UniBreak Thailand update

Update from our in country agent in Thailand



We all had a good night last night.
Kanchana taught some basic Thai to everyone and then we had a discussion on how things were going.  Everyone seems very happy and no problems were raised.
What have they been doing?  Lots, but here are some examples from everyone:
Jane - building walls, making bricks, digging drains, watching cows being butchered and playing with kids.
James - playing with sick kids in hospital, making bricks, working in child care 
Ashley - working in child care, editing English for Hilltribe.org project, enjoying the Night Bazaar.

They all went on home stay last weekend, although they went on a different style of trip than the run we often run.  We sent them to stay in a guest house near Pu Chee Fah Mountain and early in the morning they trekked to the summit to see the sunrise from the vantage point above the mists.  Here is a picture copied from the internet:
After that they stayed in a Chinese Thai village and also visited Pu Sang waterfall.  

Some of the things they have noticed are different here:
The amount of dogs.
That people make eye contact and warmly smile at you.
That kids run around and play everywhere and it is impossible to tell who they belong to, as they seem quite free and the community cares for them as a whole.
Men are regularly seen taking care of babies.
It feels very safe here, more so than many parts of Australia.

Some things they have been enjoying:
The food
The fish spa (where fish nibble your toes)
The White Temple

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Fifth week of antics for Scholarship Interns Claire and Amelia

Santa Claus is coming to India!


We’re looking forward to our Indian Christmas. Parcels have been arriving from our family and friends so we even have wrapped presents under our cardboard tree! We have slowly been putting up Christmas decorations including some extremely cute little reindeer that have proved to be a big hit with the staff at FEGG. Little Nikil had a lot of fun working out where we had hidden each one. Our room looks fabulous. Fulfilling a childhood wish, Claire went a little overboard cutting out angel paperchains to decorate the walls, literally all the walls, so we see them wherever we look. The joy of making a bizzilion paperchains was continued by some of the office ladies who furtively started experimenting with scissors and paper to get the same result. Some of them gave up and asked for instructions, laughing at how simple it was. We have a Christmas window shrine where we have hung photos of our loved ones which we visit every morning to open a window on the Advent calendar (lucky we didn’t leave home without that) and to say hello to the familiar faces in the photos. We told you we were getting a little crazy!

The lead-up to Christmas has been tainted by Amelia’s inconvenient and debilitating flu. However it did provide us the opportunity to visit the local health clinic, an interesting experience. The registration form required Amelia to give details of her father or husband – apparently they needed to know which man was responsible for her before allowing her consultation. She was then ushered over to a nurse who checked her blood pressure, temperature and went through a questionnaire of symptoms, making notes on her card. Next was what we thought was the waiting room, but soon turned out to be where the doctor saw her patients. A number of pregnant women, several coughing children and a few feeble elders formed a crowd around her desk. In a seemingly random order, the doctor took each patient’s health file and gave her advice. Each transaction was accompanied by murmurs of agreement or friendly chuckles from the audience. Amelia was relieved that her health complaint that she had to share with the room was not of a more private nature. The doctor prescribed Amelia with all the fitting drugs as well as a hemogram that surprised us by coming back within minutes of having her blood taken. Capital Pathology, beat that!

So our week rolled on with Amelia stacking up snotty tissues and Claire getting blisters from overuse of scissors making decorations. Now we anticipate a big adventure over the Christmas break and a busy return to FEGG in January.

Merry Christmas everyone!


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Jimmy in Thaialnd - UniBreak Volunteer

Fun lead up to Christmas


On Monday I was scheduled to spend the day at a school for children with learning difficulties (down syndrome, autism etc). Myself and two other volunteers got dropped off at the local petrol station where teachers from the school we were teaching were to pick us up and drive us. We've been told that Thai people are either very early or extremely late, and after two hours of waiting for a teacher to turn up, we got a phone call saying that school had been cancelled because of an election of some sorts. None of us really understood what that meant, but it did mean that we didn't get a chance to teach that day which was a shame. Instead when we came back, we helped sort out a LOT of second hand clothing to send out to the local hill tribes as its getting extremely cold here at night. Also that afternoon I had a go at making mud bricks for some of the construction projects the organisation are working on. I think if I can't make a career out of teaching, construction work is right up my alley!! (No need to laugh, I was being extremely sarcastic!) It was surprisingly interesting and pretty tiring work, but we made a lot of bricks that afternoon and a cold shower was the best remedy for a hard afternoon!

On Tuesday morning I went to spend some time at the local village of Baan Jalae and help out in the local child care centre. There were about 20 kids and they were really well behaved. It's good fun teaching the little kids between 3 and 5; we sung some great classic tunes like 10 little fingers, old mcdonald, jingle bells. Then we just spent the morning colouring in fish, then we played their favorite game: whats the time mr. wolf? They went crazy, it's a real hit! That afternoon I spent some time at the Chiang Rai public hospital. Our aim at the hospital is to spend about three hours with the kids who are there for a really long time (around 3 - 6 months) and just take their mind off their treatments etc. We brought along a big craft box and just coloured in, played ten pin bowling and had a good laugh! It was really sad seeing these kids so sick but their enthusiasm and big, warm smiles honestly really touched me.

There are about 10 or so women who make authentic goods like scarves, braclets, clay figurines that are in the style of the local hill tribes. You can purchase some of these goods online (but the website is in thai!). I spent Wednesday morning teaching these women really basic english like the alphabet, how to write the letters and some basic phonics. On Wednesday night there was a big big farewell party for a few of the Thai interns who had been working at Chiang Rai for about 3 - 4 months. It was a great excuse to eat some really good fun, have a few beers and have a good laugh! There was a karaoke machine and a group of about four of us kept getting asked to sing. We agreed to sing after we had a beer under our belt which certainly helped! We did a great injustice to some songs like Bohemian Rhapsody, Stayin' Alive and Have you ever seen the rain? We still keep getting asked to sing Staying Alive at any given time and for some odd reason, we keep saying no..

On Thursday morning, myself and two others went to go spend the morning at another child care centre and play with the children there. We learnt all about fruit and they seemed to understand it which was good. Once we started colouring in they went crazy and were quite hard to control - no wonder why the other volunteers wished me luck when going there for the first time! On Thursday night I went out for dinner with myself and the two other volunteers from Antipodeans Abroad with our in country agent. We went to Paul's house just to catch up and have a quick lesson in the basics of thai with his wife which was great. We went out for dinner to a local restaurant which was off the main streets of the city and it was so good! We had some great authentic thai seafood, twas delish!

This afternoon I'm off to explore the city of Chiang Mai (a three hour bus ride south of Chiang Rai) to explore some ancient ruins, temples and enjoy the night markets and local cuisine!

I'm still not sure what we're up to for Christmas and NYE. I think we have to teach on Christmas Day and then we celebrate an early NYE with all of the staff herer on the 29th. We start preparing for the party on the 27th or 28th at some crazy time like 2am for some odd reason - it's all a big vague at the moment! I might be going to Bangkok with another Aussie volunteer during this time as well, decisions decisions!!

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Roseville B - China

Hey everyone,

Here are some more photos to keep you going until we get home. Not long now!!

Love Team B. (B is for Bubbly)
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This is the summary



I hope all's well. It has been another busy week but I am much more relaxed.
The temples I got to see were very good and the children trying to sell you things very impressive. For $1 they could tell me the prime minister, capital and population of Australia.
I have had a couple of lunches at teachers' houses in the village. I enjoyed the morning glory, rice and fried duck eggs.
I have visited the silk farm and decided that silk should be at least $1000 per metre for the hand made silk.
The anniversary party at school was astounding. They had games and 8 huge speakers on the back of a truck blaring out music. The party food was soup and two baguette type rolls. The volunteers presented each child with these. It was a very moving experience to see the humble acceptance and thanks given for the food. Later the dancing started and we were literally dragged on to the dance floor (dusty volleyball court). The locals were not keen to let us go and we were given powder to rub on to absorb the sweat. The atmosphere was incredible.
I met up with a Khmer lady who is a friend of an Aussie friend. This was a real treat as I discovered clean air (air conditioning) and a real cup of coffee. She speaks good English and we spent a lovely time together.
Lunch was spent at Tonle Sap Lake and we picked up a new Aussie volunteer who will be at the same school.
We then went to the Sangheum Centre for Children to join in their Christmas party. It was a great afternoon of singing and dancing performances from the orphans there. Santa Claus (alias Tom) was a real hit.
I'm having a quiet morning and then off to the Cultural Village this afternoon.
I still haven't got used to riding in the traffic. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera at the ready when I was passed by a urinating pig lying on its back across a board on the back of a motorbike!!!

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Stuartholme B - India

Namaste from Team B!! Here is our blog for the trek...

We have completed our trek on the Singalilia Ridge. We all had heaps of fun living as adventures for 5 days. The views were amazing but it was very cold! As well as enjoying the trek we loved the food!

We are now in Darjeeling and taking advantage of the rich culture and great shopping! We head off to Kolkata tomorrow on the night train where we hope to see more interesting characters!

We are all excited to get home but will greatly miss India.

Love Team B
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St Catherine's - China

St Catherine's are at their Community Project.

Since leaving Beijing to go to the Great Wall we have all trekked along the wall together and are now working on the 2nd day of the project. We will update more when we are back in Beijing!
St Catherine's - China
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