Sports Week

This week, I have seen what may be the most amazing thing I've seen since coming across the ocean. For two whole weeks the last hour or two of school is taken off for sports. There are very few actual games played, most of the kids just do drills and exercises while about half of the students sit in rows clapping while girls dance a well known dance to a well known song.


The amazing thing is, however, not an ounce of fighting. No arguments over the rules, cheating, who gets to start, who plays on what team, someones success or failure, just 1750 kids having a blast. Games that would be reduced to redfaced battles to the death in America, continue happily and without incident with almost know attention paid by the supervising teachers.


Another thing that surprised me was the lack of organization and the overbearing concern for the children's safety. Children ran across the street after balls, where in America they're not allowed to enter the parking lot on penalty of death. Children scampered up rickety ladders to the rooftops to get down balls, children wander about without anyone knowing where they are going, or why.


Terrifying? Not at all. It was surprisingly safe and comforting. The school, in general, operates on a rule of chaos. Children are expected to be responsible for themselves. To look before they go across the street. To not wander off. To not be stupid enough to lean out of a bus. It's a small town, a very small town. The rules don't keep the children safe, we do, and of course they keep themselves safe.


Children certainly don't seem to get into accidents any more here than they do in America. Perhaps depending on rules to keep our children safe isn't any more effective than expecting the community to keep them safe, especially in such a small town.


I will certainly write more on this topic, and on teaching in general, soon. In the meantime, here are some pictures:

A very cool Thai game. Essentially very much like volleyball

but with the no-hands rule of soccer: feet and heads only.

Americans can stop feeling cool about hacky sack now.

One of my students.

And another.

A soccer drill.

The well-known song and dance...