Whoa

Just got on here and looked at that little thingy on the side that tells you where people are visiting from. There are two visits from Jakarta. Now, I realize this is a 'global' blog with me being in India and most of my readers back home in the US. Heck, Camber's in Hong Kong and checks the page out once in a while. I even have some friends in Europe and South Africa that read from time to time. But who is in Jakarta? Is it just some random person? Did dad and Cindy move there and not tell me (in the midst of remodeling the brown bathroom no less)? Life is full of mysteries. Mayhaps this one will be solved. Who are you Jakarta person?

SHOW YOURSELF!

[Edit: So, I figured it out. I delved into the depths of the bowels of the tracker device and it told me that this person from Jakarta arrived here via the Woodstock website. See, they put a call out for blogs so I gave the go ahead to use mine. And as I searched I also found others that had come across the blog from WS. Must be looking at international teaching positions.

If you're a science teacher, come, love Woodstock. It's a great place and the people are wonderful. Besides, I really don't want to end up prepping the grade eleven chemistry next semester when Sue leaves for Australia.]


Anywho, compose yourself.


k


So, I've meant to give a good update with activity week and all but things have come up and it's been neglected. I have about 75 pics from that week I want to put up but I've yet to find the time. See, I've been sick. I'll spare you the messy details (believe me when I say messy) but let's just say it's good to be back on 'solid' ground.

Just a quick update sans pictures:

There is only three weeks left of school before exams start. The pressure is really on. I'm only a whole chapter behind where I'm supposed to be. It's ok though, the entire department is. To top things off I have a huge stack of papers in need of grading. Not only that, but I also have to have my final exams written by Monday so that they can be reviewed, copied, stapled, placed in folders, and given to the principal by next Friday. Don't expect a real update anytime soon.

Last week we had a visitor, Dr. Bunhead. He's a great guy. It's too bad that he was only here for a day. He gave a show to each of the schools. The old head of department said it was the first time she had seen liquid nitrogen here at WS. There was lots of wee and booger (or bogey as he calls them) jokes. Let's not forget to mention the launching of a hamster from a cannon, blowing up a hot water bottle, making freedom fries with a tennis racket, and igniting his head on fire. All in all, a stellar show.

This past Saturday was JSB (Junior Senior Banquet). Basically, it's the equivalent of a prom or matric dance. The theme was the Oscars and the tenth graders I advise did a bang up job of decorating and serving throughout the night. I showed up in my suit and bowtie claiming to be the maitre d'. I only wish I had brought my tux shirt with me. Que sera sera...

Ok, so I lied. One picture:

My indie rock album cover.
(And don't freak out, the cigarette's only a prop. It's not even lit. Besides, I have a pipe.)

To satiate your thirsts...

Update coming soon...

However many I feel Like on Saturday

1- The week has been insane. Every teacher was giving tests which really stressed out the students. They in turned stressed me out. Somehow, my stack of papers to grade tripled this week.

2- Tuesday was Diwali. It's been described to me as the Hindu equivalent of Christmas. There's lots of celebrating and gift giving. T and I went down to Gargi's to relax and have some dinner. I took down the accordion and we sang 'Diwali Carols.'

3- The 12th grade boys spent Diwali protesting. They had some points that were good (poor living conditions, etc) and some that were not so good. There's been lots of talk this week about 'intangibles' here at Woodstock. The boys feel like they're being taken away from them.

4- I fixed the broken reed in the accordion. I'm good at stuff like that. I just need to figure out how to remove the bass strap so that I can get it replaced. I also need to find a pattern for shoulder straps so I can get them made as well.

5- Tomorrow I'm leaving for Sarab Talla (I think that's how you spell it), a village about 3 hours away, for activity week. I'll be with two other teachers and 12 ninth graders. Basically, we're learning about the culture of the villages and giving the kids a bit of an eye opener.

6- If my life had a soundtrack it would be predominantly Vince Guaraldi. The man's got a way with the piano that is nothing short of amazing. I think the main track would have to be 'Cast Your Fate to the Wind.' If ever there were a piano piece I wish I could play...

7- I have a headache that just won't go away.

8- The weather's getting colder and colder. I'm kinda dreading/excited about spending this next week in my tent. Don't worry, my sleeping bag goes down to 30F and I packed some underarmour and a skimutze. And big fuzzy socks too. The same kind of socks that are great for making sharfins out of.

9- I'm about to start payments on my student loans. Here goes my paycheck for the next 15 years.

10- I still haven't gotten up to the top of the hill to see the snows yet. Hopefully I'll get up there when I come back from the village. Definitely expect pictures of that.

11- I was doodling and accidentally drew a picture of dad. He's yelling, "An Ammonia Leak!" For some reason, that's usually what I think of when I think of him.

12- Yesterday was Halloween. We turned one of the old dorms into a 'haunted house.' Well, I didn't. I've had my fill of haunted houses with APO. Haunted houses are dumb.

13- Indian candy involves boiling milk a lot and then coating the top with a thinly beaten sheet of silver. Nothing says sweet to me like heavy metal poisoning.

14- It's November. I like November.

15- Finally decided that I'm going to Hong Kong over my winter break. Camber is working there teaching English and acting. She invited me for Chinese New Year and to stay for as long as I want. Dad and Cindy aren't coming. I told them not to unless they're going to spend at least two weeks here. That goes for everyone else too. I'm not going to have a bunch of people come visit me and the only thing we ever do is go to the Taj and see Delhi. BORING!

16- Beckers is preggers again. Just means another damn stuffed animal for me to make.

Am I ever going to be able to come back home?

Today I took a little trip into the bazaar. I was supposed to go down to Dehradun and hang out but I've been sick all week and have a pretty well established cough right now. Anywho, I woke up this morning and kept coughing. I canceled the trip and slept in.

Eventually, I got up and made my way to the shower and off to lunch. The Indian version of anything has some amount of spice and kick to it. Their fried chicken is no different. I'm getting off topic though. Have I even been on topic yet?

Whatever.

So I head into town. I need to pick up some items like speakers; headphones; and, most importantly, toilet paper (remember, I've been on one roll this entire week, not a good thing to do in India, especially when you're sick). It was an open bazaar day so it was simply crawling with little Woodstockers. Quite a few stopped me to say they really enjoyed the staff talent show last night.

I suppose I should take a little tangent to explain that. You see, the staff puts on a talent show for the students each year in the fall and the students are then to put their own on come spring time. When the call first came for acts I was quite reluctant. I eventually signed up for the staff Bollywood finale. Just imagine 30some teachers up on stage doing a multitude of Indian dance moves (Think Benny Lava) and a good majority of them are white. I did Signal Signal with one of the elementary teachers. There is going to be the actually talent show on youtube sometime soon. I'll link when it is. Soon after I signed up for that I got roped into making a guest appearance for the female staff's Evolution of Dance sequence. I popped out of the side during What is Love? wearing dad's old yellow cardigan and a bowtie. I was promptly kicked off stage. Not before I recieved wonderous applause and cat calls though. The night before the talent show I got roped into the skit "The Enlarging Machine." Jared, the middle school science teacher, and I, being the men of science that we are, created an enlarging machine to help alleviate some of the shortages we experience here on the hillside. First went a piece of a broom because if you've ever been to the dorms you'd think there was some shortage by how filthy the rooms are. There were others like a water shortage where Jared spits into the machine and gets a glass of water in the face. The punchline was that there is a huge teacher shortage going on (we need to hire soemthing like 6 I think) and Jared decides to throw me in. There's screaming and Dave, a guy about a head taller me and probably twice as wide, comes out wearing the same outfit and my glasses and chases off Jared. The last thing I got roped into was literally just before it. It was the skit with people fishing and one guy in the middle is the only one catching anything. We all ask him what his secret is and he just mumbles. Eventually he spits out whatever is in his mouth and says, "The secret is, You have to keep the worms warm." Ba-dum-dum. It was a good night and the kids really enjoyed it. I promise to post the video when it gets put up.

So, back to my story, I was in the bazaar getting things I needed. I picked up some speakers for my laptop so that when I brought it in to school to show movies for my new exploratory block, Cult Movies, I wouldn't have to use my laptop speakers. I have 15 kids in the expo block and showed them Spinal Tap on Friday. We didn't get to finish it but I think they enjoyed it. I think next week is going to be The Gods Must Be Crazy. It was a warm day in the buzz today. I wore jeans and a light hoodie and was still sweating. I trudged all the way through the bazaar amidst innumerable students who all stopped to say, 'Nice dancing Mr Rice' or 'Funny skit.' There were even a few elementary students who asked if I really turned into Mr Boven during the enlarging machine. Oh the wee ones...

I made my way all the way to the other end of the (useful, i.e. non-touristy) bazaar and trecked into the Cambridge Bookshop. I had a list of books I was hoping to get priced. Most were graphic novels or some of C.S. Lewis's non-Narnian works. Unfortunately, he told me he wouldn't be able to get any of them. Sad day, but not like I don't have enough to do/read as it is. I picked up two books I had eyed last time I was there and hiked back.

And this is where I've been going with this entire thing. As I was walking down the hill there was a dog walking up. The dog suddenly stops in the middle of the road and proceeds to give birth to her litter of puppies. I casually keep walking. This is not something completely out of the ordinary around here. I'm sure if it happened back home that some mother would probably be outraged by the fact that her story she told her children that they were brought by the toothfairy and not spurted out of her birth canal was just utterly shattered. Lawsuits would be had and I would be saddened even more.

But things are just different. When the power goes out, people scream and then get scared and upset. Here, no one misses a beat. You're having dinner, the power goes out, you still eat. The other night was pooping and the power went out. I finish my business and wipe my butt in the pitch black. Of course, as soon as I gird my loins the power comes back.

...

There are other things. Getting used to living with giant spiders (it's just not ok when they're inside my shoes in the mornings...). Monkeys. Trust me, they're not cute and just get annoying.

Then I think how much do I really miss it? Not a whole lot. There are a few people I miss but I wouldn't see them that often even if I was in the states. I did think earlier today about how much I miss the UP. I'd love to go back there and spend some time. I'd love to go back for the turning of the leaves and Winter Carnival.

And I think it all ties into how I feel things have been going so far since August. Am I enjoying teaching? Sure, it has it's ups and downs and it is only the first semester of my first year. Will I stick it out? Fer sure. I plan to definitely stay at Woodstock for my two years and we'll see how I feel about the profession after that. Lately I've been going back to play with the idea of being a real lab chemist. Of course, I do plan to get my masters so maybe I'll get some engineering or something like that.

Ok, I made my point ages ago and rambled into other things. I'm just going to sit back and try to enjoy my pipe.

Edit: I also just wanted to say that Ben Fold's album Has Been with Will Shatner is amazing and would make an amazing Christmas gift for anybody. Especially expats.

Update

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Let's see how long it sits in Delhi and how many (extra) pieces it's in when it gets here.

Touch wood.

By the numbers

Because I'm sick ... here's the best you're gonna get:

2- the number of boots I got made in the buzz

47- the number of kids that bailed to camping with me this weekend (that was all of them)

1- number of leopards I'm pretty sure I saw about a week ago

8- number of hours I spent in the sun getting burnt last Friday attending the mandatory sports day

2- boxes of apple juice I've gone through since this weekend

6.022 x 10^23 - number of atoms/molecules/formula units in one mole of substance (Mole Day's coming up folks)

0.5- how I'm feeling right now on a scale of one to ten

2- the number I saw in the 'optical illusion' ... colour blindness tests do NOT count as optical illusions...

1- rolls of toilet paper I have left in the house

5- the number of classes I should be prepping for

1- number of freakin' rad elephant head mugs I've made in the clay centre

4- number of winter hats ('tooks') I've busted out of hibernation

1- prototypes of elephants I've made

1- the number of accordions I have in the mail right now somewhere between Delhi and Chicago

The year is one fourth done

Already! Hot dang. It's really gone by quite fast. Tomorrow I have parent/teacher conferences in the morning which should be fun. I'll write something a tad more reflective later this week when I'm not so tired. What you really want is pictures and I happen to have a few of those.

So, each quarter we have a break. Fall and spring breaks are relatively short; days off plus a weekend. A group of us decided to go down to Delhi. I was originally planning on going camping but decided that I would give Delhi a second chance after the nightmare it was when I first got here. My buddy, Saahil, has a house there and offered to take us and let us stay there since his parents are in London.

We took the train down right after school and got in around 11. A friend of ours, Kapil, picked us up and we ended up crashing as soon as we got to Saahil's place. The next morning we got up bright and early and headed to Agra, home of the Taj Mahal.

Part of the Taj. This is the main gate to get to the main part. It's full of symbolism. The king built the Taj for his wife who died in childbirth with their fourteenth child. The eleven bulb-like things on top represent the eleven years it took to build. The designs around the archway are actually Arabic script for the first fourteen books of the Quran, for the kids. The tiny things are people.

Just a more direct shot of the gate.

Up the gate.

First view of the Taj.

Majesty...

Group Shot.
(Front Row: Me, Jennie, & Megan
Second Row: Saahil, Megan, & Nan)
We were supposed to be cheesing it up, but, apparently, I'm the only one who got the memo.

This is the mosque that is to the east of the actual mausoleum. There's an identical building on the other side that they kept referring to as a guest house. Kinda creepy to have a guest house if you ask me.

Heading into the Taj. No photography inside so this is as far as you get. You can't go down to the actual tombs but the builder (a Turkish guy) had the sense to build a replica above. The walls are all inlaid with precious and semi-precious gems. It's a pretty stellar sight to see.

One of the four towers. They're actually built with a ~2 degree tilt outside so that in the event of a natural disaster they'll fall outward rather than on the Taj.

The Red Fort. The king who built the Taj was almost immediately overthrown by his son as soon as the Taj was finished. He was then imprisoned here where he could just see the Taj. We didn't get to go here because we ran out of time. When dad and Cindy come in December I think we'll hit this first and then go to the Taj at sunset.

Close up of the script.

Tourists lounging. Almost immediately after taking the photo two guys came up to me and asked for my picture. You get that a lot around here, "OOOO a white person! Let's get their picture!" It's even worse for Megan since she's a redhead.

A view of the gate and gardens standing in front of the Taj.

The gate to Akbar's tomb. He was a Muslim emperor. We went here since we couldn't get to see the fort. Indians are really fond of these huge tombs. Delhi is covered with them.

Akbar's actual tomb. This place wasn't quite as touristy. In fact, it was rather dead.

After the first day we just relaxed and actually slept in for a bit. We went to one of the markets and met up with Kapil and Teeran who had been doing there own thing. We had lunch with them and then spent the evening at Kapil's. He lives outside of Delhi and has his own factory making gaskets. Without going into too much detail, there was lots of fun there. Finally, on Saturday we just lounged until the afternoon. We were heading in to the city to go to another market when Kapil's engine literally dropped out of the car. It was a rather interesting experience to go through being stranded on the side of an Indian highway and all. The last thing we did was go to a place called Dillihaat. It's a huge outdoor market with booths clustered together from all parts of India. It was cool to see the stuff but really too touristy for me. We all got up early this morning to catch our train back up and we had a relatively uneventful trip up. I've just been unpacking, going through emails, etc.

Guess I should do something productive before it is actually Monday and not Sunday anymore.