Advertisement
Published: July 27th 2011
Woman of the century
Nee Shar is in Green I wish I could show you the stars in the sky- oh how I miss their clusters and isolations. it is a rare occasion to see the stars here because it is always cloudy and raining. Some might say that is a blessing because I have never noticed the shining stars like I did tonight. They brought me home and opened my eyes. I miss them, but i know in a couple months in the winter months I will see them again and when I stare up into the below zero sky, the warm breath that leaves my mouth and nose will frost in the air reminding me of all the clouds that forbid me from seeing the night time stars all to often here in Thailand.
Scroll past this next paragraph if you don't want to read something lame and emotional
to all my friends- skyped yesterday, or havent seen in a year, old, young, lover, passed away, family, now enemy, ... for the friends i lost and for the ones i will gain...
Let me tell you that you are much like the stars that shined tonight. It might be a while since we've had a
she doesn't even like cake
NS with the cake and studants.. isn't it pretty chance to catch up or talk at all, but that brief moment you make way into my life, it is magical and always leaves an impression on my life ! Dear friends, I miss you all- you set sparkles in my eyes, and bring joy to my heart. Just like the stars, you are more valuable than all the money in the world. Clouds will not stays clouds forever; the wind blows, rain falls, the sky clears and there come my beautiful stars again bringing light into the darkest time of the day. They will never lose their place in the universe and they will never lose their place in my life or my heart. I miss you all, and love you dearly. Thank you for being exactly you. If we faught; don't talk any more; hold hands to school; no each others deepest secretes; forgot one anothers birthday; got in the others way, stole the others man..or woman?.. each of you has brought experiences that would have been completely different if they were with someone else.
honestly, I would not be here, I would not be who I am, I would not have this kind of happiness without all
happy faces
some of the kids with their posters and beautiful smiles the people that have came into and even those who have ran as fast and as far from my life as possible..
-thanks..
I am so lame some
Today was an eventful day. I woke up at 630 because I had a lot of errands to run for the simple but super exciting reason that it was Nee Shars BIRTHDAY! Boy do I love birthdays- for other people that is! I love making cards, and buying gifts and making people feel special. That is why i love baking.. So i can give things away...everyone loves a couple sweets.
So my plan for NS ( head mistress of my school) was to buy her a giant fruit basket and a giant fish..and i really should of done that last night, but yall know me.. full time studies at university in the art of procrastination. I could be teaching that professionally.
Anyway so I woke up early this morning so I could go to the market and buy a fish, a basket, a large variety of fruits and vegetables, balloons, a cake and get candles and flowers.. i also had to make photo copies of bingo sheets so I could
play with the students before we started decorating the class which was suppose to be just before lunch at 11 o clock. That was we could have fun all lunch time. Anyway.
I teach at 9 and I left at 830.
No worries at this point I had already picked up the fruits and vegetables. Mind you there is a 15 minutes bike to the school lol.
So I through the fruit and vegetables into my bag, stole the giant basket off our fridge, went to the grocery store and bought some random giant fish threw it on my bike, along with my black pack back, a GIANT plastic bag that had the posters form the weekend ( when the students made cards and stuff for NS), stopped at the cake store bought a cake- showed up to class 10 minutes late, sweaty like you've never seen me, troll bun up and poppin.
When I got to school the students had already moved all the benches out of the way and were singing songs .. like practicing for Nee Shar. Pho Cho ( her husband and the headmaster) was playing guitar.. seriously guys celebrations here are so intense,
girls
more students.. this is my classroom ps they go all out.
The students helped me organize the basket, I threw the fish in the bag and we passed out the posters that the students had made. Many of the students had also gotten gifts for the NS, and they piled them all at the front of the class room. I was so excited.. it was embarrassing. But the students were also super pumped therefore I felt less pressure to be normal and continued jumping and taking ridiculous random pictures and talking in that voice that is freakishly high.. if you know me when i get a little too excited.. you should know this voice lol.
Then we dragged NS into the classroom, and she looked super beautiful.. like always with her tahnakah and longie... she makes me wish I was Burmese- their culture is so beautiful in a very organic way.
Anyway we had already passed out candles, and then we lit the cake and sang happy birthday to Nee Shar!
They welcomed her into my class by singing a Burmese celebration song while pho cho played the guitar.. i was useless and took pictures and stood in front of the fan hahah.
Then
chanting in burmese
that is Pho Cho playing the guitar :) she sat in front of the class and I handed her the fish.. in a plastic bag. I am going to start buying fish for everyone..
She opened some gifts and then shared her fruit with all the students and gave each of them a bite of the cake .. She doesn't really like sweets: at all. Kind of like Gin Dawg.
She cooked the fish I bought her for lunch time and her, another teacher and I all ate together just like usual. I wish she had picked out the fish though. I suck at it. every time NS cooks fish for me its like the best tasting fish ever- and trust me she is an amazing cook- i don't doubt her skills at all. But the fish i picked out ruined it all. Not only because its a Thai fish and NS is Burmese ( idiot! ) but also because I bought that fish for her and her family but she insisted on cooking it for me to eat at lunch with her.. and then I'm pretty sure she didn't even like the fish..
Lol, that's okay its the thought that counts right.. plus like I said
gifts
gift from Pho Cho - two button up shirts one purple and one pink. VERY NICe overall it was a great day.
While NS was cooking the students and I played stella ella ola.. except with the alphabet because teaching stella ella ola to ESL learners seems fairly useless. Then I showed them how to properly thumb war. Like the whole
1, 2, 3, 4 I declare a thumb war! Bow, hug, kiss, BEGIN! That was fun.
One of the kids shoved cake in my face... aung pi.. the Justin bieber loving, crazy dancer who volunteered to come to my house this morning and help me get the posters.. only to not arrive lol. He is great though!
The day was great actually all together it has been really nice, even at Lhee Bee ( my second school that I teach at in the afternoons) . I felt like I had an extremely productive, successful day with all my classes. Which hasn't really happened once yet, where I felt happy with everything - teaching wise that is- in a day.
You want to know something that was especially touching of the heart today?
Member my grade threes? That I said had very minimal amounts of English and that they were hyper
Na We Cho
their son, who runs around naked and shrieking active a lot of the time. Well like i also said earlier, i changed my approach to teaching them and so far it's been going great.
I work with them from 315 until 4, and usually I am just so exhausted by that point of the day that I just go home, but every day this week I have stayed later because students have stayed later wanting me to correct their work and just right
AWESOME JOB!!! WOOOOOO on the papers. .. ps I actually do write that lol.
But like 6 or 7 boys 9 a couple that i have had minor control issues with have been SO GREAT since i change my direction with them, and they stayed after school and together we worked through like 6 activities that I was planning on doing with my GRADE FOURS AND FIVES!!!
I WAS SOOOO PROUD OF THEM! They just have so much potential and are capable of so much more than I thought! They made me understand that today when just the 7 or 8 or us were working together, hands on in very small groups.
They need that one on one. they need that attention that I
can't give everyone in a class with 45 students. You know?
It makes me sad in some ways, because there are obviously students in this class that just ave not had the opportunity to show how much they know because of the size and diversity of the class.
I wish I could break the class into two and work with half the amount at a time because I know it would be way better for the students.
On a more unfortunate note, one of the vols here hasn't been feeling well for kind of a while now.. and so she went to the hospital this afternoon,.. let me tell you it was by force because she hates hospitals, can be very stubborn and is one of the most adventurous people I have ever met..
So the four other volunteers, her teacher and his best friend and one of her students. Spent a good part of the afternoon evenish with her.. I actually just got home. The others are still there but I am super tired from getting up so early this morning and going to be so late last night.. but also using a lot of energy.. I am
looking forward to not teaching tomorrow.
I just want to point my next focus on the people suffering the relentless heat wave that seems to be slowing down.
Trust me when I say I understand the heat sucks, its uncomfortable, makes you sweaty, steals your energy, is very difficult on people with health concerns and will spike your bills intensely.
In Ontario the heat if apparently record breaking.. i just want to pull the environmental card and remind you of global warming and climate change. I'm not going to be completely absurd and say turn your ac off .. that seems a bit ridiculous. But if you're putting it on higher you can do things to off set that extra energy your using to help prevent power shutdowns from over use.
hang your clothes that will definitely take some pressure off the generators, it will offset your footprint and your clothes will dry MUCH faster.
Don't forget the easy things like shutting off the lights, using the same water class throughout the day, or using reusable water bottles. do your part guys.. i mean we did kind of bring this on ourselves.
On a more unfortunate note,
eating cake
i forced her to do this, becuase I wanted a picture lol i have never been so itchy I think in my life, I have bites everywhere and there need for scratching is not subsiding. I have also developed a mild heat rash on my legs. They kind of look like tiny , tiny, blisters. No worries though they don't hurt much.
Tomorrow I intend on going to the Thai/ Burmese boarder with one of the old volunteers Skylar. You might remember that the boarder is a fairly long bike ride away but conveniently enough he has rented a motor bike so we wont have bike there.
I suppose that is all for now. Thanks everyone for reading, or just sending me a quick note, it means a lot!
Please try to be wishful thinkers for my two uncles who are having some pretty serious health issues, or send some prayers. Wait, in general.. sending positive vibes for anyone goes a long way.
sending my love from the East Side of the world to Canada specifically but to every country, and person that needs a thought or two.
Kathy.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.208s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 11; qc: 49; dbt: 0.0658s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
