Thursday, January 26, 2012

Thursday 1/26: “Je ne veux pas travailler”

I was able to sleep in this morning and, after a nice, hot shower, I felt a bit better. I took my time having breakfast and getting ready, then headed over to school. Pablo and I spent the five minutes before class discussing the fact that there are songs in pretty much every language called “I don’t want to work” …for example, the Pink Martini song, “Je ne veux pas travailler.” Apparently Pablo knows one in Spanish and one in Portuguese as well… In any case, we both sat there not wanting to get up and head to the classroom, but finally the clock hit 10:45am and we had to move. But, when we knocked on the classroom door, no one answered. It was locked! We eventually deduced that the CE2 classes were on a field trip and no one had bothered to tell us! Well, great. It was fine for me because I just went home and rested, but Pablo lives about 15 mins away by bike, so there was no point in him going back home because he had a class at 1pm at the middle school. He was a bit peeved because he could have slept in. :(

By the time I was walking back home, I wasn’t feeling so wonderful, so I returned to bed and read for a while until I fell asleep. When I woke up (to go teach at the other school), I was feeling icky again. If I moved to quickly, I felt kinda woozy and my head was all stuffed up again. Catherine suggested that I take the Volvo, so I drove to the other school.

My first class is supposed to start at 1:30pm (although they don’t ever get into the classroom before 1:35pm), but today I waited until 1:48pm before the kids showed up. Apparently they were having some sort of assembly that no one told me about. So, that class went by really fast because we only had 20 minutes of class time! Overall it was pretty successful though, because I found the book “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?” in the cupboard (while I was waiting around for my class to arrive) and I read that to them. After I read it once, we went through and translated each page. I had planned some other things to do, but we didn’t have time.

The second class arrived and I had those who had already finished their pen pal letters (about 3/4 of the kids) copy down a short list of useful questions from the board and then color. I went around helping the remaining students finish up their letters… and (miraculously) we managed to get them all done in time! And although the other students were far from silent, they didn’t get in any fights, so that was an improvement!

On the way home, I stopped at the grocery store to buy some big envelopes to send the pen pal letters. Once home (after I’d eaten some cereal for lunch… my stomach hasn’t been feeling so great either), I packaged up the letters and then went to the post office to mail them. So glad to be done with that! …Except that I’m about to start it at the school near me and, unlike the class of 14 at the other school that just finished their letters, there will be 60 kids writing letters! eep!

After tea with Margot, I read and rested in my bed. My stomach is all queasy now, which is rather unpleasant. I managed to haul myself up around 7:30pm so I could go down and make the salad for dinner. Catherine arrived soon afterwards and she made the omelet. Margot and I watched Dr. Quinn…who finally had her baby—out in the woods (of course). Ah, quel drame!

This weekend I’m going to Spain with Alison (leaving Sat morning and returning Sun afternoon), but I wish that I didn’t feel so crummy. I want to go have an adventure, but mostly I just feel like staying in bed. Phooey.

I got a letter from Aunt Ellen today! That definitely cheered me up!!! :D

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