Emily Takes On Thailand

It's 5 am and I'm wide awake.  Could be from the jet lag from Saturday's flight, or just the unanswered questions building up in my head. Probably both. Mavet and I only go outside to walk Callie, and the streets of Baltimore are practically empty. Apart from the occasional passerby who bows their head and puts space between you both, it's a ghost town.  With a slight skid and a thud, the plane landed at Dulles airport, and I expected to feel something: Relief to be on home soil, sadness to be pulled from site, anxiety to get through customs and grab my luggage, anger that there was no time to catch my breath.  I thought I would feel a wave of happiness when my mom bounced out of the car to embrace me after not seeing each other for 15 months. I thought I would be shocked to see Mavet and Patrick-the friends who are letting me quarantine with them-at the realization of how much they've changed. I thought I would relish in that first bite of frenc...

Yes, you read correctly. No, Paw Aw, they were not flies. No, host mother, they were not oversized moths will a strangely organized system of government. I was swiftly jogging back to my house, running late for dinner with my host family. Change out of your uniform, go pee, grab the bike, and go. I pull open my heavy rusted garage door and run inside, only to be greeted by a noise. A low whirring noise. I walk to the bathroom, open the door, and see the wall completely covered black. By bees?! Yes, world. By bees. In the six hours I had been away from home, bees flew in through the air slats in my bathroom and created a nest that attracted at least 500 bees. Now my response to this horrific scene is proof that I have been a PCV for 13 months. Old Emily would have screamed or fainted or called her mother to fix it. This Emily said-in fact I think her exact words were- "OOF!" I called my landlord, and together (or sort of together, I mainly just watched in ama...

2019  ---->                                                        2020 New Years Day. I stepped off the plane and wearily made my way off of the plane from Chiang Mai. I hadn't slept at all the night before, due to the New Year's Eve festivities, and was eager to return to my own bed. But I still had a ways to go: from Bangkok, a four hour bus ride, followed by a half hour van ride, followed by a twenty minute taxi ride with a cranky driver was between me and rest. Out of the boarding bridge, the vast windows of Suvarnabhumi airport reveal its geometric garden planted just outside. Its bushes grow in the shape of lotuses, its grass trimmed in a lighter kelly green. It is encircled by the shark-fin arches of the terminal. It's sort of an ironic sight: amidst the chaos of angry metal, flight delays, and crying babies, the garden...

"You look sad," Oh said, rather matter of factly, when she walked up to me at assembly this morning. She explained in great detail how sunken in my eyes were, and that my skin seemed more irritated than it usually was. Since daily reports on my physical appearance is something I'm used to, I responded by sticking my tongue out and scrunching up my nose. She laughed and walked away. I wasn't sad. But I guess I wasn't not sad.  This is officially our third week being back to school since our month long break in October. I spent it with the very best buddies a girl could ask for in Krabi (Southern province in Thailand) and Cambodia (not a country in Africa, weird white lady I only knew for ten minutes). This was the longest time I had spent with my fellow Peace Corps volunteers since training, and it was a break I really needed. We caught up, hugged a lot, drank with complete professionalism, and pretended not to have a care in the world.  Of course, there wer...

After next week, my first semester at Ban Huaymongkol will officially come to a close. The constant fury of lesson planning, staff meetings, and school events are going to come to a halt (mostly) for the month of October. My students will take their English final exam, then be on their way to ride their bikes or play soccer from sun up to sun down. I wrote the letter you are about to read knowing that they would probably never see it, and even if they did they probably would not know what it meant. But it still felt important to put into words. I think it encompasses my experiences of my first semester fairly well so I wanted to share it on this blog: Dear Students,  I am writing you from my living room couch the night before your final exams begin. You're almost done! Another semester has come and gone. I know you're relieved and ready for a break, just as much as your teachers are.  I will confess something to all of you: when I first started thinking about you...

If you regularly check up on this blog, you know this experience has been a lot of things for me: overwhelming, exciting, inspiring, exhausting. These past (almost) 8 months have shaped me in ways I could not have imagined, and have done so in the most surprising ways. But there is one aspect of my time here that I have not put into words yet, and I would like to do so now: "Emily, our meeting is cancelled today. We have to practice for the staff potato sack race." These exact words were spoken to me not but four hours ago, with the utmost sincerity and no smile to accompany it. My counterpart could see I was headed to her office to set up for our usual afternoon co-planning session and thought she would spare me the walk. Nice of her, really, considering the absurd amount of flashcards sprawled in my hands and sweat trickling down into my butt crack. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see it had already begun. Teachers, most of whom I have never seen without a ful...

I sit across the table from my two counterparts, both waiting for me to begin. I close my eyes to organize my thoughts. This is the first meeting the three of us have had since the Reconnect conference, where we sharpened our skills as volunteers and gained new ideas to use in the classroom. My toolbelt had been completely refurbished, and now was the time to show it to my fellow builders. After being with other farangs for the past two and a half weeks, my instinct was to talk about all the new adjustments to be made at 90 mph English. I knew- or was pretty sure I knew- what we as a team should begin focusing on. I wanted to get it all out in one breath while I still had the guts to say it at all. But as I sat across from them, I hesitated, pressing my thumb into my palm. I needed to reset myself. I wasn't shooting the shit with peers over beers anymore. I was home. It was time to get back to work. As I briefly summarized in my last post, most of Reconnect in Prathum Than...

Tomorrow I will return back to site after a two week conference with my cohort. For so many reasons, it was what I needed. I was given so much useful information about my job, my counterpart and I bonded even more than we already have, and my friends gave me the "American getaway" that truly re-energized me.  This conference was also challenging for me. I started asking myself questions about what it means to be here, if I'm really meant for this job, and how I will cope with the overwhelming responsibilities that await me when I arrive back at site.  I think all moments, the rejuvenating and the difficult, were moments that I needed for perspective. I don't have to be here. I heard that thought more times than I ever have this week, both in my head and spoken to me. It cuts me deep, that thought, because it's true.  But it's also something I refuse to give into. Regardless of the hardships, this is what I am meant to be doing. There are pea...

I want to tell you about Oh. Well, Pi Oh, as I call her. I have mentioned Pi Oh in my blog posts before, but only in passing. And considering what I want to share with you now, that fact is ridiculous. Pi Oh is my coteacher. She has been working at Ban HuayMongkol for 6 years, where she teaches English and Art. She grew up in a neighboring town called Sam Roi Yot, where the mountains were her backyard. Together, we go and visit often, since the only thing she is more passionate about than teaching is her family. She loves drawing, playing with her 4 adorable nieces, and walking her dogs. At the extremely young age of 31, Pi Oh was recently promoted to Head of Teaching staff at our school. To-poorly- summarize, the Head of Teaching staff is responsible for ensuring teacher’s paperwork is completed on time and correctly, and relays to teachers any information that the Principal or Supervisor gives her. Needless to say, the job is exhausting, and the job is thankles...

Ban Huaymongkol School opened in the rural outskirts of Hua Hin in 2514 (1971 in farang years). It is roughly 4 acres large, and on them sit bright red academic buildings, quiet teacher dormitories, and a large soccer field with real, plush grass. From it you can see the Huaymongkol temple, where   Luang Paw Tuad's black marbled, tired body sits criss-cross and smirks at tourists walking by. The school is home to 350 students, donned in red and black uniforms (the school colors) with brown tennis shoes that you can usually find kicked off and splayed , somewhat chaotically, outside a busy classroom. It is home to 22 teachers, 7 of whom stay on campus during the semester. It is home to a passionate, driven, young principal ( Paw Aw).  It is home to three cats, Fried Egg, Black Egg, and Egg Boy, and roughly 7 stray dogs, whose names are unknown. And as of about three weeks ago, it is home to me: Emily, aka Kru Chunpoo, aaka Kru Emily, aaaka Teacher, aaaaka Kru Emiloosh (...

I'm sitting on the floor of my new house, next to an empty box of ritz crackers, a bottle of Chang, and a pink fan. There it is, right above me. I'm sure you needed proof. I've been struggling to find the words to write lately, mostly because every day is a different emotional experience. Tonight, it's momentary relief. I'm alone (apart from the toad in my bathroom, but we've already talked out an agreement), I'm not-really-sweating, and I feel like today, I accomplished something. Do you ever just need that feeling sometimes? Like for the past couple of weeks you've just gotten out of bed, gone to the office, stared at your computer mindlessly, and gone back home, knowing you're going to do the same exact thing the next day. It becomes this monotonous routine until suddenly something inside you wakes up and says GET IT TOGETHER, and you do. I suppose my lack of motivation is due to fear. The kids come back to school next week, and I don...

Growing up, my family and I would drive up to Boston to see our relatives every year. I remember never being able to sleep the night before, so excited to see everyone again. My sister and I are two of eleven cousins, so you can imagine that this annual one week trip was absolute, joyful chaos. Nothing but swimming, snacking, and laughing until the sun went down, only to rinse and repeat the next day. I've been thinking of these summer days more frequently since moving in with my site host family. My host mom is one of six siblings, and together they have a total of -ironically- eleven kids. They all come to my Yai's noodle restaurant (nextdoor to us) for dinner every night, which means every night it's a party. It's fun to watch: the older cousins play dominoes at the small marble table, the younger cousins run around out front blowing bubbles, and the adults sit on various benches and chairs eating and talking about their days. I understand roughly thirty percent...

I have officially been at site for two weeks. Before we packed our bags, our trainers in Don Chedi told us "you'll have so much down time when you get to site. It's bid term there so you can kick back and relax a bit!" I think they were right, if you exclude the two day exam conference, graduation ceremony, staff dinner parties which you're given thirty minutes prior notice for and told to "go shower!" and the usual demand to play "hospital" with my crazy (but perfect) little host sisters. All joking aside, having a jam packed schedule has been essential for my integration here. I can feel my counterparts and I getting more comfortable with each other (last night she said "I'm gonna miss you when you leave" and I told her she literally has two years before she has to worry about that). My host family cracks jokes with me more, the students who play volleyball ask me to join, even the stray dogs know I'm probably gonna ...

Part 3: Hua Hin The van ride to Hua Hin was brief, only four hours. But my mind raced the entire time. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. All of my friends were gone, my family was gone, it was just me now. What was the school going to look like? What was my new host family going to think of me? Did I just spill iced coffee on my shirt? My co-teacher was sitting next to me, and my principal was in the front seat. Both had been incredibly warm to me in the past three days during the counterpart conference. They were visibly nervous, but I'm sure I was too. We made light chit chat along the way, and eventually became more and more comfortable with each other. Eventually, farms turned into mountains, and mountains soared above the water. The closer we got, the more beautiful it became. I thought "there is no way this is going to be my home." Then suddenly, my co-teacher (Cru Tok), said "we're here." I looked up to see the most stunning templ...

Okay, so it's been a while since I've posted, but I JUST MOVED TO SITE, and I don't want to leave out a single detail of what it's taken to get here, so I'll break it down into three parts... Part 1: Site Reveal It was Tuesday afternoon, everyone had just walked (more like jogged) back from lunch. We sat down on the benches that lined the walkway of the Don Chedi school, since they would not let us inside the meeting room. I swung my legs over the bench so I was turned away from the crowd. Behind me, I could hear people chatting excitedly: "Oh my gosh, is this really happening?" "I should not have eaten that much pineapple at lunch, I'm nauseous now," "Is that sweat going down my back, or just a bug?" I sat there watching some water trickle down a leaf right in front of my face, and thought Well, it's now or never I guess. Then, the doors opened. The country director smiled and shouted "Are you ready to find out ...

Part 2: Saying Goodbye I biked home as fast as my legs could take me to tell my host family the site I had been given. My phone was blowing up with texts from them: "Do you know where you are going yet?!" "Tell us where you are going!!" "When are you coming home?!" When I finally got there, Bua raced up to greet me as she always did. I jumped off my bike to give her a hug, and ran into the house. I called out "Hellloooo! I'm home!" No one answered. I quickly realized the only one home was Paw. He and I were probably the least close out of everyone in the family, but I still could not wait to tell him. I went to the back yard to greet him as he watered the plants. I said "Di chan ja bpai tii Hua Hin!" (I am going to Hua Hin!). The often stoic man smiled, something that only happened now and then, and exclaimed in English: "Ah! The beach!" Soon after that, the rest of the family came home from the market. Meeh (Mom...