English Lessons

Woo. Just finished doing the english lessons tonight. It totally wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I'm so glad I have Beth. She. Is. AMAZING. like a natural born teacher. unlike me, whos more like a test tube grown teacher... which went wrong. lol
Some of the Others screwed up in some funny ways. At one point I was like "So what do you, as thai, do as a family?" This was meant to be preping into a new lesson. They were like "...nothing." "oh... Are you sure?" "...Yes." ".. Crud."
Jess was trying to pronounce one of her girls names. She said Tui, which means dog. Then she said Tui in a slightly different pitch and that meant water buffalo. Lol. OF course, in thai, T comes out more like D. so it was really Dui. Anyway. Ill catch ya'll up. we used up our internet time. Sorry for the short post.

Church Thai Styles

This isnt a thai church. Its the Kings palace. So if anything its a buhdist temple. Very buhdist.

So I spent my first night at the hostel. It was... Uncomfortable. Not because of the hard beds that sound like they are full of hay and plastic bags. their fine. them being hospitable and turning on the AC above my bed, that was great to! They know how much it fries in a cramped room with four dudes in it. Waking up to said AC freezing me like a bag of black bananas on the other hand not so much. And then the toilet filling back up in the background. It took me all night to figure out it wasn't an electronic wine. It was just water going through a very small hole or something. lol
ah well. Woke up at 7.. Lay in bed for ages. We walked to church and helped set up at about 9. Geu, our main host (He's been to Teowmutu!) translated the bible study for us. I haven't seen revelation being taught in a church before. Very cool. Their worship songs are just as cool as ours. Sorry Chris, its mostly hillsong, sung in thai. So at least you wont hear the theologically wrong lyrics. lolololol.
They have a cool style of prayer over here. I know they do it in a few other countries to. Its so awesome. Everyone just prays at the same time. And then fantasmically everyone just quietens down at the same time and someone finishes up the prayer. so cool. We should do it more often to. Its a lil awkward at first but you'l get used to praying over each other. Don't worry, God can hear you at any volume.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, Their church services go till about 4 in the afternoon. So we spent all day at church. It wasn't that bad actually. We had all sorts of people there. Koreans preached in english, while A thai translated. It was crack up. the speaker kept going into korean by accident. Or it may have been Thai. Who knows.
Later on all the guys (Me, Jason, Zac, and the crew from the dorms) all went out and played soccer outside the huge stadium in bangkok. There are tons of people all just setting up goals all over the place. It was great. It didn't feel weird at all, playing soccer on the landing of the huge steps up, with a few chunks of concrete (Taken from the side of the road) with no shirt on. Oh yea, It was so good being on the no shirts team. Just standing there made water want to evacuate from every pore in your skin.
Tomorrow we do lessons. heh heh.
Mood: apprehensive.
Currently Listening to: For the moments I feel Faint - Relient K.

I NEED TO GO!

Dont worry. The title isn't as urgent as it seems. Let me explain.. using copy and paste, from an email I sent but moments ago!
We were coming back on the train earlier today, from Lop Buri to Bangkok. Getting into the taxi we had no idea what was about to happen and the events that were about to unfold..... (Fortunatly I had my trusty hat.)

.... Oh man, me and zac got lost again. Our taxi didn't know where we were going and took us to the train station instead of the university. He was desperatly running up and down the road looking for an english speaker. And just to make it more frantic I was desperate to go toilet even before we got in the taxi. Ema rang up and said we were going in the wrong direction. That was the moment I dispeared and was like "ILL NEVER MAKE IT!" zac: "Youl make it dont worry!" "Oh no I won't, im busting. Driver, excuse me, toilet! Toilet? bathroom? Do you know what I mean?... No... oh man oh man oh man." I even took off my belt and was ready to ditch out onto the road and run into a park. the driver was getting very worried. He was like "five minute. only five minute." and Im still panicing going "I don't HAVE five minutes!" XDBut I made it! I begged my way into a seven elevens toilet. Thank goodness they knew what I meant. They were all cracking up at the distraught big falang going "Toilet toilet TOILET TOIlet toiLET. toiiiiiileeeeet."phew.. thats my High tention story for you today. =).

The girls are just down the road in the girls hostels, us guys are hanging out in the guys hostel now on the computers. Im a little freaked out. Monday we start our english lessons. It'll be the first one. Heres hoping I don't mess up!

p.s. I found this bottle of colouring lotion just now. Its so thai can look more western by having lighter coloured skin. But this is what it says under the logo in a small font. "Being born again into attractive woman in the sea." .... You be the judge.

shop keepers

Man, this internet cafe is located in a sauna or something I swear. Theres one fan, and its pointed at the desk in which the owner parks himself. Its rather amusing to see the way shop keepers act around here. Youl peer into their dinky little store and they'l be lounging around somewhere totally random. Unlike New Zealand where we hang out behind the counter they just go wandering.
It seems as though everyone has a shop here. They were like, whats the lounge for? We'll just rip out the front of our house, sell a lot of one object, and call ourselves a shop. They then go on about life and just hope they notice people when they go wandering into their house.
Its friday here at the moment. Everyones get on the booze it seems. Doesn't look to be a safe night.

Catch ya'll around. Leew pop gun maih! (Phenetically correct but dont quote me ok.)

Sawati Khrap

Wow. Friggin wow. Its amazing here. I dont know where to start. The plane was ok. taking off was the best part. No delays. thats a blessing because of that storm that raged its way through. I'm hearing right now that it struck pretty hard.
2nd Impression. The billboards. They are Huge. Its hot. getting out of the air conditioned taxi for the first time (Onto the middle of the road. Its pretty insane if you see what driving is like over here. EVERYONE is trying to get past each other at the same time.) my glasses totally fog up. I was like "WOA! IM BLIND." Not to bad though. I have no real problems with it. Oh yea, Coke lost the war in Thailand. Pepsi rules. Even the run down little street venders have pepsi imblaizoned all over it.
Its hard to say all the different things that have happened to many. So many stories. Ill have to just select my favourites to tell.
Me and Zac getting ripped off by a tazi driver. Second day in Bangkok. Me and zac have to take a taxi by ourselves back to china town because ema-lees sick. We jump in and tell him where were going. we tell him to turn the meter on because we have been warned about the dodgy things they can do sometimes. (We also noticed that his licence on the dash board was NOT him.) He was driving for a little bit and he says to zac "100 baht?" Zac agrees, just to shut him up. We pull up to the hotel and were idling by the door and the taxi guy says "100 baht!" Zacs says "No I dont think so, meter says only 65 baht." "100 baht!" "65." he says, smiling and tapping the meter. The driver turns off the meter and locks the doors. me and zac both instantly go "WOOOOOOOAAH What EVER!" and im laughing my head off at how dodgy he is. "100 baht!" "Nope. 65 baht. Mai chi!" we hand over a hundred baht note. And the driver gives us a twenty. We decide thats an ok compromise and get out. laughing about it.
Oh yea. there are bottles of cola that are 3.1 litres. They are MASSIVE. i wont ever bother with them since a glass bottle of Pepsi is about 50 cents. I got a nice pair of Sandals For 5 dollars today. Honestly, you girls would love it here. There was a alley dedicated to shoes and bags. They also have these crazy gold necklace stores. they're everywhere. I call them fast food gold stores. Cause I can almost imagine people ordering at a drive through for Gold chains.
I was really dearing today and pet a monkey. those things don't like being touched. It freaked out. I think if I hung around much longer it would wanted to give me a rabby infested bite. A couple were climbing all over Jo. It was rather amusing how the girls would react. I have my camera, crouched down filming it. It completely ignores me walking past and around, while all the girls are screaming and jumping up. I think it liked their reactions. XD. cars stopped at the lights would be investigated by the cheeky little things.
today at the markets I found a rack of frogs cut open upside down. One of their hearts was still beating. lololololol.

This week we are doing Thai lessons so we can comunicate a bit more than we have. Its aight, Im finding it a bit tough. I got numbers down pretty good. 1 to 5 is simple. nung, sung, see, cip, Haa.

Well I cant think of much more to write other than sorry for no pics. Im in a net cafe.

Love ya'll lots (Except for you, you and you.)

tomorrows the big day

By the time most of you read this (Unless your an eager beaver and check this blog like every night or something) Ill probably be in the sky for Thailand. Ill probably buy a simcard over there so I could still text. But Ill probably check the net every chance I get to make sure your all right, right?

Man, im freakin out inside. I bet im gonna forget something. I bet Im gonna screw up the first english lesson I haven't even bothered with preparing.

I was just watching the news and apparently theres a storm headed our way to. So we might not even get off the ground! aaaaaah, I dont know anymore!

Yours freaking out truly,
IFM.

P.s. If I die dig up under the old willow tree. You'l find my childhood piggy bank with my highly prized collection of lint.

final study block and beyond

Ok I lie, Its not the FINAL study block, but the ones after will be totally overshadowed by the awesome experience in Thailand. Yay! I havent forgotten you all. (Sorry I haven't texted in a while either guys. Out of reception and out of battery juice stuff.)

Ok, Im gonna try and type about the last.... 6 weeks?

Finlay Park.

This was a great place. For one reason and one reason only.Own. Personal. SKATE PARK! I got myself a sweet deck to use here. The mornings were freezing, so it was always a bit of a run to breakfast. At night we watched the Band Of Brothers series. Everyone got into it. Even the girls funnily enough. Goes to show that Blood, guts and violence isn't just a guy thing. Its a human thing.

Heh heh. I also made a mini series with an unfortunate jenny doll, which (In chronilogical order) got its hair set on fire, drowned, frozen, dropped down a water slide, smashed, ripped in half, put back together, decapitated, and then recapitated with her head upside down. It started off as a rediculious look at how people dont take responsibility for their actions and blame it on the media. Then it went off on a tangent cause everyone liked it so much. Oh yea, on the finaly day I got my hair slashed by Aimee, Beth, Jess and Emalee. Sorry for the emotional trauma Jess. You did good. =D Its like an emo cut now, but lopsided at the back. ha ha. I did it for the opshop ball. Lt. Funk played. They were so groovy, and I knew how to dance to every song because it was all ska/funk/reggae styles. ha ha.
We got our visa applications ready as well, in little old cambridge again.

Huia Lodge

West Auckland! yea ya! Huia lodge is this little place way up in the waitakeres. The community spirit of headspace got rekindeled here in my opinion. Probably because we had two places to go. our little rooms, or our little hall with a nice fire roaring in the corner. So a lot of munchkin playing went on here. Heh heh. I made a bunch of the guys even more nerdier when I made them partake in my own homemade RPG. It was hilarious to see how animated they get freaked out when I make a Resident Weevil burst out of a box at them. ha ha. Good times... Your all looking very lost. I'm sorry. I should keep the nerdishness out of this. Oh yea, The designs for headspace are trundeling along. I designed our Tshirts. Everyone went into the mall and got their own Tshirts from hallenstines.
The actual design for headspace itself though is taking a lot longer than I thought it would. Ema is very particular. Which is great, it stretches my talent muscles somewhat. And I would rather not do a bogus design for the figurehead of headspace.
During this time we were going to my church for thai lessons and more perspectives.

Finlay Park II

KIDS CAMP! It was totally rad. I got a cabin of kids to look after. I have to say its right up there with Coopers Beach camp. Its so relaxed its great. I was mostly on Skate Park Duty. But I pretty much sucked cause I never did a good job of keeping kids in helmets. And one of the little maori Boys kept nicking the Decks -_-. Funny story though, On the last night We caught him and his mate sneaking out to go pranking. We chased them down, one of them slipped on the concrete then got owned by Ian our camp director, and the maori boy got jumped by the other leaders. He stayed in the leaders cabin so we could keep an eye on him. But obviously not a very good eye because he stole two Ipods. We almost didn't get them back. Ian was planning to do a bag search, but everything pointed to this kid, so he was grilled or something (Don't know exact details so I won't exaggerate it) and finally gave them back. Franks Ipods backlight doesnt work anymore though, saddly. But at least he got it back. Cloie, one of the chick leaders got baptised there this morning in fact. It was great. I was beaming =) I was so happy for her. Also last night All the Big Names came and played. and hey hey, I could dance to all their music because it was Ska. Yay, such luck. =D
Ian was a great camp director. One night us leaders werent getting into bed fast enough so he came in with a mini baseball bat and gave a bunch of us a bit of a wack to speed us onward. I was laughing my head off. Hmmm, Other stories.. Their all quit painful. I owned myself heaps trying to do grinds on the skate park. oh yea, and theres this kid Adam, I'm sure he's gonna win the darwin awards one day.
a bunch of my campers were sitting behind another leader in chapel. and as he was sitting down they tried pulling his pew out from behind him, it didn't really work, so as the leader was pulling back the pew, Adam put his head between the gap where the two pews in front met. He got his head caught and his ears squashed. It looked rather comical. He had been asking for it all morning though. He's the sorta kid that doesnt understand that "If you touch my hat,My oh so gorgeous hat,) one more time, or if you punch me a few more times, I WILL poke you harder than you ever could little man." So what does he do -_-. So I poke him and he crumples and cries for a few seconds, then decides that the best way to deal with the situation is to hit me again. So I sit there for a bit waiting for him to stop, then tell him again "Don't touch me or it will hurt on your part.".....AdampunchsImegaPoke and he's down for the count! The crowd roars! I feel Strong because I can beat up kids half my size. -_-

and now I'm home, Waiting to go over seas and do what I have always dreamt of doing....

....Buying pepsi in a bag.