20.07.2006 or "The Lunchtime Dilema"
Its been hot today, really hot. And I know Enlgand is suffering too but But it doesnt stop me from complaining. I just got back from School and Im sitting here with the fan on full blast, comfortable, but it means all of the sweat is solidifying into a horrible salty wax. I should really take a shower but I need to sit down first, and typing takes no physical effort, so this comes first.
Today was really good fun, I got to see the same class I saw before and generally take a wander round the School and check out my classroom to be. I met with my co teacher and we talked about how were going to go about creating our new class and its schedule. Its scary to think that in just ten days I will be into the fray and all of my planning will need to be actually implemented. I did however pick up some good advice from some of the Teachers already there, some of which will be leaving after tommorrow to make way for a new wave of teachers for the new semester, one of which is me! Ive decided to dedicate all of my time to getting everything perfect for when I start. Monday I am going to the school with my construction head on, things need to be made, signs, charts, calendars and its going to take all of my GCSE art skills to pull it off. I need to physically go there to do this because It will give me access to alot of materials which I physically do not have here at home. Bright, bold and cute are words I will be keeping in mind when contructing the classroom. My co-teacher is has considerably less free time than me at the moment but she expressed a burning desire to help make stuff. We both need to get together to design and clean the classroom for the new term and stick the stuff to the wall but thats probably going to be done on Friday.
I had another terrible sweet bread experience today. I came out of the school to find something to eat when I realised that I dont actually have the skills to choose or buy anything unless it was from a Mc'Donalds or 7/11. I had to go to the latter since the area I was in was surprisingly Mc Donalds free. I looked at the chilled section, realised I neither knew how to read or ask the microwave instructions on the food. I wandered some more, found the crisp section, but unlike in England when you go to buy a packet of Walkers, (Lays over here) they do not sell normal human sized amounts of crisps. They may be the same price, but the bags here are much too big to reasonably eat or carry in a lunchtime scenario, rather they are the size of the big packs of Doritos and Dip type bags. And since I had to go back to school, there was no way I was going to bring a half eaten bag of crisps with me becuase A) I would look like a bit of an idiot B) The last time I put food in my bag, it got infested with ants.
So crisps were out. I finally was left with the dreaded bread section. Now there was alot, but I knew that anything which looked like normal bread was going to be sweet. (It might be because they put milk in it) So what I went for, out of desperation was something which looked like a cheese coated cob. Now cheese, on a cob, cant possibly be all that bad can it? I reasoned that even if the bread was sweet, the cheese would somehow counteract that taste with a bitter/salty possibly even tangy aroma, lessening my trauma. Well my reasoning was wrong everyone, and once again I got burned at my hungriest and shakiest low. I bit into the cob and was greeted by a thick caustic, sticky layer of what must have been sugar added to fat, mixed in with flour and custard. I recoiled in pure undiluted frustration, stood up threw the cob into the bin and vowed never to eat another piece of bread in this country ever again. Cheese cob my ass!
But I still needed to eat, I couldnt finish the day in the state I was in, kids need you to be energetic and I was running on nothing but filter coffee. I hit the instant noodle section and found the instant version of the uber ramen which I showed you all a while back. By this point the check out assitant was getting a little sick of hearing the trademark "Bing Bong" of the 7/11 doors and having to say welcome to me everytime. Nevertheless, I cracked open the ramen, added the five or so packets of stuff which need to go in it and filled it up with hot water. What I realised qute quickly when I sat outside on the bench with my free chopsticks and spoon was that the water, although hot, was not hot enough to adequately heat up the ramen to the point of being soft. So to wrap up all this ridiculous rant I found my self in the boiling hot sun, on a bench crunching down solid noodles and slightly warm soup and feeling genuinely sorry for myself.
The moral of this story, if you are going to go to a country for an exended period of time, make sure you know enough of the language to order whatever you want to eat. Otherwise you will just end up like me, having to forfeit all the great food the country has to offer and have to settle food which people who dont have communication skills are forced to eat. I am so at the mercy of other people at the moment to commucate for me and sometimes that is a hard fact to swallow. I have to learn chinese, and fast, otherwise all joking aside, I might actually go a bit nuts.
Signing of for today, yours truly,
Aaron
Today was really good fun, I got to see the same class I saw before and generally take a wander round the School and check out my classroom to be. I met with my co teacher and we talked about how were going to go about creating our new class and its schedule. Its scary to think that in just ten days I will be into the fray and all of my planning will need to be actually implemented. I did however pick up some good advice from some of the Teachers already there, some of which will be leaving after tommorrow to make way for a new wave of teachers for the new semester, one of which is me! Ive decided to dedicate all of my time to getting everything perfect for when I start. Monday I am going to the school with my construction head on, things need to be made, signs, charts, calendars and its going to take all of my GCSE art skills to pull it off. I need to physically go there to do this because It will give me access to alot of materials which I physically do not have here at home. Bright, bold and cute are words I will be keeping in mind when contructing the classroom. My co-teacher is has considerably less free time than me at the moment but she expressed a burning desire to help make stuff. We both need to get together to design and clean the classroom for the new term and stick the stuff to the wall but thats probably going to be done on Friday.
I had another terrible sweet bread experience today. I came out of the school to find something to eat when I realised that I dont actually have the skills to choose or buy anything unless it was from a Mc'Donalds or 7/11. I had to go to the latter since the area I was in was surprisingly Mc Donalds free. I looked at the chilled section, realised I neither knew how to read or ask the microwave instructions on the food. I wandered some more, found the crisp section, but unlike in England when you go to buy a packet of Walkers, (Lays over here) they do not sell normal human sized amounts of crisps. They may be the same price, but the bags here are much too big to reasonably eat or carry in a lunchtime scenario, rather they are the size of the big packs of Doritos and Dip type bags. And since I had to go back to school, there was no way I was going to bring a half eaten bag of crisps with me becuase A) I would look like a bit of an idiot B) The last time I put food in my bag, it got infested with ants.
So crisps were out. I finally was left with the dreaded bread section. Now there was alot, but I knew that anything which looked like normal bread was going to be sweet. (It might be because they put milk in it) So what I went for, out of desperation was something which looked like a cheese coated cob. Now cheese, on a cob, cant possibly be all that bad can it? I reasoned that even if the bread was sweet, the cheese would somehow counteract that taste with a bitter/salty possibly even tangy aroma, lessening my trauma. Well my reasoning was wrong everyone, and once again I got burned at my hungriest and shakiest low. I bit into the cob and was greeted by a thick caustic, sticky layer of what must have been sugar added to fat, mixed in with flour and custard. I recoiled in pure undiluted frustration, stood up threw the cob into the bin and vowed never to eat another piece of bread in this country ever again. Cheese cob my ass!
But I still needed to eat, I couldnt finish the day in the state I was in, kids need you to be energetic and I was running on nothing but filter coffee. I hit the instant noodle section and found the instant version of the uber ramen which I showed you all a while back. By this point the check out assitant was getting a little sick of hearing the trademark "Bing Bong" of the 7/11 doors and having to say welcome to me everytime. Nevertheless, I cracked open the ramen, added the five or so packets of stuff which need to go in it and filled it up with hot water. What I realised qute quickly when I sat outside on the bench with my free chopsticks and spoon was that the water, although hot, was not hot enough to adequately heat up the ramen to the point of being soft. So to wrap up all this ridiculous rant I found my self in the boiling hot sun, on a bench crunching down solid noodles and slightly warm soup and feeling genuinely sorry for myself.
The moral of this story, if you are going to go to a country for an exended period of time, make sure you know enough of the language to order whatever you want to eat. Otherwise you will just end up like me, having to forfeit all the great food the country has to offer and have to settle food which people who dont have communication skills are forced to eat. I am so at the mercy of other people at the moment to commucate for me and sometimes that is a hard fact to swallow. I have to learn chinese, and fast, otherwise all joking aside, I might actually go a bit nuts.
Signing of for today, yours truly,
Aaron
posted by Aaron | 2:48 AM
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