Our first local festival, job hunting and Kristine landing the best job ever!!!

So last weekend the surrounding area of where we are living, which is a small enough village area beside the campus, came alive. The streets were filled with markets and street food, as well as what we would call a carnival atmosphere (Thai Style).


One of Thailand's biggest rock groups Carabao (the Thai Metallica) was set to play a gig next to the temple at the end of our street, so we figured we would stroll up for a look.
When we got there they had alot of the games you would find at a western carnival, including a few you might not, such as throw the basket over the bottle of whiskey to win the bottle or fire a dart at balloons to pop them, only the balloons seemed to be made out of some NASA style material, which would cause them to bounce back and narrowly miss passers by, which would excite the Thais to no end, and we got a good giggle from it also.

A friend of Rainny's was visiting so we all went out that night to try some pizza that we had heard alot of good things about, claims that it was as close as you could get to an genuine Italian pizza here in Thailand, and we can confirm it was amazing. We washed it down with a few German beers and the owner brought out speakers so we could throw on our own music and enjoy the night.
We put our heads down over the next few days to finalise our CV's in preparation for job hunting in Khon Kaen, we were advised the best way is to go into the schools and ask for the head of English department and try sell yourself straight away. So we packed up the bike on Wednesday and traveled around a few schools and made some phone calls.

That night, tired from the hunt we got a phone call from an English teacher who we had met the first week of the course who asked if Kristine and I could come to his school Thursday morning, so Kristine could do an interview for a kindergarten position, teaching 5 and 6 year old kids and for me to meet with the head of the secondary school across the road as they both needed teachers.

Ecstatic we woke up early and went down to the Sathit school, which means demonstration school and is very well recognised in Thailand and is also affiliated with the university, which means good pay and a lot of holidays as well as very good classroom set ups and facilities.
Kristine did the interview with the head of the school and the head of the primary school (she was there to translate) and they went through the questions and she nailed each one, so much so, that they asked her to start on Monday straight away, which we were both over joyed with.

P.E. ground

They advised me (Stephen) that on Monday they would bring me over to the secondary school, which is right beside the kindergarten and introduce me to the head of department there, as they are looking for a teacher to teach 13/14 year old's in English, Its in no way a promise of a job but they said they have a lot of pull so with Kristine starting on Monday in the same company hopefully I can mention that and could be starting next week as well, but we are so happy one of us has gotten a promise of a start already, as we thought we may have to wait a month or two.

Main Hall

So now let me introduce you to Kristine's new school. We started the tour by being shown the main hall were each morning the kids would attend an assembly, to go over any news and maybe sing a song or two (warm up the vocals). Not mandatory, as English teachers are free to head to the canteen for free coffee and tea. Then your classroom begins and here is that part where I (Stephen) was very jealous.

The day consists of 1-1.5 hours of warm up teaching such as date, weather and alphabet followed by that days lesson plan. Then the kids get ready for either  P.E., music class, or some times they go to the library. After all that they are ready for their lunch followed by a nap, yep that's right, a two hour nap followed by a recap of that days lesson and some story time. The kids we met where soooo well behaved and each room has an English teacher, a Thai English teacher and 2 assistant teachers for explanations and helping out with controlling the room.

The other half... 

Half of Kristine's new class room

The respect the kids give the teachers is amazing and Kristine was grinning from ear to ear during the tour and the facilities where on a par with a private school in the western world. Kristine would also once a month have to put on a show for the morning assembly, usually a song and in costume for 5-10 minutes of singing and acting. Oh, did I mention they had an entire room devoted to funny and unusual costumes for each show and previous performances have included gang-nam style.... The wages include free lunch, tea and coffee as I've mentioned and a housing allowance which pretty much covers our rent already so I (Stephen) may not bother with the job and just be a kept man for the time being :-).

Library

She has two months paid vacation in April and May and all other holidays, which Thailand has a lot of.
They have a summer camp every few months on Saturdays, so we asked if we could attend this week to show interest. Working as a teacher is all about presentation and commitment, as a lot of teachers are backpackers who only want to work for a few months and then move on.

1 of 4 playgrounds

If you are willing to hang on with a school, you will get a wage increase every semester. So it's safe to say that we are extremely happy that the job hunt took one day and fingers crossed that I (Stephen) will have some good news come Monday, but even if they already have someone lined up, I have a few part-time work offers on the back burner, which should allow me to make the same as a teacher just without the contract, this will mean I've to do visa runs every 2 months but it's also a mini holiday. But for now I'm hopeful that this job will happen, as it would be perfect for the both of us as the schools are so close together and we will have the same holidays.

Now this Friday we have the Halloween party to celebrate and then we will head off to Laos on Sunday for our first visa run.