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Hello again everybody, welcome to the first blog of 2012. This past month has been pretty busy with the start of the new school year as well as various visits from Scotland.
I guess the best place to begin would be with the arrival of Jo and Alan's replacement who touched down in Colombo on the 6th and I met for the first time a few days later in the grounds of UMV. As I was leaving I happened to spy the car belonging to the founder of Senahasa trust, knew it could only mean one thing and was soon introducing myself to Mrs Joan Hare who was about to be shown her quarters for the next two years. A veteran of the British educational system, she'd been eating England's toughest schools for breakfast and was eager to tackle the challenge of Southern Sri Lanka. Oh, and although she's worked in England for several years I'll be quick to mention that she's a Glaswegian at the root which improves the Edinburgh:Glasgow ratio quite substantially. No longer do I feel hopelessly outnumbered. What is it they say? Ah yes, 'you can take the teacher out of Glasgow but you can never take Glasgow out of the teacher.' We've already introduced her to a Sri Lankan well wash during which we watched a group of coconut pickers hop up the palms in the way that they do. After watching up close what I'd previously only seen in a Higher Geography video I had to have a go. They seemed rather amused by our request and were happy to give us an introduction to the strange technique of gripping the trunk with your feet while your ankles are bound together with strips of old sacking. Being an instant expert, I sped my way to a height of about...a metre and a half before realising that I wasn't prepared to go much farther. Anyway, I'm sure Joan will have a million things of her own to say about her first month so all I'll mention is that it looks like saris, curry and mosquitoes won't feel strange for long.
Now as for the schools themselves, Tittigalle has been reorganised as a primary school only, meaning that grades six to eight have been transferred to another school along with two of the teachers. Teaching has been slow to get off the ground - it took over a month for us to secure regular slots in the timetable but have spent a great deal of time preparing the students for the school concert. This had been scheduled for early December but the heavy winds that brought down so many trees in the area also succeeded in cutting of power to the village for several weeks. No power, no concert. The new date was given for January 17th so we all went along - Emma, Erin, Joan, Herbie and myself. I'll put up a video of the highlights which you can enjoy in far less than the three hours that we were there. The acts varied from traditional dances to songs sang in English which we took part in, proudly sporting our home made sailors hats for 'when I was one I'd just begun.' Each performance was followed by a speech from a member of staff or prominent guest. Sri Lankan speeches are known to go on a lot longer than is necessary and also, it seems, longer than is tolerable for we watched with amusement as the principle gave a nod to the sound engineer during one particularly drawn out ramble and he slyly faded the volume down to zero. I do wish they'd done that again later when a new grade one took to the stage and delivered what was not so much singing as scripted wailing. And by wailing I mean what you have when you harpoon a whale and record the noise it makes. For those of you who are shocked by this comparison, it's in the video too. Hear it for yourself then tell me that I'm wrong. In other news from Tittigalle, the principle has told us that we have faces like a goat's and the English room is proudly displaying the alphabet along one wall, thanks to the artistic skills of Herbie and myself. We've alsosucceeded in training the grade fives to respond to us putting our hands up like rabbit ears by following suit and preparing to jump. Most of the time it's because we're about to sing 'run rabbit run' but I sometimes do it just for a laugh.
At Unawatuna we were delighted to be approached by a new grade six pupil and his mother early on in the term. He'd been one of the few to pass the government scholarship exam and was about to move to a better funded school in Galle. But not after saying goodbye to his old teachers of course! His mother chattered away in Sinhala and one of the teachers was able to translate for us. 'She says that he is always singing songs around the house, and he sings them in English.' Fantastic, it's great to know that the kids actually enjoy our classes enough to use what we've taught in their free time. We asked him which songs he sang and he shyly began 'One, two, three, four, five. Once I caught a fish alive...' Herbie and I joined in but tailed off after a few seconds as we became aware of the looks we were receiving from our fellow teachers. Unfortunately we're not going to be working at UMV any longer after a complaint (yes, another one) about Emma and Erin living in the grounds but working in a different school. The complainer speculated that they must be paying rent to some corrupt member of the system so the easiest way to keep the peace was to do a swap, with them teaching at UMV and us taking their old school, Sri Gunnarathna Maha Vidyalya. Or SGV, since I doubt most people would bother to read that fully.
SGV is a half hour bus ride from Unawatuna and for our first journey we were accompanied by the girls who showed us the right stop to get off at and introduced us to all the teachers we'd be working with. They're a friendly bunch who happily invited us to join their staff room food circle and were keen to engage us in conversation during the interval. When we left after our first day we were thinking that our transfer had worked out pretty well when a passing tuk-tuk driver stopped and upon seeing our un-touristy apparel announced "Ah, you are teachers! Come, I will drive you to the bus stop.' This has happened four or five times now, it's brilliant.
We recently received a little reminder of that strange little country we left back in September, what was it? Scatlend or something? It's Project Trust policy that each country group will be visited once by a member of staff during their year overseas and for us this visit occurred last month. Our desk-officer, Nick, is in charge of keeping an eye on several countries and their volunteers including Sri Lanka. He and a collegue arrived one Wednesday while we were mid lesson at UMV so they sat to watch that before moving on to observe a lesson of Erin and Emma's. That evening they took us out for a meal at one of the coastal hotels which I have to say was possible the best meal I've eaten in 5 ½ months. For one thing it was an all you can eat buffet and for another they had passion fruit. I am a glutton for passion fruit. During the meal we collected all the gossip and news from the other countries that had been visited, delighted to hear how our companions from our selection and training courses were faring. The next morning they accompanied us to Tittigalle and watched me teach a grade 3 class how to discuss the weather, an essential skill for if they ever run into a Brit.
Herbie has had a few visits of his own in the past few weeks, from his Uncle who was briefly visiting the south coast during a three month long stay, and from his Mum, Step dad and brother who spent a week in Unawatuna before going on a month long trip around the island. The benefits of these visits were firstly that we got to babysit Herbie's cousins in the luxurious villa that they'd managed to get rent free from their friend - swimming pool included - and secondly that we were able to enjoy the musical talent of Herbie's family who played as a ceilidh band for the birthday party of a British woman who runs a charity in nearby Talpe. Unfortunately the conditions of our visa forbid us from taking on secondary projects so we haven't been able to get involved with the work they do but they're a great bunch of people who don't seem to mind us coming to visit occasionally. In fact they even invited us to accompany them on a staff day out to the Sinharaja rainforest where we thoroughly enjoyed playing cricket and swimming in the river. Jumping off the waterfalls was great, you'll see one picture of me about a third of a second before I landed on a rock about two feet under the water.
In sporting news, we were invited by the participants of the Senior cricket club to join their game in addition to umpiring. I let it be known that before coming to Sri Lanka I'd never held a bat in my life but this didn't seem to put them off and while I bowled in a manner pathetic by their standards one offered some encouragement, "Just try," while he grinned along with the rest of them. As for batting, I hit the ball a grand total of two times and was caught out exactly twice. Practice is needed. I think it could have been that day that I arrived and one of the students asked "Where is the other teacher? Mr Bean?" at which point he caught himself and stood embarrassed while his friends errupted into laughter. It seems that Herbie has a new nickname. We've also taken part in a dance lesson, believe it or not. The girls had organised a set of weekly lessons from the SGV dance teacher and Herbie and I joined them for the first one, making sure they knew that it would be just the one. The half hour warm up of vicious stretches put me off more than a little. UMV has been host to the much anticipated Unawatuna Premier League which drew over 50 entrants from the ranks of keen cricketers in the school. This took 6 hours of a Sunday for us to organise teams and umpire matches, eventually naming the Unawatuna Challengers as the victors. Keeping an eye on all the kids who weren't currently playing proved difficult but we have practice at this during our regular weekly clubs. For example, I do recall saying something along the lines of "No one gets the frisbee until they've all come down from the roof." I'm strict like that.
Today is a special day since it's exactly half way through our stay here so I thought I'd have a look at how we've integrated our way into the community thus far. I think the best way to measure it is to compare the prices you get charged over time. You may remember my annoyance at being charged Rs. 300 for a haircut back in dsjghdasun but by using my very best Sinhala throughout my last visit I've reduced that to a mere Rs. 100. Indeed, that's still Rs. 30 more than local price but I think the big picture is looking good. As for Sinhala itself, I was very chuffed to be able to hold a small discussion with the Tittigalle depute about when we were needed in the school.
Next Friday too, will be an occasion. In fact doubly so. I've taken the decision to go as far as to do a video blog to celebrate which I'll put up on the day. That will explain what's so very exciting and I'll include a few other bits and bobs concerning Sri Lankan independence day, SGV sports month and why I might just write a book.
Until next time, all the best.
Michael.
- comments
Mum Great to hear all your news Michael. Pleased to hear you've enjoyed all your visitors - and glad the Glaswegian ratio is permanently higher!
Gill Great blog Mike! It sounds like you're having a great time, i hope you didnt hurt yourself on that rock when you jumped off the waterfall!
Jen amazing again mike! had me laughing so much... your write like a pro so yeahhh get going with that book! xxxxx
Janet (aka Emma's mum) Fab to hear your news and can't wait for the video blog. Thanks.
Gran Fantastic blog and photos Michael
Dad Hi Mike. Great blog, Enjoyed reading it, very entertaining. Good job the submerged rock wasn't a submerged crocodile!
Elizabeth Bates I agree with Jen about the book. It would be a good to read. Sorry I am so late in catching up with your blog.
Dr J Hi Michael, great to read your update. Watched the video - scripted wailing?? I'm pretty sure I sound just the same in the shower! Glad you're having such a teriffic time, keep smiling :)