Regular Program

It's a four-story concrete block that was dated and institutional by the time its architect put pen to paper. It could be 60, it could be 80, it could be 15 years old: whitewashed concrete with rust stains is sort of timeless. Sometimes, I think that it could've been a bomb shelter, like the hospital, and one of the rust patches is from the “FALLOUT SHELTER” sign. Other times, I don't want to give it that much credit.

Each identical room holds about sixty small wooden desks lined up in tangled rows. I find the graffiti pretty exciting, but that's because it's all in Thai and I like looking at the little squiggles and pretending it's of more interest and intellectual merit than the scrawls on similar, depression-era wooden outposts of depression nostalgically glorified in junk shops and amid refurbished tchotchkies. Maybe if I learned Thai, I'd see into history: Rama VI can't swing, Rama V has big ears, Tappatedjiwann likes Proojiaviamandarrat, Pedawajamatakiariankowara Pride, Sukumowavaliko likes Limeys, Kanialimantirinsurapitwenanjumi Does the Dutch.

No mention that the desks are visible and the classrooms have only second-hand noise because most of the students, and most likely all the noisiest ones, are clustered around guitar players in the corridors; that's the extent of the incentive to be in class.

“If you see something going on that you don't think should be going on, just turn the other cheek and keep moving,” my boss said. Which is concerning when it comes from the guy who can't walk down a corridor in the English Program without stopping to intervene or roughhouse with at least 4 groups of kids.

Gulp.

But all is not lost: one classroom is completely full of silent and attentive students. Something about the broad-shouldered man wearing a starchy uniform and wielding a 2 cm dowel rod to slap on desks or other, more appealing targets that may or may not present themselves.

True hope lives at the top of the fourth flight: the English Department Office. Same concrete classroom, but retrofitted with metal office desks that jut into the room under stacks and piles of journals and papers, with a line of work tables, occupied by teachers assembling and cutting and stapling packets between baskets and bags of fruits, down the middle.

And, depending on the time, anywhere from 2-10 angels.

Aside from my boss and myself, the only males I've seen in the office were students kneeling on the tile floor. Otherwise, the angels are anywhere from college to retirement age, Thai ladies who speak proper English and wrangle classrooms with authority that puts students on their knees before entering the office. Not only do they have the authority, they have the experience and, crucially, attitude to teach absolutely anything to anyone.

And I will live and work in their midst.

If I fail, it is on me, because I have more help than I can poke a stick at, provided I'm smart and sociable enough to use it.

And God knows I'm going to need the help: in that building, I teach 15 classes of 48 students; in the other building, which is somehow more dilapidated, I only teach 6 classes of 60. Here's hoping I don't have to memorize names.