Pasir Tumboh

We arrived at our school at around 10 o'clock in the evening. having experience a jungle toilet more than once on the way we where keen to just go to sleep. When we pulled up outside this two storey house, we where certain it was a joke. When we had been told we where staying the the VIP Principle's house, they really weren't lying.
http://goo.gl/maps/E2XBa

The house is incredible, we have two living rooms, 4 bedrooms all en-suite, plus dining room and kitchen. the best part however is definitely the AirCon however the heated electric shower comes close. We where amazed, and a little smug. We spent the entire evening sorting and conttsuting a list of everything we would need to "pimp" our house as James called it.

After a fantastic nights sleep, we woke and prepared ourselves for our first day at MRSM Pasir Tumboh. After being shown round the school by our Mentor Reen and meeting the staff and Principle, we went round to be introduced to some of the kids. This reminded me of the scenes when One Direction step out onto the red carpet. The kids went ballistic, especially the girls. We where doing pictures, signing shirts and answering endless questions about every topic imaginable from 'Where do you come from" to "Do you have a girlfriend". The kids have also decided i look like Justin Bieber and James looks like Zayn Malik, oh dear. that evening in the dining hall. We had sat down for ten seconds when we where instantly surrounded by boys asking us about football. Some kids even made others go fetch them a drink so that their seat would not be stolen.

The staff were also incredible friendly, I reckon if we fluttered our eyelids we could eat for free for the entire year. Everyone we spoke to said they wanted to take us out to dinner. We have been good friends with the other male English, Mr Zaman who is so nicely we feel guilty every time we see him. He has taken us to dinner, lunch, breakfast, out shopping, to the market  and so much ore i cant remember. The same continued the next day, it never gets old being treated like a superstar. we where however quite glad of the arrival of the weekend.

As we were still loving our house and project we decided to invite our nearest volunteers, Tom, Danny and Dale to come stay as this was a long weekend to celebrate Malaysian independence day. the Malays have ridiculous amounts of holiday. They are working in MRSM Kota Putra and Basut in the neighbouring state of Terenganu. They arrived on the Friday afternoon. Much swearing and jealousy then took place as they check out our house. Tom and Danny are staying in the old sick bay, so Tom says "he can practically taste the disease". Dale described his accommodation as 'A cardboard box that is wider than it is tall", but imagine that in a Geordie accent. That evening we where treated again by Zaman to Malaysian Satay. One thing malaysia has taught me already his how far from real chicken chicken nuggets actaully are.
http://goo.gl/maps/HM6Uf

The next day we went to visit Kota Bharu for the first time and visited the central state market. You could have bought anything, from cabbage to a samurai sword. That evening, we had been invited to the football by the schools technician and my new best friend Hadifh (he extended the range of the wifi so we get it at home). we assumed it would be a small local game, but no. When the Malays do football they do it properly. It was a home game for Kelantan FA, or the Red Warriors. They are the states national team and this was an important game, equivalent to an FA cup semi-final. the tickets were still only RM15 (around 3 pounds). The atmosphere was incredible, however unfortunately Kelantan lost.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelantan_FA

The next day there was a surprise visit to the biggest Tesco known to man. Seriously this place was massive, it have 42 checkouts plus there was a complete mall built around the store. Tesco's in the UK do not compare. On the way home there was a surprise visit to what has now become my favourite place, the Bundle Store. Basically imagine a pile of second hand t-shirts, about 4 feet tall. we where told it was RM10 for 3 items. James bought 10, I bought 9 and we wanted to stay forever.

That marked the end of the weekend, the boys went home rather reluctantly on Sunday afternoon ao James and I had the afternoon free. after cleaning the entire house, we jammed on the guitars for a good 2 hours. After a relaxing first week we were prepared to begin our teaching the next morning.