The End

This is hard to write. Today was my last day in my schools. I am no longer an English teacher. Every sentence I put on here sounds stilted, unreal, and that's actually quite fitting: it doesn't feel real at all.

Today was one of the most chill days I've ever had at my schools. I arrived at Qingshan at regular time, 8:30, and discovered that, a) graduation had been moved from that night to that morning at 9:30, and, b) all the 5th graders had been instructed to sit in the courtyard for the next hour until the ceremony began. So, there went English class.

We hung around for an hour, then went to the ceremony, which included a very solemn march of the 6th graders around the courtyard, several speeches and awards, and, of course, Zoe's English speech. Fortunately for me, the Director forgot to ask me to introduce her, so I managed to make it through this graduation without taking the stage, apart from a generalized "thank you" to teachers. It was really a very nice ceremony, with lovely little moments like the 5th graders singing a farewell to the 6th graders, and the 6th graders singing a welcome to the 5th graders. Very sweet.

Afterwards, Patty and I went back up to our classroom to discover that our classes would continue to be cancelled, so that the kids could clean up the courtyard. In the end, we had our last class of the day for about 20 minutes, and that was it.

But of course, that couldn't be it! Patty was nice enough to postpone her lunch and take me around to the 5th grade homerooms, so I could get a picture with all of my students one last time, and give them each a lollipop. These visits also, of course, included an extraordinary amount of signing--not just of papers this time, but of pencil cases, bags, and desk mats. One boy gave me a massive bunch of balloons from the graduation ceremony; one girl, Kelly, gave me a note which read "Don't go back to America stay at 5th grade forever! Please! Please!!"

As I drove away, a small contingent of kiddos waved me off from the third story. But still, even now, it's impossible to believe the truth: that was the end.

My eyes threaten to close on their own accord and never open again (to be honest, I've typed the last several sentences with them closed anyway), but I would be remiss if I didn't mention our epic THIRD PLACE FINISH in dragon boat racing tonight! I should really just leave it at that: we got third pace in our heat. I really shouldn't go on to explain that there were a total of three boats in our heat, and we lost to the next slowest by a full 55 seconds. But that also happened.

Oh well, we did at least finish the race, and make it back without holding up the race schedule, as has happened in the past. And afterwards we all ate watermelons and took pictures while Esther, Lydia, Paul and Alex frolicked in the rain; after that, Fonda, Chialing, Rachel an I, along with Evelyn and some of her friends, went to Chialing's cousin's place for some delicious papaya milk. So that was good.

颱風來

颱風來...Typhoon's coming. School and all outdoor activities are preemptively canceled for tomorrow, simultaneously robbing me of my last day at Hanmin; Fulbright's planned zongzi-making party (also at Hanmin, but with all the ETAs invited); dinner with Alison, Maggie, Fiona and Patty; and Qingshan's 6th grade graduation (which is being rescheduled, but which now seems to conflict with our dragon boat races, should they actually take place).

The unfortunate part is that I can't even get upset at the system: they're not overreacting. We're about to be hit by Typhoon Talim, which is coming up along the West Coast; this, I've been told repeatedly, is NOT GOOD. Typhoons usually hit Taiwan's more exposed East Coast, thus running into the mid-country mountain range and slowing down before passing over to the much more densely populated West Coast; when they hit on The Side with the Cities, so I'm told, is when problems happen.

Oh, and we're actually getting off easy with Talim: just a few days ago, Taiwan looked like it was going to be hit on both sides, by Talim and Guchol. Thankfully (for us, at least), Guchol swirled off towards Japan, where it is now assailing Analicia's mom in the worst-timed way possible (she's flying from the States to Taipei with a stop in Japan, meaning she will very likely be impacted by both typhoons on her journey).

To the left: Talim. To the right: Guchol. In the middle: Taiwan.

So, we're all pretty much under house arrest for tomorrow. Well, I had been lamenting my lack of experiencing a typhoon while I was here...after all, as Margaret told me, typhoons and earthquakes are Taiwan's natural products! Had to experience both, or I hadn't really lived here.

In other typhoon news, a friend request and follow-up message from one of my favorite 5th graders finally broke my resolve and reminded me that it was about time I made good on my promise to my students that they could be my Facebook friends after I was no longer their teacher. Within minutes of my approving my many pending requests, the following photo showed up on my timeline:

Note the eyes that say "why am I doing this?" and the feet that say "I did karate for six years!"

...and promptly received a deluge of "like"s from friends back home. Further exploration of the album in which I had been tagged (thankfully, just in this one photo) revealed that my fears about presenting awards at graduation had been fully justified, as there now exist multiple pictures of my back, bowing to the students. Oh joy.

And here, buried at the bottom of my post because, again, I'm in denial, today was my REAL last day teaching at Hanmin. I came in for one period in the afternoon, during which Alison and I taught a group of 1st-5th graders from a school in the outer county areas of Kaohsiung our 3rd-4th grade Morning English lesson. And that part was really fun--the kids were enthusiastic and our goal was mostly just to give out free stuff. Then Alison and I went out for a coffee, and that was really fun, too!

Then the typhoon began blowing in. And I realized I should probably act as if it was my last day at Hanmin. And I cleared out my locker, and my desk, and left a note for next year's ETA. And now my desk looks quite desolate and depressing...

Yesterday..

Today. :(

...and I now have a bone to pick with a typhoon. 

Denial

I don't want to talk about it. Scratch that, I don't want to think about it. Actually, I don't want it to have happened, and by somehow leaving it out of my mental processes, I can pretend that's so: today was not my last day of teaching at Hanmin. Today was not my farewell to all the absolutely wonderful 5th graders I've had the privilege of meeting there. And it was also not my last day working with Maggie.

Except it was.

They're unfathomable, these "lasts." They represent the ripping out of my life of things that have become wholly connected to who I am, and who I have been for the past 10--almost 11!--months. Teacher Bekah, Bekah 老師--it was a title that fit awkwardly at first, like a new shoe. Now, though, it's been worn into a second skin, and I'm reluctant to take it off, especially since doing so means saying goodbye to the nearly 1,000 students, teachers, and administrators I've been able to work with here.

I can't think too much about it. I can't. Especially since each day brings a new goodbye, a fresh "last" to add to the ever-growing list. Last day of 6th grade at Hanmin, last day of 6th grade at Qingshan, Hanmin graduation, last day of 5th grade at Hanmin, Teacher Appreciation Banquet...It's a blessing and a curse, having my endings stretched over a week and a half. I'm reminded of the lobsters who, being put in water before it's boiled, don't even realize the water is heating up until it's over.

OK, so that's a bit morbid, but the idea holds: I feel like I'm being eased into The End so gradually that I don't--can't--mourn properly for each new step. Sure, I keep writing emo-kid-worthy blog posts about it--(sorry about that)--but it's hard to let myself realize, really, that it's ending. In class, I look around and tell myself, this is the last time you'll be here, but I can't get a real sense of it. I read the mounds of cards piling up on my desk--all very sweet, all reminding me just how much I love my kids--and I think oh, well, you might still get to see them on Tuesday and Wednesday... And yes, I might: I'll be physically present at Hanmin tomorrow and the day after for various events. But even then, there are no guarantees! And after that--nothing.

I'd better end there--no sense taking that course any further down its inevitably Eeyore-ish way. I suppose there'll be plenty of time to deal with the gloom later on--and I doubt my as yet un-summoned tears will stay away once I'm actually on the plane headed home. After all, I'll have nearly 1,000 reasons to be sad.

In the mean time, here's a more pragmatic, pictoral look at my day: a day, as I've said, of goodbyes, but also of candy and cards and smiling faces.

Soooo many caaaaaards!

Not pictured: the Teacher Appreciation Banquet tonight. It was great--scrumptious food, saw several of my students (their parents were on the PTA and/or were teachers) and fun talking with Maggie and Alison--but my camera was dead. So...that happened.

Love love love

As I pulled into the parking garage tonight and peeled my wet poncho off my back, I realized something: I had been "at school" for 12 hours. A long day, by most standards; especially coming as it did at the end of a busy week, I should have been exhausted and cranky. I smiled. Shortest 12 hours of my life.

The day began as has become the norm lately. As I get ready for the day, I look out my window: no rain. Right before heading out, I look out the window: no rain. I walk out my door, get in the elevator, and ride it the short 30 seconds or so to the bottom. The elevator doors open, and I walk out--to a perfectly timed downpour. Taiwanese weather takes Murphy's Law to new heights.

When I arrived, dripping, at Qingshan, I arrived to a day of little joys and good conversation--and a never-ending stream of Justin Bieber and Carly Rae Jepsen which made me realize, conclusively, that it is impossible to ever take yourself seriously again after leading a group of students in a call-and-repeat of "Hey, I just met you/ And this is crazy/ But here's my number/ So call me, maybe?" over and over again. In other news, the full lyrics to that song will ever again leave my consciousness.

Between classes, Patty arranged it so I could meet up with the 6th graders I didn't get to see yesterday, handing out cards and candy once in their home room--the first time since I first got here that I'd been to their homeroom, I realized, or met their teacher--and once in a tangle of 5th graders trying to come in for class, after the initial 6th grade showing was limited to just five boys. (They got their own special photo op, though!)

And don't they look thrilled about it.

Hey look, a homeroom!

Then, after a lunchtime radio session with Patty, I headed over to Hanmin to meet Alison for the 6th grade graduation that was going on there that afternoon.

The graduation...was...stupendous. It went on for over two hours; to spare you from reading and myself from writing the gritty details, here are the highlights:

• SO MANY AWARDS. Alison told me she'd heard they had 24 awards for each of the 11 classes; I lost track well before that, but they had, in addition to the top achiever awards by class (which I think went down to fifth place?), PTA choice awards, awards for special needs students, and awards for every class in every class subject--these awards featured a stage covered in an 11-by-6 grid of students, in between each two of which stood an award presenter, whose job it was to bow to them, hand them their award, bow again, step into the row for pictures, go back to their spot, and bow, after which the next row would step forward and the process would repeat. How do I know all this? Well, because I was called up to be a presenter for, not just one of these, but two; neither award set was for English, and neither Alison nor I knew what it was for. BUT, I did get to hand awards to my students! So, woo?

First prize: the smallest category of awards.

• FANTASTIC DANCING. To give the audience a much-needed break from all the awards, there were several intermission-type breaks which featured the many talents of Hanmin's students in other grades, predominantly the 5th graders. Which MEANS I got to watch my amazing 5th grade dance class in action once again, and this time photography was allowed! Pretty great, if you ask me.



Video forthcoming, whenever Youtube decides to stop hating me. But seriously, how many 5th graders do YOU know that can pull of Latin ballroom dancing?


 

• SUPERSTAR STATUS. Walking into the auditorium where the graduation was held, you'd think the kids had never seen me before (but somehow still knew my name). I posed for many, many a picture, and received many, many darling cards and gifts, including a fantastic neck pillow which will come in handy soon. I felt very loved, as all my wonderful students pressed around me telling me they would miss me. I'll miss them, too, more than they know.

After the graduation, Alison and I braved the renewed deluge in crossing the street back to Hanmin and our scooters, and then took off for a local restaurant for a graduation banquet with class 6-1, who'd invited us to join them first, much to the chagrin of the other classes who missed the ball. But it mattered little--within 20 minutes of us getting there, the entire restaurant was packed with Hanmin 6th graders there for their graduation banquets. It was a buffet, and it an absolute mad-house--in the absolute best way possible.

I spent the next few hours eating (DELICIOUS steak), chatting with Alison, posing for more pictures, and getting final wonderful moments with some of my favorite students, who kept pulling me aside just to say hi, or coming to my table for a picture, or coming en masse to toast me--my favorite moment of the night. There had been tears at the graduation ceremony, but here, it was all smiles and hugs and laughter: the perfect way to remember my great year with these kids.

I dare you not to smile.

So does Jay.

I hardly noticed time passing. By the time Alison and I left, the restaurant was all but cleared out, but I was still reluctant: leave my 6th graders for the last time? The thought was, and is, heart-wrenching. It can't possibly be that time yet.

The time has gone by so quickly. As the cascade of goodbye cards sitting on my desk attest, it doesn't seem possible that it's already been almost a year since I got here. But it has, and that means saying goodbye to all of my lovely students. And with so much love, and so many goodbyes to be made, 12 hours a day is far too short a time to spend at school.

Sixth Grade Surprises

I parked my scooter under the dripping tin cover, changed out of my flip flops and into the more teaching-appropriate flats I'd brought, and scurried across the open parking lot to the next bit of cover beneath the eaves of the faculty lunch room. I wasn't wearing my watch--no need for it to get wet--but I knew I probably had just a few minutes before the bell rang. When I arrived at the third floor English classroom at last, I was a little perplexed to hear noises coming from inside--it was nap time, after all!

I opened the door--and instantly the indeterminate voices solidified into a girl's squeal: "Noooo!!!!" One of my fifth graders came running across the classroom, gesticulating wildly, speaking quickly in Chinese with the occasional burst of English, and generally making me to realize I should not be there. Not yet, anyway. I clapped my hand over my eyes and stayed put, like she'd told me to.

 She was distraught, then, when she finally gave me leave to walk to my desk--only to discover Patty standing there with my surprise clearly visible in her hands, and which she proceeded to explain to me: the girls were filling a jar with 3,000 tiny stars for me, so I could have 3 wishes (one per thousand). I'm not sure if it's meant to be a belated birthday gift or early going-away present, but either way, it was absolutely supposed to be a secret, and it no longer is. Whoops.

The girls were fifth graders, but that experience was a fittingly strange beginning to my last day as a 6th grade teacher. Why, you ask? Precisely because they were fifth graders. See, on my last day as a sixth grade teacher, I saw remarkably few sixth graders--just one class of them, actually, and that the infamous class whose students I've mentioned on here before. After the first class, all the sixth graders were called away to a jump rope competition that Patty hadn't known about, so I actually spent most of the day sitting and talking with Patty, and helping grade worksheets.

The class I did have was pretty great, though. Handed out my cards and candy; Patty did the same, together the residual papers that always seem to accumulate over the course of the year--and then we taught them "Call Me Maybe" from this Youtube video:

So yeah, maybe it's a good thing we only taught the one class--that song is impossibly catchy, and will be stuck in my head plenty with just the one viewing...

And, of course, we did the photo-op thing. Except for the part where the boys were their typical selves when trying to get a picture with the girls...

Beginning to get frustrated...

Can you find the boys who are hiding?

Then I drove home in the rain, and that was that! No more sixth graders...except for the part where I'm still going to their graduations. So it's not really goodbye--not yet.

Cha cha slide

What did we teach today? Oh, that would be the cha cha slide.

Yes, really. And yes, that's all. Our lesson (after the handing-back and grading of finals), consisted of these videos:

...and a few more, one of which involved a stick figure. Also, me teaching them what to do for "clap," "to the left," "to the right," "stomp," "hop," "reverse," "criss-cross," "hands on your knees," and, of course, "cha cha." I didn't bother explaining "Charlie Brown," because who knows what that's all about, anyway?

Also apparently hilarious--it left the last class of the day in stitches, anyway--was "cha cha now ya'll." Because, when spoken quickly, it apparently sounds like "cha cha 奶油"--which would , admittedly, be a pretty funny song lyric.

In the process of the day, I also managed to capture this wonderful scene: our Internet failed while we were watching the Crazy Frog video above, and these boys decided dancing with the video meant stopping when, and how, it did. Not the best quality, but shows a bit of the fun. :)

Zoe

I really hate not being able to have separate classes for students at different levels. I've been reminded of this several times lately, and twice in the last two weeks, these reminders have revolved around one student: Zoe.

Apparently, the only picture I have of her is from Halloween...so, no, this is NOT her normal daily attire.

Zoe is a 6th grader at Qingshan. And I'll be honest: other than knowing her by face and name, and knowing that she was her class's leader (as evidenced by her constantly yelling at them when they misbehaved), that's about all I knew about Zoe. Was she nice? I didn't know. Was she good at English? I didn't know.

Then, a few weeks ago, I found out. Patty asked me to help write the 6th grade English graduation speech (apparently they do speeches in English, Chinese and Taiwanese at Qingshan, which is kinda cool). And, when I asked if I could get some thoughts from the students on graduation to work with, she said sure--she'd just ask the person who'd be giving the speech, Zoe.

So, apparently Zoe is GREAT at English. Last week, I helped her through the more difficult words of the speech I'd written, but even without my help she did a fantastic job of reading it. And I never knew. Because, you see, Zoe just so happens to be in a class that is 2/3 boys--and not just any boys. No, these are the boys who are legendary at Qingshan; their entire class is known as troublemakers who are all but impossible to control. In any given lesson, just getting these kids to keep it down to a dull roar so we can maybe--maybe--make it most of the way through the lesson is the sole focus of the day.

And there, plopped down with another 9 unfortunate girls, is Zoe.

In class today, the 6th graders at Qingshan performed their English finals, self-produced skits based on various dialogs from the book. The first performance came from some of the infamous boys, who laughed their way through butchering their lines; I gave them a 70 only because I knew anything lower would never make it out alive from the Taiwanese grade inflation machine. A few minutes later, Zoe's group (all girls) went, and earned the single highest score I gave anyone all day, a 99.

I'll be honest, I don't know how classes are determined in America, or whether or not kids at different skill levels are actually split into them or not. I know that happens at the high school level, and I remember hearing people talk about T.A.G. testing or something, but I don't know the ins and outs of how it works. Maybe it's not too different; maybe it is.

But I just have to say, to all education systems, letting kids like Zoe disappear into a classroom full of rowdy, disinterested kids is just not right! YES, ideally there would be no rowdy, disinterested kids, and YES, it should be and is every teacher's job to make sure no one disappears in a classroom setting (and it should be noted that Patty clearly saw her: she did pick her out of all the 6th graders to give the speech, after all!).

But if you have a class in which some of the kids don't know their ABCs, while other kids can hold advanced conversations with the teacher, how will anyone learn? That last sentence describes a vast majority of my classes here. It's an impossible task for teachers and for students; in the end, you end up catering to the middle, leaving kids at the extremes either bored or confused. Sound promising to you? Me neither.

On the flip side, one of my favorite things I've done this year was remedial English classes, which included kids who often goof off in class but who, in remedial class, were fully invested in what we were learning. And, of course, the main reason the highest-level kids are good is because of their level-specific buqiban classes. Just saying.

I started this post to talk about Zoe, and somehow it has now led me down a path that looks as though I'm calling for educational reform.  I don't know how that happened, but there it is. I'm glad that, at least last--and at last--I have discovered how great Zoe is, despite her classmates' distractions!

Badminton and BBQs

I looked up to see the flickering underbelly of an airplane cross the night sky, headed West.

I turned to Maggie. "Planes make me homesick these days."

"You'll be going home soon," she said. "And we'll miss you!" added Fiona.

I turned to see Ingrid walking back towards the steep metal stairs that had brought us here, to Teacher Penguin's rooftop.

"I'll miss you, too," I said. "I wish everyone could just live in one place!"

It was hard not to think like that. We were at a BBQ at Teacher Penguin's gigantic family home--a BBQ designed as a going-away party for Ingrid.

It had been a lovely day, really. I had gotten an early start with plenty of work done; my 6th grade classes at Qingshan were happily engaged in their work of putting together their final plays; the weather was hot, but not oppressive.

After classes finished, I drove over to Hanmin, and we enacted what felt like the quintessential lazy summer day: Ingrid, Fiona and I joined Teacher Penguin and a plethora of other Hanmin teachers on the 4th floor to play badminton (NOT just a recreational sport here, as my glances to other courts confirmed). It was Ingrid and Fiona against Teacher Penguin and I, and we managed to win despite my many missed shots--Teacher Penguin is a great badminton player--and then we all sat down by a fan to cool down and chat. It was sunset, but still warm, and the camaraderie and empty school halls gave me the distinct impression of a late August evening with friends, or a particularly good afternoon at summer camp when I was a kid.

Then it was off to Teacher Penguin's home. We stopped by the house only briefly, though, before winding our way up "Penguin Mountain," a fully rural-looking hill complete with pineapple farms and banana trees JUST outside the Xiaogang area I thought I knew so well. It was gorgeous, and reminded me that I haven't been out in nature for ages, and I miss it. It felt like a camping trip back home.


And, of course, then there was the delicious--though vegetarian--BBQ that Teacher Penguin's mom had prepared for us. We sat around--a handful of Hanmin teachers and their kids and spouses, and as Teacher Penguin cracked jokes with Ingrid and everyone laughed, I thought of how amazing this community was, and how sad I was that it would soon no longer exist.

(Let's play a game called "spot the American...")

Teacher Penguin took Fiona and I back to our scooters, and I realized it was actually time to say goodbye to Ingrid. I hate goodbyes--so, so, so much. A hug, a few words, and then--Ingrid walked home, and I got on my scooter, hating that she wouldn't be at school on Monday and hating that, in a month, neither would I.

Today was indeed a glorious day--a glorious last day. Still, at the moment I can't help but hate airplanes...

Sweat, etc.

It's back, and in full force. Today, the high was 30C (~87*F), plus a balmy 80% humidity and sunlight the brightness of which could definitely burn through any sunblock you dared to set up against it. The heat. It's here.

And it's not come alone: it's brought its faithful companion, sweat. What joy is ours.

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. We don't get a lot of days above the 80s (F) there, and no one really talks about humidity because there's never enough of it to matter. As a result, sweat was a pretty foreign concept to me before I came here. Sure, people sweat, but usually just a little, and usually just when they've been working out or something.

Not so here. It took less than a month here for me to buy a little washrag to take with me everywhere; a little more than a month to realize wearing makeup was a futile waste of money. Then the heat waned; Kaohsiung's pleasant Fall and Winter approached, and I even had to don a coat a few times. But no more. Now the heat's returned, and, with it, the sweat.

Why am I writing about sweat? It's simple, really: it's the closest thing I have to a uniting force of my day today. It was certainly ever-present, anyway.

This morning, I arrived at school with my hair in low pigtails--a response to its newly cropped length which doesn't allow for any other sort of hairstyle that would simultaneously fit under my helmet and keep my hair off my neck. I didn't want to sweat. But what had I unfortunately forgotten as I styled my hair? Oh yeah: the interview.

Today, my LETs applied for the Fulbright program for next year. Seeing as how the interview fell in the middle of a school day, and involved all of the people that I usually share classes with, Hanmin asked if I would accompany them to the interview. Which I did--IN PIGTAILS. So much for professionalism.

The interview went fine--I mostly just sat there as moral support, though I did manage to throw in a quick plug for my schools right before we left--and then we went out to lunch at a local duck noodle shop. There, I had a bit of a problem with my chopsticks--they were slipping out of my fingers. No, not because I don't know how to use chopsticks--believe me, it's second nature at this point--it was because of sweat. And that's when I realized: it's back!

Thankfully, my heat annoyance was soon relieved by a SCRUMPTIOUS visit to a shave ice place with Hanmin's principal, academic director, and Maggie (a visit which meant we were 20 minutes late to our next class, but hey! We had the principal's and the academic director's explicit permission!)

The heat continued to plague my day in various forms which, thankfully, had less to do with sweat. My shoes began to fall apart and blister my feet, which sucked, and I got really thirsty, which also sucked.

It also impacted my favorite moment of the day: the moment a gaggle of 6th grade girls stretched my birthday into a second week, crowding my desk and handing me notes written on paper shaped like Facebook "like"s, a box of cute chocolate (like what Analicia got me!), some almond cookies, and a big ol' chocolate bar. It was so nice of them, and they were so wonderful, yet what was I worried about? The heat. And the chocolate.

Thanks for the likes, Mandy, Anna, Lillian, Natasha, and Cindy!

Favorite parts: "Fo" Bekah Teacher and the squares bottom left--each with a different design and different type of chocolate inside!

All I can say is "Thank goodness for refrigerators!"...And AC. It's the one surefire way to get out of the heat, and so to avoid melting--whether chocolate or self.

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!

English Village

Here in Taiwan, they have a lovely little thing called English Village. They exist in a series of re-envisioned and rebuilt classrooms in elementary schools, each room newly designed as a weather station, an airplane, a convenience stores, a restaurant. They exist all over the country, and serve as their host schools pride and joy.

In previous years, Kaohsiung ETAs worked in them; Yilan ETAs still do. To work there is to lead the small groups of kids who come from all over through the labyrinthine hallways, instructing them to speak only English and helping them practice it in practical situations. For the teachers, that means repeating the same lesson over and over and over and over and... let's just say I'm glad it's not in my job description.

So why am I mentioning it, you ask? Well, because today, I went. Or, rather, the Qingshan 5th graders went and I tagged along. After a long, drawn-out and WET (it was pouring) process of finding Wufu English Village that ended in a kindly staff person taking pity on the clearly lost foreigner and the discovery that Patty's phone is broken, I was led into the Weather room with a group of my 5th graders.

After that, it was the airport...

The "airplane!" Pretty cool, really...

Flight attendants...

And a captain!

...also, a bathroom. LOVE that they included that.

...and then a break wherein I was introduced to Darren, their token foreign teacher from Canada, and Barry, "the military guy," as he termed himself. Then we went to Darren's "class," the faux-fast food restaurant, where we discovered that he is the EPITOME of an otter and loves to sing Adele's "Someone Like You" in a high falsetto, then to the convenience store, where I was dismayed to see "cup water" on the list of drink options. Oh, well. At least they had English newspapers on the walls that I could read to distract myself!

American prices! With decimals and everything!!

Darren the cashier

Of course there was a convenience store!

 It was an interesting day to see how English Village works--and a day which confirmed my happiness not to be working at one every day. It was fun for a day trip, though!

Pictures at last

It's odd how quickly photos can pile up. Even with my diligent posting of most of my March pictures a few weeks ago, I had several hundred still un-posted as of today, just halfway through April. But no longer.

They are now all up: pictures from various outings with my host family, pictures from Alex and Melanie's visit, pictures from dying Easter eggs with my kids, pictures from making Eggs Benedict. And I realized an odd thing about posting pictures today: I'm less likely to do it if I've already blogged about it. See, whenever I post on here, and use select pictures from the day, two things happen:

1.) I upload the pictures from my camera to my computer, thus getting rid of half the work involved. I usually even edit the few I end up using.
2.) I put the best pictures up for all to see.

These two things are unquestionably the least productive things I could do for general photo-posting. See, they make me feel like I've already done it; that all (the important) photos are up and that doing more would be a bonus/extra work for nothing. But, of course, that's not true. I post maybe 15 pictures on here, if I'm feeling indecisive; I post several hundred to my Facebook, even when I'm being picky.

Today, I was being somewhat picky. So here, for your viewing pleasure, are links to the fruits of my uploading labors, in the form of albums named:

"What will you do in March?" "I will wear green in March" (new additions);
April showers... (,,,or sun, or clouds, as the case may be);
Easter! (Dying eggs at 漢民 and 青山, then making Eggs Benedict with friends--not bad for a holiday away from home.)

Full

Living in Taiwan, "full" is a regular part of my daily vocabulary. In a culture whose local language, Taiwanese, says "have you eaten?" for "hello," eating and over-eating are regular occurrences. Today, however, my title doesn't refer to food--or, at least, not principally. No, I mean the day as a whole: SO SO full!

It's 1am now. I woke up this morning at 7am. In the intervening 18 hours, I...

Went to school, where I dyed eggs with the 5th graders at Qingshan amidst what began as chaos and ended in gorgeous colors and very few messes;

Explained to countless students, teachers, and administrators who Alex and Melanie were, and that Melanie was, in fact, American;

Lost the race against Alex and Melanie's taxi driver home;

Revealed the wonderfulness of Ali's burritos and the corner shop's milk tea to Alex and Melanie;

Took advantage of a few hours break from today's drizzle to eat shave ice at Siziwan, take the ferry to Cijin, rent bikes, glimpse the lighthouse, explore the fort, ride bikes, and discover that basically the entire seashore at Cijin is under construction;

Helped Chialing cook some fantastic noodles which Alex and Melanie obviously ADORED;

Took a window-shopping stroll with Melanie that resulted in some cute stationary for her and a nice little conversation with the adorable owner of the adorable Nini store down the street, together with some delicious cake despite my protestations that we were full;

Walked along the Love River with Alex and Melanie;

Found Alex some cold medicine;

Made a brief stopover at Ruifeng Night Market, where we saw some hilarious Angry Bird and "Angry Sponge" shirts, as well as some gorgeous leather bags;

Made plans to hang out with my host family tomorrow, after a stop at another stationary store and Dream Mall, and made tentative plans to KTV afterwards.

So "full" is not an understatement--this is just the outline! In other news, my plans for tomorrow begin at 10am, and I am therefore going to sleep.

(Belated) Breakthroughs

There are some things I've just had to accept about my experience here in Taiwan. For instance, that I will never be able to remember the names of every one of my students. And that those students will never be able to properly pronounce the letter "z."

Then today happened.

This first thing is embarrassing to admit, but a breakthrough nonetheless: today I realized, after 7 months of teaching them, that my 3rd class of 5th graders on Fridays at Qingshan has four twins from three pairs in it. I already knew that Bess and Kyle were in that class, while their respective twins were in other classes, but I had somehow missed up until today that this class also has Bruce and Chris in it--identical brothers whom I'd failed to notice were, in fact, twins.

I guess I just thought they were the same person or something? Weird.

Pictured here on the right: either Chris or Bruce. Chruce?

The letter "z" has been a major headache for me this year. It's an incredibly difficult sound for Chinese speakers learning English, yet for some unfathomable reason, it features pretty prominently in textbooks. Rachel's told me about her adventures trying to get kids to say the word "zebra," and I have had run-in after run-in with the word "zoo," which invariably comes out as "loo" or "lroo" or "roo."

To me, "l" and "r" bear almost no phonetic similarity to "z"--so why do they always resort to this? Why is this sound so hard? I honestly don't know. But I was thinking about it the other day, and realized that at least Chinese has the initial sound of "在" (tzai), which is admittedly not perfect, with the t sound before the z, but does at least feature a sound that, if said with "oo," would be recognizable as "zoo" (tzoo), not as "bathroom" (loo) or "regret" (roo/rue).

So I mentioned this breakthrough to Patty, who liked it and shared it with the classes via BoPoMoFo (Taiwanese phonetic system). The results? Whereas at the beginning of the class maybe 30% of the students could say their "zoo" correctly, towards the end I'd say about 75% could. Not bad! Now, just to retroactively teach this breakthrough to all of my students...

But it's pointless to "rue" the consequences of being slow on the uptake on this one. Just because I left my brain in the "loo" before doesn't mean its retrieval can't be meaningful--and it is, for Chris, Bruce, and the letter "z"!

Pairings

I don't know why, but I do love it when I come across a pairing of two that seems to suit in some way or another. Maybe it's a subconscious human instinct, to join two things to make a single one complete. In any case, I've been noticing plenty of pairings lately, and thought I'd go ahead and share them with you.

Kids' Names:

The best part here is that I have a pair of pairings, or actually a trio of pairings, taken from both of my schools. I notice paired names most often when kids sitting next to each other have appropriate names, or their names are next to each other on the roll call.

Take, for instance, two of my 5th graders at Hanmin who sit in the same row: Amos and Andy.

And then there's the two 6th grade girls at Qingshan whose names directly follow each other: Penny and Candy.

The best one, though, is a tidbit Maggie passed along to me today on the walk to one of our classrooms. She said that one of the teachers at the school has twins, a boy and a girl. Their family name is Li, and the twins are named Li Ke and Li Le. (李可 and 李樂.) Yes, Chinese speakers, that's right--the kids' names are made of the halves of the word 可樂--cola. According to Maggie, people ask the dad how his drink is, and things of that nature, all the time. And I have to say, he deserves it!


Smaller Pairings:


My most pervasive frustration with traffic here comes out when I am most fully taking advantage of traffic here. It's a perverse pairing. Essentially, when I'm running late and I hit traffic, I get quite annoyed at the cars, scooters, pedestrians, bicyclists and pushcarts--yes, pushcarts--in my way. Stupid Taiwanese traffic, I say, why is this person pushing a cart by hand down the middle of the street? This would never happen in America... 

I then rev my engine and find the best way around the problem, weaving and making marginally legal turns as necessary. That is, I drive in such a way that, if I were in America, would get me in massive trouble. It's a catch-22: the very order I'm longing for is the order I am more than happy to thrown to the wayside to get me to my destination quicker.


Another pairing: The Hunger Games and Sour Patch Kids. I like to eat sour candy when I go to the movies. Taiwan has a serious shortage of sour candy. However, Kaitlin brought me some like the gem she is, and so today I got to relive one of my favorite essential pairings from America: candy and a great movie. Nothing not to love!


So those are my pairings from the day. What are yours?

Making it work

Can I be honest? I don't really want to blog tonight. But here goes.

Today marks possibly the first time all year that I've gotten up on a Thursday morning with a specific purpose in mind: in this case, to climb Monkey Mountain with Kaitlin.

There were several problems with this plan, the most notable of which being that I had never before been to Monkey Mountain and thus had no idea where we should go to hike. Information gleaned from Rachel (who'd done it twice before but had never driven there) and the Internet (which had surprisingly little to say on the subject other than 'do it') taught me it should be easy enough if I just took Wufu and followed the signs for the zoo, and then the giant yellow banana signs. Of the latter, one oh-so-helpful blogger had this to say: "If you can't follow these, you're a moron."

Well, I am not a moron. But the signs, while large and easy to see, are themselves quite moronic. In essence, they led us on a wild goose chase around the mountain. We first followed them up the mountain and parked somewhere, wandered around and found nothing. So, we returned to a huge grouping of giant yellow banana signs--pointing in two different directions, and with the places they were pointing to written solely in Chinese.

We picked one to follow and ended up at the zoo where, according to some Internet denizens, you can also take a little hike. Except there were no trails in sight. So we headed back to our sign beachhead and went the other way, which eventually led us to a temple--another place where, according to my research, there should be trails. Indeed, inside the complex, there was even a portion marked "hiking trail."

We walked to the back of the temple (so far so good) and found a little trail, which we climbed, and where I did manage to see my first Taiwanese monkeys, lounging on the temple roof. "Great," I thought, "Now let's hike!"

Then the trail ended. We spent a while looking for others, but to no avail--that was destined to be the extent of our hiking experience.

On the plus side, though, that then gave us time to visit the always gorgeous British Consulate Residence, Wu Pao Chen bakery, and try to find a Starbucks selling a Kaohsiung mug (fail).

Then it was time for me to go to school, while Kaitlin got some rest. Highlights at school:

• Patty suggesting I take a little nap because I wasn't feeling well;
• me: "What is Teacher Patty wearing?" (correct answer: pants) 6th grade boy: "Ugly pants!"
• Remedial class begins again--love love LOVE getting to teach a class of 6! Back to being able to say "Howard, what's this word? Teddy, what letter comes next? Jenny, what sound does 'k' make?" Judy, what's this word? Leo, what is this? Evan, what's this word?" It always makes me jealous of those in the county schools with tiny classes....*coughKarinacough*

Great day overall, though! Despite minor geographical failings.

Small accomplishments

Often, it's the smallest things that determine how I feel about today. The same is true today--I feel like the day went great: I made dinner.

I also taught, of course, giving my past-tense-and-Thailand Powerpoint to the 6th graders at Qingshan, and continued work on my class-by-class seating chart I'm making for myself for all of my classes. And I got/am getting more organized, which always makes me feel accomplished; I made a calendar for cleaning duties in our apartment and am in the process of making a daily schedule for myself which will (or so the theory goes) make me actually go the gym when I plan to go the gym--I hate not doing things that are set in stone, or, you know, written on paper with ink.

But those are not today's triumphs, in my rather illogical mind; no, the triumph was making dinner.

Part of that is because today's dinner was the first I've cooked since the beginning of CNY break a month ago, but the bigger parts come from the fact that, in making this meal, I felt like a local.

No, not in flavor. But in ingredients, and how I got them. The drive back from school found me starving and ambitious, so I took a detour and found a big outdoor vegetable market I'd been to once before a few months ago--yeah, that's right, once--and was able to, not only find parking in the rush hour madness, but communicate with the vegetable vendors in Chinese, seek out the best produce and prices, and buy them without a hitch. (Getting home my creativity was not quite so productive, and involved a somewhat less planned detour, but that's beside the point.)

I ended up with a pair of onions for 30NT (~$1), a  red pepper and a good-sized yellow pepper for 45NT (~$1.50, and the more exciting for having seen my roommates' supermarket-bought peppers priced at 45NT for one), a couple of green onions the guy threw in for free, and a spectacularly massive carrot for 14NT (~$.50).

At home, I already had a chicken breast thawing, but no marinade, so I popped over to the local Taiwanese grocery store, explored their mostly-Chinese-written-and-flavored sauce section, and picked one labeled as BBQ satay which, once I got it home, smelled slightly fishy. I mixed a few teaspoons of that with oil and soy sauce and voila! Marinade. After throwing some rice and bullion in the rice maker, it was time to chop up the veggies, and boy were there a lot of them:

Then it was just a stir frying away from deliciousness and the knowledge that, for ~$2.25US plus the chicken and rice, I'd made at least three or four meals worth of wonderful, healthy food.

It's a small accomplishment, to say the least. But to make this meal, I had to navigate the city successfully to place I didn't know well--in rush hour, nonetheless, use my Chinese to get the vegetables I was after, and experiment in completely unknown sauces to make it all come together nicely. And it did! So yeah, it's small, but it also happens to have made my day.

Past Tense

Today marks my last day of Chinese New Year break, a day which I mark with an odd mixture of joy and remorse. It's been a very strange experience, flitting about with nothing to occupy my days but what I choose, a ragtag diet of books and movies and TV shows (and, yes, a trip to Thailand) supplanting my steady routine of classes and work. I haven't had this sort of a complete and total break since Christmas breaks in high school, and even then I was living at home, which meant my free time was snapped up to get the house ready for the deluge of people which always marks the holiday season for us. This break was different: it was a break.

And now it's over. I spent several hours today sitting in my favorite coffee shop nearby and hammering out a Powerpoint presentation for my lesson plan at Qingshan this week, featuring my trip to Thailand and a new lesson on the past tense: read, watched, played, went, rode, and saw. Patty thought the kids would like to see what I did over break, and I tried to make the slideshow a nice blend of my trip and the grammar, teaching the concepts and then heading each slide of my pictures with a sentence: "I went to the beach." "I went snorkeling." "I saw lots of fish." "I rode an elephant."

I like how the presentation turned out, and it felt good to sit down with a decided purpose in mind and work until it was finished. I've missed teaching, missed having a task set before me that I needed to finish. Especially since it took place in a coffee shop, it reminded me of being in college, which is (for me) a pleasant memory.

But now, these weeks of relaxation and exploration are a memory, too. They are all now set in the past tense, and I can't imagine I'll encounter a similar break again. Going forward, I'm no longer a student, and after this year I'll no longer be a teacher, either, leaving me in a standard job working standard hours, which notably exclude weeks-long breaks for holidays, Western or Taiwanese.

So am I excited to go back to school tomorrow, excited to meet my new students at Hanmin, see my co-teachers and students at Qingshan again and step back into my routines? Yes, absolutely yes. But even so, I can't help but feel a twinge of sadness as this break, and breaks in general, slips irrevocably into the past tense.

Readers' Theater, concluded

Yesterday, I mentioned that I presented what I was doing to all the other Fulbright grantees. What I neglected to mention, though, is what I talked about--readers' theater. And, for that matter, I realized, I have never showed here the final outcome of my readers' theater projects, which is a real shame, because they're adorable.

So today, back home and in full-on relaxation mode, let me take a moment to show you all the wonderfulness that my kids at Qingshan and Hanmin came up with. I think it was pretty great.

First of all, here are myself and all of my fantastic actors, fully decked out after their performances.

Qingshan

Hanmin

And now, of course, here's them in action. Here's Qingshan's play, "The Spooky Crown of Tim Cockatoo," which was based off of The Terrifying Tale of Prewitt Peacock, by Bill Peet, one of my all-time favorite children's book authors. (I apologize for the film quality on both videos; they're the official film from the hosting school, who wouldn't let anyone else film or take pictures during the show.)

And here is Hanmin's play, "The Emperor's New Clothes," the script for which I wrote based on the classic story. They won third place in this city-wide competition.

So there you have it! You now know all that my fellow Fulbrighters do--and just a little of what my kids have been up to lately.