Learning...

It's tough when you sacrifice lesson prep. time for a bit more sleep so you can make it through the day, and then you have your 5 classes x 50 minutes each, of teenagers who constantly push the limits and have no problem lying to your face just to escape trouble. It's tough when you realise that your very own students are trying to cheat - when you were sure you could trust them. It's tough when you have to talk to them about it. It's tough enforcing the rules that students know they should follow but still try to sneak around...

So I'm learning...

I'm learning you need to be consistent, for their sakes.
I'm learning that you need to be able to take insults or tantrums or lies and handle them calmly.
I'm learning you need to be on top of things all the time - there's no relaxing at this grade level.
I'm learning that students cheat, and some may not feel any remorse, and will do it again.
I'm learning you need to find people to talk to, because doing everything yourself is too much.
I'm learning that it's impossible to keep up when you are in your first year of teaching.
I'm learning how little I really know.
I'm learning that I need to take more time to relax, but I also need to take more time to study and grade...
But so far I have not learned where that time will come from...

I also learned that there are some friendly tourists around who will stop and talk to you as if you are best friends! It was quite cool and unexpected - tonight while going through the night market for supper, my housemate and I happened across some tourists from Canada and Australia. We chatted about work and travel and had quite a jolly time comparing notes.

I felt a bit less down after that, and from that I learned that you need to take time to connect with people so you can go on and complete the emotionally taxing job of teaching. I am learning that in my job, I need to be both real and firm. And that's tough - for a personality like me :)

Well the unfortunate part of chatting so much is I haven't eaten supper yet and it's after 8:00, so,

Until next time

- R

Some days...

Some days classes just run themselves. Like today. My alarm rang at some unearthly hour again although this time I shot up and turned it off and turned my light on, muttering something that didn't quite make sense but I thought it did in my groggy state. It's a good thing my light was on. I promptly fell over back on to my bed and ended up snoozing for another 30+ minutes. Finally I bolted upright and stared at the time. Great. No lesson-planning time this morning.

Instead I thought about what really matters, and took time to write a bit and read a bit. Somehow I felt much better afterwards and for some odd reason, my day has been going well, despite it being the 3rd day in a row of rain. I was afraid the students would be climbing out the windows to get outside and get some exercise, but today they weren't. And yesterday, when I least expected it, something was up in the air dusting everyone with something unrecognisable...

Well I must prepare for my class, my last class of the day! (relieved sigh)

I shall return...

I have bread!

So I'm walking home at 7:30 pm, a bit too tired to be hungry, but knowing my stomach will begin battling me once my 500 mL of water finishes sloshing around inside of it (don't you just love the mental imagery?). So I begin to think about what to eat for supper, and if I should buy something or find something at home...

The latter option worries me slightly for I cannot remember what I have in my fridge. But I do not feel like buying food from the vendor in the night market that I always go to, for I am a bit tired of the same kind of rice after 2.5 months, and need a bit of variety.

I'm afraid to go to 7-11 for my favorite corn patties (less than a dollar) because I distinctly remember someone saying recently that probably nothing you buy at 7-11 is good for you. So I scratch that idea and continue to head home in the rain, dodging cars as I cross each intersection. Did I mention two of my colleagues have been hit by vehicles during their stay here? Consequently I am very wary when I cross any road, and I look all around me like those decorations you see in cars with bobbing heads that turn in all directions when the car is moving.

Thankfully I am still alive and have not been hit, but I am told it may be only a matter of time... but on to other, lighter topics.

So I come across my favorite grocery store which has everything from toilet paper to gum, as well my favorite vegetable - canned corn. After picking up some items, half of them chocolate snacks to fortify me on my way home, I find my soggy umbrella, thankful it is still raining and I can't walk off without my umbrella like I am prone to do (leave things behind).

The store is my favorite because it is right by my house and I can buy almost everything there that I need for daily life, like the previously mentioned toilet paper and chocolate. The second reason it's my favorite store is because I don't have to walk 2 miles to bring my groceries home.

 I am still not sure what to eat and I am racking my brains trying to think. I bought what looks like already-made egg salad, and I only wish I had bread to eat it with. I desperately try to think of what's left in the fridge and all I can see in my mind is the loaf of .... very .... old bread I still haven't thrown out because I am never home when the compost truck comes around. The egg salad comes in sealed plastic - not a jar and not a plastic box - it comes in a thick sealed plastic bag, and you squeeze it out like toothpaste. It conveniently has pictures of ways you can eat it, which is why I bought it in the first place - the tantalising pictures got my attention. One picture shows the salad on a piece of bread, another picture shows the salad on a lettuce leaf with a decoration on top... Unfortunately, I don't even have a lettuce leaf to eat my salad on... I am definitely feeling sorry for myself. If only I had bread...

I carefully run through my options: run back to 7-11 and buy bread that probably has less nutrients in it than a piece of my bedspread, run forward and look for a bakery that sells bread with a few more nutrients, hopefully, but that is at least 10 minutes walk one-way, or, my last option, go home and eat my salad solo. I decide to go home. I still cannot think of anything, not even a cucumber, to put my egg salad on. But I am hungry enough to eat my salad a cappella, or without accompaniment. I may even make some rice and try the two together... or I'll just eat my salad by itself and skip the rice idea...

So I get home and carefully open my chocolate snacks to try them (for some energy). They're not bad. Usually the chocolate here is quite different and that's really the only way I know to describe it right now.

Then I head to the fridge and peer inside... and lo and behold!!!!!!!! I HAVE BREAD!!!!! there is one seedy loaf sitting on the top shelf looking back at me in silence as I begin to sing gleefully that I have bread. It's raisin bread with poppy seeds, but the mayonnaise here is sweet anyway, and right now raisin bread really is better than nothing.

And on the second shelf I spy a small clear tupperware bowl with some mixture inside - I HAVE MACARONI and sauce!!! (or pasta, for those who do not use the word macaroni). I have food I knew nothing about, and I'm so happy. No need to wait for rice to cook, no need to fry eggs or eat my carefully hoarded cereal (I have to walk very far to get that cereal!). I have supper! So I sing some more.

Because I can't bring myself to mix raisins and egg salad, I pick out the raisins first and then spread my bread. Then I dash into my room to begin blogging about my experience. No need to dwell on the fact that today I almost decided teaching was quite fun, until my last class, choir, when for the first time, I really became upset at the students and they knew it and I felt bad they saw it.

I am thankful I didn't shout, not that I would know how to, (do NOT laugh or you just may hear me practicing my shouting in your direction), but I usually am able to stay calm even when I have someone challenging me and loudly demanding me to explain why I asked the class to do such a stupid assignment. 

But somehow, with the choir singing twice in the next three days, one of those times being for parents and families, and with this being our last practice before our first performance, and with it being Wednesday, and my last and most rowdy, and often least focused class, I guess I just reached one of those breaking points where suddenly you feel a great injustice is happening to you and you have to strike out against it as quickly as you can before it hurts you anymore. Did anyone ever say teaching high school was a breeze? Well, perhaps they were refering to the typhoon season, for 'breeze' in my opinion only refers to way attention spans fly.

But, it's over and tomorrow is another day, and I have several more ideas of how to teach and thankfully, several more chances to try them out. And I have bread!!! I'm so happy!!

just a quick note on the random pictures - one is the pile of grading I had accumulating in my office around midterms - wouldn't you like to be a teacher? (angelic smile). The other, the one with the wide-eyed, glazed over stare, is a teacher in the midst of grading the pile larger than a pyramid.

That's all.

Until next time,

- R

A day in the life...

A day in the life of a perfectionistic, novice, 1st year teacher in Taipei... it goes like this...

6:10 am   Alarm blares loudly

6:30 am   Arm reaches out to smash blaring alarm clock one final time

6:40 am   Eyelids blink open and stare wildly at white wall (due to lack of decorations, there's only so much  you can fit in a suitcase)

7:10 am   Bleary eyes try to focus on contents in refrigerator: soymilk, grape juice, eggs, rice, fruit jam, and very old bread that looks like new (I won't touch it because of that, must be poisonous, but it's still in the fridge because the recycling comes in the evenings - when I'm at work usually).

7:40 am  After a breakfast of cornflakes (very western choice), teacher hurridly puts rice into a bowl, takes a spoon, and shoves both into a plastic bag and puts in packpack for lunch later.

8:10 am  Mad dash to school

8:20 am  Run in just as bell rings and go to fridge to somehow lodge food in amongst the hundred other food items spilling out

8:21 am  Trudge up to 3rd floor office next to 3rd floor classroom, where students are happily breaking the no-Chinese-speaking rule

8:22 am  Check work email and catch up on news sent after 8 pm previous night

8:40 am  Check clock and drop jaw - 30 minutes to plan 5 classes

9:10 am (regular schedule, not week of prayer schedule) sigh in defeat - yet again a day of not-so-well-planned lessons

9:11 am  Gather up materials for classes: notebook, binder, textbook or two, laptop, backpack, water bottle, pen, notes, anything for any activities

9:13 am  Feel the way down the stairs since it's hard to see over everything and everyone passing by

9:15 am  Smile at students in first class and retreat to corner to set up laptop

9:16 am Students take over the first 10 minutes of class: class president writes topic on board; vice president starts timer for 6 minutes; secretary takes attendance

9:22 am Class pastor comes up to take prayer requests and write them on board and pray for them

9:25 am Students turn to look at teacher...

9:25 am Teacher turns to look back at students

9:25 am + 30 seconds Panic - memory loss has occurred again - what was today's lesson supposed to be about?

9:25 am  Teacher has an idea for an activity

9:26 am   Teacher attempts to explain activity

9:27 am   Students attempt to understand activity

9:28 am   Students attempt activity

9:30 am   Students decide activity is not working and begin to sleep

- Later -

Repeat 5x: same scenario, different students.
.....

- Later -

5:33 pm  Stumble out of school building amazed it is still light this time
5:33 pm  Stand and debate what to do for supper
5:34 pm  Head towards home to get something near home
5:35 pm  Stand at record long stoplight
5:40 pm  Change mind and head to metro station for supper at another place
5:43 pm  At metro station realise metro card is in other purse
5:44 pm  Head back and decide to follow original plan
5:45 pm  Change direction and head to bookstore to pick up wrapping paper for friend's b-day present
6:15 pm  Head out of bookstore, look around, dazed
6:16 pm  Head back from detour route and continue home
6:26 pm  Head into night market to find supper
6:28 pm  Find that outdoor food vendor does not make vegetarian options
6:29 pm  Continue on dejectedly
6:30 pm  Stumble upon housewares store
6:35 pm  Walk out with a huge glass jar for storing water, and a small cereal bowl, congratulating self on two of the fastest decisions ever made
6:36 pm  Make way back home
6:37 pm  Stop at two other food vendors and find one who can make vegetarian egg-fried rice
6:47 pm  Realise he is not only the diner-recruiter, he is the manager, and chef, and waiter, and the egg-fried rice order is at least 5th in line
6:50 pm  Finally walk away with supper and an angry stomach
6:56 pm  Home at last - sit down and begin blogging...


Ok, so perhaps that is a little exaggerated. I actually do plan my classes a little more, but, honestly, things change faster than I know how to deal with it. Moods change and concentration wanes and focus is lost and my memory loses things like water in a strainer. One thing teachers must learn to do - be flexible and prepared for anything. Working with people will never be a predictable job. And did you know that teachers make thousands of decisions a day? So for a perfectionist, that's super-stressful. So, it's 8:47 pm... time to start planning for another day...

Shopping Deals, or Ordeals

Today I took the MRT to a large supermarket close to my home that sells everything from spices to laptops. I think it's the first time I go by myself and I am quite proud of the fact that I got there without getting lost or getting on the wrong train... the store is two stops away from mine...

So anyway, there is one thing you should know about living in Taipei and not having a car. Unless you go everywhere by taxi, or you somehow manage to fit a bike into your backpack and take it on the train, you better be careful how much you buy when you go shopping, because every jam jar you buy, and every can of corn you pick up, is going to be something you are going to have to carry home. And I have learned that it will weigh twice as much when you have to carry it for over a mile.

So of course, since I only go to this store a couple times a month, and I feel the sudden need to stock up for a 10 year famine, I usually leave the store hunched over double, muttering angry phrases about cities and long distances and walking and my temporary loss of clarity of mind.

If you had been outside the store today you wouldn't have seen me actually, for I was obscured by my everpresent backpack carrying its friend, a 2+ lb computer; in my right hand was a huge blue shopping bag filled with misc. items such as vege meat and hangers, and in my other hand was a medium-sized box housing a slow cooker. Why I felt the need to buy jam, a jar of turmeric seasoning, 8 eggs, a packge of vege meat, cornflakes, and a slow cooker, at the same time, is really explainable only because I am so used to conserving as much as possible, including time spent going shopping. If you can kill two birds with one stone, or stock up for a month instead of a week, then by all means do it.

Well needless to say, that jar of jam got heavier by the minute, and by the time I stumbled home I was in no mood for socialising, so I went straight to my room and curled up with my subber sandwich and relaxed with some Christian comedy on youtube.

So that's how I spend some of my time at least. Some  misc. notes: 1) I always abbreviate misc. because I can never remember how to spell it. 2) here you need to bring your own bag for your shopping or they will charge you for using a bag. It's very minimal but still... 3) When you pick up something in the fresh bakery or produce area, you take it to the little counter with someone who weighs it for you and puts the price on it.

On a side note, yesterday one of my students raised his hand in class just before I had the opening prayer, and said "Teacher, I want to pray today!" Then another student raised his hand and he wanted to pray too. They had tried it in another class and were ready to practice their new skill. So for 3 days I will not have the opening prayer - my students will. If that doesn't make a teacher smile, then that teacher needs a holiday. Speaking of which, isn't it almost Thanksgiving? ... don't I wish!

Until next time,

- R

Diners

Dear All,

I just got back from supper out with 3 of my friends and fellow teachers. I got to try an Alpine Burger (veggie of course and, for lack of better word, slightly soggy, but still good). The meal came with 2 sides, a drink and of course, the monstrous burger sandwiched :D between two pieces of fluffy, sunflower-sprinkled round buns. It was quite something. My hot chocolate came with a marshmellow and cream and enough sugar to send me spinning. It was great!

Thankfully I went with friends, or I might have just been starting my meal now... let me explain... Last time we had a holiday I agreed to meet up with two friends at the stop after the main station in Taipei, so we could go to yet another burger restaurant together.

I had been to this place twice so I was quite sure I could make it. How hard can it be, there are only 3 or 4 main metro lines and as far as I could remember, I didn't have to change trains. So I figured I would be fine.

So I hopped onto the first train that sped up to the platform, and happily found a seat and relaxed, proud of myself for doing the trek alone. I was listening to music, observing the children around me, feeling independent, when I decided it was close to my stop and I should start looking at the station names.

The really nice thing about Taipei is it is pretty much a bilingual city, and you can find almost every sign with an English translation, so it's quite easy to travel around. So I was reading the running commentary at the top of the train doors, looking for my station name, and I didn't recognise the next station's name. So I decided it must be coming up and settled back down to wait.

2 stops later a small figure with a wilting black backpack ran to the train doors and hopped off onto the platform at lightning speed - that was me - and looked around in bewilderment... how in the world did I get on the orange line when my train was supposed to go from red to green? My worst fears about my sense of direction, or lack of it, were looming up in my mind and taunting me.

Long story short, I made it safely back, after making a u-turn where I found the train going back the way I came, and from there made it to my station and my waiting, and hungry friends :-P Lesson learned: there are two trains that share the same line that goes through the station by the school. One goes on to the yellow line, a far-out place, which I found out was a little less populated. It has a yellow line on its digital display outside... which of course I didn't see.

And the other train goes onto the green line, and has a green line on the digital display on the outside... with my luck, or lack of it, I naturally took the wrong one and, while I would have been fine, I had to make the one mistake that would send me to who-knows-where, on my own, while my friends wondered how I could stretch a 20 minute trip into an hour :P and end up in a completely different location... I tell you, it takes talent, not everyone can get lost quite so easily. But that's another story.

I just realised I have not been sharing much of the cultural experiences I have been having, so I will try and do more of that. One cultural experience I have absolutely delighted to discover (thanks to one of my wonderful housemates) is the fresh fruit juices they have at the night market! I am officially hooked and am catching up on my fruit servings I have been neglecting. The guava juice - tastes like guava! I feel like I'm eating guava! it's amazing! And the mango...well guess what that one tastes like! :D it is my other favourite... sigh... some things I will definitely treasure while I am here!

Until next time, for some more experiences,

- R

Quick Note

Dear All,

I am still here and still alive, just wanted to let you know. I survived midterms, although I didn't know how I would. I have finally returned my carefully hoarded mounds of homework assignments to each respective owner and writer and can breathe a little more now.

Next week is Week of Prayer - could you pray that my students gain more than just head knowledge during this week... and that I will be able to guide discussions in a meaningful way... those are my requests.

I'm taking some time to relax this week - I've been overworking myself if you can believe that... some of you can. My advice - it's really not a good idea. My solution - leave work before 8 pm for a start. So I did and now I'm off to bed before night turns into morning. Hope you are doing well. Would love to hear from you!

- R