quite a lot has been happening and it's been hard to find time to make a blog post, and harder to crunch everything into a readable post, and not a novella.
the most recent and exciting news was that i hosted a visitor. my dearest andy came to visit and we had a great time. he stayed for a month and of course it went by too fast. despite the fact that i was teaching and therefore had to balance work and vacation, he had a great time on his own adventures, and we had a great time bouncing around to nearby attractions. Rayong is conveniently (compared to some places that other folks in my company are placed in) located near enough to bangkok by minibus (2-2.5 hours) and from there thailand is your oyster. in the other direction- southeast of Rayong lies Ban Phe, which is the ferry town to Koh Samed, a very popular weekend island getaway. Many locals and tourists visit the island.
When Andy arrived he had a few days to get over his jetlag and then he came to school with me for our christmas show. Thais don't really celebrate Christmas of course, but they sure get in the Christmas spirit. All the teachers were decked out in red. I didn't even have any red. I wore purple.
The Christmas show was a variety show of student performance. We had dance numbers, short skits, kids in santa hats singing 'Christmas all over the world' and even the the story of the Nativity. The foreign teachers were all required to put together some kind of performance. From all the skit planning experiences I've had over the years, I was excited to plan a skit. I chose to create a very American production, and modified Dr. Seuss's classic 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas' into a short skit for my students. I worked with some wonderful students in my M4-2 class (equivalent to 10th grade). They are some of the most creative students and they love to perform. They designed all the props and sets. I wrote the script, but they did most of the leg work. Sadly many of my pictures disappeared but I do have some that you can take a look at. I was really proud of those students. For about a month we practiced everyday after school and they even came on some weekends to make the props.
My wonderful performers. From left: Who 1: Jao, Got (in the back with sunglasses), Who 2: Yam in blue, Sets and props: Pond, Narrator: Babie (with the peace sign), Non: sets and props, Tae (far right): Mr Grinch! and Who 3: Yui in front who is not looking at the camera.
Last minute set repairs' the sign reads "Welcome to Whoville"
Show time! These are some other students helping to hold our Mt. Crumpit
Tae (Grinch) with his faithful dog Max (Mark) telling all of his plot to steal Christmas from coming to the town of Whoville
Stealing the presents, decorations and Christmas ham!
Foreign Language Department
Thai kids love to perform and are very creative. It was a really fun project working with these kids. I really got to know them better and I learned a lot about them and from them working with them beyond our class time. I was assisted in this project by a fellow English teacher, Teresa. She worked really hard at training the students with their speaking parts. It was a fun experience and I think the students really enjoyed it as well. I was especially honored when the Director of the School walked into the hot field with sun blazing down and took a picture for himself. All in all our skit in the entire Christmas show was about 15 minutes, but it felt like much more than that.
It was a joyous celebration for the first two periods of the school day. Then we had to teach classes for the rest of the day. This after 4 days of midterm exams. The students were so motivated to sit in class.
More stories of school and adventures to come...
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