So far, my August has been pretty good. I went to Manila for a week long training on co-
teaching, with my counterpart, Mrs. Sarabia. It was a pretty good training, I think we both got something out of it. Here is a picture of us working together, just like we will soon be doing in real life at West II Elementary. : )
My birthday happened while I was there, which for me was great. Friends of mine also at the conference chipped on a birthday cake for me, and it was also the birthday of a girl in the new batch, Annie. So we got cake, they sang to us, and we wore some birthday crowns. Later that day a select few of us (about 12 of us) got to go to the American Embassy and have cocktails and appetizers on the Ambassador's private office
balcony, with a view over the lush embassy grounds and Manila Bay. The ambassador is a really cool lady, I always like hearing her talk, and getting to chat with her was really cool. We also met some other foriegn service people, and guys working for USAID, another government development agency, only with money. We got some neat ideas for future careers, although that was not the intention. It was a super sweet birthday thing, though, and the ambassador even ended up walking around with a tray of chocolate cheesecake, with about 3 Filipino embassy staff following her around trying to take the tray from her.
Later that night we same few went out and did videoke, which is always fun, and since I was with an entirely different crowd than I'm usually with, we got to hear some different songs. This picture is me and Kelly singing together. This was our second try. During our first song, a cockroach landed on her, and she screamed and brushed it off onto me, and so I screamed and brushed it off, and we were screaming and jumping around instead of singing.
Back at site now, it is Rambutan season, everyone's favorite crazy fruit. Here's a picture of 1/2 kilo of rambutans. You bust open that crazy skin and there is a smallish juicy fruit inside. very juicy.
sometimes smell nicer. But this year, the first massive rainstorm made my
house flood. And every small rainstorm thereafter. It comes in from the bottom of the walls. Here are some pictures of it flooding, bit by bit. The one picture is looking out of my door at the deep water outside. When they built my house they built (or more likely, after the first rainy season, they added), a tall door frame. So the water outside doesn't come in the house. But you can see it's progression as it floods from a hole in the wall across my living room. Slowly at first, then covering most of the floor. The laundry basket was accidentaly left outside at the begining of the rainstorm (fortunately with dirty laundry in it) so It's already soaking wet. Everything else I was trying to move to the other side of the room so it wouldn't get wet.
