Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Boxing Day

Well I'm sitting in Chiselhurst at Babagenouche's Aunt and Uncle's house on Boxing Day morning with fine memories of Turkey, Christmas Pudding, Wine, Conversation, and hysterical TV show called "The Vicar of Dibley" dancing through my head.

It's been a bit strange being away from the family in Canada. I miss everyone there. So if you're reading this blog put a comment on it! It's the only way I know any one's actually reading it and it's nice to hear your voice...or read your text as the case may be.

Christmas day was wonderful. We got things rolling around noon with some champagne and orange juice. The we commenced to open gifts. I got some lovely stuff from Genevieve including a shirt of Darth Vader trimming a hedge in the shape of the Death Star. I'll take a picture and upload it. We had Christmas dinner in the afternoon which is traditional here. It's a good plan actually. Aids the digestion mightily. You get to burn off the meal and then have a light dinner later.

I've discovered the most dense substance in the universe: Christmas Pudding. You think to yourself "Jeez that's a small portion" as you gaze upon the small cake on your plate. After two bites, however, you're crippled. You can barely lift your spoon it's so heavy. It's like a delicious brick of boozy lead on you plate. Four spoonfuls and you start to go into a coma. Five and the weight of it tears a hole in your stomach and you die with a smile on your face. I survived six spoonfuls (or is that spoons full?) I'm proud to say. I've still got burn marks on my chest from the defibrillator but it was worth it.

We'll be heading out of here today and I'll post some pictures I took.

Merry Christmas to all!

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Christmas Break, A Coma, and A Man Pisses on A Pop Machine in the Underground

Christmas break is upon me! Thank God! I crossed the finish line and collapsed into a mega coma last night. I fell asleep at about 8:00 and slept until 10:45 this morning. You think pimpin ain't easy? Try teachin!

I feel refreshed for the first time in 2 months.

As for the third line of my heading...

London is a different place than Toronto. It's also much different than Seoul. People do things in public that I just wouldn't expect in either of those two places. Granted - in Seoul people would wander out of bars and piss on walls in full view of everyone but at least they were kind enough to use a wall. Plus they were always dressed in business suits which added an air of respectability to the act.

Babagenouche and I went to a place called Spitalfields market today to do some shopping and were about to purchase a beverage with which to quench our thirst from a pop machine in the London Underground when a scruffy looking bum strode up and stood beside the machine and the wall in what I can only describe as the "Urination Position." Most men are familiar with this as it's the stance assumed at a urinal - though rarely at a pop machine. We backed off and within a minute or so (apparently some stage fright had slowed the process down) we heard a mighty splashing. I couldn't believe it. The guy was obviously hammered out of his mind, most likely homeless, and hopefully insane but I still couldn't believe it. I wish I'd had the guts to take a picture. I don't think he would have minded.

Having said that Babagenouche and I had a good day. Spitalfields market is a cool place. Usually it's rammed with people but since we went on a Wednesday during the day it was much less crowded. There's an area that's full of stall that are loaded with all the accouterments of alternative street stall life. Clothes ranging from hippie rags to stylish funk, knick-knacks of all sorts, beaded jewellery, art, drug paraphernalia, food stalls, and all the fair trade and organic food/clothing/furniture/jewellery you can eat. There are all kinds of great shops around that often fall into that high end specialty category. There's cool wine bar we have to go back to...a place to buy bean bag furniture...just a cool all around place.

We had a brunch meal in a place called Giraffe which is a "Global Eatery." Really good food and atmosphere. I have a picture of us in it but I don't know how much of the restaurant you'll see.

Anyway, back to school.

I had a pretty relaxed time over the last few teaching days. No planning. I just did some fun stuff like watching some movies. The students were pretty good overall. I was warned that things can get really crazy because the kids actually hate x-mas vacation as they often don't like the time they spend in their home lives. The kids were pretty good though. I think a lot of it has to do with the stellar management that the school is doing. There was a prize draw for a bike or a PSP (portable play station), gifts for students, and certificates of merit - all given out at then end of the last day. Oh and there was a Christmas meal at a pub on the second last day that went extremely well. The kids can be great when they're relaxed and having fun. I think this really tied some kids in and kept them going to the end.

Anyway I should have lots of support for the upcoming term from a science program at a nearby school and from a consultant. I'm really paranoid about my evaluation and record keeping so that's what I've got to improve for the upcoming term.

Hopefully I find the will to do some planning over the break.

Monday, December 11, 2006

A Moon for the Misbegotten


Wow. Babagenouche and I went down to The Old Vic Theatre in Waterloo on Saturday and took in a little play by Eugene O'Neill called A Moon for the Misbegotten staring Kevin Spacey and Colm Meany. Damn it was great! I took a couple of snaps of the theatre which I will upload to Flickr shortly.

For those of you who don't know Colm Meany he's this guy:

That's right. Star Trek the Next Generation's chief engineer. Chief O'Brien himself. He's done a lot of other great work actually including The Commitments, Layercake and some other stuff. Anyway he actually stole the show in my opinion. He was AMAZING.

The performances all around were fantastic but Eve Best was a force in her role as well. My room mate (who saw the play earlier in the month) though she was the best. There wasn't much to choose from between the three actors. All were great but when Kevin Spacey is not the brightest star on stage you know you're seeing something special. No knock on Spacey whatsoever. He was great he was just in great company.

What a play this is. It's a play of huge unending dialogue which could get boring if not for the skill of these actors. The characters are constantly lying and saying the opposite of what they mean which injects a lot of humour into a really heavy play.

But enough raving about the play.

After the play Babagenouche and I then went down to the Tate Museum of Modern Art and poked around there for awhile. Neither of us get modern art much. Best I can say is that everyone in awhile you think: "That's pretty cool".

Then we walked down the Thames, past The Globe Theatre (the reconstruction of Shakespeare's old haunt) and around Southbank. Southbank might just be one of the greatest arts areas in the world. It's chock full 'o' art. We ended up at The Chocolate Factory Theatre Cafe where we had a drink and a cheese plate. Fine times indeed.

Things seem to be coming together a bit better at school. I felt relaxed again today, although I didn't teach. I'm getting used to the power struggles with students. I've figured out that you have to win them all...just not right away. You have to log stuff and come back at students with a consequence later a lot of the time.

We have a production we're mounting next week and it's been a real struggle. It's an updated version of A Christmas Carol but students here are very challenging to work with in a Drama situation. They like to sabotage things, or just take advantage of being able to move around and get at each other. Trust is low between the students but I think we've actually got a show!

Well I have to go prepare. It's almost 10 pm so maybe I'll get to bed before midnight!



Friday, December 08, 2006

Four Good Days


Well for those of you concerned about the tone of my last oh...10 posts I'd like to state that I just had my first run of consecutive good days since I got here. Four days without feeling like either bursting into tears, kicking a hole in something, hiding in fear, or jumping off a bridge!

Monday I went into school and told them I'm wasn't sure if I wanted to sign on just yet. I had a long conversation the next day with the principal and he was really incredible. The guy is quite inspiration I have to admit. Anyway, the gist of our conversations has been that he thought I was doing a really good job and that I was an asset to the school. He thought my drama skills were needed and basically that, because I cared about the students, I was the right person for the job. I also had some conversations with the head of the school and the director of the school who all were very supportive. Heck I even went and saw the school pyschologist and had a conversation with her (reluctantly) and all in all it seems to have gotten me through.

I've had absolutely fantastic advice from the principal about classroom management and I've learned more in the last week on that level than I did in a year of teacher's college and 18 months of teaching before that. Things like laying out books on tables where students are supposed to sit, having materials organized and ready, writing the lessons objectives on the board, creating worksheets to focus on... kicking kids who are misbehaving immediately out to get the class under control and having work ready for those who have been kicked out ready are HUGE things I've learned. Much of this sounds elementry but its key to teaching these kids (and probably millions of others as well).

Much of what I'm doing here flies in the face of what I was taught to do in teacher's college at York. Teacher's college was all about co-operative learning and integrating all learning styles into a lesson. If something wasn't a group based project that integreated dance/drama/music/art and social justice it was a failure. Unfortunately that stuff doesn't work here. Having kids read a passage and fill in some missing words here focuses them, makes them feel like they've accomplished something, and gives you a jumping off point for a review game where the material is discussed. Not exciting but it works. All the crap I learned in teacher's college and was forced to do is useless to real world early teachers. I actually think a lot of what we were taught is interesting but as a first year teacher in this situation its somewhat useless. Lessons on how to assess would have been nice....bah...my axe grindeth over.

Anyhoo...I'm feeling more confident largely due to the amount of support the school is giving me. They're giving me training as well.

As for England I'm beginning to manage that as well. I don't feel as confused, disoriented, fearful, and anxious as I did. I've started to realize that the English folk are loud and more agressive than I'm used to but that's not much to be alarmed about. A lot of what I hear is bluster.

Maybe I'll actually enjoy it here soon!

Thanks to everyone who's thrown support my way. You know who you are. Couldn't have made it without all of you.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Goodbye to a friend

One of my favourite blogs has disappeared!

I went to check in on postmoderncourtesan and an error message popped up. After much googling, and the imput of other bloggers, I can only conclude that there has been some scandal or other and the witty, well-written, poignant Olympia Manet has had to pack it all in.
It is a bit like losing a friend.
Goodbye Olympia - I read your blog almost from the beginning, and never felt brave enough to leave a comment. Thanks for sharing your fascinating, always provocative tales. Good luck and godspeed!

On an up note - I've just found another new fun blog: belleinthebigapple.blogspot.com. Another excellent writer with a unique style, seeking her fortune in New York and musing about delicious food while doing so. Bliss. As one door closes, another one opens...

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

No, really, I DO exist

Just to quell all of those internet rumors that my dear husband has chopped me up and hidden me under the floor-boards...here I am, alive and kicking (and posting!)

It's been a rough old couple of weeks. We have hit major assessment time at school, which means our class is constantly being scuntinized by our tutors for any signs (however vague or remote) that we have absorbed something (anything!) of what we've been taught this term. The biggest hurdle has proven to be the swirling whirlwind vibe of panic and resisting getting sucked down into it full force.

I guess I have an advantage over some of my class in that I've been through similar periods of stress and assessment at my last drama school, and so this process is vaguely familiar. Hopefully I'm able to learn from my experience and keep it all in perspective as well i.e. I'm no longer say to myself, "Oh god, if I don't absolutely nail this vocal warm-up where I lie on the floor and go, "huh HUH", they're going to chuck me out of the school!"

It's a funny old thing, though, to see what stress does to people and how they react under pressure. There was definitely some cracking on the part of my classmates. Tears, rage, and general bitchiness were in the air. I am a bit sad that my new group doesn't seem to be as supportive and generous towards each other as were my colleagues of drama schools past. Sometimes I do wonder where my kindred spirits are among them. Sometimes I feel really advanced and deeply wise and talented in comparison - and sometimes I feel like I know nothing and that they're all miles ahead of me. It's what is known as "actor's teetor-totter syndrome".... or it is now that I've coined the phrase, anyways.

We get the results of all these assessments in ye grande olde "feed-back" session this Friday, where we are sent in, naughty school-child like, to shuffle in our chairs before a panel of teacher people. I'll let you know kids....

In other news, lots of great film and theatre abound! And I have no time to see any of it! Must make effort this week and over Xmas holidays to get more cultured. Who has time to be cultured when you're training to make culture??

Also, Edukator and I have taken to jogging together nightly - mostly so I can defend his honour against any roving marauding Essex "youf" we may chance upon. We've become "the couple who jogs together." I know - let me be the first to offer you a barf bag.

And finally (because I love a good list!), I leave you with some details of things I do (when I'm not balancing on one arm in a dance studio reciting Blake poems, that is):

a) laundry. Endless laundry. This is because our washing machine is the size of a small basket ball - one pair of the Husband's jeans fills it to capacity. And it's in the kitchen. Hello, Britain!

b) walking. Lots of walking. We are a bit spoilt for walks, as there are some lovely bits of green fields and countryside out in the sticks. There's a really lovely hill right near our house with rather poignant 3 oak trees atop it - it's quite nice to hike up and watch the sunrise across the land.

c) shopping. Our fridge is the size of a cat-carrier. Shopping is a daily ritual. The Husband hates this, but I quite enjoy it. I pretend I'm a French woman, off to market with my panier. Our local Sainsbury's somewhat shatters this illusion: it's low-ceiling, dark, and dingy, like some ex-communist horror, complete with mysterious shortages of fairly staple foods on a regular basis. The Roomate and I look at it other, shrug, and remark stoically, "oh well, no milk today!"

d) make tea. Lots and lots of tea. Gone are my merry days of take-out coffees. They are too expensive here and, as we live in Essex, you are more likely to get an eel pie or a kehab than a coffee. This is why most people can be found:

e) going to the pub. When you're sick of doing laundry, buying food, and walking in the rain, there's nowhere else to go. There's no place like Essex...

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Claustrophobia ,Jogging, and a Haircut

I've been struggling with what I should do with this blog because it was pointed out to me that this is a public space and it's occurred to me that anything I say on here could come back to haunt me. Also, the damn blog is not working properly.

Techie question for anyone out there:
1) When I used to want to insert a picture into this blog I would insert the image, the image would appear and I could drag it around my window. Now I'm just getting code when I'm making my post but then the picture is actually there when I post it. This basically means I can't do anything but put a picture at the top, however, as I can't really figure out what all this code means. This is a new development. I thought it was because I upgraded to Internet Explorer 7 but I'm now using Firefox and that's not working either. Argh! I'm not really impressed with blogger I've had a lot of problems with it.
2)Same problem if I try and put things in italics or bold. I get the code on screen but it doesn't actually but text into italics.

As for postings, like I said I'm a bit worried so I'm thinking of moving over to Live Journal because I can set it so that only people I allow to view the page can view it. The just want to relate my experiences without worrying about saying the wrong thing. I go through my whole life worrying about that.

So anyway, last week was really really hard. The students at my school are very very difficult to deal with. You tell yourself it's not you but it's frustrating and emotionally draining to have to fight them to do almost anything. On the other hand I've established a relationship with some of them and gotten them onside - at least somewhat. I've started to feel a strange sense of responsibility towards them because I know that if I left they'd be completely thrown because they'd have to deal with another adult coming in who they'd have to figure out. They'd have to go through the whole establishment process again.

So why am I staying there? I don't know . The staff are amazing really. The head teacher is incredible and, really, so is everyone else. I have a technician who's been there 10 years and is really guiding me through the work I'm supposed to be doing. She's saving my butt all over the place. Having said all that... I'm about to sign on for the rest of the year and I have to go in tomorrow and tell them I don't want to. I don't know if I want to stay there the whole year it's just too much for me to even think about at the moment. It's going to be a really tough conversation. Basically I don't want to lock into some situation and not be able to handle it down the road. I want to have the option to leave if I have to. I'll always have that option of course but at least this way I'm being honest.

So yeah last week was incredibly exhausting. I realized that I landed and started teaching immediately in an education system that I have NO familiarity with. I'd say 60-70% of my stress is that I'm very often quite unsure if I'm teaching the right thing or not. England has these standardized tests that kids have to pass and I don't want to let the kids down by teaching things that aren't on the test or not teach them how to write the test and have them fail because of it. There's also this "course work" stuff they have to send in to some government agency to get marked. The course work involves samples of their actual work. I don't even mark it someone else does. It's all very stressful because I don't know the system. At least in Canada I know how it works just from having gone through it.

So that brings me to the title of my posting.

The culture shock here is still a major issue for me. I feel very anxious when I'm out and about and I think a lot of it has to do with the tightly packed enclosed space that is London. I've mentioned that the streets are so twisted and convoluted that you can't see more than half a block at a time. It's also hilly and everywhere you go buildings are crammed together with little alleyways leading everywhere. In Canada alleyways are danger zones but here everything in an alleyway so I think I feel like I'm in dangerous areas when I'm not. The biggest problem I have is that I really feel like I'm always in a tiny condensed packed in space. I spoke to a British man today who had travelled in America for 6 months at one point in his life and he mentioned that he noticed that feeling when he came back. I know I'll get used to it but at the moment it's difficult.

Today I went and got a haircut at a place called Hair On Broadway which is a fairly high end sort of place. The guy who cut my hair was really cool actually and we had a great conversation. Then I went clothes shopping and almost bought a pair of pants (I'll get them on pay day!). I just wandered around looking for clothes and started to feel a lot better. Something about grooming myself and getting some nice clothes (almost anyway) made me feel better. Plus I got some exercise because it's a half hour walk into Loughton where all the stores are. I went to a Kebabery (Kebabs are big here) and had a massive chicken kebab. I started to relax for the first time in days.

I decided I need to get in better shape and that I need to exercise to deal with stress so I went jogging at 9:00pm and I actually jogged for 29 minutes straight. Don't ask me how. I think it's because I've done so little physical activity that my body is just not worn out at all...or something. I felt a lot better after having done this and I need to stick to the goal of eating better, exercising, and doing some things I like so I feel better.

So my goal is to do half an hour of exercise every day, quit drinking for the week, and eat right.

1 day down, 6 to go.