“No Worries” and 120 Smiles in Thailand
Benjamin J. Trevias | August 18, 2008
Benjamin Trevias (far right) poses with his students after class at Baan Lang Khao English Camp .
What I took away from my two weeks at Baan Lang Khao English Camp in Thailand was how much compassion and hospitality could be found within a single meal and smile. In fact, it was almost two dozen meals in two weeks and at least 120 smiles a day at our school. Thai hospitality is legendary, but what we received exceeded all expectations and could only be succinctly captured in the frequently used Thai phrase, “Mai pen rai,” or “no worries.”
I was the co-leader of a group of 10 people on one of the first-ever summer trips for Alternative Breaks@UCSD. Two of my fellow students had never even traveled outside of the country. We were all headed to Trang, Thailand, a rural port city rarely frequented by tourists, except when couples lured by romance and adventure come here for coordinated underwater weddings. We were all both nervous and excited for the task at hand: teaching English to 120 sixth-graders, considering both our limited knowledge of the Thai language, as well as our small experience in teaching English as a second language.
Our entire program was coordinated through Cross Cultural Solutions (CCS) and our volunteer project had just become possible weeks before our trip. It featured brand-new contacts in Thailand’s education system and teams of schools that had never seen foreigners, let alone volunteers.
Trevias practices Engilsh conversation with a small group of students .
In the beginning, I felt so bad because not only would the school serve us a second breakfast and lunch, aside from the one provided by the CCS house, but some of our students’ families also would bring us local fruits. “No worries” was probably the last thing on my mind as we were soon being inundated with food, though I was not complaining.
We had a group meeting with our program manager, Khem(a name that must be pronounced with a down-up intonation in the Thai language—otherwise the word means either salty or dark), and I brought up the fact that we knew we were working with a poorer community and that the food was not necessary, though incredibly delicious and spicy. However, she explained denying the food would cause great shame because it was the best thing these families could offer to us in gratitude for the service we were offering them. It was then that I saw a circle had begun to form, where the ones looking to serve, were also being served.
At the end of it all, I only wished I had gotten more and better pictures of our group actually teaching. I think, though, that it would’ve been awkward to stop a lesson or to leave my own lesson to document our volunteers. So except for the pictures I took on our last day together, celebrating our UCSD group, our sixth-graders, Thai-English teachers from throughout the province and even a government representative, most of my pictures have documented our group’s full cultural immersion of Thailand.
Members of Alternative Breaks@UCSD pose for a group picture at the Wat Po temple in Bangkok.
We were able to take Thai language classes, go spelunking, learned to cook our own Pad Thai, box our way through a Muy Thai (Thai Boxing in English) camp, participate in the preparations for a Buddhist holiday, hike to the top of temples, and even visit a traditional weaving village. On the weekends, during our free time, we were even able to explore Bangkok’s Grand Palace and famous Wat Po, Kanchanaburi’s elephants and tigers, and Koh Phi Phi’s famous coral reefs.
Of all of our cultural excursions, Koh Phi Phi was the most surreal. This was one of the islands hit hard by the 2004 tsumani. Ominous tsunami warnings were scattered throughout the island and I couldn’t help but have the tsunami in the back of mind the entire time I was on the island, almost hauntingly. What was even more incredible to learn was that in our very own port city of Trang, the strength and deathly grip of the tsunami was only avoided because of the lush Mangrove Forest lining Trang’s coast. It’s a forest that is not only protected by Trang’s people, but also replenished. We were able to help their conservation efforts by bringing mangrove saplings to be planted on one of our trips to the Andaman Sea. This valuable lesson learned did, however, come with a price. Unfortunately, it was jellyfish season, and my first trip to the Indian Ocean became marked with a memorable sting.
Being able to travel abroad and be a volunteer in Thailand are both things that I could have never imagined I would be able to do, until I joined Alternative Breaks @ UCSD(AB@UCSD) in 2006. While I’ve traveled quite often to the Philippines for my family, it wasn’t until my third year in college that I, a San Diego local still living at home, was able to travel independently, volunteering to make toys for an orphanage in Cartago, Costa Rica, during spring break.
Trevias (right) and Janet Shih, a recent graduate from Marshall College, pose for pictures at the Wat Po temple in Bangkok.
I don’t know about the others, but I can definitely say I felt a genuine fear and anxiety in coming to teach. Not only did I feel I had inadequate experience as a teacher and was uncomfortable with my minimal understanding of Thai, but as a UCSD student, I couldn’t help but also wonder whether these kids really needed me to teach them English.
This was one of the many obstacles I faced as a leader, one that I shared with some of my members. In the end, I was able to see teaching English alternatively as a skill. It teaches not so much the language itself, but a hunger for an aptitude in multiple languages, one that is frequently absent in our own educational system. I became more cognizant of the fact that in many countries, more than one language is expected to be known at an early age and by virtue of regions, some of our students even knew multiple dialects of Thai. Still, despite this revelation, teaching was not going to be easy. If I was anything, I believe I was a tough teacher. Being strict on notes and even stricter on pronunciation, repetition and consensus were my tools.
Trevias pets some of the tenants at the Buddhist Tiger Temple in the province of Kanchanaburi.
Somehow, as one of the coordinators for this year’s 10 volunteer trips, I foolishly thought that leading this trip would be much simpler. I couldn’t have been more wrong. New and unexpected lessons are always learned, especially in AB trips, but the lessons this time had more to do with the struggles of leading a group for three weeks than with volunteering epiphanies like the ones I had last year in Pueblito Orphanage in Paraiso. For one thing, for about three weeks I was only one of two guys in a house of 25.
For me this trip was so much harder than I could ever have expected it to be. I have never been as homesick as I was, missing both my family and the friends I was so well connected to in San Diego. Before this trip I was incredibly sure that I wanted to be an Alumni Adviser the following year, but I came back with many new-found doubts, all unforeseen. However, if there is anything that I’ve taken away from this organization, it is that a lesson can be always learned and that adversity will always be found in the innovative, ground breaking and untested, as all of these summer trips were poised to be.
As a site leader, did I accomplish what we intended to do? Were we able to achieve new insights through our reflections? Did our members begin a transformation that would lead them to become inspired active citizens of the world? Truthfully, I don’t think I can say without a doubt how these experiences will impact any of the participants.
UCSD student Karun Amar tries his hand at Thai boxing .
While my first AB experience in Costa Rica was revolutionary in my own life, each person acquires a unique experience, more or less formidable in the shaping of their own lives. As now a previous member, co-site leader and co-coordinator of Alternative Breaks, I have seen great unexpected surprises from all involved in our program: amazing leaders born out of circumstance, invincible inspiration succumbing to apathy and innocence recovered by courage and connections. I can only hope my group will be able to take away and apply the insatiable and immaculate hospitality Thailand’s people have shown to us to those unfamiliar in their own lives. I am now learning how to apply “mai pen rai” every day.
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Benjamin Trevias spent three weeks in Thailand as part of UC San Diego's
Alternative Breaks program. |
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