WERCOME TO THE BROBISHPELE!

Salutations!

Just salutations, and nothing else,

no greetings, and especially no hello...We would not want to over do it of course.

Hello to our loveable blobs! We feel that it is our duty to inform you of a slight error in the blob. Although the text last time did not indicate who was writing the blob, be assured that you can assume it was both Thomas and Michelle. Actually, whatever the text is I think that you can assume it is a joint effort of writing. thank you so much for being so understanding, we would be lost without all of you, you are so so kind, and we so much love your comments, ohhh, this is sounding more and more sarcastic, but in reality, we love you all very much! Sorry, or in Thai, so solly, we wir stalt brobbing naw......MORE BLOBBING!!!!

Sorry, the above text is a rough idea of the Engish we are experiencing in Thailand. We by no means are being rude, because whenever we speak Thai they all burst out laughing, probably at our pronunciation. We just need to vent, we don't laugh at them for saying rets eat lice! Teaching Engrish is hard!

Now for a brief look at what we have done this past week!

With two weeks of teaching under our belts we are definitely getting a bit more comfortable. We have a rhythm of sorts now. It is different than the schedule originally laid out for us...which was:

breakfast at 7:30am
leave to school before our host mom at 8

frag raising ceremony 8:30,

school starts at 9

supper at 6pm.

That was laid out as our strict schedule, but like we mentioned before things are a bit more easy going here, so it changed. And it's all very good!

Here is a more accurate schedule:
Wake up at about 7 am because the dogs come into our hut and bark and jump and growl and lick and be dogs at us. Had we mentioned the dogs before? if not there are six very energetic puppies and one mom. They like to play when we like to sleep....lot's of fun! ahahaha. This is really just a picture to show the dogs...Michelle was already awake when it was taken.

Breakfast at around 8:10. We really wish we had some pitures of our breakfast, but instead we'll just tell you about it. We always eat rice, which is great! We also always eat cucumbers, which is OK, and we always eat dried minnows, which is not so great! Breakfast sure is an adventure!

We get to school by about 8:45 and suprivise the last half of the flag raising ceremony (a photo can be seen in our last blog entry), and the above photo is of our transportation. Thomas really enjoys driving to work on a scooter, despite the chance of death!

At 9 we begin our first class of grades three and four. They greet us altogether every morning, of course very monotone like most memorised things that you don't really understand are, "Goodmorning Khon kru Toe-Mass and Khon kru Mich-ch-elle." we say "Goodmorning!" they say "How awe you today?" we, "I'm good...I'm great! And you?" they, "am fine tankyou. and y--oh no hehehehe" we, "okay, you can sit down."

Actually, each class that we teach begins the lesson with the same memorized greeting, that has no meaning. So what we have been trying to o now at the beginning of every lesson is ask each of them how they are doing, and get them to use other words other than "am fine, tankyou." It's working out quite well with our grades five and six, but the younger ones either aren't quite understading, or are just a bit more shy. But we all have fun with it when we make the emotions faces to show the different feelings.

10 am is grades five six. This class has many very bright students that are loving the english that they are learning. It is a lot of fun to teach them.

Some days we teach preschool which is really just numbers, ABC's, colours, basic things....and they are very sweet. They have a lot of energy and like to play and repeat back at the top of their lungs.

Then 1pm is the evil grade one and two's. this is a very challenging class. We think of things that we think they will enjoy for lessons, and they do for part of the class and then they just get bored and decide to be crazy devil children.

In between and after all of the classes that we do, we do alot of playing and just fun with the children. After class there is as much learning as in class, and we learn thai from the students then as well. Many of the girls like to play volleyball so Thomas has a lot of fun playing with them.

Lastly, we always eat supper after eight pm. This is no problem for us, but we do really appreciate our Thai mom's seventeen year old son, who does ALL the cooking, cleaning and household chores...He is a really great guy...and Michelle is in love with him.

Anyways, we must go now, sorry for the lack of photos...It is very hard to put photos on, it takes approximately ten minutes for each one, and it does not always work! We will try for more next time! We hope to hear from all of you...Comments mean you love us! We were thinking of creating a communal blog account so that more of you can comment, and then post the username and password on the blog itself, would anyone care to do this? If so, go right ahead, and post it in the blog comments! We love and miss you all!

Thomamas and Michelley

A BRIEF DOCUMENTATION OF OUR TIME IN ISAAN

Hello to all of our blobs!

We apologize for being unable to blob up until now...If you were here, you would probably understand. However, you are not, and that is why we are blogging, so we shall start with a detailed description of our time in Isaan, supplementing with some photos as well!

We started our volunteering adventure, going from Bangkok to Chaiyaphum. This involved a five hour bus ride on a luxury tour bus, and cost about five dollars each. As we drove, it became apparent that we were entering into a very different part of Thailand than we had previously been in. Sugar cane fields replaced sky scrapers, and cars were replaced by cows. A subtle, but very apparent change to us was that English language was completely replaced by Thai. We were the only westerners, so a transition of situations was about to take place. It felt like Bangkok was made for western tourists, and it seemed like Isaan was made for Isaanites.* An interesting fact is that less than twenty percent of the population in Isaan speak any English at all. Maybe that is why they need English teachers?

When we arrived in Chiayaphum, we were met by Oom and her little brother. They help to get us oriented with Isaan culture and teaching English to Thai children. We did this with an American girl Nicole, who is also volunteering in the same area as us. This photo is of a festival that we went to in Chaiaphum celebrating the beauty of Isaan.

This picture is an example of Isaan dancing. Aren't the women gorgeous? We found out after the performance that they were actually ladyboys...

We stayed in Chiayaphum for a night, and then it was off on another, not so comfortable bus, that took us even farther into rural Isaan. When we got to Chum Pae, we were greeted by our Thai mom Pi Wattana, who took us to her home where we would be living for the duration of the volunteering. The home itself is simple, and she loves flowers...so he has many many flowers. Almost a jungle-worth, we would say.

This is the back entrance of her home. We live in a hut to the right of her house...and enjoy comforts such as insects, small mammals, fish in our shower water and a toilet that does not flush. Having said that, we love it and love the family that we are staying with...She is an eccentric woman who does things her own way, and staying with her is really fun!

This is a shot from outside our lovely hut...Michelle appears to be writing, or reading. Maybe she is even marking students work? Wow, we sound like teachers!

Our Thai mom has two sons. One we rarely ever see, and he is sixteen. The other (seen above) is seventeen and is really great. He speaks almost no English, and is very nice. Our mom is not always around, and in her absence, Book the eldest son takes care of us. The photo above explains itself, other than the fact that Thomas is losing at the game by quite a large margin.

On our first day, we were thrust into teaching...this is the class that we taught...without a lesson plan...because we didn't really expect to teach the first day, but it all worked out!

The children really love hearing stories in English, and we have found that as we teach them English words, they teach us Thai in return. This is in library or the school where we teach, and we were reading them Beauty and the Little Mermaid. (Thai translated stories that are made English again are often garbled, and stories are combined.)

This is a view of our school. This is the flag raising ceremony that takes place every morning at eight-thirty a.m. We supervise it every morning when we get to school, after a thirty minute motorcycle ride! We are the only "staff" at school at this point, the rest show up a little bit later... things just move at a different pace, but we love it! Oh, and Thomas gets to ride a motorcycle every day, so he is happy.

These children look lovely, they are in grade two! Don't they look innocent, well behaved and disciplined? Well, they are anything but that. We refer to them as "spawn of satan" and even though they look sweet, they are capable of turning a well planned lesson into a complete catastrophe! We love them anyways...This is one of the younger classes that we teach, and it is one of the hardest grades to educate. The older ones are awesome, and we love teaching them.

The school we are teaching in has fifty three students, and four teachers. We have been to a wedding, a funeral and a cremation ceremony...more blogs and pictures to follow! We will do our best to keep blogging as often as possible...Thanks for reading, and leave a comment if you love us!

*We do not really know what to call people from Isaan, does anyone know?

HELLO BLOBS!

Well, Meesha and I have had a very cool couple of days, and our situation is much different to that of what it was the day before last.
We have begun the volunteering aspect of the trip, and are now safely with the english teacher. (where we will be staying) Our exact location is not known to us, but we are in a gorgeous part of ISAAN, near Chum Pae, in Kon Kean province... which is in the northeastern part of Thailand. The home that we are in is reminiscent of a teakwood jungle fort, and it is really cool. We cant post photos probably, because the internet is too slow, but with our words, we hope to describe the situation as well as possible.
The food has been excellent, with lots of pad thai consumed as well as tasty sticky rice and hot and sour soooooop. We are learning Thai at an alarming rate because even the English teacher is aborently unilingual. It is an awesome experience, and we are really glad to be in this part of Thailand! We are the only westerners around, people look at us and say, wow "That girl is so beautiful!" and then our host translates for us...We have gotten our picture taken and it is really great! We will keep blogging when we can, and we hope life at home is swell!
Oh, and dont forget to comment!
MEESHA and THOMAS

Here are a few photos.  Hopefully they satiate your thirst for pictures of some of our Thailand adventures.  There will be more to come....but it takes a really long to upload the images.

Enjoy!

at the top of the golden mount.  the view was amazing

some of the stairs that we had to climb to get to the top of it.

a bit of the view from the top.

feeding an elephant on the street in bangkok.  it was so quite.  But it really did look sad.  Later in our trip we're thinking about volunteering at an elephant refuge.  We think that would be a really great experience.  elephants are so cool...we would be able to spend time with them in a healthy atmosphere instead of where they are probably mistreated on the streets of Bangkok.

Very wind blown during our tuk tuk scam ride.  later there will be a picture of an actual tuk tuk.

our haggered pigeon friend.  there are so many pictures in the parks in Bangkok.

an entire tower made of coca cola cans....wow.  Chris, michelle thought of how you used to be the coca lola kid when you were little.  this picture is for you....it was a very cool site to see.
a picture of one part of a market.  the sun is shining at kind of a bad angle, but you get the idea.  lots of fruit and food.  and of course knock off designer things.

eating fresh pineapple from a street vendor outside of the Grand palace and Wat Phrat Khao.  it was very tasty.  there is soooo much fresh fruit and it is soooo delicious.  Wehave fresh fruit for breakfast every morning, but we don't have any pictures of that yet. 

one of the many statues of Buddha at one of the wats we've visited.  they are all so huge and colourful.

   
thomas looking at the breath taking view of one of the many wats.  they are so detailed on the outside and the inside.  it is unbelievable, really.

A picture of the reclining Buddha.  this statue represents when he became enlightened.  it is soooo big and can't really be captured in a picture very well, but we did our best.

thomas walking to the shared bathroom that is down the hall from our room.  The guesthouse is really great.  as you can see it is very simple, but it is so clean and the staff are so friendly and helpful.  We have met some very interesting people here as well, so it has a very homey feel.  it is a good place to escape the hustle and bustle of Bangkok.

this is a picture of our balcony and the view that we have from our room at Asha guesthouse.  for some reason we haven't taken any photo's of the actual room yet.  but ya, this is the view.  and it actually is pretty cool...this just isn't a very good picture.

now...this picture is not supposed to be of Thomas's bum, it's supposed to be of him loading out bags into the taxi, but michelle took it at the wrong time and then didn't take anymore because she was frantically trying to put her camera away thinking she might get it stolen...that was a silly thought.  also it is the first picture taken in thailand by us...so it has to be on the blog.

our last tim hortin's for a long time.  not that we are regular customers or anything....but it's a canadian thing I guess, so...... ya last one.  in vancouver airport 

We had a six hour lay over and thomas decided to have a little nap.  michelle was just too excited to nap and decided to take pictures of sleeping thomas to kill time.

Yes. this picture is upsidedown...you're not going crazy. but we thought it was cute so we needed to put it on.  And  yes michelle does need to work on smiling bigger in pictures...she knows.  hahaha.  anyway...this is us watching one of the many movies on our 15 hour flight from vancouver to hong kong.  we also played a lot of cribbage (michelle won...lawrence taught her how it's done.  thanks)  but didn't get any pictures of that.

sorry that the last post got so brief and fragmented at the end...I had worked so hard writing it and giving some nice details and then thomas decided to finish quickly and post it before I could even have a say.... oh well...you get the picture.  things have been good.  the people are great and the fruit is tasty.

well hello our fellow blobbers!  We have had our first two days in Bangkok.  They have been very eventful days (which is our excuse for not writing earlier, hahaha) ...so eventful in fact that after much sightseeing and walking around yesterday we returned to our lovely little Asha Guesthouse and laid down for what we hoped would be a short nap at 6:30 pm....we woke at 12:30am and decided that it had passed the point of nap and we should just sleep for the rest of the night.  Basically what we're saying is that Bangkok is great and all, but is very tiring at the end of the day.

It seems like we've done so much in the few days we've been here and it is hard to keep track of everything...we'll try to backtrack as best we can... keeping it simple of course. 

We arrived in Bangkok safely! afrer a great flight with Cathay Pacific (or as Thomas calls it, Cathay Specific...because they are so friendly and get you anything you need including lots of food and movies) we went straight to Asha Guesthouse with a taxi at 2am.  Asha is great.  the people are friendly and it is very clean and simple.  Our first morning in Bangkok: Michelle can't sleep and wakes up at 6:30 eagerly waiting to go down for breakfast.  after waiting as long as she can she wakes tired and sleeping Thomas to go down for breakfast at 7:30. ...the fresh fruit was AMAZING!!!  We venture out for our first morning into the very overwhelming Bangkok. After meeting another friendly traveller we journey the rest of the day together to Wat Pho...wat of calmness and happiness.  TO describe would be very challenging, all we can really say is it was amazingly incredible.  and so interesting.  we went to more wats today and the coolest part is that they are active places of worship... anyways, we will try and post some photos for all of you dear blobbanites, and we hope to read some of you comments! GOODBYE!

well...we have arrived in vancouver to enjoy a nice six hour wait.  our flights from Saskatoon left at 7:10 this morning. affter arriving at the airport at five thirty, our parents gave us a lovely goodbye.  we landed in vancouver at 7:40 gaining two hours in life. isn't that pleasant?!?!? only to travel to Hong Kong and then to Bangkok, when we will lose 13 hours from Saskatchewan and 15 from the  Vancouver time that we are beginning to really enjoy.  But we think we'll be able to deal with that loss of time because it's hot there, unlike saskatchewan or manitoba or bc or you get the picture.  

we'll be in touch with our blobbies (the people who read the blobs)

oh, and just for the record "Meesha" is actually spelled Micha! spelling really is important. just like in Anne of Green Gables...it wouldn't be the same if it was Ann (without an "e") of Green Gables.  but thomas refuses to believe that it really matters.

THOMASstuartDRIEDGERenns

Michelle

Before leaving

So, Michelle and I are going to Thailand!  That should be lots of fun.  I thought that I would set up a blog before we left, because those of you that know me would agree that I have a tendency to put off email related things as long as possible.  Anyways, I hope that some of you will read the blog, and if you do, I will keep posting things that Michelle and I are doing.  Please email me if you have any questions or want to post something yourself.  Oh, and depending on who is writing the blog, the font will change, isn't that a clever idea?  If Thomas is typing, it will be this font...and if Michelle is typing, it will be like this.  When we are both writing, we will do This!  Right now, Michelle and I are talking and adding a blog together! Ok, it is back to just thomas, so anyways, keep looking for blogs...and tell our mutual friends if you want,

sincerely,

THOMASstuartDRIEDGERenns