Fun lead up to Christmas
On Monday I was scheduled to spend the day at a school for children with learning difficulties (down syndrome, autism etc). Myself and two other volunteers got dropped off at the local petrol station where teachers from the school we were teaching were to pick us up and drive us. We've been told that Thai people are either very early or extremely late, and after two hours of waiting for a teacher to turn up, we got a phone call saying that school had been cancelled because of an election of some sorts. None of us really understood what that meant, but it did mean that we didn't get a chance to teach that day which was a shame. Instead when we came back, we helped sort out a LOT of second hand clothing to send out to the local hill tribes as its getting extremely cold here at night. Also that afternoon I had a go at making mud bricks for some of the construction projects the organisation are working on. I think if I can't make a career out of teaching, construction work is right up my alley!! (No need to laugh, I was being extremely sarcastic!) It was surprisingly interesting and pretty tiring work, but we made a lot of bricks that afternoon and a cold shower was the best remedy for a hard afternoon!
On Tuesday morning I went to spend some time at the local village of Baan Jalae and help out in the local child care centre. There were about 20 kids and they were really well behaved. It's good fun teaching the little kids between 3 and 5; we sung some great classic tunes like 10 little fingers, old mcdonald, jingle bells. Then we just spent the morning colouring in fish, then we played their favorite game: whats the time mr. wolf? They went crazy, it's a real hit! That afternoon I spent some time at the Chiang Rai public hospital. Our aim at the hospital is to spend about three hours with the kids who are there for a really long time (around 3 - 6 months) and just take their mind off their treatments etc. We brought along a big craft box and just coloured in, played ten pin bowling and had a good laugh! It was really sad seeing these kids so sick but their enthusiasm and big, warm smiles honestly really touched me.
There are about 10 or so women who make authentic goods like scarves, braclets, clay figurines that are in the style of the local hill tribes. You can purchase some of these goods online (but the website is in thai!). I spent Wednesday morning teaching these women really basic english like the alphabet, how to write the letters and some basic phonics. On Wednesday night there was a big big farewell party for a few of the Thai interns who had been working at Chiang Rai for about 3 - 4 months. It was a great excuse to eat some really good fun, have a few beers and have a good laugh! There was a karaoke machine and a group of about four of us kept getting asked to sing. We agreed to sing after we had a beer under our belt which certainly helped! We did a great injustice to some songs like Bohemian Rhapsody, Stayin' Alive and Have you ever seen the rain? We still keep getting asked to sing Staying Alive at any given time and for some odd reason, we keep saying no..
On Thursday morning, myself and two others went to go spend the morning at another child care centre and play with the children there. We learnt all about fruit and they seemed to understand it which was good. Once we started colouring in they went crazy and were quite hard to control - no wonder why the other volunteers wished me luck when going there for the first time! On Thursday night I went out for dinner with myself and the two other volunteers from Antipodeans Abroad with our in country agent. We went to Paul's house just to catch up and have a quick lesson in the basics of thai with his wife which was great. We went out for dinner to a local restaurant which was off the main streets of the city and it was so good! We had some great authentic thai seafood, twas delish!
This afternoon I'm off to explore the city of Chiang Mai (a three hour bus ride south of Chiang Rai) to explore some ancient ruins, temples and enjoy the night markets and local cuisine!
I'm still not sure what we're up to for Christmas and NYE. I think we have to teach on Christmas Day and then we celebrate an early NYE with all of the staff herer on the 29th. We start preparing for the party on the 27th or 28th at some crazy time like 2am for some odd reason - it's all a big vague at the moment! I might be going to Bangkok with another Aussie volunteer during this time as well, decisions decisions!!
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