Time is ticking...

Only two weeks left until I set foot on Australian soil once again. Not much time left at all. Not that I am going to dwell on that, rather I plan to make each and every moment count.

We had a sports day today. This is just one of the many photos taken by CCD and uploaded onto
Facebook almost immediately after the event... have a look at their Facebook page for more...

Work is going really good. I'm finally starting to get things finalised. Just today I sent off a letter requesting fluid thikener to an organisation back home (well in NSW). They are going to help me get a supply of thickeners by contacting their suppliers and then hopefully I will be able to establish a consistent link with them. This is also something that I will be able to follow up on once I am back home.

I've also printed off a copy of a basic communication board that I will be able to introduce to the staff at Fueng Fah (the babies home). Rather than just working on it with the children there, I hope to introduce the idea to the staff so that they will learn to use it and appreciate it and it will be carried on once I am gone.

Last week I wasn't feeling that great. I had quite severe pain in my side and I wasn't eating at all. The other volunteers were quite concerned for my wellbeing and I was dragged to see a doctor (at the BNH Hospital which was so posh it was more like a hotel). He told me that the pain was most likely to do with stress and the acid levels in my stomach, I was given a nice goodie bag with medication and other information in it and have been taking it diligently since. That combined with a lovely, relaxing weekend away on the beach has left me feeling a lot better and eating food all the time once again.

We had a really good time relaxing on the beach and soaking up the sun...

enjoying cocktails at sunset.... ... 

taking in the beautiful views...

Having lots of fun all together.
Making memories... developing friendships ... laughing... 

eating good food and enjoying the amazing company we had...

It was a really nice relaxing weekend.

Ps. Now you have something to comment on Stellybelly xxx

Tuesdays and CBR 2

I have already mentioned that I spend each Tuesday at one of the community based rehabilitation centres. CCD has three different community based centres that are located in a few of the different provinces. The staff work together with the families to provide support and care to children with a range of different disabilities. This is a way in which the families are still able

Each Tuesday I make my way down to Major (the shopping centre down the road) at 7.50 am  and wait for the staff that go to CBR2 to come and pick me up. It's about a 1/2 hour drive to get to the day care centre that we

In the mornings we stay at the day care centre while one of the staff members goes around to pick up all the children. Some of them get dropped off in the morning so usually we take out some toys to keep them occupied until everyone comes. 

Once everyone is there there is usually an activity that the staff have planned for us to do and I help out with that. Sometimes we do some painting or drawing and I help out as much as I can. It different here in that the staff organise a lot more of the activities and as a volunteer I help out rather than organise things. 

What I can do as a speechie here is a bit limited, there are no feeding problems and what I can do with communication and language is limited because of the differences in the language. Still I do what I can and when playing with the kids I try to get them all involved and model how to play with them... 

When the lego blocks come out we always seem to end up building a really big tall tower...
it always falls down and breaks a lot, but...

we get there in the end...
there might be some engineering blood in me after all

The staff at CBR2 are really lovely. Almost every week they buy me a drink (one week it was this delicious green fanta drink that was lovely and sweet), and they love to have fun, I have had my face painted, sticky things stuck to my back and arms, and sprayed all over in water. I really do enjoy it there.

xxx

Working and loving

I haven't really put an update on here for a little while. Yesterday I found out that my blog had been quoted in the church bulletin and it had also directed people here to read more about what I'm doing. I guess that means that I should be providing people with something current to look at.

This past week has been really busy and I feel as if I have got lots of work done. That may just be because I was able to spend all day Tuesday writing up reports, putting information together on swallowing and writing letters. Pretty much I spent it being a speechie. I got somewhere with my list of things to do but the list is still really long. I only have three weeks of work left here and before I know it I'll be back home. So I really should get some work done.

I've managed to borrow someone else's camera from work and get the pictures off her (thanks Carmen). All of these pictures have been taken from the work at Fueng Fah babies home but they show a bit of the work that we are doing.

Hand painting on t-shirts. Lots of fun and lots of fun and lots of mess

We took some of the girls from Rachawadee to church one Sunday,
After church we took them out to lunch. It was a really nice day.

Facepainting... everyone became lions/tigers for the morning :) 

outdoor sport activites... lots of fun and hard work for us and lots of fun for everyone 

Hopefully more pictures will come :)

xxx

Adventures of Sirin House: Part 2

I did say that if you were lucky you might here some more about the adventures we get up to in Sirin House. Well, you are in luck. I am actually following up on that promise. Last Monday night we had another adventure, well at least I thought it was a bit of an adventure.

My Mum has taught me well.  Alex, our only male volunteer, had his beard shaved off and his sideburns were also trimmed. As a result, they weren't in proportion with the rest of his hair. Instead of getting it cut properly, one of the other girls offered to cut his hair, thinking that there would be some clippers available making the job easier. However she thought wrong. We didn't have any. Instead we had a rather blunt pair of scissors. So basically, the rest of the story is, I cut his hair. Then because I apparently did a really good job, I also cut someone else's hair.... Unfortunately there aren't actually any photos of the final product but they did turn out ok

So, if I can't find a job as a speechie when I get back home, there is always the potential of being a hairdresser

As I said already, we have a lot of fun all together, working together, living together and going on adventures in Thailand together.

xxx

Wednesday and Friday: at the Babies Home

Each Wednesday and Friday I am located at the CCD day care centre located at Fueng Fah, the government orphanage intended for children aged 0-7. Each day here is pretty much the same, in the morning the children are collected from the wards and taken to the centre. Most of the time we then suffer through a period of 'music' time, which is usually beautiful cacophony of various percussion instruments possibly played to the beat of the song that the Thai staff are singing.

In the morning there is occasionally a planned activity that is either planned by us as volunteers or the Thai staff. Some of the activities that we have done include: facepainting, normal painting, colouring, an obstacle course and lots of playing with toys. If there isn't an activity planned I do try and take some of the kids to do some one on one therapy. Usually I just focus on getting them to play with different toys and perhaps use some pretend play skills as these skills are such and important scaffold to build on for further language and communication skills. With some of the other kids I have also just focussed on getting them to interact and make sounds. It is really great that I have been able to see some progress and that they are making more sounds and just seem happier over all.

The afternoons usually involve a nap after lunch (while we as volunteers go get lunch ourselves) and then outside play on the toys. This is not very structured but there are plans to maybe do some messy/sand play or some water play which should be lots of fun for both the children and the volunteers.

Unfortunatley I don't have many photos on my camera (as a big SLR one is large and clunky and sometimes difficult to just slip out) I have to get some off the others who seem to have their cameras on them more often. So stay tuned for more pics.

xxx

Life in Sirin House

Sirin house. The place where I and 9 other volunteers spend a large amount of our time,  most of that is eating, sleeping and chilling. I guess it is our home and place of residence which is a good reason for us to spend time here doing whatever it is we do.

Living in a house with 9 others is a lot of fun. It's a bit like living at home with my five brothers and sisters the adventures fun and silly things we do, only different. We all have lots of fun together and get along (well you would hope so seeing as we do work, eat and sleep and do whatever else we do together). The house has five different levels, meaning that we have 4 flights of stairs and as my bedroom is right at the top, I have to climb those stairs quite regularly. Lots of fun when you forget something as I have a tendency to do.

Yesterday afternoon we made our way home from work in a rain storm and were greeted with a flooded bedroom. That's right, the top floor of our house had flooded. After the panic to ensure that all our valuables and electronics were safe and sound we had lots of fun unplugging the drain on the balcony and cleaning up the mess that was made. I made sure I took out my camera just so that I could document our adventure with water. 

Ahhh! Our room when I saw it first.
My mattress had been put up against the wall,
but that big puddle you see is were my bed is supposed to be

The flooded balcony and the water lapping in...
The water on the balcony was about 20cm deep, fortunately there is a step into our room

Lizzie and Julia our long term volunteers sorting out the issue

Mopping up the mess... only one of four mattresses stayed dry

So yeah, that was one of the many adventures that we have while living here in Sirin house. Others include making peanut butter (because we are such poor volunteers and peanut butter is so expensive), having tea tasting tests (Aussie vs. British), sliding down the stairs and playing games. If your lucky you might get to hear of more.

xxx

The view from the top balcony...
I just thought I'll include a picture of our street. Our house looks pretty much the same