Fah Fang Resort: Friday 8/17-Tuesday 8/21

Some of the breakfast foods we had during our stay at the Fah Fang Resort. Thai's do not have ordinary pancake, scramble egg and cereal breakfast. Instead, they have very hardy breakfast like fried rice, meat and vegetable soup or noodles. Yum!

These are two of the classes that we were in when learning Thai. During this particular day, our professor was Ajaan (teacher) Poi. With the combination of the bottom two photos and imagining that I am sitting in the empty chair in the middle, these are all the Public Health students. However, there are 26 more students in the Development and Globalization program.

There was always snack time in between classes and activities! This was probably my favorite snack: chicken pastry that tasted a lot like a samosa with black tea in 90 degree Fahrenheit weather.

This is an example of some of our activities in the afternoon or in the evening time. This particular discussion was on diversity, but we have also had discussions about gender and etiquette of Thailand and participated in Workshops on Organizing and Leadership in Facilitation (WOLF). These discussions were part of orientation where we would be able to use the information in the discussions to better understand the Thai culture and adapt our behavior appropriately. We would always sit on the floor and did not wear shoes inside any of the buildings.

This was one of the best lectures I have ever heard-- I even cried during Ajaans P' Decha's speech! He was so insightful on how to find ourselves and how to allow people to understand who we are and what we hope to achieve. It taught me about non-verbal communication and the power of learning by example.

Some of the lunch and dinner dishes. We had green curry, Thai omelette-type thing, fried chicken with herbs, beef with rice, pad thai, sticky rice with ground beef, etc. Honestly, all so delicious I am afraid I will need to buy two airplane tickets on my way back to the states since I will not be able to fit on a single seat!

Everyone always licked their plates clean after lunch and dinner!

This is pretty much the whole group and we would all sit in this hut right above the pond where catfish swam. We also fed the fish almost every night so they would always come by the hut and wait for their next meal.

During the evenings, we always participated in certain activities with the group. One of the nights we played BINGO because we had to practice the Thai numbers that we learned earlier in the morning. Of course, I WON (because of my wonderful Thai speaking skills, haha) a beautiful bag (first picture) that I will bring back as a souvenir!

On one of the other nights, we had a campfire and cooked hot dogs for dinner and got to know each other better!

And then, we were off again in our vans to our next destination: Homestay in a rural village of Khon Kaen, Thailand.