Training/ First Couple of Weeks of Work

At the beginning of the month I started training with Wall Street Institute.  I was excited and nervous.  Our first day of training was orientation on the Friday before it all began. It was pretty much a day of learning the facts about Wall Street and to meet some of our fellow trainees. There were 14 of us: 3 new teachers, 9 PTs (Personal Tutors) and 2 SOs (Service Officers). We spent half of the day at the Thailand head offices learning all about Wall Street and then we would head over to our new centers. I was originally hired for the brand new Central World branch but it is not set to open until May 1^st. So presently I am in between centers. I have now been told that I will either work at Siam or Central World. They are both very close to one another so it won’t do anything to my commute. The only real difference is that Central World is a premier center. People pay more money here to get treated like a VIP. I really don’t care which one I go to as long as I have great co-workers. Friday afternoon I spent my day at the Siam branch doing a scavenger hunt with some of the other trainees. It was a good way to meet some of our fellow co-workers and get to know the trainees. It was a pretty easy day and we were all done by 5 pm. I then hurried home to get pack and ready to go to Kanchanaburi. Monday came too soon and I was back at the head office waiting for our first day of training. We at least started our day off with a game. We played jeopardy of all the facts and figures we learned on our scavenger hunt. Pear our trainer was very nice and she is originally from Thailand but her family moved to Texas when she was 10 and she came back to Thailand for college. So it was cool to have a fellow Texan in the classroom. Training was going to be Monday thru Thursday from 11 am to 8 pm with Friday off because it was a holiday. The days were long. Wednesday was especially hard day since we spent a couple of hours going over how to read paperwork for advising sessions.  Thank god Thursday came because I was exhausted and I had a 4-day weekend. The best part about training was that the PTs are all Thai so everyday at lunch they let me tag along and took me to try all kinds of Thai cuisine. They are also the reason I am now hooked on Bubble Tea. Thursday night was nice because two of the other teachers and I went out for drinks after work. I drank a little too much but had a lot of fun. I then spent the rest of my weekend sleeping and doing chores around my apartment. My friend Raiyna stopped in to spend the day with me on Saturday she had been in Laos and was heading to Phuket so needed a place to crash for a couple of hours. Sunday I woke up early and made it to the old city to go to Easter Mass at the Assumption Cathedral.

 It was a great mass and surprisingly full. I would like to go to mass more often but the only church I have found is all the way in the old city, I have to work on Sundays at noon so it might be cutting it close.The best part about Easter Sunday was when I got home from Mass I had a package waiting for me. It was filled with Candy which made my day even better. Thanks Mom and Dad.

Suddenly it was Tuesday and I was back for my last day of training.  Our last day of training was spent separated from the PTs and SOs. The three teachers went up to one of the conference rooms with two service managers to focus on lesson planning and our role at Wall Street. It was a fun day of training I was sitting through some of the mock classes trying to be a student and I couldn’t stop giggling. I felt so bad I was taking it seriously I just could not stop the giggles. It was nice to have practice and get feedback I am just worried about my first day and my first solo class. After a long day of training the PTs wanted to go out to dinner to King Kong which is a Korean cook your own all you can eat BBQ place.  It was one of those restaurants that have a little BBQ pit in the middle of the table and we cook our own food.
 I just sat down and the PTs ordered everything. 

I had no idea what they had ordered but I knew they just said a lot of Thai words. All of sudden the food started coming out and coming out and coming out. There was so much food on our table we were staking plates on top of plates and using chairs to hold some food. I couldn’t believe how much food they had ordered and what I really couldn’t believe was that they ordered a couple more dishes. We finished everything. It was a great night and I am going to miss all the PTs I trained with. Thankfully I will work with a couple of them, I just wish I could work with them all. Wednesday was going to be my first day of work but first thing in the morning I had to head out to immigration with one of our HR guys, Tom, to extend my Tourist Visa and get my Non-B Visa. Thankfully Tom had done all my paperwork so it was a pretty easy process. I walked in and 10 minutes later I had already paid $60 for my extension. 30 minutes later I was looking for a cab to get back to the BTS after getting my Non-B approved. Tom waited for my passport so I could get to work. I think I was pretty lucky and really appreciated Tom helping me with all my Visa work now lets hope my Work Permit gets done soon because I would love to get a bank account.  After making it to work I was given my lesson for the day and had the rest of the day to prepare for it and also spend time getting to know my fellow co-workers. I was able to observe a fellow co-worker teach just so I had an idea of what I was suppose to do. Finally after hours of sitting around in the staff room I taught my first class. I was so nervous and a little disorganized but I thought the class went ok. I spoke a little too fast but I think the students liked me and they did well. After going over my performance with my boss I went home for the evening and I would have the next six days off. I had Thursday off because not too many classes were booked due to Songkran and Monday/ Tuesday were going to be my days off.  After a very long weekend I was back at work the following Wednesday with a nice little ear infection. Wednesday I would get teach two classes and the rest of the week I would teach two classes a day while observing other teachers. It was good to get more practice I felt more and more comfortable as the week went on. Luckily I had the same lessons a couple more times so I realized what I did wrong in one class and fixed it for the next one. My first Saturday working at Wall Street we had a social event celebrating Songkran so the first thing I was asked as I went into the staff room was if I was available to judge the Miss Songkran contest with Matthew (Siam Service Manager), Leah (Fellow Teacher), and Bey (Senior PT). As I was heading off to a class I was asked if I would do this little good luck ceremony after I finished my class I saw no problem with it and said yes. When I went out to the serivce area I found out that it was a blessing ceremony so the students would pour scented water over the teachers hands and give us a blessing.We had at least 50 students pour cups of water over our hands. It was really interesting and my hands were very pruny afterwards. Then it was time to judge six studetns who wanted to be the Siam Center Miss Songkran. It was pretty easy gig we sat at the judges table and watched the contestants as well as asked them a question. The students all got to vote for a contestant as well as the judges but our vote was worth more. After we took some pictures I retreated back to the staff area to prepare for my next class. Sunday was much more chill all I did was go in and teach my classes I did go out for drinks after work with some co-workers. I had a great time with my co-workers and hope to be able to do it more often. I then had two glorious days off where I just stayed in and tried to recharge for the coming week. Since I am still waiting for my first paycheck money is a little short right now but it was nice to just relax. My second week started pretty much the same as my first week the only difference is I have three classes a day and I was to teach a complimentary class. The complementary class is larger than a normal class and the students are not graded in these classes they just go there to have fun and practice. During my second week a fellow teacher and two service managers also observed me. I was told I was doing a good job my talking speed had decreased a lot and my teacher talk time was pretty low so I was happy with the feedback. My second week of work was pretty uneventful I have become more comfortable in the center and with my co-workers I am just waiting for my third week where it will be full schedule to see how I will  handle it. I am a little bit nervous about the extra classes and hope that I can get through them all. Thank goodness I have a three-day weekend to get myself ready for this.

Kanchanaburi

Friday I began the day heading to Silom Road to go to orientation for my new job with Wall Street Institute. Midway through orientation I get a text from Joe asking if I wanted to hop on a bus to head out to Kanchanburi to see the waterfalls. My answer was of course yes. So as soon as I finished with orientation I hurried home and made my way to the Sai Tai Mai Southern Bus Terminal. Of course it was the most inopportune time to travel because traffic was horrible all over the city. Just when you thought that you had gotten out of a traffic jam you would get stuck in another one. It didn't help that my driver was very impatient and had one of the worst transmissions I have ever seen so the ride was very bumpy and uncomfortable. When I finally made it to the bus station I met up with Joe we found our "gate" and bought our very inexpensive bus tickets to Kanchanaburi. It was about two and half hour bus ride so we made it to Kanchanaburi at about 11pm. We had no idea where we were going to stay so we had a taxi take us to the place where all the guest houses/bars were located, we would hopefully find something there. After a little bit of walking we found a room at this place called the Sugar Cane. We wanted the cheapest room possible which ended up being this room that was on a barge on the River Kwai. It was a basic room with two fans, a basic bathroom, bed, and paper thin walls. It would do since all we planned on doing was sleeping there and it was only $10 a night.

View from our room!

We dropped our bags immediately and went out to the bars. The first place we went was this little Rastafarian place that had live music. The band was a group of Thai guys who played a range of American songs to Thai songs. They were decent and it was a great first place to start. When the band took a break Joe befriended a lot of the band members and was asked to play a couple of sets. They did pretty well the mic was a little shotty, but they sounded good. The guys did have a little trouble with some songs that they were not familiar with, but that is understandable. Eventually the band had to stop playing it was too late and live music had to stop so we decided to start walking down the street to maybe find some foreigners. As we journeyed down the street we were called to an outdoor table by a very flamboyant Thai man. He immediately knew we were American and wanted us to sit at his table. He then spent the entire time we sat with his telling us how much he loved America and all the cities in America he had visited. He was extremely drunk and kept repeating the same stories over and over. Thankfully he eventually left after he finished his drink and we were free to go. Next door there was a group of foriegners, mainly British college kids who were traveling around the country. They were all pretty hammered when we got there but they were having loads of fun. We joined the group and were able to sit and talk. We ended up talking about the widest range of subjects from politics to scientific theory to cultural differences. The best part of sitting at this bar was it was the first place I had been to in a while where I wasn't hassled to buy a drink when I first sat down or told to leave because I hadn't bought a drink. We sat with these new found friends for hours and even though some were still partying when we left at four we needed to get sleep because the next day we had a busy day of exploring waterfalls. Surprisingly I had a good night's rest, for no A/C the room was quite chilly and the bed wasn't that uncomfortable. We were woken up pretty early by motor boat engines and some odd sound rolling on the floor boards outside our room. We ventured to the restaurant to get a quick breakfast before heading out to the waterfalls. I had some amazing chocolate pancakes while Joe was boring and had a traditional breakfast of eggs, bacon, and toast. Since I was traveling with Joe that meant we were getting a moto so after breakfast we went to scout out moto prices. We found this one guy right outside our guesthouse who was very knowledgeable and nice. When it was all settled our guy told us how to get to the waterfalls and get gas for the moto. We decided to go to the Erawan waterfalls which was 65 km away. The drive out to the waterfall was pretty tough. It took us about an hour and a half to get out there and I had forgotten my sunglasses so I had to keep my head down most of the journey because the wind was brutal on the eyes. Also the seat on the moto was not too comfy so we couldn't wait to get off the bike when we finally made it to the waterfall. The Erawan waterfall is actually seven tiers of waterfalls since neither Joe nor I knew that before we ventured out there we were super excited to get started. We were worried when we started out because the bottom tiers there were lots of people picnicking and we thought the rest of the journey would be just as bad.

When we got to the second level waterfall there were monkeys! We were not suppose to feed them but they would come down the trees and steal food from picnicking people. One walked right in front of me I never thought in a million years I would get to see a monkey in its natural habitat. There was even a baby monkey up in the trees and all the other monkeys were helping it get to new branches or higher into the trees. As we finished up with the second waterfall we found out that we were not to be greeted with picnickers the rest of our journey. No food or drink was allowed beyond the second waterfall. I realized how out of shape I was when we began climbing to different levels of waterfalls. It was not an easy climb there was no clear cut path sometimes there was steps and sometimes you climbed up and over a branch and then over a boulder. It was so much fun trying to figure out how to get to the next waterfall. Joe and I spent a lot of time exploring each level of waterfalls. Sometimes we would venture out on downed trees or climb up waterfalls or climb over rocks. A lot of the times Joe and I were the only two people at these waterfalls which was so cool.

We finally made it to the seventh waterfall and boy were we exhausted. We didn't spend too much time there because of all the people and the bugs were horrendous. We spent way more time at the lower waterfalls and had an amazing time so we didn't need to spend a ton of time at the seventh one. The walk down was so much easier than the climb up. We didn't realize how dehydrated we were until we made it to the second waterfall and downed two bottles of water. We grabbed something to eat and decided we would try and make it to one of the caves before heading back to town. The cave was about 12 km away which wasn't so bad but when we turned down the road to the cave it turned into gravel. Joe can drive on gravel he just doesn't feel to comfortable doing it. So we made the decision to forgo the cave and just make the journey back to town. This time we took our time to observe the scenery and to stop and take pictures.

One of the cool things we saw on our journey back to town was this group of Thai men herding cattle down the road. Only in Thailand would you see something like that. The whole journey back was great we traveled along the river where we saw mountains, dams, and lush green countryside. As we entered town we made a quick stop to the bridge over the River Kwai. Both Joe and I didn't know the significance of the bridge but we knew it was important and it was made into a movie at one time. It was pretty cool bridge with great views. I didn't know how important it was to cross this bridge but I did find it really cool to walk across a river on railroad tracks. After spending some time on the bridge we decided to head back to the guest house. We didn't realize that we had missed our turn so we ended up 10 km outside of town and had to turn around. By this time we were very anxious to get back to our guest house because our butts were killing us, we were running low on gas, and it looked like a rain storm was coming. Right before dark we found the turn and were back to our guest house within minutes. Not even 10 minutes in our room there was a loud clap of lightning and the torrential downpour followed. I hadn't been in a thunderstorm that bad in a while I actually jumped a couple of time because the thunder was that loud. Eventually we couldn't stay in our room any longer, we were starving, so we faced the elements and ran to the hotel restaurant to get something to eat. We ended up sharing tables with other guests because it was an outdoor restaurant so some of the tables were soaked and all the guests stayed in so it was a little crowded. Eventually the rain stopped and we went back to our room to watch a movie on Joe's computer and go to bed. I couldn't believe how tired I actually was it was very hard to get up the next morning. We returned the moto, had breakfast, and booked a ticket on a van back to Bangkok. This time we had the van drop us at Victory Monument. Even though the ticket was more expensive going back, in the long run without the added use of a taxi to public transport we would save so much more money. It was a pretty cramped van ride but we made it to Bangkok in about three hours. Once we departed the van Joe and I said our goodbyes and I went East he went North. After finally getting home I uploaded all my pictures and videos then decided to take a quick nap before heading out to grab some dinner, that was at 6 pm. I woke up the next morning at 6 am I think I was a little more tired than I thought. It was a great weekend I am so happy I went. Now I have to start my week or training I am not sure how this is going to go.

Rangsit/Bangkok

After leaving Phuket I was making my way to Rangsit, which is a northern suburb of Bangkok about 45 minutes outside the city center. I had a friend who I met through LanguageCorps who was working out there and allowed me to sleep on his couch. I arrived very early Monday morning and somehow made it all the way to Rangsit with a very expensive cab ride. Once I was situated Joe, my friend, took me around town on his moto to explain where everything was. Joe lives right near Rangsit University so it is like living in a college town. On the main strip there are tons of Internet cafes, ice cream shops, and restaurants. Other than the main strip Rangsit didn’t have much to offer. There were a couple bars and snooker halls but that is about it.  I spent about three weeks in the Bangkok/ Rangsit area and didn’t do much except go to Bangkok for job interviews or hangout around Rangsit. I was very fortunate to have some of my dad’s co-workers being in Bangkok for a week so I was able to head into the city to hangout with them. They were really nice guys and they really took care of me. They took me out to lunches, dinners, to the aquarium, and to get Rosetta stone. They gave me a key to the hotel so I could freshen up before a job interview and even went on a search for some American candy for me. I have been so fortunate while in Southeast Asia I have meet wonderful people throughout my journey who have really helped me. Had it not been for these people being so generous with their time and money I would be in a lot more trouble financially.

The one thing I became an expert at while staying in Rangsit was using the public transportation. I learned how to get from the apartments in Rangsit to Future Park hop on a public van to the BTS (Sky train) and get wherever I needed for about 300 baht ($9) round trip. I used the vans at Future Park so much that the lady who ran the vans didn’t even ask where I was going just pointed to my van smiled and waved. I am going to miss that lady.

Once I had gotten my job I had to go about searching for an apartment, which was quite difficult. I was online searching for places but just couldn’t find anything I liked or places were too expensive or it was all in Thai so the language barrier was a little bit of a problem. Thankfully one of my friends Brianna had used this real estate agent to help her find her place so I gave him a call. His name was Bill and he had been in Thailand about 15 years, he was originally from Canada. I gave him my preferences of studio that was decently priced, furnished, and close to BTS; he called me back in an hour saying he had a place he thought I would like and to meet up with him on Saturday afternoon. After going to almost the very end of the BTS I arrived a little bit early for our meeting so I decided to walk the neighborhood. I didn’t know which apartment building I was going to look at since there were numerous ones throughout the neighborhood but from my quick walk I found a pharmacy, numerous restaurants, a grocery store, and plenty of street food vendors. After a quick walk I knew that I at least liked what the neighborhood had to offer. I met up with Bill at a local coffee shop and we walked about 10 mins. to the condo building I would be staying in. He told me how this was a new and upcoming neighborhood because of the recent addition of a BTS stop. The neighborhood had always been cheap to live in, but with the added public transportation more apartment buildings were popping up and places were getting rented pretty fast. When we made it my building I liked the outward appearance and the grounds. It had a nice lap pool, fitness center, and a lot of security.   

Once we went into the condo I was in love. When I imagined how my dream condo would look this place was it. I walked in to a small kitchenette on the right hand side. I had a big sink, cupboards, a cook top, and a fridge. As I ventured more into the apartment I had a decent sized bathroom with an enclosed shower and a giant mirror that took up one side of the bathroom with a long ledge to place all my toiletries. Once inside the apartment I had a small dinning room table with two chairs, a queen sized bed, a couch, built in closet, and entertainment center with TV. I had loads of windows with curtains and a balcony. Everything I wanted was in this place. I couldn’t believe that everything was included and it was in my budget that never happens. I told my agent I was in love and that I wanted it. He said "when would you like to move in?" I said "as soon as possible" and he responded "how about tomorrow at noon?" Of course I was ready to move in as soon as possible. I was so happy in one week I had a place to live, a job, and  everything was working out just beautifully. By Sunday afternoon I had signed a lease forked over three months rent and was buying necessities. My week was spent running errands, getting internet, signing my work contract, going to orientation, and hoping on a bus at 9 o’clock at night Friday evening for Kanchanaburi for a weekend of waterfalls. I know before I came to Thailand the last city I wanted to live in was Bangkok and now I can’t imagine myself in any other city I really like it here. The only thing that could make this any better would be if my Thai was better, but I am pretty sure my new co-workers will willingly teach me.

Job Hunting

Finding a job here is just as bad as it is in the states with some differences. For foreigners the only real job you can get is to teach English as a second language unless you current job sends you here. So applying to be a teacher is a nice long process. First you have to make a resume completely different than the one you made in the states. I had to add my picture to the resume, give my relationship status, date of birth, and all my special hobbies or talents. I am not sure why the picture I guess to see if you meet their idea of a proper English teacher. The relationship status is because supposedly single people are more of a flight risk than married people. Single individuals want to go out and travel. They will go out the night before and may be hung-over the next day. While married people have commitments and are usually staying in the country for a long time. The age is because they want to place you with the right age group. Special hobbies or talents is because you can sometimes teach extra classes which can garner you a larger salary or when you have to do extra curricular activities they have something for you to do. The resume is also two pages long and under the employment history there is to be no spaces of time where you didn’t have a job. If they see a month space they put you aside. I am not really sure why it is such a big deal, but here all you do is make sure your work history has no blanks and most of the time the school doesn't even check. So once my new resume was made I began the search for a job. There are 6 types of schools you can choose from: Public School, Private School, International School, Language School, Vocational College, and University. I originally thought I wanted to teach at a Private School because I will get the 6-week breaks between semesters and the pay was really good. As I began researching schools I really wanted to get in with an International School because the pay was very good and if you lasted past the 6 month mark you were going to stay with the school a very long time. Working at the International school also meant you could easily go to another school in a different country and demand the same kind of money/benefits. The only problem with the International Schools is they are highly competitive and the school only wants teachers with an education degree and 2 years of teaching in their home country. Only a few without those qualifications get into these types of schools and if they do they are very lucky. I didn’t originally think I wanted to go with a language school because they had weird hours, they worked weekends, and they taught adults. I like teaching adults but I originally decided to teach English so that I could make a difference in a child’s life. As I began researching Language Schools I found that it reminded me a lot of my Management Courses and since I loved my Management courses I wanted in. My journey to getting to my present job was long, exhausting, and stressful, but I am proud of myself for not accepting the first job and waiting it out for the perfect job.

My journey began in Pattaya while I was still in training. I began sending my resume to schools in Chang Mai, Phuket, and Nakoon Si Thammarot. I applied to mainly private schools for primary and secondary students. After a couple of days with no response I continued applying to schools in the Bangkok area. I knew after being in Phuket I did not want to work there it was just too much like home and the reason I came to Thailand was to do something completely different from home. So moving to the big city was the logical choice. I applied to a bout 10 more schools in Bangkok and one Thursday night I got a very rushed phone call from a teacher at a Government Secondary School in Western Bangkok. She wanted me to come in the next day, which I told her there was no way since I was hours outside of the city. When I told her Tuesday she was a little perturbed but I didn’t really care. She told me I would do a 15-minute demonstration for teenagers using newspaper or magazine articles and I was to use all the technologies in the class. So I began my research and preparations for the class two days before the demonstration, I had a feeling that the article I chose on technological advances in Thailand would be too difficult so I sent an e-mail to the teacher to have her read the article to see if it was too difficult. When I called her the next day to see if everything was ok she told me yes it was fine the students would understand it fine and see you tomorrow. I felt good I was ready to go. The school is off the beat and track. It is a part of Bangkok where there is no public transportation so I had to taxi it down to the Southern Bus Terminal, which cost me an arm and a leg. I then took a moto to the school from Sai Tai Mai, the bus station.  I got there a couple of hours early so that I could eat, go over my lesson, and maybe check out the neighborhood since I would be spending a lot of time there. There was no neighborhood. The school was on a double lane highway with a restaurant, a 7-11, and loads of mechanic shops. I was not too thrilled. I arrived early for my interview and the first thing the teacher said was "oh your really early, just go sit over there and I will get to you in a minute." When the teacher eventually got to me she wanted me to go over my lesson plan, which she didn’t like. She didn’t understand what I was trying to do. She thought some of my activities were below her students and I needed to have more exercises about the reading. Then she asks about the other lesson plan I came up with. I looked at her blankly saying "I didn’t know I had to make another lesson plan" she goes “yes remember I told you that yesterday when we talked on the phone.” That is not what I got from that phone conversation. So I was given 30 minutes to tweak my current presentation while the teacher wrangled some students because there was no class that day, the students were preparing for an open house. I gave my demonstration to students who were extremely shy and didn’t really participate, but were very nice and respectful. I then had my interview where I was asked everything from what I liked to do to am I scared there will be more floods. We discussed salary which was a little bit lower than what was advertised but since I was a new teacher with no experience that was to be expected, but what really bothered me was she said that I didn’t need that much money because there were really cheap apartments down the road with a bed and bathroom perfect for me. I would be close to school so all I need to do is go to work and home to work on my lesson plans. I didn’t need that much money because I should be focusing only on my job. I didn’t come to Thailand to sit in a room or work I came to experience a new culture. At that moment I knew this was not the place for me. I thanked her she helped me get to a place where there was public transportation and I was on my way. The next morning at 8 am I received a phone call from the teacher telling me I had the job and they would want me to start the next week. I then had the most painful conversation stating that I did not want the job. She couldn’t understand that I didn’t want the job. She tried everything to get me to take the job and I just kept saying no. I felt really bad but I knew that I would be completely miserable at the place and I would leave within three months time. After she finally got that I wouldn’t change my mind she hung up and that was over. I was just worried that I did the wrong thing and she could get me blacklisted from other schools. I asked my adviser Jam who said everything I did was correct and if I didn’t want a job don’t take it because everybody will suffer in the end. So now I was back at square one.

I spoke with my adviser Jam from Pattaya and she gave me the name of two places: an agency that places you in a school and a language school in Bangkok. While applying with those two choices I  started applying to language school throughout Bangkok. I originally wanted to work for this language school called AUA because they did have the ideal schedule I would work 6 weeks get 1 week off, but of course I never got a call back. I did get contacted right away from the agency Jam recommended and scheduled an interview for the following day. I really didn’t understand what they did so it was going to be interesting walking into this interview. I made it to this interview a little easier than my last. I didn’t get too lost and was really proud of myself for that. Once I got inside I was met with a recruiter who asked me a few interview questions and then explained their program. She explained how they had schools already lined up and that we have a predetermined salary. I would have another month of training, then they would take me to the city I was suppose to teach in find me housing, help me find my way to work each day, and acclimate me with local places. It sounded fine but I was not guaranteed a spot in Bangkok, which after saying I never wanted to live here I now desperately wanted to live here. They were nice enough to let me have a week to think over my decision. I was a little wary of working for an agency I felt like I would be trapped and have no say in my life. On the positive side I would have guaranteed employment. I wanted to wait and see, more like hope and see I would have phone call in the coming week. Luck would have it I had a phone call Monday night to interview with Wall Street Institute.

I went in the next day and met with the HR manager James. I felt I had a great rapport with James and I really liked what Wall Street had to offer. The way they had their teaching site and their way of teaching is what I liked the most. It reminded me most of the management principles I learned while at Stetson. Wall Street studied other language schools and found what worked and what didn’t work then tried to form a program based on all the positives of the language schools they studied. While in their centers English is required to be spoken by all staff and students, the class sizes are small, there are walls but they are all glass so there is transparency, there is a social area which welcomes all it students to spend as much time there as possible, and a speaking center to help you learn without being judged by others. I really wanted to be apart of something like this so when I finished the interview I was told that I wouldn’t know anything until early the following week. I was a little disheartened with that response but hopeful. I decided to send a quick thank you e-mail to the HR manager James and within a day I got an e-mail asking me to come back for a second interview with the Service Manager for the new Central World branch. I was beyond excited I immediately replied saying I was available as soon as possible. I was required to teach a 45-minute teaching demonstration on Present Perfect Grammar. I was a little nervous about the Grammar explanation but I was just so happy I got a second interview. I spoke with my Service Manager on the phone and we seemed to have good rapport so I was hoping this might just be the place I will end up. So the day comes and I have my interview with Karn, my hopefully Service Manager, and I believe have another good interview. We really hit it off I did an ok teaching demonstration but he really liked me and wanted to take me to the new Central World center. The only thing is that I needed to meet with his boss, the Center Director for final decision. I swore if I didn’t get the job after this I was going to throw myself off the building. He gave me all types of hints to winning over his Thai lady boss, because these women are tough. I smiled and tried to slow down my speech as much as possible when I finally met with her, at the end of the interview I was told to go sit in the lounge so they could talk. I had no idea how I had done I couldn't read her. I wasn’t sure if she liked me or not I just couldn’t tell. Finally after making me sweat for a bit they came out congratulated me and welcomed me to the team. I was beyond excited. Finally I have a job. All this training and sleeping on couches was all worth it now. I could finally get a place of my own finally feel like I belong somewhere. I had a week of free time before my training began and I couldn’t wait. Now I had to explore Bangkok for a place to live, which is not an easy task.