{"id":2570,"date":"2015-05-07T18:24:46","date_gmt":"2015-05-07T18:24:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.farmingdale.edu\/blogs\/?p=2501"},"modified":"2015-05-07T18:24:46","modified_gmt":"2015-05-07T18:24:46","slug":"what-its-like-being-in-a-fraternity-part-2-mr-international","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/2015\/05\/what-its-like-being-in-a-fraternity-part-2-mr-international\/","title":{"rendered":"What It\u2019s Like Being In A Fraternity \u2013 Part 2 \u2013 Mr. International"},"content":{"rendered":"

In\u00a0my previous post, I talked about my Tau Kappa Epsilon\u00a0fraternity experience<\/a>, and how becoming a “teke” added so much value to my life. This post is the biggest\u00a0example of one of those valuable moments.<\/p>\n

One day I was lying on my\u00a0hotel\u00a0bed\u00a0in\u00a0Bangkok, browsing\u00a0Facebook on my laptop, when suddenly\u00a0a\u00a0light-bulb flashed in my head:<\/p>\n

“I wonder if there are any other ‘teke’s’\u00a0in Thailand?”<\/p>\n

I while back I joined a Tau Kappa Epsilon Facebook group which was reserved for\u00a0members\u00a0living in New York.\u00a0\u00a0I decided to post my location and\u00a0see what would happen.<\/p>\n

“It’s worth a shot,” I thought.<\/p>\n

I posted something along the lines of, “hey there, I’m a teke\u00a0currently in Thailand for a year, and I was wondering if there were any other tekes in the country. Thanks in advance.”<\/p>\n

I didn’t know how likely it would be that I would get a response. I figured I had roughly\u00a0a\u00a040% chance of\u00a0hearing back from someone.<\/p>\n

A few days later, I would get my answer.<\/p>\n

\"TKE-worldwide-300x225b\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Two members of the group replied to me,\u00a0conversing with\u00a0each other about members currently in Thailand. Then one of them presented me with a name of a person I could add as a friend.<\/p>\n

I was delighted. I didn’t expect to get such a quick response. I thanked the men that helped me, added “Tim” immediately, and we\u00a0began chatting.<\/p>\n

We talked about a variety of things: Where we lived in the U.S., the colleges we graduated from, what we were up to in Thailand, and most importantly, when we would be able to meeting up.<\/p>\n

Tom worked in the field of politics, but it seemed to be more of a seasonal job. During his off time he traveled for months at a time. Thailand was one of his stops. He also did some teaching\u00a0in the south of Thailand.<\/p>\n

He invited me into\u00a0his email group, and\u00a0I was able\u00a0to correspond with even\u00a0more TKE members\u00a0who were also in Thailand at the same time. Each man had a different field of expertise.\u00a0One of them had a business in Thailand which involved fruit shakes. Another one worked\u00a0full-time in a marketing position\u00a0for a foreign-based company.\u00a0With the addition of me, our little group grew to seven.<\/p>\n

I was\u00a0delighted before, but now I was ecstatic. Here were the fruits of my college labor finally coming to, well, fruition. Last year I was meeting\u00a0tekes at various\u00a0colleges, but this year I was networking with fellow\u00a0tekes in Thailand, literally half-way across the planet. Amazing!<\/p>\n

I had to wait a few months to meet them though. All the other guys were located\u00a0in Bangkok, as most foreigners are in Thailand. As for me,\u00a0I was 12 hours north in Chiang Rai, teaching English daily. I had school off on weekends, but I felt as if\u00a0I wouldn’t have enough time to\u00a0make a quick trip to Bangkok and back. It was a bit tough seeing all the other members\u00a0plan weekly outings\u00a0together, but I knew I would get my chance to meet them someday. I just had to be patient.<\/p>\n

Eventually, I was on vacation from teaching, and me and Tim\u00a0planned to meet in Chiang Mai. It was 4 hours away from Chiang Rai by bus, much closer than Bangkok. We would also be there during Thailand’s\u00a0annual Song Kran Water Festival. Chatting in person, partying, and getting buckets of water poured over our heads.\u00a0Sounded like a good time to me.<\/p>\n

I got to Chiang\u00a0Mai and met up with Tom soon after. We headed to a local club, where I met his friends for drinks. He was a congenial guy with lots of great stories to share.<\/p>\n

That night I also met Mike, the marketer who was also on his vacation, and Fred, a teke visiting from America.\u00a0Tim had to leave for Michigan\u00a0the\u00a0next day, so the three of us\u00a0spent the day planning a mountain motorcycle trip, riding on our motorcycles\u00a0though the water parades, getting constantly wet with said water, and exploring Chiang Mai. Mike\u00a0even took some time to teach me how to ride a motorcycle for the first time.<\/p>\n

Mike and Fred\u00a0invited me to go with them\u00a0on their\u00a0four-day mountain riding trip. I said yes at first, but I declined later, since I didn’t feel confident enough in my motorcycle riding\u00a0skills. So we said our goodbyes\u00a0and vowed to meet again someday.<\/p>\n

Meeting Tim, Mike, and Fred\u00a0changed my perspective on travel forever. For the first time, I realized the power of being able to\u00a0connect with any fellow TKE\u00a0member around the world, just by\u00a0posting\u00a0a simple\u00a0message. As I spend more time in more locations, I look forward\u00a0to meeting more of my fellow brothers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In\u00a0my previous post, I talked about my Tau Kappa Epsilon\u00a0fraternity experience, and how becoming a “teke” added so much value to my life. This post is the biggest\u00a0example of one of those valuable moments. One day I was lying on my\u00a0hotel\u00a0bed\u00a0in\u00a0Bangkok, browsing\u00a0Facebook on my laptop, when suddenly\u00a0a\u00a0light-bulb flashed in my head: “I wonder if there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alumni","category-himmler"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2570"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2570"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2570\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogsdev.farmingdale.edu\/sites\/rambassadors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}