But here it is, my student and I with real smiles.
17 December 2010
One of my students, a 10th grader always looked so gloomy in class and church. So I may have decided to cheer him up by grinning wildly at him everytime I saw him, until he started blushing. Then I would tease him about the slightly guilty smile he would always make. He would insist that it wasn't guilty, but I told him I knew better. But on our visit to Managaha, he and I took a picture together, and he made a REAL smile. The kind that wasn't guilty. I, of course, made a huge deal about it, which then embarrassed him some more and he started blushing again.
But here it is, my student and I with real smiles.
But here it is, my student and I with real smiles.
12 December 2010
Street Market
Street Market is pretty much the coolest thing Saipan offers. Every Thursday night (except for a couple weeks when the government shut it down in an attempt to manipulate citizens into approving a new casino) in Garapan, the tourist village of Saipan, Beach Road fills with vendors selling Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Chamorro, and Thai food. Almost every booth will sell you a dinner for $5, usually with 6 different items of food, or else you can hop around, grabbing 1 item from several different booths, for $1 each.
The food is very often very good.
But I'm not here to tell you about that.
One lovely night, Miss Blackwell, Mr. JJ, and myself took some students down to Street Market. We grabbed our food (Go with Chamorro, so GOOD!) and made our way into the outdoor pool area of one of the resorts. Fiesta, to be specific.
It wasn't as quiet of a location as we might have expected. On the other side of the pool, under a shelter, was a group of Japanese partyers. At first I thought it might have been a rehearsal dinner, but I soon realized that was not correct. First, the group was skewed towards males, and then the partying seemed just a trifle too enthusiastic for a rehearsal dinner.
This analyzation was proven correct when all of a sudden about 5 guys whipped off their shirts and shorts to reveal nothing but Speedos.
Not something I was exactly prepared for.
But then, I wasn't really prepared for it when they pulled off the Speedos too and proceeded to jump into the pool.
Nope, definitely wasn't prepared for that.
[pictures omitted]
Should I have labeled this blog NSFW?
The food is very often very good.
But I'm not here to tell you about that.
One lovely night, Miss Blackwell, Mr. JJ, and myself took some students down to Street Market. We grabbed our food (Go with Chamorro, so GOOD!) and made our way into the outdoor pool area of one of the resorts. Fiesta, to be specific.
It wasn't as quiet of a location as we might have expected. On the other side of the pool, under a shelter, was a group of Japanese partyers. At first I thought it might have been a rehearsal dinner, but I soon realized that was not correct. First, the group was skewed towards males, and then the partying seemed just a trifle too enthusiastic for a rehearsal dinner.
This analyzation was proven correct when all of a sudden about 5 guys whipped off their shirts and shorts to reveal nothing but Speedos.
Not something I was exactly prepared for.
But then, I wasn't really prepared for it when they pulled off the Speedos too and proceeded to jump into the pool.
Nope, definitely wasn't prepared for that.
[pictures omitted]
Should I have labeled this blog NSFW?
11 December 2010
So Beautiful. So Awkward.
One day my 12th graders began telling me that I was so beautiful. This is a ridiculous statement anyway, but even more so in a culture more beauty-obsessed than in the United States, so I responded,
"I know that's not true."
"No, no," they hurried to explain. "Not outwardly beautiful. Inwardly beautiful."
"That's more like it," I said.
"I know that's not true."
"No, no," they hurried to explain. "Not outwardly beautiful. Inwardly beautiful."
"That's more like it," I said.
The Library
At my school, not only do I teach Conversational ESL, 10th, 11th, and 12th grade literature, and music, I also work for a couple hours in the school library. This is not quite an idyllic an assignment as one might think. A library may not be the best place to employ people who speak English as a 2nd language. One of my jobs has been to sort catalog cards (yes, we still use those on the island of Saipan), and so I have the privilege of authoritatively informing you that about 80% of the cards have errors on them. I'm not just talking of disformity* of formatting, which is entire. Many of the errors are spelling errors, but not all. Some cards have subjects in the author or title line. Some cards leave off half the title of a book. Some cards include only the first word of the title. Some cards list dust jacket illustrators as authors. Some cards list authors who in no way coincide with the book.
My favorite card had 3 different spellings of the author's name, accompanied by an indecipherable title and vague publication information. I tried Googling every possible spelling of the author's names with the two words of the title I could make out, "Abraham" and "times," but I was unsuccessful. When I pointed out this card to a fellow library worker, she got a little upset with me. I'd tried telling her that the title on the card was no such thing, and she kept gesturing impatiently at the title line of the card. I tried a different tactic.
"It doesn't mean anything," I said. "It's nonsense."
Yeah, that didn't work.
I asked if I could see the book, but I was told that I wouldn't be able to find it since the book was entered this summer with many other books that had yet to be shelved.
So much for the book by John Dee, Dea, or Dec.**
The title and author cards provide another problem. Each book should have both a title and an author card, filed separately under its respective categories. Notice the word should. While sorting through the author cards, I found a good-sized handful of Title cards in the mix.
"Not a problem," I thought, "I'll just set them aside and file them in with the Title cards when I go through those."
Tiny problem. There wasn't a duplicate Author card misfiled in the Title card place. No, I had 2 Title cards. Or sometimes just 1 Title card, in the wrong place. The reverse situation worsened. Whereas I might have only found 5-10 Title cards per letter in the Author section, I found 20, 30, 40, Author cards in the Title sections.
Sigh.
I've told you a lot about the library. But actually, I could have summed up my entire library experience in one story.
I was typing a borrowers card when I realized that the source card was incorrect. First, the editor was listed as the author, a common enough error, but this was a magazine and it was listed as a book. To top it off, the periodical was listed by its title, with no mention of the issue title (which it clearly had) or volume/date identification. So I brought it to the librarian and pointed out these errors to her. She dismissed both the author/editor and the book categorization confusion, so I submitted, but I tried convincing her that she needed some issue identification.
"This is a periodical," I said, "so you can't just file it by its name, since there are other issues."
"But we only have one issue," she said.
"I know," I answered, "but we may get another issue, and then what will we do?"
"If we get another one, then we will pull this one from the shelves and then we will have to get it a new number and reprocess it."
"Okay," I said.
*no, it's not a word. But it could be.
** Googling did produce a result for John Dee. He's a mathematician and physicist from the 1600s. Not my guy.
"It doesn't mean anything," I said. "It's nonsense."
Yeah, that didn't work.
I asked if I could see the book, but I was told that I wouldn't be able to find it since the book was entered this summer with many other books that had yet to be shelved.
So much for the book by John Dee, Dea, or Dec.**
The title and author cards provide another problem. Each book should have both a title and an author card, filed separately under its respective categories. Notice the word should. While sorting through the author cards, I found a good-sized handful of Title cards in the mix.
"Not a problem," I thought, "I'll just set them aside and file them in with the Title cards when I go through those."
Tiny problem. There wasn't a duplicate Author card misfiled in the Title card place. No, I had 2 Title cards. Or sometimes just 1 Title card, in the wrong place. The reverse situation worsened. Whereas I might have only found 5-10 Title cards per letter in the Author section, I found 20, 30, 40, Author cards in the Title sections.
Sigh.
I've told you a lot about the library. But actually, I could have summed up my entire library experience in one story.
I was typing a borrowers card when I realized that the source card was incorrect. First, the editor was listed as the author, a common enough error, but this was a magazine and it was listed as a book. To top it off, the periodical was listed by its title, with no mention of the issue title (which it clearly had) or volume/date identification. So I brought it to the librarian and pointed out these errors to her. She dismissed both the author/editor and the book categorization confusion, so I submitted, but I tried convincing her that she needed some issue identification.
"This is a periodical," I said, "so you can't just file it by its name, since there are other issues."
"But we only have one issue," she said.
"I know," I answered, "but we may get another issue, and then what will we do?"
"If we get another one, then we will pull this one from the shelves and then we will have to get it a new number and reprocess it."
"Okay," I said.
*no, it's not a word. But it could be.
** Googling did produce a result for John Dee. He's a mathematician and physicist from the 1600s. Not my guy.
23 September 2010
Twenty-Three
A couple of weeks ago I had my twenty-third birthday. Twenty-three always seemed like an important age to me, far more than 21 or 18 or 30 or [take your pick]. I'm not sure why, but maybe it had something to do with the plans I had for myself growing up.
Life dreams were a big thing for me. It wasn't the career so much that I obsessed about. I've known ever since I was about 5 that I've wanted to teach and write for a living. (To clarify: Once, for about a month, I wanted to be a virtuoso violinist, but then I realized I lacked the technical ability or the ambition. And then there was my constant fascination with being a spy. It had nothing to do with an interest in gadgetry or adventure; I just have always wanted the balance of information to tip on my side). Anyway, my life goals, then, were often time and location goals.
From the ages of 10-16 (circa), my life plan looked like this.
Graduate from high school one year early.
Go to college at 17
Graduate at 20
Go to grad school at 21* (same year as graduation; it's how my birthday falls), and finish the summer before I turn 23.
Somewhere in the middle of high school I decided I wasn't going college a year early. I didn't even want to. So the life plan got pushed back a little. But that was okay, I'd still be halfway done with my graduate program, and looking out for the career of my life.
Then, the summer before my freshman year in college, I decided to go through college attempting two majors. Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, I wasn't going to be shoving that into four years. Four and a half years was the smallest amount of time I could manage, so I knew I was going to graduate a semester before I turned twenty-three.
That's okay, I told myself, graduating from college is an epochal moment, and twenty-five is not a bad age to finish a first masters. Then there's a doctorate, of course, but that's the kind of schooling appropriate at any age.
And then somewhere in the last year or two of my college education, I decided that I wanted to travel more, see the world, and experience new cultures. The masters program could wait until I got back.
So here I am, in Saipan, having just graduated from college, teaching English to a bunch of Chinese, Chamorro, and Korean students, (oh yeah, and one Russian), with no immediate plans for a graduate program, and with a frequently postponed life plan.
But that's okay. I've always like the number 27, and that seems like a great age to finish a graduate program.
*At Oxford; Balliol, to be specific, where I could meet the love of my high-school life, Peter Wimsey.
Life dreams were a big thing for me. It wasn't the career so much that I obsessed about. I've known ever since I was about 5 that I've wanted to teach and write for a living. (To clarify: Once, for about a month, I wanted to be a virtuoso violinist, but then I realized I lacked the technical ability or the ambition. And then there was my constant fascination with being a spy. It had nothing to do with an interest in gadgetry or adventure; I just have always wanted the balance of information to tip on my side). Anyway, my life goals, then, were often time and location goals.
From the ages of 10-16 (circa), my life plan looked like this.
Graduate from high school one year early.
Go to college at 17
Graduate at 20
Go to grad school at 21* (same year as graduation; it's how my birthday falls), and finish the summer before I turn 23.
 |
| Ah, 23. What a magical number you were. |
Somewhere in the middle of high school I decided I wasn't going college a year early. I didn't even want to. So the life plan got pushed back a little. But that was okay, I'd still be halfway done with my graduate program, and looking out for the career of my life.
Then, the summer before my freshman year in college, I decided to go through college attempting two majors. Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, I wasn't going to be shoving that into four years. Four and a half years was the smallest amount of time I could manage, so I knew I was going to graduate a semester before I turned twenty-three.
That's okay, I told myself, graduating from college is an epochal moment, and twenty-five is not a bad age to finish a first masters. Then there's a doctorate, of course, but that's the kind of schooling appropriate at any age.
And then somewhere in the last year or two of my college education, I decided that I wanted to travel more, see the world, and experience new cultures. The masters program could wait until I got back.
So here I am, in Saipan, having just graduated from college, teaching English to a bunch of Chinese, Chamorro, and Korean students, (oh yeah, and one Russian), with no immediate plans for a graduate program, and with a frequently postponed life plan.
But that's okay. I've always like the number 27, and that seems like a great age to finish a graduate program.
*At Oxford; Balliol, to be specific, where I could meet the love of my high-school life, Peter Wimsey.
05 September 2010
The Greatest Story That Happened to Me Ever
During my two weeks of ESL camp, I taught a Taiwanese girl whose English name was Vicky. She was pretty shy and cute, about 11 or 12, and obsessed with Chinese pop music and Justin Bieber. One day, during a break, I noticed her reading a familiar-looking book, albiet in Chinese. Upon closer examination I discovered that, yes, it was New Moon. I have read the first two Twilight books, so I thought I would ask her about it.
"Do you like that?" I asked, "I've read that. In English, of course," I added.
Her eyes got so big and she started excitedly asking me about it. I tried telling her the names of the series in English, and tried to ask if she was more Team Jacob than Edward, but then we ran out of time, and class had to begin. It was the last time I thought about the encounter until . . .
The next morning, as I'm coming in, Vicky was sitting with her guardian-for-the-trip, an older Taiwanese girl who was observing the English teachers. All of a sudden they both started chattering at me in a mix of Chinese and English. But one sentence came through.
"You wrote this!" (holding up a copy of New Moon)
Well, that explains the huge eyes.
"No," I explained, with enormous shaking of my head, "No, I just read it. That's all."
They didn't believe me.
"See," I pointed to the picture of Stephanie Meyer, and then to my own face, "This is not me."
"Oh, so you translated the book?"
"No, I can't speak a word of another language. I just read it. In English. Everyone reads it where I'm from."
The older girl caught on. "Oh, yes, it's very popular in Taiwan."
The next day or so, Vicky came to me during a break time and asked me to sign her book. I sat down, and once again, compared my face with Stephanie Meyer.
"This isn't me, you understand. I didn't write this."
She nodded her head.
"I just want you to sign it," she said, once again offering the book with a plaintive face.
I sighed, and signed,
"Dear Vicky,
I'm so glad we've read the same book in a different language!
YOUR TEACHER, RuthAnn Ledgerwood
(emphasis added in my mind only)
So, was that the end?
No.
A couple days later, in Writing class, the students had to write a letter to me. Vicky sent this letter to me that said,
"I like your books very much. You are a very good writer. Can you tell me where to get them in English? Taiwan doesn't have very many English bookstores."
"Try Amazon.com," I told her.
"Do you like that?" I asked, "I've read that. In English, of course," I added.
Her eyes got so big and she started excitedly asking me about it. I tried telling her the names of the series in English, and tried to ask if she was more Team Jacob than Edward, but then we ran out of time, and class had to begin. It was the last time I thought about the encounter until . . .
The next morning, as I'm coming in, Vicky was sitting with her guardian-for-the-trip, an older Taiwanese girl who was observing the English teachers. All of a sudden they both started chattering at me in a mix of Chinese and English. But one sentence came through.
"You wrote this!" (holding up a copy of New Moon)
Well, that explains the huge eyes.
"No," I explained, with enormous shaking of my head, "No, I just read it. That's all."
They didn't believe me.
"See," I pointed to the picture of Stephanie Meyer, and then to my own face, "This is not me."
"Oh, so you translated the book?"
"No, I can't speak a word of another language. I just read it. In English. Everyone reads it where I'm from."
The older girl caught on. "Oh, yes, it's very popular in Taiwan."
The next day or so, Vicky came to me during a break time and asked me to sign her book. I sat down, and once again, compared my face with Stephanie Meyer.
"This isn't me, you understand. I didn't write this."
She nodded her head.
"I just want you to sign it," she said, once again offering the book with a plaintive face.
I sighed, and signed,
"Dear Vicky,
I'm so glad we've read the same book in a different language!
YOUR TEACHER, RuthAnn Ledgerwood
(emphasis added in my mind only)
So, was that the end?
No.
A couple days later, in Writing class, the students had to write a letter to me. Vicky sent this letter to me that said,
"I like your books very much. You are a very good writer. Can you tell me where to get them in English? Taiwan doesn't have very many English bookstores."
"Try Amazon.com," I told her.
30 August 2010
Lost in Translation, 1
My two weeks of teaching were for ESL Camp. The camp was dwindling in numbers, so the last week I actually taught by myself, to a group of kids from about 7-16. Their English levels were completely different, so it was a bit of a challenge, and they weren't exactly motivated in any way, but overall it was a good experience.
On the first day of the last week, I had the students write me a letter about themselves. One of the oldest boys (about 16) whose English was also the worst wrote me this:
"You are tall and skin white. You are common."
I actually have no idea whether he meant that as an insult or a compliment. I'm not sure anyone really could know. But I do know, that although I have been called many insulting things, I've never felt quite so insulted as when he called me common. What does that say about me???
I don't know, do you think Koreans consider commonness positive?
On the first day of the last week, I had the students write me a letter about themselves. One of the oldest boys (about 16) whose English was also the worst wrote me this:
"You are tall and skin white. You are common."
I actually have no idea whether he meant that as an insult or a compliment. I'm not sure anyone really could know. But I do know, that although I have been called many insulting things, I've never felt quite so insulted as when he called me common. What does that say about me???
I don't know, do you think Koreans consider commonness positive?
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