Taking The Long Way: Teachers: Saints walking among us.

So my first day of work was...how to put this nicely...a mess. Oh my gosh, I always believed that teachers were extremely underpaid and now I very firmly believe it! If I could find another job here, I'd do it. Those little kids wore me out! And who's idea was it to teach English to three year olds!? Those kids can barely speak Spanish let alone English. They just spent an hour staring at me. My next class was the older preschool kids, the 5 year olds. They were pretty good. There was about 18 of them I think and they would at least repeat after me when I said things in English. I brought out the Buddy puppet though and they just looked at it like really lady, we're a little too old for this thing. And the three year olds just stared at it the same way they stared at me. So Buddy the Bear was a flop. The first graders weren't too bad because there were only 10 of them. They didn't really want to listen to anything I had to say though and I spent about half the class trying to get them to stay in their seats. Then there was a lot of excitement because two girls went to the bathroom and came back shouting excitedly about a paloma, or dove, and then all of a sudden everyone had to go to the bathroom. I didn't fall for that though. I don't know what was so exciting about a dove but there was no getting their attention back after that. The real test of my day, that I failed, was the second graders. Oh my goodness. These kids were the reason why when I got home and Octavio asked me how my first day went all I could think to say was "please don't make me go back there!" There was 23 of them and they all wanted to ask me a different question. My favorite was "How's Australia?" I had just explained that I was from the United States and this kid apparently thought that meant I'd been to Australia too. He was all disappointed when I told him I'd actually never been to Australia so I didn't know. This class was a disaster. A complete and total disaster. There's no other way to describe it than that, it was awful. They were all over the place and talking to everyone and throwing things at each other and rolling on the floor. A mess. There was no way I was going to gain control of that classroom. I was doomed from the start. So now I'm going back to the drawing boards and going to revise my lesson plans in a hope to first, get their attention, and then hopefully keep it.

Luckily today was the day we had to pay rent and water and the phone bill and all that good stuff so it was a reminder of why I need a job. Otherwise, I might have been tempted to play sick tomorrow.

In other news, Octavio & I went to Tres Valles, his home town this weekend. Here are some pictures.

Welcome to Tres Valles! The city hall all lit up at night and decorated in preparation for Independence Day this month.

Brunch on Saturday morning.

Octavio's sister giving his baby niece a bath.

His quiet little niece. She had to be bribed with juice to give me a kiss.

After the baby's bath. Octavio's little brother and niece were watching from the sidelines.

Octavio's aunt with his new niece.

Octavio's grandma.

His aunt taking a break from the heat in front of the fan. 95 degrees with humidity feels a lot hotter when there's no air conditioning to escape in!

Homero, Octavio's aunts parrot. He whistles at all the cute girls.

Chailo, the cute little hoppy puppy I got to play with at his aunts house.

I was in kitty heaven.

Watching a movie/taking little naps in the afternoon. Well, I was taking little naps anyway.

Octavio's aunt & I. And his little old man hat.

Octavio's adorable chatty-cathy niece peeking at Lola (our kitty!) in her carrier. I think my Spanish got 10 times better just answering her questions. She is too cute.