Changes...

Well, things are changing... for better and worse!

Yesterday was the first day back to work after Mr. Lee was fired. And even on the first day the changes were evident!

There was a meeting with all the teachers. Schedules were handed out to every teacher. The textbooks were properly labeled and curriculum schedules for the entire month were distributed. Each teacher was only scheduled for the days they were contractually obligated to work. It was wonderful! Everything was organized. Everyone knew exactly where they needed to be, when they needed to be there and what was expected during class!

A few other benefits...

1. I no longer teach on Saturdays! Hooray! Of course, I have lost the overtime pay that I earned on Saturdays, but I can go out with my friends who all have the weekends free!
2. I also don't have to teach TOEFL classes anymore! TOEFL classes are the training classes for the English-As-A-Foreign-Language tests that students have to take in order to attend foreign schools. TOEFL classes are boring! (Think of how exciting your SAT prep courses were... See what I mean?)
3. I get to teach two of my favorite little boys... Tom and Harry. They are about five years old and the silliest little boys you have ever met! They can't sit still for even thirty seconds, but they laugh and giggle, so I can't stay mad.
4. There is MUCH less prep work for all my classes. Teaching 5th grade history takes much less effort to explain than trying to convey the implications of anthropocentrisim and cost/benefit impact analysis to middle school children!

Nonetheless, changes are usually bittersweet. I no longer teach my favorite debate class. It was a group of about six students, all boys and one girl. The boys were rowdy and really goofy. The girl was quiet and shy, intimidated by the boy's extroverted personalities. But, the girl became more confident and the boys became more focused and I always had a very good time!

In fact, this wasn't the only debate class I lost. I lost most of my debate classes! I'm teaching mostly elementary (4th and 5th grade) US history and science. I still teach some debate on the weekends, but only on Sundays. What a shame!

But, as you can see there are many more positives than negatives. I'm very happy with my situation.

Onto other news...

I'm reading Robert Penn Warren's "All the King's Men." I've wanted to read it for awhile, but I just hadn't made time. I came across a passage that I thought was beautifully written...

" The end of man is knowledge, but there is one thing he can't know. He can't know whether knowledge will save him or kill him. He will be killed, all right, but he can't know whether he is killed because of the knowledge which he has got or because of the knowledge which he hasn't got and which if he had it, would save him. There's the cold in your stomach, but you open the envelope, you have to open the envelope, for the end of man is to know."

I'm going to the American embassy tomorrow. I know it sounds silly, but I am really looking forward to those 45 minutes I'll spend on American soil.

By the end of the month I'm going to have to make a 3-4 day trip to Japan. Poor me.

Within three months I'll have to take a 4-5 day trip to California. Poor me, again.

I don't think I'm going to be getting a bigger apartment. I may be stuck in my shoebox for the next nine months. In that case... I'll make it a bad ass shoebox!