Hi,
It's Nicole here. I hope you like the title, it is a tribute to signs we see around town often they get things mixed up. Like so many things in English, it is not wrong, but just not the way we say it....so tough for ESL learners to get.
Well, what a busy time of year. I had a great Birthday (Dec 16th), thankyou all for the Birthday wishes. We celebrated the night before with a party at our place, pizza, chicken and a bottle of Australian Red wine. Not the menu choice I would make in Australia, some thai or a roast would have been nice, but I had fun. Then we played poker and Matt and I lost again.....No trips to the "Norebang" this time, people were still leaving our place at 4am....
I received some great pressies, Matt gave me a ceramic platter and container and I got a beautiful basket of flowers, from my 6th grade teacher at my Friday school. See photo. He speaks very broken English and I travel with him by a car to my second Friday school (about 20mins) and we always have a great old chat, with my broken Korean and his limited English I pretty much know what he is talking about.
On my actual Birthday, after the party of course I was hungover and cleaning up the aftermath. We had just packed away all the empty beer bottles etc. when the doorbelll goes off - 4 of my students were at the door to wish me a HAPPY BIRTHDAY.........!Soooooooo sweet. We had heaps of cake left, i would say I invited them in, but that would be a lie, they barged in and Matt served up the cake much to their delight. They had bought some little pressies; a santa hat, diary, some smelly stuff and some dried octopus legs........mmmmmmmmm. "Teacher, it's delicious" - "Try, it"....what could I do, but I think they got that i didn't like it, and took it off me to eat themselves ....laughing hysterically the whole time.
The students had just had just received their English test results, so I asked them how they went. 2 girls got 96%, 1 92% and the 3rd wouldn't answer....eventually
Student (S):"Teacher I am very sorry, don't be angry"
Nicole (N):"Why?????, I would never be angry at you"
(S):" I got 84%....... "
(N):"Wow, that's wonderful....don't be sad, you should be very, very happy !"
(S unconvinced): "Ohhh yes teacher.."
Wow - these poor kids put a lot of pressure on themselves, I guess their parents do too. Last I checked 84% was a Distinction or about a B.....not too bad in my book. The fact that she can understand the question and tell me what mark she got is enough for me.
I had an excuse to ask the girls to leave as I had planned to go with my Korean Co-teacher, and Therese to have acupunture. I was a little nervous with this being the first time and was happy to have a Korean translator up my sleeve. I had been thinking of my aliment during the drive there, and was at a bit of a loss cause i had such a horrible headache (completely self inflicted) from the night before, BINGO, this might give the Doc something to work with.
So, I watched my friend go first, the Doctor seemed gentle and kind. She has stiff shoulders and neck - it was wierd to watch......but when the needles went in she said it felt good and her shoulders seemed to loosen up.
I was up next, the doctor prodded my foot a bit and seemed to hit a spot then, the needle went in and honest - my headache went.....it was wonderful. Then I didn't know that I had to sit with the needle in my foot for about 15mins. The staff / "nurses" at the place took this time to admire ........wait.....the bridge of my nose. At first I wasn't sure what they were looking at, it was when the 2 of them started touching it I knew. So, while I was trying to relax, I had these 2 women in my face looking at of all things my nose...very weird...but my headache was gone.! Afterwards,we went to a korean franchise burger place "Lotteria", I opted not to have the kimchi rice burger for a more traditonal beef burger.
Sunday, it snowed all day - I woke up to see the snow and then woke up Matt like a little kid cause I was soo exicted. Actual snow, it was on the rooves and some kids had made a small snowman.
This week at school I have been teaching the "12 days of Australia Christmas"...."On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me A kookaburra in a Gum tree, 2 snakes on skies, 3 wet galahs, 4 lyrebirds, 5 kangaroos, 6 sharks a-surfing, 7 emus laying, 8 dingoes dancing, 9 crocs - a -snoozing, 10 wombats washing, 11 lizards leaping, 12 possums playing''. Very sad, I know it off by heart. The kids seemed to enjoy it, particularly the kangaroo bit. See movie.
Christmas planning has begun, we aren't getting our hopes up but there is a chance we can get and cook a turkey, it's only a 3 hr drive away...no worries. And I received a Christmas care package from Mum complete with UHT custard and plum puddings....sooo good. Thanks mum.
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE AND YOUR FAMILES...................."I'm dreaming of a White Christmas............"
Update from Christmas.....It is sunny - not snowing, a bit sad (but you can't complain about good weather.)
We celebrated Christmas, Christmas eve with the rest of the foreign teachers here. It was wonderful. After a big effort on therese and EJ's part, we had a huge turkey...which they cooked to perfection. Our contribution to the day was honey carrots, trifle and rum balls....mmmm. So lunch was turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, brocolli, carrots followed trifle and plum pudding. There was soo much food we will defininately be heading over there for leftovers. Including dips and smoked salmon and salami.....fantastic. The Korean teachers and the bar man joined us and really enjoyed their first turkey and Christmas lunch.
Secret Santa was fun, definitely felt like a big kid ripping the pressies open. Well that's about all, we hope that everyone had a wonderful, warm Aussie Christmas. We are in our last week of school which is going to fly.
We both have over a month of holidays coming up, and intend to head to Hong Kong and China. Look for updates and photos late January, it's going to be rather chilly there we suspect!
BYE
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