Liquid.

Admittedly, last week was an unusual, emotionally-charged time for those of us who reside within the Bangkok region. It was marked by the festive spirit arising from Songkran, the Thai New Year celebration well-known as the “world’s largest water fight” where shops shut down and everyone does their best to soak each other thoroughly for three days straight. Unfortunately, it was also filled with tense anxiety as the political opposition party erupted with a series of violent clashes with government troops in the streets of Bangkok.

My journal entry at the time:

..Amidst the threat of rioting, we made our way down to Khao San Road (a Bangkok street famed for its foreign tourists and Sangkran water fights), which was absolutely writhing with Songkran spirit. The streets and alleyways were teeming with people who carried with them every sort of water-projectile mechanism imaginable.

I looked down at my feet and saw that the white chalky paste smeared on one’s face [during Songkran] had intermixed with the excess water to create a small, milky stream down the main road. It reminded me how blood flowing during a fierce battle must appear.

After a while, they began to shut down many of the streets, claiming that the red-shirts (Opposition Party) were on their way there and no one exactly knew what was going to happen..

Fortunately, we made it out with no serious difficulties and from what I heard, even when the protesters did arrive, violence wasn’t headlining the demonstrations.

Fortunately, Thai people didn’t let the political tensions to dampen their Songkran spirit and I joined up with the uproarious neighborhood party, which made it their sole mission to soak every truck ladened full of water warriors with ice water. There are facial expressions observed following the impact of the frigid liquid that will never be etched out of my memory.

Music blared from the DJ hired by a local businessman, people donned themselves with flowery Sonkran shirts danced and grooved in the streets, and beer flowed almost as freely as the water- Thais love a good party like none other!

After the celebrations that left my head spinning, I got away to Hua Hin Beach and spent the last of my week break reading “Pride and Prejudice” (excellent, by the way), finalyzing a short story, and eating cheap, fantastic seafood. The summer is going exceedingly well and I find myself presently refreshed and fully-invigorated.

So far, my plans after teaching summer school begins with a week of surfing down in Phuket, an island off the coast of southern Thailand with adequate waves. May 14th will find me on a plane out to the Philippines, spending one week there with my mom and another week writing an article for a non-profit magazine concerning the refugee camps down in Mindano.

Although I am saddened in not having the pleasure of visiting many of you during the summer, you can observe that it is being put to adequate use and please know that I miss many of you very much- please continue in your correspondence with me during the continuing months!

Exhale- Classes Over. Inhale- Summer School Begins.

It didn’t strike me during the lofty farewell speech I gave my students or during the poignant slideshow of the year’s fond memories, in-synch with Green Day’s throat-clenching “Time of Your Life”. It wasn’t during the informal picture-taking with students or even signing their “friendship books” as they call them- an adequate substitution for our dismal lack of school yearbooks.

It didn’t register in my mind that the school year was finally over until the next day as I cleaned out my classroom, gutting it of its paper-strewn entrails, and caught myself staring blankly at the weathered beer box allotted for me to store my class belongings. Even though I was finally able to acknowledge the closing of the school year’s workflow, the departing of students I have come to love, I simply felt nothing.

Something that has recently come to my attention is my apparent inability to create deep connections with individuals and locations that should cause me to undergo a deep sense of loss when I finally depart. It is as though the constancy of change is so deeply ingrained within me that not only do I struggle to lay down roots for myself, I subconsciously avoid it.

At times, this saddens me- I genuinely desire to feel loss when I am separated from the things I have grown to love and enjoy, and yet for one who changes their scenery approximately every two years, I feel this resilience to be almost a necessity.

Oh well, so long junior high English class.

The truth is, even though it was my request to teach 6th grade
next year, there are definitely many things I will miss about teaching English language arts to the 7th, 8th, and 9th grade classes (catching Fifi gossiping in Thai, frightening Oat as he attempts conceal his slumber behind a strategically-positioned backpack, playing pranks on Elf, etc.). However, I am looking forward to trying something new, and more importantly, not being responsible for lesson planning and teaching for three completely different levels on a daily basis.

Tomorrow will release its own onset of completely new challenges; I will begin teaching summer school to a group that consists of 4th, 5th and 6th graders. Essentially, that is all I have been told, and even that much information did not arrive till yesterday. Although I am not necessarily looking forward to that aspect of the month of April, I’m definitely anticipating the evenings free I will have; something I have not experienced on a consistent basis for the last..ehh… since highschool, actually. Hopefully, I’ll have more time to pursue the things which I have had little time for during the past year.

I hope you are doing well, in good spirits, and feeling refreshed and invigorated amidst the budding promise of spring- farewell for now.