Dia del Maestro (Teacher's Day)

Good thing the walking club is in full force because I think I'm still recovering from Teacher's Day last Friday.  Miss Dorin had the 7th grace Social Studies class redo their classroom and transform it into a Honduran cultural arena.  The students were dressed in traditional clothes, the room had many wonderful decorations and best of all was the piles and piles of food.  We had elote (corn on the cob), tamales, catrachas, baleadas, plantains stuffed with beans and cheese, various breads (corn bread, coconut bread and women's bread), etc.  They also had coffee, horchata and atol to drink.  Did I say that this was at 9:15 a.m. and was the day after a huge dinner Profe Mabel fixed for all 14 of us at her house?  Another parent brought in a huge tray of pastelitos.  A student gave me a dessert her mom had made.  The food didn't stop.  One teacher even got a card that wished him a great teachers day and said he deserved it because of his hair, the way  he walks and other beautiful reasons.  It was really cute.

Later on Friday evening, Don Wil (a wonderful SJBS father who does nothing but give to the school turned 50.  His family had all 14 of us over for baleadas, cake, ice cream and a pinata.  It was great conversation until late into the night (ha ha I was home by 10:30 but I lasted hours longer than others:)

This week continues the food fest as we're all going to another SJBS students' house on Thursday for dinner.  Friday is a half day for teacher in service and we're having a meeting and then a social for the Honduran and US teachers to mingle.  Miss Danelia is making food and we're going swimming - should be fun.  On Sunday, I will again be visiting a student's house. 

Life is good and things are busy.  Student behaviors are changing and more students are being sent to the office for discipline issues.  It is interesting to see how parents react when they are called into conferences at the school, even more interesting is to see their children's reaction when the parents are there.  I subsituted for a sick teacher for a period today in sixth grade.  I'd just come from the pre-kinder room.  Boy what a difference in behavior.  It was great to see the 6th graders working through the writing process.  They were finishing the pre-writing (brainstorming stage) and starting their first drafts.  Looked like the start of a lot of good material.

Its crazy to see pictures of people back home in sweatshirts and jackets.  Its still in the mid 90s here on a daily basis (actual temperature), let's not even talk about the what it feels like temperature.  Two pairs of shoes have died on me in my short three months (one pair of chacos - don't worry I'm going  to see if the shoe repair man in the market can fix them - and a pair of flip flops).  My computer is slowly coming back to life (thanks Giulio) but I still don't know how to download pictures with this new set up.  Baby steps I say.  I'd heard before I got here that laptops come here to die....I'm going to challenge this and hope my laptop is still going strong come July 2011.

Tomorrow I'm off to renew my visa for one month.  Hard to believe that I've been here for 3 months already!