Month 2: And We're Back. :)

English Week.  It's like Shark week for...uh...grammar nazis?

Time flies when you're having Anfiladas...I mean...anfilades...one minute, let me check dictionary.com...yeah...okay, so Enfilades...is a word...but it doesn't mean "week-long celebration" in English.  Anyways, so three weeks ago we had English week.  I gave everyone a US "road trip" which involved most of my students listening and trying to answer questions while the fastest English speaker in the world talked through 200+ slides in 40 minutes.  It was fun, most of them liked it.

On our way to see Beauty and the Beast

We also got to sing a song or two, and...we went to see Beauty and the Beast at a special American center at another school.  FYI...if you're representing a foreign nation and inviting people over for movies...say the United States for example:  1)Make sure that your representative speaks very good English.  2)Have a screen at least as big as a proper television set up if you're going to invite people over for movies.  3)Don't place said screen in front of full-length windows for an afternoon screening--or buy some better curtains at least.

Later that same evening I had a much more successful English-language film screening of a French-inspired musical, Les Misérables.  Just need to get some computer speakers to finish our "home theater system," consisting of my laptop and a cable that hooks to the TV.  The new Les Mis is amazing!!!  Go see it!

Russian Week

The next week was "English week" for the younger students, and Russian week for the upper grades.  They had me play a series of games with the students on rather short notice...the first one went really well--in the second one, they told me to just play the same game with a wider audience, and it was so-so, but the kids still had fun I think.  We celebrated Men's day on Friday at school and on Wednesday at youth group.

All the ladies at YG painted on facial hair for us.

A Dance some of the Older Students Performed on Men's Day

Men's Day Festivities...Yum!

At school there was a feast and some performances.  On Thursday I was at the bus stop and one of the guys  ended up talking to me for an hour, asking me about my story and what I believe.  That was really cool, felt like I was supposed to be there for that one.

On Sunday the youth group leadership came over and we made pizzas and chatted.  It was alright, they're talking about changing the group again, which, meh...without strong leadership, it doesn't matter very much.

This girl came to me in tears asking to be re-seated last Wednesday morning.  Sixth class has a tendency to be hurtful to one another.  It was very cool that I just so happened to be talking that day about "A Hero is someone who makes peace."  So for the last five minutes or so I stopped talking about St. Francis and The Cross and the Switchblade and put it straight to them.  Another girl had just left the school because she felt excluded.  So it was really cool to be able to speak firmly and authoritatively about something really relevant.

On Thursday I had a showdown with the meanest teacher in school:  I've been teaching 1st Class section B for fun, because I have a good relationship with the teachers and students and they're awesome.  Apparently some of the section A parents were jealous, and the teacher tried to manipulate me into taking on a second class.  Standing up for yourself is freeing, standing up for yourself to the lady who makes the other teachers cry on a regular basis is a plus, and correctly using the formal "you" in Russian while heatedly explaining that "I'm sorry, but you blew your chance from the start because you tried to use manipulation rather than asking nicely"?  I was proud of myself.  Pray that I would be able to love her as a co-worker, and that she wouldn't take it out on the other teachers.

On Friday the 10th class guys invited me to go bowling with them.  That was cool.

Saturday mornings I've begun English classes at a family-ish style children's home.  The younger students were a joy, the older ones will be much more work.  Starting from ground zero is much easier than starting for an unknown point.  In the afternoon I went to a second children's home.  The home is very crowded and chaotic, and finally it was warm enough to play outside.  I played football with a bunch of the guys, broke up a fight or two, hung out.  Was kinda too tired to be very outgoing or talkative, but it was still good.  I hung out with the older guys a bit, didn't really talk much.  I saw one of them smoking and made a joke about dying one.  He said something about making it to 25, and I retorted that I was 25 and hoping that I was just getting started.  Those guys are gonna be hard to reach out to.

8th Class Ladies Singing during English week

Highlights from the last few days mostly involve 8th class.  We've laughed and cried together.  You see, on Friday we talked about parents, which was heavy enough to get everybody worked up and bring on the tears.  There are some very mature and wise young people in the group, and also some people with pretty rotten relationships with their parents.  And today we had a giggle-fest courtesy of a somewhat related topic:  sex.  They did a good job though, and we had a good conversation vía a Nooma video that talks about the three Hebrew words for love, and the importance of commitment and friendship alongside the physical for true love.

Three quarters of a school year nearly down!   Aah!  Coming this week:  Women's day, more orphanage visits, and    a tours of some of Bishkek's finest places.  :)  And...time to start outlining next quarter.