My Interview of the Roundtable's Very Own Emma Thomas

[Sylvie von Duuglas-Ittu]

Here's my 20 minute interview of our Roundtable mod Emma Thomas:

You can read the full article here. 

[Micc]

That's such a cool interview! First, because we rarely get to hear Emma talking :) But secondly, the things you talk about are exactly the things a lot of people think about and are scared to ask. I was like that too, until I found your blog Sylvie, and later through your blog - Emma's, Kelly's and other blogs. Suddenly I had access to formulated thoughts about things I was going through and had noone to talk to about until now. Reading and hearing about other's experiences really help to gain that confidence you are talking about.

Now I know that if something doesn't feel right, it probably is not right. This confidence that I slowly gained allowed me to "spread my wings" this year and go to a second gym where I loved the training and I hope it won't go into the "down" cycle anytime soon - but you never know.

PS. I love Emmas' accent, it's perfection! :D :D 

[emma]

That's such a cool interview! First, because we rarely get to hear Emma talking :) But secondly, the things you talk about are exactly the things a lot of people think about and are scared to ask. I was like that too, until I found your blog Sylvie, and later through your blog - Emma's, Kelly's and other blogs. Suddenly I had access to formulated thoughts about things I was going through and had noone to talk to about until now. Reading and hearing about other's experiences really help to gain that confidence you are talking about.

Now I know that if something doesn't feel right, it probably is not right. This confidence that I slowly gained allowed me to "spread my wings" this year and go to a second gym where I loved the training and I hope it won't go into the "down" cycle anytime soon - but you never know.

PS. I love Emmas' accent, it's perfection! :D :D 

I'm glad you're enjoying your new gym after making that change! It is hard, even if you know that there's something not right with where you're training, to be confident enough to step outside of it. I've been struggling with that for a while now, being unhappy in my gym but just keeping my head down and working the same way that I always do. I've come to accept now that it just might be time for to me to go somewhere else because there's only so much I can do on my own. A gym might cycle back into a good phase just as it cycles out of it, but I'm not going to be in Thailand forever so I don't have all the time in the world to wait for it to get better. So, I'm looking to move on and I suppose I'll have some more concrete news about that soon.

By the way, it's funny that you say that about my accent. It's changed slightly a result of living abroad for so long and being around people from America a lot of the time. Some of my students are confused by it and can't quite work out where I'm from, but whenever I hear my voice back in a video, I think 'ugh, I sound so British'. 

Thanks for this post, Sylvie. I'll try not to leave it so long before I get down to Pattaya again next time!

[Micc]

Emma, I'm looking forward to how your "story" unfolds, but I think it's great that you managed to start acting on changing your situation. 

It's a bit funny, but serious at the same time - we go through very similar (if not the same) things all around the world. 

I'm no pro in accents, but I did notice after a while of listening that yours is not a classic British accent. It has a kind of international feel to it and it's def easier to understand by not natives ;) When I went to London three years ago (this being my first time ever going to the UK) I couldn't understand a word the waitress at the restaurant was asking me. Null. And I studied English for 5 years.... T_T It was pretty disheartening. But then Bastille (the band) went big and I spent hours watching interviews with Dan and came to love the British accent (crushing for a British guy makes you change your view on languages and accents) :D