So my weekend in Bandung was not as much as a holiday as I would have liked, I had to wake up at 5am to drive to Bandung, then wake at the same time the next morning to drive Astrids mom back to Jakarta, wait around and then drive back to Bandung. Still I must note that I enjoy driving a lot so it wasn’t all bad!

 

On Friday we went for a walk and ended up sitting on a bank of grass, on the way there a guy in a truck shouted out the window to me, Astrid asked if I knew him or something and I told her no, but this is what happens when your with a celebrity (jokingly of course), when we were sat on the bank of grass we noticed people looking at me as they were driving past. Astrid decided to call my bluff about being a celebrity and said if they stare for more than 5 seconds I should wave. I agreed and in the ended I must have waved to maybe 40 people, It got to the stage where I was waving at everyone who was passing. The nice part was they were smiling and waving back! Don’t you just love Asia, In England they would probably have given the finger!

 

Funny thing happened not to long ago, when we came down to the iLab (that’s where I am now) the new girl who’s second lesson here this is must have thought it was a break or something because she was stood out in the lobby watching TV and playing with her cellphone. I walked up to her thinking she might be lost and asked her what she was doing, she said playing with her phone, I asked why she told me because she likes to, it took a good 30 seconds to get it through to her this was part of the lesson. She was shaking her head when I was telling her to come use the computer! Very innocent but for a teacher – very funny!

 

This week was once again new intake week, and also my last intake before leaving for pastures new, I have unfortunately not got any Real English which is my favorite level to teach, but I do have a conversation class that is by far the most diverse I have taught, in any level/class. The oldest student is around 45 and the youngest is 15. This could be quite a hard one to teach but I think once they have been to a few classes they will settle in and be fine. I will keep you posted.

 

In Tuesdays conversation class the student who came late (1hr) is by far the most talkative. He studies Business at college and has a freelance job as a global warming campaigner. So he gave us a talk about it, I expected it to be just a couple of minutes but it lasted for the rest of class with other students asking questions and being really interested in it! I certainly learnt something that night!

 

Next week I have a week off so I some of my ex-conversation students want to meet up to hang out once more before I leave which will be fun, probably shisha and karaoke! Which will be fun, then the following week I have 2 days off, one for a public holiday and one for leave again, the public holidays here seem to happen so frequent! It’s almost once a month. The Friday holiday will be an early start as Astrids family have invited me to go to Bangka for a few days. Bangka is in Sumatra and has (from photographs I have seen) one of the most beautiful beaches in the world and it is still a relatively unknown destination so not flooded with tourists and tourist stores! It will only be for 3 days but I am very very excited about it! I have been dying to get back to a beach since I left Bali and when her mom asked me if I wanted to go it was an immeditate yes! The flights there are cheap only 650k IDR ($65) return. Will hopefully have lots to talk about when I get back from there.

 

The two new teachers who came last week have been very quiet indeed, They have both been here for 1 ½ weeks but they still don’t talk to any of us. The one who is living with us is from Canada and is a comedian (Alex Roach, If any Canadians have heard of him) but so far he hasn’t told a joke or said anything really. He just stays in his room all the time. He arrived at the house after Whitney left on Monday and we have seen him once when we were in the lounge and he went to the toilet! That’s it! We were all hoping he would be chilling out with us all and talking, getting to know everyone. Still I guess some people just like to keep themselves to themselves.

 

As always if you have any questions or comments please leave them below and I will get back to you, Don't forget to rate the blog if you enjoyed reading it!

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