Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Well, slightly exaggerated. Actually there is no exaggeration. This is the English department, so I may be dead from a student stampede before long.

It's been a while, since my return from the south. After I got back I went out and got a bike! A cheap, $60 used Japanese thing. It was nice enough for me. It had a belt instead of a chain, which was new, but overall worked out. I enjoyed it for 1 day. Notice how this paragraph is in the past tense?

So, I was riding home one day, crossing the street at an intersection. A taxi decided to do a U-turn pretty quickly and crashed into me. So, that was fun. Honestly I'm fine, it just sort of knocked the bike enough to make me quickly jump off it. Anyway, now the wheel was all bent out of place. So the taxi driver took it to the side of the road to get it back into shape. After spending about 30 minutes pounding away, he declared it was done. Except, the wheel was all crooked. I said it is definitely not done, so he basically said "Ok, fuck it then?" and drove off. Why you gotta make things all complicated, man? So I got a photo of his plates and I'm waiting for the ever-so-fast Thai police to get things taken care of. Stiiiill waiting. I'm not hopeful. I'm glad it was a cheap bike. When I replace this thing I'm going to stick to only my side of the street, on the sidewalk. Combined with my 4th rabies shot (2 more to go!), Thailand is trying its damnedest to kill me.

I got back from my vacation on Saturday, which gave me all of Sunday to get settled and hit Monday running. Except I got a text that we wouldn't be meeting until Wednesday. Alright, then! Tuesday I got a text saying it'll be Thursday. Then Wednesday yet another text saying Friday. I actually got a bit of a cold during that time, so it worked out nicely. But as such, I only had 1 day of work before another weekend. Silly, my job is. And to be honest my job is pretty cushy. I have so many classes learning the same material, I can pretty much reuse my lesson plans 4, 5 times the same week. It may get a bit boring for me, but I don't think I've ever had a chance to practice one lesson so many times. After this year I'd imagine they'll be quite refined, so that'll be nice. On the downside (upside?) my classes are big. Really big. Like, 50-60 students, "I use a microphone to teach" big. This will take some getting used to.

Regardless, with a whopping two days of teaching in Thailand under my belt, I am ready to make judgments about Thai students. First of all, they are not shy at all, especially the girls. This is a big change from China/Taiwan. It's also very easy to get everyone to talk...although, I find that they abandon English pretty quickly, so that's kind of missing the point. I told them hearing Thai makes me sad, and when I am sad I give lots of homework. We did an activity where each class got to come up with rules, and I was surprised by how straight laced Thai students were. I've done this activity before, and almost always the first rule they come up with is "No homework", "No tests", or something along those lines. Only 1 or 2 of my classes did that. The rest said very reasonable things like "No cheating" or "Please participate". What the hell, guys? Do you know how to be kids? Actually compared to China/Taiwan they do. They have a good amount of free time, comparatively, and have a variety of interests. The rest of Asia is really hard on their students, so it's nice to see that they get some time to enjoy being kids now and then. Anyway I took a picture of the board when the rules were finished. One of them shouted "Selfie!" so I was happy to oblige.

Speaking of Thai observations, I've had a note on my phone of weird things I've noticed about Thailand, so here they are:

• Ketchup is really sweet here, even moreso than the US. It tastes like candy.
• Fast food is a bit expensive. In fact, they give you your food on real dishes when you eat in.
• Thailand has apparently figured out how to do steak properly - I'm looking at you, Asia. It doesn't cost a months salary for a crappy cut of meat, and isn't cooked on a plate of noodles. God, wtf Taiwan.
• Escalators run a little fast here. It throws you off at first.
• Stairs are slightly smaller than what the rest of the world uses. It's awkward to make so many tiny steps.
• People drive on the left side of the road. I know that's not revolutionary, but it takes getting used to even as a pedestrian.
• Women's fashion here is more "sexy" rather than "cute" like the rest of Asia.
• There are men's clothing stores. Maybe even as many as women's. I know that sounds obvious, but it's apparently not, Taiwan.

This blog in general was pretty "Wtf, Taiwan". But it's funny, I really miss Taipei. It still feels like home to me. Bangkok is 100x more exciting than Taipei is, but I just don't feel like I fit in here as much as I do there. Maybe it's the language thing. At the very least, I know a taxi driver in Taiwan wouldn't say "Eh, I'm bored of your bike that I broke so I'm leaving." And that's the big difference - Taiwan is very nice, orderly, and kind. It's just not as exciting.