Thai'm Travelers: Mai Pen Rai ไม่เป็นไร

(Mai Pen Rai = Hakuna Matata = Pura Vida = No worries)

This is a motto that Thai people live by. The beauty of it is that it applies to any and every situation:

You didn't sleep for an entire month because your bed was as hard as the cement floor? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You rushed to the train station in Hua Hin with all of your luggage, only to have to wait until 9:15 for the train that was supposed to arrive at 7:40? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You spend your first night and the next day in your new city puking from who-knows-what and dreading your first day of school the following day? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You showed up to school one day only to learn one minute before school starts that your classes were cancelled and no one told you? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร
(*Reason my classes were cancelled: "The monks are coming.")

You show up to school drenched and dripping and stay that way for about 4 days because it's pouring rain and you don't own an umbrella? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You eat nothing but white rice and cucumbers for lunch for about 3 straight weeks because you just can't stomach the fish option that stares at you while you rip off its scales/skin/meat to eat? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You spent hours planning lessons and printing/preparing materials for the class, only to watch them spend the entire class period hitting each other with broomsticks and throw said materials out the window? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

You break your leg in a motorbike accident and don't have the insurance or the language skills to deal with the Thai emergency room? Mai pen rai. ไม่เป็นไร

Don't have a heart attack - that last one didn't actually happen. But all the rest did, and I absolutely have adopted the motto. I'm pretty sure that's how I was living my life already, but now I have a cool Thai phrase to blurt out in those moments.

There is really something freeing about being in a stressful and/or frustrating situation and being able to step back, take a breath ... mai pen rai. Especially when you're living in a foreign country with a foreign language and a foreign alphabet. You go through every day "communicating" with many different people but don't have a clue what they're actually saying. You can't read the street signs, or any other signs. And you don't have control over your lunches, your transportation, your work schedule, the torrential rains that never seem to stop... mai pen rai.

That train ride I mentioned? Left Hua Hin about an hour and a half late, arrived in Hat Yai about 2 hours late. (mai pen rai!) It was still awesome - slept SO well and woke up to some awesome middle-of-nowhere Thai scenery out the window.