training

Well it has been a while since I’ve updated so hold on to your seats, I think I’ll just spew a lot of thoughts at you.

I was gone for almost 3 weeks at Peace Corps Training. I was hoping I would come away with a more positive attitude about Peace Corps then I left my initial training. I did. In fact staff was apologetic about how badly we were treated during our first training (if you recall there was a lot of spying on volunteers to gain negative information and lots of threats to kick people out of Peace Corps). Mostly I got to hang out with some staff (both Thais and Americans) in a more casual way, and think of them more as friends, than people out to find a way to kick us out of Peace Corps.

This second training we were put up in a really nice hotel in the old capital of Siam, so on time off we were able to check out the centuries old ruins. Amazing history in this country. But it was also a treat just to stay in some air conditioning and watch MTV! We didn’t have a lot of free time though, our days were fill from 8 to 5 or 6 or 8…. The best part of the training was being back with all my friends that I got to know so well the 1st three months of training, but who have been scattered across the country since April. We certainly checked out the nightlife in Ayuttaya too.

We had a lot of language classes. We did some team building activities. One guy game and gave us a interesting lecture on the history of Thailand. We talked about cultural issues in Thailand. We did workshops on student centered learning. We learned a lot about the AIDS situation in Thailand.

AIDS patients in Thailand was growing faster than most other countries in the early 90s and the government threw a lot of money into the situation. And things got a lot lot better. But since the economic crash in 97 there hasn’t been an increase in funds. My group took a trip to a temple that is a hospice for AIDS patients. Many are healthy and functioning well, but can’t go home because they are shunned in their communities. People are afraid of being near them and catching AIDS.

The activities I enjoyed the best were the reflective or group building ones. We did one where all 50 of us were stranding in a circle holding a rope. We were blindfolded and had to then get the circle into a complete square. What would you do?