royal palace and orientation.

Sooo here’s a new update on what has been going on the past few days!

On Friday, October 15, CIEE loaded the whole group on to buses and we set out for Wat Phra Kaew and the Grand Palace. Wat Phra Kaew, also known as the Temple of the Emerald Buddah, is the name for the place that contains the former residence of the Thai monarch, the Grand Palace. We were split up into groups and were taken on guided tours. Our Thai tour guide, Kay, was hilarious and shared tons of information about the grounds, Thailand, and life in general. The buildings were beautiful! The main attraction there is the Emerald Buddah which was an amazing site. After our tour with Kay, we had lunch at a restaurant along the river and then were brought back to the hotel for more teacher training.

That night the coordinators from all of our schools came and met us at our hotel so we could meet them and ask some questions before we actually moved there for the rest of the year. The Sunflower school sent one of their school administrators, I can’t remember her name now…she was really nice, but she’s not the English coordinator so she couldn’t answer a lot of our questions. She did however inform me and two other girls would be teaching at the primary school and that the other girl would be teaching at the kindergarten school. We would be living in the teacher dorms but we would have our own room and bathroom….and our rooms have wifi! That was suuuuch a relief to hear. There is a common area in the lobby that has a small kitchen so I will be able to cook meals which will be nice. There are other westerners that teach at the school; there are some teachers from Australia, Canada, and England that are already there and have been teaching there for a while. The English coordinator is a guy named Peter and he’s from America—I’m a little relieved about that because now I know at least there will be no language barrier with him and will be easier to get all my questions answered!

CIEE had set up a welcome dinner for us and the coordinators after our meeting. Although the dinner wasn’t too amazing, some kids from one of the schools in Bangkok performed traditional welcome dances throughout the dinner. The girls who danced were amazing and their outfits were so colorful and intricate; it was really amazing to watch them and watch their dancing.

After a full day of thai language learning and teacher training, the girls and I decided to venture into central Bangkok and check out some of the sites. The 6 of us took a cab to khao san road, which is known as being a big touristy/market area. It was so nice to get out of the hotel and get into the middle of the city and check out another part of Bangkok. Khao san road was filled with people, vendors, street food, and sooo much more. The girls and I walked around looking at all of the stuff people were selling. We could have spent hours there shopping, there was just sooo much stuff. We went to this random restaurant for dinner and had some amaaaazing pad thai. After dinner we wandered the streets some more and checked out a few of the bars that lined the street. At this one bar we went to, if you purchase a drink you get to get a foot massage….but not just any foot massage! In the back of the bar there is this water pool looking thing. It’s kinda like a giant tub. In the tub are hundreds of little fish. You’re supposed to put your feet into the tub and the fish are swarm your feet and eat off all the dead skin and clean your feet. We couldn’t pass up the opportunity to do this so the girls and I bought our drinks and headed for our foot massage. It was the weirdest feeling ever! It was a mix between ticklish and uncomfortable, but it was a fun experience. We explored some more that night then decided to call it a night and head back to the hotel.

The past few days have just been filled with teacher training and more thai lessons and learning what to expect in the next few months. Yesterday we had a workshop on traveling and the coordinators listed some amazing looking places to travel to. I cant wait to start traveling and seeing all of Thailand; there are soooo many places I want to go so I’m excied to get out there and start adventuring!

Today we leave the hotel and head to kanchanburi and are staying the night there. Today we’re going to visit the bridge on the river kwai, and tomorrow we’re going elephant trekking and bamboo rafting! I’m really excited to experience all of it! Tomorrow night we come back to Bangkok and get picked up by our school coordinators and head to our permanent locations! I’m really excited to see what my school/accommodations are like! Although this week has gone by really slowly because we’ve been stuck inside doing training all week, I feel like my year here is going to go by suuuuper fast so I’m excited to get out there and start experiencing it before my year here is up!

Love you all!

at the royal palace with chelsea and jess

with one of the thai guards at the royal palace