Let It Go

In a country that knows no winter or snow,  the movie "Frozen" is a household and classroom favorite. For many of my students, singing along to "frozen" songs is the most English words they've even spoken consecutively, some of their best pronunciation, and a good chunk of their vocabulary.  It's catchy. It's enticing, and incredibly foreign to them (when I asked my fourth graders to draw a picture of the best weather they can think of, I got a lot of snow, snowmen, winter, cool, cold). 

They might like the tune, might like the simplicity, might be fascinated by the concept of winter. But there's also an incredibly strong tie between the "theme" song, "Let it Go" and the behavior and attitude in Thai culture. 

When I first explained the lyrics to my kids (1st through 6th graders), I did it word by word but then also tried to give them a comparison. "Let it go" is similar to the Thai "Mai bpen rai" literally "no is nothing" but used as "don't worry about it, it's alright" or, as I explained, "let it go". 

Mai bpen rai is used for EVERYTHING in Thailand. Train is 2 hours late? Mai bpen rai. Your leg is broken (co-teacher) and you still have to climb the stairs each day for class? Mai bpen rai. The foods too spicy, theres a bug in your salad, you broke a glass, you can't pay rent for another two weeks? Mai bpen rai. 

All my students loved Frozen long before I came along. But when I made that connection, some of my older kids got really excited. 

I assigned homework (once) for my fourth graders, and when a young girl forgot to bring it, she said "teacher, let it go". When kids are screaming or running around the class, I inevitably have a sympathetic student tap me, smile, and just say "let it go". Whether that is because I overly simplified the phrase, because that's their solution to problems, because it's easy to remember, because they like the song or because of any number of possibilities, "let it go" has become the go-to phrase for my older students. 

As it's so much a part of Thai culture to just accept things as they are, to let it go, not worry, be happy, smile... My students find it so natural to adopt "let it go", to just smile and continue on when frustrating things happen. For me, it's proven a bit harder. 

I don't want to just let it go. I feel like that's giving up on it, accepting the bad as a fact rather than an opportunity for improvement. There's a lot we don't have the power to change, but when we do, how can we just let it go? 

Last weekend, a stoplight on the busiest road on our island went out. It was chaos- a police officer kind of helped direct traffic, but all day long the roads in the surrounding neighborhood (my neighborhood) were in a standstill when there's normally barely any cars. Instead of complaining for better regulation of the light or clearer direction from the police officer, people just went along with their days. If the problem is out of your power to fix, this mentality can save you a lot of energy and frustration... But when you can do something (go a different route, call the police to ask for more help), why wouldn't you? 

The weekend previous, we had a similar problem, but with much different results as it was us as westerners that were affected, and apparently we haven't fully assimilated. Across the street from our apartment, a wedding began at 5:45 am. Congratulations! Beautiful! Lovely for you both! AWFUL for the neighbors. The wedding extended out onto the street and included extreme speakers, meaning that at 5:45 am on a Sunday, we were all wide awake, and able to hear every breath, cough, musical note and sigh at incredible decibels, all from the comfort of our own beds. 

The offending speaker system

At first, we thought there had been a mistake. I waited, thinking that surely this was a mistake, the music shouldn't have started this early, someone will get up and shut it off. Second song began, I was up and out of my door, saw the rest of the foreigners up in arms and two already marching over to tell them to turn it down. I had been scrambling around my room to find scissors for the wires, but I supposed diplomacy would be a good place to start. It worked for a little while, they turned it down slightly, but by 8 am we were all fed up and left the neighborhood for the day- out to a nice breakfast then working in a coffee shop a safe distance away from the hellish speakers. We ended up having a very enjoyable day and getting a lot accomplished (with delicious cappuccinos in hand), when it started out so uncomfortably. We "let it go" that the wedding was going to be incredibly loud, but we didn't have to sit around and listen, so we didn't. 

The wedding speakers to me seemed like a clear cut situation. Loud, jarring, unavoidable- so leave (until 8 at night). But there were many Thai neighbors who did nothing to even acknowledge the wedding- they went about their day doing laundry and watching TV as if they could hear it over the sounds (trust me, they couldn't). 

They had fully "let it go" that there was this incredibly loud event happening, and essentially began to ignore it. At what point to you realize that you have no power over something and that you have to let it go? And if you let it go before that point... what does that show? Laziness? Acceptance? Complacency?  Or just an inner peace that can be found through all that Thai meditation.... 

How often do you just "let it go"?

Rains in Bangkok made my train sit in the station
for over an hour... Let it go.