#26 Thailand part 5: All-you-can-eat buffets are not a challenge and other lessons learnt.

Over the last month and a bit I've been trying to figure out why I really came to Thailand and thanks to bears I think I've figured it out.

I like to think that chapters in life have symbolism in them just like the movies and the theme for Thailand is most definitely bears.

It all started with a giant bear at the hotel in Bangkok that I convinced LS to pose for a photo with and continued on to Phibun Mangsahan. We kept noticing them on blankets, in cars, at school and at our favourite resturant Siri. I'm talking teddy bears of course - not real bears. That would be the beginning of a much more exciting blog.

After jokingly discussing this 'theme' with LS I decided to research what bear symbolism meant in the hope they were significant in some way and that their significance would give us some deeper level of understanding Thai life.

Whether you believe in this stuff or not, what I found gave me warm fuzzies, which coincidentally is exactly how I imagine being hugged by a bear would feel.

According to www.whatsmyspiritanimal.com -  a very reputable source - bears represent a time to be courageous. They also represent protection over children and apparently appear in a persons life when they are required to step into an authoritative role, engage and inspire. All quite relevant right now and I think it sums up exactly what the Thai chapter is all about.

I've had to become an authoratative figure in the classroom which is a skill I needed to learn. As for protection over children that's an obvious one. Teaching has meant I've had to dig deep down to find the courage to do something completely out of my comfort zone. As for engaging and inspiring, it's a great feeling when the students are enthusiastic about what you are trying to teach them. I've found that if you plan a lesson you are excited to deliver then that makes a huge difference.

Any way enough about bears and children. There were several other things that motivated this post.

Firstly I wanted to examine an aspect of travel that doesn't get talked about very much but is something I've been thinking about a lot lately.

When travelling you interact with so many people with such vastly different backgrounds and people you have very little in common with except those core human traits that go beyond, age, race or religion.

These interactions, at least in my experience, often bring to light inequalities in such a way that it is impossible to ignore and even more impossible to know what to do about it.

Many of the people who have been so kind to me are unlikely to ever travel to New Zealand or any of the other countries I hope to visit. I probably won't be able to return their hospitality in the same way they welcomed me into their homes and countries.

When I think about this I feel a pang of what I can only describe as guilt. Why do I get this priveledge just because I was lucky enough to be born in a fairly wealthy, developed country to middle class parents? I don't know what to call this feeling and the closest thing I could find was white guilt. I looked into the concept and read a very interesting article about it from the perspective of an African American woman. Her take on white guilt was that it was a wholly self indulgent coping mechanism to remove yourself from the blame. A sort of "I can't be part of the problem because I'm feeling bad" type thing. I can see her point and makes a lot of sense. But the article didn't explain how to actually stop being part of the problem. I'd be interested to know what other people think about this.

Is white guilt the only term we have for that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when inequality stares you right in the face? How do we stop being so self indulgent and actually make some changes? I sincerely hope talking about this isn't coming from a self indulgent place and instead a curious place.

Perhaps the only way to deal with having that priveledge is to use it well and live life with only good intentions. To learn and experience as much as you can and try your best to see things from someone else's perspective. Make an effort to truly understand where someone is coming from. These are things I'll endeavor to live by for the rest of my travels and when I come home.

The other thing that motivated me to write was a particularly eventful weekend.

The other foreign teachers, who I will refer to as the United Nations of Phibun for future reference, and I went to an all-you-can-eat sushi bar in Ubon and into town for drinks afterwards to celebrate a birthday. We were intrigued by the promise of a Thai 'cowboy' club. Who wouldn't be with that description?

It turned out this was a bit misleading and there weren't any cow boys after all. Just non-stop over-the-top glittery Thai pop. There were Andy Warhol-esque paintings of The Beatles, Ghandi and Che Guervara on the walls but that was where anything vaguely familiar stopped. It was brilliant and bizarre. My favourite combination.

Later we moved on to another place at the suggestion of the UN of Phibuns' Thai friend. His brother would drive us. When we got to his truck it was clear we weren't all going to fit in the cab and some of us would have to ride on the back which we were all far too keen to do.

I never saw who was driving but it quite possibly could have been an actual enraged Grizzly Bear for all I knew (see what I did there? I'm trying to create some kind of connection for the sake of this somewhat disjointed piece). We later calculated he would have been driving at speeds of up to 160 kilometres an hour to get us where we were going in the time it took us but all's well that ends well. We arrived a bit wind swept but nevertheless alive.

When it came to getting a taxi home everyone was considerably sozzled especially our 20-year-old South African friend who I'll call Teacher Hungry or TH for short. We were about half way home when our taxi was pulled over by a police officer doing a routine check.

When he saw it was loaded with farangs (foreigners) his eyes lit up and he proceded to grill the poor girl sitting in the front seat about what we were doing going to Phibun Mangsahan. Completely understandable because it's not exactly a tourist hot spot. He wanted to see our passports but of course we didn't take them with us into town. Luckily we all had a drivers license on us which seemed to satisfy him.

Just as I was handing over my license TH projectile vomitted his all-you-can-eat sushi buffet all over the back seat. The police officer uttered a surprised and very restrained gasp of dismay. We all sat for a minute processing what had just happened and appreciating the volume of nori and rice that had just launched itself from TH's mouth. Thankfully the policeman took pity on us and let TH get out to clean up as best he could.

Despite it being quite a serious situation that had the potential to end badly, it was undeniably hilarious once the police officer let us go and we giggled all the way home, probably to the annoyance of the driver. We gave him a nice tip to make up for everything and to help with the clean up but I feel the indignity of cleaning up someone elses vomit is something that no amount of money can really make up for.

Several lessons were learnt that night. Don't actually eat ALL you can eat at an all-you-can-eat sushi buffet, and if you're going to drink afterwards, try to hold everything in until AFTER speaking with a police officer.

It seems strange to write a post that includes musings on the signifigance of bears, priveledge and a story about vomitting in a taxi but what the heck. Life is just a series of seemingly unrelated events that all wind up into one messy, confusing, wonderful experience and it's a lot of fun trying to work it all out.

The highly anticipated yet misleadingly described Thai 'cowboy' bar which turned out to be equally as bizarre as we had hoped.

#25 Thailand part 4: The first month

It's already been a month since I started teaching in Thailand and I'm mostly surprised by how much I still don't hate it.

When I first applied the thought of standing in front of 40 very small children every day in 30 + degree heat terrified me. I wouldn't say I love it but by my standards not hating a job is a definite win.

After a few weeks of feeling like I was in a bizarre dream I gradually settled in to a routine until one day I realised I was actually happy here - for now anyway!

Each day begins with a short scooter ride to school and morning assembly where we say Buddhist prayers and sing the national anthem. On Thursday's I'm on gate duty which means standing at the entrance to the school and welcoming all the kindergarten kids and their parents. They don't call Thailand the land of smiles for nothing. So many friendly smiles and greetings.

The rest of the morning is spent teaching at the kindergarten which involves a lot of singing, clapping and dancing around the classroom. It's quite fun being as silly as possible and I love me a bit of silly.

Then it's lunch time. To an outsider it's probably quite a comical scene. I eat with the rest of the students at a tiny little table with my knees up around my ears. The other teachers get to eat later at an adult sized table when the kids are having their afternoon nap but as the token Farang I just do as I'm told.

After lunch I teach the 6-8 year olds. They are little rat bags and will take any opportunity to be naughty especially if the Thai teacher doesn't show up. At first it worried me but I then realised there's no point worrying when this is completely out of my control. All I can do is be well prepared and present my lesson in the best way possible. The rest is up to the school and the students.

I'm not going to pretend I took the job for any other reason than my selfish obsession to travel as much as I can for as long as I want to. I knew at the time it wasn't fair on the students to have a teacher whose heart wasn't in it. Here I was with hardly any teaching experience and I didn't even like kids but it was either this or go home broke and unemployed.

However as time has gone by I think I understand the attraction to this career and I feel like I am putting some heart into it after all.

Whilst I know teaching is not something I would want to pursue in the future I think this experience is a good lesson/reminder that having a career which you find rewarding and stimulating is such a wonderful asset to life. It's a good feeling when the students learn something and you can walk away knowing you've given everything you've got to that class.

The evenings are usually spent eating dinner with LS. We made friends with a woman who can cook vegan food for LS and does tasty cheap meals for me. She also speaks good English as she has a Dutch husband which makes things easier.

LS and I had to do our visa run to Laos a few weeks ago. It was a fairly unexciting activity and involved a lot of different modes of transport, a good few hours at the Thai embassy, quite a few forms and sweating out a few litres of water but we got it done and we returned to Thailand with out Non immigrant B visas which means we can legally work in Thailand until August when we are required to renew it.

We stayed in a town called Savannahkhet which is just across the Thai-Laos border. It's a strange place with a mixture of very run down old buildings, a hint of French architecture and very upmarket places obviously catering to the visa run tourism industry. The only thing of interest was a very dilapidated Dinosaur museum but it was closed when we went to have a look.

All the rickshaw drivers knew why we were there and immediately would ask to take us to the embassy. Laos is surprisingly quite an expensive place so I chose to walk everywhere including for an hour in the heat to the embassy from my hotel.

LS and I stayed at different hotels as I wanted a cheap backpackers whilst she wanted a bit of luxury. The place I chose also happened to be the same place that a few other ESL teachers were also staying that weekend for the very same reason.

I went out with them one evening for a few drinks but it just reminded me why I don't do that very often. There was terrible Thai karaoke music, shallow conversation and I got hit on by a Laos woman which was rather awkward. It wasn't my scene at all but it was an experience and made me even more glad to have LS to talk to one on one on a regular basis.

Last week I came down with some kind of bug so I spent three days in bed feeling very sorry for myself. Of course, with so much time to think, I began to remember everything I missed about home.

I missed the ocean, the west coast sunsets, the seafood, the rain, the sausage rolls and bakery food, my family and all my friends. I missed the cities, Auckland and Wellington and the people in them and I even began to feel sad that I was missing out on Winter. It would be fun to wrap up in a hat and scarf and go for a long blustery walk along the beach with Dad and talk about everything under the watery winter sun.

Thankfully I knew this was just a result of being stuck inside away from people and feeling below average and I got through it by imagining now amazing it will feel to come home after a long time and really appreciate everything. Sure enough when I came right I no longer felt the urge to scroll through old photos and Google image search all my favourite places back home.

When I felt better I began to take notice of everything I am grateful for. When you have very little expectations you really appreciate the small things. After India and Nepal I am grateful for having my own hot shower, my own room, a double bed, good wifi, good food places close by, for having an income and English speaking friends. I am grateful for the weekends and for the heat and for the beautiful tropical jungle that surround our block of flats.

I'm grateful for the adorable kids at school and their smiling faces everyday and above all I'm so grateful that I decided to take the plunge, quit my job and go on this adventure.

I am exactly where I want to be.

Some of my kindergarten students

It's got nothing in the west coast sunsets back home but there is something magical about dusk in Phibun

A temple in Laos

Me and my little red scooter

Home

The word 'home' has many different meanings for many different people. For some it is the physical building they grew up in or where their family and friends are, for others it is another sort of inexplicable connection to a place, country or culture.

Whatever it is, home usually means a safe place with food, water, shelter and/or some kind of community. Most people will agree that everyone deserves to have access to these basic necessities and to deny a person of these things is wrong.

In fact the Human Rights bill was drafted so we would all be on the same page regarding this topic. Clearly the concept of 'home' and belonging to a community or in the larger sense a nation, is very important to us as humans.

The bill recognises the concept of home as being a deeply personal matter so when people tell new migrants to 'go home,' it really isn't that simple. Apart from a range of complex social, political and economic issues keeping people from going home, to tell someone to go home, you yourself have to be very sure that the land you're standing on is actually your home too. But that's a topic for another day.

Over the past three months I've spent a lot of time with people from all kinds of different backgrounds, cultures and walks of life. It's been eye opening, insightful and brilliant. I've had a taste of what it's like to know nothing about a place and to have to muddle my way through. Thankfully the majority of people I've come across have been incredibly helpful and compassionate and I would like to think that New Zealanders would be the same if these people found themselves in my home country but sometimes I'm not so sure.

When you have a home you tend not to think about it. Such is the nature of privelege. I am lucky enough to have had a stable, physically safe place to live, a close community of friends and family all in the same beautiful country. Unfortunately not everybody has this.

Sometimes, despite being stubbornly unpatriotic on most counts, I'm proud to say I'm from New Zealand even though there is no logic in being proud of something you have no control over. Maybe proud is the wrong word. Perhaps it's more grateful.

However, after being away from 'home' for three months, I haven't felt that old homesick feeling and it began to worry me. Surely it's only natural to miss something good and familiar?

Of course I miss my family and friends - the history we have, the in jokes, the unspoken understandings we share and their loveable, familiar quirks and that beautiful rugged Pacific Ocean - but not to the point that I want to go back. Not yet at least. I've been able to feel at home where ever I've dumped my backpack. (It's the best feeling ever to know you have everything you need in a 40 litre bag on your back.)

Upon some reflection I have come to realise I'm not homesick because I know that my home will always be there for me to go back to. I love the feeling of having all my belongings on my back because it doesn't have to be that way. It's very much a priveledge position to be in.

Many people who are being forced to flee their homes and immigrate to new countries don't want to leave everything they know behind. They don't want to make a new life for themselves and their families in a completely unfamiliar world. For some people who have chosen to leave their homes for economic, social or political reasons, the new country may never feel like home.

If I've learnt anything from my travels so far it's that being constantly confused is just a fact of life when you arrive in a new country you don't know much about especially if you don't speak the language. Of course some lucky people may feel an instant connection with the culture they find themselves in whilst others may never understand parts of it. The other thing I've learnt is that this doesn't matter so much if people are patient and kind.

What I'm trying to say, in a very long winded way, is that I've come to the conclusion that 'home' isn't a place. It's a feeling.

You can feel 'at home' somewhere that isn't actually your home and a big part of that depends on the people you are surrounded by.

So perhaps if we all started caring less about where we came from and focussed more on where we are going we could all just get along.