Teaching in Thailand

I was an English teacher for a week, and a teaching assistant for the first week in a small town in north-eastern Thailand. V. few tourists there so got to see a very different side of Thailand. Stayed with a lovely family, ate lots of hot spicy food, including raw fish mixed with ants - very tasty! Had spicy papaya salad most days (no choice as all food supplied by the Thai lady I stayed with, but I wasn't complaining) - and although it made my noise run, my eyes water and my whole digestive tract burn, I grew to love it - especially eaten with fingers and sticky rice (not actually eating the fingers though, of course).

Anyway, teaching Thai children, even 17 and 18 year old ones, was a very trying experience, and quite surprising, too. The town I was in in the northeastern area of Thailand is rarely visited by westerners, unlike the rest of Thailand, so these children didn't have as many opportunities to practice their English with native speakers. However, although one or two were enthusiastic and came to talk to me outside of lessons, most were reluctant to even answer simple questions like "What is your name?" in class. Whether because they were shy/grumpy teens/didn't understand my accent/were asleep/hiding behind their bags on the desk whispering on their mobiles/engrossed in their cross-stitch/couldn't hear me over the din of the diggers outside, the fans buzzing overhead and the rest of the class moving chairs and chattering - probably all of those reasons and more, the lessons turned into mainly me speaking about myself and England and English things and people. Which bored me to death when I had to do it about 12 times in the week, but pleased the few of them that could understand/hear/were listening very well. I explained the differences between the UK, Great Britain, England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and N Ireland to them, via Venn-style diagrams on the blackboard. And I reminded them about the importance of verbs: "It's 'My name is Bea'!!" I suppose if I'd been there for longer proper lessons would have been more feasible, but being there for a week I was never going to achieve that much.

Apart from teaching, I was invited to a few Thai social gatherings which always involved lots of food. I think throughout Asia, not just in Thailand, the common greeting is, "Have you eaten?" And whether you have or not, if you're a visitor, you must eat what is offered to you, otherwise you're rude! Hence I think I gained a few unwanted pounds on my trip. Thoughts of going for a jog or doing some yoga remained just that, as just standing still under a fan caused me to break out in a sweat, and when I was shovelling food down my throat nonstop all day, I was always too full to move!

Needless to say, the few Thai words I learnt were about food. Every meal, "Aloy, mai?" "Mmmm! Aloy!" Delicious! And "Aaaaaah, phet!" Hot!

I really enjoyed my teaching stint overall. Making me consider doing more...only teaching English though. Although I'd never say it was easy, its definitely not the stressed-out kind of teaching that a UK teacher would have - I wouldn't have to worry about kids failing (none of them do surprisingly enough!), and its really pleasing when they do pick up something you've explained to them...watch this space!!