Rotary Camp

It’s evening. Pitch black but still hot which seems strange because I’ve always associated dark with cold… at home I would never be found sitting with my shoes off wearing a tank top and capris this late at night let alone this late in the year… but I remember this isn’t Alaska. This is Thailand. I look around the large oval of people, I can barely make out faces, but I know whom everyone is. There are ten, maybe fifteen of us, sitting on dock, talking, laughing, learning about each other and about the world. We are discussing German and Chinese phrases, Thai food, people and customs… we are comparing our homes and our lives to one another’s and to those in Thailand. As we talk and laugh we pass around a fresh coconut, drinking the sweet milk from a tiny hole in the side and trying not to spill the precious drink. I learn to say in German “Ich trinke aus einer kokosnuss.” “I am drinking out of a coconut.” Of course, my friends only teach me essential German phrases such as this.

I relish this moment. For most of us, the Inbound Students of Rotary District 3350, this is the day that marks two months living in Thailand. We are spending this day together along with nine other days. Tens days of Rotary Camp, what fun!

The first five days we stay at Beungboraphet which is in Nakhon Sawan Province about one hour from Lop Buri. Beungboraphet is Thailand’s largest freshwater lake/swamp and it is absolutely gorgeous. This week we visit an aquarium, accidentally go swimming in water which we later find is inhabited by crocodiles, go bird watching from a boat, learn to make Thai sweets, make banana pancakes, eat a lot of chips (especially seaweed and spicy squid flavor… Oh Asia :) and visit many gorgeous temples. We stay up late knowing that the next day we will have to wake up early, we talk late into the night and sleep for maybe 5 hours at the most each night. By Friday we are all exhausted but we have no regrets, as we say our farewells we are happy to know that in just two days we will all meet again, this time in Lop Buri.

My roommates

Alex (Oregon) Kelsey (Illinois) Me (Alaska) and on top Turi (Washington)

All of us are from the USA because 13 of the 28 exchange students in District 3350 are from the USA.

Beungboraphet

The boats we went on, they use water pumps and spray water  to the left or right or back to make the boat move. I've never seen a boat like it but it's pretty cool.

birdwatching from the boat

Beungboraphet

At a Chinese Temple

Where they fire the pottery in Nakhon Sawan

Temple on a mountain in Nakhon Sawan

The view from the temple on the mountain in Nakhon Sawan

The second session of camp is held in Lop Buri. We stay at a hotel about twenty minutes from my home in Lop Buri. The first three days we learn Thai massage. Being able to spend half the day laying down and being massaged is very nice and the beds are convenient because once again we all of course stay up late talking and get very little sleep.  In the evening one day we go swimming, I race against a fellow exchange student who was also on swim team in America, how I miss swim team. We play chicken, sharks and minnows, try to breath underwater by connecting straws and of course we have to try running on water (we succeed only in looking entirely ridiculous). The fourth day we learn to cook Pad Thai and Kao Pad (fried rice) and to make Krathongs. The last evening we have a formal dinner complete with karaoke and dancing. The fifth and final day we go to see Prang Sam Yod, the famous ruined temple in the middle of Lop Buri where tons and tons of monkeys live. We also go and see King Narai Palace, I have been to both of these places before but I enjoy visiting them again very much. Finally we eat lunch and then after talking for an hour or so it is time for everyone to separate.  This time we don’t know when the next time all of us will be together again will be. We hug each other goodbye and wish each other luck. It’s strange to think that I’ve truly only known these people for ten days yet all twenty-eight of us from nine different countries (America, Canada, Brazil, Hungary, Switzerland, Germany, France, Taiwan, Japan) have already bonded so strongly.

fat, fat, fat monkey

...and then a monkey ran off with Sidney's (exchange student from Colorado) glasses... plucked them right off her face. I swear these monkeys will take anything. They can be seen drinking from bottles, eating people food and even trying to wear glasses.

Prang Sam Yod from the side

As much as I will miss staying up late and looking at the stars with my friends from Germany, America and Japan and I will miss talking late into the night and it will certainly be strange not to share my bed with two or three other girls, I’m glad to be going back home.  These two weeks were so much fun, but in a way they seemed more like vacation than exchange. I enjoyed them a ton and I look forward to spending more time with the other inbounds, but I am also glad to be back with my host family, speaking Thai once again and getting a good nights sleep. 

-Kearn