Friday, November 26, 2010

I just lived through a coup. Jealous?

So before I get to the coup, a few things to say first...

Happy Thanksgiving all my American Friends! i hope you ate some turkey and drank some beer for me. i had to work so no Turkey for me. plus I wouldnt even know where to go to find turkey in my town. im not even sure if there is turkey. so instead I went italian and had pasta. what can you do?

Next CONGRATULATIONS to my Eric, my bro, and Becca for getting into Teach For America. Its so awesome that you got in (though i didnt have any doubts about you getting in) and am excited you are both going to do it. keep me updated on how its going and what you have to do.

so on to the coup. last Wednesday, which i think was the 17th, MAD had an referendum election for a new constitution. key changes were the lowing of the age to be president (the current one is 36 and you are supposed to be 40. he took control during the last coup so of course he wants to be eligible to actually run for president when there are elections) and the 6 month rule, which means you have to live in the country for 6 months prior to the election (which makes the former pres, the one ousted in the coup, ineligible cause he isnt here and if he comes back, he will be arrested and serve the rest of his life in prison). anyhoo a group of soldiers decided that they didnt like the new constitution so they hold up in an army barrack by the airport and stated that they had taken over the governement, were dissolving/halting government institutions and forming a military committee to run the government for now. what happened next you ask? nothing. absolutly nothing from a operational standpoint. people in my town had no idea there was a coup, or if they did, dismissed it as a little coup that was all tanas problem. I still had school to teach and everything ran smoothly. The end result of the coup? the 20 military people were arrested after other military stormed the barracks and at no time was I in danger. it was basically a lot of smoke. boring! hehehe

that was the big event since last time I blogged. teaching is going ok. i love my 2nde class and 2 out of my 3 6eme classes. I think the third 6eme class is actively trying to give me an ulcer. They are never quiet, goof around all the time, and love to tattletale on each other. my angry voice has come out more times then I would have liked and next semester had better be better or they are really not going to like me. i will start moving kids around, sending them to the office and docking points from their tests. shits about to get real for them if they dont start listening. They are by oldest 6eme class so maybe that contributes. who knows. i just know that i dread teach there class cause it takes so much out of me.

I did give all my classes a quiz recently, which was fun. I caught 10 cheaters in my 6eme classes but none in my 2nde. my 2nde students did pretty well, for the most part. Here its just passing or failing. ABCD doesnt matter, at least as far as I can tell, and more people passed then failed in my 2nde class. the same can not be said for my 6eme. most of them failed and i gave them that test on a silver platter. i had a review the class before where i gave them the entire test and more then 50% still failed. they really just dont care. at least thats the theory Im going with, since i hand feed them the test. I have to give the 6eme kids their final next week (which i didnt know till this last thusrday. the last day of school in dec 18, according to the MAD govt and we are ending 2 weeks early. absolutely no idea why) so we shall see how that goes. thay donĂ¹t have that much material to review so they should do ok. SHOULD being the key word. im not holding my breath. I give my 2nde kids their final next week, since i have to miss the last week of school for out IST (inter service training).

I am getting excited about IST. i cant wait to see everyone and trade stories. also to just chill with other Americans. i am supposed to be going to the beach for xmas, so that will be fun. it will be a good chance to even out the tan lines i have from my socks. nothing else is really going on right now, besides school. I am tutoring 2 different woman. ones a teacher at a private school and we usually just chat. the 2nd is a university student on break right now, who really isnt that good. i am tutoring her as a favor to my counterpart. we spend a lot of time on vocab and things like that. i made pancakes for the doctors family one friday and they loved it. it was really fun to cook american food for them. ummmm been on a lot of walks, cooked a lot of food, and planned out a lot of lessons. thats it!

i will be coming back into town on Dec 9th so if you have news send it by then. i will be checking my email and hanging out. I miss you all (and america) and will talk to you soon!