N-Joy Buffet Ubon Ratchathani and a Birthday, Thailand.

I have written about N-Joy and how to get there here. It’s an expat meeting place where you can get a cold beer and chat to other expats in the area.

Lance and Lek the owners also do food as well. On Wednesday nights there is a 100 Baht buffet starting about 6.30pm.I have blogged about the buffet before and over the weeks it has become bigger and better.

Lance fires up the BBQ about 6pm.

These are pork ribs and were delicious; he also does marinated ribs that are even better.

Lance does a selection of meats, skewers, fish and soup. Also there are jacket potatoes and Lance sometimes spoils us with a really good potato salad.

Tom takes care of the Thai food, fried rice and stir fried vegetables and other dishes as well.

The punters lined up to fill their plates.

Miss Noot had tagged along for once, and she was playing a game of pool.

Noot had come along because it was Big John’s birthday. Here are Lance, Tom John and Fon.

I don’t think the candles are meant to be used for this purpose.

And here is Big John’s cake.

And time to blow out his candles. Luckily John has plenty of wind to do the job.

So if you want to meet a few expats in the Ubon Ratchathani area drop into N-Joy on a Wednesday, Friday or Saturday as these are the busiest evenings and meet a few new people in the area.

Brunty

Nong Ja My Thai Niece, Isaan Thailand.

We have the pleasure of looking after our amazing little niece Nong Ja. She has been with us for at least 3 weeks straight now and will be staying with us until who knows when. It will be at least until mid May of even fulltime until she goes to school.

We love her so much and she can at times be very demanding as any 21 month old can be, but 99% of the time she is a champ of a kid and a joy to help bring up.

In three weeks she has picked up so much being around us all the time. She repeats nearly everything you say and remembers so much of it. She says words in English and Thai and other times in a language we cannot work out, which often has us laughing.

We have been privileged to been able to help raise Ja since her very first few weeks of her life and we look forward to doing this for many more years, until the time comes that her parents can look after her fulltime or on a part-time basis with us.

She has her two favourite bears, one was a present to Noot from a friend for her birthday and the koala bear is a present from my mother and father to either Noot or Ben for Christmas or a birthday.

She treats her bears like little kids; she drags them about the house and chats away to them. Tucks them into the bed at night and usually grips hold of one or both of them when she goes to sleep. Thankfully she isn’t so attached that we have to take them everywhere we go. It is usually in the early mornings and at night before bed.

The first thing everyday we feed the fish. Ja heads straight to the fish tank and after that we go to the fridge and Ja gets the carrot out of the crisper that we cut and wash for Cola the rabbit. We sweep the floor and then most mornings go for our walk to see the chickens, cows and across to the market.

That is about as exciting as my days have been the last few weeks, but I actually really enjoy it. As I write this Ja is on the bed dressing one of her bears up with the help of me of course. There have been many interruptions writing this post.

Tomorrow will be the same, a bit like Groundhog Day but I don’t get as stressed as Bill Murray or am able to make myself the amazing person he become while stuck on the same day for so long. I will just wander along and enjoy the company of my amazing and very special Thai niece Nong Ja.

Brunty

Congratulations Mum and Dad, 47 Years of Marriage.

Today I gave my parents a call back in Australia as I hadn’t spoken to them for a few days. I caught up an all that they had been up to and then mum told me it was their 47th wedding anniversary today. I hadn’t remembered and it was just pure luck I had called on this day.

47 years, and dad said, ‘you don’t get that long for life in jail,’ a standard joke. I know most of us say that our parents are fantastic and so forth and I am going to do the same, as it is bloody true.

When I was young growing up I thought the ‘old man’ was tough, he was pretty strict but always fair and if you wanted something, you earned it by doing chores. Not many kids get this anymore I think.

Dad got me into golf, when I was a little fellow I would tag along with him and hit a few balls here and there and that started me playing. I would honestly say I was 7 or 8 years old when I started playing properly. I used to race home from school to go out for an afternoon game with him or pull the golf clubs behind my pushbike back then.

My mother worked her butt off, 4 boys and dad to look after kept her very busy when I was young. I used to play so many sports, golf, outdoor and indoor cricket, play and referee basketball, tennis, Australian football, squash and on it went. My good old mum ran me everywhere I couldn’t cycle to.

And over all the years they have always been there for me when I have needed something (usually money when younger). There are a million stories of why they are so great, like many of us have of our parents but I won’t bore you with them all.

Since retirement they have enjoyed themselves a lot. Travelled around Australia towing their caravan, spend lots of time on the golf course, been overseas a few times and of course visited Thailand twice as well to see me. We stayed in Pattaya as a base to play golf; they really enjoyed it there as did their friends. But we weren’t out late at nights seeing all the unsavoury crap that goes on there most the time.

Of course we ventured to Walking Street and checked out what Pattaya is all about, but all our time there we didn’t have any problems (except one asshole of and Indian tailor).

The golf courses in the Pattaya area are excellent, we played some awesome courses, and Greenwood and Plutaluang Navy Golf Club were just two of them.

This is mum at the signature hole at Plutaluang a short par 3. I will not tell you where her ball went but you can guess!

This is dad at Greenwood Country Club and this course was a gem of a find.

Anyway back on topic. To my mother and father congratulations on 47 years and hope there are many more to come. Thanks for being great parents. Lots of love from Noot, Ben and me and of course Nong Ja..

Living in a foreign country you can lose contact with mates and family. But nowadays with all the social networks available on the internet it is east to track what your mates are doing. I use Facebook sometimes, I am not a huge user but log in every few days and catch up with mates and see what they have been doing.

Probably the best thing for me I discovered a long time ago was Skype, most of us know about this product. It gives you free calls computer to computer and computer to landlines are very cheap. When I call people in Australia on their landline it costs me under 3 cents a minute.

I have been using Skype for at least 3 years now and I talk more with my friends and family now I live in Thailand than what I did when I was back in Australia. I see then online and I call them for free computer to computer. A while ago the lines or connections were terrible at times but now this is hardly ever a problem.

My father set Skype up with a little help, he isn’t that computer savvy, and now we chat 2,3 or 4 times a week whenever we catch each other online at the same time. Dad is on dial up so he is a spasmodic user and sometimes I don’t catch him for a few days so I will ring the landline and chat.

I hadn’t seen dad or mum online over the weekend so today I gave then a call this evening their time and chatted for 28 minutes and it cost a whopping $0.84 cents Australian. I am sure that there are other companies out there that offer the same sort of service and if any of you use one please let me know.

Brunty

Miss Noot's Graduation Isaan Thailand

The time finally came for Miss Noot to graduate. That meant an early morning to the hairdresser’s for make-up and of course her hair done. It wasn’t too bad as Noot didn’t have to be there until 5.30am.

I know some who go at 3 or 4am to be made amazingly beautiful, this usually means being caked in make-up and made as white as possible.

This is Noot’s best friend Annie who is also from her class.

And some of Noot’s other classmates.

Miss Noot and her older sister Joom.

Miss Noot and Nong Ja. It was getting a little too much for Ja as it was very hot and a lot of people. We had to keep going on walks, to keep her entertained.

Miss Noot with from the left, her step father, half brother, her mum, Nong Ja and her mum Joom.

Noot and her younger sister Ben. Ben and I arrived a little late. I dropped Noot off at 7am and then we were going back at around 8.30-9am. Ben had come from the village and then had to shower and make sure she was beautiful.

Miss Noot, her mum and half brother Beer.

Noot’s mum, Nong Beer, step father and Ja.

Noot and Ja, here Noot is wearing a wreathe of fake flowers. She couldn’t wear this in her graduation gown as there are two small badges that are from The King of Thailand on the gown. Wearing the wreathe above them would be rude as this would be more important than the badges from the king.

And this is Noot’s most influential teacher. Ajarn Fumiko is the Japanese teacher and Noot loved her classes. She excelled in Japanese getting A’s across the board. She did pretty well in English with A’s to C’s. She finished 2nd overall in her class but I am not sure for the whole English Faculty.

So Noot has finally graduated, some of her friends are now going through ‘summer school’ or making up failing grades for subjects. Noot didn’t fail any subjects so is free for the next few months.

I am trying to have her keep on studying next year, especially pursue her Japanese. I will see what she decides in the next few weeks.

Brunty

I am Finally Free, Holidays are Here. Thailand.

I have been busy of late trying to wrap up everything at school and start relaxing until the 10th of May. All the marking is complete and the endless and at times senseless paperwork is done.

Today I submitted all my paperwork and new knew there would be trouble with some of it as I had not passed a few students in my classes. There is a well known saying of “No student fails in Thailand and this is pretty much true.”

Kids in upper secondary can miss 50% or more of their classes, fail all their tests and not submit any work throughout the year. It is expected of the teacher and the teacher’s assistant to give this student extra work to attain a passing grade. So the teacher is meant to go out of their way, chase the kid and wipe their ass so they can get a passing mark, bullshit to that I say.

I never want to have a student not pass my class. Students that are weak are taken aside, parents are called and then ways of improving the student’s English ability is offered to the parents. I always try to involve the parents so that they monitor their child and make sure they are trying to improve.

Sometimes this works wonders and the student improves leaps and bounds. Other times the student makes no improvement and the parents are again called in for a meeting to discuss what they are doing at home to help there child. Some parents sadly believe it is entirely the teacher’s responsibility to do everything for their kid.

Anyway I could go on and on. So today some of the pen pushers were not happy with the grades I had given, I couldn’t care less what they thought as they don’t stand in my classroom and teach the students 5 days a week. They don’t see the effort being made or not, they don’t know if the student can read a word or a sentence. They don’t know if the student participates in class activities and so forth. So where do they get of telling me that I have to pass a student they no nothing about.

I asked this question, “Why do the students have to be passed?”

The answer was, because it looks bad to the public. I was lost for words. Having a few students with low scores and this score going to the main educational office is seen as an embarrassment to the school apparently.

In the end I feel sorry for the student, as they need help. The school sadly wants this to be overlooked so everything looks fine and dandy on paper. The parents go on believing that little Johnny is just passing but in reality he could be failing miserably.

If I was a parent, I would want to know that my child had problems and what they were so I could help improve them or get help so that they can reach an acceptable level to achieve a pass. Wouldn’t everyone be like this?

And to top it all off, it was explained to me that I should apparently be giving the student extra work (already do this), helping them out in my lunchtime or after school (don’t do this as I am not insane and have a life outside of the school), keep an official record of all the things I have done to help the student and also records of the meetings (no one ever told me there was a sheet for this, but I have copy of letters sent to parents asking them to meet with me).

So apparently it is entirely my, the teacher's responsibility and no one else’s (say the parents) that the students pass. So I have called a meeting with every student that hasn’t passed my class, I am making a list of the problems for each student and possible ways to improve the student. I will also inform them of their true or real score or grade and that the school is giving them the false grade so they obtain a pass mark and this is done so that everything looks great on paper and the school’s nose is still straight with the local education office.

And just through luck today, a parent with one of the students, who hasn’t passed was at the school. An impromptu meeting was made (spoken to her before) and we sat down for a good reality check. All his exams were pulled out, his problems were laid on the table and ways to try and improve his grades were offered. The mother was really nice and it didn’t surprise me when she said that he was lazy at home just like in class. This was reinforced in all his subject grades and comments from teachers.

His mother explained she had bought a 30,000 Baht learning English set a little while again but he had never really used it. So she had made some effort to try and help him but this is not what he needs.

He is in primary 5 or ten years old. His English ability is that of a primary 2 student or a seven year old. He needs to start at the very basics and build his vocabulary as now this is virtually zero. He reads basic words as ‘in, the, a, an.’ but to read, “Hello, my name is Adam. I am ten years old.” He would probably read is, am, I, but the other words would be a challenge and the reading is really laboured.

He has a big road ahead of him and lots of work to do. He only came into the programme this year, so maybe he had never studied with a native speaker before. It would have been a massive leap into the deep end of a swimming pool and sadly he couldn’t swim and has fallen further behind.

I know that back when I was ten, over 20 years ago, if a teacher told my parents I wasn’t towing the line I would have been given a very stern warning and if it happened again for sure would have had the strap across my butt. But it smartened you up. Didn’t most of us get a good old reminder in those days to wisen up? This is the problem today for me, parenting is too soft and kids just walk over parents. That’s my view.

Look I could jump through hoops, say ‘yes’ to everything and so forth but this isn’t me. My only concern is for my students. They come first, before the school’s status, not what some people sitting in the education department might think at the sight of a fail mark.

If the student has a problem the parent needs to be made aware of this, they need to help them improve; they need to become involved in their education. I am not going to be one of the majority (99.99%) that just write in the passing grade and go on holidays leaving a child with a problem that isn’t going to be addressed. That isn’t me, never will be.

Maybe I am wrong; maybe I am blind and just too blinkered and it is better to tell little lies so everyone is happy, no ripples are caused on the water and life goes on smoothly for all. Should I really care? Not my child, not my money, not my child’s future, or you can say ‘not my problem.’ No, can’t do that. That’s not me..

Brunty

What do you think? Am I being unreasonable? Should I just pass these kids and forget about it all?