King Narai Festival

Apparently February is King Narai month in Lopburi.  I guess that he lived in the palace in Lopburi and was a pretty well-loved king during the 17th century.  In celebration, the students wore traditional Thai clothing for the past three weeks.  It's really fun to see them in clothes that aren't their uniforms and the traditional Thai clothes are very colorful.  The culmination of the celebration was a week-long festival held at the palace.  There were lots of clothing vendors, food, and shows throughout the week.  Anuban was sponsoring a small stage and our director, Ann, had to go for a few hours each night.  We were told that she wanted one of us to go to the festival with her each day and they would dress us up in traditional clothing.  I got to go this past Tuesday.  After lunch I was wrapped in some thai silk to make a skirt and then wrapped in some pink lace cloth for a top.  Then I had lots of make-up applied, a hair ornament added, and was adorned with jewelry.  Then I was told to wait for two hours until we left school...  We finally get to the festival and I have to wait around some more until Ann shows up and we get on stage.  I mostly just had to smile and nod and agree with things that she was saying, even though the majority of people watching would have no idea what I was saying.  There were five different performances that we introduced, a few dance rountines and a traditional Thai band.  Then I had my picture taken with over 100 different Thais, they do love their pictures here.  Overall it was a good experience, but a very long day!

On stage at the festival

With Ann and someone I was told is "very important in Thailand"

Nearing the End

Yesterday everyone in the Mini-English Program went on a school trip.  P1/2 went to an aquarium, P3/4 went to a museum in Bangkok, and I went with P5/6 to a National Park.  We got to school early and settled in for a 2.5 hour bus ride to the park.  Then we split up and I went with some of the P6 girls and a trail guide.  Now none of this trip was in English, but I still enjoyed being outside and seeing some different scenery.  It was a tiring day and we made it back to the school around 6.

Our final exams have been scheduled for March 1st and 2nd, so only 2 and half more weeks of teaching!  It really has gone by quickly.  I'm excited for some traveling before I go home.  My friends Brie and Mel are coming to visit this weekend, so we're going to try and make a tentative schedule for March and April.  Also, Brie bought the same ticket back to NYC as me so I'll have some company for the flight!

Not much longer now, I'll have to bring my camera to school a few more times and make sure I get lots of pictures of all my favorite students! Like Jeans...

End of January

Well we finally got three new teachers for the Mini English Program after three left at the beginning of the year.  They decided that teaching wasn't for them and they would rather be traveling.  So last week three new teachers arrived from South Africa.  I'm sure it's hard to be thrown in halfway through the term, but they seem to be liking it well enough and I think they'll be able to stick it out until the end of the semester. 
I think that final exams will start the last week of February/beginning of March, so there really isn't too much longer!  About four more weeks of teaching and then off to travel for five weeks!  Time to start finalizing my travel plans I guess.
Yesterday to celebrate Victoria's birthday, Teacher Ann took us all out for lunch.  We went to a really nice Hot Pot Buffet.  There's an electric burner on the table and a giant pot for you to cook your own soup.  You choose anything you want from the buffet, plop it in the pot, and hope for the best!  It's pretty fun and if it comes out tasting bad then you only have yourself to blame.

And here's a picture of a school lunch from last week (and yes that is a crab staring back at you!)

A few pictures from Christmas & New Years

At the Anuban Christmas show with one of my favorite students, Beam! 
They had these dresses custom made for us.

Alice with some of the Grade 3 students dressed for their dance routine.

All the English teachers doing our dance to "Rock Around the Christmas Tree"

At our fancy Christmas dinner in Bangkok

Lounging in Koh Chang

Koh Chang

Back to blogging!

Alright, so I have been very, very lazy about blogging for the last...4 months!  But I am going to try and go out as strong as I went in, so this is the catch-up post.
October:  I spent three weeks traveling around the islands in the South of Thailand.  I went to Koh Tao, Koh Phangan, Koh Samui, Koh PhiPhi, Koh Lanta, and Riley Beach.  It was a great vacation and though I was getting sick of living out of my backpack by the end of it, I'm so glad that I did it!  I think my favorite islands were Koh Tao, Koh PhiPhi, and Riley Beach (which isn't actually an island, but you still have to take a boat to get there).  I did and saw a lot while down there, but some of my favorite things were the Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan, lighting a lantern on Riley Beach, hiking to the lookout on Koh PhiPhi, and visiting AngThong Marine National Park on a daytrip from Koh Samui.
Here are some of the pictures that I took while I was down south.
https://picasaweb.google.com/chelsea.brasel/IslandHopping?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJydweGdmuL23gE&feat=directlink

November:  After applying for a few jobs in Bangkok, I was having some trouble committing to a school without seeing it first and the flooding was also making it more difficult to secure a job.  A position was still available at the school I worked at in LopBuri, so I met with the Director, Ann.  I basically just had to walk into the office and she said "You can have your old job!"  So that was easy.  I wasn't sure if I was going to like being back at first, but it was so nice to see all the kids again.  And already knowing the way the school works and what's expected of you made it a lot easier this time around, so all in all I'm glad that I ended up coming back here.  I also went to Sukhothai for a night with Holly to see Loi Kratong, which is the lantern festival.

December:  The second semester is not only shorter than the first, but also has twice as many holidays!  We had two three day weekends in December and then a four day weekend for New Years!  The first long weekend I went back to Khao Yai and did the fullday tour of the National Park, then we checked out the sunflower fields in Lopburi and the bat cave.  The second long weekend I went back to Hua Hin with some friends and got a little beach time.  For Christmas a group of us went to Bangkok and had a nice (expensive) Christmas buffet.  Then for New Years I went to Koh Chang with some friends.  It's the second biggest island in Thailand, after Phuket, and very green and lush.  I had a great time lounging in hammocks and reading and we even did a zipline course, which was a lot of fun.
 Pictures from Sukhothai, Khao Yai, and Lop Buri
https://picasaweb.google.com/chelsea.brasel/SukhothaiKhaoYaiLopBuri?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCPyy_oWPsp-jUQ&feat=directlink


January:  This month I my goal was to save some money after all the long weekends in December, and then we find out we get another three day weekend for Teachers Day!  This time I didn't go anywhere far and just went to Bangkok for a night with some friends.  We went to the Sky Bar, which is an open air bar on the 64th floor of the State Tower building in Bangkok.  We went in the evening, but it was still amazing to see the city all lit up.  Unfortunately the drinks were a little out of our price range (about $15 for a cocktail or $10 for a beer), but we did enjoy the complimentary cashew nuts :-).  The next day we checked out Terminal 21, which is a new mall in Bangkok.  Each floor represents a different city from around the world including; Tokyo, London, Paris, Rome, Istanbul, and San Francisco!  We didn't buy anything, but it was a fun mall to walk around. 
The internet is going pretty slowly, but I'll try to upload some pictures from this month soon!

Picture update!

Here are some of Ashley's pcitures from Khao Yai National Park

Inside the bat cave!

Playing with a snake

Thousands of bats streaming across the sky as they go out for the night

A giant centipede!

And here are some pictures from the weekend.  Tiffany came to visit and we actually played with some of the monkeys that we usually try to avoid.

Holly and a baby monkey

Once they started climbing on us we left, haha

Still in Thailand!

Sorry it has been so long since my last post!  About a month ago I went to Kanchanaburi, about 5 hours west of Lopburi.  It's known for beautiful national parks, waterfalls, and the Bridge of the River Kwai.  It was a really good weekend; we hiked the 7-tiered Erawan Waterfalls and walked to the bridge.  Unfortunately somewhere between the fourth and the fifth tier something happened to my camera (I'm thinking I got water on it).  Without any pictures to post, my blogging has suffered..
Here are some of the pictures I did get while in Kanchanaburi.

One of the military cemetaries in Kanchanaburi

 Tier 2 of Erawan Waterfalls

 Tier 4: used as a waterslide, which I definitely went down

Let's see.. there was also a trip to Khao Yai.  Another national park, but two hours to the east of Lopburi.  We stayed at a really cheap, nice guesthouse and had a halfday tour that went to two bat caves and a natural spring.  The guide was awesome and he kept finding all sorts of snakes, spiders, and giant insects to scare everyone with.  The first bat cave we actually got to go into and we could see hundred of bats hanging from the ceiling.  It was a really cool experience.  The second bat cave we went to we didn't go in; it's one of the biggest in the area and has 1-2 million bats inside!  We just stood in a field and watched as thousands upon thousands of bats flew from the cave at dusk.  It was one amazing to see this thin line trail across the sky, continuously for over 20 minutes.  And it was so quiet that you could hear the sound of the bat wings flying into the sky.  Khao Yai was green and jungley and reminded me of the Thailand I was expecting to see before I came here.
Those are the major things that have happened in the last month.  The theme of September is saving money for October!  My last day at Anuban is October 5th and then I have the rest of the month for vacation and most schools don't start again until the first week of November.  I've been starting to plan for the month with a few of my girl friends who also want to go to the south of Thailand.  As of now the rough plan is to take an overnight bus down to the south and then a ferry to Koh Tao (around a 15 hour total journey), then to Koh Pha-ngan and Koh Samui, then to the other coast and go to Phuket and Koh Phi Phi!  We'll see if we can fit it all in or if we just find paradise on the first island and decide to stay!