Guilty pleasures

Blogging, in the small space of a half hour

Cycling to weekly lectures through cowpat field, and taking pictures. Hahaha. The best part: To my consternation, I heard someone cycling up the path whilst I was loitering and taking pictures. I looked up and this girl cycled up, with her own camera in hand... and we smiled sheepishly at each other. Hahaha I think I found a friend :p

Waking up to the view every morning :D Sunny skies, gray skies, and...

Squirrels! (there is a little gray one, can you see it? Distracting creatures hahaha, I tend to stare when they come around)

Lectures :) The more in depth, it seems, the more interesting they are :D

Whipped cream birthday fiasco

Skyping and MSN when I'm supposed to be working :p

My volunteering to teach at a house and a teaching placement at a primary school - why oh why didn't I do it earlier?? I'm having so much fun. True - it's not all play - my class control is atrocious and there is a fine line I feel I need to respect since the teacher is in charge of the classroom, so I can't exactly tell the kids off too sternly without overstepping the teacher (and I'm not too sure I can tell them off, even if I wanted to -.-). But... but!! Wow. what a difference in the teaching style. I felt I learned a lot. The class was small, with around twenty students. The teacher I observed had really effective ways of keeping the kids quiet - she clapped her hands in a sequence, and the kids joined in, but the message carries across - time to listen. There was an emphasis in group work and the kids' enthusiasm and pro activeness was encouraging (although that means that they dare to make more noise and misbehave - these three boys misbehaved really badly and the supply teacher told them off - and I really don't know how this scales on the results - enthusiasm in class doesn't always translate to good results). And even more amazingly there was an interactive whiteboard and a laptop on each desk to facilitate teaching. Waaaaah. I suppose, this is a bit like what my dream school is like. It's already out here. Hmmmmm. Oh oh oh!! Aaaaand I have the most amusing conversations with the kids. Hahahahahaa. A real guilty pleasure to the max - how do I balance actually imparting some knowledge to the kids or ensuring they do their work and learn something, or just getting to know who they are? There was this little English boy who said to this black boy that he's lucky to have curly hair, cos he could stick his pencil in it and it won't fall off. And then there was this little girl who got rather exasperated with her group partner because he kept quizzing her on her crushes and complained to me, boys are weird, I don't know why I went out with him before. And then the misbehaving boys prior to fighting some time later were quizzing me on where I was from, guessing China, Korea, Japan up til Boswana (cos I told them my country started with a B). Immediately labelled a little girl as little Hermione Granger in my head. And there was a really friendly little kid who got round to introducing me to the rest of his group members. The staff there was really friendly too and I do think the teachers I came into contact with are very pretty. Hahaha random, but they have a certain sweet, patient, demeanor about them. Of course this evaporated when the kids misbehaved but they look like they really enjoy their work. Wah. I really do hope I can be half as good in future.

Reading my bedtime book (Currently, it's Celia Rees' 'The Fool's Girl') when really, it's bedtime and I should sleep cos I will get up at eight the next day.

Listening to emo music when actually I feel like bouncing around for happiness XD I don't know why but I find most Chinese music (well, maybe just the ones I have on my laptop) rather mellow and so, emo :p But they are nice hehe. And perhaps it's the only way to settle down and work :p

No matter how transient this feeling may be... It feels nice all the same. To feel at peace and pretty much loving what the world has. And I feel this is just a glimpse at how much more wonderful experiences the world has to offer :D

Even if my supervisor and I discussed how the world sucks :p (she is awesome by the way) Haha, some context is needed - Arnold and Tennyson wrote some pretty bleak poetry about how the world is desolate and cold, perhaps because it was changing or perhaps someone they love has passed away; the difference is that in Tennyson's poem time heals the hurt and Tennyson's sister found someone to love again and the world becomes alright, sunshine-y and bright again in 'In Memoriam', but for Arnold the world still sucks except that somewhere out in the cold bleak world he has found someone to love in 'Dover Beach'. She prefers Arnold, and I, Tennyson. Hahaha goodness knows which is an accurate view of the world. Both are valid and true to the poets themselves and I guess, the two poems are not that different in essence, only the displacement in the experiences the poets go through in their lives (i.e. one newly lost a friend, one newly married) puts them in different positions. Ah, life.

I fully intended for this to be a short post. Ah well :p