A Very Suphan Christmas!

Well Christmas has come and gone already! Christmas morning Matt and I opened some presents and headed off to work in our very decorated santa hats, thanks to Mom! Most of the Thai people we passed on our walk to school did a small smile and giggle as they went by. Since the M4, M5 and M6 students were on a field trip, I luckily enough did not have any classes to teach all day.

For lunch, all the Thai teachers put together a little christmas luncheon complete with french fries, and thai food. For the rest of the afternoon all the foreign teachers went into the library to use the big screen TV and watch Tommy Boy.

After school, Matt and I got back to the house and got ready for the Christmas dinner at the Thai/Farang Restaurant close by. The owner is from Holland and he made is a free (!) dinner with mashed potatoes and thai meatballs. There were about 25 of us foreign teachers from other provinces of Suphanburi there to celebrate. After dinner, we all headed up Nikki's room in the apartments and participated in White Elephant. We all bought gifts, 100B worth, and came out with some good stuff. I received, after stealing it from Ian, a wonderful toilet seat that says "Take Your Time" on it. I was very pleased. Overall, a very Thai christmas!

Christmas is comingg..

Friday is christmas..

... and I have presents to open this year!! wahoo!

School Camping Part II

Well last year around this time, I went camping with the 3s, 4s and 5s to Chanthaburi down south. So it was nice to have a change of scenery for this year with the 4s, 5s and 6s. We headed East of Suphanburi to Khao Yai National Park. Sam, SiSi, and I left early on Friday morning, while the other teacher had to work (ha ha) and teach the 1s, 2s, and 3s. We arrived at Khao Yai around noon and put our things away in our tents. We ate some lunch (out of the back of a pick up truck) and then started on a 6k hike through the woods.

our lunch out of the pick up

SiSi and I during our hike

During our hike we saw some elephant footprints, crocodiles, and lots of bamboo. At the end of our hike we came upon a waterfall where we met up with the other teachers: Matt, Brett, Ian, Tessa, Ally, Alex and his girlfriend who was visiting Anna. We headed back to the campsite and relaxed before dinner. After we finished dinner, we all got ready for spotlighting at night! All the teachers piled into one pick up truck and all the students split up into other trucks. There was one Thai boy in the front of the pickup with a giant spotlight and we went looking for animals. We saw lots of deer (unexciting) and then we got to see 2 porcupines, which was very cool.

The next day we were woken up at 6am to go bird watching. Yes, bird watching.. at 6 in the morning. You can imagine how thrilled we all were. We walked along the paved roads with students for almost 2 hours then made it back to camp. Saw nothing interesting. Ate some breakfast and packed up to head off!

On the way home from camp we made some pit-stops. First, Chokchai Farms, where apparently they have the best ice cream and dairy products. Which is true because the ice cream was delicious. Stop #2: waterfall, where we ate lunch and went swimming which was very fun. After a few hours of swimming we hopped back in the vans and headed back to Suphanburi! It was a fun time to spend with the students and see them outside of the classroom. And Friday is Christmas!! Happy Holidays!

Updates.

So I've been a bit behind on catching this blog up. Since I am home from school, sick with strep throat, I figured this would be the best time for me to get all up-to-date. When I last left you, I was trekking through the jungles of Laos and spending time in Chiang Mai before semester II started at school. Well school has obviously started since it is almost Christmas time. So here are some updates:

1. New Teachers - They always seem to be coming and going! We have many new teachers in our school. Some new teachers from CIEE (the same program I came through) are Nicki, Maddy, Tessa, Ally, and Tash. We also just got another one from Tasmania for three months, Alex.

2. Weekend Travels:

Nov 1 - Nov 3 : I went to Laos again, to get a new Visa. Pain in the butt, although I got to miss some days of school since the embassy is only open on the weekdays.

Nov 13 - Nov 15 : School Exhibition, I learned some paper folding origami stuff and a group of us went to the tower we have in town that has a water park with 3 slides.

Nov 18 - nov 22 : Had a long weekend so sam, matt, tessa, susan and i went to Koh Chang for some fun in the sun. Awesome sunset photos here.

Nov 28 - Nov 29 : School's 80th Birthday, had a big to do at school in the evening. Free dinner and whiskey. On Sunday went to the Lopburi Monkey Festival, which I had already been to = already blogged about = read about in my archives.

Matt and I at the School's 80th Birthday

Dec 5 - Dec 6 : King's Birthday Weekend. Went into Bangkok to see my Thai friend Gift.

The crowd in Bangkok for the King

Dec 12 - Dec 13 : Bangkok Christmas shopping!