เรื่องเล่าอาสานานาชาติ FOLKLORE MUSEUM
เรื่องเล่าอาสานานาชาติ FOLKLORE MUSEUM
I am the lucky one, who is volunteer at Folklore Museum (Songkhla Province), a beautiful and interesting museum about Southern Thailand. I am working in charge of public relation public, Nongluk, very kind as colleague and tour guide.
My activities are diversified: translate some documents, write some articles for a blog, guide, help in conservation service and English teacher. The work is not so hard, but you have to be open and flexible and above all ready to share and communicate.
I invite the next volunteers in Songkhla Province to come to visite the museum and see this area .
I live with a very nice and kind family and it is interesting to see and live a Thai life .
I have time to visit with my host family and my colleague and especially eat and try something new each day. Breakfast, lunch, diner. A real “EATING TRIP” like we said with my host family.
For me everyday can become an amazing memories.
About Thailand ?
Their lifestyle is different from us and above all of rare simplicity. People are very welcoming, and kind .
Love, respect and hospitality lead their life.
I am here since 2 months now and Thailand keep going to surprised me .
We don’t call Thailand, the country of SMILE for nothing .
“Kop’ koun khaa” for this incredible personal experience .
Laure Moura, a happy volunteer
https://www.volunteerspirit.or.th/blog/international-volunteer-blog/folklore-museum
Folklore Museum
A beautiful and folkloristic Sunday with the children of the orphanage
Hello, we are Lorenzo and Nicolo’, from Italy. We spent a month volunteering in the Folklore Museum of Yo island, in the lake of Songkhla; but the time here has not run only during the work days. In particular it has been a special Sunday in which all the museum has shifted in Sosa Orphanage in Hat Yai. What does it mean? We explain: since the fact that the orphanage has not enough budget to visit the museum, its staff decided to bring there the opportunity of living a day of full immersion in the southern Thailand folklore. We brought in the orphanage objects and information from the museum creating a little new one for the children. We brought also everything useful to build up a little fresh (and free) market in the garden… it couldn’t have been nothing better to support the activities and the games of the day! Everyone of the staff had taken care to hold a space in which every child could try ancient and traditional games passed from generation to generation.
It has been wonderful looking how the games, usually kept behind dusty glasses inside the museum, have woken up in the hands of the happy children! In exchange we got a very nice show with children dressed in traditional clothes performing fascinating dances for us. The day went off among laughter, smiles, crushing spinning tops, kicks at the ball (it isn’t a traditional game, but the temptation was too strong) and a very exciting challenge of coconut graters. What is this? Every player is sitting on his coconut grater, the typical and still used tool to grate the coconut meat, and every one has a coconut to grate, of course; the first finishing the coconut is the winner. Easy, maybe little dangerous, funny!
We think that the worth of the day was over the good entertainment given to the children of the orphanage; with this initiative games and culture has been blended together, preserving and passing them a heritage which maybe too often remains closed in the rooms of the museum, far from the real life. The museum was alive, vibrant: it was outside the museum, achieving its mission in the best possible way.
Lorenzo and Nicolo’
August 2013
Folklore Museum-Daiki
I’m Daiki from Japan. I stayed in Koh Yor 7 months and staying more 3 months.
When I came here the first time I could not understand Thai and did not know anything, nowadays I can talk with Thai people and had a lot of experiences. I’ll do my best 3 months left too. Thank you
SCHEDULE
I usually help staffs on weekdays. it’s a really flexible except Tuesday.
On Tuesday this museum closed then staffs clean up something, artifacts, rooms, outside museum and so on. On weekdays there are a lot of work with staffs, hold an exhibition, go to school or temple, guide, make documents and so on.
DETAIL
There are a lot visitor at the museum everyday, tourist, children, student and local people. I guided and talked with them. And there are also a lot of staffs in this place.
They have own projects so I help them too. For example, this month we held a festival for children, on that day I helped staffs and made a Popsicle for children. It was extremely interesting. I could see them smiles and it made me happy. And on another day, I went to the primary school to teach English, then I taught 6 classes (Primary 1 - 6) a day.
It was highly challenging but interesting and I felt their enthusiasm.
I had a great time with them.
Daiki
https://www.volunteerspirit.or.th/blog/international-volunteer-blog/daiki-report-on-january
Folklore Museum -Julie Luchet
By Julie Luchet
Working
The amount of work was well balanced. It wasn't too much but enough. The tasks were varied (brochure, translation, buying products for the museum shop, set up exhibition...)
I could see Krich really closely when i helped cleaning the artefacts on tuesday which was the closing day.
Here, it was about inventorying and taking pictures of traditional knives and krich in order to stock them in the museum.
Exhibitions
I could helped to set up exhibitions in Taksin University. It was my second day and it was a big meeting, all day long, where students gave presentations about Southern thai culture. I tried a lot of different specialties from the South.
Trip for giftshop
One Tuesday we went on a trip to Nakhon Si thammarat to buy and bring back to the museum some products to sale in the museum giftshop. We bought a lot of silver products that we had to select before. Then we went to Patthalung to buy coconut shell products.
During my first week I created a brochure in French for french visitors in the museum. Then translated a long text about coconut graters and traditional music in southern thailand. It was about translating in french in order to create a sound explanation for french visitors as well.
Accommodation
The apartment had a lot of space (really big for one person) and a breathtaking view on the lake. It was really clean and the museum provided towels and sheets and that was nice. There was a fan to make the temperature more bearable.
A bed or a real mat would have been better, sometimes sleeping on the ground is really painful when you're not used to it.
Food and Drink
Everything was really delicious. My neighbor cooked really well and always paid attention to what i lack nothing. They always were offering me food and fruits.
I learnt a lot about Thai food, the dish and the way of cooking it and especially about typical food from Southern thai. Thai food is really healthy and well balanced. They eat rice at every meal, the food is full of protein with eggs, pork, chicken, duck and beef. But they also eat a lot of vegetables and local fruits. Thai food is really spicy so you have to ask ‘pet mai’ (“is it Spicy?”) before eating a dish that you don’t know. Fortunately for me i am fond of spicy food. For thai people food is really important, it’s a main aspect of their culture, they will always ask you “arroi mai” (“is it good?”) when you have dinner with them.
Pi Luk was really kind and helpful she helped me more than once if i had problems or requests. I was touched by the museum staff that often invited me to events, venues, or morning market in Songkhla.
Everyone was really careful with me. Even if language barrier is sometimes not easy to manage when you're alone, i really appreciated that everyone made their best and tried on their own way to communicate with me.
I could learn a lot about Thai culture, and the typical way of life.
The Museum
The museum is beautiful and really well equiped with a lot of artefacts to see, conference rooms, a cofee shop with breathtaking view. An idyllic environment to stay and work.
The global atmosphere was friendly, respectful and friendly. And that's what i expected from the place.
Folklore Museum
by Zy Carreon
The whole museum is stunning, it is perched on a mountain on an island surrounded by a lake and to get there, you have to pass by lotus flowers and a long bridge and finally a huge statue of a gold reclining Buddha.
The accommodation is comfortable with the view of the fishing village, the lake and the neighboring islands. It is peaceful and everyone else who is in the building is friendly.
I work from Mondays to Fridays. On Mondays, I go to an elementary school about 15 minutes away by car and help local children improve their English communication skills, it is a place with vibrant energy and I always look forward going there and leave with a wide grin on my face. On Tuesdays, I go to a different office in the museum and help clean recently acquired objects that will be displayed in the museum which is surprisingly a tedious job. These tools depict the daily lives of people in the South of Thailand, they are usually rusty and were used either in their houses or for their work. For the rest of the week, I usually am in the secretarial office that’s located near the entrance of the museum where I help translate articles and mingle with the local staff and we teach each other about our cultures and they teach me how to speak Thai and I help them improve their English as well. Everyone here is so warm and accommodating. Our coordinator has been nothing but kind to us and I could not ask for more. The food here is also great.
Sometimes we go out to other towns like Nakhorn Si Thammarat and Phattalung to reach out to different schools and also some Buddhist temples and teach them how to take care of their artifacts. We’ve also gone to Thaksin University which is where the museum is under, I presented facts about my country and discussed the similarities and differences with it and Thailand with the students. I’ve also been taken to other places to solely experience Thailand and not work, like Hat Yai and we’ve gone rafting in a river in the middle of the jungle and we’ve been on a boat on a lake hours away that only had lotus flowers everywhere and it is one of my favorite places on Earth.
I am really thankful to be a part of this project and I think I really learned a lot about Thai culture, especially the Southern part and it has all been very interesting.
https://www.volunteerspirit.or.th/blog/international-volunteer-blog/folklore-museum-1
Folklore Museum project by Sterling Ulrich
April 2019 was my third and final month as a volunteer at the Thaksin Folklore Museum. I have spent many days working on a big project, editing all the English panels in the museum. But because this is a festive month in Thailand, many of my projects were located outside the physical museum, in Songkhla or Hat Yai.
I made several visits to Thaksin University to meet English language students under Acharn (teacher) Nok. These visits included playing crossword games, hanging out with students in the library and cafeteria, performing group activities with the “Actionbound” app, cleaning up garbage on Samila Beach, teaching English, learning Thai words the students taught me, and teaching about American culture. I was able to make friends very quickly and have plans to stay in touch with some of the students after I leave Thailand.
Between April 11 and April 16, we celebrated Songkran holiday. Songkran is the Thai new year and is sometimes called the “water festival,” because crowds of people line the streets, squirting water guns, spraying hoses, and splashing buckets of water on everyone they meet. It can get crazy, and a little dangerous, inside the big cities, but at the museum we celebrated more traditional rituals. On the first day of Songkran, the staff carved a beautiful pagoda made from white banana stems, and statues of Buddhist monks were placed inside it. Visiting monks sang chants to begin the ceremony, and people took turns pouring water on the Buddhist statues, or scooping rice into a large communal bowl. Afterwards, all the elders took seats, and we poured water on their hands to show respect and receive blessing. The ceremonies concluded with an outdoor banquet. The heat was extreme, but everyone made up for it by splashing water on each other.
The next day, I joined the museum staff in a parade for the “Welcoming the Angels” ceremony in Hat Yai. It is believed that on Songkran, the spirit who has been guarding the Earth departs, and the spirit of the new year takes its place, so celebrations are held for the spirit of the new year. We followed a short parade route downtown, carrying banners and a pagoda palanquin made from more white banana stems. At the center of town, the parade changed to a procession of traditional dancers, including the Manora of Southern Thailand, who wear beaded costumes with tiered crowns, funny tails, and elongated fingers. I had been reading about them in an book by Dr. Marlane Guelden, which was given to me by the museum staff. For the festival, there was a spectacular dance performance, followed by more chanting and rituals with the banana pagoda. People were hesitant to splash parade performers, so I miraculously managed to stay dry!
I had another chance to get very wet during my final week, because my friends from the museum took me snorkeling off the coast of Trang, in the crystal blue Andaman Sea. There were clownfish, parrotfish, and even a crown-of-thorns starfish—animals I had seen in pictures or movies but never up close in the wild. The area was beautiful and spectacular, with green hills and mountains rising straight and sheer out of the water, and bats nesting in the walls of sea caves. I am very glad I got to experience this part of Thailand, and I hope I can return soon to visit the many good friends I have made in this country.
ICL-YOUR FEAR IS NOT ALWAYS TRUE
By Hanna Gifani
I came from Indonesia. I’m Indonesian people and my speaking is not fluently. So, I try to joining the program to be apprenticeship at Thailand for one month. First, I know that I will be live at Koh Yor and I don’t know about the place (I just know from “Google” that is island near lake and the sea). Second, about the job because I applied to have a field practice in here. Third, I know maybe I will get many problem in there, because I don’t know about the language, about the culture, the people and many things. And the last but importance is about the food because I like to eat.
So, this is the “answer” about all of the problem that I think before I’m going to Thailand after I live in Songkhla city for one week and then in Koh Yor for 3 weeks.
First is about “WHERE DO YOU LIVE”. I live in Songkhla city at Suanton village near Songhkla Zoo. This village is very beautiful and clean. This village have a little lake and in here I can see that some of street is a sand not soil like in my country. Next week I live at The Institutes of Southern Thai Studies in Koh Yor. The meaning of “Koh” is island and “Yor” is name of the island. Every time that I see is the sea in front of office and lake in behind of my room. It’s so beautiful when you see the sunset everyday.
Second is “WHAT ARE YOU DOING”. I’m internship at The Institutes of Southern Thai Studies. That is museum owned by Thaksin University. First day I work, my supervisor asks me and my friend to read the information about the museum and the detail all of the room, that totally they have 26 rooms. She invited us to go around the museum and guide the special guest (local people or foreigners). She also introduce us to others. One day, we guided college students from Phuket Rajabhat University and we were telling them about development “Wayang Kulit” and “Gamelan” because Thailand people have the same but with the different design and shape. The other job is we must translate the information from museum brochure or web to Bahasa Indonesia to help developing the museum if Indonesian tourist visit them, on Tuesday when the museum is closed we help to maintenance the antiquities of museum before it display. Sometimes we were attending the event with local people like a inauguration of cooperation with local woven fabric craftsman and volunteer event to cleaning a road of Koh Yor with local people.
Third is about “HOW ABOUT THE PEOPLE”. This is interesting because I can’t speak Thai language. When I had orientation I know some of language like “Sa-wad-dee-ka” is meaning for hello, and then to the end of the sentence they use “ka” for woman and “krap” for man and then we use “Pi” to called the older person. “Kob-khun-ka” is meaning thank you and other words. I’m so glad when my supervisor can speak English, because I think that is more easy to conmuunicate about the job daily. All of the staffs and the president, director is very kind too, although they can’t speak English sometimes they use Google translator or just use body language. To buy the meal or I want going to somewhere, I used “Songthaew”, that is one of public transportation in here. One day that was rainy, I wanted to going to Hatyai city with my friend. I used red songthaew from Koh Yor to Songkhla city and then use green songthaew to Hatyai city. In the songthaew to the Hatyai, sometimes the driver tell a story (I don’t know) with Thai language and I just smile and nodded my head as I understood what he was saying. That is funny experience for me. The other is about culture in here. They are very love the King and Queen, and also they environment too. Every time I visited some place or tourist attraction is very clean and food vendors are organized. I’m so glad (again) brcause they are very kind and know how to make a conversation with tourist (some people can speak Malay) and they are tolerance too.
The last is “WHAT DO YOU EAT”. Because I like to eat very much, in my country Thai tea is very famous and the price is a little expensive. So, the first time I found when I was going to the mall or canteen university is Thai Tea, especially ‘Matcha’ (like green tea). That is so delicious and cheap. For one glass you must pay 10 baht, but in Indonesia you need 48 baht for it. So, the first thing I bought to souvenirs was Thai tea in sachets. The other food I found in here the rice. In here the rice is more sticky, in Indonesia they called it “ketan”. So this is other new experience to me eat blue rice color and the chicken. Everyday I bought my dinner at 7-eleven, and I found the other new food again which doesn’t exist in Indonesia. Like the noodles, fruit drink, milk and many more. My favorite food is fried rice, in Thailand they called it “Khao-pad” and I try it. In here the fried rice have much side dish like shrimp, chicken, vegetables which is unique to me was they used lime to eat with the fried rice. This is the other new food for me (again). After a month in here I know that Thai people like food with a slightly sour and spicy taste.
So, I think there are all of the “answer” from my question and worried before I go to Thailand. We just need to enjoy and ready to all of the condition. Thank you Thailand for all of the experience. See you in the other time.
https://www.volunteerspirit.or.th/blog/international-volunteer-blog/icl-your-fear-is-not-always-true
VSA Thailand สมาคมจิตอาสา
https://www.volunteerspirit.or.th/
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