Friday, November 20, 2009

Nov 19th Meeting at DG with Wanida Thai language Instructor

Everyone,

It was a very nice meeting last night with John, Linda, Amanda, Jenifer, myself and special guest Wanida the Thai language instructor. Wandida was wonderfully helpful, personally I feel much better about learning some basic. Below are the videos of her lessons I took. Hope you enjoy them despite the occasional background noise interruption.
tnx -Jeremiah

SORRY, WE FINALLY HAD TO REMOVE THE VIDEOS TO CONSERVE SPACE ON THE BLOG

Sunday, November 1, 2009

First Meeting of District 7570 GSE Team to Thailand

Standing: John Zimet (Team Leader), Nee Hopple and Mike Kitt
(owners of Thai Winchester), Kip Mumaw, Linda Taylor
(Alternate Team Leader), Brooke Conover, Jeremiah Shifflett
(Alternate); Kneeling: Amanda Compher, Jennifer Green

Although the District 7570 GSE Team to Thailand has been sending emails back and forth to each other for two weeks, the members of the team had never met each other as teammates until the first meeting, held on October 31st at (appropriately) the Thai Winchester restaurant in Winchester, Virginia. Not only were the actual team members present, but also the alternates. We were also joined by Steve Gyurisin who had designed this Blog for us.

After we got to know each other, Nee Hopple and Mike Kitt, owners of the restaurant, introduced themselves. Nee gave us a short lesson on Thai cuisine and explained the etiquette of Thai dining. Contrary to what one usually experiences in American Thai restaurants, native Thais never use knives or chopsticks. Holding a large spoon in the right hand, one cuts the food and, with the back of the fork, held in the left hand, you push the food towards and onto the spoon.

As we were receiving this lesson, Mike presented a slide show on his laptop, depicting sights of Thailand. It certainly whetted our interest!

Once we indulged in a delicious meal of Thai delicasies, as well as tested our tolerance for hot, hot, HOT, Steve explained the general idea of Blogs and made himself available for any future questions. John passed out handouts about the history of Rotary and of District 7570, basic Thai phrases and grammar, the history of Buddhism, and copies of emails from Quanchai Laohaviraphab (Ernie Bentley's counterpart in District 3330), containing maps and prelimiary details regarding the areas that we will be visiting in Thailand.

After lunch we discussed language training (John has arranged for a Thai-speaking professsor from Shenandoah University to help us), uniforms, our responsibility as ambassadors not only from Rotary but also from America and, most challenging, Quanchai's desire that we present an American Culture Show at their District Conference. We made excellent progress on all topics except the Culture Show (but we haven't given up.)
Our next meeting is scheduled for November 14th.