Arwen in Gasa: Sweet, beautiful Power!

Well, such a lot has happened since we last spoke. (Even though technically I posted 3 days ago) I'll start with the most recent occurrence – the power came back on! For a whole hour! And Dawson's sleeping again and my head torch is securely back on. I think I'll be getting a permanent dent in my forehead before too long. If it's in the middle of my forehead maybe when I'm good, I'll be very, very good (Cue for people to say I'm already horrid when I'm bad). Fortunately, throughout the whole blackout, the raptor fences must have been kept on as we're all still alive with limbs correctly attached.

The other good thing that's happened, and fortunately is unlikely to stop, is that I have begun teaching. I have four classes – one year 8, both year 7s and the year 6 for English. This means I'll be teaching 33, out of 42 I think, periods a week which is more than any other teacher in the school. Go me! (I have since learned that I may not be teaching the year 6 class anymore).

I'm afraid my first assignment for each class was a little dull but it was just for me to diagnose grammar and writing ability. I got the students to tell me a bit about themselves and Bhutan. I learned several things from these essays. Firstly, it seems common for Bhutanese people, or at least Bhutanese students at this school, to refer to their country as 'Our Bhutan' which seems quite sweet. Second, the plural of 'takin' is 'takin.' I double checked that with a teacher as leaving the 's' off in plural words seems to be a common mistake of my students. Third, according to one student the population of Bhutan is seven thousand million people. I didn't even know that there were that many people on the planet! But my favourite bit of information came from a seventh grade student who informed me that 'Our Bhutan is like a cheese.' I'm not sure how this country is like a fermented dairy product or which one it is meant to be like (brie probably. A double brie from Tasmania that's been out of the fridge for the perfect amount of time and is just a little bit melty and utterly delicious) but apparently it is. I asked my neighbour and she thinks that the student meant that Bhutanese people like cheese and certainly most of them seem to. My favourite dish here so far is kewa datsi which translates as potato cheese. It is very similar and almost as wonderful as Gullam, or Mom's, scalloped potatoes.

Speaking of food, I've been experimenting and while I've found that reading The Graveyard Book while cooking noodles leads to squidgy, overcooked, blecchy noodles. I ate them anyway as I felt that it just wasn't smart to waste food and it was my fault. I now make sure that I use a timer if a book is involved. But one of my experiments which included apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, brown sugar, water and a pressure cooker, while it didn't turn out like I originally wanted it to, made something very friendly and comforting. Basically, I wanted poached apples but, and I really should have expected this, I ended up with apple sauce which was absolutely delicious either by itself or on the french toast I was able to make since we got a shipment of bread. It was extremely decadent and I almost felt guilty eating it. I also discovered that a grilled cheese (dry-fried) sandwich with chillies and onion is wonderful. Sadly, I'm now out of bread so I'll have to experiment with other things but I am trying to eat chillies at every meal to make sure that I toughen up a bit heat-wise. It's slightly embarrassing to cough like mad when I have a tiny mouthful of food. And really annoying when it costs me a trip to see takin!

Yesterday (a few days actually, but never mind) we had an interesting visitor come to the school. We actually had a few visitors as it was school election day and to teach the students about Bhutan's voting system the students got to vote for their various captains with the actual voting machines that will be used in the national election in April which was quite impressive. Why don't Australian election officials show up at school captain elections and teach kids about the preferential voting system? Lazy! I found out that they don't vote in the primitive pencil and paper way that Australia does but they have little machines where you press a button with the candidate's photo and name next to it. The machine then lets you know that your vote has gone through by emitting a high pitched buzz. Every time someone votes. Every time. There were about 10 voting machines, one for each position, and lots of people who had to vote. I felt bad for the teachers who had to sit by the machines to make sure that the votes went through. They now know what the world sound like to Pete Townshend. But it was still fun to have the school election done in the national way.

The visitor who wasn't an election official was a monk. He was apparently the forty-somethingth reincarnation of a well-known lama. The most interesting thing I found about him was that he was no more than three. Many of the teachers and other staff members went to get blessed but I refrained as I am not a buddhist and didn't feel right about it. I found it very sweet how afterwards he seemed to delight in running round the school while his mother, or I think she was his mother, chased after him. I also don't think I've seen a monk in a baseball cap before.

I should probably say that, following a meeting last night and because we have some new teachers I am only teaching 24 periods a week. I can relax slightly! I do feel a bit guilty and sad because I won't be teaching year 6 but I am wondering if I can talk to the year 7 math teacher(s) and say that if they ever are feeling under the weather, and providing it doesn't clash, I'm happy to cover. I miss math! I love English but sometimes I just want to do some long division or add fractions with different denominators!

Ah well.

Hugs to All and I miss T'eo.

PS Don't watch Toy Story 3 without lots of psyching yourself up for it and making sure you have as many of your toys with you as physically possible. Tissues are difficult to get in Gasa. I miss Pooky, and Johnny, and Squirrel, and Molly, and Kirsten and I could keep going but I think it would irritate people so I'll just say I miss them all!

Additional - It has occurred to me that some of you possibly don't know what T'eo, Eve and Padraig look like so I thought I'd remedy this. Or you haven't seen them in a while. Or you want to see them again because who wouldn't?