New PM, ABC News, oh and Happy Christmas!

Happy Christmas everyone! I had a great day here in Thailand. This morning in front of the whole school, Shaleas, Kelly and I sang 'Silent Night' and 'We Wish You A Merry Christmas' while Devon played the violin. It was a beautiful sight. Kelly also told the historical story of the real Santa - St Nick, and a student spoke the words of the song 'Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer' among other activities. 

The kids enjoyed having one more thing to yell at us down the hallways. Now instead of just "Hello teacher! Good morning!" it's "Hello teacher! Good morning! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!"

My friend Kara had sent me a can of cranberry jelly, powdered mashed potatoes and powdered gravy from the States which the four of us made and ate with some good chicken for Christmas dinner. Then it was followed up by some delicious mince pies and traditional Christmas pudding which I received this morning from London thanks to Naomi!

After stuffing our faces we watched The Christmas Story on Kelly's laptop and I now feel appropriately 'Christmassy.' But now Christmas is about to be over, so what now? By the way, HILARIOUS skit about the time between Christmas and New Years by Michael McIntyre here. Please check it out, he is hilarious. American's may not find him as funny, so Brits, enjoy. :)

I hope you've all had a great holiday, it was definitely strange not being home for the first time, but I got lots of love from a lot of you through cards, e-mails and Facebook messages so thanks so much for that. 

Moving on briefly...

A few blog posts ago I wrote about the political situation here in Thailand.

Since then I've mentioned that Thailand does now have a new Prime Minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva. One blog reader asked me what I thought about him. Right now I'm not sure what to think. He represents a political party that I'm not particularly supportive of, however if you check out what he has said in that past (read here, thank you Wikipedia...it's on the internet so it must be true right?) he seems to be all about helping out the people. The PAD as a party appear to be more about supporting the rich and ignoring the poor, but Abhisit says he supports creating free health care and lower gas prices among other things, which clearly help out the less fortunate in this country, of which there are many. So in other words, I don't know and I will wait and see just like everyone else! He was educated at Eton and Oxford (more bio information here) so maybe it's just my innate tendencies to love my fellow Brits...

As far as news in other parts of the world - my only connection to the Western World is Aljazeera, the Internet, and my podcasts. I am a podcast junkie, subscribing to over two dozen including ABC Nightly News. I am currently watching the December 22nd episode, and I just want to say how ridiculous it is that the FIRST headline news story; the one Charles Gibson/whoever actually organises the show thought was most important, was the weather. That's right everyone, it's winter. In winter, it snows sometimes. Sometimes a lot. Apparently this year, so much snow that it trumped the economic downturn, the many wars going on in the world,  and all the other fun things Charles Gibson chatted about. The reporter on the scene - standing in front of some ...snow... Linsey Davis (someone should tell her there's a D in Lindsey) described it as 'bone numbing.' That's one level above 'bone chilling' I guess? Fascinating stuff. Also in the podcast - you can now buy an attachment for your iPhone called the iBreath to test your own alcohol blood content. Love technology. 

That's it for now. I miss you all especially during this holiday season, so have a great time and Happy New Year!!

English camp and English nicknames..

So just over a week ago I went down to Nakhon Sawan with Kelly, Shaleas and Kru Rin to help out at an English camp for the day. 

It was fun, nothing too much to report, but I wanted to take the opportunity to discuss the ridiculous nicknames Thai children have.

When Thai kids are babies, their parents name them, and then also give them a nickname that they go by except in more formal situations. Some of the names are nothing to look twice at, but some are priceless. In their quest to be more American, a lot of Thai kids are given English words as nicknames. I don't mean English nic

knames, like Tom, Nick, Ali, etc. I mean just completely random words, including 'Milk,' 'Beer' and 'Tutor.' Pictured here are 'Bank,' 'Nut' and 'Beer.'

At English camp I think I found my favourite name so far. God. I met a child named God. I'm not sure if he had any divine tendencies, but I started to doubt it after watching the way he fumbled through 'Head, shoulders knees and toes.' 

At camp, the kids were also split into groups, with names from Disney characters and things like that. Except one group. The Playboy group. Referring 

back to the picture of the three boys, you'll see that Bank and Beer were both members of this group.

The teachers insist that it's okay, because they don't know that Playboy is a company that promotes sex and naked women. Maybe that's true, but it is still disturbing to hear a group of eight year olds singing 'I like Playboy, you like Playboy, I like Playboy, let's all be friends!' 

The day after camp, Kru Rin's friend showed us around the city, which was nice. I bought a kick-ass jacket at the night market. It's amazing. It's made of plastic, but that's a 

small detail and if you could see it you would all be jealous. Or you should be at least. I'm sure it will feature in a photo some time in the future. For now you'll just have to imagine it.

The Friday after we 

came back from camp, our school had their Exhibition day which was a day of good food cooked by the students, singing, dancing, a

nd all around good times. I even got some students to make a custom cloth bag for me with my name in Thai letters painted on it which I love. 

Since then, it's just been school as usual, although I have to admit that the pangs of homesickness are starting to kick in a bit. It's definitely going to be hard to be away from home over Christmas, but thanks to all of you that have sent Christmas cards and/or care packages so far, including the lovely e-card I received from Blair, and the card from Liz! :) Thanks as well to Johanna, Kara, Jackie and Naomi who between them are supporting the Thai postal system's finances. :) I know some more of you have sent packages and I can't wait to receive them. 

This Thursday we'll be singing some carols and playing lots of Christmas games with the kids, so I'll let you know how it goes! Miss you tons, have a great Christmas/Hanukkah and Happy New Year!