Traveling Through the Land of Smiles

I am in Thailand... after a four day Pre Departure Orientation for YES Abroad, two days in DC for the gateway orientation, two days of traveling, and about one week of orientations in Bangkok, I have reached my host family in Yasothon and started school. I am definitely going through a bit of culture shock, something that I didn't ever really feel in France, and I am taking my time to adjust. For now, here are some cultural "nuggets" (homage to Miss De Soto) about Thailand.

Driving home from the AFS orientation camp was the least boring ten hour car ride of my life. My perspective of Thailand originated in Bangkok, but in reality, Bangkok is not a accurate representation of Thailand. I was sad to leave the friends that I had come to know and love in the past week (or two weeks for the YES crowd), but it was time to move on. As my host family opened the car door for me and I sat down in their black Toyota, I was automatically struck with the idea that my life was changing for good.
The first thing that I noticed that I found peculiar was the roof of their car. I looked up and was surprised to see over two hundred miniature Buddha amulets stuck to the fabric, shining down on me like a thousand beams of light filtering through the forest (how poetic). I didn't ask why, but it became fairly apparent that Buddha and Buddhism means a lot to my host family.
As we got on the road, I mentally waved goodbye to Bangkok, a city that is completely and utterly in its own league. To me, it is indescribable-- I don't know how to express how amazing it is. Everything is compact and colorful, and there are people everywhere. I was a bit despondent to let it go; however, I knew that it was time to go home.
The first thing I noticed outside of bangkok was the mountains. In a province called Saratburi, I couldn't take my eyes off of the lush green hills rolling past my vision. Californian hills are big, but Thai mountains are beautiful. We stopped after only about an hour of driving, and walked up to a stand where they were making some sort of dumpling. I wasn't quite sure what was happening, but it seemed like my host family and the cooks were on a friendly basis, and they had me pose for pictures with woman frying them in a large vat of oil, and even had me put some filling in the dough and awkwardly try to make it ready to be fried. It was an odd, yet "sanuk" experience, and we bought a few boxes and got back in the car. I asked my host mother in English: "Do you know them?" and she responded with a slightly bewildered "No." Needless to say, Thai people are friendly.
After every hour or so, we would stop and get a snack at seven-eleven (thai peanuts are delicious), or we would stretch our legs and buy something at a little market. It definitely made the ride much easier. Three hours out of Yasothon, I started noticing the sky. The clouds were unlike Bay Area clouds. They seemed more three dimensional; they seemed to take up more space in the sky and start lower to the ground. It looked as if somebody had dabbed a paintbrush across a piece of paper and splattered and blotted the extra paint on top of it. I am not doing it justice here...
I also noticed the fields. Skinny and malnourished cows grazed here and there, and on the off occasion I saw a motorcycle or truck parked under a tree in a very picturesque fashion. Stray dogs roamed everywhere. They roam everywhere. I can't walk somewhere for five minutes without seeing a stray dog. The worst part about it is that I can't just go up to it and cuddle it. I have been warned coutless times to stay away from them because they are sick and dirty. I don't question this... but I wish that it would be different.
One more thing that I noticed in Bangkok, on the way to my host family's house, and in Yasothon, even, is the poverty. It permeates every portion of the country, and often you will see a ramshackled house on the side of the road patched together with wood, tin, and other scraps. In Bangkok, there were large concentrations of these houses in various parts of the city. It isn't something that is hidden, like it can be in America. Poverty is everywhere, and you can tell.
I know that this is getting way too long, but I also want to mention a little about Buddhism in Thailand. It is pervasive in 95% of Thailand, and it plays a big part in how people live their lives. I am trying to learn more about it by researching and observing my host family, but it seems to bring about a very unique way of life. For example, monks are everywhere-- and female monks, too. They cannot buy their own food, so people must offer it to them in the morning. Many of them look extremely thin, however they always seem to be happy, or if not, at least content with the task at hand.
In addition, women wear buddhist pendants around their necks. My host mother wears one daily.
An American teacher at my school lent me a book called "A Constitution For Living." It is about 80 pages, and it acts as a "cheat sheet," more or less, about how to conduct yourself as a Buddhist and a member of society. It is fascinating, but I feel like many of the statements in it require further explanation, and therefore I want to delve deeper into the various aspects of Buddhism to attempt to understand a Buddhist worldview. I think that if I read and observe Buddhist practices that I will be able to cope more with any difficulties that are presented in front of me during my exchange.

Me making a presentation in front of my school-- they couldn't understand and I couldn't understand them, but it's the thought that counts, right?

Performing with the other American AFS'ers in Thailand at our welcome party.

Making dumplings on the side of the road.

All of AFS Thailand!
SA WAT DEE KA!!

Hey there world... this will be my last post from Los Gatos, CA for approximately a year, and perhaps from the USA. I head off tomorrow morning at the ripe 'ol hour of 5:00 AM for the YES Abroad National Pre Departure Orientation in Washington D.C.. We will have three days full of bonding, workshops, and visits to the State Department and the Thai Embassy. I am excited, sad, and nervous. All of the emotions expected of person who is about to venture off into the unknown for about a year. I don't have much to say. It's true that it doesn't feel real yet, yadda yadda.
All I really know is that I hope I live up to the standards of the greatest exchange vlogger in existence: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEeKuNbOklI&feature=relmfu
And I love you all. And I want you to know that.

I am really just dreading saying goodbye to my parents. I know that there will be tears, and I just don't want to have to face that solemn pit in my stomach once more. :| But in time, it will be replaced with the excitement of arriving at my destination, and the beginning of a new and irreplaceable experience.

So, I would like to say adieu.

That's all for now, folks,
Carly
xoxo

Hello, Y'all

I have two weeks left in the good 'ol U S of A, and I am trying to soak up as much Americanism as possible before I leave. Reflecting on my time before France, I was much more anxious and fidgety than I am today. I had so many expectations for France, and in this case, I just don't have many of them for Thailand. I think that doing this a second time around will be a very awesome and unique experience. I have learned from my prior successes and failures, and I will try to improve upon them this year. I am aware that this year will not be easy by any stretch of the imagination, and this has kept me grounded during my last few weeks in the US. I imagine that my first month will be even more terrifying than my first month in France, and that I will struggle relentlessly with the infamous Thai language. That being said, I am also very excited to explore a part of the world that I know little to nothing about, and I can't wait to meet up with the YES Abroad kids in DC!

Back to reality:

I wrote this post to keep you all updated about the ongoing happenstances in my life. Countless shenanigans have ensued since my last post. First and foremost, I graduated from high school! Hooray! It was a jolly good ceremony. The last two weeks of school were the biggest whirlwind of my life, filled with tantamount stress levels and piles upon piles of work. Now that I am done, I can finally have un peu de repos...



Secondly, I GOT MY HOST FAMILY! For those of you who don't remember/have not followed my blog back quite that far, I left the USA for France without an inkling of who I would be staying with. While in New York, I was finally notified of my permanent host family. Needless to say, I was not expecting to get word of my Thai host family so soon. A few Thursdays ago, I got an email from YES Abroad telling me that I had received my permanent host family placement. I don't know too much about them, but I have traded a few emails, and they seem awesome! There is a mom, a dad, and a 22 year old son. The parents are both teachers (!! :D), and I am not sure whether the son lives at home or not. I will be living in the Yasothon Province in North Eastern Thailand, close-ish to the borders of Laos and Cambodia. It is a small town, and apparently everybody knows that I am coming... All the attention will be interesting. I expect my first few days to be filled with many a Thai bow and innumerable sa wat dii's. I am overjoyed to have gotten this information so soon, and I am looking forward to meeting them.

Lastly, I had to say my first goodbye yesterday. :( One of my neighbors and close friends is leaving for Europe this morning with her family and will not be back until after I am gone. HÉLAS!! It is saddening, but, in fact, she will be departing for France on September 5th with AFS, so I am excited to say that there will only be a five hour time difference between us next year. Yesterday was our last day together, so we climbed a mountain:

-Carly

That's about all for now. I hate to inform you that I will not be bringing my laptop to Thailand, so I don't quite know how often I will get the chance to blog. We shall seeeeeeee... :)

I will talk to you all soon-- perhaps a post in the midst of packing.

Fun Dee! I don't know how to say goodbye, so a "sweet dreams" at 11:19 in the morning shall have to suffice.

New Beginnings...

Two weeks ago, as I sat on my swivelly chair writing the previous post, I had no realistic expectations to write a another one. I expected that it would be the end of my blogging days, and that I would resign to 'ol-fashioned journaling on the off occasion in college. However, I was wrong.

Early last week, I received a voice message on my home phone, which, coincidentally, we barely ever check. As we sat down to dinner, my mom pushed the "play" button to read the new messages. It was one of the YES Abroad staff letting me know that they hadn't received my alternate status acceptance forms and telling me to submit them as soon as possible if I wanted to be considered for the scholarship. After a slight freak-out, I ran upstairs and sent the forms as fast as possible. The only problem: it was eleven o' clock eastern time. I came back downstairs and picked at my dinner begrudgingly, mad at myself for not confirming that they had originally been received by somebody. Being late is not something that I like to do... and my chances to study abroad for a year were in jeopardy!

Fast forward two days. It is Thursday. I spent the day pondering YES, and thinking about the six or so spots that had miraculously opened up. I wished and hoped with all of heart that I would be chosen, but I knew that wishing and hoping weren't going to get me very far at that point.

Right after lunch, as I was about to walk into my French classroom, I heard my phone buzz. I looked at the text, and it was Olivia, another alternate (whose blog you can find in the "helpful links" page), who had written "I GOT INTO TURKEY OMGGG!!!!!," an understandable reaction. I called her quickly and jumped up and down with her in spirit. She deserved the scholarship so much, and finally her hard work had payed off. After the phone call; however, I couldn't help but notice the absence of email in my inbox. I checked my phone discretely and at various intervals during the class period, but to no avail. The sadness started to hit me.

I really thought that I had lost the opportunity. I sat back in my chair and waited for the bell to ring so that I could go home and lay down pensively on my bed. I got a ride home from my friend as always, and as I was nearing my door, I took one last look at my phone. My mom sent me a one-word message reading: "Thailand!!!." I truthfully didn't know what to think. I called her, and as soon as the words escaped her mouth, I started crying. I don't even know why. I am not one to cry at happy occasions, but I was laughing and choking and tears were flowing as I walked in my house. I ran around for a while and then called Olivia. We rejoiced at our luck, and then I was up in my room, laying down on my bed pensively, and reveling at the amazing opportunity that I had just been offered.

I am going to Thailand...

In less than two months, I leave for DC to meet with the fifty-four other YES Abroad scholars who have been chosen for several different countries, and from there I will leave for Thailand. I am incredibly excited for what is to come. In the meantime, I have to finish up school, learn a new language, pack, and say some dreaded goodbyes. But it's all worth it in the end.

Goodbye USA, sa-wat dii kaa Thailand!

*Pardon how long and unnecessary most of the information in this post is!*

Warp Speed Ahead!

"There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have been altered"
-Nelson Mandela

Guess what, world? I have a lot of stuff to talk about. It has been, believe it or not, about ten months since I got back from France. I have undergone periods of sadness, nostalgia, reflection, and just about every emotion in between since July 11, 2011. I am constantly analyzing and changing my opinions about my time in Normandy, and even after almost an entire year has passed, I have continued changing because of it. I can honestly say that exchange was the best thing that has ever happened to me, and because of that, I desperately want to do it again.

Back in 2010, right before I left for exchange, I discovered a program called NSLI-Y (National Security Language Initiative for Youth), and I found out for the first time that you could get a scholarship to do the same sort of thing that I was about to embark on. I kept the idea in the back of my mind during the early months of my exchange, but eventually forgot about it.

Fast forward ten and a half months. After I got back from France, I spent some time thinking about what I wanted to do with my life after high school. I started brainstorming what college I might want to attend, what I wanted to study, and what my long-term goals were going to be. In that process, I realized that I had one more chance to unearth some of the secrets of the world while I was still young, impressionable, and adventurous, and I decided to pursue a gap year. I found the NSLI-Y site and started the application, and along the way I also discovered a similar scholarship program called YES.

This one, short for Youth Exchange and Study, focused on sending students on cross-cultural immersion exchanges in countries with a significant Muslim population. Founded after the attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001, it aims to promote diplomacy among the United States and Muslim countries. Initially, the program sent teenagers from all over the Middle East, South-East Asia, and Africa to America for a full school year to learn about American culture, but in 2009, the opportunity was extended to American teenagers to study for a year in either Inodnesia, Ghana, Thailand, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mali, Egypt, Turkey, Oman, Malaysia, India, or Morocco. Its mission resonated with me, and I decided to fill out the application and see where it led me.

Lo and behold, a few months later, I was informed that I was a semifinalist for the program, and that I was going to be attending the annual In-Person Selection Event in Denver, Colorado, in late March. I jumped for joy (figuratively--there was a seatbelt around me when I found out), and started packing my bag for Colorado...

Within a few weeks, I was in a beautiful hotel near the Denver Airport, sitting at a round dining table, and greeting all the people I had tried to connect with before the event. We hushed ourselves as a few speakers stood up to talk to us about the great opportunity we had been given. Among others, Allen Evans, the YES IPSE coordinator as well as a head member of another scholarship program (CBYX--which sends people to Germany for a year), gave us some words of advice, and then we ate dinner.

Eating Group B:


Although I was nervous, I could already tell that I had found my people. All of the YES Abroad kids share similar goals and motives in life, and I automatically clique'd with practically everybody I met. With 90 semifinalists at the event, I wasn't able to meet everyone, but I managed to forge some pretty strong bonds with people I did talk to, even though I had met them only days beforehand.

But of course, the selection event was not only there for finding new friends, but also to give us a chance to show our personalities to the selection committee and alumni who would eventually be choosing who got to go abroad the next year. The second day I was there, I had my personal interview and two group evaluations. Surprisingly, I was less intimidated by the interview than I had expected to be, and I thought that it was a good practice for any job interviews that I may have in the future. I was calmer than I had imagined partly because the leg of my chair had literally fallen through a little whole in the floor right as I sat down in the interviewee seat. After a couple laughs, the interview resumed its semi-formal tone, and I was asked a series of questions for a about twenty minutes. The people who interviewed me were friendly and asked me questions that required some thought and self-analysis, which actually made me think about myself in some ways I hadn't previously recognized. Altogether, it was a good experience! I won't go into too many details about the group evaluations, but I can tell you that they were stressful, comical, and confusing all at the same time! I personally thought that the actions that they asked us to perform were hilarious, and I enjoyed both rounds (Sorry about the vagueness, but I don't think that I should disclose that much about it!). Anyhow, even the parts of the weekend that I had initially thought of as being the hardest ended up being quite fun. :)

After that, I spent some time looking at all of the country options at the country tables they had prepared for us. The alumni were super helpful in answering any questions we had about the customs, food, language, and culture of the countries, and the representatives of AFS, iEarn, Amideast, and American Councils also gave us a lot of insight into what the exchange would be like in each place.

By Monday, I don't think that anybody wanted to leave-- everybody had made at least one great friend, and we were all enthralled at the prospect of going abroad at all. Just this morning I was informed that I am an alternate for the program, and I am happy to even have made it this far. I encourage anybody interested in exchange to apply to YES, NSLI-Y, CBYX, or any other program out there that offers it. The time to explore, discover, live, and love is now, but it's up to you to seize the opportunity.