first year. check.

It’s 5:30 am in Cairo. I’m on my way home.

Back in July when I left for this adventure, today seemed light years away. I was scared, I was nervous, anxious, excited, ecstatic more like it, and heartbroken. And while most feelings of July still consume me today, I am going home with a head full of new thoughts and a heart full of emotions and experiences.

Yes, yes. I’m a lucky girl.

So, because the first year has officially come to a close, it would be bad manners for me to not do a wrap up of my first official year abroad in thailand. And mind you. it is now 6 am after an 8 hour flight. I’m going to mess something up.

To my kiddos. you are all so very, very amazing. I know you won’t be reading this blog (I sincerely really, really hope that you don’t read this blog), however, I just want to put it out there that you all have taught me so much. Most of all patience and joy. I can’t begin to tell you the amount of joy you each brought to me every day. Thank you for making me laugh. And sharing your thoughts, learning, and experiences with me.

To my friends, especially Jamie, Lisa, Amanda, ashley, and Toya. You girls saved me on numerous occasions. Thanks for the looooong talks, with tears and sadness or joy and laughter or hell, all of these together. I don’t know if I would have ever gotten through some of my “phases” if it wasn’t for you. Thank you.

And Lisa and Amanda, I’m going to miss you crazy ladies. Amanda, melbourne 2013! Lisa, you just tell me where you land, and I’ll make a trip.

To Beckie. You changed me. the adventures we had together are incomparable. You opened my eyes and because of that, I’m heading for many, many new adventures that I never thought I’d have. Thank you.

To my friends and family back home. Your support and love was felt from across the world. I can’t begin to tell you how important the skype dates, emails, Facebook posts, letters, and packages were my first year here. Thank you for your kind words and your continual support no matter how often I screw things up, shake things up, will screw things up, or in general, scare the hell out of you. Cause just so you know, there will be lots more of these moments.

To thailand. Oh thailand. what a gem of SE Asia you are. As I was walking home last night (Friday night? What day is it?), I realized that I will only be away from you for two months, but I will miss your non stop chaos, your “mai pen rai” state of mind (cause you are so right, everything is always alright), your patience, and smiles. Thank you for treating me so well.

To my adventures future and past. You taught me (and will teach me) a lot. talk to people. let go. relax, love life. have fun. dance. a lot. seek out new adventures. Thank you for helping me become a person that knows how to do most. I’m working on the rest. Dancing… I still don’t know how to do it well, but that’s not going to stop me.

I’m feeling a little sentimental looking back on this past year. There’s been so much awesomeness that went on (as well as a lot of very, very difficult times), it’s sad to see it go by so quickly. But onto a really kick ass summer, full of new travels, classes, new and old relationships, family love, river runs, beer drinking, spanish tapas and beaches and hot spanish nights, and hugs. lots of hugs.

Taxis, Trains, and Thai Massages

You hear about the traffic in Bangkok.  It seems to be pretty common knowledge that this city doesn’t exactly have the greatest traffic-abiding citizens.  Now, I will say this, the TRAFFIC isn’t exactly any more congested than what you would see in say, NYC or ATL.  Its not that.  Its the mere fact that those little white lines in the road… ya, you know, the ones you stay IN BETWEEN while driving… those don’t really exist.  They actually exist, like, they are ON the road, but the drivers don’t seem to care.  Its a zig zag of pink taxis and motorbikes all through the city.  A race to see who can get to the next corner.  And then when you get to the corner, it becomes this merge of four to five lanes of more pink taxis and motorbikes.  And did I mention that (mom, don’t read this next part) there are no seat belts in the back of taxis?  Sweet, right?

I headed downtown for my first time yesterday.  I had my talking cards (simple phrases given by my school to help me get around), phone numbers, and my fingers crossed hoping that I DO get downtown.  The taxi picked me up at the front gate of my apartment.  This was my first real experience of being around someone that only speaks Thai.  So, yes, I was nervous.  I have been in situations where I was the only English speaker and handled things just very well, but regardless, each new time makes the butterflies in my stomach flit a little.  “Mo Chit” I say to the taxi driver.  “Mo Cheet?” “Um, yes, Mo CHEET”.  “Oh, MO CHEET?!”  Ok, there’s really only two ways you can really say this.  Phonetically, I couldn’t screw it up THAT much to where it was that incomprehensible.  We got it figured out.  After the sixth time.

As soon as you leave the front gates of my community, BAM!  there it all is.  Street food carts, dirt alleyways, loose dogs, traffic, motorbikes, advertisements, and people!  People everywhere!  AH!  I loved it!  This is what I’m talking about!  While taking the 20 minute taxi downtown, I was glued to the window just like you would imagine a first time tourist to be.  I was THAT girl.  The only thing that distracted me from my state of amazement was the trip we (meaning the taxi, the taxi driver, and myself) got to take onto the sidewalk to attempt to pass a truck making a right turn.

I arrived at the Mo Chit train station!  Woo!  I felt successful already.  140 baht (near $5) for a twenty minute cab ride?  I’ll take it!  I met Toya, whom I met through a mutual friend in Asheville, at the station.  A phone!  That was the first thing on the agenda.  Yup, not that exciting, but totally necessary.  I’m not about to go explore the great city of bangkok without having any connection.  There ya go family.  Safety first!  Toya just left Spain where she’s been teaching Kindergarten.  She was in Chaing Mai (northern Thailand) for some time, so this girl knows some Thai.  Amen to that.  We went to Sukhumvit, one of the busier roads in Bangkok just to walk around.  Hello world of dildos, porn, and Justin Bieber T-shirts!  (who would’ve ever thought that the biebs and dildos would have anything in common??)  so that was fun.  And no, I didn’t get anything.

We met up with Toya’s friends from Spain, Bob and Bonnie, at their posh downtown apartment (see skyline pics… that’s from their balcony.) I finally (and yes, I say finally for a reason) had a drink.  Vodka, tonic, with a splash of mango juice.  We were starving, except for Bonnie, whom (who?) tried the street food for the first time the day before and spent the afternoon on the toilet.  Down the way, we came upon this lovely little establishment right off, and I do mean RIGHT off, the main road.  Multi-colored lanterns hanging from the tin roof, plants lining the inside wall, and traffic used as our background music, this place was everything I needed at that time~Good food, alcohol, and chaos.  Bob ordered a Singha, which YES! I had to try.  Everything I expected and not much more.  Those of you that know me best, know I love my beer.  (oh Asheville breweries, how I miss thee).  But Singha and Chang, apparently you will be the new flavors in my life.  I ordered noodles with chopped chicken.  And oh my goodness.  These noodles… I have never had noodles better than these noodles.  I’m not a foodie, never have been, so describing tastes of food is not my forte.  Sorry anthony bourdain fans.  We shared plates… I was in heaven.  Red curry with spicy chopped pork, sweet shredded pork with pineapple fried rice; This is happiness.

Here’s my adventure to get home:  I got back to the Mo Chit station and went to catch a taxi.  Only to be denied by one.  “too fah!” He says.  ya, ok. I open another cab door.  “uuuh… cent-on chang-wat-ta-naa, soi samakee, nichada thani”.  This is where the talking cards totally saved my ass.  “ok, ok.” “OK?  you sure?” “yes, yes I sure.”  5 minutes in… not so sure.  I was on a highway I KNOW wasn’t familiar.  No familiar signs, no way of knowing, no seat belt… 10 minutes later, just as I was imagining myself being sold on the black market, there was the sign to Pakkret, the division I live in.  A-MEN.  We did four u-turns once getting into Pakkret, which directly led me to learning how to say “Left”, “right”, and “NO! U-turn”.  Nothing like a crises to get you motivated to learn some thai.  35 minutes later (mind you, the ride into town was 20.), I arrived safely.  And positively exhausted.

I deserved a Thai massage.  Between the traveling, the moving, and the taxi talk, I needed this massage.  Yes, looking back on it, I probably should have gone for the relaxing, calming, oil massage, but no, I went for the beating, stretching, and kneading.  When in Thailand…

Bamboo Spa is located across the street from the front gate of my school, inside the Starbucks.  (Yes, we have a starbucks within our gated community.)  I walked in to be greeted by a beautiful Thai woman, whom is the owner and also a parent of an entering third grader.  She asks if this is my first Thai massage and upon answering, “Yes”, “Ok, we’ll be easy on you…”  I change into my garments, which replicates those of scrubs.  The woman walks into the dimly lit room as I stand nervously over the thin mattress and pillow.  I had no idea what to expect.  I lie on my back and close my eyes as most people do during massages.  But this was a little different.  I felt odd trying to relax.  This woman grabs my legs endlessly pulling, kneading, stretching them like I am Gumbi.  I wasn’t sure if I should try to relax and close my eyes or sit up and start doing calisthenics with this woman.  I chose to relax, lying there with my eyes closed.  And there were periods of time where it felt great.  You never really know just how much tension you hold in your appendages until they are tirelessly kneaded.  But then out of nowhere, she pummels the bottoms of my feet and then my thighs and then my shoulders.  It was always right when I went off into dreamland and then, “BAM!”  So much for that… After an hour of what felt like a visit to the chiropractor, acupuncturist, and yoga studio, my massage was done.  I’m glad I did it, but next time… I think I’ll go for the traditional oil massage.

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and the journey begins…

So here I am.

I arrived late last night after a full 25 hours en route.  grueling?  yup.  Part of my brain was screaming, “YAY! YAY! YAY!” and the other part of my brain was yawning.  The flights were relatively uneventful, which over the years I have come to appreciate.  But I will say this, I fully enjoyed the individual screens each person gets on Korean Airlines.  Pimp.

After standing in the immigration line for about an hour, I proceeded to pick up my four oversized luggage pieces.  And thank goodness they were all there to whisper to me, “We wouldn’t leave you Melanie!  We’re all you have left!”  Jess, the school’s new staff appointee, was there to greet me with one of those signs reading, “Melanie Slimko ISB”.  There was a sense of comfort seeing that sign.

We walked out into the thick dense humidity that we apparently have to grow to love here in Thailand.  We stood there waiting for our school van to pick us up only to see that we are standing next to my principal, the man that hired me five months prior.  He just returned from his home in Canada.  “Melanie!  Man, the last time I saw you, we had way too much red wine when accepting my job offer!”  Which is true.  At least we know how to celebrate!

It was a thirty minute drive from the airport to my community Nichada Thani.  I was squinting through the darkness of the nighttime to make out sort of silhouette~ a building, a house, a palm tree.  Most of what I got out of that were billboards and neon signs that read, “โรงพยาบาล” (hospital) or “Nescafe”.  I gave up due to my eyes being weary from the previous 25 hours.  Jess and her husband are originally from New Zealand and have been in BKK for three years now.  Before they were in the Philippines teaching.  Now, this is common for these people to have traveled all over the world.  I feel quite inadequate when comparing myself to some of my fellow employees.  Australia, Brazil, Prague, etc… they are experienced.  But ya know, I have to start somewhere.  And its pretty bad ass that I’m starting my journey in Bangkok.

We took the back way into my gated community, Nichada Thani.  Guardsmen greet us at the front gate.  I felt special.  You know, total first class.  ha.  Jess points out, “This is where most of the American Embassy families live.” Once again it was dark, but I could make some of the two (sometimes three) story, white plaster-like houses out given the dimly lit sidewalks along the red-brick road lined with palm trees.  White houses, red shingle roofs.  Pretty common.  luxurious living apparently.  (And after walking around the neighborhood today, WOW.  I live in a really beautiful community.)  I turn to Jess and ask her in a slightly hesitant voice, “so, uh, these parents of our students, what do most of them do?”  “Well, they work for rich companies.  We mostly have Chevron people.  Chevron, Swiss Embassy, and American Embassy.”  Oh.  Now, for the most part, I’m pretty confident in my teaching skills, but I have yet to explore this world.  So here I am: not only on the other side of the world, but on the complete flip side in my profession.  I’m imagining kids with stamps in their passport that quadruple mine.  Parents that walk in with their hands on their son’s shoulders and say, “My child will be at Harvard in 8 years.  You will make this happen.”  I know I’m exaggerating.  That’s because I can.  I can make ridiculous assumptions because I have yet to meet these people.  Sometimes its fun to do.  But in all seriousness, I’ve taught on the Navajo Reservation where most students live with the grandparents, have limited electricity, and walk a mile down a red dirt road to catch the bus at 6 am (insert your best, “I had to walk uphill both ways in ten feet of snow” comment here).  I’ve taught in West Asheville where a large majority of parents work three jobs to make ends meet, spend little time with their kids reading and miss parent conferences b/c of this, and constant behavior issues develop in our students.  Its a switch.  I’m anxious about this more than anything; a little unsure b/c its so new.  But I’m so welcoming to the idea.  I love to take on new challenges and this one may be my biggest yet.

Back to the car ride… It was a very quiet Friday evening.  Reminder: I am not IN Bangkok.  I am about 20 minutes north in a small community called Nonthaburi.  I am pretty sure my posting would be entirely different if I were riding in a van into downtown Bangkok.  We pass the lake, which I am SO excited about because lakes and rivers are my favorite to swim in.  Immediately upon expressing this to Jess, “ya, um, there’s Mekong catfish the size of humans in there.  and mermaid fish.  when I’m saying its a mermaid, I’m saying that it’s huge.”  “Well, can I swim in it?” “ya, I don’t.”  ok…  I’m gonna conquer those fish.  but I tell you, if I run into the mermaid fish, my days of swimming in lakes may no longer exist.

My apartment complex is JUST outside of the Nichada Thani community.  Once again, greeted by two more guardsmen at my apartment complex (see, this is what I’m saying… rock star.  Ha.  I’m only kidding), the apartments are six stories tall, and my apartment is the top three floors (explanation will follow).  I get out of the van to walk back out into the dense hot air, lift my 70 lb. pieces into the elevator and roll down a hall lined with lush green plants and red brick.  I could see the sky lit with Bangkok’s craziness miles away.  Can’t wait to get involved in that craziness.

Opening the door, I walk in to my split-level apartment with cherry wood flooring.  Master bedroom and bath below, kitchen and family/dining room next level, and top level: spare bedroom and bathroom.  FYI~ I have TOO much space up in this place.  This means that visitors aren’t just welcome, they are kinda mandatory.  The furniture is what you would see in a Destin, FL beach house, but hey its free and I would much rather have it than not have it.  The fridge had some basic necessities: milk, shogun OJ (oh my god… this stuff is deeeeelishus), grapefruit, a fruit I can’t yet identify, a whole pineapple (there no time like the present to conquer pineapple cutting), bread, water, and coffee (the instant NesCafe stuff, not like the good stuff).

So how do I feel?  Not sure yet.  I slept really well last night and woke up in a cheerful mood.  I’m wrapping my head around this significant change that I am about to dive into head first.  I’m excited and VERY eager to get into the city to explore.  I’m waiting for that moment when I say to myself, “I’m home.”  When walking out on my front porch off my spare room I look out into the distance only to see the Bangkok skyline.  That made me jump up and down (literally).  It’s new and I am easily amused.  Plush green treetops, blue, red, green roofs, and tall white highrises are all I can see for miles.  The pool at our apartments, along with my massage at the spa down the road, may have to wait till tomorrow.

I’ll post some pics on here soon.

I thank you all for the love and support in the last few months.  I truly don’t believe I could have done this move without the positive words, prayers, and thoughts from each of you.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

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