
The story Facebook shows is of girls in pretty dresses and boys in tuxes sitting in a decorated room.
I'm on a bamboo platform hut, totally exposed to the elements in rural east Asia. It's Tom, Andy, Sam, Jake and I. The conversation alternates from sociology and cultural politics to the stuff you would expect teenagers to speak about.

But tonight's incredible. So much more so than Prom could ever have been. Ever. Last week, these guys were strangers, tonight the only thing louder than the laughter is the rain- it's a monsoon. Torrential, deafening, but not cold, heaving streaming, pouring, like you've never seen it rain. So we sit for a few hours, until gone midnight on this platform. Listening to crickets. Watching fireflies.

I've never seen a firefly before.