25 July, 2018
I’m sitting in my bed listening to the rain pound against my ceiling. I can hear the stream below my little blue house raging down the mountain as it fills up and up and up with water. There are little holes in my ceiling, so every now and then, water drips on my bed, arm, or head. My small room is fairly well-lit tonight with a small candle, solar-powered light, and solar-powered lantern. We haven’t had electricity all day (for the second day this week), and my light sources are starting to dim. I found the perfect spot to hang them out my window while I’m at work, and if I’m lucky, the sun will appear long enough to charge my lights, which I feel like I can’t possibly live without.
But my students… My students are brave people. They’ve been doing this their whole lives. They live in one-room homes made from bamboo or wooden sticks, most of them with no electricity or running water inside the house. Last night, I was basking in my electricity and phone service, talking on the phone to my mom with 2 of my bedroom lights on. Then, through the crack of the door, a large, fuzzy black spider appeared. With a pounding heart, I squeamishly poked at it with my umbrella until it ran out of the crack between my ceiling and bedroom wall. After work today, I told my co-teacher about this and asked her what she does when giant spiders enter her room. She said, “Go get one of the students to kill it for you.” These kids are fearless. They kill rats, birds, and 4-foot-long snakes with their bare hands, and now apparently spiders, too.
Every day after lunch, I go to my room to recharge my brain for my after-lunch classes. My house is at the school and used to be the nurse's office, so it is placed right in front of a string of 4th-6th grade classes. Being that this is the prime hangout spot at 6:30 am, lunchtime, and after school, I get the privilege of hearing students play, laugh, scream, and cry during most hours of the day. Today, after lunch, it was pouring rain and completely gray outside, making it pretty dark in my room. I was feeling a bit glooming for multiple reasons, all having to do with the weather and no electricity. Then I sat on my bed and started to listen. Some students outside my house were laughing so hard I couldn’t help but smile. I went out to talk to them and see what was so funny. I saw a group of girls playing jump rope with a jump rope they had made from small red rubber bands all strung together. Another group of students were playing a game with small gray rocks (I was just recently taught this game, but I’m not sure of the name). I was blown away by the amount of smiles and joy that all these amazing children had, even though we were on our third dark and rainy day, and the second day of no electricity.
I realize these students don’t know any different as this has been their whole life, but when I was just feeling a little mopey sitting in bed with raindrops literally falling on my head, I thought of my students and started to laugh. I started to think about how incredibly strong they are, and how I want to be just like them. I thought I came to Thailand to teach them English, but it turns out I came to Thailand for them to teach me happiness.