Thai Class

YAY! I am half way through my intensive Thai course and am so glad that I chose to do it.  I expected to have to drag myself there everyday, and while there have certainly been days when I'd rather take a nap, overall I have really enjoyed going.  I don't have to concentrate as hard as I did at the beginning in order to follow along and the two hours pass much more quickly than I imagined they would.  The biggest challenge at this point is the sheer amount of vocabulary that I am getting everyday- there's just no way to remember it all. This is how I usually feel during class:

I just can't catch all the words falling at me.  But I am being exposed to them and I plan to use December and January to work on reviewing and memorizing more of them, in addition to improving my reading skills.  One thing I've been really proud of with this class is that I am working from a book that's written in Thai instead of phonetics. I can really see my reading and writing improving, but it has also shown me some of the HUGE gaps in my reading and writing, which would be natural since I basically taught myself how to read and write from a book I bought while I was back in the States.  So I have the basics down, but I'm crap at the finer points, and at some of the not so fine points as well. 

One thing that has been really enjoyable about the past two months is the singular focus of it all.  I work from 6:30-3:30, I have Thai from 4-6, I eat dinner and have time for one other small thing- whether it's a skype date or catching up on email or watching an episode of Downton Abbey.  My schedule is fixed and regular and routine- ahhhhhh.  But at the same time, being gone for 12 hours a day gets tiring pretty quickly and I'll be glad to have the flexibility back to return to tutoring, coffee with friends, actual grocery shopping and cooking, and things like that. 

And don't worry Argentine friends, my Spanish is still stronger :)  Though Thai is catching up!!