Living the hard life at Nai Harn Beach, Phuket

When I stepped off the plane from Bangkok and arrived in Phuket, Thailand, I was still a little skeptical about the American TESOL Institute (ATI).  These are the administrators of the course I am taking to become certified to teach English to speakers of other languages.  Before I left, I had zero information on where I would teach, what age, or basically anything else about the course.  I also found a few scary things online that lead me to believe I may be stepping into a huge scam or maybe even a ring of sex traders.
  Who knows??  After waiting for about 2 hours for an unknown person from ATI to pick me up at the Phuket airport, I met another girl who was also waiting for the same unknown person.  Things are looking up!  This made me feel a significantly better because now I know I’m not the only fool who gave my money to some strangers via PayPal from half way around the world.  This sounds a little silly saying it out loud but A.) I didn’t give my parents all the details (mainly because I didn’t have any) and B.) I’m not the kind of girl that’s going to sit home and wonder if anything bad could happen, I’ll just risk it and find out for myself!  About 2 and half hours after arriving, a Thai man pulls up to the curb in a van holding a sign that says my name, Michele’s and our new friend’s name on it.  Ok so maybe it’s not a complete scam!  I’m extremely relieved when we pull up to our hotel called the All Seasons in Nai Harn Beach.  It’s located at the southern tip of Phuket Island and Nai Harn is one of the cleanest and nicest beaches in Phuket.  As soon as we reached the lobby to check in there were several westerners also in our program who had arrived a few days prior.  There are about 40 students total, mostly American, one English, and one Irish, all awesome.  Besides feeling extremely overwhelmed by the rush of new faces, greetings, and tons of questions in a matter of 2 minutes, I was tremendously thankful that ATI pulled through and I know I am exactly where I am suppose to be.  The gorgeous beach right outside doesn’t make it too hard either!