Jia Zhi (Clare)

Photo:

Essay:
Chiang Mai is the largest and most culturally significant city in northern Thailand. It is the capital of Chiang Mai Province, a former capital of the Kingdom of Lanna. It is located 700 km north of Bangkok, among the highest mountains in the country. The city is along the Ping River, a major tributary of the Chao Phraya River. Chiang Mai means "new city" and was so-named because it was the new capital, founded in 1296. In recent years, Chiang Mai has become an increasingly modern city and has been attracting over 5 million visitors each year.The residents speak Kham Muang among themselves, though Central Thai is used in education and is understood by everyone. The Yupparaj School is a public school, the first school of Chiang Mai. Set up in 2442 by royal policy.Land for the school was donated by Her Royal Highness Princess Jao Dararasamee and Prince 

Intarawarorot Suriyawong, former rulers of Chiang Mai. 

The school is situated in the center of the old town in Chiang Mai. The school have modern facilities 

such as library, scientific labs and computer labs. 
The Doi Inthanon Royal Project is located on the main Doi Inthanon mountain road in the Hmong village of Khun Klang. It was established in 1979 as part of His Majesty's Royal Project Foundation. It is one of many re-education projects conceived to familiarize the hilltribe people with new agricultural techniques. The research station carries out work on developing marketable crops, ranging from fruit trees to flowering plants, to help the surrounding hill tribe villages, composed chiefly of Hmong and Karen tribes. There are many greenhouses where flowering plants such as lilies, roses and many others are grown. There are also greenhouses for ferns and cacti. Wat Pho is a Buddhist temple in Phra Nakhon district, Bangkok, Thailand. It is located in the Rattanakosin district directly adjacent to the Grand Palace.Known also as the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, its official name is Wat Phra Chettuphon Wimon Mangkhlaram Ratchaworamahawihan. The temple is also known as the birthplace of traditional Thai massage.
Credits:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Mai, http://www.bangkokpost.com/travel/22017_info_inthanon-royal-project.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wat_Pho

Day 4:

Today, is the last day at Yupparaj Wittayalai School. Yesterday we planned the activities so today they planned the activities. When we first reached there, we listen to a presentation about lichens. The presentation was interesting as I was amazed how thai students found an organism to determine the air pollution. After the presentation, we headed out to the nearby pagodas and look at some lichens. When we got back, we got ready for the Thai cooking lesson. Today, I learned how to cook Pad Thai. After watching the teachers doing it a few times, we finally got to have hands-on cooking. It was finally my turn to start cooking, i cooked with Li Ying. At first I was in-charge of pouring all the ingredients for her to cook, but i wanted to give a try of cooking pad thai so i exchanged roles with her. Although I cooked until some ingredients flew out, i still had fun. It was a good experience for me to cook in front of a crowd as every time i cook, only one person will be beside me. Soon after we cooked, we got to taste it. The noodles were not bad but it was just a little bland so that is one thing I could take note of when I am cooking pad thai in the future. But that was not our only lunch. We went back to the conference room where a buffet was prepared for us. After lunch, some people received their punishment for misplacing their name tags. They had to showcase a talent and if the crowd and seniors are satisfied then they can take their name tags back. After the talent show, we headed to the computer lab. At the computed lab we used photoshop to see how much red, blue, green are in our photos we took when we went out to look at lichens. I learned some new functions of photoshop that i did not know it actually exists. After that we went back to the conference room for some snacks. After the snacks we listen to both representatives from both the School Of Science And Technology and Yupparaj Wittayalai school. Both of the representatives talked about what were their feelings about our exchange programme. Afterwards, we gave gifts to our Thai counterparts and took pictures with them before we bid each other goodbye. We wished each other good luck, take care ect. After we left, we headed for special dinner. It was the most expensive dinner on the trip. The restaurant had a good ambience and we had variety of food. There was even a band in the restaurant! After the dinner, we followed our tour guide, Jack, to release lanterns into the sky. We made wishes and after the tour guide check our lanterns were ready to go, “1,2,3!” The lanterns were up in the sky. We watched as our lanterns get smaller and smaller and that concludes the day. 

Overall experience

I think I benefitted a lot from this trip. Although there were many challenges for me through out this trip, i overcome the challenges. I made many many new friends. From the first day, being room mates with someone i was totally not close with before the trip, to trekking in the mud and having my shoes all totally muddy to having three Thai counterparts that were older than me and doing experiments I was not sure of in front of teachers. But definitely I had lots and lots of fun. It was my first trip with school, without any of my relatives, first time trekking in the mud and so on. I believe many of us had many first times through out this trip. I became much closer with my school mates. I would remember this trip and I hope I can go on more GCP trips. :)

Email: chua_jia_zhi@s2013.sst.edu.sg