Living in the land of "Mai pen rai"...

The Thai live their lives by a simple philosophy "mai pen rai" which, from what I have been told, loosely translate to something close to "it can't be helped" or for my Japanese readers "shoganai".

Annoying, cumbersome, frustrating and generally bothersome situations just kinda roll off them like water off a duck's back. Do they really not sweat the small stuff? Well probably not but like so many countries in this part of the world, they have an uncanny ability to smile away their frustrations and carry on. I am attempting to follow the same path. It's a struggle at time and believe me, the fact that nothing in this country seems to work properly at the best of times does not help in the matter. But I'm slowly starting to turn that frown and furrowed brow upsidedown.

"oh there aren't enough books for the students even though they are paying thousands of dollars to come here?...mai pen rai"

"oh you want to me photocopy the books because you won't buy anymore but you forgot to tell me that there is no paper for the photocopiers in the whole school?...mai pen rai"

"oh you finally photocopied the books but you forgot to tell me that the school hasn't ordered any plastic bindings so I just have a stack of about 1000 unattached pages to sort through?...mai pen rai"

"oh my building got hit by lighting which resulted in a 12 hour power outage...mai pen rai"

"oh the alarm clock that I paid extra money for because it was supposed to have a back up power supply in case of power outages died the minute the juice turned off...mai pen rai"

the list goes on and on but my hair is still embedded in the folicles and the wrinkles do not seem to have multiplied too much as of yet.

This weekend I'm off to Koh Samet with some of the younger teachers at school. After 2 arduous weeks back in the land of teacherdom it's going to be a welcomed vacay!

Apparently this is the view from the bungalows I'm staying in:

Yes! HEEELLLOOOOO THAILAND!

Cheers from the land of Mai Pen Rai...
J