john denver makes it big in jhubei

1. today is an awesome day. =) its actually a bearable heat outside...of course that still means its 30 degrees... but i can breathe today.

2. taught my very first movie review class today. its so strange...i taught for the same amount of time that i used to in the states, but the day seems sooooooo much quicker! maybe its because i start at 2...but the day seems to fly by! i have my first private lesson tonight @8. i really love the classes that i teach. the students are sooooo cute!!! the ones in the kindergarten can't speak any english so thats a challenge, especially when the one thing i really need them to understand is "SIT DOWNNNNNNNNN!" and they can't =) but the phonics class (my favorite-who knew. a class full of 8 year olds!!!!) is coming along nicely. today i taught Ss, Tt, and Uu. we chanted those sounds for 90 minutes and played game after game after game. its so funny...i acutally genuinely enjoy teaching little kids. again, its night and day compared to teaching american high school, but its loads of fun really. they are just the cutest kids ever and it makes my day to hear "teeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeecha!" when i walk into the room. the kids in my movie review class (we are studying night at the museum) are really advanced and speak brilliant english. that is the closest i have to the kind of teaching i did in america, so i like it. they are hilarious too, and they think its fascinating that im from america (which i still find amusing =) basically, i love this job! i really love the people i work with as well...today during our little break, the school manager's wife gave me a lesson on how people in taiwan use abbreviations online. it was so funny! couldn't have asked for a better place to work =) but i do hope they hire another teacher soon.

3. people still stare at me.

4. today i went to a dumpling stand to have supper and tried to order in chinese, but i couldn't. i ended up switching to english and the girl looked so scared. she had to call another girl over who spoke english to figure out what i wanted. i looked at the scared girl and apologised in chinese, and she smiled and said "its ok!" in english. ooooh my chinese. my lack of chineseeeee! if i could just speak chinese..........it would be a miracle. a miracle.

5. i have been in taiwan for 2 weeks today. that is totally hard to believe. only 52 more weeks to spend in taiwan... =(

6. my house is a wreck. when i have no japanese roommate or angry american mother to tell me when to clean, i am at a loss! it would also be pretty good if i could figure out how to take out the trash. if i could only catch the "ice cream truck" when it comes!

7. today i saw one of my students on the playground across from my house. i was walking down the street when suddenly i heard "TEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECHA!" i looked up and he was in rollerblades flying across the basketball court to come tell me hey. see why i love this job?

8. today i heard someone playing a john denver record while i was walking down the street. i have to say that is one of the most random things ive heard in taiwan. i didnt know asians liked john denver?

9. i think its really funny how couples dress alike here. today i saw 4 different couples dressed in matching outfits, the funniest of which was these tshirts with big angry faces on them that say "cheer you up." random. i also just love looking at the english on people's clothes that makes NO SENSE. so far i have seen one that says "jesus is the diamond i wash my face with," one with 2 paddington bears that said "pineapples," and one that just had a bunch of words put together: i remember "butterfly," and "you can be a 100 woman." it cracks me up. my favorite thing of all though are the medical masks that everyone wears.

10. find this on youtube. best.song.ever : 陳乃榮-不再MV 完整版