So I'm alive...

So in response to Zach query, I will update you on what I've been doing. The short answer is working too much and (probably in all honesty) drinking too much. The longer answer is probably not much more interesting than that, but I'll give it a go.

So things here are good, but it's finally getting cold. I haven't bought a winter coat, although I was cornered by a salesman at the market last Saturday and told me I needed to buy a coat. I told him I didn't, but he didn't believe me and gave me a long, quizzical look before letting me, the stupid foreigner, go. I'm on the edge between buying a normal (relatively speaking) looking coat and just going extreme and buying a ridiculous leather coat with fur trimming like one of my friends did. The ridiculous-ness that is Russia has been wearing off on me. I also bought a Russia football (soccer) scarf that says "We are from Russia." I'm hoping that the militsiya (police) or muggers will be fooled into thinking I'm Russian and leave me alone. We'll see. I've got a good group of friends - other teachers - here but I really need to start hanging out with Russians; particularly the absurdly attractive girl (she's my age so its not anything inappropriate, just to clarify) in one of my classes, which leads me to...

my classes. Teaching has been good, but challenging. In particular, the company I work for is fairly disorganized and I've had new classes dumped in my lap the day before they start; their preferred method is to mention something about "your new classes" offhandedly and walk away. It has been somewhat frustrating, but since there's not much I can do about it, I've decided just to grin and bear it. Again, I think it's symptomatic of the country in general and not just the company. The actual teaching has been good though, although hard. I have a lot kids classes, which are difficult just because they generally come after school and don't want to sit through another hour or hour and a half of class. The adult classes are easier I think, but challenging in ways the kids classes aren't; adults are generally a little more demanding on the teacher than kids, who don't really care if they learn anything or not.

Living in Russia has been interesting, but not as different from living at home as I thought it would be. I think that's because Moscow is sort of like New York City - if you only visit/see New York, you've not really experienced what the rest of America is like. Still, it is different. People in public are definitely more abrupt, you see a lot more drunks, the police (for me) are scarier (in the sense they can give you a lot of problems if they ask you for your documents and decide they need to "fine" you) than in the U.S., and the drivers are insane (crossing the street is a bit stressful). Still, most everyday things, like food and public transport, are cheaper than in the U.S., although its incredibly easy to spend a lot of money in almost no time. I haven't gone out to any real clubs yet - I'd go but a lot of my friends here aren't really into that thing and they're really expensive anyways - and I was supposed to go to a soccer game today, but my friend who I was supposed to go with was too hungover and took a rain check. I'm debating whether to go to the CSKA-Spartak match next week (thus risking getting the hell beaten out of me regardless of which team - its Russia's biggest rivalry and they play in the same stadium - I support) or the Lokomotiv-Dinamo match (marginally less chance of getting beat up, but they're both Moscow teams so it'll still be crazy) but I'm excited about that.

Phew, that's whats been going on with me. I've been trying to update my other blog http://rossiyablog.blogspot.com/ so if you're dying to know what's going on with me, thats prolly a better bet. I also have some pictures up at picasa http://picasaweb.google.com/TEWonder. Anyways, hope all is well with you guys

пока,

Tom

Elizabeth McCarthy and Tom Wonder

what up everyone,

I've been absent in this blog thus far, but have been reading everyone's entertaining entries. Good stuff, lets keep it up. FXCF, after reading your posts, I'm still dumbstuck that you are responsible for the education of 2o something 5th graders. You are a buffoon. In other news, heres a quick update on what I'm up to. I'm living in DC with 3 roommates (one a good friend from ND, one the friend of a good friend at ND (also in DC) who went to Dartmouth, and one a random Craig's list kid from Wash U in St Louis). I really couldn't have asked for a better living situation, as we're all pretty sweet. Going in to a living situation not knowing 2 people is a tenuous situation, but it's more than worked out--it's rocked out (sorry for that). I'm working at a law firm in DC, and after going in to the job mildly interested at the prospect of law school, my interest has since dwindled. They work way too much. The only kind of law I can see myself possibly doing is human rights law, but all things considered its just too panstakingly meticulous a profession. Ivan came up 2 weekends ago for his bday and me, him, Danger Reeves and Mach H all were able to meet up at the Sabarre sanctuary for a good old fashioned big ass food bash. No night would be complete, however, without Aaron randomly showing up with Paolo by his side, and that is just what happened. This week I'm going up to NYC to visit 2 of my roommates from senior year who now live with one of my other best friends from school too. The tentative plan is to watch High School Musical 3 with that dreamy Zac Efron. Before I wrap this up, has anyone heard anything from Liz? like her status of being alive? Liz, if you read this, you should write us when you get the chance (and I understand you may not have had the chance yet). And Tom , whats the haps in Russia? Alright playuhs, im out. latro,

Zach

all right all riiiiiiiight

So a lot has happened from the labor day weekend as far as teaching goes! Well for starters, my school has started this new thing called Benchmarking. Throughout the entire year, a teacher has certain state-wide standards that we have to teach. Beginning each quarter, the kids take a pre-test (which they're supposed to BOMB considering they don't know anything on the test) and then take a post-test, where they're supposed to improve. We have a math benchmark and a writing benchmark test. . .but it gets a little tricky. The thing is our school curriculum has not been universal by any means. . .so essentially there are 8th graders in my school who don't know 3 x 3 off the top of their head. The school expects an 80% increase in grades from pre to post but with that many deficiencies there are obvious huge problems.
. . .So here's where I come in. I suppose it's rough enough to come into the first year of teaching, trying to find your method of doing things. It's incredibly difficult to do it while an administration is attempting to make a school-wide change of implementing and executing instruction, all while more or less grilling us about the scores. I felt in the dumps this past Thursday when I got some scores back and my kids improved by just 10%, where the administration then told me I should use the math textbook program even though they told me not to in the beginning. Haha, it's kind of a mess BUT the bright side is that it can only get better from here and at least next year the administration won't be so confused about what to do. My kids are doing great. . .having a birthday and being a 5th grade teacher is maybe one of the best things ever. I got a MASSIVE smiley face baloon, bags of candy, homemade cards, and 2 kids even brought me empanadas (think of the delicious mexican version of a Hot Pocket) and a giant cheesecake. I gave them practically no homework that day. Thank God the kids are a great group, they really have made this experience worth the hard work and endless amounts of planning. Also, if any of ya'll remember maybe a story you REALLY liked in 5th grade, let me know. . .I'm reading them the BFG right now, they're lovin it.
As for the community I'm living with, things are amazing. I'm really lucky to be in the place where I'm at with the people I'm with. We get along super great (which is good, considering other ACE communities don't always click so well) and we do stuff with each other all the time. I just gotta mention yesterday because I guess it was pretty epic as far as teachers on the weekend.
Basically I got my house on a VIP list for this swanky club called Myst. Two weekends ago, my housemate Pat and I went out to the bars with some of his friends in the area. A friend of one of his friends so happened to be the DJ at said Myst, and Pat and I chatted up a bit. He told us he could get us into the club for free, so I took his number down. . .time went by. . .and Matty Stuntz (I kid you not, that is his name) texted and asked for all the peoples we wanted to bring.
So then this happened. We rolled with 10 people, partied for 3 hours, then went home. It's pretty fun
especially when your housemates literally just fist pump the entire time. The club-goers just kinda stared at us, but we didn't care. . .I guess when you can stand a class of 26 5th graders for 8 hours a day, you start to get pretty tough skin.
Hope all of you are doin well, keep up the updates!

Mi familia

Life and mi familia

So…. I am not so intelligent- After setting up this blog, I’ll managed to lose my gmail account name and password which I set it up under…until a couple of days ago. But, eureka, I figured it out finally… kinda like a pirate finding a buried treasure (I apologize I have been a little obsessed with pirates since coming to Caribbean, haha I even have a skull and cross bone bathing suit). But anyways, now I have been able to read and see how everyone has been doing. It sounds like everyone is managing well, and we are all going through that first fun and ackward stage of getting acquainted with a new place.

So today is just another day in the sweltering heat of the DR (although the mountains are not as bad as Santo Domingo). I am right now watching a cult of aliens in “Hombres en negroes dos” Men in Black 2, with my 11 and 3 year old host nephews, as I wait for my host brother to come home so I can interview him about his business for my project for class. I have to write a business plan paper in Spanish and an Income Statement by the end of this week for one of the companies I interview. This should be interesting, since most of the places I interview don’t really keep any kind of records… and not to mention I am sure things are getting lost in translation (my Spanish is progressing slowly but surely. I think I am passed the early child stage. But I have definitely not matured yet. I think I am in the ackward puberty phase of my Spanish capabilities).

I really like my family here in the Mountains of Juan Lopez. I dance and sing with them all, especially the 3 year olds. I play lots of baseball with the 11 year old. Whenever the volunteers get together to play at the field on the side of our mountain (I’ll need to take pictures of this, like lizmac says, its sure not ugly) kids appear out of thin air in the matter of minutes and soon there are 25 kids playing/ watching. For a place where there is no cell phone reception, word sure gets around here fast!

Also, I really like the daughter-in-law, Jokaira, whose family lives with us right now. If its not raining, I am going to skip class tomorrow, and go to her work, which is in Porta Plata, the big beach town about 2 hours away. Since she works at a resort, she speaks a little bit of English, which comes in handy if I am having communication issues. She is really trendy, cool, and an awesome mom (her kids are so good and not annoying!) So she is sort of my Dominican role model here. I decided I might even change my name once I get to my village and start going by Jokaira. Not just in memory of her but because I have found that NO Dominican can say/ remember my name, I think the double L is tricky or something. But it’s always kind of funny, to watch people struggle at it.

And my neighbors are really fun too! We convinced, Jesse, who is the host sister of one of my best volunteer friends to have a house party 2 nights ago. Now Jesse has a little 3 year old, but she is really crazy and funny! We have dance parties A LOT, where we teach her the Macarena and the running man, and she teaches us to try to shake our hips… (one of my 2 year goals is to be able to shake it like Shakira). Or we will have cooking contests or just mess around. Well anyways, she lives next to me, and we convinced her she should have a party. So I went on a beer run on the back of her husband’s moto, helmet and all! And some how we were able to a fit this huge crate of beer on the motorcycle with us! Then our other friends and volunteers arrived from the top of the mountain with the Dominican rum! We blared the music and my friends host dad whom is 60 came over somewhat drunk and showed us card tricks. Then the Spanish and English music flowed, and we had a good old time talking in Spanglish and learning lots of Spanish slang and bad words. Then me and my friend Justin, pulled out the Soulja Boy Superman dance to show Jesse. Haha my Dona, also around 60, came out too, it was a good old time in the campo!

So yea, my family is basically the bomb, except for one. The other daughter-in-law, whom is my age, doesn’t like me so much. Luckily, she has only come around a few times, but every time I see her, she always has some not-so-nice comment for me. But I think I am going to just kill her with kindness. Today, for instance though, she came over and before even saying hello, she tells me I am gaining weight, but my Dona (host mom) and Jokaira came to my defense real quick. And then I ran about 9 miles, to show her! But, besides that life on the mountain is pretty sweet! I am going on a lot of cool field trips this week, so I will update you guys soon about stuff I am actually doing!

Adios BFFS,
Kels/ Jokaira