Laura's Year in Asia = Fun Stories

I have just spent the day technologosizing Sriwiangsawittayakarn school. (technologosizing is a quote from one of the thai english teachers)

I am exhausted, at first I thought it would be a great deal. No teaching all day (2 classes of those pratom 1 brats..) and just setting up a few email addresses.

See....apparently an urgent memo came from the provincial education office that all teachers must be able to be contacted by email. That's cool, I mean it is easier than the memos they literally still send over by horse-cart (a la the horse and carriage in Mowbray, South Africa) ..... Anyways there is internet all over this school and its about time everyone got an email address. What i didn't anticipate was the day turning into a how-to computer seminar run by Laura!!!!

Everyone who is aged 5-30 right now remembers what it was like when their parents discovered the computer. 'HOW DO I WRITE AN eh-mail to your aunt?' 'WHAT DO YOU MEAN GO TO FILE?' 'Where are the pictures? What is a www address? ...." and my personal favourite.... 'NO don't just do it, explain and show me!' ....oh dear. Well today was like that X100 + in THAI - any ability to grasp the concept of why I just can't make up an email address of noot@sriwiangsawittayakarn.com

They didn't even know what email server they wanted to use, so I googled around and found thaimail.com which they could navigate in Thai. But 1/2 way through that stopped working. So we moved over to Yahoooooooooo. Which they kept yelling for the next 3 hours. (Think asian-cowboy voice). I made up not only their email addresses, but their english-translated names. It was a long lound day with over 50 teachers in my office yelling at me in thai about their phonetic names. "OIIIIIIIII OIIIIIII OIIIIII" which they demaned be spelt Oil....but of course there is no available oil@yahoo.com .... ahhhh

And now i just got asked to fill in a spreadsheet (all in Thai on THAIexcel) of all the names/emails/phone numbers...etc. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. I haven't sat infront of a computer this long since UBC's essay-season in March.

So anyways moral of the story is.....I should have them blogging by September ;)

WAIT!

I'm just about to post this blog entry, and Noot (one of the thai-english teachers) comes in and says that we go eat downstairs since she passed the exam to become a director (principal) and placed 3rd out of 50 competetors. So it turns out she bought some food because she promised the Gods that if she passed the exam she would have a feast. Sweet! But then she says to me, "I think you mae chop..." (I think you wont like) and I give her my now famous suspicious eyes (i use these in Thailand more than you can imagine) that just by looking ask the person if they're serious of just putting me on because i'm a farang.... So she says, "OK come with" I go downstairs to the outdoor/indoor room and what do i see sitting on the table.

A BIG GIANT PIG'S HEAD. Teeth, eyes, ears, spine sticking out..everything there. and the teachers laughing their heads off and offering me little pieces they have cut out of the cheeks. Now i'm not too picky anymore thanks to Thai cuisine presentations....but this was sick. And it didn't even taste like meat. oh man. Well ya. so that is my story about Pigs and Technology. It's just another Monday at Sriwiangsawittayakarn

ps. happy birthday dad