Tales and Travels of a Teacher in Thailand - Softcover

Sparks, Mr Jeff

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1544753713 ISBN 13: 9781544753713

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2017

Synopsis

Disillusioned with the tedium of life in the UK, Jeff Sparks spends months each winter roaming Thailand. Increasingly drawn to the liberation of a tropical climate and the ease with which Thai people enjoy life, Jeff yearns to feel more involved. Eviction from his U.K. flat by an overbearing local authority propels Jeff to move to Thailand where he soon finds a job teaching English alongside fellow ex-pats in a private Bangkok school owned by a matriarch who regards all the staff as members of her own family. Jeff and the teachers try to establish new lives and families in the Land of Smiles with varying degrees of success over the next two decades. The reader joins Jeff and his friends on their adventures, both humorous and reflective, in rural Thailand and the Bangkok classroom. A graduate of Thai language, the author’s lengthy time in Thailand makes ‘Tales and Travels of a Teacher in Thailand’ an engaging, joyful and insightful personal account of a Westerner abroad.

About this title

About the Author:

The author spent his formative years in Nigeria, an experience that inspired his lifelong love for the tropics. He moved to Thailand in 1992, dividing his time between Bangkok and his wife’s family farm. Determined to escape the tedium of a dull office job and the grey streets of a cold UK, Jeff Sparks moves to tropical Thailand, intent on building a new life of joie de vivre and freedom in the Land of Smiles. Like many other Westerners, he turns to teaching English to earn a living and finds himself with fellow ex-pats working in a private school starting an English Programme. Bonds of friendship and camaraderie develop between the teachers and the school as it struggles to survive in an increasingly competitive atmosphere. Over two decades the deep attachment of the teachers to the school and Thailand lead to happiness and sadness as dreams are both fulfilled and crushed. From the chaos of Bangkok in term time to the mountains, fields and beaches of the provinces in the long holidays, we follow the teachers in adventures laced with humour and pathos, both in the classroom and outside.

About this edition

• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1544753713
• ISBN 13: 9781544753713
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 214