Dolphin Day Camp and other Tales from the Field

Tuesday, May 17- Sunday May 22

Well, it's long this week, folks, so hope you're in the mood for reading!

Well, Tuesday dawned wet and rainy. Pouring rain, in fact, so much so that Lucy and Fiona’s house was flooded and they couldn’t even get out! Lucy called and said that they were not going and little Annie was so sad. She had been so excited that she was up early, and then she was so disappointed she was crying. Poor thing. She’s only 4, so it’s no wonder she was upset. Their house was so flooded they didn’t even make it to Taw Saeng that day!

Wednesday I went to TS early to meet up with Orawun to transfer my motorbike into my name. :)  It didn’t take nearly as long as I thought it would! It took only an hour and we didn’t have to go to two places like we thought we would. We just went to the DMV, got the inspection done and waited for them to call us up for the green book (registration). I showed the guy my passport and work permit, gave him the forms and some money (245 baht, about $8) and he said to come pick it up on Thursday!

When we got back, I headed to the bank to get some more money because I had spent the last of my cash on the registration, and on the way, Lucy called. I was with Ning, so I talked to Lucy for a couple minutes, but then couldn’t really understand what she was saying so I had her talk to Ning. Turns out, she did not pass her test to get into university on the teacher track. I guess here you have to test into the program you want to do. It just breaks my heart because she is SUCH an amazing teacher! She won’t be able to take the teacher test again until next year, so she is just going to try to test into a different program. She is taking the test for hotel management and tourism, which is ok. I think she’ll be great at that too

So, yesterday she finally came and was really sad and worried, so I was like, ok, we are going to DK Books to get you some study materials. This is before I realized that she was not taking the teacher test again. So we spent a while looking at all the different admission test books, most of which were for the high school standardized tests. I was surprised at the lack of college level books there were other than those for English. But, I finally understood that she really only needed to study English for this test, so I got her a couple books with English practice words. We’ve spent a couple hours the past 2 days going over some of the exercises. This does not inspire confidence in me for how she is going to do on Saturday. Oh, well, all I can do is help and pray, right?

I’m also going to have her practice speaking English properly to me. No more of this Thenglish.  I want her to tell me a story about her life and only use English. I’m also going to have her start writing me emails in English so she can practice her spelling and writing that way.

Class was pretty good today (Thursday), we ended a bit early, but that’s ok sometimes. I’m still not sure how much they are really understanding about sounding things out. Last week, I thought they really had the ‘a’ and ‘e’ sounds down, but now I’m not so sure. Today I had them play a game that they had to spell the words out, and they didn’t remember which letters made the sounds when they saw them written down. I’m not sure if I’m just not getting the idea across or if they are just not absorbing it. I don’t really know the problem or how to fix it. I need to have Judy come in my class for a day or two to get her prognosis. Lucy is great to have help in class. LOVE her. She defuses situations because she can speak Thai, and she gets them to pay attention. It’s a perfect situation!

Tonight, Winnie came into class and just hung out with us, which was so funny! She was helping the kids play the game, but she was telling them all the answers! I eventually kicked her out to her own class. We went downstairs after the game so that we could practice our “Let Everything” song on the keyboard. Willow was getting frustrated that her team was losing, so she stopped wanting to play, so I said she was going to play the song while we sang and that seemed to cheer her up a little bit. I think they are getting the song, but we still need to work on the “praise the Lord” part. It’s super cute to hear them singing though, even when they don’t know the words, they still make the noise of the note. Hahahah

After class ended, Winnie found me to help with her English homework. We did her 2 pages of workbook and finally Field kicked us out! I swear we were open til 8pm when we were here in November. Leaving at 7:30 seems so soon! Sunny’s sister/Francie’s mom was late to pick them up (as usual) and of course, Penny forgot her backpack, so Field was going to take it to her house, along with Willow, Peyton and Yvonne in tow, who live on the way to Field’s house, while I was going to stay with the girls til Sunny’s sister came.

 Ning was leaving, and Ben didn’t have his bike today, so I asked if she was going to give him a ride, since they live near each other. She was like “no! He has to drive because I’m still learning.” Hahah. So, Ben gets on Ning’s bike, starts it up no problem, and she pulls on her helmet, jumps on the back and off they go. Twelve year old Ben driving himself home on P’Ning’s bike. It was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.

After everyone had left, I was just hanging out with Sunny and Francie, who are just the sweetest girls. I’ve said it before, but I just love spending time with them. They are so quiet they rarely demand attention like the others, so it’s easy to overlook them. That’s why I like staying late, because it means I get to spend some time getting to know them. Tonight before we all left, Sunny came running up to me and (in Thai) asked how I was feeling: “happy, sad, angry?” (that part was in English). Haha, I laughed and said “chan me kwam soo” which means “I am happy.” She giggled and said “very good!” Then I asked if she was happy and she corrected my grammar (of course) but said she was happy too. So, we were bouncing a balloon back and forth while Francie played with a balloon on the sidewalk, and I asked Sunny who she lived with, where her parents are, if she likes to sing songs, what songs she likes, how many siblings she has and where they all are. I think that is the extent of my vocab at this point. She also asked about my family and where they are. I tried to tell her about Arizona, where my sister lives, but I’m not sure she understood cactus. Haha. Anyway, it was a nice conversation. I look forward to expanding my vocabulary so we can have more in the future.

Earlier today, Lucy went with me to the DMV and was laughing at me the whole way because I’m so tall and she’s so short she can’t see over me to see where we are going. Plus, she was trying to give me directions and they were different from the way I had gone yesterday, so I was like, really? She thought it was funny that I didn’t know where I was going. She showed me where her house is, the general area anyway, and she thought it was so funny that I was scared of the cars. Dude! I feel like they are going to run into me and we will die! Or that I will run into them and wreck my bike! I think a little bit of respect for the larger vehicles on the road is in order. We did almost crash though. Well, not almost. We turned right into a small soi and there were all these cars parked on the right side of the road and just as we turned in, there was a fat farang with no helmet tearing down the alley toward us. I screamed a little and pulled off to the side to let him pass. Lucy was laughing hysterically, like “P’Heather! You drive crazy! Scream at the cars in the soi! Hahahaha” I was like, “stop making me laugh! Don’t tell P’Judy I drive crazy or she’ll never let me drive you anywhere again!” So of course, she told Judy the whole story. 

Friday was a busy day, since Inna was still sick, Marie-Clare had the day off and Em left early so they could go to dinner with some friends. So, Judy took over Inna’s art group and we did a little change around of the other groups. Willlow went into Ning’s class, Billy joined Field’s guitar class and Winnie and Sophie are going to do keyboarding with Yvonne and Amelie. Today though, I just had Yvonne and Amelie. This new arrangement works out great for me, since I was already teaching Winnie and Sophie on the side and I had no idea how I was going to continue teaching them in addition to the 4 kids in keyboarding club. So, I started teaching them Amazing Grace, since Winnie and Sophie already sort of know it. Winnie has been working on it for a week now, but I just taught the first line to Yvonne and Amelie tonight. It was fun to just have them, and they did a great job. I started out just teaching them that every note has a name and trying to get them to learn the names of the notes and where they go on the lines and spaces of the music sheets. I was very proud of them and they had fun.

After club was done, Winnie finally came and Sophie came down and I told them I thought they should be in keyboarding because they are both so good at it and I’m teaching them anyway. I was actually able to convey this in Thai! So, they agreed and now I have a good little class. J

Saturday was Dolphin Day Camp! Fun times! 10 little kids (5-7 years old) and 8 adults. Almost a 1-to-1 ration. You’d think that would be enough, but you’d be wrong. Haha We met at Taw Saeng, got in a song thaew and traveled to the Botanic Gardens. It was really hot, but the kids were so excited! Most fell asleep on the way, and I nearly did too. It’s about a 40 minute journey. We got there and all clambered out of the van into the vast greenery.

The kids started running wild, but Ning corralled them and put them in 2 lines: one to ride their own bikes and one line to ride the back of a grownup’s bike. The littlest kids were riding with us and the bigger kids who have bikes at home rode their own bike. As we were going over to pay for the rentals, I took the little girls to look out at the swans and we saw that one of the swans had 5 babies! Little Francie was SO excited! She was hollering at the other kids to come look so they all ran over. Then they went to the end of the dock and looked at the huge fish in the lake. They were fascinated and excited and just all talking over each other, pulling on me to point to things and chattering away. So cute.

Finally, the bikes were rented, Rob and Judy arrived and we were off to the Herb Garden! I had one of our new kids, Felicity, on my bike and she is the cutest little thing ever. She was holding on to me as I was riding, and saying “faster! Faster!” hahah. Francie was with Marie-Clare and was saying the same thing! These kids are hard taskmasters.

Marie-Clare educated them about things in herb garden, then it was back on the bikes and on to the zoo. They have a few cages with different animals, and I had done some research on the ones I knew were there, so I had a few things to tell the kids. We saw peacocks, more swans, ostriches and deer. The kids were scared of the ostriches at first, but once they saw that there was a bucket of food we could feed them and the deers, they were super into it. I have to say, I’m a little scared of those ostriches myself, but at least they don’t have teeth! We then rode around to the camels and buffalo to feed them a bucket of greenery too. The camels have bigger teeth so are a bit more dangerous to feed, but the kids did great! They had so much fun.

We rode over to the playground for lunch and the kids freaked out at all the space to run and play in. They were all over the swinging pirate ship and climbing gym. After lunch, I asked the girls if they wanted to go see the nam tok, or waterfall.  They were very excited by this idea, so I Francie and Orawun’s daughter grabbed my hands and we walked over to the topiary hedge garden and into the waterfall area. The girls were so excited by the waterfall! I wonder if they’ve been to the limestone one nearby. I haven’t yet, but I hear it’s amazing. Marie-Clare got some great photos of us, so that was fun. She has a really cool SLR camera, so I’m excited to see how those turn out.

After the waterfall, we rounded everyone back up and went to the provincial tree garden, where Field told about the different trees in the provinces of Thailand. Then, we rode around for a while, trying to find the cool topiary Ning and I had seen last weekend that is shaped like hearts. Finally, we found it, but on the way Carrie’s chain kept falling off her bike, so Em stayed with her to fix it, as the rest of us found the heart wall and rose garden. As we waited for Em and Carrie to get back, Marie-Clare took pictures of the kids framed by the heart and then they all had a great time using our cameras to take pictures of the deer. They were so docile; they even let us pett their heads. It was super cute!  

We headed over to where the paddle boats are, but sadly, there was not enough time to go on the boats! Poor kids. Oh, well, they had a full day anyway. We took one final lap around the park on the bikes and when we were about 50 feet away from the bike return, when Ewan fell and hit his head. Blood everywhere, crying, crashed bike, 4 stitches later, he was all patched up. Such a bummer way to end the day! We called the song thaew and piled in again. Francie fell asleep on my lap, Felicity on the other end of the bus, and the boys were pounding on each other the whole way. The back of the bus is open and we were traveling on a highway, so the fact that the boys would not stay seated was a huge safety issue. Luckily, Em and Marie-Clare managed to distract them for a few minutes at a time, and eventually most of them fell asleep.

We got back to base camp and unloaded, then waited for Ning and Ewan to come back. Parents came by and started picking up their kids. I’m sure they will sleep well tonight! I hope Ewan’s parents aren’t too freaked out by his accident to never let him go anywhere again!  After everyone was gone, Em, MC, Ning and I went to dinner at Duke’s, which is a great burger place!  A quarter pound burger and fries for just over $3! Nice. Of course, I was exhausted by the end of the day, so I headed to bed early.

Sunday was a great day! Church with the kiddies in the morning, then lunch at Pantip with 15 kids. The kao soi lady actually knows my order now! Haha. I thought all farangs looked alike. I guess there aren’t many farangs who come in every Sunday with a pack of Thai kids though. Francie wanted me to sit by her, and dragged me over to the video game arcade after lunch to watch the boys play games. Sunny and Molly came over and sat in a corner by the game systems, so I sat with them. Molly has been pretty reserved up to this point, she’s sweet, but she doesn’t talk much to me. Well, today, she was little miss chatterbox! Telling me stories in Thai, asking me how to say things in English telling me how to say things in Thai. So great! Sunny of course, was her usual self, helpfully correcting my grammar when I tried to ask questions and chatting with me too. It was fun to hang out with them.

After everyone had finished, we headed back to Taw Saeng, where I did piano lessons with Willow, Sophie and Winnie, then helped Sophie with her English homework. This is like the best time for me, getting to hang out and give the kids individual attention, getting to know their personalities, practicing my Thai and teaching them new English words. It’s the best part of my week. People keep saying that I’m going to get burned out spending so much time with the kids, but even on my days off in America, I spend my days off hanging out with kids and helping them with their homework, so I still consider it down time. I couldn’t do it with the little ones all day every day, but the older kids are a blast to hang out with. I wouldn’t change my Sunday afternoons for the world.

After I left Taw Saeng I went to see Lucy at the walking street and the poor thing is sick. Oh, no! I gave her my tonsillitis! And she starts university tomorrow too. Man, I feel bad. I talked to her a little about school and whether she thought she’d have time to come either teach me Thai, practice English or help with my class this week. I think we’ll have to see how her first week goes and take it from there. I’m selfishly sad that she is starting school so soon! I was preparing for her to start in June, but the new program she signed up for starts earlier. I’m bummed that I won’t get to hang with her every day anymore. She’s become like my kid sister, and I’m really proud of her for persevering and going to college. She’s the first person in her family to do so, and even though she is nervous, and she didn’t get to go into the program that was her first choice, she’s still going anyway. It’s awesome.

Finally, Jaz and I went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. It was entertaining. Better than the last one anyway. But, we didn’t get back til late, so I’m off to bed early tonight for sure!