Life as usual

I will go into a little detail of everyday life here in Om Koi. I stay at a center in the middle of town, now keep in mind that the town is not very big and mostly made up of residential area. There is the main road that goes through town and it is where all of the shops are. When I say the shops I mean stalls. There is only one place I would call a shop and this big exciting place is no more than a corner store, however the people here call it a mini mart. Life here is beautifully simple I wake up at 5:30 in the morning to pray then I usually make myself a coffee. While I am relaxing the students work they are always working. On thier own they have formed groups, the groups do chores together. They switch chores every week. There are 42 students and they cook for themselves. So cooking is a chore, also the two people in charge of this project try to teach them how to be tidy so they clean our house as well as the property surrounding the house. Everyone except my lazy ass is working in the morning. Sometimes I take that time to prepare for school as I have many classes to teach and never want to go in unarmed. The kids are quick to get bored except the few that really want to learn english. Mondays I teach at the elementary school (Banuan) I teach 3 classes 30 minutes each. Grades 4,5,6, then I break until 1:30 when I have to go to the highschool to teach grade 10(my favorite class). The classes at the highschool are 1 hour long. Tuesday I am at Banuan again same gig then again to the highschool for grades 9 and 11 also good classes. Wednesday I teach all day at the highschool. I only teach grade 7. Now I have to explain that in Thailand they split the grade up into levels there are four levels. 1 being, I suppose you could say the most knowledgable, 2 just a little less, 3 even less and 4 hardly any english. So for the grade 7 classes I teach all levels. It's a challange and if I didn't love the kids so much it would be difficult. Thursday I teach a different grade 9 class then a 7 then I teach a grade 8 class and finish my day with a grade 12 class, they know quite a bit of english and have great personality. Friday is always a half day so I only teach 2 classes another grade 12 and another grade 8. Ok so when I leave school I often just go straight home, I do this for a few reasons I like to take that time to practice Thai or read also it is impossible to shower once the students get home so I need to do that before 4:30. I shower 2 to 3 times a day here that's just what you do. So naturally they do the same thing. But when you are contending with 42 students for water you are just not gonna get it. The students after school do many things each day has proved a little different sometimes they go to the garden sometimes they help with the construction that is being done. A few days last week we went to the river to get sand I helped. I had a great time I played in the river in between carrying buckets of sand. While we are doing whatever it is that needs to be done the others are making food. They eat arround 6. Then at 7 they study. Monday and tuesday they study one thing and wednesday and friday they study another thing. I always teach english but to different classes. Some days the students study the Bahai books then the next days they study english with me or the other man Ginney. The older students facilitate the younger in learning the Bahai books in Thai of course. At 8 we pray then after prayer I teach another english class this one is special because I only have a few students they are the older ones who want to learn english. We study a Bahai book for youth in english. I really like this group of students they are becoming my friends. So I hope this gives all of you a better idea of what I am really doing here. I also want to say to those who knew him I think of my grandfather alot here and I think in some way he is here helping me, I can't help but think that he would have been really happy with the work I am doing here. I am after all doing two things he loved, teaching and learning about another culture. I estimate I think of him at leaste once every few hours. Anyway I digress. I am happy here and I can see so much potential for this place I want to stay and get to know the people and their lives. This is truly the greatest experience of my life thus far.