Thailand

First of all, let me just state the obvious and say that Thailand was amazing and I did NOT want to come back here! You cannot compete with a place where the first thing you notice is the smell of flowers and where you can lay in bed and listen to waves rolling onto the beach!

But let me start at the beginning, in which case I should say that I am so OVER the whole flying experience. I used to enjoy it and couldn’t understand why some people didn’t find it a delightful process, and then. . .

After 3 hours on a bus and 4 hours of sleep, the mini flying marathon began on Christmas Day. Our first flight to Shanghai was uneventful, besides my discovery that while Christmas music had the power to instantly make you feel joyful and festive the whole month before Christmas, when that day actually comes and you’re sitting on a plane, the music somehow loses that effect. It’s not that it made me sad or nostalgic for home, it’s just that it felt off- like blasting hard-core rap while doing yoga. It just didn’t fit.

In Shanghai, while we were being transported to our connecting flight via an airport shuttle which took us away from the main terminal and to deserted tarmac, I hypothesized that this was the airstrip for all the derelict planes, because there would be fewer people around to see the planes if the crashed and burned during take-off or landing. I wasn’t really convinced of the validity of my own hypothesis until we ended up sitting on the plane for over two hours while it was repeatedly announced that there was going to be a “few minute delay” due to mechanical problems.

When we finally landed in Bangkok and got a hold of our luggage, we had 30 minutes until our third and final flight took off. Let’s just say there was some Amazing Race-esque full-out running and careening through that airport, with some encouraging/insistent shouting of "Run! Run!" from gate agents thrown in for good measure. However, when landed on Koh Samui and encountered the glorious smell of flowers and a temperature well above -6, the stress and frustration of traveling dissipated at record speed.

When we arrived at Amity Bungalow in Lamai Beach late Christmas night, I reveled in the fact that I had to walk over sand to get to the bungalow I was sharing with Mary. Then as I was sitting on my bed I finally placed that unfamiliar noise and turning to Mary I said incredulously, "I can hear the ocean from my bed!"

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I lived on the beach! The view from my porch.

I ate my first meal in Thailand (pad thai, of course) at 10 o'clock at night sitting at a table on the beach listening to the waves, feeling a warm breeze and with countless stars visible overhead. Ah, Thailand, how I loved thee!

You remember that one morning when you were kind of startled awake and you were laying there trying to figure out what it was that woke you up and then you realized it was your dad nudging you and telling you you were late for work because your alarm didn't go off and then suddenly you were wide awake (when usually it would take a hot shower, a silent breakfast where no one talks to you because they know you hate mornings and a 20 minute commute to wake you up)? Well, that sort of thing happened to me my first morning in Thailand, only it was the unfamiliar smell of flowers that startled me awake and I didn't have to speed to work- instead I took two steps off my porch to Amity's open-air restaurant and ordered a breakfast of French toast with honey, a fruit salad, and freshly squeezed orange juice. . .

. . and this was my view. Every meal was like this, but one - literally on the beach or a few steps of it. Speaking of eating, I'm officially in love with Thai food. . .spring rolls, pad thai, Thai curry, fried egg noodles, fried rice, fresh fruit. . .

We spent Sunday uneventfully lounging on the beach and went to Lamai centre that evening for some shopping at the Sunday night market before we checked out Rock Bar- which is literally a bar on the rocks-and watched an amazing(-ly shirtless, well muscled and tattooed) Thai fire dancer.

Monday was another beach lounging day, although it wasn't so uneventful as the previous day due to a certain "large waves vs bathing bottom" episode that happened to a person whom shall remain nameless and which, once it was over with, was admittedly quite a hilarious incident. That evening we tested out the famous Thai bucket and checked out Swing Bar, which like Rock Bar, was true to its name. It had swings instead of stools at the bar- although you can't really swing because you just end up smashing into the bar, but I applaud the originality of the idea.

Tuesday morning we headed out on an excursion which involved. . .

. . .eating and drinking from a coconout. I like sunscreen, but I don't like drinking it.

. . .holding a sticker-eating baby monkey after watching a monkey show, a.k.a. a trained monkey on a rope climbing a tree and throwing down coconuts

. . . RIDING BAREBACK ON AN ELEPHANT!! I didn't have to share my elephant, so I was able to ride on her neck the whole time! She was 8 months pregnant, by the way, which made me feel a little guilty.

. . .and finally, we went to a couple Buddhist temples/shrines. No sock comments necessary.

Wednesday was another beach lounging day, with a little market shopping thrown in. Nothing noteworthy happened.

On Thursday we went on an island boat tour to Ang Thong National Marine Park where we. . .

. . . hiked to Thale Nai, the beautiful salt water lagoon in Koh Mae Ko.

. . . then made our way to Koh Wua Talap where we didn't end up snorkeling thanks to a recent monsoon which left the water less than clear. We did hike to Bua Boke cave which had stalagmite and stalactite formations, then lounged at the beach and watched a Thai versus Indian pick-up volleyball game.

After making our way back to Koh Samui (via a boat ride with some pretty consistent pitching and rolling. Unaware of what we were to experience, we initially claimed spots on the flat roof of the boat and were, from the moment of departure, committed to said location because walking upright was basically impossible and crawling wasn't much less of a potentially humiliating option) we went out for dinner where I had my first encounter with one of Thailand's infamous lady-boys, who was our waiter (waitress?) and saw a cabaret show at Chaweng Beach which ended splendidly with some ABBA!

Friday was another beach lounging day (yes, I realize I've been using "lounging" a lot, but it just describes so perfectly- kind of like the word "hunkered"- haha) which included an amazing Thai massage. That night we made our way to the New Year's Eve Full Moon Party at Haad Rin Beach on Koh Phangan which involved waiting on a beach for an hour for our numbers to be called for the speedboat and then assertively keeping our places in line to get on the boat so as not to be pushed out of the way by aggressive line-cutters (Seriously, even my 5 year old kindergarteners know line-cutting is not acceptable, and at the very least if there's any dispute there should be a rock-paper-scissors throw down to determine who stays and who goes to the back of the line!) We eventually made it to Haad Rin Beach by 10:30pm to join the party of 10 000 people and then left by 1:00am before the real craziness started. We didn't make it home til 3:30am due to the line up for the speedboats and the fact that I was unwilling to fight for my place against aggressive drunk people for fear that either they would fall of the dock or push me off. During the wait I did meet some nice, sober Americans and had some intellectual conversations- as a result of which I am now somewhat converted regarding my opinion of the American health care system.

At midnight. He's a photo-crasher.

Saturday was our last day which involved getting my hair cut and lounging (snuck that in there one last time) on the beach before leaving at 7 pm for our, thankfully, uneventful 18 hour journey home to the cold.

Christmas

I realize I haven’t blogged in a long, long time but that just goes to show you that a) time is flying over here, because it feels like I just wrote my previous blog and b) my life in Korea can be as routine and un-noteworthy as my life back home in Canada, which I would never feel the urge to blog about.

That being said, seeing as I missed Christmas with you all back in the home country, I thought I would share with you about Christmas celebrations here. They started the last week of November when Sonya and I started drilling our kindergarteners for their Christmas presentation on December 9th. That whole process and presentation was not comparable to anything you can envision from an elementary school in Canada. There was a lot of stressing, shouting, bribing and demanding that these children memorize faster, sing louder, dance better, smile bigger and generally perform like they were 15 and not 5 years old. Seriously, the first time we rehearsed on stage I kept having to turn away laughing because it was just so hilarious to watch their serious faces as Sonya kept up a constant stream of “No, other way. . .why are you standing there. . . sing louder. . .LOUDER. . .I can’t hear you. . . move over there. . . I still can't hear you. . . what are you doing?!?!” But by the time the performance came around, I was fully committed to this method (My favourite tactic being guilt: “Do you want to make your mom sad? Pretend I’m your mom right now. . . I can’t hear a word you’re saying- see, I’m crying!” ) Sorry, not photos of this, I was busy wildly gesturing and stage-whispering to my students from the side-line.

These photos are actually from Christmas Eve Day- when our students had to sing for their presents from "Santa".

Although it's only indirectly related to Christmas, I can't forget to mention December 16th, the day that it snowed, because we all know the festive feelings softly falling snow evokes. . .although in Korea it evokes a few other things as well, such as the appearance of umbrellas, see below (which I must confess I initially made fun of, but later realized the ingenius practicality of it- no snow melting on your hair and rendering time spent straigtening it moot) and lengthy delays in traffic (buses arriving half an hour late at school, which I also made fun of and will continue to do so).

The weekend before Christmas, our directors offered us their time-share rental near Muju Ski Resort. So we spent Saturday there eating a Christmas dinner and then spent the evening snowboarding (boys) and sliding (girls). A certain person kept bailing right out of the gate, which led to a humiliating experience for us Canadians as we were repeatedly “taught” how to properly use our sleds.

Just a festive photo of the SLP ladies

On Sunday, we returned home and it was literally straight on to another Christmas gathering for the Redeemer girls with more food and the added bonus of presents.

Another festive photo of some different ladies

On Thursday, aka Christmas Eve Eve, we had our staff “meat party”, which ended up being an enlightening experience in regards to some Korean drinking traditions. I won't get into my thoughts regarding this particular evening as this blog is public domain and no photos I have adequately depict the tone of this evening, so we'll leave it at this brief mention and you can ask me about it later.


Christmas Eve was spent working until 5:40pm and then rushing home to multi-task last minute emails, a Skype conversation, dinner and apartment cleaning before I left at 7:00pm to catch the bus for Incheon, which was 40 minutes late on the coldest night ever.

I spent most of the ride trying to cling to the spirit of the season by listening to Christmas music on the iPod I received as a surprise gift from my family and naughtily opened weeks before Christmas. Note the engraving

When we arrived at our airport hotel at about midnight, Kristin, Anna, Mary and I exchanged Secret Santa gifts, so my tradition of opening gifts on Christmas Eve remains unbroken.

Christmas Day, on the other hand, was a whole other story. . .