April-17-153Y

good kids &
Khruu Mary
A
n hour’s
drive out
of the city of
Chiang Mai,
behind narrow
roads lined
with rice paddies,
the Good
Kids Preschool
is tucked away.
It is a quiet morning
in the village, but the
schoolyard is alive with
noise and movement. A
teacher plays tag with a
group of kids, who are
shrieking with laughter.
Each child is greeted with
a hug as they run inside
for the school-wide “circle time.” This is no ordinary Thai preschool.
And among the black-haired Thai teachers and a sea of green smocks and patterned
pants in the Northern Thai style, one young woman in a bright pink top and blonde hair is
conspicuous. But really Mary Raikes, a Kiwi cross-cultural worker who teaches preschool
English, is not that out of place at all – she’s actually quite at home. “There’s this contentment
and this peace in my soul, like this is where I’m supposed to be,” she says.
Mary came to Thailand in 2014 to serve as a teacher at Good Kids Preschool, a bilingual
Christian establishment. As a native English speaker with a background in preschool
education, her skills were a good fit for Good Kids, especially since access to English teachers
is rare in small and more remote villages like this one. English is both a desirable and
increasingly necessary skill in Thai education. Then there’s her salary. Foreign teachers
are usually quite expensive, but as a missionary who has raised her own funds to live in
Thailand, Good Kids is able to employ Mary and keep costs down so that tuition remains
affordable for those in their community.
She came to teach so that she could love the children, and Good Kids Preschool,
where showing and modeling love is the highest objective, is a good place to do that. So
Mary greets the kids as they patter up the stairs into morning assembly, giving them a wai
(a greeting in which the hands are pressed together, prayer-like, and the greeter bows
slightly) and a hug. The former is a traditional Thai greeting, the latter decidedly less so,
but hugs are given freely at Good Kids Preschool.
“Not all the children are treated with love at home, and they need that and deserve
that,” says Khruu (Teacher) Amm. “And if you hug them, they know that they are loved
every day. And when we are talking about how God is love, they remember that God loves
them and that God is good to them.”
Mary has visited other Thai schools: “It just seemed like there’s this distance between
the teacher and the student, this innate respect, which means they can’t get on the same
level as the child... and hug them and be close to them. So for us, it’s all about showing
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