Mothers and Surprises

If I had written a real post yesterday, it would have been on mothers: we taught a cultural lesson on Mother's Day to the 5th and 6th graders at Qingshan, and I was amazed and saddened at some of the things I heard my students say. I found it particularly shocking because it's become amply clear to me that Mother's Day is a much bigger thing here than in America, and honor for your parents is an absolutely crucial component of the culture.

Still, it was sad to see how many of my kids had nothing good to say about their moms; our activity was a fill-in-the-blanks letter for their mom (or grandma or aunt or dad or...), and I know enough Chinese to know what they wanted to use to fill in the blanks was significantly less than flattering (one memorable boy's first attempt to finish "My favorite thing about you is..." was  你的大的屁股). Other answers were less inappropriate, and more heartbreaking. I'm sure a large part of it was because yesterday was the 6th graders, but it still served to remind me of how incredibly lucky I am to have my Mom. She's awesome.

Today was different, and confirmed my 6th-grade theory: with the 5th graders, while there were still a few complaints, what I heard more of was "do I have to choose just one thing to say about her? Can't I say my favorite thing about her is her smile and how fun she is?" That was lovely to hear. I also rather enjoyed seeing the drawings they did of their moms. Here is my favorite--and no, this does not mean he has a horrible home life; his mom is a teacher at Qingshan and is a wonderful person.

Yes, according to that picture, Zack's mom is Godzilla. Something tells me she'd be less than thrilled at the comparison...I like it, though! Added a smile to my day.

And there were plenty of smiles to be had today! Halfway through our fourth and final class of the day, Patty and the class of 5-3 surprised me with a birthday celebration! Patty had bought me a cake (one of the BEST cakes I have ever had in my life--vanilla with frosting layers of chocolate frosting and fruit) and some fabulously blingbling的 earrings, and all of my students, 5th and 6th graders together, had signed a MASSIVE card for me.

Just a few samplings of their glorious work :)

Beautiful, scrumptious cake!

西瓜甜不甜?

Gifts. <3! Pink bow and yellow barrette from Kitty and Linda; bracelet came without a card, pretty earrings from Patty!

Another hugely popular gift was boxes filled with 300 paper stars: I got two today, one in a silver box, and one in a pink pig music box. Kiki and Sherry also assured me that they were making me one, but hadn't finished yet. Apparently, it's a tradition akin to making 1,000 origami cranes in Japan; it brings good luck! Here's what my silver box looks like (once I've turned it on its side and artfully dumped the stars into the lid, that is):

Another lovely moment of the day was the several students--several bearing gifts or cards--who Patty prompted to the front to take a picture with me. One of them, Kevin, apparently said he was going to kiss me, and I got a little worried, but he didn't. Here's Kevin and I:

...and here are Judy, Angela, and a boy whose name I can't remember at the moment, but who was in the crew of people making stars for the pig music box. :)

So many lovely surprises today! This year, my birthday has brought such a wonderful store of love flowing from so many wonderful people at both of my schools. I'm eternally grateful to all of them! Today restored my faith, not only in kids' views of their mothers, but in the belief that Taiwanese people are the best people on Earth. Period. Thank you all so much! It's not even my birthday yet (okay fine it's 2am...), and yet this ranks among my best ever because of you. Thank you!

My Mother's Daughter

Colors slosh in white bowls: red, yellow, blue, green, purple, teal. A circle of white spins in a pool of purple; too fast, the waters lurch to one side and--oh! there it goes, over the shallow edge.

"Does anyone have a mop?"

Another casualty of adventuresome teaching.

In many ways, I'm like my dad: we both love coffee and almonds, we both value our down time, we both play the bass guitar, we think similarly about problems. But when it comes to teaching style, I am completely and totally, 100% my mother's daughter.

See, my mom's philosophy is that teaching should be fun, things will come together when they need to, and messes along the way are not only expected, but perfectly okay. As an example, earlier this year, my mom let every kid in her 4th grade class make their own apple pie; she's currently planning a unit on the Oregon Trail that features desk wagons that teams of kids will pilot through obstacles like a river crossing and food shortages. It's an absolutely stupendous way to teach, and it has resulted in, not just a great education for myself, my brothers, but for the hundreds of other kids she's taught over the years. And now, through me, her teaching legacy has reached a whole new group of kids here in Taiwan.

So what did I do today? I dyed eggs. With 5 groups of 30 5th graders. In the school multimedia room. For Easter.

Because, really, what could go wrong with giving a bunch of 10-year-olds bowls of colorful dye?

And, a few dozen spills, paper changes and calls for clean-up crews later, I can tell you the answer: actually, not that much! As my mom can attest, problems can be fixed when they need to be; new rules can be implemented at the last second, new papers can be found to cover the desks, broken eggs can still be dyed, worksheets can be handed out as needed for fast finishers or those who forgot to bring an egg.

And the kids loved it! I truly wish I could teach every lesson like this, full of fun and controlled in name only--though the school administrators might grow to hate me. But the kids wouldn't!

At the start: so clean! Though this was our third complete set-up of the day...

Some of the girls added adorable crayon designs!

And faces. ^_^

Of course, the boys got pretty creative, too--I wish you could see his whole egg! He drew rainbow stripes in crayon, then died the whole thing blue. Gorgeous!

Of course, we had a few casualties...(and undercooked eggs)..

...and a few premature snacks.

Hers was easily one of my favorites: yellow flowers on blue, and red flowers on purple. So pretty!

Cheesy grin! Proof that even the kids without eggs could decorate eggs. :)

...and eggs don't have to be perfect to be dyed...gaping hole? No problem!

Messes aside, it was a fabulous and fun teaching day. And yes--I will be doing it again tomorrow. So look out, multimedia room floor and countertops!

Pastime

I don't really feel like writing today. This is in part because I finally just finished uploading the 170 or so photos my mom and I took while she was here visiting me; if you're interested, you can see those here.

But mostly I'm just languishing in the wonderfulness that was the holiday special episode of Downton Abbey, a masterful British TV drama that I follow. And since that's mainly on my mind right now, know that if you're interested, you can watch it here. Because perhaps the only thing better than great character development and superb acting is great character development and superb acting coupled with a British accent.

Which is appropriate, I guess, seeing as how it's Boxing Day today: perfect time to watch British TV!

So that's it for tonight. Enjoy. :)

Last Day, in Taipei

Today was complicated. After the others in our hostel woke us up all night (and turned the lights on twice!!!), we started out the day tired. We soon found ourselves, Starbucks in hand, in a cab with an extremely talkative Chinese driver who pushed me to the limits of my Chinese conversational skills (I said 好 a lot, and he knew enough to end many of his monologues with　你聽不懂, not that it kept him from trying.) headed towards the National Palace museum.

The morning of looking at ancient artifacts was great; next, we hopped a bus and, several MRT transfers later, had lunch back near the hostel and retrieved our bags.

That's when the trouble began. We couldn't find an MRT entrance with an escalator or elevator; when we finally lugged my mom's big bag and our two smaller ones to the train and made it to our stop, we discovered that the directions the hotel had given us were crap. Seriously.

An hour and a half later, we admitted defeat and hailed a cab to take us to our hotel--which ended up being maybe five blocks away. Fail. But that didn't begin to cover our charming discovery once we got here that our reservation was for the wrong night. Last night, to be specific. EPIC fail. Fortunately they had an open room, but at this point we were both so frustrated and stressed that we proceeded to waste the next hour or so just sitting and recuperating.

We finally rallied ourselves enough to venture to Taipei 101, and we explored the observation deck for a while, and I then discovered my new favorite place in Taiwan, Page One. AKA the home of the largest selection of English books in Taiwan. Heavenly.

We were both too tired for our planned night market adventure at Shilin (sadly...) so we went back to our hotel, bought food on the way and planted ourselves on the bed to watch It's a Wonderful Life. Couldn't make it all the way through, though--after all, we leave the hotel at 5:30am tomorrow morning!

Annnd, on that note, I'm going to bed. Tomorrow should be easier, but also much sadder, as I have to say goodbye to my mom and send her back to America...it's been a fun trip!

Frenzy

My mom is coming today! According to the online flight tracker, her last flight left Tokyo just a few minutes ago, and is due in Taipei (Taoyuan, actually...) in 4 hours, 16 minutes. So soon! I'm getting antsy.

Beginning yesterday, I've been in an on-and-off frenzy of preparations. Clean my room: check. Buy poinsettias to make it look somewhat Christmas-y around here: check. Clean the kitchen: check. Clean the dining/living room: check. Sweep and mop the apartment: check. Clean the bathroom: check. Buy groceries: check. Re-clean my room, since all this rushing about has somehow gotten it dirty again: check.

So now, with all that done, there's not much else I can do but sit stiffly on my new-made bed, or on my freshly arranged couch, trying not to get things dirty again as I await the time for me to head up to Taoyuan to meet her. So yeah, I'm getting antsy; sitting seems like somewhat of a chore in itself. I've made three or four separate errands-related runs around the neighborhood in the past few hours, and I still felt like there's something else I should be doing.

Then I realized: there was. This blog. No way it's getting written at my normal time! Nope, around midnight tonight I'll be uncomfortably secured in a bus headed back from Taoyuan to Kaohsiung with my MOM! So that's what this is: my blog. Written when I have time. So that I don't miss it.

I'm sure I'm forgetting more than that (always seems to be the case--oh, wait, I need to copy down all the vocabulary I'll need tonight, since I'll most likely forget/mispronounce it!), but at least this will be done, too.

OK, a blog about writing a blog is pretty lame, so I'll cut it out for now. After all, MY MOM IS COMING TO VISIT ME! And she'll be here tonight (or, rather, early tomorrow morning), ready to admire my shiny clean apartment. Except--OH NO that mirror needs cleaning! Well, I'm out.