Days 5 & 6: I'm a Teacher!

Well, it’s my second day of going to school and I’m exhausted, but let me recap the last two days before I go take the nap of the century.

Yesterday, around 5:50 am our time, I woke up and looked at my watch, and tried to go back to sleep… that happened approximately every 2 minutes for the next hour, so I got up and chatted with Marci for a little while, and took a shower and got ready for school. I couldn’t sleep cause it was the first day I was going to meet everyone, and I was nervous about taking the bus and all these new things. Anyway, Irina was worried I wasn’t going to make it to the bus on time, so she quickly gave me a TON of food, and tried to get me to call a cab, but I wanted to take the bus so she sent me off (“You must be running, running, ya?) and I made it to the bus on time. I lost one of my ear bud covers though, so I couldn’t use them, so I only had one earphone, and because it was so humid and sticky outside, I was super uncomfortable so I just decided to leave it off. Everyone on the bus was glaring, so that was also uncomfortable, and it’s part of the culture, but it’s one part I don’t totally love. Anyway, I got to my stop on my first bus and waited for the second bus, but realized while I was waiting I didn’t remember the name of my next stop. The bus finally came, but there aren’t any maps that I could see on the bus, so I just played it safe, and got off at the station that was 2 blocks from my school that I knew was close. I walked to school from there, and got there just in time. I met most of the other teachers and got some pastry and went to my meetings for the day.

Because it was so hot and humid, and I hadn’t slept well that night, I was having a hard time not following asleep, but I shook it after a while, and made it through the rest of the day. However, we also had a dinner we were required to go to, and at that point, I was both exhausted and not feeling well, so I really wanted to bail. I was really nauseous at dinner but a little better after I had some rice and this mild chicken dish (we went to an Indian restaurant, and the smell of curry was not helping me feel any better, but the one mild chicken dish was good) which was good, because I had to go after this dinner and meet Lloyd to have dinner with Tonu and his wife, Ingrid. Since I hadn’t been given a schedule of the day, I didn’t know we had this required dinner, but I went and had water with them anyway (still no drinking at all for me, no thanks to the other night). We had quite a fun time with them… Tonu and Ingrid were fantastic, and I loved hanging out with them. We walked around after dinner because Tonu wanted some other drinks, so we went to this super duper VIP club that you have to swipe a card to get into… it looks super shabby on the outside, but once you get upstairs, it’s really cool, so that was fun. We were tots VIP. I had really yummy Russian minced meat dumpling things with sour cream and green onions… quite tasty. We tried to go to Angel (the local gay bar that Dennis loved, where Stephen picked up two boys, and Eric…. Well I love you..) because they have the best margaritas in town, according to Tonu, but they were closed so we went into Déjà vu instead, to which Lloyd walked in, looking around confused saying, “I think I’ve been here before…” I thought he was kidding, but he was out of it enough to not even get the fact that he’d made a funny joke lol. Anyway, we finally got home, and I’m hoping to see Ingrid and Tonu again soon.

Unfortunately, my body is still adjusting to the time change, and I was no longer sleepy when I was home. In fact, I was wide awake. I got to talk to my parents and Clara for a while on Skype, which was nice to finally get to talk to them. I talked to Eric for a few minutes too, and tried to fall asleep but didn’t get to until like 2 am. Thankfully, today was okay waking up. Same routine this morning…shower etc., massive feeding before I left, and got to the bus earlier today. When I got to the bus stop, I FOUND MY OTHER EARBUD COVER! YAY. So I finally could listen to my iPod on my way to work. I took Our Lady of Monsters to school with me this morning on my iPod which I’m glad I got to listen to because there is like absolutely no Lady GaGa here, which infuriates me. A lot of people don’t know who she even is!!!!!!! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!

Anyway, so I got to my second bus stop and got off, and instead of waiting for 15 minutes for my next bus, one came right after that because my first bus was early, so I ended up getting to school 15 minutes early too so it was nice to just chill for a few minutes before getting into the swing of things. My big excitement today was getting a new email address and a staff account for the school!!! If you need me, you can feel free to contact me at virginiah@ise.edu.ee.  I also got to utilize my skills in team building, by suggesting a bunch of great ideas for the retreat I’m going on on Monday and Tuesday!! We’re going away with the 6-12th graders for an overnight retreat to bond with the kids and the Upper School principal didn’t have many ideas for team building activities, but since my mom is my mom, I know approximately five thousand jillion billion, so I will be leading most of those. Look where we're going!  http://www.lainela.ee/index.php?page=129
 I’m also looking at perhaps coaching basketball after school, as they’re currently looking for a basketball coach, and they told me that I should stay active after school, so perhaps I’ll get into that too.

It’s been a long day, and I’m exhausted, so I’m just vegging out and watching tv and going to bed early hopefully.

Love you all. Thanks for keeping up with me!!

Maintain,
Virginia