Sawatdee Bii Mai

This is just a quick post to wish everyone a Happy New Year.  In Thailand the year is 2555 BE (Buddhist Era).
In the last few days I've been to three New Year's Parties, all going late into the night and involving good food, karaoke and good company.
Fireworks and lanterns are abundant in the sky tonight.  Filling the entire horizon with artificial stars and wonderfully colourful explosions.
I have plans for another party in the near future with the other exchange students where we will make some of the food that we've been missing thus far.
I am working on the next retrospective update from November and hope to get it up soon.

I wish everyone a healthy and happy new year!  Try to stick to any resolutions you make and enjoy yourself as much as possible.

(See a nice and quick post)

Not the fireworks from tonight (because my camera couldn't capture them) but fireworks none the less :)

Fa la la la la la la la bacon...

     Hello all, I realize that it has been quite a long time since I've updated. My deepest apologies to any who were upset by this.
     In the last two months a lot has happened. So much so that it would be nearly impossible for me to include everything in one blog post. So I propose this solution: I shall restart my blogging with a lovely Christmas story and then we can Tarantino it back through the beginning to see how I got there. Everyone okay with that? Good, because that is how I have decided it and so it shall be.

A Lovely Christmas Story
     As with most Christmas stories this one begins with hopelessness and end on a high note (or a kiss, but not this time). Over the weeks leading up to the holiday we, that is my friend Deng-Tai and I, were planning a trip to Khon Kaen to join our friends in the celebrations. After many complications and then finally a ban on all holiday travel, due to some exchange students breaking certain rules, the plans were cancelled. It was at this point that we had lost our Christmas spirit; there was no snow, no visiting of friends and no "holly jolly" feeling in the city. 
     However, as we are exchange students and therefore adaptable and resilient, we did not let these draw backs ruin our Christmas. We planned for me to stay at Deng-Tai's house. A main factor in our decision and renewed happiness was that she had macaroni and cheese that her mother had sent. So I set out for her house on the eve of the big day, with a only bag and Christmas box from my mom. We got lost only twice, for a moment or two, but we'd made it before and could this time too. 
     After arriving I headed up to her room where we could begin our celebration. We watched three movies over the course of the night; the Grinch, A Charlie Brown Christmas and the Miracle on 34th Street. While we waited we decorated our tree, a simple drawing in a book, but that was all we needed. At supper time we took a break and made the macaroni and cheese which so swayed our decision. While we worked we listened to and sang the carols of childhood and of our home country.
     We ate way too much chocolate and I nearly threw up with the amount of macaroni we ate.  We finally went to sleep in the wee hours of the morning, anticipating a warm Christmas morning (something new for both of us).  Our plans to awaken early and Skype with our families were ruined when we slept in :D  It all worked out though, we just Skyped later in the day.  Christmas morning was definitely a success! 
     Later in the evening we went to the mall to buy presents for the gift exchange we were going to do at a party later.  The party was at our friend Gun's house and there were farang and Thais alike.  Before going to the house we visited one of the waterfalls in the city.  Fie from France made spaghetti carbonara for us, it was delicious, she did a great job.  There were also French Fries and many other Thai foods (some I liked, some I did not).  We listen to music and comedy, played with his punching bag and his dad let us check out his guns.  We ended up staying the night, unknown to us at the time of arrival.  One of the gifts was a movie Let the Right One In, the original Swedish version of the Hollywood remake Let Me In, and in my opinion a much better movie, so we watched that.  
     Christmas was fun, the party was great (I helped cook shrimp, I don't like shrimp and seeing them cooking didn't help) and  I had an awesome holiday!

Plans for the next week include a Rotary New Year's party and seeing a movie with some friends (A Big C just opened in out city and they have movies in English subbed in Thai, so everyone can enjoy :)).

I will attempt to update much much sooner with more stories from the last two months.  Until then please enjoy my Christmas story and share with me what you did for the holidays!

Flying a kite at Gun's Grandparent's House

Our Super Special Awesome Christmas Tree!

Chang lae Ngoo lae Bling, Oh My!

This will be a very short post.  I will post again next week sometime with more details and events.

 

All the farang (foreigners) got to participate in our school's sports day parade.  Which means it was another day to get dressed up.  Now, if I had written a post the day of or the day after this parade, it would be an angry one.  But I have mellowed out on the subject and have found that it wasn't quite as bad a day as I had thought (wow the tenses in that sentences are screwy).  I won't go into much detail, but we started 2 km from our school and then walked to the school, then we stood for about an hour waiting for a ceremony to finish (I only use these words because none of us farang knew what was going on, so we waited), then me and my friend had to stand on the road side and wait for our ride, for another half an hour or so.  Luckily there was a shop just across the street and we bought some orange Fanta. 

With my Rotary club here, we helped out with the flooding by packing bags of supplies for those unable to leave their flooded homes and for those who are living elsewhere.  A big circle was set up and you would get a bag and then walk around the circle and people would put the supplies in your bag (a bad explanation, I realize), think of it like trick or treating for the Good Samaritan.  The bags were then delivered to Bangkok; some of our club member (like our President) went to help distribute them.  I myself would like to go to Bangkok to help out directly, but I have a feeling that it may be deemed dangerous.  I will ask and in the meantime, continue to do what I can here.  As long as you all over there do what you can as well (donate, pray, give support, etc.) --> there was this really nice commercial on here that had messages for the Thai people from Japan.  They said things like ganbatte and sousou (meaning fight fight in Japanese and Thai respectively) as well as messages of hope and love. 

I learned a new word in Thai that doesn’t have a direct translation to English its: nam jai, it expresses the idea in Thai culture that it is necessary to help other who are in need, whether you know them personally or not.  From my understanding it means something like “water heart”, in the sense that you have to let your heart pour out in the giving to and helping of others. 

On to something a little more light-hearted, I had my first moment of “Oh, I can’t remember what the word is in English.”  It was brief and it involved the word “sapaloht” which means pineapple but, at the time, I couldn’t remember that J

That’ll be all for now, a non-picture post, as I have no pictures from these events on a camera that I currently have access to.  

Tomorrow I am off Phu Kradeung National Park; where I will be climbing a mountain, taking beautiful pictures and attempting not to be eaten by wild animals (including snakes and leeches à ngoo and bling in Thai) or trampled by wild elephants (chang). 

Thus I will be without internet until the 14^th and probably too tired to write a blog about it until the weekend.  I will however bring paper so I make notes to make sure I do not forget anything important that occurred.    

At this park on November 10^th, we will be celebrating Loy Krathong, a water and lights festival.  It is a time when thanks are given to the water spirits, couples wish for happiness, others pray to Buddha and still others wish for good luck and longevity.  All this is accomplished by floating a krathong (boat made from banana leaves) down a river after having lighted candles and incense on it and decorated it with flowers; as well as floating paper lanterns into the sky (like Tangled).  If you would like to read more go here: http://www.thailand.com/travel/festival/festivals_loykratong.htm

If you would like to see pretty pictures Google Images Loy Krathong Festival. 

I will talk/write at you all soon, hopefully with pretty pictures.  Until then....

See you on the flip side :)

Too hot to think of title...(well, one any better than this one)

Wow, almost a month since my last post.  Well, sorry for the really long stint of inactivity.  It was mostly due to lack of internet connection and business.  I'll try to cover everything in this post, but if it turns out I'm too lazy, I'll post again in a few days to cover the things this missed. 

First thing I did was explore a little, so here are some pictures from my exploration. 

Then; Pit Nui, Pre Pun, Puen and I went to the Mangrove forest.  It was very pretty and only a little dangerous (on the bridge and the damaged pathway that had trees growing through the middle of it. 

That same day we went to the aquarium and saw lots of cool looking fish, including those in Finding Nemo and also some sharks and rays and other cartilaginous creatures. 

The next thing I did was go to RYLA Camp (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards).  It was just like summer camp and it was all good fun.   We did a lot of things (which I have no pictures of because my camera died and also my memory card became full). 

Day 1 we hung around the camp and got to know each other (the camp was completely in Thai, unless there was something very important for the foreigners there to know in which case it was translated). 

Day 2 we went to a wat, which is a temple and also a pottery place.  The camp was in Korat Zoo, so we also got to explore that.  Saw some reptiles and nocturnal animals (had a staring contest with an owl). 

Day 3 we went to Little Italy and an adventure place called Bonanza.  Here it rained, a lot.  Everything was soaked and when things get wet in Thailand, they don't dry because it's so humid here.  But it was still fun.  I bought chocolate, really good chocolate and then helped clean the garbage that was left on the bus and accidently put my chocolate in that pile.  It pains me to talk about it, I'll be in therapy for ages. 

Day 4 we toured a hydro power plant, we went into a really deep tunnel to see something mechanical (I didn't quite understand because they were speaking Thai, my vocabulary doesn't yet extend to Hydro Power jargon.  We also hiked up a large hill to plant a tree at the top, I called it a pilgrimage because I assumed it had more meaning to those who knew what was going on.  Then each team (everyone was split into teams, I was green) did a presentation and every country did one too.  I went with Canada because I didn't have enough time to learn the lines in Thai to present with the Green Team. 

Day 5 was the last day and we all sat in a big hall and awards for participation were handed out.  Then we went on home.  Well most people did.  All of the Foreigners and some of the Thai students went to ThreeBound.  A Rotary conference.

At ThreeBound, the inbound were all there to tell the potential outbound about their countries and about the exchange itself.  Also we played sports.  Marvellous times were had by all. 

After all that I took a few days off to relax and then went and made pancakes at Deng Tai's house with Jessica.  It was an adventure because (due to Deng-Tai's wheat allergy) we had to make our own mix, and we didn't have all the ingredients.  But it all worked out in the end, after some playing with batter to make it a less watery concoction.  The first one we made had the consistency of crepes and the appearance of scrambled eggs, ergo the name Scrambles PanCrepes.  I think we should patent it, it's quite a good snack food.  So just when we were thinking Jessica and I would have to leave, DengTai's mom comes in and says that we are staying the night.  Which was fun, but smelly, we hadn't brought any "sleepover items."  Then in the morning when we thought we were going to go home, they said they would take us to Robinson (the good mall in Chanthaburi) until 2pm.  Also, because Jessica had a dance class it was supposed to be me and Deng Tai, then the dance teacher calls and cancels, so we got to unintentionally hang out for two full days, gotta love Thailand. 

Monday, my family and I travelled to Pattaya.  For some good old fashioned tourism.  We saw the Sanctuary of Truth, which is essentially a temple but made completely of wood.  It contains many styles of art, including Thai and Cambodian and Indian.  It has four halls each facing a different direction and each representing a different creator or aspect of human nature.  Construction started in 1981 and is still not done, it has cost 2,000,000,000 baht so far. 

After we went to a National Park, whose name escapes me, I may look it up later, but probably not.  Its pretty well known.  We saw traditional Thai dancing and a Muay Thai performance as well as an awesome elephant show (although occasionally the "fun time" mood was killed when you heard the jingle of chains around the elephant's foot).  The elephants, threw darts, played basketball, danced, and gave massages (at this I thought, I don't care how well the elephant is trained I would not let it step on me).  It was quite good.   

Pictures all at the end in an annoying way, because I'm tired of trying to position them.

That's everything I have for now.  I start school again tomorrow and I think things are going to change there because Noi Na's Mom called and said she was bored at school.

I'll let you know when it happens.

Delicious drink that I will miss

This milk is an important plot point

Mangrove Forest

Mangrove Forest

Mangrove Forest

Mangrove Forest

Tree in the middle of the path

Shark at Aquarium

Seal Show at Korat Zoo (RYLA)

Figure in Wat

Cool Pottery

Dinos at the Zoo!!!

Sanctuary of Truth

Thai Dance

Muay Thai

Thai Dance

Elephant Show

Elephant riding a bike

Elephant playing basketball

Finally! An Update!!

Sorry for the very long wait before an update.  The internet is still broken and my mind is beginning to go.  As such, this post will likely be very random, mostly notes I've typed on my iPod over the last, however long its been. 

Let us begin: 

I had fish and ate its spine.  It tasted good as I had thus far subsisted on delicious fried chicken and subpar pork and beef . 

Pee Nui explained how you have to eat quickly in this family.  The first time she ate with them, she ate slowly, looking pretty and then looked up and the food was gone!

She also teased me about my pronunciation because I had said "kao" and pointed to something "white", because "kao" means white, but with the tone I used, it  meant "mountain".  So she was like, "mountain, where is this mountain, I see no mountain." 

I also ate chocolate covered seaweed the Pee Nui and Pre Pun had brought back from Korea.  It was weird, but not terribly inedible, although I suppose my not liking seaweed probably contributed to my discontent.  The chocolate was however very good, top quality chocolate, that was ruined by the seaweed. 

I suppose if they had a real winter all of the stray dogs would be purged in some kind of ice apocalypse.   (I wrote this because I was getting annoyed by all the dogs, in restaurants and such and having to avoid getting touched by them because they look diseased.)

They bought me bacon yesterday and I ate it this morning.  I speculate the purchase was due to my nearly  being brought to tears over seeing bacon in a salad they had ordered in a restaurant.

You know you're not using dollars anymore when your order at KFC comes out to 443.00. 

I am eating Korean Grilled Pork with Chopsticks made in Thailand listening to French music. 

Paper Lanterns :)

Temple, If you make it bigger you might be able to see the monks inside...

Candy Maker!  Things in front are molds.
 

Pretty Lights

Went to a Chinese vegetarian festival.  It happens because there are 10 days where some people don't eat meat or any animal products, etc. 

 I hate pictures on this site!  Anyway...

That's all for now folks!

The next post will probably be an even longer wait as I have camps and such to go to this month...but we'll see.  

Flood Week! Its a new holiday.

So the internet is down at the house and I'm taking this, now rare, opportunity to update my blog (which is a word I've just realized, I don't really like).  Anyway, the internet went down right after my last blog post (it wasn't my fault, I swear).  I've realized that said blog post sounded very much like complaining.  And it was.  But that's not to say I'm not having a good time, it was just a bad day, and I had subsequently no internet to fill you all in on the awesome parts.  Which I will now do.

The reason the internet isn't fixed is because no one can get to the house to fix it because there is a flood (nahm too-am).  There were three to four days of incessant rain and the river overflowed.  This river was full of fish and, as a result of the flooding, people could fish in the streets.  I don't have any pictures and I haven't seen it myself yet because who wants to go to a flooded area if you don't have to...I do.

I wrote a journal about last Friday and Sunday, they were good days and you may now read of the awesomeness.  (Again, no pictures, because I'm a terrible person.)
Friday:

Today started off by going from bad to worse.  Yesterday we were told we had to dance again today and we only had a few hours to practice.  When I got to school today I had to try and fit into their "free size" leotard thing.  Me and my friend could not fit in because she was too tall and I was both taller than her and wider.  So they found us the "large size" ones and they worked.  Also we wore long mermaid-like skirts.  Then we drove to the waterfront and it was hot and rainy and the material of the leotards were specifically designed to cause the most pain and discomfort.  So we danced and we listened to music and my tall friend and I hid behind the "wall" for a while to avoid the shouting and such.  I had a major headache and was discontented and dispassionate about the whole thing.    Then we went home.  My friend came to my house because she had no way to get to her house.  (It gets better here...)

Around 5pm that night we had to return to the same place on the waterfront to do another, different, dance that the exchange students had made up.  This was more fun than I had expected it to be.  The dance started with a French Canadian Flash mob dance, then went to a Thai dance and then to an American hip hop song and finally the Macarena.  No one here knows the Macarena so they did not get the inside joke, but we knew and that's all that matters. 

After dancing my tall friend and I walked around the festival for a little while, and were able to, with our limited language skills, buy some drinks and some food.  We had these delicious rice ball things that had sausage skin around them and were filled with rice mix.  We also bought ice cream and someone bought us tiny chocolate roses that tasted like strawberry and we bought pineapple chips, which are delicious. 

We wandered around and looked at the stores and I had pretty much the most fun I've had in a while.  We were going to go back tomorrow but I have a rotary thing. (Which I didn't end up going to because the food would be too spicy, so I stayed home and had pizza and pasta and wings with my little brother.)

Sunday (clearly written the day after):

 Yesterday we made cookies, we being me and two other exchange students.  They came to my house because I have an oven (braving the flooded streets).  We made chocolate chip cookies with rice flour because one of the exchange students has a wheat allergy.  The cookies were a little different tasting than usual, we think it was because of the different tasting brown sugar.  The cookies were slightly burnt, because nobody knew how to use the oven (the last time anyone used it was the Brazilians who were inbounds last year).  We thought the oven wasn't working because it wasn't heating up.  We were about to give up when Dtang-tai, turned the timer dial, just for fun, and the light turned on!   It was a good moment.  The ones on the top rack were burnt beyond recognition, the ones on the bottom were burnt on the outside but alright-ish on the inside and the third batch was almost perfect.  Although all were flat, like 2D flat, because things melt very fast in Thailand.  It was quite fun to chat, we had conversations in or about Thai, English, Spanish, French, Mandarin and Russian.   

Those were some good times, now I just sit at home, slowly working my way through my Complete Thai book.  Which reminds me, today I understood my first full Thai sentence that wasn't said to me in an excruciatingly slow manner and then explained afterwards.  It was Khun mair talking about me getting a SIM card for my little brothers old phone and she said, more to herself: gor dai mee to ra sah, which means (essentially) "then you can have a phone." Yay for progress :)  

I've also discovered the deliciousness that is Durian snacks.  I've had cookies, bread-sticks and (Ritz) crackers with Durian (the crackers also had pork) and all were delicious. 

Off for the rest of the week due to said flood and will hopefully be back to school on Monday.  Also just noticed that the font in this post is constantly changing, but am too lazy to change it and you can think of it as being on purpose.  

Ants in my Keyboard!!

So I must have dropped some candy on my desk or something, I can't find it, but there are ants on my desk.  I keep my laptop there and spend the first few minutes after turning it on chasing the ants around the keyboard and killing them!
Any who...
School is still good, although I am increasingly uncomfortable with the amount of dancing they want us to do.  On Friday we preformed a Lam Thai dance in front of the school (We being the exchange students, some regular students and the teachers).  It was part of a school show.  We had to get make up put on and get our hair done. Neither of which I enjoy doing (as I'm sure those who know me can attest to).  But I did it, and I thought that was it.  But apparently we have to dance at the school charity show this weekend (why does it always have to be dancing!).
Also today in the school they did a uniform check.  The boys who had something wrong (I'm not sure what because I didn't understand what was being said) were hit on the back of their legs with a stick.  They checked hair lengths and if it was not short enough for the boys or all one length for the girls they took scissors to them...I found this strange.  My exchange student friend's Thai friends explained to her that because she was an exchange student, she wouldn't be punished.  My friends didn't say this (perhaps they didn't know), so I spent the rest of the assembly in fear that there was something wrong.  (My nails were too long but my friends brought nail clippers with them so I violently trimmed my nails to avoid being beaten... unnecessarily)
On a lighter note, my younger brother is in training to become a monk so we visited the temple he is at on the weekend, Wat Phai Lom, I think.

Looking forward to another week, gonna be busy, lots of stuff to have done for Friday, and usually really tired when I come home from school.

Can't Think of a Title

Sorry for the hiatus of sorts.  I was away for the weekend and the week has been busy.

Gifts From School

Friday I went to school for the first time.  It was a part day, I saw my classroom and met the students.  Then the all the exchange students at the school (4) went to the gym to give speeches (which I was not aware of until that moment).  The school gave us some flowers and Thai Bean Cake, very welcoming.  I was only at the school for two hours but by the end of it I had melted.  The uniform has long sleeves and a long skirt, who came up with that?  I've seen other school uniforms, they get short sleeves and short skirts, and the guys at our school get shorts and a t-shirt, its not fair!

First Night Resort

Nori Seaweed Flavour

After that we left for Korat, to go to a Rotary Inbound Orientation.  We took a half bus - half van, there were 8 of us and the driver.  Everyone in the car was shorter than me, so they had a comfortable ride because the seats are made for small people.  The top of the headrest, when I leaned back, was at my neck.  It is very hard to sleep like that.  On the way we snacked on butter cake, seaweed flavoured Lays and orange mango juice.
We live 6 hours away from Korat, so we went 5 hours to a resort on Friday and the rest of the way in the morning.
The orientation was fun, made lots of friends.  Mingles, networked, talked about my favourite things.  We learned a song about fruit and one about elephants.

Loom

Octopus thing

We visited a silk weaving factory and at one of the dinners I had like baby octopus or something, it was just so cute with its little tentacles that I had to eat it.

View from the second floor of my school building.
There's more than one building.
I'm on the third floor.

That Monday, I had my first real school day.  The students and the teachers are all very nice.  They made a sign for me that said "Welcome to Thailand and Streemandapitak School."   I am "taking" regular school courses at the moment (physics, chemistry, biology, history, etc), however the school is working on getting the exchange students into "not-classes" like cooking, Thai dance, etc.
I'm working on learning the alphabet mostly in class, and they give me books to read (in English).  School here is much more relaxed, sometimes the teachers just don't show up for class and then we play dominoes, chat or just hang out.

Bag-o-Pepsi

There's a market in the parking lot of the school that opens at the end of the day.  You can buy snacks, noodles, drinks and ice cream.  I bought a Pepsi, which they drink in bags with a straw.
A thing I found amusing to see on the way home from school was a young boy riding in the bed of a pick up truck eating noodles.

Saturday we had a party for my host sister, Preaw, because she is leaving on Wednesday for BC, Canada.  We went to the department store (a cross between a Walmart and a Costco).  There we bought meat.  They don't have their meat prepackaged for the most part.  It's just a cold table thing (like we would use for fruit) filled with raw meat.  I also saw a pile of pig heads for sale.  Later we ate the most delicious pasta I have ever had and I learned how to make sushi.  Then we did karaoke.

Park

Bridge to Park

Cafe across from Park

Today, Sunday, my younger host brother, older host brother, his girlfriend and Preaw took me to a park to see a victory monument for King Takshin (something like that) who freed Thailand from Myanmar's rule.

There's my poorly written blog for today.  I'll probably update weekly from now on.
Cheers

Flower from park

PS. I must reiderate how hard it is to put pictures where you want them in this blog

Victory Monument

Fifth Day

Lizard from car (same as kitchen and bathroom)

Back to the regular title, I've exhausted my creativity.

One thing I forgot to mention yesterday was that I had my first encounter with the local lizards.  The first was in the trunk of our car.  Maa plucked it out with a grocery bag glove.  The second was on the kitchen floor, we chased it out the door.  Done and done, no animals were harmed in the making of the blog.  Today there was also one in the downstairs bathroom.  And they always seem to be in the doorway.

Doorway lizard.

Breakfast was a familiar one, Frosted Flakes and toast.  Also I had guava.

Flood. 

Real Pad Thai.

Lunch I went to a restaurant called (I think) Pad Thai 100 and guess what I had...Pad Thai!! (shock and awe) It was real pad thai and it was soooooo good.  On the way there we went past a small contained flood, from when it was raining, everyday...
Then we picked up my uniform.  When we got home I tried it on and the skirt was too big, but def-con 1 was temporarily averted by the use of a safety pin.  Safety first.  I can only describe how I look in the uniform as frumpy, cause its a good word.

Hot Pot. (Suki)

Uniform.

Supper was a hot pot.  For those of you who don't know what that is (which included me) you have a pot of boiling water and then food stuff (like raw meat, vegetables and noodles) you put the stuff in the boiling water, then take it out and eat it.  Today was also the first day I tried something spicy, a really small amount of sauce, and all was well.  This success is likely attributed to my friend's mom's Indian cooking, delicious Indian cooking (or should I say aroi).
So I start school tomorrow and will finally know my schedule.  Later tomorrow we head out to Korat for an inbound orientation conference, so I will finally sort of know what the heck I'm doing.  (also adding pictures here is hard)

Day Four

We went shopping today, groceries and my shoes and socks for school.  In the mall I heard a bunch of songs I knew, including: YMCA, Rhythm is a Dancer, The Pink Panther Theme Song and Everything I do I do it for You.  Now Rhythm is a Dancer has been stuck in my head all day.
I also found a neat saying thing on a notebook:
Let your mind start a journey thru a strange new world.
Leave all thoughts of the world you knew before.
Let your soul take you where you long to be.
Close your eyes let your spirit start to soar, and you'll live as you've never lived before.
I had rice with chicken and pork for breakfast and lunch and pizza and pasta for supper.  I enjoyed it not only because I love pasta and pizza, but because I got to eat with a knife and fork again.  Here they eat with a spoon and fork.  You use the fork to put food on the spoon, which you then bring to your mouth for consumption.
The pizza place was like a Pizza Hut and they had a Canadian Bacon Style pizza.  It had cheese, bacon and corn on it.
At the end of dinner my older brother bet my younger brother 100 baht that he couldn't eat the last piece of pizza.  He ate it.  Classic times.

That's it for today, I'm quite tired so its rather short.  Also I'm watching Doctor Who at the same time, so the post is a bit disjointed.  I do love Doctor Who, and also Thai dramas are amazing.  I have no idea what's being said, but it's so dramatic!  I watched one for like 12 twelve minutes and 20 people died, including two good guys.  The comedy shoes here are also awesome, hilarious whether you speak Thai or not.

Day the Third

Changing up the self-explanatory titles.  Oh yeah!
So first day in Chanthaburi.  I had delicious khao with bped for breakfast (that's rice with duck for you non Thailanders) and really sour soup with some kind of gourd in it.  Preaw and I watched half of Black Hawk Down (English with Thai subs) and half of Kate and Leopold (Thai, no subs), while waiting for Pun (I think, who is my younger brother) to get up, he skipped school because he had a bad headache and for Maa and Por to come back from work for lunch (they can do this because the shop is like right outside the front door).
For lunch we went to a noodle shop that is famous in Chanthaburi and ate, you guessed it noodles!  We also had corn bread, which was more corn than bread and the strangest texture of corn I've ever had, and a Thai dessert which was some kind of coconut cream and jelly cake thing with corn.

The restaurant is in the background.

Then us girls headed to Streemandapitak school to get my uniform.  On the way, we stopped at the hospital to visit a sick Rotarian and meet all the other Rotarians, who were also visiting.  I met the other exchange student, a girl form Quebec named Audrey.  She came with us to get her uniform as she will be at the same school.  I start school on Friday, with a half day and then my first full day is on Monday.
We went home and I got a tour of the shop and learned some more Thai.
Then we went out for dinner at a seafood place by the sea.  Had crab, shrimp. squid, seafood fried rice, white rice and garlic chicken.  The meal reiterated to me my disdain of  eating things with eyes still attached.  I had the opportunity to look into the eyes of the shrimp that I was eating.
By then I was really tired, and I slept in the car on the way home.

I keep forgetting to mention that I was given a Thai name and a Thai nickname.  My name in Thai is Wanida and my Thai nickname is Bpin.

A few observations before I go to sleep:
There are dogs walking around all over the place here
Mickey Mouse, Stitch, Disney, Winnie the Pooh and Hello Kitty are big here
American Standard is a big company here
and Hospitals are depressing in any language

Second Day

Judging by the title I'm sure you're all intelligent enough to figure out that a) I'm not very creative and b) this post will be about the second day.
I didn't really sleep last night, don't know why, probably a sensory overload thing.  Preaw (my sister) had to wake up early, 5am to get to her VISA interview and I "slept" later until about 7am and hung out with khun maa (mom).  Preaw did not return until about 11am, apparently, there was a lot of standing in line.  Maa and I met Preaw and Khun Por (Dad) at a Japanese restaurant, right next to the one we ate at yesterday.  It was there I learned that tofu is slippery when wet and miso soup adds no flavour to it at all.  However, unintentionally dropping it in rice, with teriyaki sauce form your chicken, helps to rectify the utter blandness that is tofu.
Then Preaw and I went shopping and she bought us matching elephant coin purses.  Then it started raining, hard.  After waiting out the rain for a few minutes, it just got worse, then it got a little better and we decided to book it across the street and back to the safety of the condo.  When I say raining, I mean the streets were flooded rather quickly.  I am not used to running in a foot of water and, being the graceful beast that I am I tripped (in the process almost losing my sandal, having to go back a little ways to get it).  So my foot is scratched and my ankle is swelling (noticeably, Mother), but not too bad, took an Advil and will sleep it off (auto correct turned Advil into anvil, well that's one way to get to sleep).
Then we set off to Chanthaburi.  I have no good pictures of this drive as 1) it was rainy 2) it was dark and crucially 3) I was asleep for most of it.
About 40 minutes away we stopped at a restaurant.  The first table we stopped at had a frog on it and like the thick idiot I am, I once again forgot my camera (note to self: read your "notes to self" otherwise they are useless).  We didn't sit at the table with the frog, but I don't think its because there was a frog, I think it was because the table was getting wet from the rain.  There we ate rice with various toppings, curry if some sort and pork and sour mango stuff and so on.  They ordered the curry not spicy, but it still burned my tongue.  I also need to work on my rice to curry ratio, I think I was using too much rice (but it was spicy).
The toilets at the restaurant were squatters.  You stand on the sides of the toilet, squat, do your business, throw the toilet paper in the garbage and then pour water from a pot beside the toilet to flush it.  Is that what it's like in Italy?  I don't know.

My own awesome room.

Anyway, we get to the house (awesome house, really nice house) and I get my own awesome room and my own awesome bathroom and I get to stay the whole year. :)

Still having a great time.  And I once again promise pictures, when I figure out how to put them on here.

First Day

 After 24 hours of travel from Toronto to Tokyo to Bangkok, I was tired.  But meeting my host mom, dad and sister, YEO and the district chair-woman perked me up, for a little while.  We drove to their condo in Bangkok, making a stop at 7/11 for snacks and drinks and we'll be staying in the condo for a few days before moving on to their home in Chanthaburi.  We chatted for a little while and then went to sleep.
They let me wake up late and so the first meal of the day was lunch.  We crossed the street to the Central Plaza mall in Bangkok and ate Ramen at a Japanese restaurant.  Also, I forgot my camera in the condo (note to self: never do this again), so I wrote some notes about what I saw instead.  Here is a copy of my quickly written notes:
  Bangkok not much different than other big cities.  Has really steep roads.  Have not seen any speed     limits.   Saw guy selling things in the street.  In the middle of the street.  In stopped traffic.  Wearing a ninja mask.    Colourful taxis (pink, green, blue, yellow).  Lots and lots of people at bus stops.

These notes were from a ride to a hardware/home decor store.  After looking around, we went to a cafe next door.  I had hot chocolate (much richer than the stuff at home) and white chocolate cake (so good).  While we were at the cafe it started to rain pretty hard, we tried to wait it out but it didn't stop quickly.  So we called over some men carrying large umbrellas and they walked us to the car, that's their job.
Then we headed home and us girls went shopping at the Central Plaza mall, I didn't but anything.
Back in the condo, we're eating snacks, using the internet and watching TV.  The snacks are delicious.  I'm eating some kind of dried pulled pork, coconut cream flavoured peanuts and really spicy grilled seaweed.

Some words, I learned today:
Su-wai --> Beautiful
Aroi --> Delicious
Saa-bai --> sort of like comfortable, well
Dee --> good
Yin dee tee dai roo jak --> Nice to meet you
Mai --> question word (like "ka" in Japanese) and negative
             i.e.  Su-wai mai --> Is it beautiful?
                   Mai su-wai --> Not beautiful.

I am having an awesome time here and I promise there will be pictures soon.
 

How did I get here?

So, my mom told me about this program, The Rotary Youth Exchange, and said that I could go to school in another country for a year.  This was a compromise as a few weeks earlier I had said I wasn't ready to go to university and said I'll do another year of High school or go backpacking through Europe.  Needless to say she was not happy with these choices.  I was happy however, when she came home with this idea.
The application process was a long one.  First a preliminary application form with basic information.  Then came a small interview with some Rotarians from my city.  After that another application, although this one was about sixteen pages long and very comprehensive.  Then another larger interview with Rotarians and previous exchange students.  The interviews were nerve racking and the process was long but the results were worth it.  There were over forty countries to choose from and there was always a chance you might not get your first, second or even eleventh choice.  Everyone in our district (6330) was accepted and placed.  I was placed in Thailand (which I am thoroughly excited about).
After being accepted to the program, there were a number of conferences to attend all in preparation for the next year.  All the information for any mundane or unexpected eventuality was covered, I don't think anyone feels they are going in blind.
I just heard from my host club, The Rotary Club of Chantaboon, in Chanthaburi, Thailand, and cannot wait to get there.  Having just finished my exams and graduated from high school, I can't wait to start my next adventure!

If you are reading this and you think an exchange might be something you would like to do visit these sites to read up on it.
http://www.rotaryyouthexchange.net/
http://www.rotary.org
If you're interested, I encourage you to try it.