Wai Kru

During this last week I attended 3 Wai Kru ceremonies at my new school in Thailand. I'd never heard of Wai Kru before and had no idea what to expect whatsoever. Thankfully the ceremonies were informative and I now have a far better understanding about Wai Kru.

Wai is the Thai greeting that is a sign of respect. Even Ronald McDonald is respectful. 

Kru is the Thai for Teacher or Master. So, Wai Kru is a ceremony in which students say thank you to their teachers in advance for everything that they do for them. Teachers are greatly respected in Thailand.

During the ceremony students make a pledge to be good students, listen to their teachers, follow instructions and not cause any trouble. Depending on your own world view and sense of humour depends on how you view this pledge. Some suggest that perhaps this pledge should be repeated each morning during the school year!

Flowers are a very important part of the ceremony. Students present their teachers with floral arrangements and garlands. The flowers used are symbolic and represent their respect, readiness to learn and intelligence. Some of the flowers I received had very strong scents and most of the arrangements were in the form of a loop with a flower chain hanging down. Students kneel before their teachers, wai and present their offerings.

The Secondary ceremonies I attended involved Muay Thai demonstrations, speeches about the 21st century teacher as well as singing. The Primary ceremony included Thai songs, traditional dancing, competition results and more singing. It was a really nice ceremony each time, but I did feel a little uncomfortable having students kneel at my feet and wai. Aside from the discomfott the ceremonies were very positive as many staff felt even more positive about their job and relationships with their students.

China in Auckland.

Obviously you have to get a visa for certain countries and being British you definitely need a visa for China. I am rather proud of the number of stamps and visas stapled and glued into my passport. I am going to be devastated when I have to renew it in a couple of years time. Getting our Chinese visas was not impossible but it gave us a little culture shock.

My new School prepared my paperwork, I had my ridiculously expensive medical and we made sure we had enough passport photos. We headed to the Chinese Embassy in Auckland for the actual visas. Having gone through a similar process for New Zealand, American and Kyrgyz Visas I was expecting it to take all day and be somewhat tedious.

After getting lost courtesy of our slightly old TomTom that decided we wanted to go to the TipTop Bread factory instead we arrived at the Embassy. It was just like any other building in the area. I was actually shocked by the lack of people in the embassy. We took a ticket from a machine and went to the seats in front of the counter which resembled those you see in some banks where the tellers are behind glass with a narrow slit to receive papers. We glanced at our number and the electronic system above the employees and there were only 2 numbers until it was our turn. We were in shock! Within in moments the number changed and they waited about 10 seconds. No one came to the window, so it was onto the next number. Having seen this we readied ourselves to sprint to the front as quickly as possible.

Our number came up and we did our best Usain Bolt impression and made it before they moved to the next number. The man was officious. He said that my work place was wrong that my husband should be getting a different kind of visa to the one requested. Demanding a form we couldn't find and telling us we had filled things out incorrectly and dismissing us with 2 minutes. So, a speedy correction, mild panic and checking everything very carefully we took another ticket and resumed our place in line. Within about 30 seconds we were in front of a different man who was very nice and helpful. The forms were submitted and we were given a hand written receipt (hand written!) and told to return in 4 days.

Not a particularly painful experience at all. On our way out we decided to use the facilities. I think the picture says it all. 

3 Cubic Metres

I have a two year contract in Suzhou, a lovely Husband, my little fluffy Labradoodle, an obscenely large sheet music collection, a ridiculous amount of text books (mainly about Wagner and Russian music), a snowboard, some rather fabulous shoes, a one of kind wedding dress made by Josie Smith Couture and the usual sentimental items that a 27 year old female would have. I should probably add that I also have a shipping allowance of 3 cubic metres for my little family of 3 to go to Suzhou.

So, as I've said before we have both done a fair bit of backpacking and we can live without a lot of things. Things have changed since we last backpacked though. The major round of backpacking that we did together was a relatively short time after we had started living together and so we didn't have a lot of possessions that were of great importance. Yes, there were some things, but predominantly we didn't have quite so many material possessions that represented our life together. 3 cubic metres seemed fairly simple to us. We were wrong.

It turns out since staying in New Zealand for 4.5 years we have accumulated some belongings. My parents have always joked that I have expensive taste. I can look at a magazine and pick the most expensive item on the page as being my favourite without even looking at the price tag. Quite a skill really. We thought we would be staying in New Zealand so we bought the beautiful Italian leather sofas, the Balinese boat wood table, the sleigh bed we've always dreamed of... Then there are the hobbies; triathlon, snowboarding, surfing, dressmaking, cooking.... I'm thinking our new hobby should be "eye spy". Far less specialist equipment necessary.

We started to be brutal with ourselves the moment I had the contract in my hands. We got the tape measure out and we measured an area of the exact size in our kitchen. This gave us a really good idea as to what had to go and what we could keep. I was always trying really hard to keep in mind the advice I was given by another teacher who was already working internationally just to go with what you could fit in your suitcase. The school organised a relocation specialist to assess our shipment and we came up at 5 metres cubed. Interestingly the school that has employed me offers a single teacher the same shipping allowance as a teacher with dependents. Still, at least they are offering shipping and the company even pack for us.

Immediately after our assessment we have reassessed. We have 40 items on "trade me". We are both making sacrifices. We have had to consider what is irreplaceable and what we can perhaps upgrade or live without. It is incredible how attached you become to pieces of wood, fabric, leather, metal and paper. Our future as we see it right now involves seeing a lot of the world and making the most of every moment we have together and every beautiful place we get to experience.