Why Many of Us Are Lucky

I figured it out.

            It took me two weeks (which, in itself, is silly… I mean, how long did I think it would take? Did I really think it would be instantaneous? Is anything good ever instantaneous?) to figure out why, exactly, I am in Sakon Nakhon, and not, say… Switzerland.

Which probably seems very random (I mean, is there even any sort of demand for English teachers in Switzerland?). I’ve just been thinking about Switzerland a lot because it blew me away two years ago when I visited, and I’ve been comparing Thailand to it ever since I arrived here. I’ve had moments where I’ve thought: Well, yes, of course you loved travelling when you were in Switzerland and Europe. It was a place with culture and museums and extreme natural and artistic beauty, and it had a culture that somewhat, faintly, resembled your own. So why did you come here, then? Why didn’t you go back there, a place you already knew you loved?

            Anyways, so I think I figured it out. And part of this “realization” happened for me Tuesday night, at a workout class at the gym.

First off, here’s a picture of the gym from the road (the one the owner of my building—mentioned in the last post—drove me to last Friday):

It certainly doesn’t look like much. One of my student’s recommended it. In America, it would be the crappiest gym in the world. You would have had to pay me to go there. But here, it is heaven, and I pay ridiculous amounts of money to attend it.

Some back-story: On Monday, a really sweet young woman in my Pump class asked me if I’d come back to take a dance class with her on Tuesday. It costs me about 100 baht to take a taxi home (the equivalent of 3 dinners), and public transportation is only an option going to the gym, and even then, it’s risky (sometimes the songtaew shows up at 4:45, and I have no problem getting to the gym… other times, it doesn’t show up, and all public transportation stops running at 5, so then I have to just walk home and give up). But it isn’t like I’m being flooded with social offers here in Thailand, so I am a little desperate for fun things to do and friends to make. So I told her yes, that I’d somehow find my way back to the gym the next day.

When I walked into the gym Tuesday, I saw two of my students. I waved to them as I paid for my 1-day pass and asked them, mostly joking, “You want to take a dance class with me?”

“Sure, teacher!” One replied (the Thai one). The other one (a French foreign exchange student), understandably grimaced, but shrugged. “Well, I guess I have to.”

This class was—to put it simply—SO much fun! Honestly. I was smiling the whole time (and also terrible… the teacher kept looking at me and laughing, and sometimes he’d pause the whole class just to show me the moves personally, like I wasn’t already trying to blend in as best I could). We listened to Avril Lavigne and Backstreet Boys and Justin Bieber and learned crazy dance moves, and we were all dripping in sweat by the end but having a great time… apart from my boy students, who quit after about twenty minutes. My friend had arrived, so I didn’t mind.

The guy who teaches the class is also my favorite teacher. He’s bulky and muscular but short and always wears a backwards hat. When he sees me, he says, “AH! Teacher here!”

But here’s the best part: After the class ended, the guy who works at the front desk (super cute and knows English SO well), promised to help me lower the price of my taxi home. When I said, “So, you’ll help me bargain?” He liked the word so much that he kept repeating it throughout the night—“I will try to get you a bargain; we will bargain; I am right now bargaining with the taxi; I just finished bargaining.” It was sweet, how attached to the word he got, how devoted he was to learning it.

After he was able to lower the taxi price for me from 160 baht to 100—which, he promised, “I might be able to lower even more next time!”—I asked him if he had any recommendations for dinner spots, so I could pick up take-out before the taxi arrived (and also because I enjoyed talking to him and his friend). He described a Vietnamese place he liked on the corner, but the taxi was already on its way to get me, and it was at least a 5-minute walk. His friend, whose name I forget but who looked like he couldn’t be older than 20, said: “I take you on motorbike.”

“Oh no!” I responded instantly, laughing. “No, no… too dangerous. I’ve never been on one.”

“Not dangerous! I drive slow.” He replied. I wavered—I mean, what were the odds I’d get in any sort of fatal accident right now, with empty roads at 7 p.m., on a trip that couldn’t be more than 200 meters away?

“Uh, well… Okay,” I conceded. Of course, he didn’t wear a helmet, because they’re crazy here and none of them wear helmets, but I still hopped on the back and hoped for the best.

It was actually relatively peaceful, all things considered. I held onto two handles, one on each side of my hips, and put my feet on these little steps. We didn’t drive far at all, and I immediately understood the appeal. The breeze felt so nice, compared to any other form of transportation, and it was really fun and easy (for me, the person not driving, anyway).

We got to the Vietnamese restaurant in two minutes, and he came inside with me and pulled out a chair. “Sit,” he instructed.

“Uh,” Shoot. Did he think we were going to eat together? I didn’t want to insult him, especially with any sort of miscommunication, but I managed to say, “Thank you, but uh, my taxi is just on the way…”

“Oh! Take-out?” He nodded and brought me a menu. I looked at the pictures and he described, as best as he could, what each was. Finally, I pointed to two salads and said: “Which one would I like better? I don’t like spicy.”

“You will like this one,” he pointed.

“And what do you like, when you come here?” I asked him, as I’ve learned to always ask, because it’s the only way I’ll ever branch out with my eating here.

“I like spring rolls!” He pointed to the first page. They looked okay-enough, and I felt bad rejecting his recommendation, so I said, “Okay, please order me both.”

He translated to the waiter, specifying—“ma pet”—not spicy.

Then we sat and chatted, mostly about simple topics he was able to understand, as I waited for my food. I learned he had been to England a few times, to visit his sister who studied there, and that he sold motorbikes for a living. He had gone to university and graduated already. He apologized, saying, “My English… not good… but I understand when you talk what you are saying.” I promised him my Thai was much, much worse, and I was impressed regardless.

Then my friend from the front desk of the gym walked in and said, “Your taxi is here! I brought him,” at which point, almost simultaneously, my food arrived. Desk-boy (wish I knew his name!) picked up my food for me.

“Wow, this is great service,” I said, to which he laughed. He said excitedly, “I got your price down a little more! Don’t tip or anything. It is all set—driver understands.”

We reached the pavement and my other friend, Motorbike-guy, stuck out his hand American-style and introduced himself to me (I think he said his name was Noon, but I was frazzled, so I forget). The other one opened the taxi door for me and said, “See you soon!”

And this is the first moment when I realized—Okay, this is why I’m in Thailand. Because Switzerland, for all the beauty of it’s water and trees and views, does not have these people.

The salad I bought from the Vietnamese restaurant... a salad with vegetables, pork, egg, and peanut sauce... one of those complexing meals where, one bite, I am in love and it is delicious; the next bite, I am disgusted and decide to throw it all away.  

Part two is less a single moment, and more a gradual set of events. I was in class the other day, for instance, when my student Fluke stood up to describe an item that “reminded him of home.” It was a sweatshirt he wears every day, and he said, “This is my favorite item because it is the only birthday gift I’ve ever gotten, from my friend.”

I didn’t really understand, and the funny thing is, I still felt bad, because I thought he meant the only birthday gift he’d received THIS year (Can you imagine? Such a tragedy!) But he clarified: “No, teacher. I mean ever.”

Then, to explain a separate example: I asked my M6 students (M6 is like senior year, in America) to tell me one reason they want to learn English. Most of them said that they dreamed, one day, to travel outside of Thailand by themselves. Not just to America—to anywhere (many of them mentioned China, England, Japan, Canada). They knew they could only do this if they knew English, the world’s quickly growing #1 form of communication.

Other M6 students also told me they want to get a higher paying job, which can only happen if they know enough English.

Their dreams are so earnest and pure and beautiful. They simply want to communicate, professionally and personally, with the rest of the world, of which they know only a tiny, tiny part.

They trust English to build them a new life, even though they can’t even imagine what this life is supposed to look or feel or sound like. And they trust me, their teacher, to help them get there. They assume I know best, that I am smartest, because I am a native speaker. This is something I’ve always taken for granted, but for them, being born a native English speaker is like being born lying on a pile of gold.

There is nothing wrong with their language. In another reality, another world, perhaps Thai would be the language taking over the world, and I would be the one struggling in the classroom because if I did not learn it, I would never have the privilege to enjoy travelling by myself as I am right now.

Being in Thailand reminds me how arbitrary language is. It’s just a bunch of random sounds we’ve strung together to make our own meaning. Sometimes, people here speak slowly to me in Thai, as if it might just click in my brain, the more times I hear it. And I’ve done the same thing: repeated “Where is…” multiple times in frustration to a person who will never understand, no matter how many times I repeat it, because English does not intrinsically make sense to anyone, nor does Thai, nor does Spanish or French or Japanese.

Fluke, the M6 students—they all reminded me of my fortune. I mean, Switzerland? How lucky am I that I get to even entertain this idea for my future? Some of my students cannot ever dream this big. Some of them will never leave Thailand in their whole lives, to see other parts of the world as I am doing now.

What I am saying is, my job is the second reason I am in Sakon Nakhon. Because for long periods of time, I forget that I am technically getting paid to do this job, and that I am not doing it simply because it is so painfully essential that it get done, for all these students who want opportunities similar to mine.

For me, I feel lucky to realize that my trip to Thailand, an experience I thought I was doing just for myself, will end up benefiting someone else.

Yesterday I learned that in Thailand, when you are 21-years-old you go to the store (or, you go somewhere… I think my coordinator said store, but he might have misunderstood), and you stick your hand in a basket, which contains red and white cards.

Red: You are obligated to join the army to fight for your country for two years.

White: You are not.

This is how I am beginning to feel, in regards to my slowly growing understanding of the importance of being a native or fluent English speaker. I feel as if I have pulled a white card out of a basket. I mean, many of us (us meaning me and whoever is reading this, assuming you are from America) are in the top 7% of the world: we have a college degree (only 6.7% of the world has one, apparently), we live in America, and we are native English speakers.

One other thing I love about travel is this constant sense of urgency (the feeling of “If-I-don’t-do-it-now-I-never-will”); the pressure to always say yes, to adventure and to explore every minute of every day. This urgency, if not entirely disappears, at least dissipates when we live the same lifestyle for a long time. But here, in Thailand, I am constantly feeling this urgency. I have a 6-month countdown always in the back of my mind. And this is the third reason I am so happy I am here.

Take today, for instance. This morning, by 9 o’clock, I was ready to go home and go to bed. I was tired, I had to fill out all of these stupid sheets having to do with my grading system and my syllabi for the semester for each of my classes, and everyone just kept talking about lizards all around me. Then, when I went to the refrigerator, we were out of water, and I felt so dehydrated.

I turned to my friend Teacher Ying and, barely capable of not snapping at her, said, “Teacher Ying, where can I get more water?”

“Hmm, shoot. I will have to go get some more down the street,” she said. She looked up at the ceiling and then her face brightened. “There is a coffee shop near there. Want to come with me and I will take you there?”

“Yes!” I could not say yes fast enough. I wanted out of this fluorescent office, of these people talking all around me, of these stupid sheets I’d been filling out for three days now.

So I went to this cute coffee shop with her and ordered a very delicious, very American-tasting iced coffee and a cake. When we got back to the office, I’d barely sat down when one of the Phillipino women asked me, “Caroline, want to come get lunch with us? We’re going to sit outside and get chicken and sticky rice from a restaurant down the road.”

So I went with them, and ate chicken, and learned about these porcelain dolls in Thailand that people sometimes try to put spirits into (illegally, by stealing corpses, which is a whole other topic… Google it, so creepy). These dolls are supposed to bring you good luck as long as you don’t forget to feed them (like your children).

After lunch, Teacher Ying took me to the mall, and we got my phone fixed and then went to the grocery store (keep in mind, I only have 1 hour for lunch… but this adventure took at least 3).

We got back to the office around 3 p.m., and then my director said, “Okay, that’s enough working, everyone can go home early today.”

This is one other thing I love about travel and about Thailand. Just when you are ready to explode because everything is feeling frustrating and mundane and stifling, you realize that YOU are the only one who is making it feel that way. All of my other coworkers understand work in Thailand, and luckily, they are slowly teaching me: you do what you feel capable of doing that day, and then you take the rest of the day off to shop at the mall or discuss porcelain dolls at a chicken shop.

^A picture of the market near my house, where I usually go for dinner because I can see the food in front of me and don't need a menu! 

The best food I've had here...
a chicken, vegetable, noodle soup

^Sakon Nakhon is famous for it's indigo fabrics...
My co-teacher took me to a shop where they dye the clothing and sell it 

My co-teacher took me to this very haunted-looking temple, with a shrine created for a princess for which the temple was built. 

Frying chicken butt... After living here for a while, this
seems tame.  

We are both equally incompetent when it comes to technology... 

Our coordinator Owen took my friend Devon, Myles, and I on a day trip to see two separate sides of the Nong Han Lake, a famous body of water right here in Sakon Nakhon (maybe two miles from my apartment?). He took us to two separate sides because, as he said, "It is very big, and the two separate sides are very, very different." 

Here is the first side of Nong Han that Owen showed us... It has a street that circles the outside of a small swamp, which many people use to walk or run; it also has a kid playground, places to eat and work out, small shops set up; and a beautiful tree that looked like a willow tree but with red leaves (leaves? ferns?): 




And here is the second side of Nong Han Owen took us to (see how different they are? One of them is like a beautiful public park... the other is like a quiet beach town pier). We saw some buffalo at the end of the pier, seemingly stuck on a small grass island... Owen is not sure how they got there. He says, "Maybe they swim." A lot of men also fish off the pier and in boats around this area, and kids sit in the gazebos on the side of the pier and relax or play games:

         

Hiking trip with Devon, my coordinator Owen, and Myles! (Our tour guide took us through some TALL grass--very scratchy--and there was this high pitched noise and I said, "What's that?" and the guide responded, "Big cockroaches." So it was definitely a scary hike, but it was great stopping to smell the (very tiny) flowers that our teacher Owen loved so much):