saturday. august 23 2oo8

i have been receiving requests on updates and pictures. not only am i honoring that, but i don't think yall can keep up =] i figured in my last post since i showed a glimpse of the car, i believe it deserves a closer look. let's take a gander, shall we? let us begin with the exterior of the car. with its promising silver-bluish, tarnished paint job, the 1989 peugeot 205 xs is sure to stun this side of the hemisphere. do notice its compact size enabling its driver to weave in and out of kenya's finest. and if parking is ever a problem, no worries. you can park it next to any utility vehicle, and people are sure to complain more about the SUV. before getting this bad boy rollin', we gotta fill it with gas...ahem...i mean petrol. as many used cars around here, who knows how big the gas tank is?!?! some of you may notice the unique style of this lid. it requires the key to open. yup, you guessed it. i gotta take the keys out of the ignition every time i wanna fill it with gas. i suppose it's not all that unusual to turn off the car when filling it anyways. oh here's something i noticed immediately. check out the blinker light on the right side of the car...or should i say lack thereof? i thought it was hilarious that there's just a hole there. i have no intentions of fixing it or doing anything about it. i'm ok with it just the way it is. let's take a moment to enjoy the bumper sticker that came with it. yes yes KENYA IS YOU AND ME. how can you not love that? it's all sun-faded and everything. gotta love it! hmm i have yet to figure out if the back windshield wiper works. ah well. and of course, you can't go without mentioning the awesome styles on these hubcaps. they each have their own specially designed peugeot logo in the center of the wheel for maximum balance and protection? let's now move into the interior of the car. at first glance, you can't help but notice the blue grip added onto the steering wheel for extra traction to your hands. and why would you need that you ask? ah yes, this sucker doesn't have power steering. that just means extra arm workouts for me. i hope to build these massive forearms. hahaha whatever the car is so tiny i can barely feel it. next we have the dashboard consisting of the air conditioner, emergency light, clock, tape deck, radio, and any other devices on this panel that do not function properly. i kid you not...none of these things work the way they're supposed to. then again, what do you expect out of an '89 french-made car that somehow made its way to kenya. finally we have one i can only assume to be the newest and shiniest part of the car, the oh so grande stick shift. admire it's beautiful wooden shine in all its glory. i'm willing to go as far as to say that the stick could probably sell for more than the car. well there you have it folks. someone call Xibit and get him to pimp my ride. i don't think anyone in the states can compare. peace out! ::: :::

thursday. august 21 2oo8

here we go. picture time! let's start off with personal stuff. this year i decided to move in with this great korean family. i am priveleged to have korean meals almost every night for dinner. often times, they look like this... here's my room. i appreciate how the family gives me my own space. oh and no the tv isn't plugged in or being used. so i still need yall to send me tv shows and movies =] i have those two narrow closets to put clothes, but i'm also still living out of one of my suitcases. it took me awhile to figure out how to utilize the space in that room. it helps that i like to keep things simple. and for those who don't know, i finally did it....i got a car! it's a little 1989 peugeot. there are little things like one of the blinker lights missing, but who cares...the car runs well. it's also been fun learning how to drive stick up the steep hills in stop-and-go traffic. funny thing is....so far i've clocked more drive time at night than during the day hahahaa. i hope to be confident enough to begin driving to school starting next week. alright enough about me and my living, let's look at some new developments with our school... for starters, they painted the mailboxes green and reorganized the positions of all the names. it took me forever to find mine. you may also notice that there are TWO copy machines. but hey, you gotta learn to not get too excited about things like this b/c the machine on the right has a sign on it already that says "out of order". what the heeeezie!!! yea i know that's what you're thinking. what happened to the office?!?! well PTF wasted no time getting in here and making a teacher's lounge. for the first week, they moved our three desks out into the area in front of the bathroom. i'll admit the lounge is nice even though i think i've only sat in there like once or twice to chill out. for those of you who have been here before must be wondering two things. first of all, where'd the two computers in the corner go? secondly, where'd those three desks go? if you remember that corner in the "den" where a table of stuff used to be, then that answers the first question. if you remember ever going down that hallway to the right of the front desk, then you'll be surprised by how they managed to fit three desks in there. mine's still the dark brown one. that sucker's ready to fall apart. i like my new space. the two other people i share it with are nice...and quiet too. so i opted out of moving to the "book" room. i haven't spent much time over on the elem/ms side, so i can only tell you of new things on the hs side. first, we have this newly paved floor right in front of the high school. it's such a small change, but it makes a big difference in my opinion. if you walk further down to the former PE room, you'll be amazed at how quickly they were able to split one room into two. now they are used for special ed and esl. i'm impressed by how fast they were able to make that happen. if you go down the hall on the left, it takes you to the esl room. and finally we have the field. i immediately noticed the new rails along the edge. i guess it's not too late to be concerned about kids falling over the edge, huh? the field is looking good in all its green glory. if you notice, it is kinda patchy still. and the ground is fairly soft right now. i don't know if it's b/c they watered it recently or b/c it has an "interesting" layer underneath =P so there you have it...lots of new stuff this year. i'm looking forward to getting girls bball started. we had tryouts this past week. this had to be the toughest year to choose players. 30 girls showed up for the ms and hs teams on the first day! it was nuts! but i can confidently say that this year i chose a team full of aggressive players. i hope you enjoyed all the pictures. i hope to continue posting throughout the year. keep checking and send me money. thanks! =] ::: :::

tuesday. august 19 2oo8

pictures are coming some time this week. promise! thanks for being patient =] ::: :::

wednesday. august o6 2oo8

i left home on sunday. i arrived here in kenya on monday. i went in to school yesterday to meet new teachers and get some work done. there was also a staff dinner in the food court at westgate. today i'm going in to hopefully get some lesson planning done and sort some stuff out with a car. tomorrow and friday we have staff orientation. on saturday, we have lunch at school where we invite families to come out and meet us. and school starts on tuesday. talk about having stuff to do back-to-back since the day i arrived. i hope to take pictures of the new developments at school and post them soon. i need to drop the kids off at the pool now. later! ::: :::