Homeschooling A Se Asian Wife: What Next?

[aeolion]

About six months ago my wife, Vietnamese and 24, was watching me do some math problems. She said, "Teach me." I asked, "What?" She said, "Everything." I asked, “Why?” She said, “Every time I say something like ‘When an owl lands on a house and makes a noise three times, someone in the house will die,’ you laugh and ask how the owl will kill them. Then I say the owl doesn’t kill anybody, it just knows somebody will die in that house. Then you ask me who told the owl, and I can’t answer. I think for a while and realize the whole idea about the owl sucks. I feel so dumb. You know stuff and I don’t know anything.”

I told her I knew only one way to teach, full speed. Was she up for it? She said yes.

The town house we rented over a year ago came with two new TVs that I immediately asked the landlady to remove. We have plenty of time for studying and cooking and long evening meals. My wife is no star student, but she is doing well, although the curve of her early progress approximated a horizontal line. Her progress seems to be for no reason other than she enjoys learning about the world. I once mentioned college in passing, and her eyes got big and she said, “No way!”

In addition to the English that I have always taught her, I now teach her science and math. I am certified to teach high school chemistry, biology, and math from years back, and I taught for two years before I got serious with grad school at Cornell. We have gone through a couple of math books -- Basic College Math (remedial, reviewed by teachers using it as on the sixth grade level, I kid you not) and pre-algebra. We are now working on algebra, in parallel with geometry, which she loves. And chemistry. Thank god for well-though-out (and lengthy) math and chemistry videos.

I also teach her photography, mainly as a break from the hardcore academics, but also for the shutter-speed/aperture/ISO complex and its interplay in exposure, with the flash distance thrown in for kicks, with the camera always on manual exposure: Nice for feeling the math in your gut and automatically shoving numbers around in your head for a practical outcome. And I teach her piano keyboard, for which she is minimally talented, but she enjoys it, and it is opening up the world of jazz for listening. Scale and chord theory is also a cool mental exercise for repeated patterns.

I will throw in here that our relationship is typical husband-wife, she is generous in overlooking things, but she has a temper that flares up when I am an asshol_e, she loves to cook and does it well, but if I am impatient when I teach her I do not eat well for a day or so. At times I say “Enough teaching for today!” Then she says give her an assignment from a math or chemistry or grammar workbook.

The question for the forum: Where do we go from here? I guess it would be more accurate to ask: Where do we go after homeschooling reaches its limit? After all, I am teaching high-school material, not college. For weeks I have put in an hour or so each day on the Internet looking for an answer.

If the US, and in particular California, doesn't self destruct, CA would be a good start. Second chances in life are common in the States, and community colleges in California are open to students without a high school diploma as long as the college feels they “would benefit from taking classes.” Non-native-speakers can even take classes without a qualifying English test. And if foreign students manages to pull at least a B in a two-semester series of community college freshman English classes, they can move on to the UC system without a TOEFL or other such test.

The only problem is that US embassies seems disinclined to allow my wife into the US.

There is Singapore, which has an accredited nursing school that can give a written and oral exam to a foreign student who lacks an appropriate diploma. But the Singapore immigration page states specifically that an undergrad student visa does not grant a spouse’s entry.

Likewise, the Philippines do not grant a student’s spouse entry. Another thing is that the Philippines have a problem with the proliferation of low-quality for-profit colleges. Plus my wife would have to submit a high school diploma stamped by a Vietnamese embassy.

New Zealand – I can think of worse ways to spend a few years than fly fishing the South Island again, and there are decent universities that accept international students without a high school diploma “on a case by case basis.” Alas, there are no spouse visas, and no other way for me to stay in the country more than six months a year.

The most expensive of all is Australia, which allows spouses, same-sex partners, children, and parents to enter on the student’s visa. But you gotta have a diploma for a student visa. Plus, as a Vietnamese, she is barely above Bangladesh on the official "Welcome to OZ" list.

There also might be the possibility of some sort of high school for her. I looked at the Web page of a local international school, but the whole idea is so fraught with problems as to be incongruous. And four years of high school and four years of college might be more than I want to put into it. Although I will admit that the image of her coming home in her high school uniform is not exactly unpleasant.

The GED? I think in a year or so my wife could pass the math and science sections, but analyzing poetry and recognizing literary conventions will never be her forte. The TOEFL and TOEIC don’t even require that. (It is said that for Jamaicans, Filipinos, and Indians, the GED is a possibility. For others, it is not.)

There is a lot riding on this. Does anyone have anything to offer? Any suggestions at all? Have I overlooked anything? Does anyone know of any special visa for any country that sort of speaks English? I can find nothing on India. dam_n, I forgot to look at Jamaica.

An alternative is to teach her to fly cast and tie flies, and we fly fish around the world, eating well as we go. I think this would make her happy. And one way to look at it all is this: I got a Vietnamese motorbike that is curious and loves life and is up for anything, and I should stop trying to morph her into, say, a German Mercedes Benz.

Thanks, aeolion

[CMSteve]

Assuming that you are an American, you should have no issues with the wife going/coming to America for studies. Provided she is matriculated into a real institution the embassy will not bat an eye. It is only the women that happen to be "just married" or going on vacation with no job or bank account to show .

Another option, again assuming you are American, is to get her a green card. \ Process is fairly straight forward and as long as you are in good standing(job, pay taxes, etc) should not be a problem.

There are also Universities and other third-party learning institutions for the one offs. Take a language course , cooking, accounting,, kung <deleted>, etc. kind of like a continuing ed situation.

good luck.

[Pacificperson]

Can you get a visa for the Philippines and bring your wife as a dependent? Plenty of good schools. You don't have to put her in a diploma mill.

Edited September 5, 2011 by Pacificperson

[onionluke]

Yeah , just remember to get her pronounciation right . It's hodelays not hodeleys .

[Semper]

OP.

Do you have a plan for all this schooling of your wife?

[aeolion]

Can you get a visa for the Philippines and bring your wife as a dependent? Plenty of good schools. You don't have to put her in a diploma mill.

Actually, I could get a visa for the Philippines, though it would have to be a retirement visa. And my wife could get a student visa. But that would require that she be admitted to a college, and that would require by law that she submit a copy of her her high school study that has been verified by a Vietnam embassy. This she lacks.

Otherwise, the Philippines would be cool.

[harrry]

deleted as she is not Thai.

Edited September 5, 2011 by harrry

[harrry]

google australia tafe general certificate of education

some of the TAFE colleges in Australia have fair to excellent correspondance courses. THey take you from a school dropout who did not learn anything to about Year 12 level in a series of steps. Hard work but possible.

http://www.wit.tafensw.edu.au/industries/general-education-and-work-skills/courses/course-details/?id=397

may give you a start.

Edited September 5, 2011 by harrry

[aeolion]

OP.

Do you have a plan for all this schooling of your wife?

Your question reminds me of the old saying, I think it's Jewish, that if you want to make god laugh, tell him your plans.

A couple of things here: One is that I am a retired academic, and I am a pushover for anyone who really wants to learn. I didn't suggest that I teach her, she came to me and asked for it. And she didn't ask so she can get a nice job somewhere in the future, she seems to have concluded that she didn't like the idea of being uneducated. I have time on my hands, and it seems to me that to refuse her would be immoral.

The other thing: I have read on this forum something like, “Never invest in anything in Thailand you can’t just turn your back on and walk away from, and that includes relationships.” Well, my wife has invested in me. When we met, she was 22, and a typical Vietnamese farm girl -- pure, good-hearted, and uneducated. She was also little more than a beast of burden to her family. She dropped out of school after the 8th grade for Mama to start saving to put my wife's younger brother through a top Saigon high school. For eight years she worked pretty much seven days a week 12 hours a day at soccer ball and tire factories (with faked papers before she was 18). Her brother made it into an OK university, but had always been notably lazy, and after three semesters, he was kicked out. Her younger brother didn’t get a job because he didn't want heavy work, and light work was unavailable

I was naive as hell as to a common view SE Asians have of daughters, as well as what a family might expect out of their daughter marrying a white boy. (I plead guilty to being embarrassingly naive.) Anyway, I thought the above information was relevant. I also told my wife her family was well-landed, her older sister had a new large house on the family compound, stocked with the best and largest of everything, and her brother could work, so I would pay not a cent to her family after a single moderate dowry. If she understood I would never change on that, and that was OK with her, then let's go to Singapore and get married. (This was after we had dated for about six weeks.) She thought a day and then said, "Let's go."

So off we went. And she has slowly lost her family. She would cry because not once did any member of her family call and ask how she was doing, or what her life was like. It was always phoned screams of "Send money" that you could hear across the room. It took them a long time to give up. My wife cried and told them to sell some of their large land holdings and learn how to enjoy life. But they were brutal. Her older sister finally called and said she and her husband were flying to Chiang Mai to get my wife. So tell her where Chiang Mai was, and give her our address. Which my wife did not do. The last we heard was from her mother, "I worry about you. Do you remember the neighbor girl who went to America to study? After three months she had mental problems because she studied so much, and she had to come home. Well, she just died. Please stop studying so you won't die."

My wife said to me, "You have to be strong to talk to my mother." Oh yes, her brother now works at a tee-shirt factory loading boxes. Does my heart good.

Westerners would probably think my wife was just doing what any rational human would do. But most on this forum know how hard it was for her. She wanted to be a good daughter, and she wanted them to love her as family, not a source of money. But her family forced her to choose, and they assumed their 22 years of training her would win out. My wife said to me, "I have no family now. I am yours." And the only jewelry I have ever bought her, other than the simple wedding band, is a pair of 20 baht earrings at the night bazaar. Though I drop $100 a whack on math books.. I also keep her supplied with cheap simplified novels, which she loves to read to me, although she likes me to read to her sometimes. In a couple of years I will probably buy her a couple of pieces of nice jewelry, but she will probably want a lens for her camera or something like that.

You know, I can easily teach her to love money and jewelry just like her money-obsessed family, or I can lead her to a different set of values. I just re-read that, and it sounds like something out of of some godawful book from pre-WWI. But I will stick with it.

I am rambling something terrible. Anyway, she could have gone back to her family and gotten a different husband. I even said I would pay her airfare and give her a few thousand dollars. She would not speak to me the rest of the day for that, and cried off and on. She stuck with me. I have a lot of respect for her. My plans for all the schooling? To make her life fuller, more interesting, and perhaps someday she will be able to use it to live a more decent life.

And besides, we laugh an awful lot when we study together. Even algebra.

[aeolion]

google australia tafe general certificate of education

some of the TAFE colleges in Australia have fair to excellent correspondance courses. THey take you from a school dropout who did not learn anything to about Year 12 level in a series of steps. Hard work but possible.

http://www.wit.tafen...details/?id=397

may give you a start.

Thanks, I am spending some time browsing their site.

[aeolion]

Assuming that you are an American, you should have no issues with the wife going/coming to America for studies. Provided she is matriculated into a real institution the embassy will not bat an eye. It is only the women that happen to be "just married" or going on vacation with no job or bank account to show .

Another option, again assuming you are American, is to get her a green card. \ Process is fairly straight forward and as long as you are in good standing(job, pay taxes, etc) should not be a problem.

There are also Universities and other third-party learning institutions for the one offs. Take a language course , cooking, accounting,, kung <deleted>, etc. kind of like a continuing ed situation.

good luck.

Thanks for the wish of good luck.The US State Department can reject any application for a spouse immigrating to the States if they feel the marriage probably does not have an authentic romantic, in-love basis. Immigration lawyers say US immigration is suspicious of marriages with a large education gap, a large age gap, or a large economic gap. Well, that's a hat trick for us. I would have no job in the States (I guess I could be a Walmart welcomer, but I just discovered this moment that there is a limit to what I will go through for my wife to do college.) With a little frugality, we could probably live my life out with my savings. But US immigration officials might look askance at a woman who has not attended high school but who is planning to go to college. As I said, it is easy for a non-high school grad to attend a CA community college. But immigration? I guess if nothing else pans out, we will give it a try.

[naboo]

To continue current studies, have a look a t Khan Academy. I find it excellent with my students.

In the future, she could take an online university course from The Open University in the UK. Its popular and I'd say as well respected as an online university could be. I've not checked, but I don't think there are any requirements to be based in the UK to study there and they have a broad range of courses.

[gpdjohn]

The wife and I just went through the "green card" procedure.

If you are legally married, US Immigration does not have a problem with her education level, or an age problem ( unless it's like you're 65 and she's 18 ) and if you are retired and make over 18k in a year... another no problem.

Easy, peasy process, ours took 5 months.

One thing I learned quickly w/ the US Immigration process.... Do not use or listen to a lier..oops, a lawyer.

[Thakkar]

Khan Academy is a great resource. The match section is especially useful with the practice exercises and associated progress monitoring tools.

Macau has a number of universities (list), some of which used to (I don't know if they still do) offer hybrid Open University-like courses that required some attendance. For people over 25, they have flexible entrance requirements, though do require an entrance exam. The living costs in Macau are surprisingly low provided you avoid the casinos and, outside the tourist areas, is a nice, laid back place to live.

As the OP appears to live in Chiangmai, another consideration is Payap University, though, by Thai standards, it's not cheap (about 400k baht a year?)

Your wife's enthusiasm is gratifying to hear of and I wish you both luck.

T

[jombom]

Have you considered the Open University ??

Below is a link for Vietnam.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ho_Chi_Minh_City_Open_University

In Thailand there are a number of Open University options, and some do not require a high school diploma

Below is a link for Sukhothai, which is one of the biggest.

http://www.stou.ac.th/Eng/

My view, is that if a young person wants to be something, then they can. It depends how badly they want it.

[Tokay]

I'd first check to see who has the least amount of owls. :jap:

[harrry]

http://www.canningcollege.wa.edu.au/internationalCourses.html

Is one of two government schools in perth catering for bridging courses for local and international stiudents. As it is a Government school visas should not be a big problem. Main problem is cost. Perth is not a cheap city to live in. On the other hard it has a vey large Vietnamese population. Thai too.

[londoedan]

Lovely topic

Funnily enough, in Western societies the owl is perceived as a wise bird (probably because of the way its face looks), however in Indonesia it is known as burung hantu,(= the ghost or spirit bird), and as your wife suggests, it has a different association.

I would carry-on with the homeschooling if I were you. Textbooks in a range of subjects can be found very cheaply in local bookshops all over SE Asia.

And as you mention, it will be great fun for both of you.

I had a similar expereince with my first Indo girlfriend that cropped-up when we were watching one of the Jurassic Park movies. The look on her face when we started to talk about dinosaurs after the movie finished was priceless

Good luck and stay clear of too much Maths !

Simon

[bobbin]

Yours is an interesting story. I would love to know what the future holds for you and your wife.

Here is another, that I have posted about on TV before, usually eliciting surprisingly few comments.

A good friend of mine has a vacation home in Mexico. Many years ago, a family living nearby inquired whether he could help a young woman they knew to obtain nanny, maid etc. work in Canada. He actually was able to help with this request, as he knew a Canadian family who were willing to sponsor her to work as a live-in nanny.

I met her at this time. She was 19 years old, an indigenous Mexican Indian who could barely speak English and had not gone to high school. Over the next two years, while she continued her work, they formed a relationship. The age-gap was about 25 years. They married.

She was keen to become educated and obtained a GED or high-school equivalency certificate. She enrolled in the well-respected local university, graduating several years later with 2 Masters degrees. Archaeology and Spanish. Funny thing about the Archaeology was that the university specialized in Plains Indians. Not the rich, pre-Columbus history of Mexican Indian cultures.

She is now, for several years, a well-respected teacher in the separate Catholic school system. They have a 15 year old son.

I contrast this with the several Thai girls I know, who have married/received sponsorship from farangs. Without exception, they have all "retired" to a life of ease and somtam.

Similar opportunities. Different people.

[aeolion]

Have you considered the Open University ??

Below is a link for Vietnam.

http://en.wikipedia....Open_University

In Thailand there are a number of Open University options, and some do not require a high school diploma

Below is a link for Sukhothai, which is one of the biggest.

http://www.stou.ac.th/Eng/

My view, is that if a young person wants to be something, then they can. It depends how badly they want it.

God yes, someone with a modest IQ of 100 (I know, I know, IQ test are iffy things) but who is hungry for learning will run circles around someone with a 130 IQ, but whose greatest loves are bars and a Play Station.

I checked out Stou,and it requires a high level of fluency in Thai, because all teaching is in Thai. Too bad.

[aeolion]

Yours is an interesting story. I would love to know what the future holds for you and your wife.

Here is another, that I have posted about on TV before, usually eliciting surprisingly few comments.

A good friend of mine has a vacation home in Mexico. Many years ago, a family living nearby inquired whether he could help a young woman they knew to obtain nanny, maid etc. work in Canada. He actually was able to help with this request, as he knew a Canadian family who were willing to sponsor her to work as a live-in nanny.

I met her at this time. She was 19 years old, an indigenous Mexican Indian who could barely speak English and had not gone to high school. Over the next two years, while she continued her work, they formed a relationship. The age-gap was about 25 years. They married.

She was keen to become educated and obtained a GED or high-school equivalency certificate. She enrolled in the well-respected local university, graduating several years later with 2 Masters degrees. Archaeology and Spanish. Funny thing about the Archaeology was that the university specialized in Plains Indians. Not the rich, pre-Columbus history of Mexican Indian cultures.

She is now, for several years, a well-respected teacher in the separate Catholic school system. They have a 15 year old son.

I contrast this with the several Thai girls I know, who have married/received sponsorship from farangs. Without exception, they have all "retired" to a life of ease and somtam.

Similar opportunities. Different people.

Nice story, bobbin. It seems to me that the ability to see possibilities is a cornerstone of motivation. It is unlikely that the young Mexican girl studying for the GED pictured herself as a woman teaching in a Catholic school. She just had the feeling that something good might well happen. Life is a crap shoot, and things don't always work out, but there are things we can do that sure increase the chances of a meaningful life. She seems to have done it in spades. And was also brave enough to marry a man twice her age.

And just having raw intellectual curiosity also helps. The research is also clear that people who get a kick out of learning English advance much faster than someone like a bright Korean salaryman who is learning English merely to get promoted.

Again, thanks for the story. I will always have it near.

[aeolion]

Lovely topic

Funnily enough, in Western societies the owl is perceived as a wise bird (probably because of the way its face looks), however in Indonesia it is known as burung hantu,(= the ghost or spirit bird), and as your wife suggests, it has a different association.

I would carry-on with the homeschooling if I were you. Textbooks in a range of subjects can be found very cheaply in local bookshops all over SE Asia.

And as you mention, it will be great fun for both of you.

I had a similar expereince with my first Indo girlfriend that cropped-up when we were watching one of the Jurassic Park movies. The look on her face when we started to talk about dinosaurs after the movie finished was priceless

Good luck and stay clear of too much Maths !

Simon

During my years in Korea, I never saw a raven as other than a dot flying the other way. Tokyo, on the other hand, seems to have substituted the raven for the city pigeon we are so familiar with. An omen of death, a sign of good luck. Some ravens are lucky, I guess, and some aren't.

Yeah, the books. High school geometry books range from conceptual works that will put a student through her paces, on down to a collection of 600 pages of photos of geometric figures and little else. I look in vain for even the mildest of analytical geometry in such a book.

I have a supply of material for my wife's English, a lot of which we have already covered. The complete Side By Side series, the five levels of Rosetta Stone, Azar's Grammar, and a pile of simplified stories. Plus we use the free Anki software to help her remember vocabulary. Plus there is an awful lot of "free talking."

A famous teaching company has a fine rigorous high school chemistry video series, plus geometry and algebra I and II, though the geometry is pretty much a vocabulary class. There is also a series of high school and early college math books that have accompanying videos by a teacher both gifted and wise.

When choosing a math textbook, you have to be sure to get one that aims at "mastery." That is, it covers a math subject from start to finish. A "spiraling" book gives a snippet of something and three problems, and then the next year adds another snippet. Perhaps good if you have six years to do it. But I am not convinced of this.I knew nothing about textbooks when I started, including their approach. I just downloaded a pile of books and discovered that some were lousy and some were right on. The learning curve for me was steep.

So we are set for homeschooling in Chiang Mai for a year. We have a pile of books, and we just got a pair of cheap binoculars for fun birdwatching, which with a little planning can become a taxonomy project. I am still working on getting a microscope. I got a set of pipettes in Korea and pH paper for running series of dilutions, which use scientific notation. If I teach well and am patient, she seems to handle anything I throw at her. If I don't prepare well, things fail.

The problem is what comes next. Somehow we have to go from her having knowledge in her head to her finding some way to get into college.

And those moments like the discussion of dinosaurs are magic.

[scorecard]

Yours is an interesting story. I would love to know what the future holds for you and your wife.

Here is another, that I have posted about on TV before, usually eliciting surprisingly few comments.

A good friend of mine has a vacation home in Mexico. Many years ago, a family living nearby inquired whether he could help a young woman they knew to obtain nanny, maid etc. work in Canada. He actually was able to help with this request, as he knew a Canadian family who were willing to sponsor her to work as a live-in nanny.

I met her at this time. She was 19 years old, an indigenous Mexican Indian who could barely speak English and had not gone to high school. Over the next two years, while she continued her work, they formed a relationship. The age-gap was about 25 years. They married.

She was keen to become educated and obtained a GED or high-school equivalency certificate. She enrolled in the well-respected local university, graduating several years later with 2 Masters degrees. Archaeology and Spanish. Funny thing about the Archaeology was that the university specialized in Plains Indians. Not the rich, pre-Columbus history of Mexican Indian cultures.

She is now, for several years, a well-respected teacher in the separate Catholic school system. They have a 15 year old son.

I contrast this with the several Thai girls I know, who have married/received sponsorship from farangs. Without exception, they have all "retired" to a life of ease and somtam.

Similar opportunities. Different people.

Nice story, bobbin. It seems to me that the ability to see possibilities is a cornerstone of motivation. It is unlikely that the young Mexican girl studying for the GED pictured herself as a woman teaching in a Catholic school. She just had the feeling that something good might well happen. Life is a crap shoot, and things don't always work out, but there are things we can do that sure increase the chances of a meaningful life. She seems to have done it in spades. And was also brave enough to marry a man twice her age.

And just having raw intellectual curiosity also helps. The research is also clear that people who get a kick out of learning English advance much faster than someone like a bright Korean salaryman who is learning English merely to get promoted.

Again, thanks for the story. I will always have it near.

Agree nice story, but I can't agree with the slaging of Thais. I have a family connection to a Thai man who completed 3 years of primary school in numerous temples, then nothing more. In his early twenties he jumped at an unexpected opportunity to go to school, he completed primary and all of high school through the adult Sunday systems, at the same time taught himself English with a minimum of help, he went to university and is about to receive his doctorate.

[bobbin]

Note I said "Different people" not different cultures.

Those are the only two cultures in my sample group. And (here comes the stereotype..) Mexicans aren't noted for their strong work ethic as a rule.

But I take your point and kudos to the Thai fellow you speak of in your story.

These are the good stories to hear.

To the OP, I'm sure a door will open.

[sbk]

Just be careful, my dad refused to teach me how to drive because, as he learned with the two older sisters, it always ended in tears. It becomes too personal and then it becomes the means for an argument. If you don't mind that, then forge ahead, but you might consider tutors for some subjects. esp the contentious ones that tend to foment the tears and arguments.

[aeolion]

Just be careful, my dad refused to teach me how to drive because, as he learned with the two older sisters, it always ended in tears. It becomes too personal and then it becomes the means for an argument. If you don't mind that, then forge ahead, but you might consider tutors for some subjects. esp the contentious ones that tend to foment the tears and arguments.

Yeah, teach your wife to drive so she doesn't have to take a taxi to court for the divorce proceedings. I saw it the other way once in Korea. A medical intern in his last year married a school teacher who had driven for years. He himself had not learned to drive because of a lack of time, not unusual for interns back then in Korea. He told me that one time his wife got so furious at his driving that she told him to pull over, whereupon without a word, she just got out and took a taxi home.

I talked about the dangers with my wife, and I said I would do my best to be a "kind" teacher, but she would have to show a little patience for me, too. We stuck with it, and she trained me well. There are even instances when she approaches me with a book, and I make a cross with my fingers as they do to keep a vampire away, and I yell "Get away from me!" She laughs and says how about a workbook assignment.

But yeah, there is not only the driving sort of thing, doomed almost from the start. There is also the question of am I her husband or her teacher. I at times blur the two, and she says something like, "Teacher! Do you do that with all your pretty girl students?"

Anyway, I indeed am careful. But I can always use a reminder. Thanks.

[travelmann]

OP.

Do you have a plan for all this schooling of your wife?

Your question reminds me of the old saying, I think it's Jewish, that if you want to make god laugh, tell him your plans.

A couple of things here: One is that I am a retired academic, and I am a pushover for anyone who really wants to learn. I didn't suggest that I teach her, she came to me and asked for it. And she didn't ask so she can get a nice job somewhere in the future, she seems to have concluded that she didn't like the idea of being uneducated. I have time on my hands, and it seems to me that to refuse her would be immoral.

The other thing: I have read on this forum something like, "Never invest in anything in Thailand you can't just turn your back on and walk away from, and that includes relationships." Well, my wife has invested in me. When we met, she was 22, and a typical Vietnamese farm girl -- pure, good-hearted, and uneducated. She was also little more than a beast of burden to her family. She dropped out of school after the 8th grade for Mama to start saving to put my wife's younger brother through a top Saigon high school. For eight years she worked pretty much seven days a week 12 hours a day at soccer ball and tire factories (with faked papers before she was 18). Her brother made it into an OK university, but had always been notably lazy, and after three semesters, he was kicked out. Her younger brother didn't get a job because he didn't want heavy work, and light work was unavailable

I was naive as hell as to a common view SE Asians have of daughters, as well as what a family might expect out of their daughter marrying a white boy. (I plead guilty to being embarrassingly naive.) Anyway, I thought the above information was relevant. I also told my wife her family was well-landed, her older sister had a new large house on the family compound, stocked with the best and largest of everything, and her brother could work, so I would pay not a cent to her family after a single moderate dowry. If she understood I would never change on that, and that was OK with her, then let's go to Singapore and get married. (This was after we had dated for about six weeks.) She thought a day and then said, "Let's go."

So off we went. And she has slowly lost her family. She would cry because not once did any member of her family call and ask how she was doing, or what her life was like. It was always phoned screams of "Send money" that you could hear across the room. It took them a long time to give up. My wife cried and told them to sell some of their large land holdings and learn how to enjoy life. But they were brutal. Her older sister finally called and said she and her husband were flying to Chiang Mai to get my wife. So tell her where Chiang Mai was, and give her our address. Which my wife did not do. The last we heard was from her mother, "I worry about you. Do you remember the neighbor girl who went to America to study? After three months she had mental problems because she studied so much, and she had to come home. Well, she just died. Please stop studying so you won't die."

My wife said to me, "You have to be strong to talk to my mother." Oh yes, her brother now works at a tee-shirt factory loading boxes. Does my heart good.

Westerners would probably think my wife was just doing what any rational human would do. But most on this forum know how hard it was for her. She wanted to be a good daughter, and she wanted them to love her as family, not a source of money. But her family forced her to choose, and they assumed their 22 years of training her would win out. My wife said to me, "I have no family now. I am yours." And the only jewelry I have ever bought her, other than the simple wedding band, is a pair of 20 baht earrings at the night bazaar. Though I drop $100 a whack on math books.. I also keep her supplied with cheap simplified novels, which she loves to read to me, although she likes me to read to her sometimes. In a couple of years I will probably buy her a couple of pieces of nice jewelry, but she will probably want a lens for her camera or something like that.

You know, I can easily teach her to love money and jewelry just like her money-obsessed family, or I can lead her to a different set of values. I just re-read that, and it sounds like something out of of some godawful book from pre-WWI. But I will stick with it.

I am rambling something terrible. Anyway, she could have gone back to her family and gotten a different husband. I even said I would pay her airfare and give her a few thousand dollars. She would not speak to me the rest of the day for that, and cried off and on. She stuck with me. I have a lot of respect for her. My plans for all the schooling? To make her life fuller, more interesting, and perhaps someday she will be able to use it to live a more decent life.

And besides, we laugh an awful lot when we study together. Even algebra.

Its nice to hear a decent story and for others to see there really are some good women out there interested to learn and improve themselves, my wife is not interested in money but she does enjoy the thrill of making it, she still buys secondhand clothes or wears clothes from some of our customers ( she does condo rentals). Shes got over 3 million in the bank right now. She used to earn 12000 a month now for all her efforts its closer to 200000 a month yet remains unchanged.

Out of her entire family of 10 siblings only two of them are honest hard working planners who dont live for today, Ive spent 5 years apart from her for months on end due to work and not once worried if she was running off with anyone else, she often goes out for some food with male friends/customers.

I hope your wife enjoys her education as much as you enjoy teaching her.

[claffey]

OP.

Do you have a plan for all this schooling of your wife?

Your question reminds me of the old saying, I think it's Jewish, that if you want to make god laugh, tell him your plans.

A couple of things here: One is that I am a retired academic, and I am a pushover for anyone who really wants to learn. I didn't suggest that I teach her, she came to me and asked for it. And she didn't ask so she can get a nice job somewhere in the future, she seems to have concluded that she didn't like the idea of being uneducated. I have time on my hands, and it seems to me that to refuse her would be immoral.

The other thing: I have read on this forum something like, "Never invest in anything in Thailand you can't just turn your back on and walk away from, and that includes relationships." Well, my wife has invested in me. When we met, she was 22, and a typical Vietnamese farm girl -- pure, good-hearted, and uneducated. She was also little more than a beast of burden to her family. She dropped out of school after the 8th grade for Mama to start saving to put my wife's younger brother through a top Saigon high school. For eight years she worked pretty much seven days a week 12 hours a day at soccer ball and tire factories (with faked papers before she was 18). Her brother made it into an OK university, but had always been notably lazy, and after three semesters, he was kicked out. Her younger brother didn't get a job because he didn't want heavy work, and light work was unavailable

I was naive as hell as to a common view SE Asians have of daughters, as well as what a family might expect out of their daughter marrying a white boy. (I plead guilty to being embarrassingly naive.) Anyway, I thought the above information was relevant. I also told my wife her family was well-landed, her older sister had a new large house on the family compound, stocked with the best and largest of everything, and her brother could work, so I would pay not a cent to her family after a single moderate dowry. If she understood I would never change on that, and that was OK with her, then let's go to Singapore and get married. (This was after we had dated for about six weeks.) She thought a day and then said, "Let's go."

So off we went. And she has slowly lost her family. She would cry because not once did any member of her family call and ask how she was doing, or what her life was like. It was always phoned screams of "Send money" that you could hear across the room. It took them a long time to give up. My wife cried and told them to sell some of their large land holdings and learn how to enjoy life. But they were brutal. Her older sister finally called and said she and her husband were flying to Chiang Mai to get my wife. So tell her where Chiang Mai was, and give her our address. Which my wife did not do. The last we heard was from her mother, "I worry about you. Do you remember the neighbor girl who went to America to study? After three months she had mental problems because she studied so much, and she had to come home. Well, she just died. Please stop studying so you won't die."

My wife said to me, "You have to be strong to talk to my mother." Oh yes, her brother now works at a tee-shirt factory loading boxes. Does my heart good.

Westerners would probably think my wife was just doing what any rational human would do. But most on this forum know how hard it was for her. She wanted to be a good daughter, and she wanted them to love her as family, not a source of money. But her family forced her to choose, and they assumed their 22 years of training her would win out. My wife said to me, "I have no family now. I am yours." And the only jewelry I have ever bought her, other than the simple wedding band, is a pair of 20 baht earrings at the night bazaar. Though I drop $100 a whack on math books.. I also keep her supplied with cheap simplified novels, which she loves to read to me, although she likes me to read to her sometimes. In a couple of years I will probably buy her a couple of pieces of nice jewelry, but she will probably want a lens for her camera or something like that.

You know, I can easily teach her to love money and jewelry just like her money-obsessed family, or I can lead her to a different set of values. I just re-read that, and it sounds like something out of of some godawful book from pre-WWI. But I will stick with it.

I am rambling something terrible. Anyway, she could have gone back to her family and gotten a different husband. I even said I would pay her airfare and give her a few thousand dollars. She would not speak to me the rest of the day for that, and cried off and on. She stuck with me. I have a lot of respect for her. My plans for all the schooling? To make her life fuller, more interesting, and perhaps someday she will be able to use it to live a more decent life.

And besides, we laugh an awful lot when we study together. Even algebra.

Its nice to hear a decent story and for others to see there really are some good women out there interested to learn and improve themselves, my wife is not interested in money but she does enjoy the thrill of making it, she still buys secondhand clothes or wears clothes from some of our customers ( she does condo rentals). Shes got over 3 million in the bank right now. She used to earn 12000 a month now for all her efforts its closer to 200000 a month yet remains unchanged.

Out of her entire family of 10 siblings only two of them are honest hard working planners who dont live for today, Ive spent 5 years apart from her for months on end due to work and not once worried if she was running off with anyone else, she often goes out for some food with male friends/customers.

I hope your wife enjoys her education as much as you enjoy teaching her.

Dude you are gonna get stung big time!!! I suppose your way older than your 'wife' too.....

[Trembly]

To continue current studies, have a look a t Khan Academy. I find it excellent with my students.

In the future, she could take an online university course from The Open University in the UK. Its popular and I'd say as well respected as an online university could be. I've not checked, but I don't think there are any requirements to be based in the UK to study there and they have a broad range of courses.

Open University degrees are well respected in the UK. They are accepted as a bona fide degree by the armed forces . . . not insignificant when you consider that a degree holding Officer Cadet will be paid the best part of 10'000 sterling more a year more than the non-degree holding Officer Cadet in the same troop, and will automatically be given the rank of Lieutenant instead of Second Lieutenant (big pay gap again) upon passing out of training.

Edited September 7, 2011 by Trembly