I survived week two.....

Well as many of you can see, I haven't blogged in over a week and well I apologize but it has been quite a week. I am going to start from the begining where I left off..which is last Saturday:)..

Saturday

We were pretty excited because we got to sleep in after our crazy first week of school and it felt good:). It took a while for us to get moving because we got distracted watching old music videos online. After we got our butts in gear, Malita invited us to come with her and Charlie to her grandma's house. We of course said yes and all 5 of us piled into a taxi to her granny's house. It was a nice little house where her grandma lives with her 3 sisters. The outside of the house is tourquoise and it looks like it is going to be quite small but you walk in and it actually goes pretty far back. It has a nice little outside area where they have plants and hang laundry. The inside is typical of loving elderly people:). There were definitely two pretty interesting features which included their water purifier and air conditioning unit. Their water purifier is a pretty nifty and inexpensive way to purify their water. It is basically a hollowed out stone that resembles a orange traffic cone tipped upside down but made of stone instead of rubber. They pour water into the stone and about 3 hours later they have a pitcher of purified water. Malita's granny said they bought it 30 some years ago so I am pretty sure they have gotten their money's worth. The water did have a distinct taste, it wasn't bad just different...and we didn't get sick from it so it that 30 yr old stone really does work! Their air conditioning unit consists of a square like container that has hay in it and you pour water into it and through some magic:) it cools the air. Most of the town, including our house and school uses this as a cooling agent. After we chatted for a while, Malita's granny and aunts fed us lunch and it was quite the feast! It was sooo nice and generous of them. We started out with some sort of soup that had a little shark in it. It wasn't too bad...I admit I was a little concerned but you know me and trying new things:). Then there was a second course which consisted of some sort of fried fish, rice and a sweet salad. It all ended up being pretty good and I of course was happy because it ended with nuez ice cream which is basically like butter pecan and it was GOOD!!

When we were finished with lunch, Malita's aunt took us to the market....so all 6 of us piled into her little car and she drove us throught the streets in her stick shift car. It really kind of cracked me up because she is such a crazy driver and she resembles my Grandma in so many ways!! It honestly is soooo strange. She basically is the Mexican version of my grandma...even Breanna agreed. While we were at the market walking the streets, we saw a ton of flower shops which brought me back to the days of Addy's Floral:). The flowers were arranged beautifully and they smelled as good as they looked. We stopped and went into this open air market that was full of anything and everything. Anything from little maracas to special potions/powders to Santos shirts. Santos is the local soccer team and so we thought we should go to the games in support of the team. It was a plus because we got them for a deal but here I thought mine was going to be 8 bucks too but since all the women's shirts were skin tight, I had to settle for men's which was a dollar more...bummer:)

When got back from the market, we took a family trip to Soriana to buy the weekly groceries. We decided to pick up some fried chicken when we were there for some grub. The fried chicken was pretty tasty! Well by the time we got home from store, it was about 8pm and we had to eat and change so we could head to this bar with live music for Gina's birthday. We once again around 9:30 piled into a taxi and tired to find the Cantanita. It was pretty funny because the taxi driver didn't know where it was and we had no idea but we eventually found it! It was a pretty sweet lucha libre themed bar with live music. Most of the teachers here were there and it was fun just hanging out. The live music was for sure a plus. As you can see our Saturday was JAMMED packed! I was exhausted and ready for bed by the time we got home and I slept in and it was great! Sunday was an ok day, basically it was spent grading grading and grading some more papers and doing some work at school.

The rest of the week

My week was pretty crazy. My kids still are having issues with talking when I am talking. Monday was horrible especially with my 4th graders. I was pretty upset with them because of how rude they were. I had a lot of kids in for recess because of this reason. On Tuesday it was one of my last straws. One of my worst kids decided to throw a fit and throw objects at me and throw a tantrum. It was pretty fun;). I ended up giving him detention because of his choices and he was not ok with it. I think it made him more angry but well a note went home and what not. The next day I decided that I was going to have a better attitude and some how try to find a way to reach or relate to this kid. So even though he wasn't acting very well, I designated him my errand runner and permanent board eraser. This somehow made his day and his face just lit up. This really caught be by suprise.. so well we will see if this works. I also had my fourth graders spend some time journaling about how they were going to be a better person in my class. I am also hoping this solves some problems as well. I was very stern when explaining this to them and I mentioned that on Thursday night I would be meeting their parents and they were oddly quiet for the first time since school started. Actually I don't know if they were ever that quiet.

Well Thursday came and it was a LONG day. It started at 7 am and ended about 9pm. I had school all day and then I had a short break and then I had to go back for a 2 hour tutoring session and then I had to quick go home and change so I could go back to school for parents night!!! Parents night was pretty fun. I admit I was a little nervous because many of the parents would ask me things in Spanish. I did have a Spanish translater but she was more nervous than I was and she wasn't there afterwards when parents would talk to me. All round it was a good time. The parents for the most were very warm and welcome. I was greeted with many hugs and kisses haha...The parents were very supportive and they told me that their kids liked me and if there was anything I needed, that I should not hesitate to ask! That was very reassuring and I am hoping by getting to know the parents more will help me in dealing with the kids. One parent raised their hand though and I thought they were going to eat me because of the look on her face. She asked me why I assigned soooo much homework. As soon as she got done saying this, the parents in the room quickly turned around and faced her. It turns out her daughter who doesn't listen, wrote down that I assigned 6 pages of math homework, when in reality, I assigned 1 page and 6 problems that should have taken them no time. It was interesting:)...My second heartfelt moment was before I was about to give my speech, a mom slowly came up to me and quietly said.."I'm Diego's mom and I am ashamed to show my face." He was the boy who threw things at me and who I gave detention to...Well we did have a nice chat and we are going to work together to get this figured out. All in all it was a good night with the parents and I felt good about it. The thing that just cracks me up is that the fourth graders tell their parents that I am great but I feel like all I do is yell and assign journal assignments about good behavior....very strange...very strange...:)

Well that puts us to Friday and we were all pretty stoked for it. It was a tad crazy because it we had mass in the morning which meant my morning group had barely anytime to do anything but it turned out ok and I didn't really have any behavior problems so I guess you could say I had an okay day. Let's hope next week is a ton better!! This weekend, I am looking forward to rest and relaxation!!! and of course grading grading grading and more grading....grading may be the death of me.............:)