End of Semester Tidbits

School is over! It was weird not to go on vacation in December, but finally it has arrived. I spent my last two days of school watching and then playing dodgeball with my students. Dodgeball in Taiwan has really crazy rules, and none of the English-speaking grown-ups at school actually knew all the rules, so I kind of got them in bits and pieces. As a result, there were a couple times in the first game where I was like yes, I totally got that kid out, but then no, it wasn't true, because I didn't raise the ball before I threw it. Confusion!

Once I got a handle on Taiwan Rules dodgeball, it was more fun. The only problem was that our classes would just play against whoever else was on that section of the court, which always turned out to be 6th graders. I hadn't realized until then just how giant the 6th graders are compared to my kids, so a lot of my students were really scared. 5-4, my troublemaker class, turned out to be pretty good at dodgeball, but a lot of the sweet little kids in 5-5 spent a great deal of time trying to hide behind me. One chubby little guy kept putting me in front of him and yelling "save me, teacher! save my life!" We were doomed, but it was fun anyway. I get paid for this!

I accidentally made a silly discovery in the process of meeting with my academic director to discuss scheduling for next semester. Patty had introduced him to me as John at the beginning of the year, but he corrected her and said that he had changed his name to Jeffrey because there were too many Johns. It wasn't until now that I discovered that he actually thinks his name is "Jeforly." It's even in his email address like that. I can't correct him without making him lose face, so I just have to let it be. Jeforly and Dragon, my school administration. Inspires a lot of confidence in our quality of education, don't you think? I think my parents might be going out to lunch with these jokers when they come, so that should be a good time.

Now that school is over, I have a week of free time before leaving for Hong Kong and China. It's a time to relax and prepare and try to adjust my sleep schedule for optimal traveling with jetlagged parents and maybe figure out what I'm going to do with my future in between. I'm psyched.