Pay day and play days

Despite the fact that I'm meant to be teaching right at this very moment, I am going to use the fact that my class stood me up in order to update my blog. Considering this is the second time they haven't arrived in three weeks does make me question whether they just don't like me as a teacher or whether they don't like the subject etc. But I'm just going to keep telling myself that none of my other classes have ever refused to

Teacher Kip is up after yelling her lines at me

show up when I was teaching so that can only be a good sign...

All in all, today hasn't started in the best way. Coupled with the fact that when I woke angry and sleep deprived this morning all ready to shower, I discovered we have no water. This seems to have been quite a common occurrence since we moved to Phuket- according to the teachers, Phuket doesn't have a main water supply from the islands and the school runs on rainwater. Despite the fact that it's the supposed rainy season right now, we constantly seem to find ourselves without water which is not a brilliant feeling when you've been on your feet all day in a 35 degrees classroom to find you can't come home and shower. God knows what the teachers do in the dry season...

But I can't be grumpy for too long. Today marked pay day! Which means this weekend will be spent in the

Princess Bifern is workin it

ridiculously over the top beach resort Patong which, from what we've been told, is like someone has placed the strip from Magaluf smack bang in the middle of Asia. However, I feel like we most certainly cannot leave Phuket without visiting Bangla Road!

The past couple of days have actually ran pretty smoothly and it's making the realisation that I'm over halfway through my time here feel really weird. Play rehearsals have been in full swing over Wednesday and Thursday night and I have FINALLY found out why we are even doing it in the first place. From what I can gather, there's an orphanage in Phuket which was set up after the tsunami and is sponsored by Europe. Every so often the students here seem to go to do charity work within the community (I have seen several photos of EP 2 doing karaoke/playing bingo at the old peoples home) and I think performing a play to an orphanage will be something similar. I also have to hand it to these kids, they are putting a lot of time and effort into perfecting something I wrote in an hour bless them. They all seem to have gone home and learnt their lines and are desperate to pronounce all the English words correctly (I have lost count of the amount of times that Kip, one of the EP 2 students, has started yelling her lines in my face so she can practise). And, although it may not be quite up to Oscar winning level, it is a lot of fun! I challenge you to find a more amusing thing than watching possibly the campest (but sweetest) Thai boy I've ever met asking (rather unconvincingly) the Princess to be his girlfriend.

THURSDAY GIRLS NIGHT! (with pinky)

Last night me and Flo (I make it sound like a joint effort but really it was all Flo) decided to cook spaghetti bolognese for teacher Morn and teacher Pinky after they cooked us dinner a few weeks back. We wanted to cook them something traditionally English, but without an oven and limited ingredients we had to settle for something vaguely European. It was nice to spend time with the teachers outside of school- they do seem to let us fend for ourselves sometimes and it would be nice to do more things with them. After all, they know Thailand a lot better than we do! It was also a nice way to say goodbye to teacher Morn before she goes to her hometown for the week to sort out her wedding as she is getting married next friday which is all very exciting- I want to see what a Thai wedding will be like. How many other times am I going to get that opportunity?

The rest of the evening was spent chatting with Pinky who is so desperate to visit England! I have never seen anybody so excited by British culture- I showed her a picture of some daffodils and I thought she might cry out of happiness. Pinky really is the cutest lady ever. She was saying how she really wants to go to Chelsea as she's a fan of Chelsea football club and she was over the moon when we informed her that it's a really wealthy area and she may even be in with a chance of seeing a Ferrari. I have never been more desperate to show another human Made in Chelsea before but this definitely seems like my opportunity- Pinky is the type of person who would LOVE it. (When Kate and Wills got

Western food that isn't rice = happy Sarah

married, Pinky bought every edition of Thai OK and Hello magazines just so she didn't miss out on ANYTHING. Made in Chelsea is definitely going to be her thing). I'm definitely going to miss Pinky when we return to the UK- although she did promise to send us post cards!