Waning Long Weekend

Hello again, world! Apologies for the two-week hiatus; frankly, not much happened last week to warrant an update, and also it was midterm week so all of my free seconds were hijacked for grading and comment-writing. But now, my comments are done (at least the drafts of them), and my grading for the weekend is done, and my lesson planning is more or less done, and here I am with some seconds to spare!

I think this job is making me more of a workaholic: in weeks like this past one, during which I had next to no free time, I actually wanted to spend what free time I did have on more work. It just felt like there was so much to do, and every minute I spent goofing off was a minute wasted on the other end of things, so my days were pretty much crammed full of typing and circling things and inputting things into Engrade, the magical online tool that calculates everything for you. It can feel kinda nice to be so jam-packed, even if the days sometimes end up being 10-12 straight hours of activity with barely a dinner break in between. Today, which was a long weekend Professional Development day, a fellow teacher made a joke about barely getting 5 hours of sleep, and I laughed collegially on the outside but my brain was saying "PLEASE DON'T LET THAT BE MY LIFE WHEN I DO THIS FULL-TIME."

Because that's the big news from the week, I suppose: I'm coming back! My contract is signed for the 2014-2015 school year and I'm getting more and more excited for what's in store. Here are some very very fuzzy details:

- I'm hoping to move into an actual dorm and be a dorm parent, partly because it'd be fun and partly because my salary would get a significant (10%-ish) boost

- I will probably rent a car from the school and share it with Chase

- I will have my own advisees! Which is a little scary, honestly, because it feels like a big responsibility to be the "here" at which the buck stops for 4-5 students. But I'm looking forward to really connecting with some kids and feeling like I have a group to call my own...

- As for the classes, I thought you'd never ask. A lot is still not set in stone: generally teachers do 4 or 5 classes each, so at least double what I'm doing now, which I think is the usual load at schools around the world. However, I have the distinct honor of inaugurating a brand-new and super-exciting King's Academy class: Big History.

Created by some kind of super-curriculum-designing-squad and funded by none other than Bill Gates, Big History is about grand designs and big-picture thinking, which when I consider it makes it sort of a meta-class. See, I'll be teaching one section of 9th graders here at King's, but only twice a week - the rest of the time, I'll be leading online seminars and discussions with students from every other school that's implementing the course - that means America, and maybe Japan, and maybe beyond!

There's a lot to learn about the course, and in order to learn it all, I'm going to be attending some PD sessions, which means travel, which is thrilling. The first is in February (which is very soon, not that I'm counting) and will be in America somewhere; location TBD so I get to be on tenterhooks for at least a few more days. The next is in August in San Rafael, CA - an excuse to spend some summer days in California? Sign me up.

And what, you may ask, will I be teaching, exactly? Well, a little of everything. The point of Big History is to start at the very, very beginning (i.e. the Big Bang) and take the students all the way up to the present day. Every lesson has been meticulously planned, down to the specific seconds at which I should pause each video to ask the predetermined discussion questions. I'm interested to see how this plays out; on the one hand, of course, it's such a relief to have all the planning taken care of, but I wonder how much it'll feel like an impediment to my autonomy in the classroom.

More than anything, though, it's a fairly wild new experience, which only makes the prospect of next year more exciting. There's plenty more to come as the next few months sort themselves out; you'll know the details just about as soon as I do.

Other than that, it was a weekend of relaxing, cooking, eating things other people had cooked, and playing board games, which seems like just the right way to unwind after a busy busy week. Four (far less hectic) school days stretch out between us and February, and I'm showing The Matrix on Tuesday and Wednesday, so let's get this party started.

Wild Wadi Weekend

Hello again from Supervised Study Hall, where it seems I'll reliably have time to blog as long as I'm not grading or forcing the children to be quiet. They seem to have gotten the hang of things by now, and I usually kinda look forward to the 2.5 hours of mandated quiet sitting time. Productivity goes through the roof when you can't really do anything or make any noise. At least it does for me; can't really speak for these layabouts.

What a weekend, though! First off, it was a surprise 3-day weekend: we were going to have class off on Monday, but they switched it to Sunday last-minute, so all of a sudden the world was our oyster and we made the most of it. In brief:

THURSDAY: A return to Burger Shack for delicious burgers in celebration of a fellow teacher's birthday. TONS of students milling around and dancing; they were super embarrassed by our presence but we mostly thought it was kinda hilarious. Then a return to King's for adult refreshments and silly card games.

FRIDAY: A trip to the brand-new Carrefour in Madaba, which is a huuuuge game-changer for the grocery fanatics among us. It's closer by a factor of 4 than any grocery store was before, and has a giant selection (including home goods and kitchen supplies and rugs and shoes) at lower prices than the other grocery stores. It was PACKED with King's people when we were there, and Yasmine and I took full advantage to host a dinner party at which we served baked ziti and Noor baked cookies and a truly delightful time was had by all. And then out to Amman to hang out with Joanna's brother, who was in town, and we got back at 1:30am which wasn't great for what ended up happening the next day.

SATURDAY: See below. Ridiculous.

SUNDAY: Relaxed, prepped for class, watched Downton Abbey, the usual. Back to Saturday.


Really this post is about Saturday, because my threshold of crazy adventures in Jordan keeps getting bumped up. Now that I've piqued your curiosity, here's the deal:

Saturday was going to be a pleasant day: Alli had planned a trip to the art gallery, and my Arabic teacher was hosting a gathering afterwards at a nearby cafe. Normal, pleasant weekend day. But Jordan had other plans: on Friday afternoon, just before the Carrefour shopping trip, Alli sent the following email:

This was somewhat surprising. Immediately I knew I was doing it, and so it was that four hours after falling asleep at 2, I was back up and ready (-ish) to hit the road. The adventure unfolded as follows:

Four teachers (Alli, Meg, Jimmy, and I) gathered at 6:30 to drive to Amman. A bizarrely thick fog had settled over the highway as we drove, and it took us a little while to make our way to the mall at which our "charter bus" planned to meet us. Said bus ended up being a rickety powder-blue affair - I wish I had a picture - whose windows kept getting jostled open, exposing us to the surprisingly cold morning air. I had a hat and a scarf and I wore them the whole bus ride, sleeping fitfully and reading my book as we bumped and screeched our 3-plus-hour way to Wadi Rum.

The only other travelers on the bus were Americans, Russell and Allie, who had gotten the same call and had similarly adventurous spirits. Around 11, the six of us arrived at our destination: Wadi Rum station, a roadside museum of sorts dedicated to a truly beautiful train:

                                      

I had been smitten by this train the last time we went to Wadi Rum, and was more or less beside myself to finally be in its presence now. (Check my Facebook profile picture for proof). Not only that, but there was a reasonably big crowd milling around, and some professional-looking equipment, and a lady who introduced herself as Diala and told us she'd be taking care of us. This seemed like enough to go on, so we went into the exhibit for respite from the cold.

Hours and hours we waited. As promised, they served us lunch, which very unexpectedly was a quite tasty chicken tikka take-away that was, even more bafflingly, still warm. How they shipped it out to our desert outpost may always be one of the mysteries of this day. We passed the rest of our time by standing, sitting, pacing, and exploring the nearby railway offerings:

                                                      

Tracks to nowhere.

The part of the train where the coal gets shoveled. Boiler? Guess Thomas the Tank Engine didn't teach me that much.

Wadi Rum, beautiful even in the clouds. If you look closely you can see Meg wandering across the lower right of the image.

But at long last, that is, at about 3:30, our time finally came. And what a time it was.

The star of the music video was Jaafar, a pop singer of apparently modest fame and allegedly nephew of the king. As far as we could tell, the gist of the video was that he was performing a concert on the flat bed of a train car, and we (along with about 30 others) were to be his audience. This involved dancing, flailing our arms, and looking extremely excited, and we were good at it.

We were so good, in fact, that we were singled out from the crowd to be focal points in almost every shot. When they shot the crowd from behind, we stood at the back. When they focused on the front row, we were the front row. When they needed to surround the lead female concert-goer with excited-looking audience members, we were the go-to gang. And so we listened to about 90 seconds of awfully catchy pop music over and over and over and over again, dancing up a storm all the while and having a blast. Jaafar proved a somewhat unpolished performer, not really heeding the director's instructions (mostly "dance!" and "energy!"), but we did a plenty good job providing our own enthusiasm.

Shooting wrapped up as the sun set, and we took a long cold sleepy rickety ride back to Amman, and cranked up the heat in the car on the way to King's. Exhausted and victorious, we arrived back in time for a full night's sleep.

I have no idea when this video will get released, but I am fairly certain that I will feature in it to some degree. Rest assured that you will know as soon as I do. Most importantly, it was every bit the adventure I hoped it would be, and I feel validated once again in the "never don't go" ethos. No regrets, as they say. 

Life goes on, though, and now it's time to wake up the sleeping girl in this study hall. Again. See you soon!

Back for 2014

I am sitting here in Supervised Study Hall, which provides all the joys it did way back in December, and thinking about how soon I'll be able to go to sleep. I got back to Jordan on Friday night and slept for eight delightful hours, but that appeared to be a fluke, as I've since woken up at 4:13 and 3:18 respectively (funny how my seriously exhausted brain chooses those kinds of specifics to remember).

But I got back to sleep last night, and I'm approaching the point of being so tired that I have no choice but to sleep through the night. I hope.

Mostly, though, it's been a couple days of reacquainting myself with the routines of life here. Classes, meals, co-curriculars, lesson plans and grades and free evenings - slowly but surely I'm sinking back in, and enjoying the little differences that have so far separated this week from three weeks ago.

First off, I'm taking tae kwon do as a co-curricular. I say "taking" because I'm not at all in charge; there's a professional instructor, the genial and surprisingly flexible Coach Mustafa, and all I have to do is take attendance and reacquaint myself with martial arts. Can't complain; with very little responsibility, I get to exercise and punch and kick three times a week, and ever since the Great Capoeira Experiment of senior year ended after one session with black blood blisters on both my big toes, I've been hankering to get back in the game in a way that doesn't leave me immobile for a week afterwards. So that's been fun.

I'm also about to start individual voice lessons with a handful of students. But I haven't yet, so that one can be a cliffhanger for now.

And of course, the new classes, with whom I had less than two weeks before the break. We're definitely still feeling each other out, but both of them have continued to be sharp, hardworking, and good-natured, and if they keep that up, I can't imagine I'll have much to complain about these winter months.

Except the cold, because it's cold. Often in the low 40s at night, and 50s during the day, which wouldn't be terrible except that they're still getting the heat worked out. So far it's been safe to assume that the outside temperature will be equal to (or sometimes even greater than) the inside temperature. I don't usually mind 42 degrees when I have a jacket and am only outside for 10 minutes, but my hands are just a tad numb as I write this, as if winter is just giving me a frosty little nudge to remind me it's there. Plenty of heat in my apartment, though, plus a new fitted sheet (cause I sure know how to treat myself), so I think I'll manage.

***

I almost published this post and then I realized I didn't really talk at all about the last three weeks. I guess most of you reading this saw me at one point or another, but in case you were wondering, it was truly a wonderful vacation. Highlights included:

- seeing family in NYC, Woodbridge, DC, and Vermont (all of these instances were largely focused on eating, except one where we watched The Hobbit)

- celebrating my first-ever Christmas at Sam's house (also almost entirely food-centric)

- taking Sam skiing for the first time, and introducing her to the crucial 2:3 ratio of skis per day:huge meals per day

- reuniting with Spizzwinks up and down the east coast. Managed to get nine of us together in Brooklyn one evening, which was an absolute joy. Can't wait for my crazy jaunt back in April

- I'll remember some other things and talk about them later maybe. It's late.

Basically, I had a blast, and the readjustment period has passed full swing but definitely isn't over. I guess I miss those folks back home, and as much fun and excitement as there is every day at King's, it's certainly impossible to jump back in as if those three weeks didn't happen. As I've reiterated countless times to myself, I should mostly feel glad to miss people because it means I'm lucky enough to have people to miss, which of course is easier to say than to actually feel but I'm doing my best. Don't cry for me, America; this place is still a lot of fun, and I can only look forward to getting back in the groove for the coming two months.

Twenty minutes until I leave this room of disgruntled teenagers, and hopefully twenty minutes after that I'll be sleeping for the next eight hours. Wish me luck. Happy New Year!