Weekend en el Campo

I've been super overwhelmed with school (and probably a bit of culture shock and home sickness, too). We are on a three day weekend right now, and I'm actually out in the country with my previous host family. I stayed with them when I was studying abroad in 2007. They live in Santiago, but they also bought a cherry farm about 5 hours to the south. It's a cold and rainy weekend, but it's nice to get away from the hustle and bustle of the city. I think I am learning that I am not a city person! maybe a smaller city? There are over 7 million people in Santiago-- that's more than a third of the population of the entire country!

I think if I decide to stay in Chile, I will move to a smaller city. I like this country, I just think that the city life isnt for me.  I think being in the city affects how the students act, too. They are not very respectful of teachers, especially young, foreign ones (ie, me). It has gotten worse as the year goes by, even though I have gotten more strict with the rules.

www.telegraph.co.uk

Even though most of my students are only a couple years younger than me, the level of maturity expected is much lower than in the United States. They're rowdy in class, and never listen to instructions. They told me it was because they don't understand when I speak English (even though some of them are on their sixth semester of classes), so I even started to explain things in Spanish. Unfortunately, not only do they not pay attention to my directions, they now know that I speak Spanish, some refuse to speak to me in English.  It can be very annoying sometimes!

So, I've been a bit frustrated with the classes, especially with having so many levels. We have our second tests next week-- the written tests are standard, but I have to come up with my own orals. I've finished writing them all except for one class, so I can relax a little thus weekend.  I did really horribly with my documentation last time, so I'm looking for better ways to administer the tests this time.  I think I am going to come up with a printed paper that I can give to each student and just circle the points, or something like that.

Aside from working, I haven't really had time for much else. This weekend is the first I haven't worked since I first arrived. It's nice to get away, though. The weather is kind of bad, so we are stuck inside at the moment, but it feels good to know that I don't have any work to do (well, I do, but I'm caught up enough to take a beak). The family I'm with owns a huge parcel of land where they mostly grow cherries, but they also have avocados, oats, honey, chickens, and a horse. Too bad it's such a far drive from the city--this is where I want to live! They're actually trying to sell it because it had just gotten to be too much to take care of, with two active teenagers and both parents with full-time jobs. I would totally buy it from them! Even with the rain, this place is gorgeous!

Well, we are off to start the asado ( Chilean BBQ).  Yum-o!

Hello...

Long time, no write.  What a surprise, right?  So I thought that I might have some extra time this week, but then I had to go and lose my flash drive which I had conveniently forgotten to back up for the past two weeks, so now I have plenty to do!  Also, I am not feeling very well today.  Both of those things are great for those of you reading this blog--they both mean I need to stay home and stay near the computer (although I should probably be re-doing all the work I lost instead of writing in my blog.  I already did that for a few hours, time for something a bit different)!

If you can't tell, I'm a little stressed right now.  But next weekend I get to go to the country with Mauricio and his family! Hopefully I am feeling better by then... I think the sickness is a combination of a bunch of things--stress, less-than-healthy food, extreme pollution, cold weather, and not enough exercise.  Although I did join a gym!  And I go about every other day, but I must say that I could probably stand to go more often.  I was quite proud of myself for running 3k on my first try.  I know that's not any great feat, but I'm proud of myself!  Haha, I'll let you know how I progress... I'm also hoping to find some time to get into some aerobics classes or something, although as of right now, most of them are during my own class time.  They do have spinning, though!  I am a bit nervous about that; it seems a bit intense!  A lot of the people at this gym are pretty intense themselves--there are some guys there that could probably knock me over with their pinky!  I feel like such a lightweight there!  But I suppose it's good motivation.  I am not even going to go into the details of my endeavours into weight training.  If you think my running is embarrassing... yea, we're not going to go there.  But I guess that's why I joined the gym, right?

So, let's see.  What else have I been up to?  Other than a lot of working (and now doing it all again since the loss of my pen drive), I've been thinking a lot about my next step.  I know it might be a bit preemptive, but I can't help it!  I guess I'm kind of always planning out the next step.  Like the fact that there are 70 days left until the end of the semester.  Or that there are 37 days until Scott comes.  And only 9 days until the next testing cycle!  I'm nervous about the next test; I hope the students do better than last time.  Last time, I had only about three weeks to teach all the material.  This time, I will have had about five, so I think they will do much better.  But that also concerns me a bit--to motivate them, I promised that I would buy a jar a peanut butter for anyone who gets more than a 6,5 (out of 7,0).  Not many people did that on the last test, so I didn't think I would have to buy much peanut butter.  However, it seems like the students are grasping the concepts much better this time--I could be in some trouble now!!  Anyone want to donate some peanut butter? :-)