Last Saturday, I went with a group to JJ's Market. It is essentially a huge bazaar where you can find pretty much anything you want. It's divided into sections, each of which would take about half a day to go through. I was on a mission to get some seating cushions for my class, so I wandered through the home decor section with my friends, Steve and Andrea. They were hunting for things to decorate their apartment, and ended up with some pretty cool things. My favorite was a flower display that had fiber optics and could light up. It was very elegant and cool looking, and stands about 3-4 feet high. As for me, I got some really cool hair clips, a bedspread, and 10 cushions for my classroom. I also got to test out my rusty bartering skills. I was able to get the ten cushions for 1350 bhat, making them around $40 total, or $4 each. Incredible. I also learned that it is much more enjoyable to barter with someone when you can communicate verbally. Bartering with a calculator just stops any sense of give and take and makes the process cold and mechanical.
Another item that i purchased at JJs was a Thai skirt. This was very important, because my school has a dress code, and every Thursday is 'Thai day' which means dress in Thai clothing or a white button-up shirt. I was a bit nervous about finding something that would fit me, but I was able to find an adjustable skirt that was very pretty.
After the shopping spree on Sunday, I spent the next several days finishing my room and working on curricula. Unfortunately, there was only so much work that I could do before seeing where my students were in terms of ability. One cool thing about the school, though, is that they keep the lesson plans from previous years to build upon for the next teacher. Some plans were more helpful than others, but they were great at giving me a starting point. This was especially appreciated as the school is small enough that I am the only 2nd grade teacher.
Thursday was my first day of school. It started off a bit rocky, but it all turned out alright in the end. For starters, I began my day 30 min early on accident. The schedule is set up so that I do CAS (Content Area Support) for the half hour before school with students identified as having difficulty during the previous year. This was not to start until Monday, but me being me, I became slightly scatterbrained when the bell rang and students began entering the classroom. By the time I looked at the clock and realized how early we were, I already had a handful of students, so I just went with it. We played a lot of icebreaker games and got to know each other. I am so grateful that I had a ball ready to pass around!
If you were not aware, Thai people do not use their first names as a form of public identification. Everyone has a nickname that they use. This is helpful, as many of their names would be incredibly difficult for me to pronounce, much less remember! Some of the names are western, such as Naomi, and William, whereas others are quite eastern, such as Ton Gla and Toey. Then there are the fanciful names, like Music, Bam, and Ice. One girl is named Fafa, which of course makes me think of the Flight of the Conchords song (feux de fafa!) Seriously, every time I think of her name, the song goes through my head.
So, that leads us to today. I was exhausted last night and ended up declining to go out in favor of curling up to watch The Office with a pizza. It felt like a piece of home. Then this morning, I really wanted to get some work done on my lesson plans, so I stayed behind instead of going out to visit the local orphanage. One of the girls goes there every week, so I know that there will be other times.
All in all, today turned out to be a pretty good day. It's been pretty restful, and I managed to get some things done, such as updating this blog after a much longer time than I anticipated. I'm sorry that I can't add any pictures. I took some really cool ones of my class, but they won't upload to my computer. Very frustrating. Anyway, until next time!
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