Postman Pat

A very nice gentle day,  I actually managed to do two classes with no problems.  Yes at the moment that is all I am expected to do, and I was worried that I would not have the energy for the work here! In theory I am supposed to be teaching 20 hours, so I arrive at 9 and left today at 3pm.  I spend the rest of the time either doing my Kyrgyz lesson or trying to get resources for future lessons sorted out and when the little ones came in to do their IT I was on hand to "help" and the same again this afternoon when several of them sat through 15 minutes of Postman Pat in English. Agog at Mrs Goggins!

Two lifts and one near disaster

I am almost too mortified to say how much went wrong with the class today.  12 5-6 year olds giggling at a rhyme is lovely, them saying hello to Sooty is lovely too, then them grabbing all the toys, trying to play the piano and then thwacking each other to bits whilst I try and stop them playing the piano is not ideal.   One boy was crying so loud luckily he got the head to come in!  So no hiding place for my inability to carry my beautifully devised lesson plan through.  I had been in the class a few times before and each time the kids had shouted out, hello, how are you?, my name is.. so I was fooled into thinking that they knew the phrase and that they knew how school worked, but they have actually only been here as many days as I have so school is totally new. I forget that when I worked with similar age kids before in Senegal most of them had come to nursery at the school and knew the routine so whilst my presence caused a stir, it did not cause too many riots and as there was always an assistant around I was never left to fend for myself. Here they are new, I am new and well it was terrible.

BUT the good news is that although class was over, no one came to take over so I let the kids play, and just chatted to them and they were pretty much good as gold, I even allowed a bit of supervised piano playing.  Then when their teacher came back I stayed in class and I watched as the kids calmly sat beautifully for a full half hour doing their mark making practice in their books and then we did applique together and then we all went into the computer room watched the beginning of Postman Pat on the huge screen in the room, followed by Rapunzel in Russian. Then back to the staff room for chai and bread.   The head said perhaps I should not teach them again till they are more familiar with school, which may be a good idea, but I have asked if I can sit in on their Wednesday afternoon classes so that they get used to me and listening to English. I do not want them to think I am no good so need to come up with some solutions and pretty quick.

Two lifts today, one sad, one hugely funny.  I am quite happy walking to work, but I think it does not seem to come naturally to the locals. Even though I had already said good bye to her Raja, the lovely family matriarch who is off to New York, insisted on giving me a lift part way to school today on their way to the airport.    I shall miss her.  She is away for a month and a half so we have said it will be interesting to see who knows more new words by the time she comes back, me or her.  My money is on her. Meanwhile on the way back, despite my best efforts to say, No thank you, Jok Rackmat, or something like that.  I found myself being hoist up on to a horse and lead home.  The poor man, carried all my books and whilst I was trying to feel intrepid realised that normally this high up I would have a helmet on and speculated that my insurance probably does not cover horse riding accidents.  No sooner than he had helped me down again then he was back on horseback galloping away. Wonderful.  

Horsemen gathering on the route to school.

Day 4 The real start of school.

A gentler day: no tourists, just a quick breakfast of bun and the delicious jam (which may be from a Russian jar) and I walked the 25 mins to the school across the river and up the road.  I wondered if something was wrong as I expected to see the children milling around, then realised that actually they had already started and I was late  But my first class was not till 9.30.    Typically I had lots of materials with me but had forgotten what I actually needed but both the small year two classes (7 and 8 year olds) were fine. Most of them joined in,  all of them knew my name is and were then able to draw a picture of themselves and put their names in Kyrgyz on them.  I had noted down their names the day before too and translated them into some kind of English (many a bit like Turkish names), so I could recognise them when they said them.  I then had a very pleasant 11.30 lunch of salad and soup, before tackling year 1, who I am sure are lovely, but suddenly trying to control 20 kids and find out what they are all called proved impossible  for unlike the other classes I had seen nothing in writing to advise me, and when I tried checking their details out later, the cursive forms of the writing defeated me so I am still none the wiser. We started well as they were almost all able to come out one by one and write a letter to copy the date, Tuesday September 3rd 2013, but when I tried finding out their names, there was so much noise I could not hear them.  Some of the girls were beating up the boys, some of the boys were beating up the boys, and some were happily colouring in during class until I was mean enough to get each of the "transgressors"  to stop and to try and engage them in a game.  These kids being very smart were able to do both, so definitely the greatest challenge so far, apart from trying to find out the word for paper so that the children had something to draw on and realising that the CD would not work as we are still out of power.  Just as I set off home the lights came back on but I was off to the local shop to buy a small ball for tomorrow's activities which will hopefully be a little more successful.

Tonight I thought I had meal time sussed.  I had had a lovely salad, I had had a lovely soup, felt perfectly happy that it was very similar to what I had already eaten. I was thenoffered chai, so happily munched the rest of the bread and jam, thinking that was it, when the main course came out and then afters!  Suffice it to say, I am very very very full.

BESHBARMAK

I gather via BBC i player that it is still warm in the UK.  Luckily it is still warm here so yesterday evening I sat in the sun trying to read the Russian on my timetable in order to find out my schedule. I had just worked out that I had misunderstood my name and had got everything wrong when I was called over to the restaurant to eat.  To my surprise it was full of  mostly senior men and women surrounding a table laden with small apples, salad and sweets things.   Sadly people do not really wear traditional clothes, but their colourful scarves, gave it a quaint feel.  I munched on some of the lovely little puffs of sort of sweeten pastry and salad trying to fathom whether this was a snack or dinner and being told that is was something to do with the ancestors did not clarify matters, nor did the whole table decamping to the next table (except for me) make it any clearer.  A huge pot of something liquid that I assumed was tea, was brought in and it seemed that I was starting my meal just as they were finishing theirs. But no hunks of meat appeared instead, in fact I cold make out sheep's skulls which are supposed to be very popular here.  So when I was offered something, I just asked for something small.  The meat was delicious, so too the noddles that accompanied it. but I felt rather too tired to finish it all.     It turned out that the gathering was in honour of Raja who is I think the mother of the owner who is about to go off to New York. She and her whole family are lovely.  Very well educated and creatively entrepreneurial  Her 22 year old great grandson (I think) helps run the place, speaks perfect English so was able to explain what was going on and that the dish is the famous local delicacy beshbarmak. The meal was topped off with local vodka, so who was I to refuse a glass which I happily downed. But I refused further offers as I had to prepare my lessons, and I wrongly assumed a long night of drinking was ahead.  Instead before I could finish my own meal, most of the guests had offered their prayers and left with bags of the sweet puffy things.

Day 3: First day of school.

Waking to the intense blue sky and warm wind, I just felt lighter and excited: for we stated work today.  But in a very nice gentle way. For we had the opening ceremony.  All the kids were dressed up, a few parents had come on horse back, but most had walked or came by car and after looking around the school, we had a little open air welcoming ceremony when some of the children in the youngest class recited a poem and did a little dance together.  Very impressive.  They were mostly very confident and pleased to be back at school.   The teachers hugged the kids in welcome.

Then we went inside for a little talk about the programme when  I was introduced to the students' parents and the school schedule and successes were illustrated. The children had their first lessons and ice cream. (The generator has gone out, but the music, come IT teacher, and photographer and some others had liberated enough power for our needs today) Then the children went home and we staff had a nice cup of chai, bread and the most wonderful plum jam and cucumber and tomato together.  I thought it was lunch until we got back to the Alsu guest house where I am staying only to find that they had prepared us lunch.  I am certainly not going to go hungry here.  In the end I ate one mente or something like that which reminded me of Tibetan momos.

I am still on UK time so to me it is almost 10  but really it is 2.50 so time for my afternoon nap.  Tomorrow teaching for real starts.  So lots of prep needed for the week, but my schedule does not look too bad.

From hot to cold and from city to rural: Day 2

This lovely building is my new work place,my new school.  I flew into Biskek yesterday and was met by my colleague and driven the three hours straight here.   Most of the journey was along good roads along a wide valley, it was very early and no one else was on the roads, the little fruit stalls along the route, (a bit reminiscent of Senegal) closed still. At times it called to mind roads through France but the folds of mountain in the distance were unlike anything I have seen before like a billiard table cover rucked up. We then turned into the valley where I will live most of the time, hay ricks, and horses, cataract coloured river water rushing by. Shabdan is the village, we have two or three shops, selling the basics, a little clinic, and a small range of sort of smallholding farms and two schools, one state and the other ours. 

  I am being put up in the Ashu guest house and to my surprise other English speaking guests are staying here.  So having thought I was an intrepid pioneer I am nothing of the sort.  The family who run it are the same family who have set up the school.   My host speaks excellent English and when I walked around the village lots of people said hello in English.  The location is very rural. It is hot today and dusty, everyone is pottering around doing work on their houses or out for a ride on their horse.  Really I expect the pace of life to stay similar for the next few weeks then who knows as the cold sets in, but it was an exciting start yesterday, visitors from Russia, a first lovely meal with the staff at the school: rice, carrots, freshly baked bread, and lots of chai.  Then back to my new home to try and make sense of cyrillic and to prepare for school opening.