Farewell Jason

One of the foreign teachers, Jason, finished his contract at Uncle Sam a week ago. Right about now he should be in Thailand I believe, for a bit of a vacation, but he will be returning to Taiwan and teach another year at a school in Taipei. We had a farewell dinner in Sanxia on Wednesday night (4.16) and on the Friday he left (4.18) all of his students came to say goodbye.

Table Talk

We got back from the health check and has some time to waste, so some how we decide to take pictures under the table :)

Emily

Trying to get a picture of Ken, but Emily loves the camera

Rain

Jasper

Polly

Jenna

Patty

Rain

Emily (Megan, this one's for you!!)

Emily, get out of the way! Sorta got Ken in there that time!

Jasper had to get one more picture.

My class

GORILLA TIME!!!

I talk to much, time for some pictures!  We had to go on a health check, so I took my new camera to try it out.  See for yourself:

Dora, T. Phoebe, Ken

Jenna and Polly

Patty and Jasper

Rain and Emily

Ken, being a ninja

Selina and T. Phoebe (so far all pictures have been taken on a moving bus)

Patty, Dora, Ken, and Emily waiting patiently

Ken Ken the ninja

Rain, Emily, Jenna

Polly, Jasper, Patty

Dora

Jasper

Jenna - Jasper was upset this wasn't a picture of him

He LOVES to have his picture taken

Jenna, Emily and Jasper

Getting ready to go back to school.

Crying on the job.....?

I'm fairly certain I have the flu, I've been home since 1:30 and it's Friday, I didn't go into work at all yesterday and I left a half hour early on Wednesday. It's not fun, I'm never eating Doritos again (don't ask), and I know the details of my bathroom very well. I tried really hard to make it through the whole day today, but I couldn't do it, and when I asked to leave I had to fill out a request form and when I went to give it to someone they were discussing who was going to fill in which classes. Now, one thing to know is when Chinese people discuss things, they sometimes get very loud, almost like arguing even though they're not. I walked into this, in my sick, I'm going to faint or puke, emotional state, and started to feel really really bad for causing such a hard time, and I started to cry. Thursday I stayed home sick and found out another foreign teacher did too, plus one other teacher's contract was up last week, so he's gone and Gretchen is in Australia for the week, so we are very very short staffed, so Thursday I cried to my mom about it. I'm very emotional, I get it from my mother (sorry Mom) and this is the second time I've cried at this job.

The first time was when I was being critiqued over my teaching and I had a huge migraine. The problem is I'm more critical of myself than anyone else, combined with being told everything I'm doing wrong and my head pounding for everyone to shut up, it was really bad. Then when I started crying they started the "don't take it personal" speech, when really, it is personal. At least for me, my job has always been personal. I love teaching, I love these kids, the idea of leaving all my "babies" in 2 months is enough to make me cry.

My only concern is if my crying at work makes me appear to be sad and pathetic, or just emotionally involved. And if it's a good or bad thing. Talking to mom, she explained that she was glad I appear so concerned about being sick and missing work, and actually caring. Which helped to hear, and reminded me of one thing my dad said to me once that I'll never forget "I'd rather you care too much than not enough" So I hope when I get way to emotional, people realize I'm not crazy and unstable, and just that I try my hardest to do my best.

Bags aren't cheap

Occasionally I'm able to read the Wayne Stater online, I was very pleased they finally got full papers available online, good way to keep me updated.  It was interesting to read an article, "Hopeful extinction of the 'urban tumbleweed'" talking about Pac N Save offering "green bags" that people are supposed to reuse so they don't have to keep getting paper or plastic bags just to waste.  I always found it to be an interesting concept.  Here in Taiwan, bags are usually not free.  At grocery stores and convenience stores, bags usually cost 1-3NT (about 0.03-0.10USD), which doesn't seem like much, so I usually pay it.  You usually have to specifically ask for a bag, but a lot of times people bring their own bags with them to the stores.  I have gotten in the habit of taking my bookbag and an extra bag when grocery shopping.  Although we do have a collection of plastic bags in our home, they do get reused, a good habit I think everyone should have.  Another habit I will hopefully bring home with me.

Sorry Mom, but I officially hate fireworks....

Don't get me wrong, I look forward the the 4th of July and the pretty lights in the sky. Mom likes to say all the fireworks on that day are for her, and I tend to agree since it is her birthday. Plus it's the only time she spends money (probably too much :P) and doesn't care about the most likely negative reaction from Dad. All's well and good, except that for the past two days, I've been able to sit in my room and hear: boom bang bang blast pop pop pop bang boom....etc. It's very loud and very annoying...especially since I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING. I look out my window to see the building across from me, whoopee, let's celebrate (*insert sarcastic tone here). Now, I see nothing wrong with fireworks, I actually like how fireworks can be used year round here, for any sort of celebration. If it was like that in the US I'd have a huge firework display on my birthday every year, and for any other tiny celebration I throw. But seriously? Do they have to do them at midnight, that's the time they started last night. At least tonight it's only 7pm so far.

I recorded the sound...and put it into a quick random video...which is much more entertaining than what's really going on :) At least now I'm not so cranky anymore hehe.

Camera Happy!!

 

I purchased a new camera on Friday night.  I've been needing a new one and I am thoroughly pleased.  My old camera had horrible horrible quality because it was cheap.  My new one has really good quality, plus it's easy to use and cute!

Because we shopped at an electronic store with membership benefits, it was better for us to get a membership card so I could get my camera at a cheaper price.  And for signing up for a card you had to pay 400NT ($13US) you got to choose a free gift out of 8 things (blender, fan, rice cooker, waffle iron, radio...)  Gretchen was ecstatic when she saw this waffle iron, her face turned red she was so happy, she'd been wanting one forever, so we got it of course.  After further examination we noticed that the bottom part wasn't the normal waffle squares but we're dog related shapes.

Anyway, it was a very successful evening for both of us, plus I've been in the mood to buy something for a long time, so it was either a better quality camera or a game system :) I think I made a good choice...and now I'm taking pictures of so many random things!

I love milk a lot, and this shows the huge zoom my camera has (I was on the couch and this was on the kitchen counter across the room).  Monday I feel on the walk to school and got a huge scar...it's healing but it was painful and looked horrible :D Bye!