The Land of Northern Thai... and I

The Countryside just outside of Pai, Mae Hong Son Province

I don’t know how to start this post off other than to say that I LOVE THE LAND OF NORTHERN THAI. I love it. I can’t believe I have lived in this country for over 10 months and this past holiday was my first visit to this beautiful place. I got up to Chiang Mai after a long morning and afternoon of travels. The easiest/quickest way to get up there from where I am is to take a mini-bus three hours south and then fly from Hat Yai directly to Chiang Mai, which is a two hour flight. Since I only had 9 days and wanted to make the most of them, flying was the only option. Plus,  although I wasn’t aware of the severity at the time, bus and train routes to Chiang Mai shut down around that time due to all the flooding. Anyhow, the method of transportation to and from Northern Thailand was just about all the planning I had done for this trip, aside from jotting down a few things into my journal regarding what I wanted to do/see based on word of mouth. I was so excited! 

For the record, 9 days to explore all one would like to explore in Northern Thailand just isn’t enough. There are three provinces I really wanted to see: Chiang Mai, Mae Hong Son, and Chiang Rai- all three border Burma and they are supposed to be some of the most breathtaking places in Thailand. I only made it to two of them- Chiang Mai, where I stayed in Chiang Mai proper, and Mae Hong Son, where I stayed in a little bohemian town up a windy, windy, windy road up in the mountains called Pai. From these two bases, we explored many other parts of the provinces.

Literally, as soon as I got to the actual city of Chiang Mai from the airport, I was blown away by the place. Everything about the north was breathtakingly beautiful- everywhere I went, every place I explored, I was in love. The skies, the landscape- terraced rice fields, lush mountains, jungle giving way to a more temperate terrain as the elevation increases- and the people are different. I can’t really say what it is exactly. Walking down the streets, exploring the jungle, mountains, and countryside,  meeting people- there’s simply a different energy than down here in the south.

So what I did was write down my “List of things to do in the Land of Northern Thai” verbatim, and then below each one, I commented on the experience (or lack thereof, as there just wasn’t enough time to get to everything and I added a few other things on the way.)

1.    Take a Thai cooking class.

      DID IT! And I loved it. I was trying to decide whether to do a course in Chiang Mai or in Pai, and eventually went with Pai. I’m glad I did- there were only four people total with one chef who was just lovely. First, we went to the evening market for a little lesson on essential fresh ingredients- galanga, ginger, tamarind, mushrooms, shallots, onions, garlic, chili peppers- how much, what kinds, etc. Then, the cooking began. I made Som Tam, Red Curry (even the curry paste- people complain about it, but I thought it was fun), Tom Kha Gai, and Cashew Chicken. Obviously, it was all amazing, because I cooked it. I learned a lot, laughed, and ate. Perfect.

At the Market

I made Som Tam! Yum!

Making Red Curry Paste

Me and My Tom Kha Gai

Red Curry and Cashew Chicken!

2.    See the tigers and hug one.

DIDN’T DO IT. I couldn’t- or wouldn’t- after the elephant experience. I just didn’t have it in me. I would love to touch and be around tigers for a day. But not at their expense. Life is full of double standards, I know, and this is one, because I do other things that are not animal friendly, like eat them (not tigers, but other animals, clearly.)

3.    Ride and elephant.

My Sweet Elephant. Mein.

DID IT. I was really excited about it, and it’s something my mom had me promise her I’d do. It sounds exotic and  unforgettable, and like hugging an orangutan or having a macacque attack you, or getting stung by a jellyfish, it’s something fun to tell people about. Unfortunately, it wasn’t all it cracked up to be. I had been warned about this by a couple people- that people who run these elephant businesses are in it for pure profit and have no regard for the well-being of the animal. I was told to the Elephant Nature Park or Thai Elephant Home were more humane options, as these places are more sanctuaries/reserves for the elephants. But, I didn’t listen. I think it was something I needed to experience for myself. I don’t want to go into it in detail, but my heart hurt for this animal, and I actually got a little teary-eyed afterward. Leaving ethical reasons out of it- it was an experience being atop this giant animal. But I got the same feeling just standing next to her, touching her trunk, and feeding her. They are magnificent animals. And, riding her was rather uncomfortable as we rode bare-back. Actually, it was incredibly uncomfortable unless I was sitting close to her neck. My rump was pretty sore the next day from the spine. Knowing what I know now, I would have just spent the day with one or more on a reserve. I think it would have been a better experience all around. So I did it, but am not proud of it. To anyone thinking about doing it- go to the reserves instead. Sorry mom!

Had to make this photo big so you could see the look of sheer enjoyment on my face. Poor Mein. 

4.    Go to Pai and get my portrait done by the guy on the street

Looks just like me! HA!

DID IT! And loved it. Two teachers came back from Pai with these quirky little portraits they’d had done while in Pai, and I was on a mission to get mine . The second night there, we found him, and for 50 baht, he drew me in his quirky little way. I’m pretty proud of it. Pai was such a great town. I could have stayed there for many more days. I’ve never been any place quite like it, but in some ways, it reminded me of the little towns up on the coast of Northern California by where we have a family house- Inverness, Point Reyes, Bolinas. Very bohemian, very friendly, and when I left, people I’d met were coming out of their shops and waving, like we were old friends. It was a good feeling.

An Evening Shot of Pai

5.    Ziplining through the rainforest.

DID IT! And loved it. It was so much fun, and the views were just spectacular. It was about 1 ½ hours outside of Chiang Mai and we climbed high up into the mountains. Seeing the jungle from above instead of down below presents quite a contrast. I never once felt scared- I think as long as I’m attached to something. I am fine. The guides were thorough with safety and were also incredibly funny and fun.  We did the B course, which had more ziplines, drops, and canopy walks. I loved the getup they put us in also. Definitely recommend it and this company- Jungle Flight.

The Hot Spring @ the National Park

6.    Go to the “Cave Place” where they send you trekking and draw the map for you by hand and you explore alone. (yes, Kevin, after all that work you did for me, this is all I wrote down.)

DIDN’T DO IT. There just wasn’t enough time, and it made me really sad. The Cave Lodge is the name of this place, and I asked about it when we were in Pai. Alec (our guide for the hill tribes and longneck village) knew a lot about it and was pleased that I wanted to go there. I hope I get to someday.

7.    Go trekking/hiking

DID IT… sort of. It was a mix of driving and mild hiking. We went to 2 of the national parks and walked to the hot springs, walked to the villages, and  I explored a lot of Chiang Mai on foot, especially the first day I was there. Once again, it was all about time. This is why I wish I had more of it- another week, and I think that would have been enough.

There were also things that we did that were NOT on my list- as we got to know the area and more about what it had to offer. One of my travel buddies took a massage course. I took one day and dedicated it to exploring Chiang Mai for food (big surprise, right?) since the city is probably one of the more health-conscious parts of Thailand and a lot of the country’s produce and grains come from that area (plus I had a great guide who had lived in Chiang Mai previously!) We also spent one day traveling through the Mae Hong Son province while we were visiting Pai.

One of the most memomarble parts of my trip was not on my list- it was planned while we were staying in Pai. On our second day there is when we decided to take a trek through the Mae Hong Son Province. I think our experience was different than most (or I would like to think that, anyhow), in that it was much more intimate and personal. Our guide, Alec, originally tried to sell us this one-day tour, where you stopped about 7 times, did something like the Chinese fire drill in/around some sight with about 10 other tourists, and then piled back into the car to trek to the next tourist place, stopping at shops along the way. We didn’t bite at the offer, and I could tell he was a bit frustrated- most tourists just book a tour and want to pack as much in as possible. As we talked with him more, he learned we were teachers, that we were living here in Thailand, and he got very enthusiastic. So enthusiastic that he told us HE wanted to be our guide, and he would take us to the Longneck Karen village and to the Lisu village, and then see what else we had time for. “I just get very tired,” he told us, “So I have to make sure I have lots of coffee and be home by six, otherwise I will fall asleep while driving.” Hmm. Okay. Comforting thought. He said that he was friends with the people there and that we would have a good time. He was right.

At the Primary School in the Lisu Village

Alec had asked us to bring biscuits for the children (not because they are starving, just because everyone likes cookies!) that we would be seeing in the villages, so we stopped along the way and bought huge tins of cookies. We stopped at the Lisu village first, and almost immediately went to see their school, where we met the children and the teacher and got to hang out and play. Then after about an hour there, Alec took us to see his friend’s wife, who was sick in bed. She had been for over a month, and Alec said no one could explain what was wrong with her, but that she was paranoid and the spirits kept telling her things and giving her warnings about her and her family. So she was refusing to leave her house. When we met her, she was smiling and came to sit outside a bit with us. My diagnosis: she wasn’t crazy- she was depressed. In rural village terms, she was tormented by spirits. In Californian “there’s a diagnosis for everything” terms, she just seemed like she was unhappy in her life and was depressed. After spending some time with her (she gladly took some cookies as well, by the way), we explored the rest of the village, kids in tow. They followed us everywhere, pointing things out, playing with us, and grabbing our hands. They were all so sweet.

This little girl followed me everywhere- we had a
connection <3

Lisu Children- such Sweethearts!

Lisu Boy

After the Lisu village, we piled back into Alec’s truck and continued another few hours to the original longneck village, stopping for noodles for lunch on the way at a place where Alec is a regular. And he’s a bit older and forgetful, and he forgot to pay them. So on the way back, we stopped again. Getting to the longneck village was rather perilous. It's deep in the jungle, beautfully set but hard to get to. If it rains too much, there’s no way in or out, as you have to cross this river with no bridge- just drive right through the water. If it gets too high, then you’re out of luck. And the roads are dirt/mud and rocky and it’s very easy to get stuck. But we made it. Alec doesn’t really have any teeth, so he was taking a really long time to eat his lunch and told us to go in without him, and to ask for his friend, Maloot, and to give her some lunch, and he handed me a bag of noodles for her. The three of us walked down the dirt road and into the village, which was quite small, maybe a tenth of a mile long? Right away, we found Maloot, a beautiful young and pregnant woman who spoke English impeccably well. She walked us around the village, introducing us to her mother and grandmother and telling us a bit about the history of her village and family.

Maloot's mother

Maloot doesn’t wear the coils around her neck. In fact, most people in the tribe don’t anymore. They are beginning to embrace this change/evolution in their culture. She took her coils off when she was 16, after having them on for about 12 years. Her neck is scarred from infections the heavy decoration caused. It was hard for her mother to accept, but she eventually did.

We came when school was in session, and Maloot took us to the village school. It seriously blew me away. It was in a raised bamboo hut that was divided into classrooms by partitions. The walls left about a two to three foot gap between them and the ceiling, and desks and chairs were fashioned from logs that sat on the floor in a couple of the classrooms. But what was being learned in these classrooms- these children are learning FOUR languages. They study math in English, Geography in Thai, and then they learn their village language and Burmese as well.

Maloot's little cousin who
followed us everywhere

Other members of the village augment
their ears instead of their necks

I probably should have said this previously, but the Thai government does not recognize these people as citizens of their country. Instead, they are deemed refugees, even though their village has been around for generations. As such, they are confined to their village since they do not have Thai ID cards. They cannot get jobs, they cannot leave and go anywhere else (although due to U.N. aid, this is changing). They survive off tourism. And they hadn’t received a donation in over 5 months. You see that they are living on, in spite of the increasingly modernized, westernized world around them, but you also see they are beginning to fade. It isn’t just loss of tradition (there was only one girl of about 30-40 who was wearing the coils on her neck, which, by the way are incredibly heavy. Sometimes, they get up to 15 kilos!)- I really think it’s just that there’s no place for them. And they’re starting to see and know and be educated about the world around them and they want a piece of it. I don’t think it’s a bad thing. I was shocked at how the children are getting a rather good education despite circumstances. Members of the community leave and go to the refugee camp for a few years, and there they receive education and knowledge about the world from U.N. workers and volunteers and then come back to their village to teach.

The School from the Outside

Math Class

Typical Classroom Setup

Another Shot of the Karen Village

I loved sitting and listening, observing the students, and chatting a little bit with the teachers in their “lounge”. No electricity. Nothing on the walls. No books other than workbooks. Yet learning, meaningful learning was taking place.

The wat next to our guesthouse

Blind Musicians at the Night Bazaar

After being in the Mae Hong Son province for a few days, we went back to Chiang Mai. We attended night markets and bazaars, ate delicious food from around the world, and perused many a bookstores. There’s all kinds of great art and this one man sells these great postcards- fabric on cardboard, with little quotes and watercolor paintings on them. I was sad when I reached my last night in Chiang Mai. We went out to Mexican food (SO SO delicious- it was almost like being back in California, no joke, I ate there twice) and had a chili martini at a posh little bar near the university. 

At another Wat during the Street Fair

I really fell in love a little bit with the place.

Longneck Karen Heading Home

La Cucaracha!

This week back from our nine-day holiday has been a killer! With one T. Meaghan back in the states on holiday and the new science teacher being held hostage in Malaysia by the Thai embassy regarding his non-B visa (have I mentioned I hate the Thai visa process?),  the rest of us have been scurrying from class to class to cover PE, Science, Values, and Clubs for the 7^th and 8^th grade. Two days this week, I taught every single period from 7:35 until 3:30 (not complaining, just stating J) including giving up my lunch and break to do detentions (complaining this time).  I loathe being the detention… monitor?... facilitator?... I absolutely loathe it. No one wants to be in that room, and it is miserable. Plus, I am already the most firm/austere/stringent teacher at our school, so adding detention to my repertoire of duties only makes me that much more school-marmish. I’d rather be handing out ice creams at lunch or something to kind of balance my strictness out. Anyhow, on Monday, I was at school from 6:30 until 9:00. THAT is wrong. Needless to say, I have seen some goings on with cockroaches in our building at these late/early hours, and this is why I came home to write my blog instead of staying there in my classroom. I think it’s the weather lately, but these little creatures have been coming out in full force. And by “full-force”, I mean I have seen one in the bottom drawer of my desk, one in the auditorium, and one or two scuttle across the hall every morning when I arrive and at night when I leave. This is more than enough for me. More than enough. I really dislike them. My feelings weren’t this bad when I first got here.  Now, they make my skin crawl and I freak out when I see them. A couple of weeks ago, I came into the auditorium because kids were screaming their heads off, and there was a coffee mug FULL, FULL of cockroaches. Why?!? Why did approximately ten 2-inch long cockroaches all decide to crawl into this coffee mug like it was their own personal Jacuzzi?! I’ve had enough. But they’re all I can think about- I think I see them everywhere.

In detention, sometimes students have to write essays of the detention… we’ll just go with monitor… monitor’s choice. Yesterday, I had the students in detention write essays on cockroaches. A couple of them looked at me with the “Is she kidding?!” face because they’re usually asked to write about changing the world and future goals. But when I said, “Ready, go!” with arched eyebrows and tight lips, they knew I meant business. And I got some pretty good essays from it. One student referred to them as having “bodies like little monsters that are dirty and full of bacteria” (agree!) and another told me if I needed one to be “taken care of” that he would do it (thanks!) Most students expressed the same sentiments as me regarding these beastly little creatures, except their stories are much, much worse. My favorite though, was one student who seemed very concerned about whether or not cockroaches had noses: "I don't know it have a nose or not but I know one thing: I never seen the nose of a cockroach before". He spent a good two paragraphs explaining why he was on the fence about it.

Anyhow, the week is almost over and I am so happy tomorrow is Friday. TGIF.

(And I promise, either tonight or tomorrow- my tonight or tomorrow- a blog entry will be up about my lovely 9-day holiday)

What's a synonym for marvel?

I have a word document on my desktop entitled “Homeward Bound!” with an itinerary that begins with my departure from Phuket on December 12^th. Three days after the semester ends, I will be leaving Thailand to begin what I am optimistically thinking of as a new adventure for myself, one that will be both a finale to my time here in Thailand and the catalyst for resuming my life back home. My new adventure will be taking me back to Bali (I vowed to go back someday- who knew it would be six months after my first visit!?) and then to Australia, and that's as far as I've booked as of now. Exciting, right? Maybe, what I might be doing is trying to make my leaving here as exciting as possible so that the shock of such a big change is lessened to something more along the lines of just a little zap in the tangled electric cord that is my life (ahhh, metaphors.) As I’ve previously stated, I like change, but it’s definitely difficult for me. Leaving here seems so… definitive. I really can’t think of another word to describe it.

As with all big choices I make in my life, I obsess over what I am letting go of by leaving here. Sometimes it seems like not much at all. Sometimes it seems like I’m wiping out everything. But I know that’s not the case. It’s dramatic to think of it that way though, and yes, I sometimes have a flair for the dramatic. Everything from being abroad, and everything from before being abroad- that can’t possibly be erased. I don’t think there’s such a thing as a clean slate. I remember telling this to a friend I met while here. He had been traveling around the world for a year, and was on his way home, back to the U.S. “When I get back, it will be a fresh start.” I told him there’s no such thing. No do-overs. No fresh start. You either pick up pieces or break them apart. Either way, you hold on to something from the past and move forward. I don’t think a fresh start is what anyone should want- why would you want to do that, when your experiences have made you who you are today? You learn and evolve from your past experiences and adventures. This is how it should be, ideally, anyway. Now that he’s back, he jokes about how he’s regressing. I don’t think that’s possible either.  No going backward. Digressing, yes. Regressing… no. Digression has its pros and cons, I think.

I’m digressing right now, because I should be A) grading, B) writing about how wonderful I found The Land of Northern Thai to be, or C) getting some much needed sleep. But for some reason, I’d rather be writing this, occasionally stopping to stare out my window at the green field with the humped cow grazing and the white egrets that follow it everywhere under the wet, grey sky. Thinking about All of This. It’s…. something else.

Hanging Baskets, Lisu Village, Mae Hong Son Province, The Land of Northern Thai

Time Flies When You're Having Fun.

Last weekend, I went to Khanom to help out with a fundraiser/beach day for the Sri Thammarat Home for Boys, the orphanage in Nakhon. I know I have mentioned this before, but Khanom (which, by the way, means bread in Thai) is one of my most favorite places to “get away” to in Thailand. Close to Nakhon, it’s an easy escape when you want or need one. There is a bar there- CC’s Beach Bar- owned by a really great guy named Charlie. When I was there about a month ago (when we splurged and stayed at Aava), Charlie and I talked for a good long while about this event. How he was getting sponsors, like Coca Cola, to donate products and supplies, and how he was recruiting many foreigners, who now call the Suratthani and Nakhon provinces their home, for their time, money, and resources to make this dream of his a reality. All he wanted was to give these kids a day at the beach that they would never forget. He sourced boat rides along the shore, games and activity stations, kayak rides, a banana boat!, and a huge feast of food and treats. Then, he recruited a Nakhon teacher, who has been here a while, to coordinate it all, get teams of foreign teachers together, and execute it. I can’t believe all she did and was able to do, and how wonderfully she made it all come together. These kids were not lacking anything- they had bags and bags of toys given as prizes, and the day was filled with smiles and shrieks of excitement and the most positive energy.  After a busy week, I really had to push myself to go, but I am so glad I did.  

Originally, I was assigned to the scavenger hunt activity, but about an hour into it, the scavenger hunting was over, and I found myself knee deep building sand castles with the kids. Later in the afternoon, I took a boat ride along the shore with a group of about 10 kids who looked like they were between the ages of 4 and 10. Many of them had never been to the sea before let alone on a boat, so this whole experience had to have been a complete sensory overload. At times, the ride was silent except for the motor and splashing water- with the children watching the land and the water as we putted along, some with the most contemplative looks on their faces, some with just huge grins, and us two teachers just watching their faces and smiling for reasons of our own. I kept thinking about what these little children must have been feeling, thinking, what their imaginations must have been churning out about what they were doing and how they were making sense of it all. I thought about what it felt like to be that young and excited about something so foreign. There was one little boy, maybe six years old, who started off sitting next to me, then scooted down to the side. Then, gradually as the ride progressed, he scooted over a little bit at a time, until he was sitting in front of me, on my toes, his back against my knees, leaning on me and looking out at the sea, pointing out the big homes along one section of the beach, and letting out little excited gasps every once in a while. Adorable. It was a really good feeling, being there on that boat.

The end of the day was spent wading through the water, trying to corral these kids and make sure they were staying safe. All other activities had ceased and it was just pure water chaos. My friend Bliss, an Aussie who teaches here, also keeps a blog, and in it she wrote about one scenario in the water that I thought was really cute:

Many of the kids had never been to the beach before and I stopped a few of them drinking the sea water. I assumed they were doing it when they got thirsty but one of the other teachers, who speaks better Thai than me, asked a boy why he was drinking the sea water and he said he wanted to keep the ocean with him when he left. How beautiful. I ams o happy they were able to come along and have a wonderful day.  – Bliss, hellomissbliss.blogspot.com

At about 3:45, things began wrapping up and all of us teachers were dragging children out of the water, only to have them run back in, only to have us drag them back out, only until we finally found a way to put an end to the game we had unwittingly created. They simply couldn’t get enough of the ocean. I couldn’t either, as a child (actually, I still can’t- nothing’s better than being salty and sandy from a day at the beach. I LOVE IT.) It felt really good to be a part of something like this, and to be able to play with kids at the beach all day long- I miss those days.

One teacher was explaining to me how the beach day was giving him anxiety- the thought of orphans made him really sad. Seeing their faces, watching them all day- it wasn’t sad at all. It was wonderful. They were so happy. Kids are, after all, just kids. To them, this was a fun day at the beach- they weren’t wondering if we were judging them, pitying them, wishing better things for their lives. To them, on this day, their life was wonderful. And I feel lucky to have been a part of it.

Trying to keep him from running back into the water at the end of the day!

(To see some great photos, visit Bliss’ blog… I unfortunately forgot my camera.)

My Favorite "Rap-Song" Ever

Today, I woke up at 4 o’clock in the morning. I left my apartment about a half an hour later, and drove the unusually quiet 5-minute commute to school. While the rest of Nakhon seemed to be sleeping the darkness away, NICS was ablaze with light, and the library was filled with… ladyboys.

Our Mandarin Teacher

Getting A "Gentle" Application of

the Inch-Thick Makeup

A Student Getting His

Makeup Done

          Yes, that's right. Ladyboys were our makeup artists, hair stylists, and wardrobe coordinators. And they were working hard when I arrived on prepping our students for the parade that would be taking place in 5 hours. I thought I had it hard having to wake up at four, but some of our students had been up since 12 or 1 o’clock. Some didn’t even go to sleep at all. It was insane. I couldn't believe the good moods everyone was in- the Thai staff, the kids, and most of all, the makeup/costume/hair people, who had to process over 50 people!

Karn- as a Japanese Man. Note the Lack of Daylight Out the Window... 

All I knew was that we would be participating in a parade for some festival. Any time I asked why I would be getting dressed up in costume, I was told “This is a parade!”, or “This is a festival!” When I asked why a festival/parade was taking place, they said it was for a procession to the wat- Wat Phra Mahathat- only arguably the most famous/important wat in Southern Thailand (see previous blog entries or Wikipedia.) Apparently, it contains a relic of Buddha- one of his teeth! Either way, what I was being told was not quite so informative, so I asked other teachers. They told me it was to celebrate the 10^th Lunar Month. I asked why the 10^th Lunar Month was so special, and everyone shrugged. So, I asked Google.

Part of a Float

Waiting for the Parade to Start

Boys in the Back of A Truck

Waiting and Waiting

Our Students Also Waited... and Waited

Thailand is SO Colorful!

Some of the Parade Sights....

Some of the King's Wives

Waiting to Begin the Procession

According to my not-so-extensive research, I would liken the festival of the 10^th Lunar Month, or Sat Duan Sip, or “Rap-Song Tai Yai” (obviously, for those of you who know about my affinity for rap songs, I like this name better) to All Hallow’s Eve (or what I know of it) or to Dia de Los Muertos (or what I know of that.) It is Thai Buddhist belief that during the 14^th to 15^th days of this month, the spirits of ancestors come back to this world for a visit. So the people, generally afraid of upsetting ghosts, especially ghosts of family members who might be a little upset with how the family name has been upheld/abandoned, tend to want to make some merit during this time. Thus, extensive and elaborate offerings are made to the Thai Monks. This is where the parade comes in, as it is essentially one gigantic procession of people bringing gifts to the monks for merit.

The Dead

One of the King's wives...
 and a Korean

Pharaoh

Almost all of our students participated in the parade. I was so tired, but so excited when I got to the school and saw everyone dressed in “international”  and Thai costumes. One group of students portrayed the King of Thailand and his wife, secondary wives, sons, and servants. Then another group was dressed in costumes from around the world- circa 1500-1900 A.D. We had Japan, Korea, Elizabethan and Victorian England, France… Oh! Please forgive the date estimations previously stated- there were also a couple of Ancient Egyptian pharaohs. All kidding aside, everyone was beautifully dressed. We were excited to get our hair and makeup done because everyone looked so great! I didn't recognize a lot of the students at first- SO much makeup was used. We couldn’t wait to get our costumes on and be a part of the parade. By the time 7:45 rolled around, everyone was looking exquisite. 

I Prefer To Remember Myself

Like This

Except for me and Clare. We weren’t sure what we were dressed as, but our principal, who can sometimes be more awkwardly blunt than me, said he couldn’t figure out if we were vampires or transvestites from the turn of the century (1900, not 2000.) Unfortunately, he was right. Not only that, but between the makeup and the lace shirts and the rough skirts we were given, and the hot Thai sun beating down on us, we were very, very uncomfortable.

They're 13 But Look Like They're 25
(and when I told them this, they were insulted: "Ew!
That's SO OLD, teacher!"- excuse me?!?)

 I’m going to end this by saying it was an experience. Not quite what I thought it was going to be, but nothing ever is here! The other people’s costumes were beautiful. The floats were amazing- intricately designed, come made completely of flowers and fruit, and despite everyone running on little to no sleep, everyone was in a great mood.  I got some great photos and had a good time with the kids.
     One thing: I wish I didn't look like one of the ladyboys who made me up.
     I can now add "Dressed in Complete Thai Costume for a Parade" to my list of things I've done in Thailand. Right below "Officiated a Spelling Bee at a Local University" and "Guest Lecturer at English Camp" (Twice!). 
Don't worry- the Spelling Bee was amazing- there will hopefully be a post about that relatively soon. Just waiting to get my other camera back. 

My Virtually Unrecognizable Yet Beautiful Students in Costume

NICS Teachers & Faculty

Almost Completely Made of Fruit and Flowers!