From Chiang Mai to being dumped on a crossroad in Bangkok and walking down Kho San Road in the early morning to finally catching a minibus to Kanchanaburi and a final short bus journey to the school... we finally made it home! After washing a whole load of clothes and grabbing some food it was time to knock out ready to get back into the school routine.
Apart from meeting PacSai's daughter whose home from Cambridge for the Christmas break, giving the janitor's grandson his little T-shirt we brought him from Chiang Mai, a healthy week of eating papaya salads in the evenings and the WiFi situation hitting its worst yet (they have a new stronger WiFi signal in the middle of the school which reaches even the other buildings which didn't even get WiFi in the first place. But if you get into our hut there is none... I mean what the stuffing. The last eight days...)
Teaching was fun this week. I taught sounds and object though a pair game and played fill in the gaps/ hangman with the younger classes and used paper balls for question and answer drills (which could have gone terribly wrong but thankfully didn't). My m2 class was observed by Lordy who was there to write me a reference for my time teaching at WangSala. I taught positive and negative emotions with a short conversation and it went down a treat. In my spare time I started to prep for next weeks lessons... Christmas!!
Final time in Kanchanaburi:
The final time we would pack our bags for a weekend in Kanchanaburi. The final time we would catch a bus into Kanchanaburi. The final time myself and Roseanne would be catching a two seater bike thing to Noble Nights... a few final moments there which just dawned on us as we took the journey. This weekend I decided to take my camera and capture Kanchanburi one last time and I'm so glad I did! As soon as we got to Noble Nights we met bumped into Callum and Amelia who were also checking in. This weekend we stayed in family rooms and it was myself, Roseanne and Charlotte who shared a room and Amelia, Callum and Olivia who shared the other. The rest of Friday afternoon was just spent at the pool until we got peckish and went to get a bite to eat.
Bad idea... I lost my card to an ATM. It was literally just taken and I was told the machine was out of order. After a few calls to the ATM owner and being told my card would be destroyed once taken and there was nothing they could do for me I needed another plan for money while I was here. Now, considering we've never met each other till we all landed in Thailand, I would just like to say I am surrounded by the best people possible. Thanks guys... love you #LoveTEFL team! (It's all sorted now though and I'm still here!)
Floating food and the magical river Kwai:
We decided we'd do a special final dinner in Kanchanaburi on a floating restaurant on the river Kwai. It was a beautiful restaurant and across the river there was a special reenactment of the bombing of the bridge over the river Kwai which we were so going to watch after catching moments of it whilst we enjoyed our dinner. It was amazing. They turned out the lights and we had our dinner (this was not turning out to be a great day for me... Friday the 13th... they forgot about my food. I had to remind them and then when it came I was a little disappointed about the portion size considering how much it was... but I was hungry so I was not going to complain!) in candle light. All the buildings and boats on the river had their lights all turned out too and the only lights which could be seen were from the show.
We obviously were going to watch it so we walked over the bridge over the river Kwai (this is a famous bridge you know). Now I have a real phobia of walking over these sorts of bridges which aren't made of concrete and it wasn't helped by Wilson jumping on parts of the bridge and asking if I was ok. We sat down (I brought some candy floss after some gentle persuasion by Callum and Charlotte. They were stopping all the food sellers and telling them I want to buy it... so not good, so I eventually brought something. Talk about peer pressure!) and the show was not disappointing. It told the story of the prisoners of war and Thailand's involvement in the building of the railway. The fireworks, pyrotechnics and acting all added to the telling of the story and what made it awesome was an actual train going over the river Kwai. It was a great thing to attend on the final weekend in Kanachanaburi to actually live the history that we seen in the museum and war memorial.
The night ended with a massive hug from Charlotte telling me everything will be ok. It's something I badly needed.
The Saturday was one of those pool days so I spent the whole day sitting by the pool enjoying the sun, a chicken salad baguette and lassi. Roseanne and I then left to come back to our WiFi-less hut one day early as PacSai (our English teacher) had a day out planned for us on Sunday.
A day out in Kanchanaburi with PacSai:
After a unsuccessful night of sleep I was up at 6.45am aiming to be ready for 7.30am. Our first stop a little coffee shop to consume some caffeine to keep me going for the rest of the day. We then headed onto our first tourist stop... Sai Nok Yai waterfall. We were told it had a suspension bridge. Now when someone says suspension bridge I immediately think of Indiana Jones... luckily it weren't like that. It was a solid concrete bridge (phew)! There we tried a large orange fruit which was really bitter and BBQ banana which was really delicious (the strange things here taste the best). We were then taken to the Hot Springs. Now unless you really want to go to a hot spring, I wouldn't really recommend hitting one if you're in Kanchanaburi as there are so many other beautiful things to see. The hot springs were just over crowded with tourists and it's basically sitting in hot water and then cold water.
Time for lunch! We got taken to a place where PacSai takes her daughter to eat. It was a small little roadside restaurant which made a delicious coconut chicken. Definitely my favourite dish of Thailand, no doubt! We also had a fried fish, fish in watered soup, stir fried veg and a pineapple shake. To top it off (not that I wasn't stuffed already...) they brought some traditional kind of crisps. It was like banana and other fruits which had been dried and fried. These were also equally delicious and not something we would have tried without guidance from PacSai or her daughter.
We were then taken to a historic park which held the ruins of an old city. Literally the only ruins left were of three buildings the rest of it had eroded away. It was slightly eerie and I totally needed a nap after all that food... we didn't spend too long there as the sun was beating down on us too, adding to the uneasiness and tiredness.
Next stop was the death railway resort which looked like so much fun. It looked like camp and we watched a few groups play a few games and a go ape kind of thing in the trees. It basically looked onto the death railway and also had boat huts just full of beds on the river... this would definitely be a place to stay if we knew about it before.
Totally battered we headed back home but not before a final stop at Tha Muang for the Pork Noodle Soup... even though I was still totally full I still managed to yam it down.
Our last proper weekend in Kanchanaburi was over... now onto the last week of teaching. Oh what's that I hear...(jingle bells... jingle bells). That could only mean its time for Christmas!
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