Yu Xuan

Introduction 10/10/13

Hi! I am Lim Yu Xuan, you can call me Crane. Now look a picture of me below ^_^

Research on Chiang Mai 10/10/13

Chiang Mai is the largest and most culturally significant place in the Northern of Thailand. It was founded by King Mengrai. It has a tropical wet and dry climate. The maximum temperature ever recorded there is 42.4 degree celsius in May 2005. Chiang Mai has over 300 Buddhist temples, also known as “wat”. Chiang Mai celebrates cultural festivals such as the Chiang Mai Flower Festival. This festival takes place during the first weekend in February, when the city’s temperate and tropical flowers are in full bloom. Another festival that the locals there celebrate is the Songkran. Held in the mid-April, it is to celebrate the traditional Thai New Year.

Yupparaj Wittalayai also known as Yupparaj College is the first government school in Chiang Mai. The land for it was donated by the Princess Jao Dararasamee and Princess Intarawarorot Suriyawong, who were the former ruler of Chiang Mai. Its school Motto are courtesy, care, honest and responsibility. Its Vision is “The school strives to produce academically able global citizens with a high level of spritual, intellectual, social, ethical and physical development. Being a government school, they offer tuition at very modest price. All their classrooms also has air-conditioning, LCD projector, screen and audio system.

The Inthanon Royal Project is held at the Doi Inthanon National Mountain which is the highest mountain in Thailand. It is even higher then Mt Kosciuszko, situated in Australia. Although cold at the top, it does not snow there. Around the bottom of the Mountain are two waterfall and a market. You can also find the one of the biggest waterfall, Mae Ya Waterfall.

Wat Pho is a buddhist temple in Bangkok, Thailand. It is located directly adjacent to the Grand Palace. Wat Pho is also known as the Temple of the Reclining Buddha. It is also the birthplace of Thai massage. Wat Pho is named after the monastery in India where Buddha is believed to have lived. After an enormous buddha image was being destroyed by the Burmese in 1767, its fragments are incorporated to build a temple. Wat Pho is one of the largest and oldest buddhist temple in Bangkok. The Reclining Buddha in Wat Pho is a statue that is 15m high, 43m long. Its right arm. Its right arm supports its head with tight curls on two box-pillows of blue, richly encrusted with glass mosaics. The 3m high and 4.5m long foot of the buddha are inlaid with mother-of-pearl.

SOURCES:

 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Mai

 - http://www.yupparajep.net/

 - http://wikitravel.org/en/Doi_Inthanon_National_Park

 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wat_Pho

 - http://www.chiangmai-chiangrai.com/doi-inthanon-national-park.html

 - http://www.tothailand.com/wallpaper/bangkok.php

Day 1 Reflection 28/10/13

This is my first time going overseas without my parents. Once my mother told me that at the age of 10 she would allow me to go travel on the plane alone to meet her when she goes on business trip but in the end her she stopped going for business trip.

I learnt of what to do in the airport, what you can bring what you cannot. I feel that I have grown up a little more as I do not need to rely on my parents when going overseas anymore. Even though there are some parts that I may have done wrongly but these are a ways to learn in life, by learning from my mistake. I am sure I will be able to be responsible of what to do when traveling in future. 

Although I miss my father as he was not able to bring me to the airport at the last minute when we were about to step out of the house as he had some work to do, I did not get mad at him this time. Instead I tried to understand him and calm myself down stopping my tears from dripping. This has indeed showed that I really have grown up of it was me in the past I would have already scolded my father when he answered my call.

I am tired now after a long day of flight but I am really glad that I learnt a lot of stuff and became more independent.

Day 2 Reflection 29/10/13

Today is second day of the trip. In the morning I was really surprise that I actually woke up right away when my room mate call my name. Usually it takes people a very long time to wake me up. I just realised that most of the people in our trip really likes to eat omelets, during breakfast time there was a line in front made up of only SST students in front of the person frying the egg.

We went to the Inthanon Royal Project. It was very tiring as we had to hike most of the day climbing up and down. However when we actually reach the top we it was quite satisfying the scenery was very beautiful especially the one of the waterfall. Although my phone was very wet after taking all the pictures but it was quite cool. Nature is really something very special and we should really appreciate them, we had a lot of fun there.

We went to the farm market and I actually bought souvenirs for my family, I even bought clothes for them, I was fun buying stuff there, I want to thank Ms Wu for helping me get a good bargain for one of the items I bought.

We also saw many plants and animals. I was actually really able to smell the flowers. It was also nice seeing where our rice we eat everyday was taken from and how they are like at first. As for the animals we actually saw some of them moving about freely. I saw how the villagers tend the flowers before sending them to the city to sell. 

Although not a coffee lover I really love the part of the day when we bought our coffee. The fragrance of the coffee was really very nice. I was even able try grinding the coffee beans by myself. I bought the coffee powder and I am seriously gonna drink them at home.

These first times like grinding the coffee beans and hiking the mountain really made the day very memorable. I really want to thank the driver who have drove us up most of the mountain and been with us for the whole day up on the mountain. Today was really a fun the special day.

Day 3 Reflection 30/10/13

Its the third day of the trip now. This time we went to Yupparaj Wittayalai school. It is the first day we meet our Thai counterparts, their school is very big and they have students  from six different levels, from grade 7 to grade 12. I had three Thai counter part, Ami, Cindy and Asia.

I was in group B so I had to do the soil testing and water testing first, I was assign to do the testing of the soil for pH level. We had to teach our counterparts for the whole day. At first I was talking very weirdly to them maybe its because it was our first meeting and I have to teach them and communicate with them. It was not very difficult communicating with them, the only difficulty is that I actually talk too fast. 

Then we switched with group A and its is our turn to do the the Arduino. I taught Ami how to use it while Jodie taught Cindy and Asia as they wanted to be together. It was easy to teach her at first but it eventually got difficult as we had to move to the circuit ten and above which I had not done before. I was actually learning while doing the circuit with her. At times I even seem silly as I there are facts that I did not know that I was suppose to do like I actually have to upload the circuit again for the buzzer to ring. There was also one circuit which should be circuit thirteen, we actually redid everything thinking that maybe the wire is wrong and eventually still realised that we actually use a temperature sensor or something like that instead of a transistor, they actually look exactly the same and I thought it was the same thing. We was not able to do much due to that though.

When I saw the Thai students taking off their shoes to go in rooms in the school I was curious as to why and learnt from Ami that it was actually a tradition for them to do so. I also found out that their names such as Ami and Cindy did not sound Thai as they were nicknames given by their parents, they actually have an extra special name. 

Lastly we discussed about what science and engineering projects can we carry out with our counterparts. They were actually quite quiet but they did speak clearly and fluently when we ask them something, they are just shy to speak out their thoughts. We did not finish the discussion as their school curriculum ends at around five in the evening. Ami thanked me for all we have taught them and I gave her a hug before saying goodbye to them all.

It was quite a great experience to teach them and I enjoyed the day with them. I really look forward to meeting them again tomorrow and also to try making their Thai food.

Research Idea: I decided to research on that in what environment does rice or wheat grow best for the Science Project and for the Engineering project I decided to use this information and use Arduino to make an indoor rice field. Thanks to Mr Tan’s suggestions of the indoor rice field idea.

Day 4 Reflection 31/10/13

Its that last day of this trip and also the day we say goodbye to our Thai counterparts before leaving Chiang Mai tomorrow. Today we went to Yupparaj Wittayalai again however this time is special, its their turn to teach us.

Most of the activities that we did was about their project on using lichens to test the air pollution in the surrounding. After hearing the presentation from three Thai students on the project, we went around Chiang Mai and look for lichens. We were divided into different group that are based on colours and my group is the purple group. My group went to a temple and looked for lichens growing on the chedi outside the temple to take photos of them. We were lucky to be able to go to the place were they sell lots of food, so after taking the pictures, we went to have a small walk around some shops. Mr Tan followed our group and bought some fried bananas. I tried on of them and it was really crunchy, it was better then the fried bananas sold in Singapore. For me I bought an ice popsicle, It was rather special as it was in the flavour of jackfruit that was not sold in Singapore.

When we went back we had to wait for the others as the places they went was further then ours. Then we had the Thai cooking lesson. Yes! This was the part I looked forward too very much previously. I really had a great time there as I got to cook by myself! I was really delighted when I was being commended by some people that I was able to cook well. Although I did not try cooking or eating the desert, I had fun cooking the noodles and I actually learn a new dish I can cook.

After all this we went back to the meeting room to have our actual lunch. After the lunch had fun seeing students being “punished” as they left their name tags lying around. All the goofing and laughing around were over and we went to the computer lab to check out how well the lichens grew from the photos we collected. We used photoshop to find out how many percent is the green colour in the photos then the red and blue colour which can roughly tell us if we have more in which sides of the chedi showing which situation that the lichens grows best, as the lichens are green in colour.

Then we had our tea break before finding out the result of the the whole experiment of lichens. We got back to our groups the day before and exchange gifts. Then we have speeches being recited by both schools representative. Before going we were given time to take photos with out counterparts. We had fun photo bombing that I became high real high even after we left the school.

After having dinner we even got a chance to put up the put lantern and watch them fly away. I have always wanted to have a chance of putting them up and this time I actually really got the chance. In the bus back, I was still high and tried entertaining people but instead I think I entertained myself, making everything feel weird and me feeling like a crazy woman.

I really enjoyed this last day with the knowledge of in what environment lichens grow well, with the experience of cooking Thai food, putting up the big lantern and being high for a while. By the way, I also enjoyed the dinner too it was special this time and delicious.

The Whole Trip

Visiting the Doi Inthanon mountain, I learned the history of the mountain, the history of Chiang Mai and how the mountain is used to support the living of the citizens in Chiang Mai. I also learned more about some agriculture and seen wheat with my own eyes. From the waterfall, I found out that how water in it is actually used by people living on the mountain. Visiting Yupparaj Wittayalai School allows mw to learn more about how students in Chiang Mai study and how to teach students what I have learned before, gaining more experience. It also allows me to be more socialise with others from countries different from mine and learn more about cross-cultural. I gained a lot from these experiences and would be able to use them in the future.