Teaching your primary language to a group of students is harder than it seems. Especially when they don’t understand a lick of English and you don’t have a translator. You learn to make use of actions. So when we had a week of not teaching English and moved on to construction and painting we were ecstatic! A week without being physically and emotionally drained from wracking your brain to think of English lessons easy enough to act out. Little did I know that during my week of painting I would experience something just as shocking as six white girls showing up to a school in Asia.
These past two months we’ve been living in a little village in Chatturat, so word gets out when there are “filangs” (foreigners) in town. What does that mean? The neighbor kids start coming over in the afternoons to play and hang out. One of our favorite little girls is Noon. She lives with her older sister and grandparents because her parents live in Bangkok for work purposes, this is a very common story in Thailand. Noon is a joyful ball of energy and loves dance parties! Originally we all thought Noon was a boy until the week we were at home doing construction and our host told us Noon is a girl and has a thyroid disease.
About four days into painting our hosts decided they want us to paint the hammock hut, so while Rachel and I paint, Noon hangs out by the hut. I let go of Noons hand to go and grab my paint brush, as I turn my back I start hearing somewhat of a waterfall. I turn around to find Noon standing over Katie’s water bottle and a giant wet spot while what I thought was water is still spilling everywhere. My first thought? “Oh shoot! Noon knocked over the water bottle, its spilling!” Then it hits me…that fluid is not coming from the water bottle on the ground, its coming from above…Noon is peeing her pants while simultaneously laughing, pulling her pants to her knees, and saying “Uh oh! Oh no!” I stood there paralyzed in complete shock, the pee would not stop coming!! The waterfall officially stopped and I let out a slight confused laugh. As I head out to get our host for help I turn around to find Noon taking her pants off and balling them up. Before I can say anything the pants are flying through the air and land on top of Rachel. Rachel took off running and screaming faster than I originally was to find our host.
I couldn’t believe what I just witnessed, I stood there frozen in an uncontrollable laughter. I walked Noon back over for an awkward encounter with her Grandparents motioning what had happened, once again using actions to communicate. Katie’s water bottle drenched in pee, Noon covered in pee, and the ground soaked. That is the moment where I realized this is not a normal year. I am going to see and experience many different situations. So here we are, a third of the way finished with the race and moving on to Africa and month 4 in just seven days, water bottle still in the same spot. These months are flying by and I can’t wait to see what jaw dropping story comes next!
Merry Christmas!
