Thailand: The Land of Smiles: Chamnan sure knows how to party!!

Hi there!

I hope none of you are all Christmas-ed out quite yet, because I have a little more holiday cheer from Thailand for you. I am excited to share with you all the pictures and videos from the Christmas and New Year's Assembly at my school, Chamnan Samakkhi Wittaya School (say that name ten times fast). Chamnan throws two holiday parties, the first is a New Year’s assembly for the students and the second is a late night party and dinner for the teachers.

First, a student who was extra excited for the New Year’s party to start! =)

The Party for the Students.

Let me start off by saying the day we had the party for the students was the best day I have had at Chamnan! The party for the students was a lot of fun. Before we get in to the logistics of this assembly, I want to tell you all that Thai people are OBSESSED with Karaoke. A big part of every event or party is singing karaoke. In the states karaoke is a joke and if you sound awful everyone laughs. In Thailand Karaoke is serious business. Neither Jill, nor I, are stoked about singing on a microphone, let alone in front of 1,500 people, but you can bet we were volunteered to perform as the surprise act.

The Audience

The Surprise act before the show

Another fun fact is that when someone in Thailand says that there will be a Christmas/ New Year's assembly for the students they really mean to say that there will be an all day party at our school. You all know me, so you know that I was in no way opposed to this event. I don’t have a copy of the set list, but here is how this all day event went down.....

First off, here are fabulous MC's (the girl is my level 5 student and don’t tell, but she is my favorite student)

Next up was the opening act. For the opening act the band performed a rendition of Silent Night, Joy to the World, and Come All Ye Faithful. Two days before the assembly Jill and I were asked if we would join another teacher, Kyle, in singing these songs while the band played. In Thailand you can’t really say no, so before we could answer they had the microphones ready. I would love to tell you it was a joyful noise when I sang Joy to the World, but then I would be lying. Ha Ha Ha

The Band RED YELLOW GREEN

The Band teacher!

There we are singing!

After that amazing performance a group of students from level 3 ( 8th grade in America) performed the most Christmasy skit around, Little Red Riding Hood. Here is a picture of Jill and I backstage with the cast.

Obviously they can’t get enough of us here, so next up Jill and I announced the winners of the Hide and Go Seek Snowman game. A few weeks before the assembly Jill and I were asked to think of any games that are played around Christmas time that all the students could participate in. Good luck finding a game that 1,500 students can play. We racked our brains and eventually decided that the Elf on the Shelf would be fun to do around school. The Elf would be hiding somewhere new each day for the 4 days before the assembly. The students who found the elf would also have to answer a Christmas trivia question on stage in order to win. As it turns out elves do not exist in this country and it only took us 5 different stores to come to this conclusion. The English Coordinator then decided to switch it to a hiding Santa Clause, which later was changed again to a snowman. We ended up with a game of Snowman Hide and Go seek. When all was said and done this game was nothing like the Elf on the Shelf, but the students had a lot of fun.

Next up was a “Chinese performance” by a few girls from level 6 (Seniors in America). The dancers were good, but let me tell you that my jaw hit the floor in shock when I saw how these girls were dancing. Normally people stand still when they are in shock, but in that moment I did the only thing I could think to do......

Yup, I JOINED THEM! Ha Ha

I was eventually persuaded by P' Jenny who was begging me to PLEASE PLEASE go dance with the girls because my dress was red and black and it matched the dancers' costumes. Note to self: next time wear green to the Christmas event. I didn't want to interrupt their routine, so when I was finally convinced to make an appearance I decided to keep it short. The students loved my interruption and still sing the song to me to try to get me to dance in the halls.

P' Jenny and I =)

The final act was the surprise performance from the foreign teachers. Yup, that’s us! For the surprise performance Jill, Kyle (another teacher who is half Thai and half American), and I sang and danced to Santa Clause is coming to Town. During our performance someone in a Santa Clause suit came out throwing candy and spraying fake snow on all the students. I sure could do without the singing part, but it really was a lot of fun seeing the students so excited when we walked out to sing. They screamed and cheered for us like we were Justin Beiber or the cast of Twilight coming on stage.

Coordinated dance moves and elf hats curtesy Andie Callaway! =)

After the assembly all of the students joined their homeroom teachers and class for lunch. The teachers all brought food for their students and each teacher had a table set up for their homeroom class. Jill and I are lucky enough to have lots of friends who teach a homeroom class, so we had lots of classes to join for lunch. Here are some pictures from the lunch hour of the day!

Students!!

When lunch was finished the teachers began the longest gift raffle of all time. The teachers had prepared at least 400 Christmas presents to raffle off to the students and this raffle lasted 3 hours or more. Jill and I occupied ourselves by hanging out with P' Aof and a few students who were busy doing hand tricks and making faces at each other.

The raffle didn't finish until it was time for the students to leave school, but a few more performances remained. Many students cleared out, but Jill and I stayed to dance with the students and watch some of our students perform. I had so much fun dancing around and being goofy with my students. I did lose our house key while dancing, but it was the perfect end to an awesome Christmas/ New Year's assembly.

The party didn’t stop there. After school Jill and I were invited to attend the band class’s Christmas party. This was the band we sang with in the opening ceremony of the assembly and we had a blast eating and dancing with them that night. We were also asked to judge their Iron Chef competition. As if Thai food isn't risky enough, let’s eat what 13-15 year old students create with scrap food! Ha Ha

Girl Team

The judges and the boy team. We were nervous!

P' O's reaction to the creation

The dance lesson by us foreigners!

The Party for the Teachers!

The following week we had a nice dinner and party for all the Chamnan teachers. Unfortunately, I didn't take many pictures because I was pretty busy having fun and being a little sick to my stomach, but we had a great night. We all had a formal dinner and drinks and after dinner we had karaoke and dancing.

Some of the teachers dressed in the students' uniforms for the party.

All of us dancing away!

As if the student raffle wasn't enough raffling for a lifetime, we also had a raffle at the teacher's assembly. I won a scale, not the most exciting gift no doubt. As the crowd died down we had the bright idea to teach the teachers, mostly our friends, how to play beer pong. Beer pong was a hit and we had a blast playing with everyone.