First Days in Thailand

I arrived in Thailand on Sunday, after 27 hours of travel, safe and sound. In case you didn't know, Singapore has given given those moving walkways in airports their proper (and awesome!) name. After the drive from the Phuket airport to Bangsak I started to settle into my new home. Today will be my fifth day in Thailand and so far I am sweaty pretty much all the time but very happy. It is at least 30 degrees C (~80 degree F) with 60%+ humidity everyday despite being “the rainy season.” I looked for Bangsak in my Lonely Planet guide and since the ‘town’ is not in the book, I think it’s safe to say I’m in the-middle-of-no-where Thailand. I think I will like this much better than living in a tourist hot-spot though.

I live right on the main road though, so I will be able to catch the bus to any of the surrounding cities that are on the map such as Krabi, Phangnga, and Phuket. The bungalow that will be my home for at least the next nine months is pretty cozy and my commute to work is about 5 minutes tops.

So far I have spent some time on the beautiful beach across the road from my Bungalow, eaten some delicious but really spicy (the authentic version is much hotter than the Americanized…) Thai food at a local joint, gotten acquainted with the giant spider that lives in my bathroom but only comes out at night, and bought some of the most amazing fruit at a market in a nearby town.

I started teaching classes on Monday as well. An interesting thing about Thai schools is that the students have a classroom by grade level and the teachers move from class to class instead of the students. I also found out that I will only rarely be teaching a class on my own. For the majority of my classes I am paired with a Thai teacher during the English lessons so that they can explain the difficult things such as grammar rules and I work with the students mostly on pronunciation. I am teaching what would be the equivalent of the 4th, 5th 6th, 8th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grades. I will also be tutoring older students to improve their reading, writing, and speaking skills. The students are so full of energy, very friendly, and all around hilarious.