Alex Refosco

2012-13 Outbound to Thailand

Hometown: Ponte Vedra Beach, FL

School: Ponte Vedra High School

Sponsor: District 6970, FL

Host: District 3350, Thailand ,The Rotary Club of Chaophraya Nakhon Sawan

Alex's Bio

สวัสดี (Saa-wa-dee-ka) hello, My name is Alex Refosco, I am from Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida and I will spend next year in Thailand!

So Thailand, a few weeks ago I got a missed message alert on my phone and as calmly as I could redialed the number. The next thing I knew, I found myself checking every book out of the library I could find on Thailand/Thai (actually there were only three). Since then I have gotten every response possible to "next year I'm going to Thailand" from wow I've heard it’s amazingly beautiful, to ha-ha the Hangover 2 was hilarious. Personally, it's been mostly excitement mixed with a little awe at the fact I'm going somewhere people dream about, and some nerves considering I know next to nothing in Thai. Also, a surprising amount of people don't realize that Thailand and Taiwan are different places. Let alone speak different languages, have different cultures, histories, and are all together different in, well, everything.

Now a little about myself, I have very straight brown hair, and blue eyes. I love to read books, dance, and go swimming at the beach (which is only about a 10 minute drive from my house). My parents are divorced and I split my time equally between them. They have both remarried so I have a rather large family with three step-brothers, a step-sister, a sister-in-law, and two nephews. I am extremely lucky because they all live so close and I can see them often. Also, I love animals and have three dogs, Daisy, Halle, and Buster, and a pet turtle. I can be described as talkative, energetic, and having a thirst for knowledge. I tend to ask a lot of questions, which can get on people's nerves, but for me there is just so many things to do and see, that staying quiet gets rather boring. Along those same lines, I believe life is short and you never know what will happen tomorrow. This view of life makes me a pretty optimistic and adventurous person and a bit forgetful at times.

Currently, I am a senior at Ponte Vedra High. There I take Spanish, Statistics, Marine Science, English, Economics/Government, European History, and Journalism. Additionally, I have studied some Mandarin Chinese. In my free time I love to read, learn anything and everything I can, and spend time with my family. I have also done a good bit of traveling mostly around the United States, but I have taken several trips to the Caribbean, and traveled to Australia, France, and Spain.

The more I learn about Thailand the more I can hardly wait to go. Thailand has so many amazing and different foods I have never heard of, animals that are straight out of storybooks, and a culture that is totally unique. This is a truly wonderful opportunity, so a big Thank You to Rotary and all the Rotarians who have worked so hard for all of the exchange students!

ขอบคุณ! (Kab-khun-kah!) Thank You!

Alex- Outbound to Thailand

October 14, 2012

Sawatdee ka, I have now been in Thailand for two months. Looking back I have done so much, even if it doesn't seem like it because everything just seems normal now. It is really strange to be writing this Journal. Before I became an exchange student I used to read all of the exchange student's journals. Once I was accepted an a RYE student I read them even more because I was amazed at all the thing people where doing. Well now I am writing my first Journal and while there have been plenty of times I have just had normal days to day life, I have gotten to do some pretty cool stuff, too.

When I first got to the Bangkok airport it was dark so my grand idea of seeing the city, didn't happen. What did happen was my I said bye to the other exchange students from Florida who were on the flight with me, and me and my host family headed out to get some food at McDonalds. After that I fell asleep in the car and missed the 3 hour drive to my small city of Nakhon Sawan.

The next day I woke up reasonable early at 9 am, considering I had not really slept most of my travel time, it started a pattern that I still haven't been able to break, I can't sleep-in in Thailand. Oh well it worked out because me and my host family got in the car and drove out of Nakhon Sawan to the country. There we visited a school, to check on a clean water filter Rotary had donated, so all the students could have clean water to drink. The next two days where very similar we went to a total of 3 schools, with a group of Rotarians,and checked on water filters, handed out backpacks and donated books. The backpacks we handed out were stuffed with soap, a towel, a dictionary, etc. packed full for many of the students who were affected by the massive floods in Thailand last year. My area of central Thailand was hit especially hard, in fact my host families house was flooded by several feet of water. My host mom in particular helps a lot with promoting literacy in Thailand by providing books to rural schools. It was really cool to visit all of these school, a few even performed traditional Thai dances for us!

Then on Wednesday, five days since I arrived in Thailand, I started school. I was told to prepare a speech in English to give for a little presentation at my school, and was there bright and early at 7:30 ready to give it. Only right before I got up on the stage a teacher came up to me and said don't say your speech just introduce your self in Thai. *So this is to any future exchange students* actually write and memorize a small introduction in your host language, you never know when you will have to give a speech in front of your school of 4,000 without any warning. This also happened to me at all three of the rural schools we visited.
After wards I was shown to my class and got a very loud cheer from everyone. All the students were so happy I was in their class and everyone wanted to know all about me or as much as their English skills would allow. The rest of the day I just sat in class and answered my classmates questions. (In Thai schools, you stay in the same class and the teachers switch classrooms). Now to be totally honest I hated school that first week, I got hit with horrible homesickness, the school day lasted forever, everyone was very nice but I could only speak to one person who was good in English. I really really could not stand it. Since then I really started to enjoy school, but it took time, this was one thing I was not expecting about being an exchange student. After about two weeks I got my own schedule and it got much better. Even though I could recognize some math and science topics, it became pretty clear I couldn't follow along with the rest of the class, so I now take some other classes and can go to the library for any period I don't want to join (say Biology or Pre-Calculus). I still go to my normal class on occasion, I eat lunch with them, line up with them during announcements and I always help out the teacher in English class. In English class mostly I just sit there and explain English or American words, ideas, and answer their questions. These can be very random and are really pretty hard to explain, these include: "what is the difference between nice and beautiful?", "what is surfing and why is it popular in Australia" (based on a section in the textbook), "are you sure there are 50 states in America and not 56" (I have no idea about this question, I guess they included territories?), and the strangest was "what is the dispute over Marijuana in California?" (this question was posed by the teacher based on a practice test in the textbook so I had to explain to the class what Marijuana was and why people in California are arguing about it). The list goes on and on, so be ready for some really random questions!
I also take a few art classes, a Chinese class, help with the elementary aged English classes, and I even got the special privilege of getting a private flower arranging class given by the head of the department, and received the honorary name Bua meaning lotus. By honorary name Bua I of course mean no one can pronounce the name Alex so they decided to call me Bua instead, and by private flower class I mean I have the head lunch lady teach me how to make flower arrangements in the back of the cafeteria. Actually, my teacher is very good at it and we make a lot really cool stuff.

After about a week things started to get into a routine and I started to like school more and more. Though I still do not like the Thai school system and here is why: first it is very inefficient, school lasts most of the day 7:45 until 4 and many students take extra classes after wards, then they spend a good portion of time doing homework and studying for the one big university exam that determine whether or not they get into a good college; second, a lot of kids don't pay attention in class, they talk, eat, draw pictures, one day I counted 8 kids sleeping. I could go on and on but it easiest to say they system could be improved.
I do meet and hang out with the other exchange students in my town sometimes. I am the only exchange student at my school (so I get stared at a lot there, and people shout good afternoon a lot too, no mater what time of day it is because its all they can say in English), but I hang out with them on the weekends or after school, when my Thai friends are studying. I used to think spending so much time with other exchange students defeated the purpose of coming all the way to Thailand, but I realized even when we hang out we still are speaking Thai to buy a snack, or hang out at places where Thais hang out.

So I was planning on this being short but since it is already so long, I will save you some time and just make a few bullet points about things I have noticed and thought were strange or different in Thailand. I am also doing this because there is no possible way for me to explain everything I have done and felt since arriving, just know that if you become an exchange student you will have to do a lot of smiling and you will have no idea what is going on 99% of the time.

There are motorcycles everywhere! and most road rules are taken suggestions, even wearing a seat belt, so streets in Thailand can be kind of scary.

Thai teenagers love cartoons and Facebook, if you come to Thailand be ready to get all sorts of friends requests and see a lot of animated drawings or song quotes. On that note, you will never escape American Pop songs, they love it here, along with K Pop.

For girls, hair must be kept short(chin length) or worn in braids at Thai school. Fingernails must be kept short too, otherwise the teacher will cut them.

They love Disney! I have yet to see any of my classes physics note with out at least five pictures of Mickey Mouse on them.

On Thursdays (for me it varies by school) we have scout day where we wear special uniforms that look like old fashion Girl Scout uniforms and do different activities. Most of the guys then go to military training, once they are old enough.

McDonalds and KFC deliver here.

They have the most intense fly-swaters. They look like small tennis rackets and when you push button they get a surge of electricity so flies do not stand a chance. Still it doesn't even put a dent in the fly population

If you thick school buses in America are crowed you have never ridden on a Song-taow. They are covered pick-up trucks with two parallel benches in the back.

Tuk tuks are fun! They are like a motorcycle with a bench in the back that is covered and used like Taxis. Thailand still has taxis (which come in all sorts of colors) but Tuk tuks are less expensive and more fun, if its not raining.

They are defiantly more conservative with clothing here.

Everything is super cheap, except electronics. I can buy a can of coke-cola for 6 Baht or about 20 cents and a basic lunch at school (a dish of noodles and a drink) costs about 28 Baht or roughly 1 US dollar.

Even so you will defiantly get ripped-off if you ever visit Thailand, its perfectly legal to charge more to tourists, or farangs (white people)

Coffee makes you white and skinny here (or so they claim they have no real regulation on it). It is advertised all the time on TV and is sold health stores. Last week we had an inbound "camp" because there is no school in October and all the exchange students were drinking coffee in the morning. My host mom who organized it, kept telling me how strange it was the boys where drinking coffee, it is for girls only she said.

Yes, Thailand is sexist, and will treat you differently if you are foreign, its just a part of their culture.

Thai people will never flat out tell you if you are doing something wrong or something that is considered impolite, you just have to pick up little subtle hints or notice when your host family acts differently. It gets very confusing but Thais will often give you slack if because you are foreign and they rules are very... complicated.

Buddhism is the main religion here so Wats (temples) are everywhere, they are all gorgeous and very ornate. When you visit one, though, you can not show much skin or they will give you a cloth to cover yourself with.

They wai here all the time. It is comparable to shaking hands but done much more often, to basically anyone you meet. It is for respect so younger people wai to older people, students to teachers, etc.

To wai you place both hands about chest level and the bend your head to tough your hands. How far you go down depends on how senior the person is, with friends it is maybe chin level, teachers about nose level, and monks forehead level so you are almost making a right angle.

At some point you will have to use a squat toilet, they are very common here and sometimes they even have signs on regular western style toilets telling people not to stand on the seat because they are not used to them. But most houses do have regular toilets

You might have a hard time finding toilet pepper in public bathrooms here often Thais will use a water hose, just make sure you always have an extra stash of toilet paper and hand-sanitizer every time you go out.

Even so toilet paper is still very common but here people use it as tissues. They literally take out the middle cardboard center of toilet paper and put the roll in a tissue box.

I am making Vlogs as well on youtube under the name alexocean121, I am not the best video editor in the world, but I think it has some helpful information.