Autumn Events in Vientiane

The boat racing festival, following the end of buddhist lent - 28th of October. A famous Lao event. The level of the Mekong was exceptionnaly low though given that we were at the end of the rainy season. The location of the race had to be moved up on the Mekong river, not downtown anymore. It was nice to watch. But the commercial fair that took place in the center of town was just a busy, noisy hustle and bustle!

Halloween, something  celebrated in our bi cultural English-Lao school. Kids love it. I dressed up as a wicked witch and the kids wore their nicest Halloween outfit. Check us out !

That Luang festival, a buddhist festival - the 24th of November, actually the biggest donation day of the year. Lao people wear their nicest outfit and monks gather from all over the country to get offerings that range from banknotes, fruit  juice, candies, soap, food cans, anything that you can store...

Here are a few pictures that give you glimpse of what it 's like.

My New Friend

Sorry guys, I haven't met George Clooney yet!
Let me introduce you to my new friend : Kittycat!
She was one of those stray cats that I fed, but this one was not wild, loved to be pet and became my friend. Ultimately she didn't let the other cats approach her new territory.

And one day I noticed she had a big wound under her tail, probably a dog's bite, a wide and deep cut, pretty bad! I was worried and took her to the vet. Since they had to put her to sleep to make stitches to the tail, they also fixed her hernia (she had a big lump on the abdomen) and spayed her (they removed the uterus and ovaries). In the end that is what she looked like after all that surgery, and I felt like the worst torturer to this little cutie. She had to be taken care of so I de facto adopted her !

Unidentified flying objects...

I feel sometimes that my house has somewhat something in common with a remake of Jurassic park.  I came across two small white eggs nestled in the middle of the cushions of my sofa yesterday.  After looking it up on the internet it seems that those are lizard eggs! How nice!

Furthermore I discovered sort of an oil spill at the feet of my dining table last week-end! Please check this out - see the pictures below. After cleaning it up I assumed it was the shit of an unknown animal certainly coming from the beam running across the middle of my ceiling. My greatest nightmare would be that I be the next target of this unidentified animal shit tossing during my sleep!

Last but not least, I was bitten by an army of ants hidden in my towel last morning after having taken a shower. I washed the towel twice after that, and still found living ants left in the towel...Isn't this freakish!

Actually my worst nightmare would be to come across a giant spider crawling on the wall behind my bed. This I haven't seen so far. I cross my fingers.

 

Hey hey, those are the little drawbacks of living in a tropical country ;-).

 

The Lao National Teachers'day. 10/07/2015

Did you know teachers had their "Christmas day" in Laos? I didn't! 

The 7th of October is actually the National Teachers' day in Laos. What does this entail? First of all it's like a holiday, that is to say the teachers have a day off. The day before, there is a short ceremony in the morning at school where students read a poem to the teachers, then give them flowers.  And on top of that, students give gifts to their teachers. That's how I was unexpectedly covered with gifts this very morning by my students. How cute !!! They were so excited to see me unwrap the nice packages. I was spoiled. I really have to tell you what I got because it is worth telling. A Prévert list :

- washing powder.
- tooth paste and soaps
- crackers for appetizers
- a box of kit kat bars
- 3 sets of glasses
- a hair clip covered with diamonds an pearls
- a set of goodies (drinks, cookies)
 -2 sets of bird saliva drinks (drinks made of solidified bird saliva used to build birds'nests, particularly prized due to their rarity, supposedly high nutritional value and exquisite flavor. I haven't tried yet, might be a little reluctant though)
- a piece of silk fabric
- two very good quality fake leather bags (brand name : Marie-Claire!)
- a selfie stick
- a 1000 bath bill (30 euros, a fortune overhere).

Cynical minds would say it is the National Teachers' Bribery day! Don't listen to them.



Teachers'day ceremony



Christmas for Teachers



Teng & Kobey

The National Teachers'day! Isnt' that something to emulate in France? It would cheer up our French teachers!

My Honeymoon is over !

After one week of teaching, I have the feeling my honeymoon is over :-(

I realised that I had to handle two levels of students, the ones who can read simple things, and the ones who barely know the alphabet and of course can't read at all. This means that when I gave a task, the formers were finished right away while the latters had not understood yet what they were supposed to do ! This means the formers had nothing to do but fool around while I was striving to have the latters begin the task... At this very moment I had a glimpse of what could be the feeling of the sometimes "exhausted, worne out, overwhelmed" community of teachers!

Furthermore, after a while the kids especially the boys feel more comfortable and test your boundaries ! Yes just as the kids do in our Western countries. So I had to take action and gave three warnings in a row (unhappy smileys) to be displayed on the behaviour chart of the class which had its little effect. I also needed to be much more stuctured in my lesson plans and activities, otherwise  the kids behave just like a leaking ship, they start to feel free and mess around. This was an exhausting week but I felt much better at the end of it, could handle better the activities and had the kids work in two differents groups for certain tasks.

The little Cookie who knew the alphabet but was unable to read a word last week was enjoying reading simple sentences after two weeks which was really nice to see.

Conversely I don't hold much hope concerning the little Ami who doesn't know the alphabet AT ALL and is the only one who NEVER listens, always doing something else. I just can't figure out how to manage her!

My little Japanese boy, Seiji, is my Benchmark since he doesn't speak Lao nor English I monitor him quite closely, if he understands what's going on, the others should also understand!

Well I'm getting there slowly but surely. And I can still say that my students are my little cuties!

My FEP2 class

My FEP2 class with Lao assistant Vickham.

Daily morning exercise at Oscar.

My Lao English class !

What a treat !

The beginning of school was last monday for the students, so I eventually got to know who were going to be my new students. I have a class of 13 kids from 8 to 10 years old. And believe me the Lao kids are so so cute !!! Boys are so lively and enthusiastic and inquisitive when the girls are so shy and introverted. I guess this is a cultural feature. I also have three foreign students, a girl from Vietnam, a boy from Japan, very shy and lost (does not speak Lao) and a little Chinese kid, very ugly, fat, and mean on top of that ! However those kids are such a treat !

My heart was already broken after three days of school. One kid was withdrawn from my class to be sent to the "normal English curriculum" class because his level of English was too high ! He was such a nice smart and lively kid, I was so sad to see him leave! But in the end it's better because he was so far ahead of the others and was thus overshadowing his classmates. The class is more well balanced now. However I have my burden too! A little girl Ami, she does not know the Roman alphabet, she is as slow as a slug, has the attention span of a gold fish and is only interested in drawing princess gowns and crowns !

Of course my concern is to be able to cater to their different needs given that I have different levels to deal with - some can read a litlle bit some others don't even know the Roman alphabet- , and that they don't get bored and have fun while learning.

This is an auspicious start however. I'm so happy to deal with those kids eventhough I have to sometimes raise my voice (but they are so responsive) !

Hereafter a picture of my class the 1st day. One kid (with hat) has left (as said) and three others showed up in the meantime. The young man, Vickham,  is my very nice Lao teacher (assistant).  I'll post an updated picture soon...

A little taste of paradise! August 2015 in Vientiane.

I can't help sending you a few pictures of my garden that is so lovely, a little green paradise!

I have overcome my first apprehensions of the place - I mean the surroundings of my house- I was fearing all sorts of animals, insects, spiders or snakes, and have ultimately concluded they were not that harmful nor ferocious, that micro ants in my cereals were edible, a lezard in my refrigerator had lost its way, and a moth in my shower was just as scared as I was before ! There was a snake yesterday on the cimented path going to the back of my house. The wild black cat, wandering around the house, was staring at him with mewlings of distress, the snake rose his head, threatening the cat, eventually the snake turned back and slithered away... Thank you black cat for taking car of my yard. Now, I feed him!

The beginning of class for teachers was 2 weeks ago. We are a team of 34 teachers, half Lao, half foreigners - another French girl, 2 girls from Switzeland, one from Holland, the others are from England, South Africa, the US and Australia. Nice people overall, nice boss, rather helpful. We've done preparation work for two weeks, classroom decoration,  lesson plans. All this takes actually a lot of time. The beginning of class for the kids is next monday. Can't wait to see the kids. Mine will be 8 to 9 years old with very little English exposure. I also have a little apprehension of course. This will be the next chapter...
 

Sabaïdi from Laos

Some of you might still be wondering what TEA PROJECT stands for ? Well this is the motto that has followed me since I had this Epiphany (precedent post) in March 2014. It simply means "Teaching English in Asia Project". And here I am !

My first English class was at Wat Hai Sok, a buddhist temple quite close to my hotel. My first students were novice monks age 12 to 25. They have barely been exposed to English before, mainly beginners. A couple of them went to college and learnt English there, they help me with clarifications in Lao. They are very nice, quiet and a little shy. You will see them in the pictures below. No there are not detainees from Guantanamo prison with their orange outfit. Believe me each of them has a lovely smile.

Vientiane is the capital of Laos, a country of barely 7 million people. The city has grown a lot for the last twenty years. It was a town of around 200 000 people in 1995 that grew up to 800 000 these days. Be that as it may, I find it still has the charm of a little town, no skyscapers around, low buildings, a lot of temples scattered here and there along with French cafes and all types of quaint restaurants, and eventhough it's not crowded with bicycles any more but with traffic jams (at peak times) full of big Japanese and Korean cars as you can see in the pictures hereafter, it's definitely not the hustle and bustle of most of Asian capitals around. It certainly has the atmosphere of a spread out village.




Downtown mainstreet

Downtown street

One of my daily canteen

My first English class : the novice monks of Wat Hai Sok

My first English class : The novice monks of Wat Hai Sok

Wat Inpeng



The Lao Champs Elysees, the presidential palace at one end



The Lao Champs Elysees, The Patuxai "Lao Triumph Arch" at the other end.




Entrance of Wat Inpeng

My new home, Sweet home - Chapter 2 - July 2015

Here is my new home. Could be really sweet, were it not so hot, with an undersized aircon, and no insulation whatsoever. I've been on the verge of fainting the second day following my moving in! It definitely should be upgraded. It is on its way because my landlady is very nice and comprehensive... Patience. One day at a time!

My house is a one room house, with a separate kitchen - an oven at day time -and a bathroom - a hammam as well as a sieve when it's raining. Apart from those details, the house is lovely and its green environment charming.

 

The village I live in, 10 mns from the center of town is called Sok Paluang - Vientiane is made of the gathering of different villages -.  I have this strange feeling to be back in the village of my childhood - sort of - riding my bicyle along the 200 meter dirt road, hearing the sounds of nature at night, frogs croaking, birds screeching (definitely not chirping!), roosters crowing - those stupid animals always crow before the sun rise, right in the middle of the night-. They are so loud, believe me. And in the morning I can see hens and roosters running across my garden!

 

My new house

The terrace

View of my garden

 

My little "oven" kitchen

The One room with its sleeping, living, and dining space.

My New Home, Sweet Home! 09/27/2014

As some of you suggested I will write in English from now on because I need to practice, and morever after what you are going to read next!

Please, my English native friends or English expert friends, forgive my mistakes and be indulgent with me (you have the right and the duty to correct me).

So let's go back to the SF story:

in French we say: quand les oiseaux chantent, après ils déchantent - after the birds have sung,  they stop singing ! that's what I am going through!

Guess what: my hostess I just met an hour ago is just a young Eastern witch, with a strong sort of Russian accent, she is from Moldavia. She opened the door without a look at me. The two young daughters of her companion are staying with her (10 and 12 years old) because, guess what: the companion is a nurse in a psychiatric hospital 3 hours from SF so he is away 4 days a week. The poor little girls have nothing to do except stay in their bedroom to watch TV on a giant screen in front of their bed. We are in a supposed lovely house with a lovely garden in the near suburb of SF and guess what: they never eat outside because it is too cold! (I just got a sunburn today walking along the street). There is a supposed living room in the house and guess what: there is no couch, sofa or even chairs to sit on! Only a closed piano and a cupboard, with a view of the neighbours'wall, which anyway we do not see because the blinds are lowered and closed. I wanted to have a cigarette in the garden to relax and guess what: it is strictly forbidden to smoke even in the garden because it is not good for the children! So I go back to my room ( because I am not invited to have a drink in the living room which does not exist, and furthermore she seems to be disapointed that I have nothing planned tonight!) and try to get connected to REAL persons! So I ask for the wifi code and guess what : she won't give it to me because you never know what I could do with it, so she told me she would type it herself in my computer. So I wait for her in my room so that she can type the code herself... and guess what: she never came, because she was waiting for me to bring my computer to her!  I think we are going to be very good friend.

The good news is that she hosts two other sudents, and guess what: they are away for the week-end (which I now completely understand).

 

I have to tell you about my house: very neat and clean, in a street that could be compared to Wisteria lane, the famous desperate houswifes' street (a famousTv show for those who might not know).

My wonderful Moldavian Cristina is about 30, tall, thin, blue eyes, long blond air, but she looks like a grey spider.

She prepared diner for the 4 of us last night. It was not the gin & tonic welcome diner party I had expected but well! We had a very good plate of nice vegies+ rice + chinese dish. But no drinks at all (no glasses on the table) and no desert (a fruit would have been welcome).  It was ready at 8. We were finished at 8:15! Because I tried to chat with the two adorable little girls.

After that, I asked if there might be a family television I could watch, to make up for the Russian accent and the lack of English listening. But no, there is none, the only TV is in the girls' bedroom. And there is no living room as I said previously, only a passing room. But I can Watch TV on my computer. Of course!

After that I was given the rules: I shall not go back home after 10 pm at night during the week, because it wakes up the girls (of course, they live in the former living room separated to the corridor by a wood panel!).

And the best of all, I want you to open wide your ears because I am sure you have never lived such a welcoming attitude:

I asked If I could make a cup of tea, anytime. I was told that students are not allowed to use the kitchen utensils, nor are they to open the fridge. So if I want a cup of tea, I should go to the mall (a 15 mns walk) or to the gaz station which is closer!!!

At that point, I fell down and burst into tears... No , I just said "ok I understand ". Period.

 

So this is the bright golden jail I live in! This is not a nightmare, This is my real life!

Well, as you can see I do not know how long I will be able to bear this situation!

I wish you all a wonderfull sunny sunday, mine might be a long long one!

The transformational experience of being taught how to teach

I have done my teacher training and got what I’ve come here to get: the CELTA CERTIFICATE!  Four weeks of intense training. It was such an empowering experience.

We were three in my class (!), Cat, a 28 year old woman from Idaho who already taught in South Korea and is intent on moving to Taipei in Taiwan, and Jenny a 57 year old woman from California who already taught English literature at university in the US, is willing to volunteer in Tibet and seeked effective tools to teach English as a second language. Two great women ! We were in position of teaching the very third day or our course. It was something both highly useful and dreadful - scary to teach in front of a class almost from scratch -  also the best way to learn, by making mistakes which is part of the learning process. Every afternoon we were teaching “free classes” to “real” students of the school. They were approximately 8 to 14, from 20 to 60 years old, from South Korea, Japan, Brasil, Russia, Europe and were elementary to upper intermediate level.

My two classmates: Cat on the right Jenny on the left

My great teachers: Sezgi, 2nd on the right, and Jenny far right

I have entered a new world.

I realized I was not wired correctly with regard to what is required from a teacher. I realized I had to shed all those automatic processes I’ve been used to dealing with for years, to relearn a new way of expressing things. We – company workers - have been used to studying a topic, gain an expertise on it to be able to tell about it extensively to our colleagues and managers. And now we have to reverse the process and ask our audience - our students -  to tell us the good way, to elicit their skills, their mind, their speaking ability, to find the answers by themselves. It is a new philosophy we have to adopt : We enter the dialectic method of enquiry of Socrates . And as our renowned friend Wikipedia says : “the Socratic method remains a commonly used tool in a wide range of discussions, and is a type of pedagogy in which a series of questions is asked not only to draw individual answers, but also to encourage fundamental insight into the issue at hand. This is perhaps Socrates’ most important contribution to Western thought”.

No wonder this training was baffling. The overarching principle of our teaching hinges on this student-centered methodology. I am entering a new world, I need an overall rebooting of my mind.

The paramount concept of our training lies on the CCQ  - Concept Checking Question - and its infamous enemy the TTT - Teacher Talking Time! The CCQ is a clever way to elicit students understanding rather than “spood feeding them” - quote from our teacher Sezgi-. And that might be the most difficult part for us trainee teachers because as previously said we are wired differently. That is when we are required to have a thorough analysis of the grammar point, the vocabulary or the functions we are supposed to teach. And we know we have done a good job when we’ve almost been silent during the class.

The interesting part of this course is that we’ve been taught the way we are supposed to teach our students, with this same discursive process.

Praise is the first tool of class management we’ve been told about. Surprisingly, as far as I can recall, it seems to me that the word praise does not belong to the lexical set of the educational system in France. As a tool of class management it is yet so positively obvious, because our students need confidence to be able to speak a new language! The use of interaction patterns such as working in pairs is also meant to foster confidence and encourages the student to practice the language in a “safe” environment, not being exposed directly to the teacher or the entire class. This is also the spirit of the“check in pairs” stage, in which the student can check their answers whith their classmate and thus be sure of themselves before giving an oral answer to the class.

The very scaffolding of our teaching was the lesson plan frameworks and we’ve internalized - or still are in the process of internalizing -  these while teaching ourselves or observing our peers teach. A good lesson is planned with a clear aim. The lead-in serves as an icebreaker, we then introduce a context to what we’re going to teach, we then set up a “treasure hunt” to make the students guess the rules or the meaning of what they are being taught, then we process to a controlled practice to check their understanding, then we set up a freer practice to give them a free way to practice the new language they ‘ve learnt. That is in a nutshell the guidelines to the Language lessons: vocabulary, grammar, functions. Nothing else but a logical way to get acquainted to a new language.

Observing and being observed by our peers with a time of constructive feedback  was a very empowering process and a time of self awareness thanks to our professional and empathetic teachers. And ultimately establishing a rapport with the students was a wonderful experience.

I feel like a whole new world is opening up for me. I AM so GRATEFUL!

A Sense of the Wild West - March 2015

On March the 7th, I took a Cambridge test in the morning, and joined in the afternoon my friends Anne and Coralie who had just landed in SF directly from Paris. Finally, it was vacation time! We set off for a trip to some of the renowned American natural parks and scenic drives of the West...

#The highly SCENIC highway one on the Pacific coast of California.

This beautiful road from Monterey to Big Sur definitely lived up to our expectations. Surprisingly, I felt like going through the outstanding lanscapes of Britany, followed by the low mountains of Pyrennees, the shredded coast of Cotentin or the dry cliffs of Les Calanques, all these at once, in larger and wilder than those we know. On top of that, you sprinkle some wild sea animals : seals, sea otters or even enormous sea elephants taking the sun, lazily lying on the sand of quiet beaches along the coast...This gives you a glimpse of what awaits you on highway one if you have a chance to drive on it.

Protected area between Monterey and Carmel

Anne, Pascale, Coralie

Sea elephants taking the sun.

 

# The STUNNING Death Valley.

Coralie unfortunately had to go back to work after this Pacific coastal trip. We extended the journey with Anne, heading east towards lake Taho and then south alongside the green and refreshing Sierra Nevada mountains covered with fir and spruce forests still spotted with patches of snow before diving suddenly into the dryness of the barren Panamint and Death Valley. This is a place you definitely don't want to cross in summer! We left an 18 degree temperature to a sudden 35 degree one...

 Leaving the fresh mountains of Sierra Nevada

Diving into Panamint Valley

The salted ground at - 80 m in Death Valley.

# The UNCANNY wild west ghost town of Bodie

On our way down to Death Valley, we made a stop at the village of Bodie, which was once one prosperous mining town which boomed following the discovery of gold in 1876 - a second wave of gold rush after that of 1848 west of Sacramento - This town that bragged 8000 inhabitants in 1880 dwindled rapidly to a few hundreds once the vein was used up and ultimately suffered a big fire in 1932 that ravaged most of the town. Nonetheless, this town gives a real sense of what the harsh life of the pioneers must have been at that time in this remote rough barren environment - Bodie was known to be the scene of one murder a day!

 

 

# The WONDERS of the National Parks & Monuments

We went with Anne on a 6 day camping trip organised by a Trekking agency. Seamus was our guide, a 35 year old man as thin as a toothpick, ultra marathon man (which means he runs 100 km races  -  crazy man!). We were treated with wonderful meals he cooked himself like vegie curry, taboule, blue berry oatmeal or strawberry pancake for breakfast, a delight! He reminded me of Tintin, this cartoon character whose shrewdness gets him out of any situation. We were in a group of 4 - including ourselves - with a sweet couple in their sixties, Rey and Tracey, both used to mountain climbing, having already hiked Mount Whitney twice! Tracey was a very dynamic and positive woman,  who survived cancer, and was talked into hiking by her husband to lose weight when she was young... She still craved a hamburger and a Pepsi at the end of the camping week! Her husband Ray, grumpy at first sight, was very sweet in the end, and definitely reminded us of Gandalf a character of the famous ' Lord of the ring'. The camping grounds were great, in Zion Park and Escalante National Monument (don't ask me the difference, a matter of preservation status). Be that as it may we slept in freezing cold temperatures - 0°C at night - Fortunately we had good quality sleepingbags.

 

# In Zion Park, we hiked the iconic Angel's Landing trail. Actually it is quite popular and you can just see it as it is as busy as the Champs Elysees (as the French say), but it is really worth it! This hike is reaaaaaally BREATHTAKING. A few people give up before the end because one has to walk on the ridge of a 500 meter high cliff on a one meter wide path, with a lot of rock climbing which I love ! Not difficult but just impressive because of the height right above you.

 

Angel's Landing Trail in Zion

 

# Brice Canyon was also FLABERGASTERING! A landscape unique in the  world, a forest of orange and pink limestone spikes looking like stalagmites, also called Hoodoos. There were still patches of snow which made the scenery even more photogenic. We had the chance to hike a whole afternoon in this incredible landscape,  walking down and up the colorful hills of a fantaisy land.  The trail was called " fairyland trail',  more fun than any Disney rollecoster in the world!

 

Brice Canyon in March

 

# We also discovered the slot canyons of Peek-a-boo and Spooky in Escalante National Monument. This experience was just EXHILARATING! The canyons were so narrow that we often had to take our bagpack off our back to be able to wriggle in the slot of the canyons. It was like making our way in the internal parts of a human body.

Anne in Spooky Canyon



# I keep the Grand Canyon for the end. I went there on my own after Anne had left to fly back to Paris. It is not an easy place to go to when you don't drive a car. However, its immensity is sort of unreal. So when I walked along the rim taking pictures I felt I was taking pictures of a fake backdrop hanging there. I had the chance to stay overnight on the rim, so I could walk down the South Keibab trail, half way from the Colorado river, unfortunately - my only regret -  but the hike was GORGEOUS with 360° views of the Canyon. And the Canyon became reality, eventually!

The South Kaibab Trail in the Grand Canyon

The unreal backdrop of the Grand Canyon