Farewell and Goodbye

After surving 5 weeks of teaching and my TEFL certification I am thrilled to come out of the experience excited and happy to have met so many fantastic people. I was based in Ao Luk for 5 weeks teaching English and getting TEFL certified. It was an intense 5 weeks to start off the new year, but an amazing challenge.

We arrived (12 of us in total) and 9 of us found ourselves in the 'big dorm' sharing two bathrooms (one of which was a traditional Thai bath). The first two weeks was getting into the grind (the hardest two weeks). We had chores in the morning involving sanitation, cooking duty and indoor duty. We began input sessions at 9 AM sharp learning about different teaching methods and additional information about teaching. This followed up with lesson planning. It seems easy enough, sounds easy enough, but it wasn't at all. I was in a group of 4 and for the first class we all taught 20mins to complete a 90min class. We were all worried and nervous for only 20mins!! We spent days planning the lesson. After teaching 20mins we moved up to 40min lessons and then finally our own 90min lesson. I remember feeling so tired, excited and nervous. I taught at 7:oopm and my students were between 15 -55 years of age. My class of 8 (Joy, Sao, Pit, Porn, A, Suni, Wow, and Jim) really appreciated us and were so respectful and happy that we were there teaching english. Despite the nerves I had a great time with the students and the hardest thing was to say goodbye.

At the end of the 5 weeks we had a big party with our students. It was a fantastic night of Karoke, amazing Thai food, and drinks!! All in all the people of Ao Luk have been nothing but kind and I feel so lucky to have experienced real Thai culture. I took a couple of side trips to Ao Nang and Phi Phi and they do not compare to the warmth and culture I experience in Ao Luk.

I am now getting ready to leave for India in 3 days!!! INDIA!!! I love Thailand!!

:)