My Lovely Challenge

I am undertaking an awesome personal endeavor: reading my first Spanish novel! :) I am about 10 chapters (~60 pages) in, and the story is great! I had bought the book at a mall about a year ago, thinking that I would learn Spanish by looking up every word I didn't know (which was pretty much how I had learned English as a kid). But, very soon I realized that, as an adult, I am now much busier and have much less patience for looking up every single word in the dictionary. So, I struggled through about one chapter and gave up promptly. The book had since sat on my shelf, collecting dust.

Randomly, last weekend, on my way out to catch a flight to Austin for my friends' wedding, I grabbed the book since I didn't have any other handy reading material for the plane. I didn't bring a dictionary (it seemed like a hassle), so I tried to read the story using only context clues. Amazingly, it's now entirely do-able for me! Of course, there are still words I don't know, and still some verb tenses that I'm not familiar with, but as a whole, the novel is very enjoyable in all of its banter and irony even though I'm just reading it straight up without a dictionary. --HOW EXCITING!! (A year ago, I had started to write down the list of words I didn't know, that I was encountering in the first chapter of the book. Now looking back at that same list, those words seem really easy, so my Spanish has made a lot of progress! yay.)

Anyway, the book is really good so far; it's a translated American novel called La Loteria, and it's about a man who's mentally handicapped, who lived with his grandma until she passed away. After she passed away, the rest of the family swooped down to divy up her few worldly possessions, but didn't want to take care of him... until he wins the lottery. The really charming part about the book is that he would always state something as it appears, and then state it again in his own blunt understanding of the situation (without all the smoke and mirrors), which is extra cool for me as a language learner, because I get to see the same situation described with and without ill-intentioned euphemisms.

Yesterday, at school, we had a "Drop everything and read!" half-period to celebrate National Reading Day. I told some of my kids that I was slowly reading a Spanish book, and I think they were genuinely impressed! I too often forget that we're supposed to model for our kids that we, too, spend time learning things that are not easy for us. What is it that you do to model that mentality for your kids?

Geometric Series Fun!

I'm excited about an upcoming lesson about applying geometric series. In fact, I am excited about it enough to be writing about it in way advance. :) (I'm not getting around to it until late next week. But, anyway, it's making me feel very OCD to be pretty much finished with planning for all 3 classes all the way through next week! I am kind of really in love with my job.)

Here it is. I love problem #1, because it brings up the idea of a summation approaching a particular value! If you keep constructing new rectangles at half size (adding counterclockwise each time), you'll see that they just fill in the middle portions and the overall geometric series approachs 2*(original area). YEAH! Chivisimo.




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In other news, Geoff's and my car broke down on the way back from the beach on Sunday. :( --OUR FIRST BREAKDOWN!! The mechanic has been sending us emails with estimated costs, and I just want to know which parts of the car are not broken, because it sounds like he's going to have to replace everything that I either did or did not know existed in a car!! (Fun fact: Our car was spilling oil all over the engine area after having spontaneously broken down on the side of the road, an hour away from our house, when it was already getting dark! It was a bit nerve-wracking, and it even started to rain just as we were waiting on the side of the road. Our friend Greg got out of the car, peeked under the hood, and said seriously, "You guys got a fire extinguisher?" ...Thank goodness we've got awesome friends who live near the beach, who arrived within 15 minutes with a tow truck to drag us all the way back to the city!!)

So, that's gonna be fun... I learned some key words recently from dealing with all the miraculous breakdowns in our lives: grua means tow truck, and calentador is the water heater at our house (whose thermostat broke because of electric current fluctuations that are a side effect of the heavy rains that we had over the summer). Really fun stuff.

Student-Art Combinatorics

Pretty momentous: Yesterday, after Geoff's morning run, he came back in and said nonchalantly while laying out his towel for doing situps, "Happy 1 year in El Salvador!" --Wow! He's totally right!

On a funny expat note, just the other night when I was making tea for the both of us, I had asked Geoff what type of tea he would like. For a brief moment, his face went blank and he mumbled after a bit of hesitation, "Manzanilla." I started to giggle because I realized then that he had remembered the Spanish word but not the English word for chamomile!

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I don't teach combinatorics, but a fun lesson idea occurred to me while I was skimming through a discussion online, and I thought I'd sketch it up for the possible benefit of others.

The idea involves setting aside a day when the kids would each create/bring in a full-body, colored cartoon drawing of a person, and we would cut them into three parts (head, torso + arms, legs), and make three piles in the front of class, one pile for each "body part".

The kids would then each randomly pick a head, a torso, and a pair of legs out of the respective piles, and paste them together on a page, no matter how funny it looks, and write about the combinations / probabilities involved in this problem:

Assuming that no student has yet gone up to pick from the piles...


• How many combinations of body parts are possible?


• What are the chances that you would pick out an "entire" (contiguous) paper person, with all three parts that belong together?


• What are the chances that your paper person would have at least one mismatching body part?


• What are the chances that your paper person would have exactly one mismatching body part?


• What are the chances that you would get all three parts of your own original paper person back?


• Let's say that Jenny is the first student to go up to the front of class to pick out three parts at random, and James is the second. Explain why and how the results of Jenny's paper person might impact the probability of James to then pick three parts that belong together.


• Compare the chances of piecing together an "entire" (contiguous) paper person for the first student of the class (Jenny) vs. the last student of the class (you). If you go last, will it be "unfair"?*

*This question is my favorite, because it sounds deceptively simple but it begs an intuitive wrestling between what is commonly perceived as unfairness ("I am the last person to go up; by the time it gets to me, I've got no influence over whether I can piece together a contiguous person!") and a different story told using numbers (All participants, regardless of eventual order, had an equal chance of winning prior to the picking).

It could be a fun and light activity, while still keeping the rigors of a combinatoric lesson -- and it may also contribute towards decorating your classroom! ;) Obviously, the kids would write an explanation for each question in addition to showing the math work...

--But, sadly, I don't currently teach combinatorics, so if you have stumbled upon this entry and happen to enjoy this idea and decide to implement it in your (future?) classroom, I would love to hear how it goes! Let me live vicariously through you.

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Off to the highlands of Peru! WOOHOO. :) See you back here in 10 days or so.

May (through October) showers

It is cold and damp here in San Salvador; I actually feel as though I'd have to break out the jackets soon! The dreadful rainy season is here to stay, all the way through October or so. It is making me jealous that everyone in the States is bathing in sunshine, even though I recognize the irony that I am the one who never has to deal with walking through snow to get to work.

With the end of the year quickly approaching, our twice-weekly Spanish classes are wrapping up as well -- y eso es muy triste. I love our current teacher, and I feel like I learn a great deal in her class; we even went out and got her chocolates to thank her for teaching us! Even though I will definitely keep working on my Spanish, we probably won't luck out the same way next year in getting another super structured, systematic instructor. Entonces, hoy mi clase de espanol fue a la casa de Kristin para celebrar el fin del ano con vino y brownies. Fue muy divertido! Hablamos por casi dos horas antes de la hora nos occurio.

On the personal end of things, I am feeling complacent. Work has zapped me of all my energy for personal pursuits in recent weeks; I haven't even finished a book in three weeks. The only thing I am actively working on is learning to do a headstand. (I anticipate this to take me a long time, since I have a horrible sense of balance, but I do intend on practicing daily until I get it.) I love my yoga class, and I really think that both my flexibility and core strength have improved significantly in the few months since I joined the class. This summer, my goal is to work on my personal yoga practice, so that I am not always so reliant on going to my yoga class to get things done!

And, I am excited about going to LA and Shanghai so soon to visit the fam!! Of course, I'll have to stuff my suitcase with books, TV downloads, and my yoga mat on the way there, but I do expect to come back with an extra suitcase full of American goodies! :) (Things we can't get very easily here or are very expensive: contact lens solution, sour patch kids, Neutrogena face wash, condoms, good beers...) --And, who knows? I might get to swing-dance in Shanghai! :)

Day trip!

As part of the welcoming process for the new international hires, the school organized a day trip led by a Salvadorean Spanish teacher who holds a Master's in Salvadorean history and who had worked for years at the national museum. As it turns out, Vicky is brilliant in both historical and current knowledge and was very kind to tell us all kinds of wonderful stories about her people. It is apparent that she takes a lot of pride in the culture of El Salvador, even though she has lived through some hard times here.

After a couple of quick stops, we stopped for lunch at a local food festival. Geoff and I gorged ourselves on grilled meat, chicken, shrimp, and sausage links. They had really amazing spices on them, and were one of the best meals we've had yet. On our way out, we had a bite of Jon's order of armadillo! It was very interesting. The meat is smooth but dense, and it has a strong salty aftertaste. Next time, I will keep my eyes peeled for "cusuco," which is the Spanish word for armadillo. :)

After lunch, the gang headed to Ataco, which is a very charming little coffee plantation town up in the mountains. There were some really cute artesan shops and cafes here, that the group decided we would stay here for the rest of the day. Geoff, Colleen, Eric, and I hiked up to the cross that we saw up the hill, and en route saw some interesting creatures -- big spiders and what looked like a flying ant hive.* Here in Ataco, we also bought some delicious goat cheese, a beautiful stool, and a couple of pieces of hand-painted art.

All in all, it was a really fun trip. :) Since we didn't have time to go try out the indigo-dying at the museum, Vicky promised to take us on a separate day trip just for that. --I can't wait!

*You can check out pictures on Flickr. Just click on the Flickr app on the right of your screen.

Phrase of the day...

...is duro blandito. Literally, it means "hard soft", and is a Salvadorean oxymoron used to describe the complexities of life. It is also a type of cheese, which seems appropriate somehow. Salvadoreans are practical, so they like to pack as much use into everything as humanly possible. Even speech, I suppose. :)

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I feel a bit like I have been grading non-stop since Sunday. Now that it is mid-unit quiz season and I teach 100 kids, I could easily spend hours grading just quizzes every week. I gave a round of practice quizzes in each class, followed by quiz makeup points, which all added to the load of stuff to grade and return even before administering the actual quizzes!

I've noticed that my new students appear to have only been taught rote math their whole lives. This is frustrating, even with the topics they are good at, because they can't explain any of the concepts to me. (The worst is when they've learned something solely by rote, didn't understand the concept, and now do the rote procedure incorrectly.) I have to keep reminding myself that I only have control over now, over what happens in my classroom. I don't know how much I can fix in a year, but I will try, obviously.

Ciao! The rest of this week is going to be busy with work!

The Price of "Bling"

On July 15, the day that Geoff and I arrived in El Salvador, an anti-mining environmental activist was found murdered at the bottom of a well in San Isidro, El Salvador. He had been missing for nearly a month, and his body showed visible signs of torture. Since then, 4 reporters who have been covering the news of his disappearance and death have received death threats themselves, and another priest who is also aligned with the left-wing activists has nearly also been kidnapped and killed, escaping his armed aggressors ever-narrowly only by jumping into a ravine.

Concerned about the issues surrounding the obviously heated environmental activism, I looked up some relevant information about mining in El Salvador. It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that El Salvador is a rich source for natural elements such as gold and silver, seeing that 90% of the country originated from volcanic activities. Mining companies based in U.S. and Canada are eager to come in and reap the benefits of the abundant resources this country has to offer. The local proponents of the mining law point to the jobs it would create and the income that the local government would receive as a percentage of the proceeds, but the environmental and social activists point to the amount of acidic toxins -- specifically, of mercury, cyanide, arsenic, zinc and aluminium -- that would be released into the water. Leaching, the process of extracting gold and silver from the rocks, requires an enormous amount of water and exposes chemicals to open air, allowing them to evaporate and to be absorbed into the surroundings. Mercury evaporates readily at 26 degrees Celsius, and then redistributes in the form of rainfall. The mixing of the chemicals with water also would exacerbate the existing water shortage. Already, 1.5 million Salvadoreans (out of a total population estimated to be somewhere between 6 to 7 million) do not have access to drinking water. The "acidic drainage", as it is called, is going to make things worse. Already, there have been hillsides and wells that have dried up in San Isidro as a result of "an error" committed by one of the mining company's employees. Instead of receiving water deliveries in exchange for keeping quiet, the residents of San Isidro have opted to speak up against further mining activities by these foreign companies -- hence, the recent wave of environmental activism.

In any case, the laws right now are in limbo. The mining companies are hoping for the drafted mining law to be passed, so that the suspended mining activities may resume. I don't think you need me to say where I stand on the issue.

...What an absolute outrage!

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I finished reading One L, a personal account of one guy's experience as a first-year law student at Harvard Law School. The author describes the fearful manipulation that the professors used to run their first-year classes, and the resulting degradation in decency he observed in his peers and in himself as the academic year progressed. Even though he attended HLS back in the 70s and his account is clearly outdated, the story was still pretty interesting for me to read. It made me think about what my friend Ron once said about being a witness to injustice: "Either together we stand [against what we perceive of as injustice], or individually we will fall. Today it could be them, but tomorrow it might be you... or me." I think that concept applies broadly to a lot of things, and it is an idea that I keep coming back to. Why is it that we should stand up for someone whom we think is treated unfairly? What is the broader implication of justice, for us individually and, then, collectively?

Anyway, I picked up a Spanish novel yesterday from the bookstore. --Ambitious, I know! I figured that I would try to build my vocabulary the best way I know how -- by tediously working my way through a book I'd like to read. That's how I learned English, anyway, so doing this again actually feels familiar and warm, a bit like coming home again after many years. It's going slowly, obviously; took me about 30 minutes to cover 3 pages, because the structure of written Spanish is more difficult than spoken Spanish, and words often mean different things once you string them together into a phrase. But, I love the feeling of piecing together meaning, one word at a time. I'm excited. :)

Weekend at a Beach House

Since a couple of people have asked: Yes! We finally have cell-phone service and internet at home!! :) :) It took 5 trips down to the Claro store, but we eventually prevailed. The funny thing is that their computer system is so archaic, that 1. Even after we had submitted all of the necessary documents, we had to wait another few hours in the store for the guys to finish inputting everything into the computer, and 2. We had to go back the next day (Trip #6) to purchase a related monthly service, since the computer system does not update in real-time and it would take 24 hours for the system to begin recognizing us as existing customers. Goodness. We were in that store for so long each time just sitting and waiting, that the (extremely nice) sales clerk even taught me the word aburrido, meaning "boring."

The good news is that Geoff purchased a mobile internet service that would allow him to do work at any time on his laptop, even if our home network is down. If we decide to start traveling, we can also tag on $10 a month to extend the mobile coverage to other Central American countries, like Guatemala and Costa Rica, so that he can log on at any time and do emergency fixes. Pretty sweet.

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Geoff and I spent a chunk of the weekend at an amazing beach house, along with the rest of the new international hires and their families. The beach house is owned by our principal, and -- I don't know what I had expected before getting there, but -- I was completely blown away by how luxurious it was. We had driven a long time to get there, since it was near the border of Guatemala, and by the time we were finally there, it was dark. We had passed various corn and sugar cane fields (El Salvador is lush with agriculture), and eventually turned down a bumpy little alley way. His maid's family came to open the front gate, and it looked almost like we had arrived on a FARM!! He has so much land in front of the house, that he actually keeps two goats, a big dog, and a number of roosters as pets. The house itself is gorgeous, with brick arches everywhere and a feeling of openness typical to this warm-weathered country. The back yard has a serious pool, some hammocks, an outdoors sitting area, and it opens right onto a beautiful sandy beach that is essentially private. There are palm trees everywhere in front of and behind his house, and his maid's family has done a fabulous job with the upkeep of it all.

Needless to say, the next day or so was extremely relaxing. Even though the electricity was out for a good amount of time during our stay, the people were great and we had a good time anyway. We swam in the ocean, chatted late into the night, read and napped in the hammocks, and drank many a coconut's juice. Geoff also went running in the morning with Brian along the beach, and even played a song or two on Eric's guitar for everyone! It was really a beautiful time. :)

After we got back from the beach house, Geoff and I finally set up a sort of bare-bones "entertainment system" for ourselves at home. We can download movies off of BitTorrent fairly easily, and then if we hook the computer up to our mini stereo-radio-thing, then we can watch movies in our bedroom. Hurray! We spent a lazy Sunday cooking, drinking, swimming, listening to Spanish lessons, and watching movies... I highly recommend He's Just Not That Into You, a decidedly gender-neutral flick. ;) (No, seriously -- Geoff liked it a lot, too.)

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It's looking like I'll have to go out and purchase some practical things this week, including short-sleeved work shirts and a battery-powered alarm clock. This morning, our power was out, and if that had happened on a school day, my plugged-in radio alarm wouldn't have worked, and I would have surely been late to school. That's a Must Fix! :(

We're learning to cope with the unreliable infrastructure here, slowly but surely. This is the third time in less than 3 weeks that we have experienced power outage -- each time in a different setting -- so there is a good chance that this is a common occurrence around here. Along with the electricity goes the water, since the water we use is pumped from underground somewhere. Just have to learn to roll with the punches, that's all.

Dinero, Manejo, y Otras Cosas

Everyone here rocks the Hamiltons, or $10. In fact, that is the largest denomination dispursed by the ATM. :)

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In El Salvador, since the late 90s there has existed a privatized Social Security system. Anyone who works in El Salvador would see an automatic payroll deduction (for me, I believe it will be roughly 6.5%), but it is money that they can reclaim either at retirement, as pension, or at the time when they permanently leave the country, as a lump sum. Employers also contribute to this Social Security. The same Social Security system also provides a form of socialized health care in this country. Although foreigners like us are also eligible for the ubiquitous health care, they typically go to private doctors to avoid the long lines (and to ensure "better care", whatever that means) -- hence the private health insurance that we pay for. But, it's good to know that the poor is somewhat provided for in this country, at least in theory.

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Thus far, Geoff and I have had a fantastic experience in El Salvador! People have been super friendly and helpful -- not to mention extremely patient with our Spanish. Things are definitely much slower here, except when we are driving. As in many developing countries, speed limits and traffic signs/signals work more as recommendations than as hard-and-fast rules here. Even lane divisions aren't so clear-cut; people habitually cross over to the opposite lane (in face of on-coming traffic) in order to pass a slower car. Maybe surprisingly, the craziest drivers appear to be those of busses. On our first day with a car rental, Geoff and I had a few close encounters with busses coming at us at full speeds while we are stopped, or witnessing bus drivers making 3-point turns in the middle of a busy street! Holy mother of God. They are CRAZY! Also crazy is the fact that pedestrians are literally everywhere. In the busier parts of town, at every traffic light there would be teenagers coming up to wash your windshield. They don't take "no" for an answer, even though most cars do not pay them for the unsolicited service. The same goes for street vendors who weave in and out of traffic to sell all kinds of stuff. We even saw a juggler in front of a taxi cab that was stopped at a light. On the way to the beach last weekend, we also saw cows and horses walking unsupervised alongside the cars on the highway. One kid crossed the highway in front of us on a skinny horse, which he was spurring along with a random tree branch. Geoff and I could not stop exclaiming how crazy people are down here, but it seems to be just a way of life for them, no hay drama.

I really like how things are different here. As it turns out, getting an apartment wasn't so hard; obtaining a permanent visa also seems to be fairly straight forward, albeit a matter of time. What Geoff and I have spent the last few days agonizing over, ironically enough, is setting up our phone and internet services. To get those set up, not only do we need a passport and a NIT card, but we also need apartment contracts and formal letters from my school, vouching for my employment contract and salary. And, as you can imagine, pulling those details together is not just a matter of hours, especially down here. It is a bit frustrating, because even though we are gaining basic Spanish proficiency pretty fast, it isn't helping to hurry along the settling-in process, and Geoff is losing time daily for work as long as he does not have reliable internet access at home...

I am holding my breath that everything will be OK by the end of today. The 85-degree ocean is, too, holding its breath...

Spanish word of the day

My new favorite Spanish word: sinvergüenza. It means "a shameless person." I anticipate needing to use this word regularly in El Salvador. :)

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In other news, my teaching evals came back, and the results were very interesting! My kids overall liked me as a teacher, but think that my class can use a greater variety of assignments. (Specifically, more projects and fewer worksheets, which is perhaps not surprising, because I had basically modeled the unit structures after the honors track... And ultimately, those units are too worksheet-heavy for my non-honors kids.) This gives me something concrete to work towards next year, so I am really glad that I decided to do the survey!

Learning Spanish!

Geoff and I started listening to Pimsleur audio lessons for Spanish. They are fantastic, even though they move a little slow for my taste. The audio lessons are roughly 30 minutes in length each, and they consist of new vocabulary phrases being introduced, broken down phonetically, and then the "moderator" calls out a bunch of English phrases quickly, pausing for you to repeat the correctly conjugated Spanish versions, and then the native speakers pronounce the correct words again. This quizzing modality drills the vocabulary, as well as pronunciation.

--I like it. :) The only trouble is that we have 90 lessons to get through, and thus far Geoff and I have only found one day to sit down and go through 3 lessons! It is worrying me a bit, as we are going to be very busy again this week / weekend with work and dancing stuff.

Anyway, this is all we know thus far (not yet enough to help us apartment-hunt down in ES, but it's something):

Como esta usted? (How are you?)
Bien, gracias. Y usted? (Fine, thank you. And you?)
Muy bien, gracias. (Very well, thanks.)
Entiendez Ingles? (Do you understand English?)
No. No entiendo. Habla Castellano? (No. I don't understand. Do you speak Spanish?)
Hablo un poco. Soy Norteamericana. (I speak a little. I'm American.)
De donde es usted? (Where are you from?)
Soy de Nueva York. (I am from New York.)

Excuse the bad spellings. Remember, these are audio lessons... Adios!