Final reflection

So after 5 days of (unsuccessfully) readjusting to EST, catching up with old friends (and falling asleep during TRON and The Grinch), eating non-Thai food, watching hours upon hours of Food Network, and playing Warriors Orochi 2 with my sister (and, um, accidentally falling asleep), I finally found the time to reflect on my experiences over the past 4 months.

To take an idea from Brett, I think there are two stories that I could tell about my experience: the postcard snapshot or the real picture. On this blog, I feel like I've been telling the postcard snapshot.

To be honest, throughout most of the 4 months, I hated my program.

I hated how we only had 16 free days (12 of which I actually got free due to having to plan for facilitation twice and having to take 2 of my Thai finals on my two last personal days). I hated the language barrier and the constant barrage of questions like, "Are you Thai? Japanese? Korean?"

I had my own Thai class. Just me and Ajaan Maliwan. It was just so much pressure just on me about every other day for about 3 hours. Then I would go for about 2 - 3 weeks without Thai due to being away on unit or other various reasons. I would then forget the majority of what I had learned in the past lessons and feel horrible about the next lessons.

I hated having to facilitate. I hated the constant reflection. I hated how much we had to spend talking about the ~group process~. I hated how much we had to give each other feedback and criticism. Hell, I hated how much time I had to spend with my group.

To give some context, the student group spends SO MUCH TIME TOGETHER. I felt like there wasn't a minute where I was truly by myself or with my other Thai friends. And in terms of facilitating, before every unit, a group of 3 students called Unit Facilitators had to prepare the "lesson plans" so to speak for the rest of the student group. Then, those 3 students were in charge of the entire unit: the briefing, reading discussion, activities on unit, workshop. Those 3 were always monitored and evaluated by the interns, and then the students would give those 3 feedback at the end of the unit. It would be anything from a 1-10 scale or detailed feedback on each person. Since my group was so small, most people had to do it twice. After each unit, we would have a few sessions where we would only reflect on ourselves and talk about our group and how it's developing. I thought it was an absolute waste of time; I felt that the whole process just detracted from my learning about the issues.

But in reality, it wasn't even really about the issues. Because of all of that reflection time, I learned so much about myself and gained so much more confidence in my skills. Because of the experience in facilitating, I feel like I wouldn't have gotten that experience anywhere else Because of all that feedback, I really saw myself grow. Because of my Thai classes and people constantly asking me questions about my ethnicity, I have become much more fluent in Thai and am exploring my Asian American identity further. And because of the rigor of the program, I feel that I was able to immerse myself in the process and really progress more in terms of simply being a human being or, as CIEE likes to put it, a "global citizen."

So even though I hated most aspects of the program, I eventually found it valuable in so many ways. And I'm absolutely thankful that I had the opportunity to go through it with an amazing group of people.

Thank you all so much for reading! And who knows? Perhaps I'll keep posting sporadically in the future. But for now, thank you so much for following me on my journey! If you want to talk my adventure or your own adventure, I'd be glad to! Take care, all! :D

Homecomin'.

4:56 PM - Waiting at Suvarnibhumi airport in Bangkok.

Been waiting for about 2 hours, and I have roughly 5 more hours until I board the plane. As great as this airport is, I'm friggin bored.

The past few days have been an emotional rollercoaster. First, the girls from the Community Public Health program left before us because their program was over before ours. Paola, Kamila, Claire... Miss you girls so much.

This was literally the only picture I could find with all 3 of you guys. xD

Then, when we did our evaluations of the program, it allowed me lots of time to reflect on my entire experience. It has certainly had its ups and downs, but overall, I'm so, so grateful that I had the opportunity to experience everything I experienced. This program not only showed me issues that Thailand is facing, but also, it allowed me to grow personally and develop new skills that I certainly wouldn't have obtained had I not gone on this program. For example, when would I have the opportunity to faciltiate a group and then get feedback on my performance? Hell, where else would I have a safe space to even get feedback about myself from people that really care about me? Also, all the research skills and ways of thought/new perspectives I've gained from the awesome, awesome people on my program as well as the villagers and ajaans that we had the opportunity to get close to has been something I've really cherished. And I think this development and personal growth can continue from here on out; I feel like I have the tools and knowledge to continue the learning process that I've started here in Thailand. Oh, yeah, and not to mention my Thai skillz. Hell yeah.

So anyway, day before yesterday, we celebrated the end of the program with all of us and our closest Thai friends. At arguably the most trashy (shall we say?) club in Khon Kaen.

I mean, no study abroad experience is complete without one of those nights.

And yesterday, we had a Quaker circle, where all of us (students, staff, program facilitators) sat in a circle and said whatever was on our mind. It was really nice to hear everyone's kind of "closing statement" if you will, including the ajaans. In mine, I told the story of how Ajaan Jeab called me when I was back in the states to check up on my Thai knowledge... And I totally tweaked out and couldn't speak Thai at all. But now, I totes can, and that could be a metaphor for all the other personal growth I've experienced -- I feel like I have the strength and strategies to do all the things I thought I couldn't do (what up, SESP optimism!). I kind of broke down when Ajaan John was retelling the story of how he was climbing up the mountain in Phetchabun with me, Katie, and Lindy and how accomplished he felt after keeping up with the ridiculously fast pace of the Wildlife Refugee guy. Then I for real lost it when Maddie lost it and when Ajaan May said, "Time flies when you're having fun." Good times indeed.

So then, JBO had to leave early because her flight was at 1 AM in BKK... So that was rough for all of us, as she is such a great, vital part of that group and brought a lot of insight to everything we did. Plus, she was the first person I got close to in Thailand, so.

Next, we had our farewell dinner. Yes, I cried up a storm, not gonna lie. It was especially bad when my best Dao Din friend, roomie, and Claire's roomie came and gave me gifts. I just absolutely lost it. We had to say goodbye to Katie, who was going to travel around Thailand with her mom (who has an amazing Minnesotan accent!), which was tough for me since we worked on both of our final projects together and had homestays during unit 4 and 5 together. Later in the night, we had to say goodbye to Abby (my first homestay roomie~) and Jake which just brought on more tears. We also had to say goodbye to all of the ajaans as well. I feel like that part really got to me because I feel like I didn't fully appreciate them and everything they did for us over the past semester.

Fall 2010 with all the ajaans, what up.

After that, I called a number of people saying goodbye (some of the other Dao Din kids, Orm, my aunt, host family in Sisaket, and my Thai professor). This morning, I finished packing and took all the bedding, my phone, and keys to Ajaan May, which really cemented it for me. Wow. I'm leaving. Most of our roomies came to see us off, and Fai said something that really struck me: "We'll see each other again; we live on the same world." I don't know why that struck me so hard. I almost lost it again when my roomie gave me a hug and sent me off. Seriously, that girl is a superhero. She drove me back and forth from the laptop repair shop when my hard drive crashed, she basically taught me how to read and write in Thai better, she was always there to give support and to listen to me, she was always ready to have extensive k-pop discussions with me even if it was 4 AM, and she is just so, so full of joy and life. Okay, Emily, stop tearing up at the waiting area in the airport now...

So Sam, Maddie, Brett, Alex, Bryant, and I headed off to Bangkok this morning with Na'Am, our resident van-driver (who also drove me to the Faculty of Humanities like every morning to go to Thai and is pretty much a badass). Not gonna lie, I slept the entire time. Highways and plane rides just knock me right out, idk. But finally, when we got to BKK, we all said our goodbyes. It was so hard to see everyone go their separate ways, and I almost lost it again.

So that brings me to here. I'm ridiculously emotional right now, so... yeah. Will update later after I find an outlet for my laptop. Really hope I don't have any crying babies sitting beside me or old women groping me this time.

7:43 AM - Tokyo/Narita airport

I ended up getting "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" in the bookstore in Bangkok for funsies. Also got my last meal in Thailand (pineapple and guava, yessss). Now I get to wait for another 4 hours until I board the plane to sweet home Chicago and then sweet actual home Asheville after that. I'm supposed to be getting home at 4PM on the 19th, and it's currently 7:45 AM on the 19th here in Japan. The trip from here to Chicago is a little more than 20 hours. Timezones really confuse me. I wonder how flight attendants get paid. By the hour? Even if the time is going backwards? Hm.

So anyway the flight wasn't bad coming here. It's, like, freezing too. I can't even imagine how Chicago is going to be. Now in the waiting area, listening to k-pop Christmas music. Don't ask. But totally getting into the spirit of Christmas, finally.

So, down the row from me, there's this Vietnamese woman who apparently married this guy from Cleveland in Japan. And they're talking to another Vietnamese woman who is going to the US to meet her husband... Yes, meet, as in for the first time. From my eavesdropping skills, I've gotten that they've only talked online. Okay. Messed. Up. I could legit write a paper on that right now.

Now looking through all of my old pictures. Jeez, I just miss everything so freaking much already. I would say that I held it together fairly well (except for the farewell dinner) up until now. I keep thinking that tomorrow, I'll wake up in my room in Kasiansil and go to the CIEE office and get fruit from the fruit lady outside of U-Center. Or I keep thinking that at the very least I'll at least wake up in Khon Kaen tomorrow. But alas, it's back to the real, non-summer-camp-y world for me. เศร้ามากกกก! :(

I just looked at my wallet and saw American money. It was weird. Kinda all over the place right now. Here goes, 20+ hour flight.

10:41 AM - O'Hare Airport!

Yay, finally in the states!! :D Just gorged myself on a roasted veggie + mozzerella sandwich from the Wolfgang Puck stand with a mango smoothie because it's like 10:41 PM in Thailand, and my body still doesn't realize it's morning here yet. I spent $12, which is the equivalent of 360 baht. Did I mention that I bought almost all of my meals in Khon Kaen for 30 baht or less? $1 = 30 baht, you do the math. But anyway, yeah, I don't really know if the daily value thing really applies to what I'm eating today(ish).

But nonetheless, the states are great. Glad to be back. Though I have to wait here for 3 more hours until I get home, it's nice to be somewhere where the people primarily speak English. It's odd that I suddenly don't look similar to everyone else anymore, and it's also weird that people are driving on the right side of the road. Crap, I'm so screwed. But next stop is home! I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty friggin excited. Still emotional for sure but excited. :D

10:16 PM - HOME!

I'm home! Will do a last kind of wrap up post sometime for closure. But not now. Because I have jet lag. Night, all. :D

Final days.

I legitimately have 4 days left in Thailand, you guys. 4. Freaking. Days.

I’ve certainly had an adventure while I’ve been here, but first, I’ll fill you all in on what I’ve been up to since Na Nong Bong and my Thai assignments.

Basically, we had 2 weeks of final project time. Since our group was so small, there were lots of projects to do. So I signed up for the Na Nong Bong campaign project (with Katie, Brett, and Alex) as well as the Baw Kaew legal report project (with Katie).

So first, the Na Nong Bong project consisted of all of us working on campaign materials and activities for a high school and a university back in Loei, all facilitated by the Dao Din kids that we worked with during the last unit. It was supposed to be a “fun” informational campaign for those in the area to raise awareness about the mine and how awful it is. It was pretty smooth sailing for us CIEE kids, since we went through the whole planning process a million times over the semester and knew what was going on. But we ran into a bunch of problems while working with the Dao Din kids this time. First, only the first years were able to do the event with us because the older, more dedicated members weren’t free. So there were varying levels of participation and engagement right from the get-go. Also, apparently these kids don’t know what a freakin’ clock is. With the exception of 2 kids, everyone else would come to meetings from 30 minutes to even 1 hour late. Or they wouldn’t come at all, which presented even more issues. A proud moment came when I facilitated the students IN THAI. It really just shows how far I’ve come since the beginning of the program – with no facilitation experience and little Thai speaking abilities to being able to do both at the time. So anyway, with this project, we CIEE kids basically just worked on our materials and activities, action toolkits for people who were interested at the high school and university, and other CIEE-y materials while the other kids did their regular school thing (which is so weird to me because I’m going to be returning to that in like 2 weeks…).

But even before we could go to Loei for the campaign, Katie and I had to do our legal report on Baw Kaew. On the 6^th and 7^th, we were able to go back up to Chaiyaphum (where all the nasty mosquitoes were…) to do some further research on the charges of contributing to global warming that the villagers were facing. I know, I know, it sounds ludicrous. But it’s true. Thanks to the Land Reform Network and Ajaan John, who was our translator and pretty much our saving grace for both the Na Nong Bong campaign and this project, we were also able to visit a few communities in Phetchabun province to further get material to write our report.

Essentially, the villagers we visited had lived on their land for generations upon generations but didn’t have full land ownership through specific land titles. Though the villagers had officially been given the land by the King himself, the central government decided to make the forest around their land into a wildlife sanctuary and national park. They are also currently trying to make that land into a World Heritage site, which costs money and also requires for the villagers to vacate the area. So, for the past few months/years, the government has been charging the villagers with global warming and fining them ridiculous amounts in order to try to force them off. For example, the government told one villager to cut down all of his rubber trees or else he would be charged for global warming. After doing what he was told, he was charged with trespassing and damaging government property (criminal) in addition to contributing to global warming (civil). No, I’m still not kidding. After performing some ridiculous “environmental tests,” they determined the exact fines in baht that he would have to pay for his apparently horrible deed. The charges included loss of water, increased in temperature, loss of soil, and loss of potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus in soil, and the guy had to pay over 400,000 baht. And do you know how they conducted those tests? Well, for the loss of water, an officer from the Ministry of Natural Resources would come into the area, pour 2 liters of water on the ground, and wait until all the water has evaporated. Then, he would take that number, put it into a computer program designed by academics (not necessarily scientists, from our knowledge), and then come up with the fine for that amount of time that the water took to evaporate. And if you think that sounds crazy, the other tests were, you know, just as ridiculous.

We were also able to visit a community of villagers who went out one day to pick corn for their private employer. Before they knew it, they were surrounded by government officials and driven away by the police, who didn’t even give the villagers time to tell someone to take care of their children. They were all charged for trespassing, destroying government property, and contributing to global warming. One was charged with obstructing the duties of an officer or something. And they were all pretty baseless claims.

Needless to say, Katie and I were pretty riled up. So when we got back from the Loei campaign, we sat down and wrote a monster 26 page paper when we were really just required to write like, 5 pages. Mostly, it was a pass-on for future students and a very detailed account of the information we received so that the program can use it in the future. We’re pretty proud of that. :D So here are some pictures!

Oh, PS, we also got to see an amazingly beautiful view of the national park and wildlife sanctuary while we were in Phetchabun. Pictures are courtesy of Lindy and Katie because I forgot to charge my camera battery.

When the time came to actually go to Loei for the campaign on the 8^th, we were only expecting our most dedicated first years (ชมพู่ ท๊อป โต้ง what up?!), but ALL of our buddies came along, despite not coming to any of the meetings. Thanks so much for your hard work แคน แท็ก สมา ทราย!

I would say the campaign was a success, despite there being over 100 students (when we were expecting like 30 students) at the high school (which really wasn’t a high school and actually had those from 2^nd – 9^th grade) and despite there being a super boring powerpoint by the villagers which drove tens of people away every 10 minutes or so at the university. Our activities ran well, and the Thai kids did really well in facilitating. Speaking of, after the event, we all sat down back in the village and did a +, -, delta, which is a tool we CIEE kids were familiar with. It consists of a notetaker/facilitator on the board and then everyone throwing out ideas of what went well, what needed improvement, and what we could change for those things that needed improvement. I was doing the main facilitating, and I decided to do it JBO-style. This basically consists of setting time limits on each section and putting pressure to stay on task and get things done. The namesake is JBO, who famously does this style of facilitation whenever we need something done quickly yet still thoroughly. When I said, “Okay, you all have 2 minutes to think about good and bad things about the program and what we can change. GO,” and then later, “30 seconds,” the Dao Din kids got pretty freaked out. On a positive, we got the whole process done in 30 minutes instead of the regular 2 hours that we probably would have spent. Another proud facilitation moment for me. So yeah, here are some pictures. J

สมา and ท๊อป at the high school

โต้ง , freakin' rockin' it at the high school

ท๊อป and ชมพู่ emcee extraordinaires.

Villager panel at the university

Ajaan John, P'Fac Sam, and Alex with some girl answering a question for our Q&A prize game

So that was kind of it for project time. Don’t get me wrong; it was 2 weeks filled with stress, work, and sleep deprivation, but looking back on it, that was the simplest explanation I think I could have given about the whole process.

Last, we had a human rights festival on the 10th! We partnered with the law faculty and put on an awesome conference! Certainly not Bangkok/unit 3 level, but much, much better. :P

Now, I just got back from a “retreat” where we discussed the program – what we liked, what we didn’t like, what we’d like to change, etc. It was a nice place to reflect on the entire semester and provide insight as to what we could potentially change for next time. I’m also proud that next semester might have a land reform unit just because of my and Katie’s final project about global warming charges! Yay! So essentially, that’s all for the actual Thailand bit. I’m probably going to write one big reflective entry once I get back to the states, but for now, bye~ ^^