A long way from Kansas

A drunk, racist, Irish, expat and an indian looking traveller walk into a bar

Warning: some of this story contains exaggerated events but it’s still true for the most part. See bottom for details

As everybody who knows me well knows, it has long been a dream of mine to star in a Bollywood film. So imagine my surprise when one night on a street in Bangkok I was hailed with the words ‘’Oh darling….you’re a star my boy’’. It wasn’t, as I first thought Andrew Lloyd Webber coming to pick up his stuff from the ‘Lady boys Laundrette’ next door but a Thai casting director by the name of ‘Pang’ coming to whisk me and my friends away to the set of a Bollywood film being filmed on the other side of town. Of course, I thought this would be my big chance in the much loved and arguably better world of Indian films. Thoughts racing through my mind such as ‘’I wonder if Danny Boyle will have me in the ‘Slum Dog millionaire sequel’’. Or ‘’I wonder if there’s a Chicken Balti on the buffet, Shilpa Shetty wouldn’t put up with bland quiche and stale bread sticks’’.

Upon arrival at the Hotel I quickly became aware that my dreams of stardom would be shattered. The star role had been given to some multi-award winning actor (I forget his name) and that casting director told me there had been a mix-up and that I was only an extra (something to do with me looking like Indian due to my recently gained tan). However, I would by the looks of it be getting some of my favourite worldly cuisine. Yes that’s right they had only put an Indian buffet on for the crew. My luck was finally in. That was until I was to meet the devil himself, ‘Steve’.

Often on my travels through this great land I had met the mysterious breed known as the ‘All- knowledgeable Expat’. This one happened to be Irish, drunk (getting drunker) and it would appear later, ever so slightly racist. As he staggered to the front of the queue for the buffet the nice Indian crew , members noticed what a scene he was causing and made a new rule on the spot, ‘No- extra’s for the curry buffet’.  Hatred does not cut it for this guy. He then continued to make a fool of himself (albeit harmlessly) by talking to every person who walked past. I’m sure everyone has met the type so enough said. However we plugged on with what would turn out to be 11 hour ordeal and waited for the cameras to role. This meant sitting looking at each other awkwardly whilst some Avatar sized Indians sang and acted at the bar and the Indian version of ‘Mr Sheen’ (I presume this was the director) shouted orders abruptly at them. By 8 ‘o’clock the next morning and once Steve the racist, Irish, expat had broken Ian’s 3 Strike rule of mentioning the ‘P word’, me and my friends had all decided we had had enough and acted like any normal actor does at the end of a shoot. That is we were incredibly rude and demanded to be paid IMMEDIATELY before storming out. The money was nice in the end but the time spent Idol, listening to Steve’s ramblings was not and has made me think twice before continuing with my Bollywood dream.    

**The casting director didn’t sound like a camp Andrew Lloyd Webber (man with odd facial features looks drunk and pretends to be posh)  and the cast weren’t Indian Avatars (characters from an expensive remake of ‘Dances with wolves’) just seriously tall Indians. However the director did resemble a pissed off Indian version Mr Sheen (man from surface cleaner adverts).

”Teacher Ian….No teach…..Water-full.”

My experience of floods is limited so when I was told by a fellow westerner some 2 months ago that the school would flood I was more than interested. When it came however it was more of a surprise than I’d imagined. The school began as normal but rain overnight had meant the field was out of bounds, due to it being under 3ft of water however, the school was intact. Most of the teachers however would spend the day putting expensive equipment on tables rather than take lessons. The next day I expected more of the same, however it would be much different. I was greeted outside my front door by a teacher who uttered the words ‘’shorts’’ and ‘’water full’’ (this is what the Thai words for flood translates to). When I arrived at the school I saw something that shocked me to the core. The whole school had been engulfed under 4ft of water and was completely inaccessible. This meant I would clearly be not teaching but for how long? This was not going to get answered as when asking it again it does seem a peculiar question. The local river had burst its banks however and the level at the school was rising fast not decreasing. After we salvaged the downstairs tables and chairs we set off to the headmaster’s house where she told me I was not to attend school until a teacher rang me.

This I knew could be the next day or the day after that. So imagine my surprise when the phone call didn’t come until two weeks later. I couldn’t believe my luck, everyone dreams of a two week holiday from work and mine came after a non-stop four month stint of an over loaded timetable. I’ll be honest I felt like a prisoner being let out for parole early. However, as I travelled the local area with my time off I noticed something else about the floods which had previously missed my attention. This was the scale and magnitude of its power. Where once there were fields of rice there were now oceans stretching for as far as the eye can see. Roads were fast flowing rivers full of cars struggling to make headway. At a first glance with the reflecting sunlight it did appear beautiful however, upon seeing the huge relief centres you soon got a feeling of the utter devastation. The picture of men bending down in neck high water to salvage the last of their crop is one that will stay in my mind forever. Some homes nearby had had their downstairs swept under and all the occupants belongings that could be salvaged were moved as high upstairs as possible. The teachers I knew were now living in shelters. I’m not an expert on rice farming and admittedly I was shocked to find that the floods completely destroyed all the surrounding crops. I mistakenly thought that heavy amounts of water would aid it rather than hinder it, but I was wrong. The flood water is dirty and infects the rice making it inedible. The filth also causes the water to let out an awful smell which I’m sure becomes unbearable to live with.

A month later and the floods have reached the capital and the government has finally been forced to take heavy action to prevent the capital from being destroyed and I had to evacuate the town I had begun to call my home. This epidemic is surely going to get worse before it gets better. 

”I was there in 82 and it was bad then”

Pattaya…..A place that has been stirring in the back of my mind since my Dad uttered the immortal words ‘’I went there in 82 and it was bad then’’. By all accounts that I had received even from those who enjoyed it I could safely say that it was one place I was going to utterly detest.  On arrival the hotel seemed pretty decent and it would turn out to be partially the best part of the trip due to its extensive British menu. I must at this point urge caution when criticizing me for craving such delights as beans and bacon and I would understand if I were in Thailand for a week. However, I have been away for so long a piece of unsweetened toast is a distant memory and a sausage that doesn’t look like it came out of a tin is a mere dream. So when I was confronted with the prospect of having two full English breakfast (large, obviously) I set a bit of money aside for the privilege. 

Now to explain what makes the city of Pattaya such a haunting prospect. It is of course home to its own breed of native wildlife. One of the mysterious creatures found here we shall refer to, for the purpose of this writing, as a ‘Dave’ (don’t know why that name fits, it just does!). A ‘Dave’ is a middle-age man between the ages of ’50’ and ‘too old for you love’.

 

Here’s a joke to set the mood. ..’A 70 year old ‘Dave’ walks into a brothel in Pattaya and say’s ‘’How much for the full works’’ the woman replies ‘’haven’t you had it!’’, he say’s ‘’oh I’m sorry dear, how much do I owe you then’’.’

 

Now back to my description of a ‘Dave’. There are many species of ‘Dave’s’ but they often have common features which make them distinguishable from other tourists.  A ‘Dave’ often has numerous tattoos ranging from the Confederate flag to Hitler’s phone number and can be seen to have probably not shaven since he left high school, some 500 years ago. The ‘Dave’ is not nocturnal nor does he prefer sunlight. In fact neither is a hindrance for what the ‘Dave’ is so often famous for. This is of course eliciting and coaxing the miserable local girls for a bit of ‘you know what’ (sorry, my Gran might read this). Or in short a ‘sex tourist’. Now I will be clear for a moment I’m not for a minute suggesting that the activities a ‘Dave’ gets up to are ‘illegal’ as prostitution is completely outlawed all over Thailand, with no exceptions. The woman does not receive money for her troubles (of which I’m sure there are many) instead she receives a time period of ‘company’ with the ‘Dave’ in which he can buy her clothes and take her to nice restaurants. All of which are obviously not illegal. The ‘Dave’ in quite a few cases often lives in the area and does not need to learn the local language or eat the local food. He is not required to keep himself clean as his prey are not picky on smell. For the same reason he is not in the business of secrecy as none of his prey are at all shy about their business.  

 Besides the jokey points of this I need to make a few comments in seriousness to this. I do not for a minute suggest that these men are committing a crime or a sin (I’m not religious) and their argument for ‘it’s the girl choice’ is sometimes an acceptable one. I am simply poking fun at people I believe to deserve a bit being brought down a few pegs sometimes.

As for me I like to place myself in the modest position of being too young and attractive to feel the need to pay for the services these girls are advertising. A lot like a man who gets a free lift to work in a limousine if he wants it and constantly gets pestered by someone offering a lift in a robin reliant for large chunk of his salary. It is this point that tells you why I won’t be returning to Pattaya, I simply don’t NEED to, unlike the ‘Dave’ who clearly does. I would recommend the trip to anyone though; you have to see it for yourself.  Plus the beach was pretty nice and the atmosphere seemed for the most part friendly. However, Thailand this is not. It couldn’t be further from Thailand; in fact it’s not even on the same planet. Please go to Pattaya, but do yourself a favour and go somewhere better afterwards as to leave this land with that as your only experience is a crime to yourself and this fine country’s reputation.  

‘’Imagine all the people…BE QUIET WHEN TEACHER IAN SINGS!!’’

I thought it best to continue to mention peculiar incidents at the school I’m working for, this one is different in that it is more self-inflicted than many of the others. The school is currently still in the situation I have called ‘operation no-staff’ or ‘operation contain and destroy’, depending on the mood. There are no teachers and I still have to teach children how to speak English. I regretfully offered to bring my guitar in for the children as I thought that this couldn’t get any worse than it already has and as of Monday morning all children would be learning a song of my choice. The song it-self had to be easy lyrically but still interesting enough content wise. It was always my plan to use the Ray Davies classic that is ‘Dedicated follower of fashion’. However, explaining the lyric ‘pulled his frilly, nylon panties right up tight’ might be a bit difficult. There were of course others which run with a basic melody and a basic set of lyrics such as ‘Anarchy in the UK’ by The Sex Pistols or ‘Smack my bitch up!’ by The Prodigy all sound choices I’m sure you’ll agree but the clear winner for me was possibly the most popular song of all time. Imagine by John Lennon. This song starts with a basic intro and has the usual ‘three verse two chorus set-up’ that The Beatles based so much of their music on and has a great meaning that any Buddhist would sympathise with. Furthermore, there had to be at least one of the Thai people present who knew The Beatles as it was always my belief that wherever you were in the world you could shout Paul Mcartney and thousands of foreigners would start singing ‘Hey Jude’. There wasn’t and nobody knew them, plus explaining ‘Imagine’ by drawing guns crossed out on the board didn’t work as I hoped. I then suddenly remembered the issue of not mentioning politics to children and how this song could be seen as ‘sedition’ when we got to the lyric ‘imagine there’s no countries’. ‘’What do you mean, teacher Ian. No Thailand??’’. Probably best just singing the song, I thought. Then they suddenly lost interest and began to chat. They fell silent after I had shouted at them, I normally wouldn’t bore you with the content of what i shouted but I will make an exception for these fine words. It went something like this; ‘’THIS SONG IS OF GREAT IMPORTANCE!!’’ and ‘’THE GUY WHO WROTE IT DIED VERY HORRIBLY!!’’. After I had finished miming John Lennon’s death and imitating Yoko’s fake tears they all finally sang the chorus in unison and I left it at that. I think I’m going to leave the guitar at home in future as, to put it simply, I don’t think Thai kids are ready for music outside their borders. If you were to hear what they call music you’d understand why.

I’m sure this ain’t what Baden-Powell had in mind

It may be just my school or it may be an inherent problem across the Thai education system but having to close a school because the ‘teachers’ have to go on scout camp is ludicrous. This is exactly what has happened this week. Could you imagine what the tabloids would say if a few schools were to do the same in England. There’d be a whole two page spread right in between the usual story about the 200 million Muslim children taking our ‘hard working’ white children’s places at school, and a story about how Jordan’s third child is actually because of an affair with a teenage mutant hero turtle. All the same it would be doomsday for those headmasters responsible. Here however, 9 out of the 14 teachers have been, what I like to refer to as ‘drafted’ for scout service. This, you might think is an odd thing to complain about, but that isn’t the whole story as at the end of last week a Thai teacher told me the school will be closed for those days. I of course jumped the gun and planned (thankfully not booked) a holiday to Laos only to be told on the Monday that the school would not close and that the remaining 5 teachers would have to teach the rest of the school on their own. This meant double class sizes with half the space needed. I remember thinking at the time when she told me of this great idea, how this isn’t a Bar or restaurant and you can’t just carry on half staffed after the yearly round of food poising has taken hold of everyone.

There is also another point worth making here and that is it is not impossible to teach big classes how to speak English, it is however very difficult. They are a rowdy bunch at the best of times as I’m sure I’ve mentioned in previous posts but for them to be put into classes where all mates and gangs are re-united is a nightmare. It’s like if a prison guard, about to leave on his holidays, gave his set of keys to the in-house mafia boss and said ‘Merry Christmas’, then proceeded to leave whistling and singing ‘Aud lang syne’. Carnage doesn’t even begin to describe the situation. My only saving grace is that there were no teachers around to see the epic failures that you would be hard pushed to label lessons. The second point to make you aware of is to do with the drink ‘Ovaltine’, it, for some reason is making a push to enter the already hugely populated Thai kid’s drinks market. I know this because a few weeks ago their salesmen turned up to pitch the product to the children. No doubt using harmless but exceptionally evil, underhanded, smooth, psychological tricks to get the kids to run home screaming at the top of their lungs ‘’we want to drink what old ladies drink’’. Another point our tabloids probably would have mentioned but maybe only a 3 inch square on page 35.

I can’t help thinking what would have happened if the two situations had collided; nothing, is the answer. There wouldn’t have been a problem, as there is no need for a fully staffed school if there are ‘David Brent’ style guy’s doing there song and dance to sell a ‘refreshing beverage’. I’d best go some students are rioting and have gotten on the roof they say they won’t come down until their demands are met. Apparently they want a return to normal and sane educational practice. I think that might be a bit much maybe lessen the demands slightly to ‘free Ovaltine for everyone’, that would sway nicely here.

 

Sinabit

For the last time, ‘Dogs don’t eat each other!!!’

Anyone who is thinking of uttering the phrase ‘‘competition never did anyone any harm’’ or ‘’it’s a ‘dog eat dog world’’should have been at Anuban school in Lopburi, Thailand, this morning. It was here that my brightest student was hurled into a biblical set of tears that Gazza would have cringed at.

It was last Thursday evening that I was told of the ‘Inter-School Speech Contest’ and it was then I had to choose from a limited number of students just one to partake in what I described to the non-speaking Thai teacher as ‘lunacy’. The task wasn’t to read from a script like in most speeches he/she was to memorise 4 minutes worth of a topic. This I could do, I feasibly could privately teach a 12 year old student to speak about one topic for four minutes in a language he is not to familiar with. However, this wasn’t the full extent of the task ahead. He wouldn’t have to memorise one topic, but a whole syllabus. For the judges were to draw the topic out of the hat 5 minutes before he would be due to start speaking. I counted the number of topics and it totalled 15. As you can surely now agree, ‘lunacy’. I set to work anyway, as for one thing it was sure to be a different two days of work than I am used to.

I pulled out all the stops, tongue twisters, games, speech therapy you name it. I felt like Geoffrey Rush. I decided to go a long with the tactic of choosing 3 generic topics which he would know and teach him how to adapt to each topic as the time I had to teach him made it impossible to do otherwise. These topics were ‘Family’, ‘Hobbies and interests’ and ‘School’. At the end of Monday’s teaching me and ‘Wow’ (my students nickname) were summoned to the head teachers office so he could perform what he had learnt and more importantly what I had taught him. It is here that something became frightfully apparent. This competition had little if anything to do with the students. It was a contest to see which school was best. I could tell this by the way the head teacher approached it. Not sparing a minutes thought for the actual task which she had set she delved into a bag and demanded that ‘wow’ speak on the topic she pulled out whilst she timed him. She was in an obvious state of eagerness to see if he could win her that all important trophy. To me I set his chances at unlikely at best.

We arrived to the contest the next morning and I was greeted with smiles and coffee whilst ‘Wow’ was sent off with a few words of encouragement from me. As I sat down I looked at the format of the room, it reminded me of an old court martial setting or dragons den, and both purposefully built to look intimidating. I sat back and prayed for a merciful topic to come out of the hat. It didn’t work as the topic was ‘future occupations’, something he would have to answer in the ‘future tense’ an ability missing in most of Thailand least of all in the abilities of a 12 year old. He started well picking up the pace which I had taught him and he managed to speak about his father’s profession for a good 30 seconds and even brought in phrases such as ‘If I do well at school’ which was rather a shock to me.

However, he did flake towards the end and you could tell he knew it, bursting into tears of shame as if he had done something wrong. I felt enormous pity for the boy and without a moments hesitation ran to him to tell him he had ‘’done well’’ and there was ‘’no need to worry’’. In the end they scored him 72.5 out of 100 which certainly isn’t the worst score imaginable even though he came 3rd out of 3. I myself would like to thank all those who took part in the episode as they managed to prove that 12 year old boys do cry when heaped under unnecessary pressure, something I’m sure all those present were shocked at. That’s not all it showed as well. It didn’t, as they hoped, find the school with the best student as that boy/girl was almost certainly home tutored for many years. It did prove that competitions of this nature are cruel, elitist and above all pointless. You aren’t going to improve a countries English language standard by forcing your youngest and brightest to compete in tough contests. You are only going to do it by making what is essentially a boring subject fun, so they actually want to learn. To say I’m annoyed is an understatement.  

The key to my heart = a well organised election

An election….of all things to begin a Friday morning with this one was firmly at the bottom of my ‘what to expect’ list. The children of the primary school I am teaching in appear to elect their favourite student to become some sort of head girl/boy. A lot like the ones you see in very poor American high school films. You know the ones where the script is written by a dyslexic five year old and the actors are brought in from the street to make up the numbers.

It wasn’t just any election however it was a proper election with private booths for a fair and secret ballot with the ballot papers requiring a red thumb print of the voter to become valid. You may be forgiven for thinking the nursery would be excused from such an adult like activity but no, even the 3 year olds line up in single file are handed a piece of paper and have their thumbs pressed against a red ink sponge and file one by one into a booth. It all went off without a hitch no one was left queuing for hours in the rain only to find out that they were ‘too late’ to vote, already Thai primary school; one, British general election; nil.  I did however have to sit through the painstaking and tedious process of listening to each vote being read out at the end of the school day, something even a big cynic like me would have to admit would be pointless on a bigger scale.  Another observation was that the three candidates were being chosen by what seemed to be a more ‘up-to-date’ voting system than that of Britain not unlike AV/PR. Admittedly that is no hard feet in itself; however it does raise certain questions about how a Thai Primary school can be of a more advanced political state than that of one of the oldest democracies on earth.

The result was re- sounding as candidate number 1 was clearly a very popular 12 year old girl with almost 70% of the vote. As the winner was announced there was just enough time to have a good old traditional election winning tune with a great rendition of ‘who the f**k is David Cameron’. Only kidding such sophisticated people have neither the time nor breath to waste on such pompous gits. Besides I’d rather listen to the 12 year old Thai girl she’d probably tell me less untruths and solve the corrupted banking crisis before you can say “Zip your flies up Osborne your brains are hanging out”.

There is a more serious side to this event which I must enlighten you with and that is the awareness it raises to such young minds about democratic processes and there importance in a modern society. Just this week I attended a march to a nearby town with the students in my school, where they tried to get people to vote in next week’s election. They went door to door a lot like political party canvassers do in Britain but with less door slamming and less apathetic responses. However, having children of 11-12 year olds partaking in such activity can only be a good thing, in fact the earlier the age the better. If it were to happen in Britain then maybe we could stop the house of commons being filled with men who’s left buttock is tattooed with ‘‘Eton boys for life’’ and their right with ‘‘the poor only smell because we charge too much for water’’. At the very least it would increase the knowledge of children in such an important activity. You see democracy isn’t just a word it is a whole subject in itself and one I’m sure at the very least our high schools could benefit from. 

‘The true horror of war’

“As the tanks rolled over the hill the after effects of the night before battle became apparent. Blood filled the trenches and the mud buried the bodies of the soldiers from both sides. Not far away are the smoking guns, still white hot from the deathly firing that took place and as the Smokey air subsided all that was left was the foul stench of death….” You may think this is a passage from a book on the first or maybe Second World War. However, you would be wrong on both accounts as it is actually a description of what happens when you decided to play a language based competition with 7-8 year olds with two sides split by gender. That’s right what had started out like a glorious day teaching soon became a matter not unlike the first 13 minutes of ‘Saving Private Ryan’. Children screaming teachers ignoring and laughing me bewildered. It has previously struck me as odd to see a teacher smack the legs of a child for talking when she/he is talking but then smile and laugh when a boy catapults himself head first into a girl probably causing her to fall of her chair and potentially cause her life changing paralysis. This is regular however. Not the best of starts to a week especially after such a relaxing weekend in the sun on a local island. It had been my unfortunate luck however to be left with a tan and burn combination which any ‘leather skinned’ expat would be proud of. In fact I’m sure several of the Thai teachers had suggested I maybe the impromptu love child of the infamous David Dickinson and the late great Bob Monkhouse, but I had to let them down with my very best “you do still love me though, don’t you?” Of course they still love me although the invitations for their daughters have now stopped and they have recalled my application for best looking teacher as apparently it is not good to look ‘black’. This brings me to my next observation of Thailand, the pastier you are the better chance of ‘bagging a bride’ you have; this does go some way in explaining the popularity status of the Irish somewhat. I feel it should be my duty therefore to put out a message of hope to any girl from the northern hemisphere that is thinking of picking up a bottle orange tanning lotion or saving the pennies for an afternoon on the ‘lecky’ beach (sun bed). Don’t bother move to Thailand it’s much more fun and probably cheaper. This opinion by the Thai’s that ‘white is right’ could be mistaken for being slightly racist. However the person who makes this mistake is what I like to call an idiot. I’ve heard it mentioned at times that it annoys some people to have this popularity based solely on the colour of your skin. In most cases around the World I would of course agree as I have spent the majority of my adult life arguing ferociously against such closed minded views. However it is clear to me that Thai women want to look white because it is popular, in the same way as tanning is popular in the west not in the same way throwing bricks through kebab shop windows is popular in parts of Northern England. Although on the flipside I have noticed an unhealthy fondness of Hitler here, this is a different more slightly worrying issue. I think it’s because he liked their Swastika sign but we’ll not go into that.

Two more ‘Khao-Pad-Gai’ over here please garcon!

Food…….something I like to see myself as somewhat of ‘know-it-all’ in, having been involved in so much of it since I was born. Here in Thailand there is no change, I am still a ‘know-it-all’ and one who’s tongue may well be down to its last few taste buds after being introduced to ‘ped marrr!!’ (very spicy). The best food to be had here is without doubt that which is made out the back of someone’s house where a few table and chairs are laid and you can watch your order being cooked by a chef/housewife who probably learnt through necessity at very young age.

 Like most experts I have a speciality, soup. The Thai’s, I have come to realise, are also experts in this field which delights me no end. However, this is also where the first tiny issue materialised. What they fail to realise is that soup is almost always better off served piping hot. An Italian chef can get away with it as they do the complete opposite in their dish ‘Guzpaccio’ which is served ice-cold. Some of the soup I have been served here however, has been lukewarm. It’s like toast without butter, radio 2 without Wogan or a Sunday roast without gravy, it’s just not right.

The second tiny ‘quim’ I have with food from the far-east is the mysterious product, which I have never managed to work out, tofu. I see tofu as I see Chris Moyles tasteless, annoying, pointless and above all is about as needed in the morning as a smack round the face and bee-stings in your Cheerio’s. This unfortunately does not stop my favourite teacher from bringing me a soup load of it every day as I arrive for work. I am not one for complaining as I’m sure you are aware but the texture of tofu is similar to that of tinned dog meat jelly and baby food, it turns what could be the greatest piece of Thai cuisine into something better off served at Crufts.

This does not mean for a minute that the food I have eaten here is not some of the best in the world because I can assure you it is. Even the rubbish food that is served in the 7/11’s (convenience stores) is of top quality, although there does tend to be a slight obsession with the German frankfurter sausage which is served in almost all dishes which have been given a ‘western twist’.

The rest of what I have eaten here is fabulous and the Thai way of eating involves a lot of sharing and the teachers turn every meal into a Jacobs’s joint something I can certainly get used to.          

I’m more popular in this school than Rick Waller at a cannibal’s annual Christmas dinner

Well teaching’s a blast….no really it actually is once you get into it. I’ve discovered that I’m more popular at this school than the local Ice cream man, which is nice. I think I’m ready for the routine to kick in now with the odd subtle differences such as each teacher giving me a taste of their culinary delights. Sometimes they all give me food on the same day of which I have to eat it so as not to offend anyone. My deepest fear is the teachers hating me for some reason and what better reason to hate me than to deny their food after accepting their friends five minutes before. I personally think they are fattening me up for what will be my last meal where I am subtly dipped into a deep fat fryer and served on a bed of delicious fried rice and hot chilli sauce.  I have learnt the Thai phrase for ‘full’ which is useful to a degree although these teachers are like your mum and Gran at the Christmas dinner table when clearly the 30 sprouts you just forced down weren’t enough whilst using the favourite phrase ‘there are kids starving in the world’, shortly followed by the muttering of ‘I bet they’d still refuse this crap’.

This does make me sound ungrateful of which I can assure you I’m not; in fact I need the food for energy, just wish they’d bring it at separate times of the day. One brought soup in a bag the other day which was lovely, however the practical problem of putting soup in a bag became apparent very quickly and probably the reason why nobody does it. As I went to open this now lukewarm product it exploded over the sides of the bowl all over my desk and more importantly over my trousers five minutes before my first lesson for the day.  To put into perspective this was probably the worst morning since Hitler awoke and thought ‘’Hmmmm, Poland seems nice this time of year, who’s up for a holiday?’’. The day only got better thankfully and I’ve even learnt the ‘tribal assembly dance’ off by heart (honestly though I do die slightly inside every time I think of people back home watching and laughing at this most ridiculous display). The worst part is I can feel it becoming routine and can imagine spontaneously jumping up at 7’oclock every morning in the future and doing this odd exercise routine. Think ‘Mr Motivator’ meets the New Zealand rugby team and you won’t be far wrong. I wouldn’t change a thing about it though as it brings a humorous side to an otherwise serious job.

 Apart from the obvious problems in the classroom like boys climbing up walls and jumping onto each other, doing what is universally known as the ‘Swanton bomb’ before pinning him down, looking up at me with the expression that says  ‘well aren’t you gonna count this one ref? ’.  Apart from this there are occasions when a group of Thai children have actually learnt to speak a little bit more English than they knew an hour before and all because of me. For that, I will blow my own trumpet and leave you with the knowledge that I am pretty chuffed with myself and there is a pretty decent buzz, if you get it right.