So today marks both a week since I arrived in Kew Sua and five months since I left Seattle. I have this strange sensation that time is somehow speeding up.
This past week flew by. Any worries I may have had about being bored up in this little village were for naught. I have had lots of time to catch up on my reading, and my emails, (and my sleep!) but the days have felt pretty full. Maybe it's all the extra time it takes to do little things that would only take a few minutes at home (e.g laundry!). I think I've said this to a few of you already, but I solemnly swear that I will NEVER complain about doing laundry again. Hand washing an entire load of clothes with only a bucket and a spigot takes a loooooong time. I was having flashbacks to all those Laura Ingalls Wilder stories I read as a kid, as I heated up water for my showers and my laundry this week (yes, I've caved... I can't do the ice-cold shower every day, so I've taken to boiling water when I need to wash my hair).
Some highlights from this week...
- Teaching the 2nd grade English class all by myself (I'm picking in a little Thai... stuff like, "Do you understand?" "How do you say it in Thai?" "Do you like it?"). The kids in general seem pretty amused by me and are so far humoring my absolute butchering of their beautiful language (tonal languages are HARD!).
- Making friends with a little deaf boy in the 4th grade. He now comes and sits next to me every day so he can draw pictures and tell me stories about Spiderman... I'm getting better and better with my gesturing.
- A visit from the ice-cream man. Tracey and I about fell out of our chairs when we heard the tinkling tunes of the ice-cream man as he pulled into the village on Thursday afternoon. We just looked at each other wide-eyed. I can't even explain how remote this little village is. It sits on the top of a mountain overlooking a valley. The next "town" (there's a small mini-mart and a noodle stand there) is over 7 km away on a bumpy dirt road. The next city is about 35 km away. I have no idea where the ice-cream man came from, but he arrived with lovely, home-made ice-cream. It was frozen into waxed-paper wrapped tubes. He cut off short lengths and stuck them on skewers and was selling them for 5 baht each (about 15 cents). Tracey and I chipped in and bought ice-creams for all the kids who didn't have any money, much to their delight.
- A failed attempt at hitch-hiking into Sameung for the Strawberry Festival. Stacia assured us that it would be easy to catch a ride into "the city" and *everyone* hitchhikes in Thailand. Perhaps if we had started early in the morning we would have had some success. As it was, we walked for MILES over very hilly terrain and never made it to Sameung. I did get lucky and get a motorbike driver to take me the last 4 miles home...
- Painting a mural on the new wall in our little bungalow/barn. I think I told you that Chantip, the school caretaker/handyman built a new wall in Stacia & Ton's house to add a room for me and Tracey. We spent Friday night painting a totally girly mural on it (pictures on flickr).
-Eating sticky rice and larb made from raw pork with all of the other teachers. (I was the only falang (read: Westerner) brave enough to try this.)
Spending time in this village is certainly making me think about my life at home and the things I have so often taken for granted. I have spent some time thinking about what I really need in my life. Not just in terms of things, but in terms of space. We have so much of both....
More soon!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment