Teaching English (originally posted Saturday, November 4, 2006)
To set the context, I wrote this when I returned to my previous school after a year in the US getting my dissertation proposal approved. My mention of Foucault, six months later, is a residual from my year at Teachers College, a place as far removed from teaching in Thailand as the moon is from the earth. I think that is why I am still struggling with my writing--the conception of things like curriculum and identity are so very distant from the concrete everyday life of the school.
Dear Ones:
It's a misguided narcissism to think that other people are checking their e-mail in-boxes for that long awaited Letter from Thailand. If this will bore you, I forgive you for deleting this e-mail and getting on with your lives. After all, there is nothing more tedious than a letter-writer who assumes her audience is interested in the minutiae of experience. My heartfelt apologies to Mom and Dad; it's because of me that your anniversary gift is late.
I've been getting more and more involved in the professional development of teachers. In October, I piloted a month-long program for the professional development of Thai teachers of English. The first group has just completed the program which included 3 weeks of classroom study followed by a practicum.
These teachers challenged my assumptions about what teachers of English who are non-native English speakers know about English and how to teach it. Through it all, they were unfailingly polite, good-humored, and willing to do all the assignments, no matter how challenging. I felt it was important to honor what they know and that it was my task to show them the possibilities for other ways to teach English; namely, using an active learning approach that fosters reading, writing, speaking and listening in English. During the practicum this week I saw a variety of teaching styles that ranged from traditional to experimenting with new techniques. I don't feel the program was a failure for I know from research in teacher-learning that it takes years to change practice. The bottom line is, we teach the way we were taught.
When I visited their school this week, I came to appreciate how difficult it is to teach English in their context. Class sizes average 50-55 students. It is a daunting task that discourages speaking in English and encourages lecture and rote-memorization. Nevertheless, I saw lessons where teachers demonstrated it was possible to teach and learn English in such large classes.
Out of respect for me, they called me "Teacher" and showed me the Thai way of honoring one's teacher. At meal times when they came to my school for the classroom portion of the course, I ate with them. They would serve me, and bring me gifts of food. When I came to visit their school, one of them would show me around and make sure I had food to eat and water to drink.
They began to relax around me and began to tell me things, even admitting how hard it is for some of them to learn in English. They even told me how much they feared and respected their head of school, a nun they called Ma Soeur Valentine, who despite her name was a formidable person whose presence was felt throughout the school from her daily walkabouts to her draconian policies about what constitutes teachers' work. They said they will have to write a one-page summary and reflection about my course. She will read every single one of them, they said, for she keeps notes on all the teachers in a notebook she brings with her on her walkabouts. In such institutions, people know they are being controlled but they also control each other as well as themselves without needing Sister's presence to do so. It proves Foucault's observation that although the control may be from without, it is also from within. And that is why I think it will be very hard to change the way they teach English.
The last two weeks of October were very intense. I taught a workshop in Korat in northeastern Thailand and I taught another workshop in Bangkok. The first workshop was sadly farcical because more than half the participants were inexperienced English teachers who could barely communicate in English much less comprehend how to teach it. However, it was a good experience for I began to see that the problem with teaching English in Thailand is that most of the teachers here are non-native English speakers who lack the fluency and the preparation to teach English. Any professional development program for them must attend to two things: developing their English fluency while developing their English teaching skills.
The second professional development was a weekend workshop at a new small international school that included Americans, Brits, Jordanians, Indians, Thais, and Filipinos. It was an interesting school culture that included Muslims and Christians. The head of school and the school manager and his deputy attended both days of the workshop. I thought their presence demonstrated genuine commitment to their teachers. Of course, I knew I was being auditioned, too! I think I successfully passed the audition; now they want me to come back next semester to do another workshop.
Things have settled back down to some kind of normalcy. I have to make it up to my class of adult language learners who were unhappy that I could only be with them part-time for a month. Since two-thirds of the class are nuns and priests, the approach I take must necessarily take into consideration the politics of teaching the religious; it is two-parts persuasion and one-part appeasement. Sometimes, though, the formula for these parts switch places. The kind of unilateral control the Thai teachers of English talked about is pervasive at my school too, though the owners are priests, not nuns. I also feel the control that comes from without and recognize how much I have internalized it. Indeed, it is a sober calling to teach English to as well as for God's Chosen.
Now I'm looking forward to the holidays. AJ and Taranee will come home and Andy and I have plans to spend time with them and with the family. Mama is very frail now, and her memory isn't so good any more. She still recognizes and remembers the family. We are planning to go to Khao Lak in southern Thailand for some sun and sand for a few days before Christmas.
I love you all and hope you are keeping warm and well,
Walk good,
Jo Anne
*****
It seems sometimes that capitalism has run amuck in the streets of Bangkok, creating swaths of wealth and underlining the poverty next door. It is a city of contrasts, of great beauty and appalling ugliness. When Andy's golf clubs were stolen we knew visiting the Thieves Market to get them back was a long-shot. And while Andy can afford to replace the golf clubs, I can say with absolute certainty that the thief can never do as much for himself. I'm sure survival was his only aim, and opportunity the tool. The fundamental principle here is that stealing is definitely not a sound business strategy. Just ask Bernie Madoff.
A Tale of Two Night Markets (originally posted Sunday, November 12, 2006)
Dear Ones,
They say you can buy anything in Bangkok if you know where to look. But finding what you want is the challenge. There are innumerable nooks and crannies in the city where bargains can be had; if you have the time and the perseverance you can unearth treasures. At least that is the hope of every bargain hunter. An experience that began as bargain hunting did not unearth many bargains but revealed glimpses of another world that co-exists with the one I know as "my" Bangkok.
Last Saturday afternoon, Andy came home from golf and left the gate ajar when he went inside the house to shower. He was going out again so he didn't feel he needed to shut the gate. After all, we had lived here 14 years without any incident. I had gone to St. Joseph Convent School off Silom Road to meet a group of teachers and to have lunch with them. Afterwards, I was going to take the skytrain back to Onnut terminal where Andy would meet me at the station. It wasn't until Monday evening that Andy noticed that his entire golf bag that he had left on the porch of the twin townhouse next door was gone. Boong and Ginda said they did not see the clubs when they came to wash the cars on Sunday.
We think the rag-picker took the clubs. The rag-picker is a familiar sight in Bangkok sois. He drives a sa-leng, a three wheeled vehicle that is a motorcycle with a cart in front. He picks through people's garbage for recyclables like cardboard, newspapers, and bottles. Since we live deep inside our soi in the cul-de-sac, a sa-leng is the only way to get a golf bag out of the soi without attracting attention. He can put it in the cart then cover the bag with cardboard and newspaper and simply drive away. When Andy described the value of the clubs to me, I realized what the rag-picker must have felt: he had just won the lottery.
Andy talked to the neighbors. They hadn't seen or heard anything. Usually, Gigi, the next door neighbor's dog, barks whenever she sees strangers coming into the cul-de-sac. She always barks at the rag-picker. Either she was indoors at the time or she barked and Andy didn't notice it because Gigi's bark is familiar to all of us.
Koong, the neighbor across the street suggested Andy go to the Thieves' Market to find his clubs. The golf pro at Piyarom, our Sports Club, suggested the same thing. To go to the Thieves' Market sounded like a unique adventure so we decided to try it. We knew it would be a long shot that we would ever find his golf clubs. The idea of a Thieves' Market was so intriguing we wanted to see it.
The Thieves' Market is located in the older part of Bangkok behind Central Hospital in the Yaowarat or Chinatown area, in a street known as Klong Tom or Filled-in Canal. In the old days the street was a canal that had since been filled in, hence the name. The pro advised us to beware of pickpockets and purse-snatchers and to bring mag-lites because the market is only open from dusk on Saturday to dawn on Sunday. We stuffed our pockets with some cash and went to Church for the Saturday evening mass. Now that the rains are over, it promised to be a pleasant outing. The humid air was even stirred by a breeze, the promise of the cool season to come.
After mass, Andy and I parked the car at Suan Lum Night Bazaar between Rama IV and Wireless Roads. Then we took a taxi to Klong Tom. It turned out to be a neighborhood of two storey shop houses that make one street look the same as another. It's a well-known area, apparently, for we saw lots of people down there including a few curious foreigners. It's not the typical market foreigners like to frequent with the usual souvenirs and such. The market is ill-defined, being a maze of streets and side-lanes, some lighted, some not well-lighted, hence the need for a good strong flashlight. If you didn't have one or forgot to bring it, you could buy a flashlight from the vendor on the street corner. For about Baht 100 or less than US$3.00 a small flashlight comes with batteries installed plus an extra set. Thus we were prepared for our foray into the Thieves' Market. They say that one man's junk is another man's treasure.
We saw things that literally fell off the back of a truck. Indeed, we saw a row of trucks, tailgates down and their contents emptied onto the sidewalk, parked outside Bangkok Bank. The bank was closed for the weekend and the sidewalk was torn up for renovation. Undaunted, the vendors lined the sandy sidewalk next to stacks of paving stones with tarps and tables. Some surprisingly heavy items were on the sidewalks: ceramic toilets and urinals looking like new. On a table, were electric water heaters still in the box. On another table or on the tarps spread on the ground were collectibles like rusty Coca cola trays, embossed English biscuit tins, old books and magazines, costume jewelry, hurricane lamps, and an exquisitely delicate glass sconce on a chain.
The main street of the market was busy with food sellers and vendors selling just about everything salvaged elsewhere including the kitchen sink I saw a man carrying with him. There were dynamos, shoes (Was that somebody's Birkenstocks?), piles of cell phone cases, cell phones wrapped in plastic, DVD players, TV sets including a new flatscreen, and just a few tables down, TV remotes without the TV, and a completely useless UBC cable remote that wouldn't work without a cable subscription. I swear we saw our old Sony radio-cassette player for sale; anything that could be bought can be sold. The market was buoyed by an optimism that there could be a buyer--sooner or later.
In the middle of the main market were refrigerators for sale; on the sidewalk there were boxes of masking tape and cello-tape, and screwdrivers small and large, and mag-lites big enough and heavy enough to comfort a nervous security guard afraid of the dark. There were novelty items to gross out your friends, like the plastic rat in a plastic water bottle . The market was hot and crowded, so if you wanted to cool down you could order a smoothie. A motorcyclist patiently waited for his order. The seller deftly dipped into an insulated cooler of ice and scooped out just the right amount without looking.The smoothie was neatly poured into a plastic cup with a dome lid. The finishing touch: add a straw and put it into one of those ubiquitous plastic bags with loops that are just the right size to slide on the handle bars. Sip on the go.
The golf pro had told us that the good stuff is often hidden from view. We saw some golf clubs poking out from under a tarp in a side-soi. Andy asked a man sitting nearby if they were for sale; the man said, the seller isn't here. I saw a necklace of enamelled beads with a silver clasp. It was definitely Thai. I asked how much and got the same short reply, the seller isn't here. Perhaps they were wary of us. In fact, Andy said later that the clubs on display in the open were old. The good stuff was nowhere--in plain view that is. Andy contented himself with a cheap pair of leather sandals and some golf tees.
I saw another insulated cooler like the smoothie seller's. A woman was sitting next to it and fanning whatever was inside it. I peered inside and was surprised to see there was a baby instead of ice. So this was its cradle. Briefly, I met the mother's eyes and she did not smile, her eyes as wide as a cat's in the dark. She seemed young and vulnerable and at the same time, she had an unabashed look of experience that was as difficult to comprehend as it was difficult to look her in the eye. We were both women and mothers, but so many things divide us; chiefly, social class, education, and language. Where was her husband? Why did she have to bring her baby to the market? Always interested in narratives, I wondered what her story was.
Andy and I were attracted by the smell of food cooking at a cookshop two blocks away from the bank. At the corner of the street across from the cookshop, we saw two sa-lengs pulled up to the curb and a pick-up parked nearby. It was unlikely one of them was the sa-leng driver in our soi. And even if he was, I don't think I could recognize him if I saw him again. One barely notices sa-lengs and their drivers. Something on the floor-bed of the pick-up truck was covered with a tarpaulin. We did not ask. Instead, we crossed the street where we found a table inside the cookshop. I thought I wasn't hungry but the good food smell woke up my appetite. I ordered fried rice with crab and Andy ordered two bowls of noodles. With two Cokes, the whole bill came up to Baht 160 a little less than US$5.00.
An old man came into the shop carrying a heavy tin bucket over his arm. He lifted the lid to show us tiny grass cakes and fried fish balls neatly arranged inside. In a smaller bucket on his other arm he carried the sauces. Andy spoke to him in Thai but the man raised his voice in Chinese. Andy switched to Teo Chiu and the man went away. I was curious about the old man. Andy said he probably lived all his life in Chinatown and never learned Thai. Like Papa and Mama who learned enough Thai to get by, the old man was from this older generation that never needed to be proficient or literate in Thai since they worked for Chinese-owned businesses. I thought, Just as I teach in an international school and never needed to learn Thai. Some things don't change.
An air of furtive mystery hung over the bustling market. It was a place stocked full of humanity looking for a bargain and to make a baht under cover of night. There was none of the conviviality I'd come to expect at other markets like Narayana Phand or at Chatuchak. There, Andy could joke with the vendors and cajole them into lowering their prices. Here at Klong Tom, this was pure business, and you'd best look sharply, peering into the dark with the aid of a mag-lite spotlight on the goods. To me, the night market at Klong Tom was a door into an underworld culture of thieves, middle-men, desperate housewives, old men with spent dreams, and hucksters on the make.
We took another taxi back uptown to where the sights were more familiar: the Thai-Belgian Friendship Bridge, Lumpini Park, and the glass and steel towers clustered around Silom, Sathorn, and Sukhumvit that comprise the business district. It was late but tourists and locals still mingled at Suan Lum Night Bazaar. Built at the intersection of two busy roads, Suan Lum was once a training school for army cadets until it was sold to a businessman who turned it into a gaudy bazaar and entertainment complex.
Here the goods were for an upscale clietele also hunting for a bargain in the humid night. There were no salvaged dynamos or toilets or sinks. Nothing fell off a truck here. Hence, there was no need for dim lighting or mag-lites. There were rattan baskets and CD cases made out of palm thatch and clever lamps made out of wood, paper, and string. In the shops here there were elegantly packaged cotton-covered cushions, embroidered shirts, and toys for a pampered pet.
Suan Lum is a little bit of Chatuchak and Narayana Phand jumbled together with bars, restaurants, and a trendy internet coffee cafe. A bit of this, a bit of that, a bit of East and West. Pastiche and synergy. Still the same optimism of that other night market though, that a buyer will walk in and part happily with his/her money.
Earlier in the evening Mercedes Benz held a car show in the concert hall. Owning a Mercedes is a fantasy for most. At Klong Tom though there were no such fantasies. Fantasies are luxuries that don't feed the family. As we walked past the darkened hall to where we had parked our car, we detected a whiff of ganja in the humid air. It smelled like defiance to me. It was an appropriate capstone for the evening.
Walk good,
Jo Anne
A Tale of Two Night Markets (originally posted Sunday, November 12, 2006)
Dear Ones,
They say you can buy anything in Bangkok if you know where to look. But finding what you want is the challenge. There are innumerable nooks and crannies in the city where bargains can be had; if you have the time and the perseverance you can unearth treasures. At least that is the hope of every bargain hunter. An experience that began as bargain hunting did not unearth many bargains but revealed glimpses of another world that co-exists with the one I know as "my" Bangkok.
Last Saturday afternoon, Andy came home from golf and left the gate ajar when he went inside the house to shower. He was going out again so he didn't feel he needed to shut the gate. After all, we had lived here 14 years without any incident. I had gone to St. Joseph Convent School off Silom Road to meet a group of teachers and to have lunch with them. Afterwards, I was going to take the skytrain back to Onnut terminal where Andy would meet me at the station. It wasn't until Monday evening that Andy noticed that his entire golf bag that he had left on the porch of the twin townhouse next door was gone. Boong and Ginda said they did not see the clubs when they came to wash the cars on Sunday.
We think the rag-picker took the clubs. The rag-picker is a familiar sight in Bangkok sois. He drives a sa-leng, a three wheeled vehicle that is a motorcycle with a cart in front. He picks through people's garbage for recyclables like cardboard, newspapers, and bottles. Since we live deep inside our soi in the cul-de-sac, a sa-leng is the only way to get a golf bag out of the soi without attracting attention. He can put it in the cart then cover the bag with cardboard and newspaper and simply drive away. When Andy described the value of the clubs to me, I realized what the rag-picker must have felt: he had just won the lottery.
Andy talked to the neighbors. They hadn't seen or heard anything. Usually, Gigi, the next door neighbor's dog, barks whenever she sees strangers coming into the cul-de-sac. She always barks at the rag-picker. Either she was indoors at the time or she barked and Andy didn't notice it because Gigi's bark is familiar to all of us.
Koong, the neighbor across the street suggested Andy go to the Thieves' Market to find his clubs. The golf pro at Piyarom, our Sports Club, suggested the same thing. To go to the Thieves' Market sounded like a unique adventure so we decided to try it. We knew it would be a long shot that we would ever find his golf clubs. The idea of a Thieves' Market was so intriguing we wanted to see it.
The Thieves' Market is located in the older part of Bangkok behind Central Hospital in the Yaowarat or Chinatown area, in a street known as Klong Tom or Filled-in Canal. In the old days the street was a canal that had since been filled in, hence the name. The pro advised us to beware of pickpockets and purse-snatchers and to bring mag-lites because the market is only open from dusk on Saturday to dawn on Sunday. We stuffed our pockets with some cash and went to Church for the Saturday evening mass. Now that the rains are over, it promised to be a pleasant outing. The humid air was even stirred by a breeze, the promise of the cool season to come.
After mass, Andy and I parked the car at Suan Lum Night Bazaar between Rama IV and Wireless Roads. Then we took a taxi to Klong Tom. It turned out to be a neighborhood of two storey shop houses that make one street look the same as another. It's a well-known area, apparently, for we saw lots of people down there including a few curious foreigners. It's not the typical market foreigners like to frequent with the usual souvenirs and such. The market is ill-defined, being a maze of streets and side-lanes, some lighted, some not well-lighted, hence the need for a good strong flashlight. If you didn't have one or forgot to bring it, you could buy a flashlight from the vendor on the street corner. For about Baht 100 or less than US$3.00 a small flashlight comes with batteries installed plus an extra set. Thus we were prepared for our foray into the Thieves' Market. They say that one man's junk is another man's treasure.
We saw things that literally fell off the back of a truck. Indeed, we saw a row of trucks, tailgates down and their contents emptied onto the sidewalk, parked outside Bangkok Bank. The bank was closed for the weekend and the sidewalk was torn up for renovation. Undaunted, the vendors lined the sandy sidewalk next to stacks of paving stones with tarps and tables. Some surprisingly heavy items were on the sidewalks: ceramic toilets and urinals looking like new. On a table, were electric water heaters still in the box. On another table or on the tarps spread on the ground were collectibles like rusty Coca cola trays, embossed English biscuit tins, old books and magazines, costume jewelry, hurricane lamps, and an exquisitely delicate glass sconce on a chain.
The main street of the market was busy with food sellers and vendors selling just about everything salvaged elsewhere including the kitchen sink I saw a man carrying with him. There were dynamos, shoes (Was that somebody's Birkenstocks?), piles of cell phone cases, cell phones wrapped in plastic, DVD players, TV sets including a new flatscreen, and just a few tables down, TV remotes without the TV, and a completely useless UBC cable remote that wouldn't work without a cable subscription. I swear we saw our old Sony radio-cassette player for sale; anything that could be bought can be sold. The market was buoyed by an optimism that there could be a buyer--sooner or later.
In the middle of the main market were refrigerators for sale; on the sidewalk there were boxes of masking tape and cello-tape, and screwdrivers small and large, and mag-lites big enough and heavy enough to comfort a nervous security guard afraid of the dark. There were novelty items to gross out your friends, like the plastic rat in a plastic water bottle . The market was hot and crowded, so if you wanted to cool down you could order a smoothie. A motorcyclist patiently waited for his order. The seller deftly dipped into an insulated cooler of ice and scooped out just the right amount without looking.The smoothie was neatly poured into a plastic cup with a dome lid. The finishing touch: add a straw and put it into one of those ubiquitous plastic bags with loops that are just the right size to slide on the handle bars. Sip on the go.
The golf pro had told us that the good stuff is often hidden from view. We saw some golf clubs poking out from under a tarp in a side-soi. Andy asked a man sitting nearby if they were for sale; the man said, the seller isn't here. I saw a necklace of enamelled beads with a silver clasp. It was definitely Thai. I asked how much and got the same short reply, the seller isn't here. Perhaps they were wary of us. In fact, Andy said later that the clubs on display in the open were old. The good stuff was nowhere--in plain view that is. Andy contented himself with a cheap pair of leather sandals and some golf tees.
I saw another insulated cooler like the smoothie seller's. A woman was sitting next to it and fanning whatever was inside it. I peered inside and was surprised to see there was a baby instead of ice. So this was its cradle. Briefly, I met the mother's eyes and she did not smile, her eyes as wide as a cat's in the dark. She seemed young and vulnerable and at the same time, she had an unabashed look of experience that was as difficult to comprehend as it was difficult to look her in the eye. We were both women and mothers, but so many things divide us; chiefly, social class, education, and language. Where was her husband? Why did she have to bring her baby to the market? Always interested in narratives, I wondered what her story was.
Andy and I were attracted by the smell of food cooking at a cookshop two blocks away from the bank. At the corner of the street across from the cookshop, we saw two sa-lengs pulled up to the curb and a pick-up parked nearby. It was unlikely one of them was the sa-leng driver in our soi. And even if he was, I don't think I could recognize him if I saw him again. One barely notices sa-lengs and their drivers. Something on the floor-bed of the pick-up truck was covered with a tarpaulin. We did not ask. Instead, we crossed the street where we found a table inside the cookshop. I thought I wasn't hungry but the good food smell woke up my appetite. I ordered fried rice with crab and Andy ordered two bowls of noodles. With two Cokes, the whole bill came up to Baht 160 a little less than US$5.00.
An old man came into the shop carrying a heavy tin bucket over his arm. He lifted the lid to show us tiny grass cakes and fried fish balls neatly arranged inside. In a smaller bucket on his other arm he carried the sauces. Andy spoke to him in Thai but the man raised his voice in Chinese. Andy switched to Teo Chiu and the man went away. I was curious about the old man. Andy said he probably lived all his life in Chinatown and never learned Thai. Like Papa and Mama who learned enough Thai to get by, the old man was from this older generation that never needed to be proficient or literate in Thai since they worked for Chinese-owned businesses. I thought, Just as I teach in an international school and never needed to learn Thai. Some things don't change.
An air of furtive mystery hung over the bustling market. It was a place stocked full of humanity looking for a bargain and to make a baht under cover of night. There was none of the conviviality I'd come to expect at other markets like Narayana Phand or at Chatuchak. There, Andy could joke with the vendors and cajole them into lowering their prices. Here at Klong Tom, this was pure business, and you'd best look sharply, peering into the dark with the aid of a mag-lite spotlight on the goods. To me, the night market at Klong Tom was a door into an underworld culture of thieves, middle-men, desperate housewives, old men with spent dreams, and hucksters on the make.
We took another taxi back uptown to where the sights were more familiar: the Thai-Belgian Friendship Bridge, Lumpini Park, and the glass and steel towers clustered around Silom, Sathorn, and Sukhumvit that comprise the business district. It was late but tourists and locals still mingled at Suan Lum Night Bazaar. Built at the intersection of two busy roads, Suan Lum was once a training school for army cadets until it was sold to a businessman who turned it into a gaudy bazaar and entertainment complex.
Here the goods were for an upscale clietele also hunting for a bargain in the humid night. There were no salvaged dynamos or toilets or sinks. Nothing fell off a truck here. Hence, there was no need for dim lighting or mag-lites. There were rattan baskets and CD cases made out of palm thatch and clever lamps made out of wood, paper, and string. In the shops here there were elegantly packaged cotton-covered cushions, embroidered shirts, and toys for a pampered pet.
Suan Lum is a little bit of Chatuchak and Narayana Phand jumbled together with bars, restaurants, and a trendy internet coffee cafe. A bit of this, a bit of that, a bit of East and West. Pastiche and synergy. Still the same optimism of that other night market though, that a buyer will walk in and part happily with his/her money.
Earlier in the evening Mercedes Benz held a car show in the concert hall. Owning a Mercedes is a fantasy for most. At Klong Tom though there were no such fantasies. Fantasies are luxuries that don't feed the family. As we walked past the darkened hall to where we had parked our car, we detected a whiff of ganja in the humid air. It smelled like defiance to me. It was an appropriate capstone for the evening.
Walk good,
Jo Anne
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