My daughter has just started her G1 in a new school last week, and you can guess I'm now just living out of complimentary frozen food in Life's fridge and packed lunch, nothing more glorious than a decent left-over dinner from the day before.
Although I'm lucky enough to be spared from pawn shop trauma thanks simply to the generosity of some fashionably good friends, my mother wasn't. Like many other mothers from a struggling middle-class family, the start of the semester to a mother-of-four like her often means a temporary separation from those ruby-encrusted rings and some glittering heirlooms.
After building a family fortune all through the past two decades and all her children having graduated, she doesn't have to visit the pawn shop any more, nor do her children have to. Now they just borrow her money when it's time the new semester began for the grandchildren. You can't say things have changed much really, not for those who are 'parents.'
A study has shown that education comes second to consumption in household expenses. In my case, monthly fee for school bus and lunch alone would total over 15% of 15,000 baht, the starting rate promised by the Yingluck Shinawatra government for holders of bachelor's degree. And that's just for a twice-a-day ride and a meal. I have received some financial aide from the previous government's 15-year free education scheme, but that doesn't make half, or a quarter even, of the actual expense in each given category.
And then there's the tea money _ the horrid legacy of the national corruption deeply rooted in the basic, the fundamental, the supposedly admirable institution that is the school, and has now become the national shame and a testament that inequality begins so early. As a common procedure in private school's admission system (and an under-the-table, yet widely-acknowledged one in prestigious public school), the practice has done much in widening the gap of educational opportunity already.
It's not surprising that when Education Minister Suchart Thada-Thamrongvech first mentioned his "donations for school seats" policy back in February, it entailed quite an uproar since such proliferation of "buying seats in school" _ especially in public schools where at least children of all backgrounds should be able to enjoy their equal rights to learn _ would only serve to strip the lesser-privileged majority off their educational opportunity.
Sending the wrong signal, just an attempt at euphemism or simply a case of miscommunication, Mr Suchart's words now came back to haunt him in the presence of protesting parents and students, who claim they're robbed of their rights to study in the same school due to some admission irregularities.
Whether or not this horror story will culminate in a happy ending, it has probably triggered a possibility of a sequel, or even a franchise, now that students and parents from some other schools were reported marching their way to the government house to demand their opportunity to continue in the same school.
It's easier for the authority to ditch the case as a rule of survival, a competition in which only the fittest (or arguably the richest) should be awarded a seat in the school, while those deemed unfitted, whether justly or unjustly, can just study in other "less famous" institutions.
For the students, it must feel just like being forced into early retirement with no package. Oh, we call that 'being fired' right?
What the educational authority fails to understand isn't simply the issue of equal access to education. Changing school is such big deal for some struggling parents and their family.
Of course I know, since my kid's admitted into her new school back in March, there's not a single fortnight that I don't pay for any school-related bill: admission fee (March), new sets of uniform and gears like school bag and tote (early April), books and notebooks (late April), tuition fee (early May) and school bus, meal and a new set of photographs in school uniform for documentation (second half of May).
Fee for extra evening class is what I'm expecting for the first fortnight of June (a means to avoid homework at home, simply for the sake of family peace), and oh, the June school bus fee should come around the same time, too!
It's no wonder, with the Thai educational body being oblivious to both the unequal opportunity of children in simply continuing their study, and the high, unrealistic cost of schooling compared to what is provided for by the state, many newly-weds choose to take a great deal of time in building their fortune before deciding on a baby, just for fear that they'd be unable to earn enough to support all the incurring expenses.
Sadly, the average corporate pay rise and career path can't, in the age of economic uncertainty and unexpected disaster crisis, seem to catch up with the inflation rate and the price rise of basic educational facilities.
It would take them so long to be sure they have earned enough, and when the time has come, they may need to spend more time and money with the In Vitro Fertilisation specialist before they could even get to pay for any school bill
Samila Wenin is deputy Life editor and writes about fashion.