Friday, September 26
As hard as it is to believe, we have already come to the halfway point in the 1st quarter. It has also been almost seven weeks since we arrived here in Egypt. It's like anything, I guess. Once you arrive at a new location or begin a new job, it takes a while for one to adjust to the new locale, but then once you sort of get into the system, the days begin to fly by.
Kris and I keep VERY busy here, and there isn't a lot of "down" time, or at least there hasn't been that much to this point. Even on the weekends we tend to spend at least a part of each day working on school-related tasks. I don't like to do that, because I really do believe that weekends should be spent recharging one's batteries. However, we are trying to limit our time at work.
This week we will have our first long break. We'll go to school on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, and then the next 6 days will be off from school. On our calendar it is listed as Ramadan Feast/Armed Forces Day. Ramadan comes to an end at the end of the month, and the 28 days of fasting will be completed. I guess people throughout the country take some time off at the conclusion of the month of Ramadan each year.
In any event we'll be off until the 7th of October. Kris and I are joining four other couples from school on an outing to the Sinai Peninsula. We've hired a bus and driver that will take us on the 8-10 hour journey eastward across the desert. We'll be staying at a small town called Dahab, which is located a bit north of the famous tourist city of Sharm el Sheikh. If you get your maps out you will notice that the Sinai Peninsula is somewhat triangular in shape. Sharm El Sheikh is located on the southern tip of the triangle, and Dahab is northeast of that on the eastern side of the Red Sea.
In that area there are some fantastic spots for scuba diving/snorkeling. Some of the teachers will be scuba diving, while Kris and I will probably be more than content to do some snorkeling. The waters of the Red Sea are supposed to be filled with a variety of colorful fish and fantastic coral reed formations. Of course we'll also be close to Mt. Sinai, Moses' old hangout, but I don't know that we'll be taking a hike up the mountain. Whatever we do, it will be nice just to see new territory and to have a break.
Each year during Ramadan, children collect food items for food shelves in the area, just like we do at St. Vincent's. I have a boy in my room whose father owns a shipping company. Every year, during this food drive the class that brings in the most items wins a class pool and ice cream party. Well, every year the class that this boy has been in has won the contest, as he brings in HUNDREDS of boxes of food. In fact, on the last day of the contest (Tuesday of this week) his dad sent a TRUCK to the school. It took quite some time to unload it, and the students from my room pitched in and brought the items into a storage room. Thus our class won the contest....I guess you could say that it's sort of a stacked deck; as long as this boy continues to bring in the goodies, his class will continue to win the contest. All the other kids at school have gotten used to it, and they try to beat his class each year.
The skies at school yesterday were a yellowish hue as there were sandstorms in the desert, apparently, and the winds were blowing tons of it into the atmosphere. I was on recess duty at lunch time and you could feel the particles of sand as they drifted through the air. It was just a bit difficult to breathe....Yuck!!
That's all for this week....
Friday, September 26, 2008
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Mid-September
As I write this the date is Sept. 13, and we've had 2 full weeks of school. We're beginning to get into a kind of routine, which is a good thing. Life in general can be a bit hectic, so it's nice to have some things happening on a regular, predictable schedule. At the same time Kris and I are figuring out about how much time we need each day and on the weekends to prepare for classes.
One thing that hasn't changed much is the heat. It gets hot each and every day, with temps in the mid-80's; that hea is accompanied by high humidity. Sometine in October, the thermometer should begin to slowly head south just a bit. There are air conditioning units in each room, but they are located in the front. There are also ceiling fans to help circulate the cooler air, but the students in the back of the room are always warmer, while the ones sitting next to the AC are freezing. I have begun to shut it off for periods of time each day to give the "Eskimos" time to thaw out just a bit.
This week will mark the halfway point in the month-long Ramadan period. Each evening during Ramadan when the sun goes down, the people mark the occasion by having "iftar", the evening meal. This is a special occasion and special, traditional foods are prepared. This past week on Tuesday we had our own iftar in the cafeteria. Members of the school board were invited along with other teachers from the staff who live off-campus, so we had a full-house rather than the 15-25 people who usually eat at night.
One thing that hasn't changed much is the heat. It gets hot each and every day, with temps in the mid-80's; that hea is accompanied by high humidity. Sometine in October, the thermometer should begin to slowly head south just a bit. There are air conditioning units in each room, but they are located in the front. There are also ceiling fans to help circulate the cooler air, but the students in the back of the room are always warmer, while the ones sitting next to the AC are freezing. I have begun to shut it off for periods of time each day to give the "Eskimos" time to thaw out just a bit.
This week will mark the halfway point in the month-long Ramadan period. Each evening during Ramadan when the sun goes down, the people mark the occasion by having "iftar", the evening meal. This is a special occasion and special, traditional foods are prepared. This past week on Tuesday we had our own iftar in the cafeteria. Members of the school board were invited along with other teachers from the staff who live off-campus, so we had a full-house rather than the 15-25 people who usually eat at night.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
The First FULL Week of School
Friday, September 5, 2008
We've finished our first full five-day week here at Schutz and at the same time have entered the season of Ramadan. Monday, Sept. 1st was the beginning of the lunar month and thus the beginning of the month-long cycle of fasting. It has been interesting for me to observe the consequences of this within the classroom.
During Ramadan the children who are fasting must eat their first meal of the day before the sun rises, which is at about 6:00 a.m., I believe. During the day they may not eat or drink anything, and so by the time lunch recess ends, the soccer-playing boys are VERY hot and thirsty after zipping around in 85-90 degree temperatures. It becomes a bit difficult to do much textbook reading.
Out of my class of 19 students, I'd say that perhaps 10-12 of them are seriously fasting. The other part of this is that, when they go home after school, they still may not eat anything until after sunset. The days are getting shorter, but yet the sun does not go down until about 6:20 p.m. Many of them will stay up very late, some until after midnight, and then wake up again just a few hours later. The Egyptian public schools, therefore, are not beginning the school year until October.
Anyway, it's been interesting to go through an entire week of school to see how it "feels". The students at the Grade 5 and 6 levels have the following specials during the week: P.E., Music, Art, Foreign Language, Library, Technology/Computer. P.E and Foreign Language classes are held two or three times a week. That depends on which weekly cycle we're in. The other specials are held just once a week. They do have a 45-50 minute block of time for each special. On the days when they have Foreign Language and P.E., those two specials are back-to-back. The students first go to language at about 10:00, and by the time they finish P.E., it's lunchtime. It makes for a nice teacher prep time.
It's strange, after 5 years at SVDP, to see students in the room without uniforms. Apparently that has been proposed in the past, but as right now, the children can pretty much come to school dressed as they wish.
One of my students is Greek; she was born here, but her parents have Greek heritage. Her father is the manager of a Greek restaurant in Alexandria, and this evening Kris and I are going to try it out as we are lovers of all thing Greek.
In fact there used to be many people with ties to Greece, Italy, and other countries whose families had lived in this city for generations. It is so close to the southern coastline of Europe, and many of these folks started businesses here and prospered. After the revolution of 1952 quite a few of them returned to their ancestral homes, but there remain some. In fact one of the administrators at the school has ties to Italy, but he was born here.
This morning, it being the weekend, I worked out in the exercise room. This room has lots of nifty equipment. I tend to use the stair-climbing machine and the bike. Afterwards I went for a cooling swim outside, Even at 7:30 in the morning the temp was about 80 degrees outside.
Friday is our day for washing clothes, and so I did that first.
That's all for this week......
We've finished our first full five-day week here at Schutz and at the same time have entered the season of Ramadan. Monday, Sept. 1st was the beginning of the lunar month and thus the beginning of the month-long cycle of fasting. It has been interesting for me to observe the consequences of this within the classroom.
During Ramadan the children who are fasting must eat their first meal of the day before the sun rises, which is at about 6:00 a.m., I believe. During the day they may not eat or drink anything, and so by the time lunch recess ends, the soccer-playing boys are VERY hot and thirsty after zipping around in 85-90 degree temperatures. It becomes a bit difficult to do much textbook reading.
Out of my class of 19 students, I'd say that perhaps 10-12 of them are seriously fasting. The other part of this is that, when they go home after school, they still may not eat anything until after sunset. The days are getting shorter, but yet the sun does not go down until about 6:20 p.m. Many of them will stay up very late, some until after midnight, and then wake up again just a few hours later. The Egyptian public schools, therefore, are not beginning the school year until October.
Anyway, it's been interesting to go through an entire week of school to see how it "feels". The students at the Grade 5 and 6 levels have the following specials during the week: P.E., Music, Art, Foreign Language, Library, Technology/Computer. P.E and Foreign Language classes are held two or three times a week. That depends on which weekly cycle we're in. The other specials are held just once a week. They do have a 45-50 minute block of time for each special. On the days when they have Foreign Language and P.E., those two specials are back-to-back. The students first go to language at about 10:00, and by the time they finish P.E., it's lunchtime. It makes for a nice teacher prep time.
It's strange, after 5 years at SVDP, to see students in the room without uniforms. Apparently that has been proposed in the past, but as right now, the children can pretty much come to school dressed as they wish.
One of my students is Greek; she was born here, but her parents have Greek heritage. Her father is the manager of a Greek restaurant in Alexandria, and this evening Kris and I are going to try it out as we are lovers of all thing Greek.
In fact there used to be many people with ties to Greece, Italy, and other countries whose families had lived in this city for generations. It is so close to the southern coastline of Europe, and many of these folks started businesses here and prospered. After the revolution of 1952 quite a few of them returned to their ancestral homes, but there remain some. In fact one of the administrators at the school has ties to Italy, but he was born here.
This morning, it being the weekend, I worked out in the exercise room. This room has lots of nifty equipment. I tend to use the stair-climbing machine and the bike. Afterwards I went for a cooling swim outside, Even at 7:30 in the morning the temp was about 80 degrees outside.
Friday is our day for washing clothes, and so I did that first.
That's all for this week......
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