Mousehound

Well I'm coming to BKK from Oz - my third trip this year. Tourism may be down but nothing is going to stop us. BUT it is osting us a lot more to do it so we will spend less and less time. In fact although there are discounts to be had they are no greater than last year but the $A is now worth about 22BHT compared with this time last year when we were getting 31BHT

I am a teacher in Australia with a degree and Dip Ed - 4year trained. I have been teaching (not English) for eight years now and have taught 13year old to 18year olds. I am qualified to teach technology and media (which here in Aus covers middle school English). My English is actually pretty fair. In addition I had a number of years in business. I was runner up for best teacher of the year for our state and was rewarded by my peers by being nominated as best teacher for my school. My students have won many awards. I say this to demonstrate that I really do love teaching and seeing kids do well and am prepared to do whatever it takes to get them over the line. I teach in a pretty tough government school of 1500 upper school students.

I am learning Thai at the local Tech and I do about an hour a day practice. I am just starting to get to grips with written Thai.

I heve been to Thailand a few times and love it. I would like to do a TEFL course - possibly the one offered by Chiang Mai Uni - going up there this December/Jan with a view to Teaching down the track.

However, I am now 60 and although I can teach here up to 75 I suspect this might be a problem in Thailand. I could retire but would rather keep active. And naturally a little bit of extra cash always helps.

Any constructive or factual comments would be welcomed.

Last December I was at Wat Arun BKK and we spotted an old Monaro. My son was amazed to see it as he has never seen a Holden of any kind in Thailand. It was parked outside the monks quaters. A while later it crept past us leaving us in a cloud of smoke. Didn't notice if it was being driven by a monk though.