Maybe it was the sunshine, maybe it was the good night's sleep, maybe it was the 5:20 a.m. yoga, maybe it was the Universe cutting me some slack, or maybe it was simply the catharsis of a good online vent, but today was...a complete 180. I let so much off of my shoulders in what was meant to be a wry and honest word expulsion of a blog entry. I realised, from the few concerned comments I received, that my sardonicism may not have translated over the internet. My intention wasn't to alarm you or sound in any way sorry for myself. I just felt a need to express the place I was at at the time being. But, like I said, today was a different story. My classes went fairly well (fairly well = great success!) and I had a blast doing some "r" and "l" tongue twisters with my English blocks. One great thing about classes here is that they are so easy to ammuse. They get a kick out of doing stretches at the beginning of classes (I use it to wake them up a bit from sitting all day in hot classes on minimal food and sleep) and anything silly at all. If I laugh, usually they laugh, which is great because it gives me an excuse to laugh at myself a lot. I can be a total arse in front of the classes and am met with laughter instead of rolled eyes and blank expressions. I tried to have a class BINGO game today whereby my learners have to listen to my pronunciation of words and decide if it was an "l" or "r" word (example, pole vs pour)-something they really struggle with here. Halfway through the words I had a learner sheepishly mutter "..bingo..". I was thrilled..until I realised that half of the class supposedly had a bingo, they just forgot to actually mention it. So I had to go through the entire class and check to see whether or not their bingo's were correct. Of the 18 bingo-claimers I had two legitimate bingo's. It was progress.

I have been having some listening problems in my grade 8 classes, so this week I introduced the concept of Learner of the Week to them as an incentive for good behaviour. Every Friday I announce the Learner of the Week for each class-the criteria for this prestigious honour being good classroom behaviour, hard work, improvement or good class work etc..basically anything I want it to be. Along with recognition, the learner receives an authentic Learner of the Week certificate with their name, accomplishments, date and my signature (certificates of any kind are a really big deal here..I don't know..) as well as a couple of sweets and either a fancy-schmancy pencil or bookmark. I noticed improvements in behaviour within a day. They don't know what the accolades entail, so tomorrow should be interesting.

In my 9B class one of my learners gave me her exercise book to read the special message she had written for me. I almost cried reading it. I'm not going to spoil the fun for you, I took a picture of it, so you can read for yourself just how awesome I am.

Today, I am awesome.

Flood update: We're expecting a huge wave from Angola coming in this weekend. Peace Corps have been evacuated north of Oshakati and a helicopter flew overhead today..which threw my class for a tailspin-usually when you hear helicopters and the like up here it's not a positive. Will keep you posted..don't worry; I am fine and I will continue to be fine-I'm worried about the locals and the school children. Check out this link:

http://www.namibian.com.na/news/full-story/archive/2009/march/article/north-put-on-flood-alert/