One Month (and 2 days)
Trip Start
Aug 19, 2008
1
7
39
Trip End
Jul 04, 2009
Cairo,
Egypt
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Here's a, what I was hoping would be a short, update of what's been going on since I last e-mailed home. There may be a few repeats from before.
School Life
So I just realized today that it's been one month since I left Canada and what a crazy adventure it has been so far. I've set my classroom and met my students, and have started to figure out which ones will give me grief, which ones will make me laugh and which ones need a lot of extra one-on-one help. I have 23 students, 14 boys and 9 girls and each one of them special in their own way. I call them my space cadets because they seem to be in their own world and not in mine. I have one girl whom I'm convinced is a karaoke star or a singer because she's always singing to herself (language: unknown) including a time in their Arabic class when everyone was quietly coloring and you could hear her humming/singing. The kids around her are shushing her, she looks up realizes that they're shushing her and says "It wasn't me" and continues coloring and humming. I also have a son of a famous Egyptian movie actress but neither him or his mother speaks a lot of English, he's a sweet boy but he gives me grief constantly. And the quiet children that I've met at the beginning of the month are now out of their shell and are another source of grief. I do have to constantly remind myself that they're 4 years old and they all don't have ADHD. They're an interesting group of kids and I'm really hoping that my immune system and sanity can last the year.
my fancy spancy furniture
Talking about grief, at the beginning of the year both the extra music teacher and P.E. teacher meaning that everyone in the school gets music and P.E. except for the Junior Kindergarten and Senior Kindergarten students. So I just get one prep/day when my students have Arabic class. The school has told us that they have placed an ad in the newspaper advertising the positions, but because it's Ramadan they aren't anticipating any takers until Ramadan is over (Sept 30th) so in Shallah (basically meaning God willing) we'll have someone hired by the time October ends. Ramadan - I love it, but I also hate it. I can leave school early, but nothing back in Maadi is open when I get home including the internet company, people go insane because their body need food (and maybe a smoke as well).
There are 3 Junior Kindergarten classes, and I'm really fortunate to have been grouped up with a very experienced Junior Kindergarten teacher and another teacher that has taught young grades before as well. Gill (pronounced Jill) is a British teacher that has been in Egypt for about 15 years and is an amazing mentor, she also does the whole literacy portion of the curriculum, so I'm grateful for that. So it's up to Heather (she's been in Egypt for about 4 years, and has taught in China) and I to work on the math curriculum, and we just spent 4 hours planning and making stupid songs to teach the students about the number 1 and 2. Here's the song for number 1 (to the tune of Row your boat) One, One, One is fun.
sunset on the nile
One is fun, oh yeah! One, One, One is fun. One is fun, oh yeah!And here's the song for number 2 that I made up! Sing to the tune of Mary had a Little Lamb
We can all count to 2. Count to 2. Count to 2. We can all count to 2. Show me what to do. Speak: One, Two
It takes a lot of time and full stomach to think of such an award winning song.
Home Life
I'm slowly cleaning up my apartment and trying to make it more home-like but it's hard when you have gold-painted, fancy-smancy, fit-for-the-queen tea furniture. I'm at constant war with the ants that invade my apartment and trying to keep the previous tenant's cat out of my apartment. I'm just glad that my a/c units work, apparently it does get cold in Egypt, about +5, but I have yet to feel any cool weather.
I have joined a softball team out here, although I've only been to one practice, and 2 tournament games. I belong to the Women Nomad teams and the rest of the team is mainly teachers from Canada. There are a few Americans, but we're slowly infiltrating the team. There is apparently a co-ed team for tournaments and I guess depending on how much school planning that has to be done I'll probably play on a team.
My quest to see the world...
I went to see the Giza pyramids and the Sphinx on the first Friday that I had. It was an interesting experience that I never thought I would ever experience. I think everyone that I went with to see the pyramids wanted to see them since the grade 8 social studies unit on Egypt.
at the pyramids
It was surreal to actually see them in person and ponder on how in the world they managed to build such complicated structures without the help of modern technology. I believe the consensus was that it was the work of the aliens. Who else would place the pyramids in such a way that if you lay the constellation Orion on top of it, not only would it be in the close position, but the more intense the star, the higher the pyramid? Not only did I see the Giza pyramids, I also saw the Sakkara Pyramid (aka the Step Pyramid) and the Dashur Pyramid. There was more to see at the Sakkara Pyramid but by then it was the hottest time of the day so we quickly left. But at the Sakkara Pyramid location, there was a museum where there were was an actual mummy, the jars where they put the organs in and a Sarcophogus. On the way to Dashur Pyramid, we got to see a pyramid where you could see the point where the Egyptians realized their mistake in the calculations and change the angle of the pyramid. We also got to see another pyramid that had crumbled into a pile of rubble. At the Dashur Pyramid we actually got to go into the pyramid. It was interesting to do, nothing to see and my thighs for the next four days killed. Apparently I don't do enough pyramid exercises to strengthen my thigh muscles.
A couple of weeks ago, I went to Coptic Cairo which is about 5 Metro stops from the Maadi stop. 5 of us went to explore Coptic Cairo and saw a lot of mosques, synagogues and even a Greek Orthodox Cemetery. I think the funniest thing that I saw in the cemetery (not that death is funny or anything) was Chinese characters written on a headstone in there.
Pucker Up!
So, a Chinese person buried in a Greek-Orthodox cemetery in Cairo. How confusing. Coptic Cairo was a good half day exploration of Egypt. Future Plans
The one good thing of Ramadan is the end of it. To "celebrate" the end of Ramadan, they have a celebration called Eid El Fitr, and we get a week off, a majority of the staff is going to Jordan for the week. I'm traveling with 4 other girls to go see Petra, the Red Sea and other things that Jordan is famous for and what is possible to see in the 5 days that we're traveling for.
Other then Jordan, I really don't have much plans made yet. My parents are coming to Egypt to visit me in the beginning of December and I have a week then where I'm hoping to get a trip planned to see Luxor, Aswan and Alexandria. I also do have 3 weeks off, 2 at the end of December and the first week of January, where I might be going somewhere in Africa. Exact location is unknown yet, but the idea is very appealing right now.
I've seen some really interesting things, and there are some times where I wish I had a remote like the movie 'Click' where I can just pause time, take the picture of the funny thing that I saw and continue on with life. For example the funniest thing I saw today on the way to school was a grown man on a camel on the ride, and a teenager sitting on the back where there was definitely no seat and holding on to dear life so he wouldn't fall off. I thought I was the only one who had seen that but thank goodness someone else in the van had seen it too.
Anyways this is getting a lot longer then I was hoping. Talk to you later.
evelyn
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