I do not know why but I was feeling quite fragile yesterday by the evening. I had returned from Biskek knowing I might not have somewhere to stay, after having just been somewhere else I guess and while I suppose the whole point of this is to experience things I have been spoilt by the quality of life at ASHU guest house. So although the good news was my room was free last night the not so good news is that it is not free tonight or tomorrow or etc. Luckily the manager had warned me it would happen, but I had not realised that is was today. So when I got back from work a complete stranger, though wearing exactly the same spectacle frame as me and who turned out to be the guide for the newcomers, told me to finish my coffee and follow the staff to another room just as nice.
Of course how can it be as nice. I am not good at shared loos and things at the best of time, now I am going to have to share a tumble down house with two other people I have never met before. Before I got to Kyrgyzstan I thought I was sharing a house with other teachers, and although I knew that would be a new experience for me and one it might take me a while to get used to I thought bite the bullet it will be good to have company, but that of course was before I discovered that most of the time I am in a guest house with people from all over the world popping in. Apart from the musty smells and the holes in the ceiling I guess this place is not awful and if it had a kitchen actually it would be really nice, but no such luck. However, at some point it means my new colleague will appear and my absolute boss, but quite when I do not know.
Today actually I felt very superfluous. I do not know why I was feeling quite nervous before I started school today. I had not been able to get hold of Nathan before his second trip of the year to Portugal before heading for bed but he kindly woke my an hour later and I do not know why, I guess wondering where I will eventually fetch up, could not sleep most of the night. So I was very laggardly heading off for work, but I got everything ready and apart from the fact that the girls were wearing very flouncy dresses, nothing seemed untoward, but as I checked the sound on the CD, the kids did not seem to be getting ready for the class and in fact they started heading out and their teacher told me it was something Kygyzstan day. Funnily enough I had decided in the night that the year two students ought to be taught Where do you come from? I'm from Kyrgyzstan so that they can quiz visitors to the class and begin to build up their geographic knowledge so that it should come up on some kind of national day seemed great, but it did not look like I would actually have any classes as we all watched some kind of presentation indoors then headed out into the sun and to hear speeches, from the children and dances. I was very privileged because the little girl who has been wondering around the school the last couple of days (maybe about 2, grand-daughter to cleaner/end of class bell ringer) came and sat on my lap for some of the time. I especially liked the dancing and singing, but what floored me is that I have seen no practice what so ever for this and sadly as I had forgotten my camera I have no pictures of the kids either. Strangely there were no parents, but perhaps the idea is to build their confidence and support for each other. I was really impressed with my colleagues dedication. I asked one of them later via google translate who had taught the dance and how, and he said after I leave school, but I try not to leave much before the others these days and while there are always kids about and in fact members of the public seem to wander in (teenagers usually) to ask for the help of the multi talented computer come music teacher to help them with IT, I did not see any obvious groups practicing so I do not know when they did it, some Saturdays apparently so I felt that really I am not working as fully and as part of the team as I had thought or ought to be. It was slightly similar in Senegal, I would work hard, work my hours, see everyone off the premises, but the next day as if little elves had been in, I would notice loads of useful changes that had happened overnight.
One of the problems I face here, I only realised today, whilst trying to reconstruct my day is that whilst I can happily make lots of resources, for some reason, all the printing seems to have to go through the computer whiz, The nice thing as a result is that I have to talk with him and we have so far always worked out a way to explain what I need but like today, I was waiting and waiting to try and get him to print something but by 4 he suddenly gets music students, which makes sense, but all I needed was to print. So even when I am trying to be useful I am not. And I do not know if it was the complete change of day and the fact that I did not know whether I was teaching or not but I was not very happy with what I did today. The ideas were good, and the kids loved Wedgie the friend I have bought over with me, but I did not feel very in control and as per usual when I tried playing a game it went array as the kids to be honest were a bit too excitable today.
Anyway am I going to be brave and try and crash out on the new bed. The third in three days.Very tired and lots of new people to try and have some energy for come dinner time.
(I have just discovered that the owner and his son sometimes have to sleep in their cars, when it is very full, so I probably have no right to have any niggles.)
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