Hello!

Things are getting better, my class is coming around under my iron fist and after a few days of being really evil and dishing out detentions to the whole class, they’re finally learning to behave themselves.

Well, except these four boys today of course….

I was teaching maths (I know, me, teaching maths!), and while we were learning about sequencing and how to EXPLAIN our answers (the kids have serious problems with that part), I noticed these four boys with the most unbelievably guilty expressions, and their hands were all hidden under the table. So, of course I asked them what they thought they were doing and told them to put their hands on the desk.

They had, of course, been trying to superglue their fingers together “to see if it worked”.

The sheer stupidity of eight year old boys astounds me sometimes!

Luckily for them, it turned out not to be real superglue, just some crap budget knock-off superglue, so it did wash off, (thank god), but honestly!

I had to write in the detention book the reason for detention, and I felt so silly writing “trying to superglue themselves together during maths”. I wish I could have just written “mind-boggling stupidity” in instead!!

Ah well, I have no doubt that the boys in my class will keep me amused with endlessly stupid antics to fill my emails with over the next year!

In fact, another hilarious anecdote springs to mind!

I was collecting in homework the other day, and this kid comes up and tells me he didn’t do his. I asked him why not, and he says, with a dead straight face, “Miss, my maid took too long doing my sister’s homework so she didn’t have time to do mine.”

I almost pissed myself laughing, and then realised he was serious!

I had to explain very carefully that whatever else the maids are for in their house, doing homework is not one of them!!

Sadly, that’s a bit of a problem over here, as the Kuwaiti’s are all just rolling in money, (and drowning in oil – they literally can’t pump it fast enough!! And they’ve just discovered gas as well!), and their maids do everything for them. The parents have very little involvement in the raising of their kids, but sadly the maids have no power to discipline the children, and the parents most often treat the “help” like dirt, mostly because they’re Filipino, or Tibetan or Nepali. Unfortunately the kids watch the way their parents treat the maids, and follow suit, ordering them about like slaves, and this tends to follow them into the classroom. Most of the kids see us teachers as just someone else being paid to look after them (which is exactly what we are to the parents anyway), and so treat us with about as much respect as the maids!!

I’ve had a hard time adjusting to the rudeness of some of these kids, and am setting about teaching them how to respect their teacher properly!

It’s gonna be tough, but I’ll get there!!

Everything else is going fine too, I went to a Bulgarian dinner in honour of spring, and met a really hot guy called Chris who asked me out. The next day we went to the art gallery, where his sister had an exhibition on. I was a bit intimidated about meeting his sister on a first date, but then it got worse when we got there and I realised his mum and dad were there too!!!

His sister and mum were lovely, (I didn’t really talk to his dad a lot), but his mum was a bit much. I kept explaining that we had just met the night before, and she’s nodding and smiling with this horrible glazed look, and I could literally SEE her planning the wedding and buying clothes for her grandkids!!!

Then she gave me her home number, and mobile, and work number, pager, and fax number “just in case” I should want to call her for any reason!

Of course I wouldn’t let a psychotic family put me off, except we got back to his place, and he got all nervous and hyperactive, bouncing around the house, completely unable to sit still at all, and then started making a lot of quite racist comments about Arabs and things.

So, yet again a seemingly normal guy turns out to be a complete weirdo on yet another unbelievably uncomfortable date!!

I think I’m going to need a full psychiatric assessment from prospective candidates before agreeing to any more dates!!

Anyhoo, after only three weeks at work, we’ve got our spring break coming up at the end of this week, so I shall be jetting off to Sri Lanka with Betty and Bryn for a week of beaches, booze and baby elephants!! It’s a hard life eh?

laters

love superglue super-maya

xxx