Sawatdee Kha!,
The last part of the homestays went by relatively quickly. On September 27th, we had the opportunity to teach English at a girls school in Mae Rim! We planned out games and some basic lessons to teach, regarding body parts, places, and numbers. The girls were all high school age, and very polite; an intereting contrast to a typical American high school environment. We broke into four groups with stations th girls could rotate through. Katie and I focused on teaching body parts, using a few games, including Simon Says and having the girls draw body parts on the board, to help them learn. There was a lot of laughing and mispronunciation, but I think we did a pretty good job helping them understand the words. English is such a challenging language to learn; there are so many words that sound very similar or exactly the same but mean something completely different. I feel fortunate that I learned it as a first language, and I have so much respect for anyone who is learning it at an older age.
Throughout the week we practiced three of the dances we did every night with the women of the village in preparation for a performance at the hospital (rong payabaan). At the beginning of the week we were all struggling quite a bit to get all the moves down, but with the help of Ajaan Petchera, we managed to be ready to perform by September 28th. I loved the dancing so much, and was more excited than nervous for sure. The stage was outside the building, and there were a lot of people watching since it was the opening of the hospital. Carpe Diem was one of four dancing groups, and it was fun seeing all of the other women dressed up. They were much better at dancing than we were, but luckily we had Ajaan Petchera and two other women from the village dancing with us who we could watch to make sure we got the moves right. Everyone in the audience was very supportive and enthusiastic while watching us dance, and they asked us each where we were from and what we like about Thailand. Afterwards, we walked around outside the hospital where there were various crafts and a bunch of free food and toothbrushes, which many of us took advantage of. There was a man at one of the booths who offered us blessing bracelets that he tied on each of our wrists. He said some words in Thai and blew on our hands after tying the last knot. Even though I had no idea what he was saying, it was pretty cool to know that I’m wearing a bracelet that has been blessed.
September 29th was our last day of Thai class, and our last full day in Mae Rim. Most of the was spent finishing up the Thai speeches we each had to give at the celebratory farewell potluck that would take place that evening, as well as making decorations for Loi Kratong, the festival that happened to fall on the same night. We each made these beautiful star shaped, floating candle holders, essentially, out of banana leaves and various flowers, with incense and a candle in the middle. In the evening we met at the Eco Lodge where we had Thai class, because that is where we had the evening celebration as well. Each of our host families made a dish of food, so there was a huge, potluck style feast that was delicous. It was sad knowing it was the last night with our families, so we all spent as much time with them as possible before having to say goodbye. After the amazing dinner, everyone gathered in the sala for us to give our speeches.
Everyone had pretty poor pronunciation, but the villagers were very supportive, only laughing when we would accidentally say something completely different than what was obviously intended. We also prepared three songs to sing in gratitude of everything the families did for us. We decided on Lean On Me, Shake It Up Baby, And Chang (Chang means elephant), a song we learned from Ajaan Petchera. Chang went pretty well, and they even asked for an encore. However we only practiced the other to songs a handful of times, so the performance sounded more like dying cats than beautiful songs of gratitude. Everyone watching looked pretty confused and startled, and I don’t blame them! Anyway, after that, each parent in the host families gave us more blessing bracelets, which was very sweet and emotional for a lot of people. Then we sang the song for Loi Kratong while lighting our candles, and went down to the fish pond where we placed them in the water. Ajaan PorNom explained to us that if two candles float together, it means the two people will end up together. However, the ceremony is usually done on a river, so since it was a fish pond, almost all of the candles clumped together, and stayed that way until we left.
It was beautiful watching the floating, burning decorations on the water, and it felt like a good way to spend our last night with these people that were so welcoming to us. It was sad to leave the homestays because they were full of fun and we learned so much, but it also felt like a long time to be in one place, so it was refreshing to have a change of pace. The next morning we left for Chiang Mai where we stayed for a night before heading into the rain forest to do some trekking!! P.S. We will try to update with pictures later, the computer isn’t working right now.