Full Project Week Reflection

Once we had formed a group for project week I initially took a leadership role in planning the trip. We firstly had to decide where we wanted to go to which took quite a long time of researching and looking at many destinations. We finally decided on Krabi, Thailand, here we could do many fun and adventures tourist activities as well as doing service, this was the perfect combination for us. It was also relatively close to Singapore and cheap to fly to. I delegated roles to each of us, with an individual being in charge of: Flights, service, action and accommodation.

I was in charge of service which was one of the more difficult roles as finding an appropriate location took a long time and many of the volunteering websites were for 6 month vocations. I eventually tried on of the websites which offered 2 week vocations and emailed to see if we could do a shorter, 3 day one. They replied back yes and that we would be able to concentrate on education and healthcare type services. This was great to hear and in the coming weeks I continued to emailing them and confirming the plans.

The accommodation and flights were relatively easy to find and book and we were able to get some relatively cheap but nice accommodation which was in a great location. We decided on both snorkelling and Muay Thai for the action component of our trip, this was mainly due to one of our members being a karate black belt and wanting to experience Muay Thai. We were able to find a Muay Thai gym only 20 minutes’ walk from our hotel and find a snorkelling service which would pick us up from our hotel. Overall I was really happy with how things were falling into place with the whole trip. I was also very happy with the group as a whole and looking forward to the trip.

Not much happened from then until the trip except for us planning our budget and exchanging money. This was relatively easy as we kept a detailed budget of the trip and allocated a reasonable amount of money per day for the trip.

It was now the Sunday that we left for the trip and we all met at the airport ready and excited for the trip. The flight was relatively uneventful and we managed to get a cheap taxi to our hotel. We were very happy with the hotel as we managed to get two joining rooms with a total of 5 beds for us all. The hotel was right in the centre of the town and near the beach, an overall great location. We were also able to get some great local food as well as venture to some cafes and western fast food chains.

We woke up early on the Monday morning as we were to meet our service partner, we first had to find a taxi to get to the mall where we would meet her. We found a local bus/taxi service where we piled up in the back of a car with locals heading in the same direction as us. This was cheap and managed to get us there on time where we successfully met our contact. She then took us in her car to a primary school where we would promote a non smoking campaign. We very coincidentally met another UWC project week group who had also signed up with the same service group there. This was very surprising but nice to see some familiar faces. We then spent the day at a school assembly where we promoted the non smoking campaign and played with the kids. There was even a local news network which interviewed us about our campaign and smoking in Singapore. We then had lunch with them and left for a secondary school. Here things got very strange as we walked into a school talent competition between 3 school and sat at the very front along with very important looking Krabi government officials. We were given food and treated like royalty whilst we watched a 3 hour long talent show which was all in Thai. After the talent show we got back to promoting our non smoking campaign and took photos which the local school children who were very excited to see us. After this we were dropped back at our hotel and went out to eat whilst reflecting on our quite strange day.

The next day was just as strange as we took the same journey to our pickup point. We were then taken to one of the main hospitals in Krabi. Here, we were once again treated like royalty and given a full presentation by the man in charge of the hospital. He talked about the history of the hospital and different wards. We were then able to ask questions and go on a tour around the hospital. The hospital tour was very interesting as we went to each different ward. One of the most interesting wards was the traditional medicine ward as here both modern and traditional medicine techniques were used in treating patients, an interesting compromise. After our tour was over we journeyed to a smaller clinic where we met with those in charge and had a talk about the clinic and patients in Krabi. After this our day was over and we journeyed back to our hotel.

The next day was our last service day, where we once again met at our meeting point. We then were driven back to the clinic we had been in the day before and told that we were going to a kindergarten school to do development checks on the students. This was a short drive and we were given a variety of tasks which the students must be able to do to pass. These included working with shapes, catching balls and recognising animals. There were about 10 different tests in total and we were split up into groups of 2 and 3. We then spent the next hours preforming these tests. Unfortunately most children had poor English which meant we had to comprise and come up with different methods of talking with them, which was interesting. I found this very enjoyable and rewarding, however it took a very very long time to do and was quite tiring. Once we were finished we had lunch at a local restaurant which was surprisingly nice. We then had some time to journey to a small island just off of Krabi which our service partner took us to. Here we went on motorbike taxis and visited different rice farms and other small villages. This was very interesting and a well earned break from our service. We then visited another island where we went through some small cave systems and after that the day was almost over. We then thanked our service partner for all the time and said goodbye, we also gave her a little present from Singapore which she much appreciated.

We then started our day of action, doing two sessions of Muay Thai. We once again woke up early to head to the Muay Thai gym via taxi, this was just a short 5 minute drive. None of us had done Muay Thai before and I was quite apprehensive about doing it. Fortunately, we had a very good trainer who trained us on the basics whilst also attending to the rest of the class, which was quite small. We quickly learnt the basics and tried different moves on each other. The session was a few hours long and we were all exhausted afterwards, there was then a few hours break until the afternoon session so we walked back to our hotel to rest up. The walk back was just over 20 minutes and we were all very tired in the hotel and enjoyed some food and a shower. A couple hours later we headed back out and walked to the gym, we were a bit more rested now but still quite tired. The gym was a bit more busy now and we specifically practiced on punching bags as well as going in the ring with the trainer for more individual practice. I learnt a lot that day about the difficulty of Muay Thai and was extremely tired from it. We then took the long walk back to the hotel and once again showered and ate, we were now all tired and keen to rest.

The next day was snorkelling with a once again early start, we met the snorkelling company at our hotel and took their bus to a main centre near the beach. Here, we met with all the other groups and got on the boat, the boat was quite big and packed with people. It was unfortunately an overcast day although this did mean that it was quite cool. We ventured to the Phi Phi islands taking many different stops at places full of tourists. We also went snorkelling which was a lot of fun as the sun came out a bit more. Whilst the coral wasn’t amazing, it was still very good and interesting to see. We spent the next few hours talking on the boat and going to different snorkelling locations. Afterwards we went to the main Phi Phi island which we then explored. This was quite developed and even had shops and a hotel. After spending a while exploring the island and eating some lunch we go back on the boat and began to travel back the the mainland. This took quite a while and we were all quite tired by the time we got back to the mainland and the taxi back to our hotel. We then got some fastfood and relaxed in the hotel.

It was now our second last day and we had a well deserved late wake up. We took the day quite slowly and took a walk down to the beach. We then got some plastic bags from the local supermarket and began to do a little beach clean-up. This was quite an easy thing to do and whilst there was not a lot of rubbish on the beach, there was enough that we could quickly clean-up. It was surprising how quickly we filled up the plastic bags and showed me just how easy it is to collect some rubbish and clean a beach. We spent most of the day exploring the local shops around where we stayed and relaxing in a nice local café which we found. Then in the evening we decided to take a bus/taxi into the main city where there was a market. This market was very busy and interesting to explore and buy some small gifts. We then found a restaurant to eat at and had a nice dinner reflecting on our journey.

It was then the last day and we had a late wakeup before packing our bags. We took a few last pictures of our hotel before taking a taxi to the airport. Here we managed to easily take our flight back and we were back in Singapore before we knew it.

Overall, I really enjoyed my project week experience, both what I did during the time and the people which I did it with. We were able to do a wide variety of activities which we all found very interesting. We were also easily able to keep within our budget whilst staying at a very nice place and eating properly. I do wish that our service could have been a bit more hands on a times, however, I understand some of the reasons why we could not always be involved in helping. The whole trip was a great experience that I know I will remember for a long time.