The Work I'm Doing

Each day we go to the wards and pick up a number of "children" (the guys we deal with are aged 7 and upwards. One of ours is 32) and bring them to our day care centre. There's about 10 that we take and it's pretty much the same ones every day. We try to provide a friendly and relaxed environment that is very different to their experience on the wards. We play games with them both individually and as a group and basically give them the stimulation and affection that is so important to them. Here is a picture of a few of the guys playing Dominoes with Jeff (the American volunteer who lives in the same house as me):

I will introduce you to a few of the guys in later posts.

Their disabilities fall into 2 broad categories: most of the guys have cerebral palsy, they are physically disabled but mentally pretty aware (so when we play Connect 4 for example they understand the rules and know how to play to a reasonable level but they have to tell us which piece they wish to play). Here is a picture of Nin (on the left) playing Connect 4 with Chord (on the right) who works for CCD. Nin is able to point at the column he wants to play and is actually pretty good.
The other guys have a mixture of autism and learning disabilities as well as some physical disabilities. So, for example, if we play Connect 4 with them they can put all of the pieces into the grid but (at the moment) they don't really understand the point of the game. There's one guy called Chork (wearing the orange T-Shirt in the picture below) who is like this. I have been able to teach him how to separate the pieces before the game and get them out afterwards and I'm working on getting him to take turns.


One day a week we go out onto the wards and provide a bit of entertainment for a slightly wider audience. We set out a couple of mats on the floor and the children come and sit or lie down. We play games and sing songs (I'm learning the guitar btw!) and have a box of instruments that they can play. I think it makes a nice change for those who are able to take part and even those who are only able to watch and listen from a distance.

Going to the wards (to pick up the guys and to do our visits) has been the hardest part of the job so far. I can't say too much and I can't show you pictures as we're not allowed cameras in the orphanage proper but let's just say that the conditions aren't the best. There aren't enough beds and there aren't enough members of staff and I just can't imagine what life must be like for most of the people there. The couple of times when I have thought about it I have had to stop myself - the last thing they need is someone breaking down. They need us to be a ray of sunshine in their lives. So when you are there it's almost like you have to switch off a part of you emotions.

When we're there now I try to have a walk around and spend a little time with a few of the children - saying hello and holding their hand. I can't spend long but I hope it means something to them.

Thai Food

Today I'm going to tell you about Thai food...I don't mean the stuff in Thai restaurants (I haven't seen one green curry here - well apart from the other night when one of the volunteers had one) I mean the stuff that the locals (that's us now) eat.

It took a couple of days to adjust to the new flavours, sights (flys all over the place, meat lying out in the heat) and smells...I had to start associating the smells with "aroy" (being delicious) as opposed to "ah-jee-an" (being violently ill). In the couple of weeks that I've been here pretty much every dish I've had has been very good - and I haven't been ill (yet).

We get lunch at work. We eat the same stuff that the guys at the orphanage have - which is surprisingly good (I'm sure it's much better than what kids eat in orphanages in the UK).

We eat out at night. If you choose the right place it's much cheaper than cooking at home - we tend to eat at covered in areas by the side of the road where you sit in the middle of a bunch of stalls, each specialising in a different kind of food (noodle soup, put Thai etc.). A meal at one of these places costs 20-30 Baht which is about 30-40 pence.

This is probably the best dish I've had here. It's called Put Prik Gaeng Nua, which means fried beef chilli curry. It's not the best picture but it was very tasty.


I thought some of you might like this picture...especially if you were wondering what happened to all of the extras from Aliens.

This is one of the stalls in one of the places where we eat at night.

This is Gud Dio Sen Lek Moo. Which is a noodle soup with pork (also very tasty). If you look closely you might be able to see a fish ball on the top...I'm not sure exactly what fish balls are (you can insert your own joke) but they don't taste too bad.

And finally - I saw this "little" guy crawling around outside the back of the house...I'm not sure exactly why I put him in the food section - but I do have my suspicions...I have come across the odd crunchy thing in my fried rice...

I will let you know about how work is going at some point - hopefully next week...

Also, I don't know if I've said yet but I'm really enjoying my time out here - Thailand is excellent.

Country of Contrasts

It was nice to get some positive feedback on the blog...I will try and get some more pictures for you - I feel like such a tourist getting my camera out...of course I'm sure that other than that everyone would think I was a local! It's quite strange actually, there are still loads of people here who think it's really funny to see a farang (foreigner)...people point and stare and laugh...actually now that I think about it - that happens to me in the UK as well...

Anyway, one of the things that I've noticed is that Thailand is a country of contrasts (and contradictions):
-The people are really laid back here...a very popular saying is "mai bpenrai" which basically means "don't worry about it". In contrast though people seem to work really hard - they start early and finish late...people also seem to work 7 days a week...they get a few more public holidays than us but still I doubt that makes up for it.
-People are generally very polite and smiling is very important here. People tend not to tell someone if they are doing something they object to. But at the same time - people will tell you - "you are fat" or "you have a big spot on your face"...again that's probably just me! Actually one of the workers at the orphanage did say that she thought I was handsome - and you know, I think it's really good that the visually impaired find it easy to get work out here.
-The very rich and the very poor live almost side-by-side here...in the town we are in, there are some very big houses just along from corrugated iron shacks.
-People here have a lot of respect for the monarchy and you can't say anything bad about them, in fact you can be put in jail for doing so. My question though is, if everyone does respect them - why would they have to make such a law?
-Another thing is that the general religion here is Buddhism...they don't kill animals because they believe in re-incarnation and all that stuff...so you might find it quite strange that pretty much all of their dishes have meat in them...how do they get around the problem? They get the Catholics to kill them!

The Main Road

Here's a picture I took from the back of a bus on the main road in Pakkred the other morning (you can see the handrail for the ladder - it's basically a truck with open sides that you can climb onto and sit along the sides facing each other...I did see one the other day that was so full that people were just perching on their toes hanging from the back of it - there must be a heck of a lot of people killed on the roads out here). As you can see (on the left of the picture) they are currently building a bridge out to an island that's just across from where we are staying...they are working on it all day every day - but I'm guessing the place is going to be a building site for my whole stay.

House

Right then, our house has 5 bedrooms (1 with en-suite), 3 bathrooms (including 1 on the ground floor with a urinal for the boys - every home should have one!), 5 floors and a "pet" lizard in the kitchen which gave me a bit of a shock when I arrived. It's pretty nice actually - much better than I was prepared for (the house that is - not the lizard).

At the moment I'm living with 4 other people (3 of whom arrived a few days before me). There's one guy from America who's been here for 4 months so he's been able to show us round and read the Thai menus when we go out to eat (more on Thai food in a later post - I'll take a few pictures as well).

I have just sorted out Thai lessons today. I plan to do 6 hours a week (2 hours on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights)...it's going to cost 1000 Baht for a month, which is less than 15 quid, and the guy's going to come round to the house to do them! I reckon it's absolutely essential that I get them - Thai is simple in some ways (no conjugation of verbs for example) but very difficult in others (it is a tonal language so the meaning of a word changes completely depending on whether it is said with a mid, high, low, rising or falling tone...to the untrained ear, i.e. mine, it can be quite difficult to tell the difference).

Some people said they might want to send me stuff by snail mail so here is the address you can use:

Paul McGuiness
c/o CCD
PO Box 47
Pakkred
Nonthaburi 11120
Thailand

Kitchen

Living room

Settling in

I thought that some of you might like to see what the house we're staying at is like, so here are some pictures...without wishing to sound like an estate agent: Here's the outside of the house:

Hello

Well, I got here on Friday at about 19:00. The plane was a bit late and there were huge queues at passport control. Thankfully I wasn't standing next to the couple I had to sit next to on the plane, who were the two grumpiest people I've ever met! They complained about every aspect of the flight from the length of time the air host was taking to serve the food to the length of time it took for the plane to taxi to the runway! God help whoever is looking after those 2 while they are on holiday! Anyway, it was a case of eye-mask on and ear-plugs in - I could still bloody hear them but I did manage to get a bit of sleep.

I felt a little bit tired when I got in but no more than any other time I've travelled - to be honest I haven't suffered from jet lag at all: That cycle logical crap must have paid off!

It's amazing how much stuff has happened since I've got here - I could tell you everything now but I guess people wouldn't read it all so I'll ration it out over the next few posts. Suffice it to say - things have gone really well so far - the accommodation is good and the people are cool. It's a little bit hotter than the UK(!), the coolest it's been in my room is 28.5 degrees at about 3:30 in the morning - yes I was awake surprisingly! I don't know what temperature it is outside (it's a lot higher)...apparently there are 3 seasons in Thailand: hot, hotter and hottest - this is just hot at the moment - so I've got the others to look forward to...

Just to let anyone know who's interested...you can still contact me by SMSing my UK mobile number which will just cost you your usual UK text message amount. I can then reply to you using Thai mobile so that will cost me less.

I'll hopefully post again in the week to tell you about other stuff that's happened and to tell you how things go at work (and I'll see if I can get some pictures on too).

Goodbye

Well that's it now - I'll be off in a couple of days...I had my leaving drinks over the weekend and would like to say that it was really nice to see everyone - I am lucky to have such good friends and I will miss you while I am away. If people are able to stay in touch with me while I'm out of the country I will be very grateful.

I would also like to say a massive thank you to everyone in Ireland who contributed to my fund. I really didn't expect anything - so I am really overwhelmed by your generosity.

People keep asking me if I'm worried about my trip - well, I've been more excited than anything but now that it is getting closer I guess it's fair to say that I'm a little bit apprehensive...not really about anything in particular - I just have this weird feeling at the back of my mind (where I fell off my bike) that there is something that I should be concerned about - it is probably because everyone keeps bloody asking me!

Anyway, I was reading this website that was supposed to have tips on getting over jet lag...on it was a list of jet lag symptoms - there were over 20 items - and it was supposed to be partial! Anyway it all seemed like bull to me cos 2 of the items were "constipation" and "diarrhea". Well, I'm no medical expert but I don't think it's possible to have both of those at the same time! Or if you did - wouldn't they cancel each other out? Another item on the list was "insomniainsecurity" - that's not even a word! And listen to this quote from the bottom of the page: "Jetlag is not psychological; it is cycle logical." Oh right, well that's that one solved then!

You may have noticed that I've added a link to the Ricky Gervais website - there's some very good stuff on there but just in case you're too lazy to browse it yourself, I would recommend the interview with Chris Martin (there are some other very good videos on there as well - the Chris Martin one is the only one that seems to have been censored...I wonder how offensive it was beforehand), the Guardian podcasts (of which there will be 12 - one a week) and the xfm radio downloads.

I've just noticed that the Guardian have taken down links to the first couple of episodes. Here they are 1 2.

Hopefully see you all soon(ish).