There is a formula that clearly has to be applied when making year four plays. The first part is that one has to make sure that it has academic merit in that there are clear links to the topic that has been studied recently (people who discovered America). Next there has to be lots of narration so that the parents can see that their off-spring have learned something. This is then followed by triads of year fours standing a straight line reciting carefully selected words to try to give the impression of dialogue (that's the Drama ticked off). Finally there has to be lots of songs, sung to backing tracks, shoehorned into the gaps between all of these segments to try to create a bit of razzmatazz. Sometimes, although not always, there is a star who does a bit of acting.
Thus it was that on Wednesday and Thursday I managed to watch two different year four plays, both out of interest mainly, one of which included the youngest Lawrence, Trixie, aka Leif Erikson. Being the daughter of two Drama teachers can't be easy at the best of times, but cometh the class play then surely it can be helpful? Well The Girl Lawrence didn't disappoint, and thanks to a bit of coaching and loads of praise she managed to storm the latest role called Erikson played by a Lawrence. She obeyed all the Rules Of The Drama Teacher (make every movement have meaning, get a voice from the movements, and pull as many facial expressions as possible). She also managed to avoid her father's acting failings which usually involved forgetting his lines and waving his arms around a lot.
But despite being really pleased with young Trixie I was left feeling that the year four formula could be so much better. As a result of that the Drama Team at my place have been having lots of discussions about what we can do to make plays, especially at primary level much better and avoid the formula.
Later on Thursday the children and I embarked on our latest mad dash holiday. Thanks to lots of complicated logistics and a sale from Malaysia Airlines I had booked three days away in Thailand. Sadly Lexi was not off on Friday, today, so has had to remain at home. After meeting Edwin and Trixie at the end of school we dashed off to collect Rupert and then dashed further off to KLIA and the flight to Bangkok. Chattering away about plans, ideas and random wibbles about the day I managed to miss a crucial turn off towards the airport, which meant a double back and a little more time pressure, but we still made it to the airport and flight with time to spare. Malaysia airlines is noticeably more posh than its budget rivals and I enjoyed watching a Niki Lauda film on the plane. However I was left wondering how come Rupert and Trixie's child meal was so much larger than mine and Edwin's regular adult portion?
The taxi to our Bangkok hotel worked fine, despite monster traffic, and we all snoozed well. Just before snoozing we did a quick stock check on what had been forgotten: Edwin had only brought one pair of shoes, Rupert had everything he needed and apparently so did Trixie. Well almost everything. It quickly turned out that she had forgotten to bring any spare pants. At time of writing (night two) I am pleased to report that she is getting very good at washing out underwear. She has brought two swimming costumes though.
The official reason for a day off from school today is that it is Wesak Day on Saturday and so today is a replacement holiday day for that. I am not entirely sure what Wesak Day is but judging by the crowds of people all around The Emerald Buddha Temple it was clear that it was a Buddhist festival. I really should do some research. We joined the throngs of people there but were told that the Emerald Buddha was out of bounds today, due to various holy reasons, so we gave it a miss. Had we been allowed in there would have been various knee problems though. Apparently Buddhas don't like knees, well not certain types of knees, and both mine and Edwin's were considered by a friendly and cheerful uniformed ticket seller to be the wrong sort of knees. Rupert, wearing shorts, and Trixie, wearing her best, on-tour dress and freshly washed out pants, had knees that were apparently ones that were tolerated by those enlightened Buddhas.
Undeterred, and sweating loads in the heat, we carried on with our explore, and were about to go and enter into a different area of the Grand Palace when we stopped for a second. This isn't a dangerous thing to do in Bangkok but you are never very far away from someone who is trying to sell you something in this part of the world and Bangkok works very much in that way. Wearing the confident smile of a salesman out of the shadows stepped a grinning character who did his best to convince us that we had just met exactly the person we had been searching for. Promising the earth he assured us that he could arrange a quick sight-seeing tour for next to no cash at all, and almost immediately a small tuktuk appeared by our sides. The deal was that the driver would take us to go and see the Standing Buddha, for 20 baht each, each way, as long as we visited a certain tailor's shop. Having no intention of buying clothes I agreed and off we whizzed. Children enjoyed the tuktuk ride and the Standing Budda too , while I did my best to feign interest in tailored shirts, which at 1000 baht each were a good price. Apparently the driver would receive coupons for petrol if we visited this particular tailor. Suitably full of petrol coupons and without buying anything we returned with our driver to the hotel, with just enough time for a swim and checking out.
Next it was time to get a taxi to Bangkok Noi train station for the afternoon train to Kanachanaburi. I had really wanted to take about across the river to the station, but it was sadly too hot so instead we managed to go in a pink taxi, much to Trixie's delight.
The train journey, costing a very reasonable 100 baht each, was smooth, airy, hot and through real lowland Thailand. It also had all the really pleasing additions for the tourist namely regular entrances from people selling cold drinks and various snacks to the ever popular squat toilet that emptied out to cries of "Daddy it goes straight on to the track." And then some praise for the VN Guesthouse in a delightful location right next to the river in Kanchanaburi. The manager and I had exchanged several emails prior to our arrival and had promised to send a free taxi to collect us from the station. She was good to her word and moments after we started to walk off with a smiling friendly taxi driver I caught site of another smiling friendly taxi driver bearing a sign marked "Robin Timothy Lawrence." The latter grinned more when we were united while the former's face fell a little.
Tomorrow we explore some more but will avoid the food place where the first waitress who tried to serve us listened to my first few words of Thai and then fell about in embarrassed laughing before running away. I had only asked for some fried chicken.