Current music: The Killing Moon by Echo and the Bunnymen
It is the end of Day 3 here in Tainan.
It is almost like another planet here. But more on that later. First, my job.
I am teaching two classes, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Jump Start is split into two sections: English immersion classes and bilingual classes. I have two bilingual classes, Bi-1 and Bi-5. They are thankfully smaller than the immersion classes, and I have got all my kids' names down. I also don't have a curriculum yet, ahaha. So I've been winging it this whole time. Public relations/guy-who-hired-me Eric called me today to apologize for the fact that I've had to wing it thus far. But since I've written about a frillion lesson plans in my day, it hasn't been too difficult. But I lose my voice every day from shouting. Not angry shouting, just shouting shouting. I have officially become Teacher Jess. That is my name.
Peet is a lovely South African man who has been my sort of mentor this far, and he is responsible for writing the curriculum. I'm not going to push him to finish. Mainly because he is awesome and tells me how to handle my kids. He has been at Jump Start for twelve years, so I think he knows what he's doing. He also loves musicals as much as I do. He previously taught my kids to sing West Side Story songs, and today we talked about how awesome Cher is and sang Sound of Music songs. But I digress.
Current Music: I Was Once A Loyal Lover by Death Cab for Cutie
On to the chill'uns...
The big kids:
Max is rowdy when he wants to be, but speaks English very clearly.
Duncan is a little smartass, but he knows when to be quiet.
Elma is the girl. She is late for everything, and Peet calls her grandma.
Chris is the leader. He is the biggest and is the best at English. He pretends to be teacher too often, though, and Teacher Jess feels threatened because he's smarter than me.
Ray is the little one, he is a year younger than the rest. He moves slower than the rest, but he is smarter than he lets on. Peet calls him grandpa.
Ted is autistic, but I honestly wouldn't have known if I wasn't told. He's very bright, and doesn't need any more direction than the rest of them.
Jason is a hellion. He learns when he wants to, and the rest of the time he does his own thing. I feel like tranquilizing him most of the time. I know we're not supposed to have favourites...but it's hard not to love him.
Current music: Teen Lovers by The Virgins
The babies:... 3 and 4 years old. I taught them to high five, so I feel my work here is done.
Elaine is the tallest, and knows the most English. But she's lazy, and I have to push her to try.
Yvonne is a cutie pie and helped me clean up. She is also very good at English.
Chie loves to learn colours. She points them out to me whenever she can.
Evan is hyper and high fives more than most. The school thought his name was Alvin yesterday.
Benjamin makes me laugh. All he does is run in circles. It's awesome.
Howard likes to make my life a living hell by continuously yelling. He is my time out expert.
Sam is the cutest thing I've ever seen. She is a little pudgy thing that bounces around and randomly likes to nap in the middle of the floor.
Aisan likes to push his limits, but listens if he feels like it.
Lisa is half Japanese and the littlest one. She knows English when she wants to.
Sam never left his mother before yesterday. He has cried constantly since I met him, but I finally got him to high five today. I was the proudest I've ever been.
I think that's all of them. I'm a horrible Teacher Jess if I forgot any.
Current Music: Bottled in Cork by Ted Leo and the Pharmacists.
I'm staying in this hotel until the weekend. It's so darn cozy. It took some crazy gesturing to let the friendly hotel staff know what was going on, but I like this place for now.
I've gotten into the habit of randomly walking around. I get lost quite often, but I'm happy when I do. Literally everyone stares at me. Cars slow down to look at me. Eric says that I shouldn't feel self-conscious about it but I really haven't so far.
There are no discernible sidewalks, you literally walk through storefronts to get anywhere. Most stores make up the streets, except the fancy ones. I have learned to depend on 7-11s. They sell liquor here, and I was able to buy Corona like you would a Sprite. It it quite lovely. They have bank machines, printers, the works. There is porn everywhere. It's strange to get used to. In summary: 7-11s = awesome.
People's dogs seem to wander around everywhere without leashes, like squirrels do in Canada. Everyone has a scooter and they drive around like insane people, often with their children or animals riding in front of them, presumably without seatbelts. Most cabs I've found do not have seatbelts either. My driving instructor Blaine would have been appalled if he wasn't a crazy lunatic.
No one smiles at each other on on the street. But they all make eye contact. Eric says it's a foreigner thing. I'm inclined to agree.
Current music: Hopelessly Devoted to You by Olivia Newton-John
I'm still getting over jet-lag, but it's almost gone. So tired. Drank my Corona, it was sooo worth it. And freakishly cheap, like everything else here.
Still kind of tumbling down the rabbit hole... The next project is finding a house. There are fireworks outside right now. There are also entire stores dedicated to fireworks. I'm going to go watch.
G'night.
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