Thailand has sadly come to an end.
The adventure was amazing, I made friends that will hopefully last a very long time and I hope I'll get to see my new found friends in the future when I travel again to America and Thailand.
At the start of this blog I asked myself what I want to get out of this trip, well now is my time to reflect and see what has happened.
1) experience, understand and have greater respect for other cultures.
2) greater understanding of how to teach/learn a new language.
3) learn how to cook Thai food the traditional way. I love Thai food but only know how to cook it the 'eastern way'.
1) I can defiantly say I have experienced Thailand, my whole trip was one to remember and I have lovely memories of weekend markets, smelly fish and busy train stations. I found staying out in Pluak Daeng gave me a sense of how Thai people really do live, some have very little, while others have more. Not being close to shops of any kind in a way forced me to befriend more locals and talk to our neighbours in order to survive week by week. I have a great deal of respect for Thailand now and understanding of how they always put others first. It is amazing to see how humble one person can be. Also respect for their king has definitely been one thing I've noticed as I have learnt so much about him and seen from the Royal King Project that he has done so much for Thailand. The day we visited the Royal Kings Project looking back on it was probably my favourite day, it seems to be one of the most talked about things for me on Parr with the Royal Summer Palace.
2) With learning Thai while in Thailand I have seen how hard it really is to learn a new language. Meeting the children and getting an understanding of their English ability was a struggle at the start as I thought that the students were at a higher level of ability than they actually were, this caused me to change my lesson plans and change them fast as what I was doing was not working. I learnt that even though you say something everyday to someone it doesn't really mean you know what you are saying. I had the task of finding out that the students don't know what 'good morning' and 'good afternoon' means even though they say it every day. Same with how old are you and how are you, seeing as these both start with how you tend to get the same answer for both "how are you?" " I am 15 year old". This has helped me for in the future to not assume anything and that it's better to start simple and work your way up than start harder and have to come right back down.
3) Sadly this didn't happen as I'd planned. As part of our experience we were meant to have been offered some Thai cooking courses, Thai boxing lessons and Thai dancing lessons. Jaime and I got none of this. We were at school 8am - 4.30pm if we weren't teaching we were sitting in our English department office and if not there we were home. We asked about some activities but the school never gave us anything to do and sadly it's not like we could go teach ourselves Traditional Thai Dancing. At least in the weekends we were able to partake in traditional Thai wedding, multiple different culture shows and multiple different culture destinations which was amazing to see.
I would never change my experience I loved it so much and really would love to go back to Thailand one day.
Anna xx
