where cider meets condensed milk: Teaching and Baan Unrak

where cider meets condensed milk

Monday, January 02, 2006

Teaching and Baan Unrak

Some background about the orphanage-- it's called Baan Unrak ("House of Joy") and is run by the Neo-Humanist Foundation, which is the social service branch of the Ananda Marga Yoga group. (http://www.neohumanistfoundation.org/baanunrak/) Action through social service is a focal point of the group. It was started by one of the yogic nuns when someone gave her an abandoned child, and she then was asked to take care of more, and the children's home and school grew from there. Currently there are 104 children at the home, but they are in the process of building a new school because they are over capacity. It's a very diverse group of children, a mix of Thai, Burmese refugees, or from the hill tribes in the area. The nuns are called Didi ("sister") and the... man-nuns (are they monks? it sounds funny...) are called Dada ("brother"). The adults and older children called us Sister/Brother, but otherwise the kids refer to all foreigners as Teeachaaaaa, which is a welcome change from Sensei!sensei!sensei!lookatmenow!sensei! in Japan.

Above is Abijit, a Filipino man that has been living at Baan Unrak for awhile, though he has a wife and kids back in the Philipines. He fixes and builds things, serves food, drives the motorcycle, helped lead yoga and meditation, plays electric guitar... pretty much anything. He is such a rockstar, and helped us out with everything during our stay. He set up a pretend guesthouse and laundry next to the cafe that the older kids practice running. He also showed us a shed containing lots of paintings done by various monks. Since Ananda Marga is not religious, they want to expose the kids to all types of great personalities through history, including Hare Krishna, Gandhi, Jesus, Buddha, Moses, and so forth. One of the older yoga monks was staying at Baan Unrak for a few months just to do paintings, such as this one pictured above.

I taught English classes this week at the school, which was a bigger challenge than anything I've faced in 1.5 years in Japan! The kids are roughly grouped by age, but are also divided into ability groups. On Monday morning, Daniel and I walked into the 1st grade class with a vague lesson plan, a class roster, no time for preparation, and no idea what to expect. We thought 1st graders would be the littlest ones, but in fact it was the class in which all new children to the home are placed, so we had kids from 7 to 15 years old together. Most kids haven't had any formal education before arriving, and are thus learning basic Thai as well as English, math, science, and such. Because both the women who run the orphanage are English speakers, as are many volunteers, the kids are constantly exposed to English and are expected to be able to communicate. Daniel and I also taught a psychotically energetic group of 8-11 year olds and a tiny class of 12-year-olds with fantastic speaking abilities.

Making letters of the alphabet.

The kids learn fast, want to do everything suggested, and can't get enough English. It was so wonderful! Daniel ("Caspian Spice") is an American ALT who came to the states 9 years ago from Russia, after having to leave Armenia when he was young due to religious persecution. He is one of the happiest people I've met on JET, and the kids loved him. He was a joy to work with, and knew what the kids who had no home must have endured, which is a reason he came on the trip.

Kathy (american of taiwanese descent) and I taught together on another morning, and things were similarly manic, but we had a bit more preparation. It was great playing games with the 12-year olds because I'm not used to having students understand almost everything I say!

Kathy and I stretching out number "concentration" game to last 30 minutes, since our only guidance for the entire period was a reading workbook consisting of a 6-sentence-long story about some animal friends and their healthy eating/living habits. (No joke.) Richard L dropped by for this class as well.

The last day, Emily (from Kansas) and I taught English in the morning, and then art classes in the afternoon. Emily majored in textile arts in college, so knew lots about art things, and we made paper with one class, and did drama games with the last class of the day.

Making new year's cards. I received one wishing me a "Harpy New Year's!"

Emily in a mob-scene/storytime.

Mirror games in the 1st/2nd grade class.

Paper-making with the 4th-graders (most were 10-12 years old). On this day, the kids were all wearing hand-woven garments instead of their uniforms.

By afternoon, it was hot and humid in the rooms, all the kids were tired and kept wandering in and out of the room. Our last class descended into drawing time for the girls and jumping games with the little boys. Tons of fun, and the kids did some yoga poses for us. One little girl, Phavati, has cerebral palsy, and gets around by crawling, since she can't stand without help. Nonetheless, she can raise her body up into a scorpion pose (on two hands, raising your feet up behind your head) as well as a bridge. Amazing kids!

Playing a mirror game-- this is Phavati, the one with cerebral palsy. She was in the 1st grade class, but spoke English clearly and with conviction. Out of the blue, she would say complete sentences, such as "I'm sorry, teacher, but I cannot do that!", which nearly caused me to fall over. She was also demanding, and learned that the best way to get our attention was to learn our names, so she'd ask to know someone's name, and then yell at them in English until she got what she wanted.
Example: Phavati: "That girl, what is her name?"
Me: "Annie."
Phavati: "Annie! Annie! ANNIE!!! ANNNNIEEEE! Come play with me! Play with meee! ANNIEEEEE!"
(And guess what? It always worked in her favor.)

The school is beautiful and well-run, with a diverse group of teachers, but is so much different from the military-style precision of Japan. Maybe I'm just a big dork, but I really enjoyed teaching during the vacation, since it was so much more fulfilling and exciting that what I do on a daily basis. Anyone who couldn't smile being around these kids has no soul, and the week was an absolute joy, but I was so exhausted afterwards. The teachers who devote their lives to this place have more courage and devotion than I can imagine. I'd really love to go back for a few weeks and help teach when I have the chance, since it now ranks up there with Robbinswold as one of my favorite places ever. Now, if I can only find a way to fuse Kibikogen "Plateau of Dreams" Shogakko with Baan Unrak, I might have myself a career...

posted by Raychaa @ 5:18 PM

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