Stastne Vdakydzanie!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Ok, for a country that does not have this particular holiday, I have ended up celebrating it more times than I ever have before! I had three Thanksgiving celebrations this year! Oi vey!

Thanksgiving #1 was put on by the student council, at my school, a week before Thanksgiving. It was so awesome: they did it specifically for their "American teachers," but the whole school was invited. The kitchen staff prepared two HUGE turkeys and the teachers brought side dishes. It was cool to hear what students thought of the turkey because many of them had never had that type of turkey before!

Thanksgiving #2 was with Chase and his co-workers on Thanksgiving day! It was so fun to be with families (there was an adorable little boy named Olie who is one and very stoic and likes computer keyboards) - surrounded by good food and good company.

Thanksgiving #3 was here in Bratislava, this past Saturday, with all of the Young Adults in Global Missions who are serving in Slovakia, plus a few friends and family members. It was a crazy weekend! We had people crawling all over our apartment (along with the worms...I will get to that story later), made TONS of food, and got to catch up. On Saturday morning, a guy peeled apples for 1 1/2 hours, we made two pies, fruit salad, green bean casserole (thanks mom!), mashed potatoes, and more salad in our apartment! It was hard not being around family, so being surrounded by friends and laughter was the greatest blessing!

Story update:

1. I have had quite the opportunities for travel, and find myself spending many weekends away from Bratislava. I traveled to Vienna again a couple of weekends ago, had a lot of visitors, and also went to a small village called Pribolce for a folk festival! My roommate's boyfriend Miro is in a folk group, and he was in a big competition. The groups dress up in tradional outfits (Miro's shirt, vest, and hat were his great-great-grandfather's!), and dance and sing! It was awesome to watch the "weddings," "pig killings," and village life that was portrayed. It was also great to stay in a small village for a weekend. Miro's family hosted us - even though I couldn't communicate very well with them (they do not speak English), they were extremely generous and giving.
2. Our kitchen currently has some invaders: worms! The other day, I pulled the sugar out of the cubbard and SCREAMED! The inside and outside of the bag was crawling with little, translucent, squirming worms! EW! I quickly threw the sugar away, got my roommates really grossed out, and tried to stop squirming. The next day, my roommate Amy was standing in the kitchen. She happened to look up, and was thinking that they ceiling was really dirty...when the "dirt" started moving! MORE WORMS! We actually had to borrow a ladder, and take napkins to the ceiling to kill the worms. We estimate that about twenty were killed from our ceiling, and about 15 more were killed in our cupboard. Talk about a fun afternoon activity: de-worming. *shudders!*
3. Classes are still awesome, and my first years are crazy! We have been doing a drama unit, complete with improv activities, presenting plays to the class, reading plays out loud, and writing their own scripts. It is hilarious how much American culture comes into their plays: I have at least three scripts about Barack Obama, and had one performance about drug dealing in the Bronx.
4. I have officiall made my own drama debut in Slovakia. I acted out Rapunzel for my students on day, but have been in two scripted plays this week. One was prepared for Thanksgiving #3, and the other was for church. I have been receiving many phone calls from adoring fans, a little hate mail (jealous people in this world), and am excpting the agent cards to come pouring in. Seriously though, I do think that children's theater productions (especially children's theater) will be my back-up plan in life.
   

Happy end of November! Love and miss you all!

:0) Maika

Thanksgiving #2
(on our post dinner walk)

Hungry girls

Aminka's apple pie. :D Yum.

Amazing Thanksgiving Deco

Gustav's first Thanksgiving abroad, with Carsten and Becks

It is November: the leaves are colored, fading, and disappearing. The wind is crisp, yet turns humid right before it rains or in the morning when it is foggy. Actually, there is a lot of life here in Blava: my roommate thought she had bed bugs cause she kept getting bit...then she found four really full mosquitoes in her room. Gross.

October ended with a four day weekend, so seven U.S. teachers got together and traveled .... to VENICE!! So crazy! I have always known people who dreamed of going to Venice, or watched movies (like James Bond) that were shot in Venice, but never dreamt that I would have the chance to go there. I love Italy! The landscape is full of trees, the tiled roofs are quaint, the food is soooo excellent (puts the Slovak ketchup sauced pizza and pasta to terrible shame), and the mosaics are gorgeous. We mostly walked around, drank, and ate, and enjoyed getting lost among the many canals and bridges. It was really fun to walk around on Halloween and see people of all ages in assorted masks and costumes. My favorite part of the trip was taking a boat ride to the Island of Murano to watch the glass blowers. The glass blowers were so skilled, the glass was so intricate and sparkly, and I got to sit in a gondola on the island! It was a quick, two day trip, meaning we spent almost as much time on the trains as we did in venice (I slept on the floor of the train for the first time, and bonded with our British compartment mate who kept dropping things on me all night!), but totally amazing. Gustav went too.

When I got back from Venice, I prepared to teach my last week on Hamlet and The Portrait of Dorian Gray. I have been trying to think of different activities to try in class, and fit in all of the things from the "year plan" of what we are supposed to do. It is amazing that the year plan is a document open to interpretation. This week, I transformed the "interview a character" part of the year plan into "interrogate a character" and we had a mock trial. It was a riot: the students totatlly got into their roles, I made them address me as Your Honor (I had a gavel of course), taught them to make objections, and so on. There are certainly some prospective lawyers in my class!

Cauko everyone!

Majka
(This is how Slovaks spell my name. It is the "cutest" most Slovak form of Maria)

Gustav and I enjoying some pasta....Lady and the Tramp style

We watched a guy make this. It is red because it is still that hot.

No words necessary

My flattie Laura and I....IN VENICE!

Taken from the Rialto Bridge

Halloween in Blava

YI!

Recently, I have been up to two things: reading, and lesson planning. When I am done with those two things, I read and then lesson plan. AH! I started Hamlet with my fourth year students last week. Talk about crazy and stressful! I feel this overwhelming sense of pressure to do a good job, teach them all about the themes, character foils, structure, background, etc. while also helping them find something to enjoy about the play. My most successful lesson was when I illustrated how Hamlet pretends to be mad and "test" Ophelia. I had the students draw a picture of what he might have looked like, and then had them help me draw one on the board. Talk about a terrible, possessed stick figure! I think they got the idea though (especially after I used a student to help me act it out!). All in all, I do love Hamlet, and enjoy teaching it. "Nothing is either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." - Hamlet

Here is a shout out to all the ed majors who read this: Lit. circle! I totally did one with my first year's today and they loved it! It was hands down the best lesson of our novel so far (abridged Dorian Gray), and the most dynamic and animated English conversation that has taken place in the classroom. Certainly one of those "feel good" teacher moments, when you realize that you have motivated your students.

In other news, my roommates and I brought Halloween to Blava last weekend. There are a couple of pictures below, as well as a few of Gustav and I in Hungary. So crazy that I can go to Hungary for a couple of hours on a Saturday!

Love you all!

:0) Maika
Hungary and Gustav

There was an animal theme...Hugh was just a perk.

My flatties and I were cats!

Guess which one is mine??!!

The Tatras

I am pretty sure I fell in love this weekend: the Tatra mountains in Slovakia are AMAZING! After school on Friday, five of us hopped on a train and spent the weekend in a small village close to the Tatras. On Saturday, we hiked for nine hours up Mount Rysy. It was the most dynamic hike I have ever been on, and the part where we were hanging off the mountains on chains was absolutely my favorite! The pictures help illustrate the story better than I could with words, and it was great to be able to capture some fall color before winter strikes.

In other realms, my classes are going well. I showed the Princess Bride to my first years and they loved it. (The really ridiculous part was that during the movie, I was in the back quoting the whole thing! It is probably good that they didn't catch on to this. :) I am wrapping up an oral traditions unit with my first years, and they are writing me all sorts of folk tales, fairy tales, fables, myths, and other wonderful pieces of writing. I had one student write "Sugarella," which is about a girl who can't have salt or she will turn into a salt pillar! It is great to read their creativity and see their enthusiasm.

And story: trains in Slovakia are madhouses! There are bars of course, but there are also bottle cap openers under every individual table on the train. On our last journey, we spent some time in the bar area, just listening to the drunken Slovak men sing folk songs. It was a riot. On another train, a Swede approached us and started talking to us about how the United States was full of guerillas, that all the jobs were in China now, and that everything was S#@* - he said that a lot. He was the kind of guy that you think is interesting at first, and then just can't believe that he is so prejudiced and jerky. While one of the members of our group was kindly listening to him (there was no disagreeing with the man), the train stopped at a station and there was a knock on the window that I was leaning against. I looked out the window and saw a big *flash!* There was a whole group of teenage boys taking photos of us! So strange! I also ran through the bus with gloves on my pig tails - I blame it on the delirium that accompanies six hours of hiking! The main point is: if you come to Slovakia, you must ride a train. :D

:0) Maika

This is my train ticket and the fall colors!

Breathtaking; simply breathtaking

I spent most of the hike with Becks and Carsten

Flatties! Me and Amy.

The chains and snowy cliff :)

Sampling the National Dish

Well, I decided to give up school lunches for a month. It is kind of like fasting: you gotta take some time without to appreciate and focus on what you have. The saga begins again next month...

I gave my first exam today. Since we were doing an oral traditions unit, the exam was oral. It went over well, and now I just have to spend some time grading everything. Grading and keeping a gradebook is by far my least favorite activity...I try not to have a bad attitude about it. :0)

I was introduced to two Slovak things this week: the national dish Bryndzové Halušky (potato dumplings with sheep's cheese.) It was really good, but I wonder about the cheese. It is unpasteurized and that is a little scary. But, after a gorgeous fall day and a lot of walking, it certainly hit the spot.

Other news here includes my students naming Paul Bunyan as the great-great-grandfather of Chuck Norris (they are absolutely obsessed with Chuck Norris here!) I also learned that October is national popcorn eating month. This was followed by the lesson that our microwave sets popcorn on fire...you have to learn some lessons the hard way! I am also starting the Princess Bride movie with my first years tomorrow. I have always hoped that my love for this movie would come in handy. I about had a heart attack from happiness when I saw this movie listed as a resource for this lesson. "Inconceivable" is totally a vocab word. :0)

Dobrý večer!

:0) Maika

This is one of my favorite pictures. :)

Shadow Games!

Cool Relections

"The Nature"
(As my students would call it)

Dobrú chuť!

Lebo Palica

Interesting things that have happened lately:

1. I walked home from school one day and counted the following:

• Three older ladies: two with red hair, one with purple. It is a big thing for older women to dye their hair in radical colors!
• One guy walking down the cobblestone street carrying a computer screen - cord dragging on the ground. ??
  
• Six police cars - sirens blaring - rushing down the street. I think I am a little afraid of the police here. There is the "run-in" incident, but in general, the police wear really big, white gloves, drive with their windows down, and stick either their hands or head out while they are driving. Hmm..

2. I rode the jungle bus. I ride bus 80 to school everyday. Usually, it is a one car bus with a plain, and dirty, exterior and tearing, or really worn and plain, seats inside. There are nice buses here, and then there are the 80 buses....yeah. But, today, at 7:34 a.m., I rode the jungle bus 80! There will be a picture someday because it must be seen - words can't really capture its amazingness.

3. I am learning Slovak!....kinda.....not really.....a little. I can successfully say things like please, thank you, stick, sweet dreams, have a good day, next, can I please have....?, why?, what's up?, what is this?, how do say it in slovak?, this, good-bye, and because of the bear (or lemon). :0) I am actually obsessed with the word stick: palica (sounds like "Paul-eats-uh" with an accent on the first syllable.) I think I would like to learn how to say it in a couple more languages. Hey, you never know when it might come in handy ("palica" was actually the only word I understood from the chaplain's sermon last week!!)

Čauko!

:0) Maika

Tales and Rača

Okay, if you have never been to a wine festival: GO! Seriously, what are you waiting for? (Maybe to come visit me - so that I can take you).

I was in Rača this weekend at the wine festival there. The festival consisted of two streets that were lined, on both sides, with booths that sold wine and food. The wine was the "new wine," or burciak, from 2008. It was very sweet and delicious and there were lokše, which looked and tasted like lefse! There were about ten of us that went together and, needless to say, fun was had by all. There were also a lot of pictures (enjoy)!

And school...I had my first bad school day yesterday, and it all came down to grading and the nature of the assignment I gave. It is strange to be teaching the equivalent of American high schoolers, while balancing the fact that they are operating in their second language. The assignment was a paper, and although I am giving them a lot of support and chances to conference and re-write with me, it was a little ambitious to give to a class that I do not know very well, at the very beginning of the year. I know where I want to lead them, and they will get there, but this may not have been the best path to take right now. The amazing thing about my students is that they are very gracious and dedicated. Today was amazingly better. And to top it all off, my roommate and I planned our next unit on the Canterbury Tales over chinese food tonight. I am excited about it! (If you have any ideas on the Canterbury Tales, please let me know!) I have been blessed with amazing "flatties" (my roommates), and a wonderfully supportive family here. God is good, and is taking care of me!

Random stories:

1. My first years want to learn "eenie meenie mynie moe!" (It all began when I needed to choose someone in class one day. Instead of something more mature like "pick a number between 1 and 10," my mind came up with this childish 'chooser' first. Oh my).

2. At approximately 7:50 p.m. I experienced my first "mad dash" to the store when my flatties and I realized that we were out of toilet paper. The store closes at 8:00. I got there in time, only to discover that they were completely out of toilet paper! (Oh the up-side, they did have the tortillas that we were looking for last week and couldn't find!)

3. I had a really blonde moment the other day during lunch and asked what kind of breaded meat we were having...it was cheese.

:0) Maika

Part of the Clan
(Including Jon, Stephanie, Carsten, Larry, Jana, Me, and Becky)

lokše!!

The clan with umbrellas!

Burciak

Colgate Smile!