Square One Revisited

Surprise! As most people who read this already know, I am back in the USA, having made a largely involuntary exit from Thailand. Before I get into anything else, the story:

Bess and I were told repeatedly by a number of different people who ought to have known that we were totally in the clear as far as our visas were concerned. Basically, we had gotten work visas before entering the country that were valid for roughly three months; during that time, according to our sources, we each needed to obtain a work permit, a separate document that would effectively function as a visa, allowing us to both stay in Thailand for longer and leave and reenter Thailand. We were concerned about how long it would take to get the work permit, but once we got to Sadao, our supervisor assured us that we were still legally working, and we could get it later. So we did. We actually didn't get our work permits until December, and only then so that Bess could leave for Australia and come back. Upon reentering the country, however, Bess had some issues and was allowed back only with a tourist visa. Fast forward a few days, we were told by a co-worker that with our work visas/permits, we were not actually allowed to leave the country without special dispensation, and because she had left the country, Bess's work permit had been cancelled.This meant that she was allowed to be in Thailand, but she was not allowed to work. At this point, I only had a week until my original visa expired, which would void my permit as well, and I would no longer even be in Thailand legally.

We of course had to do some quick thinking. We rushed down to our supervisor's office (incidentally, she was the one person in our lives there who could function as an interpreter), and immediately tried to get our documents so that we could leave for Hat Yai, the nearest city where we initially were told we could resolve these issues. Beam, our supervisor, was summoned so that she could figure out what we wanted. She, suddenly a wealth of immigration/labor information, told us we would have to leave Thailand, go to Malaysia, and reapply for work visas and work permits, and that Bess wouldn't even be able to go until her 30-day tourist visa was up. She called Hat Yai to double-check, and it was so.

I want to take a moment here. Beam was literally the only person at our school, and one of very few in Sadao, who could speak both English and Thai, and we relied on her throughout the process. She took care of us in a lot of respects, but clearly resented that she had to do so (despite the fact that she was the one who hired us in the first place). We had no job support, and she even had the gall at one point to call a meeting with us to tell us that the other teachers were gossiping about us. She panicked about everything. She flatly lied to us before we got to Thailand, and continued to lie while we were there.

So, on the day in question, we stood in the office, completely panicked ourselves and with no one to ask for help but Beam. She laughed at us. She basically responded with something akin to mocking. She literally told us to "flow with the water" - this from the woman who had had a melt down the week before that I had used some printer paper for the volunteer classes we held for the other teachers in the school. She suggested that we just forget about the work permits and the work visas and just cross the border into Malaysia every two weeks and "lay low," both of which are highly illegal. She told us she didn't think we had to worry about the permits because we hadn't had them for the first two months, and everything had been fine. Meaning that we had been led into working illegally by our employers and without our knowledge for two whole months, even though we asked ad nauseum about the work permits.

At this point, I dropped the panic and just pretended to be completely placated. We got the documents we needed and went home. A little later, we had a serious talk about the possibility of just leaving for good, and even though neither of us wanted to decide on the spot, the ball was rolling. We knew that we didn't want to go to Malaysia and possibly get stuck there. We didn't want to spend even more money, and it would have cost us hundreds of dollars, and that for just a few more weeks of what I call "teaching." We contacted the embassy and some other American teachers in Thailand, and the reaction was unanimous - everyone told us to get out. By Monday, just three days after the day of panic, we had booked our flights home.

We still had two days of work to get through, and we somehow needed to get paid. We decided to keep our decision to leave under our hats .This may seem deceptive, and I still don't feel great about it, but the possibility that we would have been detained and perhaps even taken to court for breach of contract was too high, and ultimately we needed to protect ourselves. We did tell the truth - that we weren't going to go to Malaysia and why, and that instead we would go to the US embassy in Bangkok to try to resolve things. We already knew that things couldn't be resolved, but we still need Beam to call a cab to take us to the airport, otherwise we would have been stuck. Ultimately, we were able to get paid and get out of Sadao without any issues, and we wrapped things up at work and at home as best we could.

We had a short break in Bangkok, where we got to actually do some fun stuff before leaving. On the way out of the country, I did actually get a citation from the Thai police for having an expired visa, but because I was able to explain the situation and provide my work permit, I only had to pay a fine. The flight was long and painful, but everything went smoothly after my run-in with immigration.

I'll get into my feelings about all this in a follow-up post, but I will say that it was definitely a huge disappointment. It was such a hard time overall - the new job, the new country, the isolation - and to end it on such a negative note frankly sucked. I feel like a missed a lot of what Southeast Asia is about, and even though I hope I will make a return visit, it is going to take a while to recover enough to be able to enjoy it.

2011 At A Glance

Places

I'm not much for drawing, so when I'm really bored and meant to be doing something else, I write things down. To-do lists, my name 25 times in different handwriting, places I've been, places I want to go, books I am reading. The other day my students were working on an assignment in class, and wrote down every place I've ever lived. Good lord.

1. San Antonio, Texas: I've never lived here, but you have to be allowed to count the place where you were born.

2. Altus, Oklahoma: 1988-89

3. Spangdahlem, Germany: 1989-1992

4. Bowie, Maryland: 1992-93

5. Newport News, Virginia: 1993-96

6. Dayton, Ohio: 1996-98

7. Keflavik, Iceland: 1998-2000

8. Las Vegas, Nevada: 2000-03

9. Mount Pleasant, South Carolina: 2003-06

10. Charleston, South Carolina: 2006-08, 2009-10

11. Nottingham, England: 2008

12. Tübingen, Germany: 2009

13. Broomall, Pennsylvania: 2010-11

14. Quito, Ecuador: (yes, I count it) 2011

15. Sadao, Songkhla, Thailand: 2011-2012

Pretty impressive for just 23 years, no?

Missing out

Something I'm rapidly realizing about adulthood is that it leaves a person downright exhausted at the end of the day. My situation may be a little out of the ordinary - I suppose most people at least have a language in common with most of the people they encounter during the day - but I think that even without the language barrier, I would be too tired to do much else than watch some shows, make dinner, and call it an early night.

As I was never a big partier, I'm not too worried about missing out on clubs, bars, and drunken exploits. I'm sure a number of those remain in my future, but it's ok that they're not in my present. What is particularly distressing for me (besides the fact that I have to get out of bed every morning) is the fact that, these days, I'm really too tired to do much thinking. That may sound ridiculous, and it probably is, but whether it's the language, the often mind-numbing monotony of a full-time job, or just the heat, I feel like my brain just clunks along, churning out only the most necessary of thoughts. Sometimes I don't even get those. I still plan on going into academia, so we'll see how this pans out.

I'm being a little over-dramatic - I still manage to teach about 300 kids a new language without speaking theirs, I can get around a foreign country with relative ease (and again, without speaking the language), and I haven't gotten bitten by a cobra yet. I worry, though, that I've lost the ability to really take in everything that's going on in my life, as well as the ability to appreciate all that is good about it. I'm too tired to look about the window and see what's really there - mountains, trees, an incredible mist that is a constant reminder of how much moisture is in the air, even on the dry days. It's other-worldly, a view unlike anything I've ever had before, but I can't quite take it in. It's like a dream. Everything is slightly foggy, a little bit unsettling, and easily forgotten. Because I am exhausted.

I used to read Shakespeare, watch foreign films, take long walks just to look and think and imagine. I would create things. I could spend hours talking about something I'd read or seen or thought. A breeze, the smell of rain, those evening hours when you can actually see beams of sunlight - all of these would send me off someplace else for a moment, and when I was there, it was as though I could really see everything. I could step outside of life and take in the substance of it all. I'm trying to get there again.

Thoughts

I've been trying to do some meaningful reading while I've been home sick, and the following two blog posts really speak to my current experience in ways that surprised me.

What the Peace Corps Taught Me About Failure

I'm Not a Feminist...

I've been working on a couple posts of my own, so you should see those soon. Maybe even later today.

Oh the places you'll go!

I take full responsibility for most of the things that happen in my life. I chose to move to Thailand, for example. And yet, what lies in store for me just two days hence is in no way my fault. I blame Bess.

It started with a conversation I have no memory of and probably didn't understand. Now, somehow, I am committed to being dressed in traditional Thai garb, made up to the nines, and paraded - and I mean that literally - around town on a float in an important festival of some kind. Trust me, I am not responsible for this.

But lucky for you, there will be photos.

Thailand

Moving is hard, and moving to another country is almost as hard as it gets. I've always know this - my first overseas move was 22 years ago, after all - and yet somehow it's always a shock when I arrive in a new place. Now when that place is the middle of nowhere in southern Thailand, "shock" doesn't even begin to cover what I am going through. I'm not going to pick up and leave, but that doesn't mean I don't want to. What's funny is that I absolutely expected this, but there is of course a difference between knowing and experiencing.

So what am I experiencing?

It's hot, first of all. It's not so bad when there's a breeze or a storm, but in a stuffy classroom with no air conditioning, it's almost unbearable. Since it's winter here now, it will only get hotter. Come April I plan to be naked on the tile floor of my bedroom with the ac on full blast, and woe betide anyone who disturbs me.

Sadao, the town where I now live, is just about as small as I've ever seen. That's not to say there aren't loads of people, but beyond a few restaurants and roadside stands, there's nothing for any of them to do. Bess and I are the only ones who walk anywhere, so I presume they just go elsewhere for their entertainment, but we've been confined to our air conditioned bedrooms staring at our computer screens and eating copious amounts of chocolate. Other than the two of us and another teacher at school, there are no other Westerners, which isn't awful, but it does mean that there is only one person we can actually talk to.

Work is frankly awful. The school is ridiculously unorganized; Bess and I didn't even know what we were teaching until the first day of school. I have just shy of 300 students total, so most of my classes have between 40 and 50 kids, mostly eighth-graders. I have a couple of great classes, but mostly the kids don't listen, talk over me, and are generally extremely rude. They speak about ten words of English between them, and I can't even imagine where to begin teaching them because, again, they don't listen to a word I say. I have no book and am trying to design a whole curriculum for two different grades. Oh, and by the way, I have never taught before.

I do think it will get better. Even if I never fall in love with the place, the shock is already wearing off and we are getting into a routine. We'll go away on the weekends when we can, we managed to get a week off for Christmas, and we are now only staying for a semester. When that's done, we're off on a crazy backpacking adventure through Asia, then we'll head to Australia to work for the summer. So if it has to be a little shitty up front, I guess that's okay.