we interrupt this broadcast...

i know i was in the middle of telling you about all the awesome gallivanting i've been doing, but i want to write a quick word about the unrest that is happening in thailand at the moment.  i'm in the middle of composing a more thorough and polished piece about my experiences/feelings/etc., but for now please know that i am safe and promise to be vigilant. it's unclear now what direction this is going in-- hopefully we are at a climax point and things will start to lose momentum soon, but because it is such a grassroots movement, it's extremely difficult to ascertain how much money, support and power the red shirts have.  i live deeeeeeep in red shirt country (as my colleagues joke, i'm constantly surrounded by red shirts, as the teachers whose desks are behind, in front of and next to mine support the cause), and i really just can't tell how far this will go.  but again, i'm being careful and looked after by fulbright and my school and do realize the gravity of the situation. more than anything right now, i feel truly devastated; it is tragic to watch a country i have come to love so much spiral into such dispair. so i ask you: please keep thailand in your thoughts, prayers and wishes; may it return to peace soon.

with love from and for thailand,
anna

adventures in wonderland(s)

i finished my first semester of teaching (!) in mid-march, packed up my bags, and hit the road for a two-and-a-half months adventure. a few pictures to wet you apetite; more to come later this week when my internet is (hopefully) being less dysfunctional:

first, i headed down south to koh tao to learn how to scuba dive. i got both my open water and advanced licenses (....though i planned to only get the first license, i ended up staying a few more days to get my second. oops?), and fell in love with the sport. the night dive was my favorite-- so peaceful! sarah, center, was my instructor, and mike, right, was the only other person in my open water group. 


next, i went up to chiang mai to cosa, a home for girls who have sexually exploited, abused, or are at risk for trafficking in the sex industry. there, myself and 5 other fulbrights taught dance, painting and yoga classes. we even indulged full-on high school style and took the girls for a bowling and pizza day at a mall in the city. thanks to all those who donated to the workshop-- it really was a wonderful success. for more on cosa, go to: http://www.cosasia.org/

next up.......... india! brace yourself for the next post.

the end of an era

It is the end of an era: as of this time tomorrow, I will have said goodbye to this sweet, hot, broken-down home and welcomed the joys of modernity. Yep, that's right: as of tomorrow I will again be living with ac, wifi and even a hot shower in a brand spankin' new apartment.

Don't get me wrong: I am admittedly quite excited about the change, especially considering we have officially launched into the hot season here in Warin and its an average of 38 degrees C almost every day. Living without ac on the second floor of a westward facing room with no tree coverage is pretty much torture for a wimpy farang like myself. The strange smells that this glorious little house holds within its walls are becoming increasingly potent as the numbers on the thermometer rise, as have the bugs, geckos (which I have sort of come to adore) and assorted other creepy-crawlies. In addition to the fact that the temperature is on the rise, all of the animals seem to be in heat too, making for some, uuuhhh, interesting noises all through the night. And, while I really do love Joi, it has been a liiiitle bit of a roller-coaster ride the past few months (briefly: her aunt moved in; aunt's family of 5 moved in on weekends; Joi's many boyfriends moved in and out while boyfriend 1 was on vacation; I still couldn't speak Thai; Joi left on weekends; aunt and family stayed here; Joi develops eating disorder... but this all for another post entirely).

That being said, it was by no means an easy choice to leave my dilapidated abode. Aside from the convenience of living across the soccer field from school, there is a certain beauty about a life without many modern conveniences. From depending more on books than the internet to pass the time, to sweating through the heat and letting your body do the cooling, to the moment when your body shifts from feeling that holy-shit-this-is-the-coldest-shower-ever to this-is-sort-of-refreshing-actually, to the view of the moon I get from my bed, to the moment, every...single... day... when you wake up at dawn because the roosters told you to: these are all things I have been fortunate to experience here. These physical barriers have exhausted me, challenged me, isolated me and frustrated me... but they have equally pushed my boundaries and my limits, given me faith that I can live with much less comfort than I previous imagined, and have, really, largely defined my existence in the past few months.

Ah well, the time has come. Goodbye, house. Goodbye, moon. Hello, next adventure!

Love as always,

Anna

Ps. Sorry for the lack of photos/videos on the blog. Despite the kindness of my neighbor (who unwittingly let me steal internet from time-to-time), the connection just isn't good enough to upload anything that big. Hopefully I'll be able to make up for lost time in the new digs!

this one's for you, dad!

from: Michael Salzberg

to Anna Salzberg

date: Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 11:46 AM

subject: blog

body: No posting on the blog in February?

(Touche. Sorry, Dad.)

I realized that after all this time, I have yet to really talk about what my life is like here. And so, here you have it: a day-in-the-life of a Fulbright ETA in Warin Chamrap, Thailand. Hold onto your keyboards.. it's pretty wild!

6 am: wake up to the sound of roosters and the vrooming of my very prompt neighbors unfathomably loud motorcycle and car.

6:05 am: put pillow over head; go back to sleep.

6:45 am: wake up, trudge downstairs to make coffee (thank you, french press!) and take freezing cold shower.

7:50 am: hear the Warin Chamrab school anthem play; realize I have been drinking coffee and perusing the internet for 45 minutes, am still in a towel, have no clean clothes and need to be at flag pole in 15 minutes.

8:05 am: stumble out the front door and to flag pole, where every Monday I am greeted by colleagues in civil servant uniforms, every Tuesday by pink shirts, every Wednesday by both staff AND students alike in boy and girl scout uniforms, every Thursday by standard school uniform and every Friday by traditional Thai dress. I, unfortunately, own practically none of these ensembles, though I have amassed a bit of a traditional Thai wardrobe.

8:45 am: begin period one. Please note: though flag pole is scheduled to end at 8:25 and class is to begin at 8:30, an adherence this official time table has yet to come to fruition. When I ask my students where they have been, their most common answer is, "Teacher! Sorry! Eat breakfast!" or, even more often, a puzzled look, because the question was not understood. This is not isolated just to 1st period; I hear this breakfast excuse all day, as my students saunter in an average of 15 minutes late. For those of you who know me and my uhh issue with timeliness, you may be thinking, "Hot damn, Anna chose the right country." You would be right.

8:45 am- 4:00 pm: I attempt to teach the English language for an average of three hours a day. Topics covered may include: clothing, emotion, Hanukkah (never got around to Christmas...), Valentine's Day, Thanksgiving, weather and seasons, music, America, yes, just in general, I talk about Amerca, telling time, shopping, counting, months, numbers, body parts, and/or descriptive words.

Students may be forced to: put on a skit, practice a dialogue, do a tongue twister (she sells seashells by the seashore), "repeat after me," "sit down please!" "just listen! no, no.. not repeat.. just listen please!", run to the board and spell/draw/look confused, decipher a language that they do not understand, give me 1 baht for coming in late, speak, speak, and "speak more loudly please!!", go "shopping" with American money I xeroxed (this may or may not be illegal?), explain to each other an activity they did not understand when their crazy American teacher explained it to them the first time and/or any combination of aforementioned activities.

And, when not teaching, I am: eating ridiculously hot som tam, lesson planning, trying not to eat all of the delicious desert-like things other teachers brought into work, drinking water, sweating, thinking about air-conditioning, trying not to pass out from heat poisoning, reading books and articles on how to teach ESL... and have I mentioned thinking about air-conditioning?

4 pm- 10 pm: Afternoons and evenings vary.... though only minimally. They are mostly filled with 1) sitting outside and reading, because my westward facing my room is approximately 40 degrees celsius; 2) watching an episode (or three.... don't judge me; I live alone in Thailand) of The Wire/Six Feet Under/Mad Men and/or Sex and the City; 3) going to P'sang's brother house for dinner, one of my most favorite things to do here, as I get to play with lots of children, drink beer on ice and attempt to practice my Thai; 4) meet Maricel for dinner in Ubon, a much needed respite that usually comes midweek; 5) go across the street to the noodle shop, alone or with Joi, where the people actually know my name AND my order (nodding head smuggly); 6) spending time with my faithful friend, the world wide web; 6) talk to all of you back in the u.s. of a (though not as much as I would like, I might add. ::hint hint::) 7) whatever combination of above activities my little heart desires.

My life, huh?! Prettty wild. There have been some awesomely hilarious and strange moments, but that's for next time. I'm thinking about going crazy and posting twice this month-- keep your fingers crossed.

Happy belated Chinese New Year/Valentine's Day/Presidents Day!

Love,

Anna

same same but (not that) different

It feels funny to be blogging about anything other than Haiti right now. Although I’m a million miles away, I am, like you, glued to my computer and news stations, in an effort to digest and to process this horrific catastrophe. Even in my office here, in my podunk town in Thailand, I walked in this morning to, “Anna, did you see about Haiti? What about in America? Close to your home?” No, no, I replied, not close to my home, but close to many peoples hearts.

That being said, I’ve been meaning to write an entry for quite some time about my experiences here as a teacher. My time here has only further put into relief the universal commonalities of broken education systems, whether they be in rural Thailand, rural Ohio or downtown D.C.

I teach at a mid-sized public school on the outskirts of an industrial town. The school sits on a stretch of highway that tapers out to the most rural parts of Thailand-- we are at the beginning of the end of urbanity in the province. Imagine this: you have superhero vision and are standing in front of the Warinchamrap School. If you looked to the left, you’d see a small city, with a handful of cute cafés and restaurants, a bunch of Walmart-like establishments and endless mom-and-pop specialty stores. If you looked to the right you’d see miles and miles and miles of golden rice paddies, a few gas stations, some factories and the occasional roadside restaurant. You would also see my students.

In other words, much like the students I worked with at Kenyon, my students here are almost exclusively the children of farmers and factory workers. While they are not the hill tribe children of the north that you most often read about as the children in need here, they come from some of the lowest income areas in the country. And, while poverty is not necessarily conducive to shoddy education systems, it is an all too-common and undeniable trend—both here and in America.

Of the 272 students who enter the Warin School their first year (7^th grade), 121 make it to graduation; of that 121, ten to fifteen will make it to university. The pool of males shrinks drastically each year, leaving only a handful once they’ve reached the second semester of their senior year. In my lowest level classes, I am lucky if half show up to our class that meets just once a week, a problem even the most veteran teachers have (“Anna, I just don’t know what to DO,” one of my co-workers lamented yesterday, shaking her head. “My students are exhausting”). I have classes with students who have been taking English for at least four years and quite literally cannot write the English alphabet. And, like the students I worked with in the states, they my students here come from broken homes and have never seen anyone they know or love go beyond a rice paddy. It is—perhaps not surprisingly—the same song that is sung throughout the public school system in the states, and throughout the world: seeing no future for themselves in the education system, or for the education they are told they must get, the students, in so few words, shrug their shoulders and give up.

I judged an English competition a few weeks ago featuring the top 61 students in the entire Isaan region. These students were truly astonishing. Most were eloquent, thoughtful, ambitious, smart and, well, fluent in English. And the things the most impressive ones had in common? Their father was a foreigner, their parents could afford to send them on exchange programs and they had just gotten back from a year in America, or they were in top English programs (where all of their classes are taught in Egnlish) in the richer parts of the region. It was, sadly, quite easy to spot the students from the “country schools” : they were the students who did not and could not keep up. I do not mean to hyperpolarize the situation; there were, of course, exceptions. Unfortunately, though, this formula held largely true.

Education, as anyone who has had one will attest to, is the surest road to freedom. It can mean freedom of opportunity, freedom from oppression, freedom of mind, and, almost always, freedom of choice. Once given and received, education is the coal under the fire for everything or nothing. If pursued, an education gives you the choice to be a farmer or factory worker, a shop owner, a doctor, or an English-speaking farmer with a law degree. It is for this reason, this freedom that education provides, that oppressive governments and institutions everywhere have long feared education, and have established, blatantly and latently, systems in which the poor remain poor and therefore uneducated and uneducated and therefore poor (thank you, Paulo Freire).

Well, that's my two cents, at least. Phew. It's exhausting to think about, isn't it? But hang on, dear reader, because these musings get even more exhausting with the big questions they agitate. Lets start with, well, what in the hell do we do about it? And what can I do in this small school, in this small place, to help these kids see that education is important and enriching and enlivening and freeing? To provide them with the support, opportunities and, well, fun they need to pursue it? How can I help them see past their very limited financial situations to scholarships and university? How do I help them to see that English really could, in this globalizing world, be the ticket that takes them far beyond the borders of their lives? How do I make them... come to class?! Most of all, how do I help to change a broken system, so that equal opporutnity is provided to all students, no matter what their background be?

Now, I understand that one might think these are pretty lofty goals for a year, a decade, a lifetime—I can perhaps see your point. Maybe I just have too much time on my hands here, to pontificate and ponder about this whole education thing. And maybe I've just let that youthful optimism get the best of me. It helps that I really do (most days) love my kids, and have ridiculous amounts of fun with them. But I'd like to believe that, in addition to my foolish optimism (something I blame in large part on the the brilliant, dedicated and groundbreaking work of so many educators I have met), that progress really is possible—even if it means reaching just one student in just one class in one school in rural Thailand.

Sigh. A girl can dream, right?

Welp, I miss you all. And again, sorry for the length—guess I should blog more often or something.

Lots of love,

Anna

joi to the world

It seems appropriate at this time of year-- when talk of holiday cheer and joy is abundant--to talk about the Joi in my life: my housemate. Though I’ve mentioned her previously, she really does deserve an entry of her own. Her personality and life are worthy of a reality TV show: she had a baby 7 months ago who lives with her parents in her hometown, an ex-husband who is trying to get her back, a boyfriend who is a musician, but only plays music in Hong Kong, and an obsession with Thai soap operas, belt making and all that is Isaan. Despite these, uhh, differences, Joi has managed, somehow, in her hilarious, easy-going and kind way, to make my life here in Warinchamrap feel exponentially safer, happier and more comfortable.

On my first night in Warinchamrap, after an exhausting day of 3-am wake-ups, moving-in, and trying not to cry about the place I was moving into, I came back to my new room to find a lovely, lovely surprise-- a foot longtokay had crawled through the gap above my door and sat its blue behind and beady eyes on my wall.

As most would probably do, I freaked the hell out and screamed for the roommate I had met just minutes prior. "JOOII!! JOOOII!!!!! JOOIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!" rattled our paper-thin walls as I frantically ran into her room, dragged her out of bed, and into my room to show her the freakish monster on my wall.

She took one look at it and then at me, her new, crazed, jumping, screaming, English-squawking housemate and stared for a good minute. "Huh?" her face read, "what the hell are you so worked up about?" Turns out that tokays are all over the place here-- a sight that I have gotten very used to-- and for Joi, who grew up in a small fisherman's town on the border of Laos, this little guy was barely of note, let alone something worth trying to chase out of a room. But after that solid minute of taking me in, she realized that my unadulterated fear could only mean that I had never seen one of those run-of-the-mill geckos before. She stammered, wide-eyed,"No.. tokay...(waved hand backwards to signal before)?"

I turned red, laughed, shook my head, and continued to jump up and down. And Joi, oh lovely Joi, promptly responded to my head shake by first laughing, and then picking up a broom and to shoo it-- and me-- away.

The tokay took off running through my room, first dashing into my closet, and then finding asylum in my newly unpacked clothes. We finally did get it out, though, and we managed to have our first big laugh together, too.

There have been countless moments like this with Joi—as I write this I am reminded of more and more--when her efforts and kindness have diffused a situation that would have felt otherwise unmanageable and overwhelming. She is patient with my Thai and is making huge improvements in her English (our conversations now consist of 3 or 4 word sentences!); I help her make these awesome, beaded belts that she sells at Big C (Thai equivalent of Walmart), and try to help her through her boy troubles (which she has a lot of); she invites me out with the other young staffers, takes me to dinner and even takes me shopping. She’s a wild one by Thai standards, but a kind, generous one by mine. Who knew you could glean so much by talking through a dictionary?

And so, reader, to end this sappy blog post I say: Joi to the world for awesome Thai roommates and friendships in unexpected places.

Happy holidays!

Love

Anna

and up-country life begins

Now let me explain myself: my negligent blogging habits have roots in two semi-legitimate factors. The first is, admittedly, laziness. There is really no excuse for this one. The second is, I think, a bit more justifiable: I just do not want this blog to become an outlet for my emotional ups and downs during this adjustment period. It is in the low moments that I feel most inclined to blog, to reach out into the depths of cyberspace and connect with people who are not here, who speak English and who too will see life here through a foreigners lens. But really, writing at those times would give you an unfair picture of what my life is like here. My life here in Warinchamrap is often (very often) mind-bogglingly frustrating, isolating and difficult. But it is equally exciting, fulfilling and awe-inspiring. I am challenged everyday by one thing or another—“Oh, only 4 out of 45 students are going to show up today?” “What do you mean its 95 degrees and considered the cool season?” “ANOTHER ant infestation????”—but very rarely do I find myself wishing I was somewhere else or doing something else. I am conscious of the fact that these daily challenges are also making me braver and stronger, and a far better non-verbal communicator than I ever thought I could be.

I live in the outskirts of the town of Warinchamrap, a suburb of the somewhat sprawling city of Ubon Ratchathani, in the northeastern part of Thailand (the Isaan region). The province sits adjacent to the borders of Laos and Cambodia, making for a cultural hodgepodge of food and language; the people around me all speak Thai and Laos, cook Thai and Laos food, and are unbelievably proud of their geographical roots. “This Isaan food!” I am often told. “You find it all over Isaan, but most famous in Ubon.” My hysterical, unpredictable Thai housemate, Joi, adamantly hates any food that is not from Isaan, shaking her head with a puckered expression anytime I suggest she try the American food I bring back from Bangkok.


This pride in local heritage comes with a genuine, inherent desire to share it with anyone who is interested in learning. Fortunately for me, this learning process brings with it massive quantities of delicious food and kind, tender people. I am repeatedly awe-struck by the intrinsic generosity and thoughtfulness of the people around me, from the women in my office, to the women I talk to at flag pole, to Joi, to the shop owner down the street. Despite the fact that we often can’t communicate in full sentences, I am constantly given food, invited out to meals, on camping trips and to family events; I’ll come back from lunch to find that someone has put a cha-yenn (Thai iced tea) on my desk, or has cooked me extra food because they thought it might be something I haven’t yet tried, or has brought me bananas from the grove in their backyard because they know how much I love bananas here. And far more often than not, these gifts are not given because something is wanted or expected in return, but rather because, simply, the giver just thought I might like it. And this spirit of anonymous, selfless giving has made me want to give back to them in the same way, to pay attention to the details of their lives too.

This is not to say that things here aren't incredibly trying. Less than half of my students will show up to any given class, and about half of those will show up twenty minutes late. The level of their speaking and listening skills continues to amaze me-- it is just so low, I'm often not sure where to start. But I am learning where to start... even if it often feels like it's at a snail's pace, going five steps forward, and then three steps back. I really do love my students, though; I find their obsession with Korean pop music fascinating, their accents endearing and their kind hearts (jai dee) encouraging. The fact that I can't verbally communicate with anyone around here on a deep emotional or intellectual level has also been quite a change from my home life and my life at Kenyon, and has undoubtedly been the most difficult aspect of my experience. Guess I'm going to have to start studying Thai, eh?

So, while it has definitely been a month of ups and downs, the good news is that-- surprise!-- everything really does pass, and the ups do always seem to come. I feel truly lucky to be here, breathing in the provincial Thai air, waking up to roosters in the morning, standing in front of a classroom of giggling faces and eating spicy, pungent Isaan food every day.

Thanks for the read and I'm sorry for the novella-length post. I miss you all!!


Lots and lots of love coming your way--


Anna