I had a busy week at school and busy weekend :)
Jim Valley, an ex-60s rocker formerly of the band Paul Revere and the Raiders was at ASB this week working with elementary school students. The school arranged for him to play a "jam session" with other ASB teachers with musical talent on the rooftop of one of the apartment buildings. The view from the rooftop was great and the weather was nice and cool. It was fun to just chill and hang out with people I don't get to see too much. and the music was great too :)
Afterwards we went to The Big Nasty - which is a bar really close to where the jam session was. The are known for serving beef burgers :) which draws a lot of expats. but we aren't so sure it is real beef - more likely water buffalo. The "All American Burger" is served with an egg on top. Apparently it is common in Australia, but I have been to 47 US states and have NEVER seen an egg on top of a burger. It is pretty good - I like eggs :) The burger was ok, the the tator tots were awesome. I wish I would have had some ranch dressing though!
I got up Saturday and worked on Spanish and finished Level I on Rosetta Stone. It only took me two weeks. I am a Spanish speaking rockstar!!! I am trying to get through all five levels before the end of the semester. Madeline and I share an advisory group and she is a Spanish teacher. My friend Pauline teaches French, but also speaks Spanish so I have some people to practice with. Oddly enough I only have one student that speaks Spanish - very different than Texas!
I work out at a place called F2. They have 5 different kinds of classes. Body Pump (I have not done and don't really want to), Body Jam (dancing - I have tried it once) Body Attack (which I haven't done but will as soon as I can - I think it is sports drills) Body Balance (tai chi, yoga, and pilates - I love it and go all the time) Body Combat (mixed martial arts - I go all the time). I had planned to go to Body Balance this morning, but was in a lot of pain. I have had nerve spasms in my right hand all week and it hurts. My right leg was totally numb and it was really hard to move this morning so I didn't think I'd be strong enough to hold the poses :( I went for a walk instead. Once I got my right leg moving, I could walk ok. So Andrea and I walked to the area where my school is. It isn't possible to walk by road so we walked on this elevated walkway thing that starts at the train station. It took forever to walk to the train station. It is very busy on Saturdays. The lanes we walked through were packed with people, animals, rickshaws, cars, and bicycles. You have to constantly watch where you are going. You get pushed and shoved and nearly ran over every 5 seconds!! I actually walked through chicken blood on the street. Once we got to the walkway, it was great. You could just walk without watching where you step!!! and we could see everything going on in the neighborhoods below. We saw some people planting vegetables in a really polluted piece of land. Of course there were water buffalo in a puddle nearby :) We didn't make it all the way to school. We got side tracked by the California Pizza Kitchen :) You can't get to it from the street. We had to go down another street and enter from the side. We had to go through a lot of security - metal detectors and pat downs - just to get in the drive. When we finally got to the building we saw that the New Zeland CG and Singapore CG were housed in the same building. That would account for the security! The pizza was great! and had ranch dressing on it!!
I went home and took a nap and did a little bit of school work. At 6:20, Darshan - one of my favorite drivers came to pick me up. I got to chat with people on the bus until we got to school to watch Embracing India. It was a school performance that raised money for a village school. There was a play, dancing performances and singing etc. A group of my 6th grade girls danced to an Usher song. A teacher did ballet dancing. An Indian girl danced a snake charming dance that was really cool. A group of 8th grade boys who have formed a band played 3 songs and were great. I was wondering where they practice. In the States boys like that play in the garage or basement, but we don't have those here. I was told that their parents pitched in and pay for a separate flat for them to practice in!! Glad my flat isn't in that building!!! My teaching parter, Jordan plays the drums in a band with 2 other teachers and they performed. The kids LOVE it when they play. The end of the performance was the BEST. Our school guards and marshalls did a martial arts demonstration that was amazing!! They are highly trained guards and work on these skills at least an hour and a half a day. They broke bricks and fought each other. It was great and showed that we are definitely well protected at this school!!!!
I chit- chatted with some friends on the bus on the way home. Tomorrow I am planning on working out if my Lupus is behaving. I also need to get some school work done! We get Thursday off for Republic Day so that will be a nice break.
Jim Valley, an ex-60s rocker formerly of the band Paul Revere and the Raiders was at ASB this week working with elementary school students. The school arranged for him to play a "jam session" with other ASB teachers with musical talent on the rooftop of one of the apartment buildings. The view from the rooftop was great and the weather was nice and cool. It was fun to just chill and hang out with people I don't get to see too much. and the music was great too :)
Afterwards we went to The Big Nasty - which is a bar really close to where the jam session was. The are known for serving beef burgers :) which draws a lot of expats. but we aren't so sure it is real beef - more likely water buffalo. The "All American Burger" is served with an egg on top. Apparently it is common in Australia, but I have been to 47 US states and have NEVER seen an egg on top of a burger. It is pretty good - I like eggs :) The burger was ok, the the tator tots were awesome. I wish I would have had some ranch dressing though!
I got up Saturday and worked on Spanish and finished Level I on Rosetta Stone. It only took me two weeks. I am a Spanish speaking rockstar!!! I am trying to get through all five levels before the end of the semester. Madeline and I share an advisory group and she is a Spanish teacher. My friend Pauline teaches French, but also speaks Spanish so I have some people to practice with. Oddly enough I only have one student that speaks Spanish - very different than Texas!
I work out at a place called F2. They have 5 different kinds of classes. Body Pump (I have not done and don't really want to), Body Jam (dancing - I have tried it once) Body Attack (which I haven't done but will as soon as I can - I think it is sports drills) Body Balance (tai chi, yoga, and pilates - I love it and go all the time) Body Combat (mixed martial arts - I go all the time). I had planned to go to Body Balance this morning, but was in a lot of pain. I have had nerve spasms in my right hand all week and it hurts. My right leg was totally numb and it was really hard to move this morning so I didn't think I'd be strong enough to hold the poses :( I went for a walk instead. Once I got my right leg moving, I could walk ok. So Andrea and I walked to the area where my school is. It isn't possible to walk by road so we walked on this elevated walkway thing that starts at the train station. It took forever to walk to the train station. It is very busy on Saturdays. The lanes we walked through were packed with people, animals, rickshaws, cars, and bicycles. You have to constantly watch where you are going. You get pushed and shoved and nearly ran over every 5 seconds!! I actually walked through chicken blood on the street. Once we got to the walkway, it was great. You could just walk without watching where you step!!! and we could see everything going on in the neighborhoods below. We saw some people planting vegetables in a really polluted piece of land. Of course there were water buffalo in a puddle nearby :) We didn't make it all the way to school. We got side tracked by the California Pizza Kitchen :) You can't get to it from the street. We had to go down another street and enter from the side. We had to go through a lot of security - metal detectors and pat downs - just to get in the drive. When we finally got to the building we saw that the New Zeland CG and Singapore CG were housed in the same building. That would account for the security! The pizza was great! and had ranch dressing on it!!
I went home and took a nap and did a little bit of school work. At 6:20, Darshan - one of my favorite drivers came to pick me up. I got to chat with people on the bus until we got to school to watch Embracing India. It was a school performance that raised money for a village school. There was a play, dancing performances and singing etc. A group of my 6th grade girls danced to an Usher song. A teacher did ballet dancing. An Indian girl danced a snake charming dance that was really cool. A group of 8th grade boys who have formed a band played 3 songs and were great. I was wondering where they practice. In the States boys like that play in the garage or basement, but we don't have those here. I was told that their parents pitched in and pay for a separate flat for them to practice in!! Glad my flat isn't in that building!!! My teaching parter, Jordan plays the drums in a band with 2 other teachers and they performed. The kids LOVE it when they play. The end of the performance was the BEST. Our school guards and marshalls did a martial arts demonstration that was amazing!! They are highly trained guards and work on these skills at least an hour and a half a day. They broke bricks and fought each other. It was great and showed that we are definitely well protected at this school!!!!
I chit- chatted with some friends on the bus on the way home. Tomorrow I am planning on working out if my Lupus is behaving. I also need to get some school work done! We get Thursday off for Republic Day so that will be a nice break.
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