Ok so here are my pictures from English camp...I realized halfway through that they're in reverse order so if you want to follow the trip from the beginning jump down to the last picture and go up. I was too lazy to fix it :P

Surat Thani

The outfit the students designed for me at the farewell party

Farewell party! The big bad wolf, 2 little pigs, and the frog prince?

All of out students saying good bye

The bug stand lady!

My eating a grasshopper...he was crunchy!

Mmmm....Yummy grasshoppers!

Monkey Becki and a coconut!

The adorable coconut monkey! I want him!

Per, Kikki, and Gong...Kikki's trying to be a monkey too!

Monkey saying hello at the training center

Krabi

The temple in Krabi

From Left to right:
Back row Za and Amee
Front row Kim, me , and Bow

Me and C at James Bond Island (Wow it's tiny!)

Trang

At the beach near the aquarium

Me, Kyle, and Kelli at the aquarium

The sad turtle trying to escape from his blue bucket jail!

Sound drills! Do the words sound the same or different?


Dr. Kris and his giant toy elephant!

Me, Gong, and the accordion in the toy factory!

Yummy iced tea with milk and chewy ball things

Pitcher Flower in the botanical garden

The Botanical Garden walkway

The Emerald Cave enterence

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Ok I know English camp ended weeks ago! I know I said I would post this sooner but I didn't! I've been bogged down with everything for this semester and it's a little crazy! So now onto my recap of English camp Day 5 onward!

May 20th

Ok we taught in the morning and had the students tell us how to make different Thai meals. Then we did some other activities where the students got to make up dialogs (always funny). Then in the afternoon we went to an aquarium and the beach. The aquarium was the saddest thing I have ever seen! There were 3 turtles that lived in giant blue buckets that kept trying to escape...they looked miserable. Then the sea lions at the sea lion show didn't want to preform...one of them litteraly ran away from the trainers and went back inside. They tried to get him to come back but he said "Hell no!". After walking through the fish part of the aquarium where all of the fish in the tanks were alive (thank god) we went to the beach. The beach was gorgeous and I went for a walk to take pictures of the amazing views.

May 21st

This was our last day in Trang. We had lessons in the morning and then we all piled onto the buses to go to Krabi. When we got to Krabi we found that we were staying in town (not near the sea). After we got settled in Kelli and I went for a walk by the river which was beautiful and just meandered until dinner. For dinner we met up with some of the students and Kyle to go to the night market. The night market was pretty big and had some great food. After eating and shopping Kelli, Kyle, and I went down towards the river where we found a used book store! While we were in there we met up with a few of the Thai leaders and decided to go get some Roti which was delicious! Roti is similar to a crepe.

May 22nd

First day of class in Krabi and unfortunately it was outside. It was loud, the students had trouble concentrating, and we had trouble getting them to listen. All in all the students did seem to have fun and we covered a lot. In the afternoon we went sightseeing around Krabi which ment we would go to a sight have an hour or so and get back on the bus to go to the next place. Our first stop was some shell museum that no one went into and a beach that they tried to charge 100 baht for. some of the instructors just hopped the fence since the beach is free for Thai people. Then we went to another beach that was free. we walked around and enjoyed the views.

Sadly by this point I was staring to get burnt out and was ready to go home. The camp was more exhausting that I thought it would be. I didn't realize that we would be spending so much time everyday with the students and that they would demand so much attention.

May 23rd

Again we started with English lessons outside :( In the afternoon we went to Phang-Nga Bay and went on a boat ride. Our first stop was James Bond Island which was not as amazing as you'd think. The island is not very big and it's in a cove so it doesn't look like most pictures of it....a giant island that's in the middle of the water. Honestly, there are more breathtaking islands that are similar to James Bond Island in the area. I recommend taking a longtail boat ride out of Au Nang to one of the further islands, then you can see similar islands that are huge.

Our second stop was a village on the water. The village was built on a bunch of cement pillars so it's about 20 feet off the water. It was really cool to walk around because it was just like a normal village. Children were out playing and riding bikes down the narrow walkways. In my opinion the village was cooler than the island

For dinner a big group of us went out for amazing pizza at an Italian restaurant. Four of us wound up splitting 3 different types of pizza and 2 salads. It was the best meal I've had in a while.

May 24th

Most of the day was spent on the bus going to Surat. On the bus we started a game called Buddy Budder. The rules of the game:

1. You write down a secret name and put it in a hat
2. After everyone has put a name in the hat you draw a name and read it out.
3. Whoever read your secret name is your Buddy. For the rest of the game you secretly buy gifts (food, jewelry, toys, etc.).
4. To give gifts to your Buddy you give it to someone else and ask them to give it to them.
5. When you give a gift to a buddy you say "This is from your budder".
   
6. At the end of the game you buy a nicer gift for your buddy and budder (person who gives you gifts). Then during a circle "game" you reveal who your buddy is by giving them the nicer gift.

In the afternoon and evening I played cards with the other camp leaders. Spoons and Kang (a thai game that's similar to Uno) were the best.

May 25th

Started the day with English lessons on my campus. YAY! We had real classrooms again!!!! In the afternoon we went to the monkey training school to watch the monkeys preform. The monkeys are trained to climb trees and collect coconuts. It was a little sad watching them do other tricks like ride a tricycle but the monkey's were really cute! The students also loved my monkey face. That night at the night market I ate a fried grasshopper. It didn't really taste like anything...just crunchy.

May 26th

We spent the day doing eco-tourism. We started at Chamin Cave which was a huge cave that we got to explore. At the beginning they had some issues getting the lights to work and periodically there were no lights on the trail. The cave was beautiful but stinky (silly bats thinking it's their home and they can poop anywhere!). After the cave we went to a Salaka (a type of Thai fruit that's really sour) farm we got to go on a tour of the farm and see how the plants grow. We also got to look at the mini zoo they had. There were bunnies, peacocks, bats, turkeys, and some adorable baby otters!

May 27th

Another day that started with teaching. Then we piled on the bus and drove for 2 hours to Chaiya to see the temple. The temple was pretty but we only got to spend an hour there. On the way back we stopped in the town to go to the silk shops. I went behind the shops and watched some of the women make the fabric. It was amazing watching them work these giant looms to make such pretty patterns. The looms were all wood and had about 7 peddles that the women pushed to create the patterns.

May 28th

Another day of lessons and then relaxation. In the evening we went to the temple to celebrate Visakhabucha Day or Buddha's birthday. We sat through the sermon in Thai and then we participated in the candle ceremony. For the ceremony you light a candle and walk around the temple 3 times. There were hundreds of people there and it was really cool watching all the candles bob around the temple.

May 29th

The last day of lessons! During the lesson the students gave Kelli and I gifts. I got a T-shirt and bracelet from my students and Kelli got a dress from hers. They also sang us a song. Since they were so sad about lessons ending we decided to skip learning and just played a bunch of games. After the class we all went to lunch and then came back and practiced for our performances for the farewell party.

That night we had the farewell party. It started with the students getting Camp Graduation Certificates and a Thai dance show. Then we went and had dinner before the campers did their skits. The skits were all really funny and also impossible to explain. We went last and did a bad American dance marathon. We did short parts of the Chicken Dance, Hokey Pokey, Macarena, Electric Slide, and YMCA then we ended with a Thai song "It's alright" which we all danced badly to. The students had a blast and loved our silly skit.

May 30th

The students all went home :( and the camp leaders went to Samui island. Once we got to the hotel the younger leaders all went to lunch (except Kelli she went to see her friend who lives on the island). We wound up at some restaurant at a hotel that no one knew the name of. The food also wasn't that good and was expensive. Then a group went shopping and the rest of us went to go relax on the beach. Erin and I wound up losing the other leaders cause we thought they went to the main beach but we wound up finding them at the private beach later. After it started raining we decided to go find a happy hour but the 'deals' were all too expensive so we went back to the hotel. After cleaning up and relaxing we went out to dinner...unfortunately we decided to follow the drunk person and wound up walking on the beach to find a restaurant that we didn't know the location of. After everyone's legs started hurting we decided to get on the main road by cutting through a hotel...but the hotel did not want us to leave....it was the most confusing set up ever. Luckily, we got onto the main road and discovered the place we were trying to find was over 4 kilometers away. So we just decided to eat at the first cheap restaurant that had something everyone could eat. We wound up eatting at this cool rooftop restaurant that was not ready for 10 tourists to come in and eat. The food was really good and inexpensive!

May 31st

Last day for everyone :( I went shopping in the morning with a group of camp leaders and bought some more thai pants and movies! Then we took the leaders to the airport so they could head to Bangkok. After they got situated the Thai leaders, Kelli, and I got back on the bus and got on the ferry back to Surat.

Camp was fun even though I got burntout part way through. I was also glad to get home and relax a little bit. I miss the students and I plan to go visit many of them soon.

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Well the new semester started yesterday and so far it's been a mess. No one's had their syllabus...at least not in our department. I've had to give 2 intros to courses where the students couldn't look at the rules as I was explaining them! My Industrial Psychology class had their syllabus but most of what I said had to be translated into Thai for the students to understand. And to top the Chaos off today I went to go teach a class only to discover it had been canceled...how did I discover this? Easy there were no students! No one seems to know what sections of Listening/Speaking are open and which ones have been canceled!

Besides the frustration of finding classes canceled when you arrive everything else is going well. I'll start tutoring again next week :D And I'll finish updating about English Camp soon...maybe around Friday.

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Yesterday we went to Plan Creation Toy Factory and children's museum to see how they make toys in their completely green factory. They make toys out of rudder trees that no longer produce rubber and all of the glues and paints are non-toxic. It was interesting to see the assembly lines in action but after a while it got a little boring. But before it could get too boring we were crossing the street to the children's museum to play with all kinds of toys! The museum was small but packed with things to look at and play with so it was a BLAST! I wound up entertaining my students with the toy accordion that actually made halfway decent music.

After the tour we went and taught the students about hometowns which was fun. Our class had a blast! I think they really like Kelli and I teaching together and trying to make everything into a game. For dinner we went to the night market and then went back to campus to watch Mrs. Doubtfire. They seemed to really like the movie even though they didn't really understand parts of it. The room was almost constantly laughing while we watched the movie.



Today we taught in the morning. We were talking about food so we had the students tell us how to make different Thai meals. This afternoon we're going to the aquarium which should be really fun!

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Well I am at English camp. I made it to Trang on Saturday with no problems! I met all the leaders from the USA and Canada. Everyone is really cool and on the first night a bunch of them sang Karaoke until the guy incharge told them no more.

On Sunday we went on the boat ride around the national park to go snorkeling and see the Emerald cave. It was a lot of fun! I saw a yellow fish that looked similar to the box car fish in Bon Aire and some really weird blue coral. A bunch of the other leaders got burned...they didn't realize how strong the sun is here. Then we went to an opening dinner for the instructors.

On Monday we got to meet all of our students! I have 3 girls and 1 boy in my group: Gong, Tap, Per, and Bow. They all speak good English and seem really smart. We wound up joining Kelli's group (since she forgot to print the lessons): Rismond, Amee, Kikki, and Kim. Team teaching was so the way to go it made the groups bigger so we could be more team exercises and Kelli and I could tag-team the teaching. Almost as soon as we started 4 of the faculty joined our class as well: Aeg (sounds like egg), pop(i think), Ying, and C. SO Kelli and I would up teaching 12 students which lead to a hilarious and amazing class. Our students seemed to have a blast with the activities! The 3 hours of teaching flew by!

Today we started the day by going to a jungle and doing a canopy walk. The guide was really fun even though I couldn't really understand everything the guide told us. About halfway through the walk we went up onto this bridge system through the trees. I think the guide said it was 500 years old...or something like that. The views up there were amazing since we were really high up! This afternoon Kelli and I are teaching together again and tomorrow we're going to a toy factory.

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Wow tomorrow I'll be 24...this will be the first birthday I'll be alone for :( I have no idea what I'm going to do for my birthday. I'll probably wind up watching movies and reading like I usually do...maybe I'll take my motorbike into town but probably not since it still scares me. I think 24 is going to be an uneventful birthday and is going to be just like any other day here in Thailand.

Sunday will be 1 year since I graduated from college. I've been thinking a lot about all the fun I had in college. Jen, Jake, and I had a lot of fun hanging out...and Jen and I went on quite a few adventures. I miss them a lot...at times I wish I could go back to college just so the three of us could be together again. I don't know if when I'll get to hang out with both of them at the same time again and I know that next time it'll be different from when we were in college. We're all growing up and we're not as carefree as we were in college. I think I'm finally starting to get homesick...and I'm even missing tiny little Laramie, WY. I'm still having fun in Thailand but I'm starting to miss my friends and family.

My class for the faculty has been going ok. We've been able to have short conversations and they've been able to adapt the example dialog to themselves...for the most part. I'm just glad the students have questions and actually want to learn.

On the 15th I'll be leaving for PSU English camp. The itinerary changed so no we're going to Trang, Krabi, and Surat. It looks like the day trips will be fun...or at least interesting. I only have 4 students in my group so I need to design some activities for a small group.

Next semester starts on June 7th. Right now I have 18 teaching hours which means I'll be making overtime. It also looks like I'll be teaching Industrial Psychology so I need to research what exactly Industrial Psychology is.

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