Feed on POSTS
Just another brief update to let ya’ll know that I’m still around, but reluctant to blog for a few reasons. I imagine that I might start writing regularly in this space again sometime deep into next year. Instead, I’ve been twittering like a twit, so if you need a fix of my Adoyzieisms in 140 characters or less, that’s the place to go. I’ve also embraced Facebook, for better or worse, where my youngest brother clicks “Like” when my status updates indicate that I’m having a bad period day.
Before the year is over, I’ll be sure to post a bullet-list of some of the stuff that’s happened since I’ve been home. It’ll be a good six months worth of rollercoasterness. Pull that safety belt tight.
In the meantime, here’s a video of my fitful sleepiness in Chittagong, Bangladesh:
Of the many awesome things I got to do with my students, I had the opportunity to teach a capacity building class about blogging. My students were fantastic and seized this new platform for getting their voices heard on the vast wilderness of the internet.
I just know that I’ll watch this video months from now, seeing them speak about how they found a medium have express their ideas, thoughts and opinions, and how it will make my heart ache with missing them and their evolution. At the very least, we’ll have the internet and if I’m lucky they’ll update me on their progress through these fiber optic wires. I will be able to witness their transformation from afar, much like you have done through my blog.
For more info: auwstudentblogs.wordpress.com/
Guess which one of your lovely, insomniac blogettes is featured in a promotional reel for Glimpse.org? Why, that would be Ms. Adoyzie, of course. This is a clip being used to recruit correspondents who write and photograph the website’s content. They’ve been really good to me with never-ending patience and insightful guidance. In addition, they are supported in part by National-freakin’-Geographic, so in a way I’m indirectly also writing for Nat Geo.
More: Big Bang: Glimpsed
I could use some whimsicality right about now.
A high-five from a stranger on a grumpy morning sounds like just the right remedy.
“Miss, how do you eat supper?” Loda was curious about how we fed ourselves since moving out of the school building, and its dining hall, months ago. “Do you take food from the dining hall to your home? Do they cook for you there?”
“No, Loda, we cook for ourselves.”
“Miss!” Her eyes widened in shock.
“What? You don’t think we can cook?!”
“No, miss. We know the teachers can do many things. But you are too busy, no? You have no time.”
This was true, months ago, when I barely had time to schedule in bathroom breaks. But as we progress and gain a better handle on our work and quasi-personal lives here, we’ve found time to keep ourselves nourished, if only somewhat haphazardly.
“Cooking is such a waste of time, miss,” Loda continued.
“It’s not that bad.”
“No, miss. It’s a waste of time to cook here. It is different in America because you can just go and buy some vegetables in a bag and open the bag and you can eat it like that. Here you have to wash the vegetables, examine it to make sure there are no insects in there, clean it some more. You have to do that for all the vegetables. It’s a waste of time.”
Most families in Bangladesh, beginning in the lower middle-class bracket, have servants and housekeepers who perform all daily house chores, which includes cooking. While Bangladeshis (women, mostly) do cook, their servants do the prep work, the tedious washing of veggies and such. Loda, who knows we don’t have a servant in our homes, was appalled that I’d waste time with menial tasks when there were larger responsibilities looming in front of me, you know, like educating her. The way she sees it, since I come from a place where clean, ready-to-eat vegetables flow freely from bags on produce shelves, its difficult for her to imagine that I could handle the inconvenience of veggie washing.
I had to inform her that yes, while we do have an abundance of fresh pre-washed veggies, American do still actually wash food too. I mean, only when we can find a free moment in between all that casual sex we engage in.
Speaking with her got me to thinking of all the awesome foodstuff that I’ll be devouring when I get home, the least of which is about every item imaginable that is stocked at Trader Joe’s, the one man in my life who has never disappointed me.
Upon my homecoming, I shall tear through a bags of organic baby spinach and gulp down gallons of soy milk! I’m gonna make mountains of salads, topped with baked beans and soy meats! I’ll lay down two slices of nutritious multi-grain bread and stuff it full of tofurky, mustard and veggies until its too thick for me to hold with merely two hands! I’m gonna inhale the aroma of homemade veggie noodle soup, filled to the brim with organic cherry tomatoes and chunks of veggie meatballs!
I’m gonna bake up a storm, the oven will never not smell like something sweet is emitting from within its amber chambers. The first thing I want to try to make are peanut butter and jelly cookies! Yes! PB&J cookies!
Do you hear me, universe?! Sure, you’ve beaten me down, banished me to a country where there is an absence of drink and salads. But I shall rise! I will rise high and mighty, like a phoenix smothered in rice and daal. I will shake the oil-saturated curried cauliflower off my wings and I will dance in the aisles of grocery stores lined with shelves and shelves stacked with breakfast cereals!
Oh, glory, glory, hallelujah!
Ya’ll are dying to know, I’m sure. You’re thinking, I can only imagine so much of what Amy is talking about when she writes about her literature students. Like the time one of her classes got on all fours to pretend to be the animals of George Orwell’s dystopic farm to recite a speech by a pig. I wish there were some types of videos on the internet that may provide a clearer picture of what happens in her classroom.
Alas, I am here to serve.
At the end of term three, all four of my lit classes had a final project where they had to find a similar theme between two stories we’ve read, and then present it as a newscast. The video below examines how the general public were misled in Animal Farm and in Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery.”
Click the playlist to view all of the presentations. The Reporting Live! project also included Ray Bradbury’s “The Veldt” and Kurt Vonnegut’s “Harrison Bergeron.”
Enjoy!
Daniel, my fake Chinese husband, sent me a link to an awesome video uncovering the mysteries of (American) Chinese food:
Jennifer 8. Lee: Who was General Tso?
Reporter Jennifer 8. Lee talks about her hunt for the origins of familiar Chinese-American dishes — exploring the hidden spots where these two cultures have (so tastily) combined to form a new cuisine.
During our second term, our students participated in Model United Nations. Here they are debating, making motions and approving or rejecting resolutions. But all the chit-chat bored me so I set the scene against M.I.A.’s track “Boys.”
Most prominently featured in this clip is my former homeroom class. You may see some behavioral similarities of students and their faithful teacher.
