First day at the school and other notes

Since my former boss was an asshole I was a bit worried about sharing a class with the school's director. But she just took part of the class upstairs and I stayed with the rugrats. My 9.30 class is around six, seven and eight years old and it's their first year of English. They are adorable and easy to teach. Well, so far, let's see how teh year goes. My 10.30 class is from nine until eleven years old and the English leve varies, two or three have no clue of what I am saying. Like at all. The 12.45 class is a handfull, they're range from eleven until fourteen and some well, have issues. One boy lost his legs in a mine, another doesnt speak to people but hits... It seems all I did was five letters of the alphabet and end fights. I also dodged a pencil. I love my reflexes. No the pencil was not for me, it was another fight... However it was only the first day so we will see.

The school is quite big but a lot of things are different. The kids bow (they do a wai) and greet you. Usually that means first thing in the morning you have a screaming chorus when you walk in. They also sing before lunch. I was a total pig and just goobled things up before I even realized they were waiting to sing. I think the whole singing thing is big here, if you ask them to draw a quarter of tehm will hum or sing out loud. Less cute when you have twenty doing twenty different songs.

Considering that I am surrounded by Burmese I am getting confused, I no longer know who is from where and the cultural rules are a bit different so most of the times it means I get something wrong and they laugh.

Another first today was a snake. I saw my first outdoor snake. It was in our backyard while I was in the hammoc. I didn't move while my Brit housemate kept saying how cool it was. Not cool for me I can assure you. Those are not dangerous but still... I think they are also more out now that it is warm, don't know.

The house is pretty big and there is some confort, I'm no in the middle of the jungle as some suggested. The whole Asian toilet hing still needs to warm up to me. The other volunteers have lived together for a few months so I am sort of trying to find my space.

People are still nice and friendly, some in the market already knew my name and that I was a teacher. I had forgotten how it is to live in small towns. One guy gave me a ride in his scooter just as my water ran out and I was going uphill. He refused money. I could hug him. (I didn', don't worry).

I think tonight is the las day of the Budha festival, I hope so because there is a lot of noise and with the crickets, birds, dogs walking outside my window I have enough things to keep me awake.