Time to take a look at Phichit! We've been living here about three and a half weeks now. I think it's starting to feel a little bit like home, but I've still got lots of exploring to do! Blending in here is impossible though, since five white chicks out in the countryside of Thailand is quite an anomaly. Most people blatantly stare, but many times they point and laugh at us! The best was as we were walking down the market street for the first time. With sidewalks basically nonexistent here and scooters and tables of fruit lining the sides, the five of us found ourselves walking in a line down the middle of the street. Every single person was staring! I wanted so badly to start doing the princess wave as we paraded down the street. It just felt so appropriate.
We met up with our two native coordinators in Bangkok before driving four hours north up to Phichit. Their names are Tang and Ake. Both speak fluent English and have taken really good care of us! Tang went to school in England starting at age nine and got her masters in engineering, but has decided to open up a preschool here in Thailand to teach kids both Thai and English (that's where we're teaching!). We are living above her dad's clinic in her parents' old house. Most people in Phichit know her dad because he's the town doctor. Ake is Tang's fiance, and he learned English as a foreign exchange student in Arkansas during high school. While there, he joined the church and then went to BYU! He's a lot of fun. Sometimes he'll tell us things about Thailand that Tang later tells us are all wrong! Those two are pretty funny!
Anyway, the next two pictures are from our train ride back from church in a nearby town. It's a rural area consisting entirely of rice fields and fruit trees. Awesome, right?
Here's the good old, brown Nan River. Oftentimes our dinner is fished out of here by a local who sells it to Tang's mom. Mmmm.Entering Phichit from the bridge over the Nan:
A little look at the town:
The market (where we were on parade!):
There is some crazy awesome fruit here!
Some frozen fish cooking over coals:
A fun party store in town with lots of random little things to buy!
Yes, that's a real bug!
A Buddhist temple in Phichit:
View of our street from the ground. I think this is an appropriate place to tell a funny story. So one night, I'm outside on this street waiting for Sarah to run across the street to get something from the school. It's about 10 pm, and it's pretty quiet out. (Everyone turns in for the night around 7 pm here! It's a little eery...) At this moment, a man pulls up on a scooter about ten feet away from me. We stare at each other awkwardly for a few moments, then he pulls out a hammer! I'm slightly terrified and ready to run and lock myself inside the clinic, when suddenly he bangs on the metal post on the street several times, then drives down a couple blocks and does the same thing! Both relieved and highly amused, I stood there and laughed for a few minutes to myself! The next night I solved the mystery when I counted ten bangs at 10 pm, eleven at 11 pm, and so on. Tang told us later that it's an old tradition for someone to go around letting everyone know the time all night long. So this poor man stays up all night so he can let people, who would probably rather be sleeping, know the time? Nice.
Here's the front of the clinic with our house on top!
Our kitchen:
Family photo gallery. Cute :)
Our room! It's really nice! But also full are really strange objects, like cupboards full of action figures and clay sculptures; shelves of ceramic figures, stuffed animals, and a large Barbie head; key chains and a scary clay face hanging from the cupboard handles. The worst discovery of all was a nasty doll sitting up in the cupboard next to the door. The kind whose eyes open and shut. The kind that give me nightmares...
Here's the hallway upstairs:
And the Buddha room!
Up on the roof where we dry our laundry:
And another shrine on the roof:
Mom's old garden:
Yard next door:
Building next door:
View of our street from the roof:
View of the next block, where the school is:
Here's the temple all light up at night for Vesakha, a Buddhist holiday celebrating the birth, enlightenment, and death of Buddha. We went with Ake, Tang, and her family (consisting of brother Ton, Mom, and Dad).
First we were given a lotus flower to hold, along with a candle and incense sticks. We lit our candles in front of the temple and then followed the family around the temple three times, holding our hands in the shape of a lotus flower. They wanted us to walk in pairs because the local television station had a cameraman there who specifically wanted her family, but most especially the random white girls hanging out with them, on TV. So here we go, walking around the temple. Just as we approach the cameraman, the rubber band holding my incense and candle together catches fire, flinging it and the candle into my face and onto ground in front of my feet! Just another day in my accident-prone life. I sure hope he caught the full extent of my priceless expression of surprise on tape. Ha ha! But despite that, it was really fun!
Here we are in the temple supposedly learning something about Buddhism. However, I had no idea what was going on, because it was all in Thai! But I think here we all put a hand on each others' backs to get some power from the special water the monk gave Dad and Ton up front. I might have just made that up though...
Here's the whole group in the temple!
Oh hey, speaking of accident-prone, a bird decided to take a dump on my shoe while we were inside. Where's all that Buddhist luck?? I feel so cheated. Mom tried to convince me "is lucky!!" though. Not so sure about that...
She's frying us up some squid! It's hung up with clothes pins until she's ready to cook it. She grills it over the fire, then uses a stretching machine to stretch it out so it gets chewy. She served it with a yummy peanut sauce, and I ate almost a whole plate!
I got some Thai crackers too! He fries the dough over a fire for a couple minutes, then folds it up to harden. They really tasted just like crackers!
Then we got some "ice lollies" as Tang called them! Very satisfying on that hot night!
Oh, the food. I've been struggling in that area. They really do have rice for every meal! It's already getting old...there have been some really delicious dishes though! We're making a list of the things we like so Tang can teach us how to cook them before we leave. One of our favorites is actually bamboo. It's delicious! Who knew?
Whole fish for dinner? Yummmmm.
We found great amusement in the rambutans :)
One morning, we decided rice porridge and salted fish just wasn't going to cut it for breakfast. Backup plan? Oreos and milk of course! I was so excited to find milk here, even if it tastes a little funny...
This is Russell, the only lizard who's been nice enough to us to get a name (there is, however, a gecko in our ceiling named Ernie because he sounds like a rubber duck). Russell, like Russell from the movie Up, is very loyal. He never runs very fast (probably because he's shedding) and never moves far so we can always keep an eye on him. And he's eating all the bugs, which is very thoughtful of him.
And here's the entrance of Tang's school! It's so colorful and fun!
And here's the play area!
And what's a preschool without a shrine? :)
Here are pictures of the kids! I took this before I had met any of them. They all looked so cute! This made me so excited to start teaching!
Guess what? We've even been in the newspaper! Tang owns a column and there's been a full page article with our photos in two newspapers already! Except it's all in Thai, so who knows what it says about us?
