Author: Erin Burk

Thus begins a continuation of this post. Cool.

March 31, 2014: XploreAsia staff showed up at our hotel in Bangkok, gave a little talk, and then shuffled us all off in vans to Hua Hin, where we would spend one week of orientation and a three-week TESOL course. I had fried rice and corn flakes for breakfast, which I think is pretty brilliant.

{truly the breakfast of champions}

{a fantastic quantity of luggage before leaving the hotel in BKK}

April 1, 2014: Day one of orientation. Spent a very involved morning in which everyone detailed their reasons for coming to Thailand to teach. There were stories and Feelings and a ceremonial burning of said Feelings (you were supposed to write down all the things you felt were standing in your way or something.) I had lots of Feelings, then burned the log and retreated to my stony-yet-cheerful cynicism. This is one thing I will need to work on in Thailand. Ahem.

{burn your feelings!}

April 2, 2014: Today was the “do all the things” day of orientation. We were picked up via songtow from our accommodations in the morning and taken to Wat Thum Khao Tao (a temple on “turtle hill”), then a pineapple farm, and then to the Hutsadin Elephant sanctuary, where we fed the procured pineapples to the elephants. Other than the fact that the temple was beautiful and that pineapple in Thailand tastes a thousand times better than pineapple stateside, I don’t have a lot to say about the first two. Have some pictures, instead. But not too many because today was the day that my brand new camera decided to betray me.

As for the elephants, well, if you know me at all then you know it has long been my dearest desire to meet an elephant. (Dangerous things happen when you read books, kids.) So, I was pretty chuffed.

{damn chuffed, even}

I was pleased because I have been concerned about my ability to encounter an elephant in a non-harmful manner. I won’t, for instance, go on any so-called “safari” or “elephant trek” because these are exploitive and incredibly harmful to the elephants. Hutsadin focuses on providing care for elephants who were abandoned due to illness, old age, or inability to work.

This beautiful girl was in her forties and when she arrived she was so terrified of people she would cower in the corner of her enclosure. Now, she is quite friendly and much prefers bananas to pineapples, thank you very much.

This fellow was in his nineties (!!!) and was a world war two vet. He had his tusks sawed off — another evil frequently forced upon these beautiful creatures. Incidentally, elephant tusks are extremely sensitive — they are actually teeth. So imagine your dentist sawing off a few of your teeth. Without anesthesia. This elephant was blind and toothless, so we had to mash the pineapples up for him. But he was in good spirits and eagerly waved his trunk around from person to person in search of more snacks.

You see all those marks on his face? It’s scar tissue from being whipped, over and over again. So can we all agree not to ride elephants for fun, or attend exploitive “safaris” that brutalize animals behind the scenes for the sake of the tourist’s dollar and “exotic” experience? Cool.

While the situation at Hutsadin is far from perfect (They only recently got the funds for coverings for the elephants. Before they were exposed to the elements and getting terrible sunburn), they seemed to be in good hands, and the caretakers seemed to genuinely care for the elephants.

Oh — one more.

This is Songkran. He is a baby. And I am obsessed with him.

April 3, 2014 to pretty much now: I won’t bother writing up everything that’s happened because boring. Basically, TESOL course, TESOL course, food stalls, TESOL course, a beach or two, TESOL course. This coming week (April 21st) marks the last week of the course. Hopefully by Monday or Tuesday I will know my teaching placement and by Friday…I will be headed somewhere.

I still have a few more things to post about — Songkran (the festival, not the elephant), the caves, general life in Hua Hin, but for now, consider yourself good and caught up, dear reader.

BOOM. Productive Sunday for the win.

Moving to the opposite end of spectrum from the other week’s Lots-of-Feelings post, the intent of this post is 100% detail, for the sake of documentation. There will be little reflection and analysis, and hopefully not too many Feelings — although they will show up again in the future, I promise, because I have a lot of them. For now, in the spirit of brevity and organization, here is an itinerary of what I’ve done so far, with some pretty pictures for good measure.

March 27th, 2014: Flew out of Atlanta International Airport, bound for Seoul, South Korea and finally Bangkok. It was an exceptionally long journey. Excerpts from my journal confirm this and also illustrate that one cannot be entirely relied upon to maintain one’s mental well-being while imprisoned in a 660,000 pound sky-ship with 500 other souls in sardine-like tow. Exhibit A:

1 hour in: Every single attendant on this flight is absurdly pretty. Contrary to what I’ve heard about Korean Air only hiring women, there is a male attendant in my section and he is as immaculate and attractive as the rest of them. Very impressed.

2 hours in: Just watched Frozen on the in-flight entertainment system. Delightful. Will now watch Frozen again, in Thai. 

4 hours in: I’ve never flown a 15-hour flight before, so I can’t really judge how superior Korean Air is, but overall I am impressed. Decent(ish) food, little slippers, nice blankets, hot towels, pastries of indeterminate origins (it looks like cheesecake, has a cheesecake-like consistency, but is decidedly not cheesecake. WHAT ARE YOU?), and random snacks of little buns on which I missed out because I was spacing and was startled when the attendant brought them by, and apparently my reaction to being startled is to refuse food. This is not evolutionarily sound. Am going to be naturally selected any day now.

{PIO (pastry of indeterminate origins) in question.}

6 hours in: Zzzquill is useless.

8 hours in: I have reached a place where I look around the cabin and think: Yes. I live here now. I understand its rules and logic and order and I know where the bathroom is and how to operate it and that the lit up green light does not mean it’s available, it means that you can get out of your seat and try your luck at getting into said bathroom. I know who snores, who coughs, who wheezes, in which approximate direction (north east) resides the child who is not happy about pineapple juice. When I realized that I have nearly seven hours left I barely blinked. I have stopped thinking about Soeul. I have stopped thinking about Bangkok. I have stopped thinking about getting off this plane. I live here. I have always lived here, and I will always live here. Thank goodness the attendants are so pretty.

10 hours in: Have reached the point where i am telling time based on where my neighbors are in Frozen. It has been exactly three songs and a snowman since the last time the north-easterly child screamed. 

12 hours in: Misery has begun to set in. Have completely given up on sleep. No one in my line of vision is watching Frozen. There is no logical reason that this should upset me, but it does. Maybe I’ll try sitting cross-legged.

12.5 hours in: Update: Sitting cross-legged does not work.

No further documentation found. Future scholars who have yet to be born are concerned for the journalist’s fate.

{this is a picture of a window in a korean air boeing 777-300 and is in no way intended to represent a tomb, or feelings of imprisonment, or the dying hope of ever kissing sweet earth again.} 

March 28th, 2014: Arrived in Bangkok. Was properly exhausted and a little ill after the 25 hour journey. Made a Thai friend during the two-hour layover in South Korea who herded me through the BKK airport upon arrival. Wandered somewhat hopelessly around the airport looking for a sign with my name on it, until a friendly gal from South Africa, henceforth known as “Austen,” asked if I was looking for the XploreAsia pick-up, to which I gratefully agreed that I was, which she thought made sense because I was wearing teacher shoes. Sign with my name was located, identity confirmed, and with one other teacher in tow (we will call her “Kalia”), off we went into the Bangkok night, jetlagged and hotel bound.

March 29th, 2014: Reached hotel at 1am and checked in. Took a shower and luxuriated in it, even though the water was tepid at best (soon discovered that the hot and cold handles were mislabeled. Subtle yet important distinction). Slept for about four hours. Woke up and stared at the wall for a few minutes that turned out to be several hours. Jet lag is a myth, right?

Wall-to-human staring contest was interrupted by Austen, who suggested venturing outside of the hotel. Met up with Kalia and another girl from the program who we shall call “Kelsey” (because that is her name) and went a-venturing. Took a wrong turn and ended up in a hospital. But we left the hospital with mango ice-drinks, so overall felt pretty good about the encounter.

{torie in a tuk-tuk}

Group increases to six (Hi, Torie and Gigi!) and we venture to a mall. Torie instructs us on how to use the train. It is basically like the underground in London but elevated. Still, nothing makes you feel quite like a sophisticated local like successfully navigating the public transport — even if you are a pink-cheeked American with a limited grasp on the word for hello (sawadeeee ka).

{boom. public transport.}

Other things happened.

March 30, 2014: Did not sleep. At all. Very bitter about it. Met up with a large conglomerate of to-be-teachers and went to a market that sounded vaguely like Chattanooga, but which google insists is actually called Chatuchak. Hijinx ensued. 

{first pad thai in thailand. was pleased.}

{it was hot. i bought a fan.}

We returned to hotel, and lounged around the hotel’s rooftop pool, and generally felt pretty grand about being in Thailand in a pool on a roof.

{100% ok with everything happening in this picture}

To be continued at a later date, or in a few hours, as soon as I feel like procrastinating my homework again.

Yesterday, I did not like Thailand. Today, I do.

Yesterday, all I wanted was a cup of tea and toast with Nutella. Today, I just wanted fried rice (and maybe some pineapple).

Yesterday, it was the most irritating thing in the world that Hua Hin has vast stretches of sidewalk that they block entirely with billboards and rows and rows of potted plants so that you have to walk in the road. Today, it’s charming.

Yesterday, the traffic in Hua Hin was completely terrifying. Today…it’s still completely f’ing terrifying, but I’m managing.

Yesterday, I was so demoralized that I came home, thought about all the terrible decisions I had made that led me to believe I could actually do this, stood in the shower, and sobbed. Today, I feel fine.

When they tell you about culture shock, they tell you it comes in stages.

• The Honeymoon Stage: EVERYTHING IS BEAUTIFUL AND ELEPHANTS AND FLOWERS.
• The Frustration Stage: EVERYTHING IS AWFUL AND WHAT IS THAT SMELL.
• The Adjustment Stage: EVERYTHING IS OK I GUESS AND THIS PINEAPPLE IS PRETTY NICE.
• The Acceptance Stage: YEAH OK I GUESS I LIVE HERE NOW THAT’S COOL.

My experience has been less that of stages and more of unpredictable and often irrational waves. And not the little baby waves of which the bathwater-warm Thai beaches boast — rather the kind of waves that make international news and overall cause Really Bad Things to happen. Those waves.

I have had a really great first (nearly) two weeks. I have. It’s been an absolute blast — already I’ve done things I never thought I’d get to do. 

I fulfilled a life goal and met (and got kissed by) a baby elephant.

{his name was songkran and i need him forever you don’t understand}

I ate questionable street food and did not get sick (yay!).

{not technically street food, but definitely questionable}

I visited a mountain of monkeys. Literally, it was called Monkey Mountain and it was absurd. To quote my sister, it was “some wizard of oz shit.”

{get out of my face, monkey!!!}

Overall, I am really happy to be here. As terrifying as some things are (read: traffic, the prospect of teaching a class of 50 Thai children), it’s terribly exciting, and every day is a new challenge. Even if some days I don’t feel up to it.

One of the wonderful and utterly infuriating things about Thailand is that nothing is ever set. You think meditation is at 8:30am? Ha ha it’s actually at 2:00pm. Your syllabus says you get out of class at 4:30? Sucks to your syllabus. It’s entirely likely, I’ve been told, that teachers will not know when the last day of school is until the actual day. I have been repeatedly informed since arrival that no one in Thailand ever has any idea what is going on. Everything — and I mean everything — is in a state of constant change from one moment to the next.

There was one thing I kept repeating to myself as I had my little self-indulgent cry-a-thon, and it was this: It’s just one moment. One moment in the wild, expansive flux that is Thai life. Yesterday, I didn’t like Thailand. Today, I really do. And that’s ok. It’s ok to have those moments and it’s ok to allow yourself to feel those feelings. Allowing yourself to experience the bad things takes nothing away from the good ones. It’s just another moment you have to get through. And tomorrow, it’ll be completely different. Promise.

(Summary: FEEL YOUR FEELINGS.)

Note: I will do a real update that actually details what’s been going on for the past two weeks sometime soon, I swear. Things have been crazy and hectic and exhausting and tonight’s pretty much the first night that I’ve had no homework and nothing planned — although I do have a 4am pickup tomorrow to go to Bangkok with a handful of other TESOL students and teach at the “SUPER FUN ENGLISH CAMP” for the day, so there’s that. (FYI, this is Really New information to me. See what I mean? CONSTANT FLUX.) For now, have this little post about feelings.

I did warn you.

I fly out of Atlanta tomorrow. 15 hours to Seoul, then another flight and a vague stretch of time I’ve mentally refused to quantify until I’m in Bangkok. I’m pretty calm, actually, which is surprising since I normally get pre-flight jitters when simply traveling from Pittsburgh to Chattanooga. (This is an irritating condition for someone who flies a LOT.)

I think the calmness has something to do with the obsessive amount of energy I put into organizing my luggage.

{haha, it looks like the suitcase has a hat. silly suitcase. you don’t get to wear hats}

No but really. I have never been this organized in my life. And when I want to be, I can be a pretty put-together lady. But this is a new level for me. You know that blog, Things Organized Neatly? It is 1) incredibly satisfying and 2) apparently what I was channeling while prepping for my year abroad. I was laying out my things on my bed to make sure I had everything — for the fifth time since I started packing — when it occurred to me that I should photo-document the crazy. For, you know, science.

So, for science and my obsessive documenting purposes, here is everything that I put in my checked bag (cat sadly not included):

• 1 large packing cube of clothes
• 1 medium packing cube of various objects (teaching supplies, some toiletries)
• 1 pair of sneakers
• 1 water bottle (of the foldable persuasion)
• 1 pair of flip flops
• 1 pair of Sanuk sandals
• 1 large bag of more toiletries aka sunscreen, bug spray, and all the murad I could hoard (even though they totally sell it in bangkok, whatever)
• 1 medium bag o’ meds
• 1 medium bag o’…toothpaste and some other stuff.
• 1 journal
• 1 Thai language book
• 1 set of travel sheets because you never know
• 1 packable duffel bag
• 1 manicure kit
• 4 clif bars

and my carry-on backpack:

• 1 medium packing cube of clothes in case my checked bag is lost
• 1 small packing cube of everything electronic and cord-needy
• 1 neck pillow for the plane that the cat wanted to make her own
• 3 (more) pairs of shoes because I believe in quality footwear and also because I wear a size 8.5 and I’ve been warned that those are monster feet in Asia and I will not be able to find shoes.
• 2 belts
• 1 shoe oil sponge
• 1 tiny bag of jewelry. (Only two necklaces, two pairs of earrings, and a watch. Who said I couldn’t be a minimalist?!)

aaaand my purse:

• 1 bag of trail mix (obviously)
• 2 small bags of make-up and other sundries
• 1 pair of compression socks
• 1 pair of sunglasses
• 1 hat that I’m still not convinced is coming with me, but it’s pretty and I like it
• 1 camera
• 1 box of ZzzQuil because FIFTEEN HOUR FLIGHT PEOPLE
• 1 bag of airplane appropriate liquids and gels
• 1 year’s supply of contact lens
• 1 computer
• 1 journal
• 2 pens
• 1 mini box of altoids because ew plane breath
• 1 set of colored flags for reading and stuff because this is who I am
• 2 packs of tissues
• 1 wallet
• 2 pairs of glasses questionably shoved into 1 glasses case
• 1 copy of Name of the Wind, which I can’t imagine being without for a whole year
• 1 copy of Lighthousekeeping, which I can’t imagine being without for a whole year
• 1 loaded up kindle
• 4 (more) clif bars
• 1 passport
• 1 iphone aka Audiobook Listening Device
• 1 ipad, aka Tangled Watching and Candy Crush Playing Device

My mother just looked at all of this and said, “I have no idea where you came from.”

Yeah well….it’s, um, a study. A study in…packing. And obsessive organization. And…excuse me I need to go triple check that I packed everything.

I seem to have a hard time staying put.

I’m twenty-five, or I will be in a little less than two months. So far, I’ve lived in Tennessee, Wisconsin, Ohio, England (only for five months BUT I’M COUNTING IT), and four different towns/cities in Pennsylvania. Most recently, Pittsburgh. When I graduated from Pitt, I swore I was staying put. I was going to put down roots. I was going to….what was it? Oh yeah. Adult. I was going to adult so hard.

I got a job. I got an apartment. And most importantly…I got a couch.

{happiness is a velvet couch. except it’s not. I guess that’s kind of the point.}

I built up a perfectly palatable life for myself. I hosted a lot of brunches. And talked about learning to bake bread. I decorated my 500 square foot apartment with a fiendish glee bordering on mania (I called it ‘stress nesting’). I spent a good amount of time staring at the GRE guide on the bottom of the book stacks and thinking about getting a masters degree in something practical. I carefully curated my life into something I felt it was supposed to be. And honestly, I was pretty miserable.

It might’ve taken my friends and family a bit by surprise when I sold most of my belongings — including my beloved couch — and announced that I was quitting my job and moving to Thailand to teach English. In fact, I rather took myself by surprise a couple months later when it dawned on me that I really had sold all my stuff and bought a one way ticket to Bangkok. As a friend told me, “It can be startling, realizing how much power we actually have over our own lives.”

Um. Yeah.

{packing for a move: my natural state}

I have long joked about embracing my inner nomad. That it was as inevitable as me making obnoxious and occasionally obscure film references…That it was just like this moment in Juliette Binoche’s brilliant turn-of-the-millenium film Chocolat:

“But still the clever north wind was not satisfied. It spoke to Vianne of towns yet to be visited, friends in need yet to be discovered, battles yet to be fought…”

Of course, that quote ends with Vianne throwing her nomad mother’s ashes to the wind and deciding to stay put in her little provincial town with Johnny Depp as a door-fixing bff. So, rather a poor choice for me here. But not the point.

{ok, V made a solid choice. hi johnny of the early aughts!}

Still…I’m sticking by my annoying reference. My own clever north wind is calling. I’m ready for my next adventure. For new towns, new battles…(new brunches??)

Time for me to go and nomad.

Nomad Chloë is go.