NEW POST

I can't believe how quickly these last 4 months have gone - I've been a terrible blogger! I have to go and plan some lessons in a minute so unfortunately my long overdue post is going to be relatively short! Sorry!
The last time I blogged I hadn't even started teaching yet so I'll start by saying I am a teacher now! I started around the same sort of time as my last post - a few days later maybe? Anyway, first Claire and I moved over to our permanent room which is at the hotel school in the teachers' and students' boarding section - our room's basic but really large and we have a kitchen too where we store our vast supplies of watermelon, mangoes, dragonfruit and 'weetbix' (australian - crazy.) and UHT milk! All in all we are extremely lucky with our accommodation!
The hotel school is literally 2 minutes away from the technical school where I teach English Conversation to 3 groups of 10 in the Social Communication section, 2 groups of 30 in the Secretarial section and 12 groups of 30 in the Mechanics/ Electrical/ Automotive section. I love my students - from the first day they were all so friendly and smiley, all shouting out 'GOOD MORNING 'CHER!', "HOW ARE YOU 'CHER?", "HAVE YOU ATE RICE YET 'CHER?" whenever Claire or I walk past, which hasn't stopped this entire time. The main difficulty has been organising myself enough with all my different classes because their English levels are completely varied, even within classes. I have to make sure I don't get the lessons I'm teaching to my 12 groups of M/ E/ A mixed up. Their lessons tend to be the same but because there are so many public holidays in Cambodia (which I am, by no means, complaining about!) sometimes some classes get missed and so I might not have that class again for another 4 weeks, by which point I've moved on with the other classes. I've been keeping a work diary though which has been the most important thing at reminding me what I've taught from one week to the next, so I don't end up repeating myself!
I am getting bitten alive by mosquitoes here in the hotel reception area so I am going to have to be quick. I'll upload some photos soon of my students and of Sihanoukville!
Teaching has been a challenge but I'm starting to enjoy it and most of my students are so keen (although some not so. Disciplining has been hard, especially considering I'm younger than most of them, but also reasonably successful so far!). Students have invited me and Claire over to meet their families and see how they live which has been so nice - they are all so welcoming and bring out trays of sour mango and chilli for us, along with some interesting Khmer desserts, as soon as we arrive! I've been playing basketball with the students in the technical school aswell which has been fun - particularly as sports day is coming up soon and I'm part of the red team supposedly .. ?
At the beginning of December both schools travelled up to Phnom Penh for the arrival of Don Bosco's real life right arm bones embedded in a spooky wax figure of the saint in a white casket. It was a HUGE celebration, with all the Don Bosco schools in Cambodia coming up to see the relic, surrounded by banners and flashing lights. I can't think of a word that does the surreality of that situation any justice, so I'll just leave it as it is.
Claire and I vistited Kep during the water festival and ate loads of the famous crab with young Kampot pepper which was so delicious! We only stayed there for a couple of days in a french run guesthouse teeming with loud German toddlers, but it was really beautiful and we took a boat across to Rabbit Island, getting lost in the jungle and mangroves as we worked our way around it - luckily we made it out, although a little scratched and extremely sunburnt in my oh so ginger case ..
For christmas I was able to have fun with my students, making christmas cards and learning christmas carols and then, on the 18th December, Claire and I met up with the other volunteers in Phnom Penh. The next day 4 of us headed off on what was to be the longest bus journey of our lives to Bangkok. 16 hours.We spent 4 nights in Bangkok, eating so much thai food and so many mango shakes. There are stalls in massive rows all next to each other so it's just too tempting to eat some roast chicken and sweet chilli dip here, springs rolls there, pad thai, crepes for pudding, mango shake to wash it down .. oh dear.
Our next destination was Phi Phi Island; literally paradise. No roads, so walking, cycling or long boating were our only options. The whitest sand, clear blue waters surrounded by mountains and far off islands - it was incredible. We spent christmas day snorkeling around Phi Phi and then in the evening went out to the beach bars which are so full of life with Thai fire dancers and fireworks going off down the beach! We didn't want to leave and ended up staying an extra 2 days than we had intended before heading over the land mass to Koh Samui. This meant another LONG bus ride and then an incredibly packed boat, full of people trying to get over to Koh Phangan for New Years - which was what we were planning to do too! We stayed in some beautiful beach huts on Koh Samui and headed over to Koh Phangan on the evening of the 31st. Due to mass overbooking, we were stuck at a strange 'we're not on phangan yet' beach party while we waited for our speedboat to drop another lot off and take us over! We were meant to leave at 9 and so by 11.30 we were getting anxious about missing New Years so we managed to sneak onto the next boat and ended up counting down in the middle of the ocean, on a recklessly fast speedboat, with fireworks going off infront and behind us on both Phangan and Samui! It was such an amazing view that we didn't really mind about missing the countdown and we soon arrived at Koh Phangan where we bought our entry wrist bands and headed to the beach parties!
We arrived back at work last week so now back to normality! It was so nice getting back and the students being so happy to see us again - a round of applause as I entered one classroom, extremely good for the self-esteem!
So all is well here. I'm sorry there isn't loads of detail in this blog but I shall hopefully update again soon with some photos which will show better than I can my time here and in Thailand (photos only from a few weeks ago I'm afraid because finally bought a new camera in Bangkok!). I'd say I'll try to update more regularly but I only seemed to jinx it last time so goodbye for now, hopefully upate again soon!
Lots and lots and lots of love,
Niabh