lens crafter

Do you think your Wu_Tang sword can defeat me?

Ghost face, that's what I have. Allways showing up and diseappering. My latest act was at CNELA teaching English again. It was lots of fun. I think I need to stick closer to the curriculum next time, because though my students had about average test scores, I can do a lot better. One of my students did get one of the highest scores so I am proud of him and also of the rest of my students, even those who didn't pass. Because each of them made an effort to learn something, and it was my fault if what they learned from me didn't help with the exam. I hope it helps in a different way.

We had a party on Wednesday. It was a great party. They served duck. Each person in the hall stood up to introduce themselves. I copied the format everyone used so I could say I my name and my job in Malagasy. There is a sort of begining dance at the begining of a celebration. I participated. There was a gift exchange. I got a ceramic pink elephant. I just gave the elepant to two girls who play outside near my apartment. After the party I went to a bar with a teacher and his friend. I was pretty inspired by the faith of the teacher in the US. He said that he is glad the US polices the world. The US put liberty first and is therefore supported by God. That is why, he says, I shouldn't fear our decline.

We met some Peace Corps Volunteers. They seemed pretty nice but they left to meet someone, inviting us to tag along. I talked to a British guy for a while. He just finished some kind of management gig down near Toliar. He left for the UK yesterday, on Thursday the 19th of Dec. So after talking to him, we did catch the PCVs, who were pretty nice. Some were new, some old, most younger than me. I talked to the brother of my colleague's friend in French. We talked about girls here. Like, I have to learn Malagasy before finding a girlfriend. He didn't really agree, because a girl to whom I am close could teach me Malagasy. I still feel like prudence is the best policy at this juncture. After, the teacher went home to his wife, and I went to another bar with the PCVs. There were a lot of foreingers and beautiful Malagasy girls. I guess it was pretty obvious what was going on. I tried my best to speak Malagasy, but eventually my headache took my outside to catch a cab.

Anyway, Merry Christmas, gj to New Mexico on same sex marriage legalization, and be calm come the new year to Washington and Colorado. I'll be 60 clicks north of Tana trying to learn Malagasy soon! Is it weird that the only songs to which I know the lyrics are from Disney movies? I guess the party was on Wednesday and today is Friday the 20th. It is a holiday because of voting. So give your best wishes for the future of Madagascar.

I can't believe I still intend to watch Naruto after the Chikara arc, which completely clashes with both Bee's training of Naruto and the war prepartions in which Konoha failed to mention Kabuto to its Allies.

Other random tidbits. I am using a distro of linux whose default default audio player is a video player and even when you open a file with no video it opens a window and plays the song. But i am like having enough of songs before there over and closing the window, but i obviously dont stop the song first because that should just sort of come along with closing the window, otherwise i would be minimizing it wouldnt i? the song keeps playing... on the flipside, i learned that if i just hold the cursor over the icon of an audio file, it starts playing after a few seconds, and stops when i move the cursor off of the icon.

I finally finished Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics by John Lyons. The beginning was super interesting, since it came packed with fun language quirks and had plenty of examples. As the book goes on, the clarity decreases as the number of examples goes down. It is pretty useless after the stuff of Chomsky. I started it in May and read the first four hundred pages by like July when I took it to SEC and talked with Jonathan and Renee's wife's older brother. Like, flying planes are dangerous and flying planes is dangerous. Or eating apples is healthy and eating apples are healthy, but not the ones that are like the one given to Snow White. The whole idea of deep structure vs surface structure seems like there is stuff we don't understand and stuff we do understand.

I watched 8 Diagrams Pole Fighter, Five Deadly Venoms, and The 36 Chambers of Shaolin. The last is by far the best. It tells the story of someone who learns kung fu to fight injustice. Of course, despite his late start, he turns out to be a prodigy and is held in high regard by the other monks.

Base

So guys, I am not sure what the reason is, but I am really starting to enjoy life here. Part of it is taking internet courses on computer science. Of course, I could do that anywhere. But here, the internet connection is dicey on the best days. Like, I am writing this offline, dicey. So it is a bit challenging just to have the chance to complete the lessons.

Another thing that is OK is that my roommate and I have come to a bit of an agreement. I buy a lot of the food and keep the kitchen clean, and he lets me by with less than half the rent. Thanks to mom's packages, we have exchanged movies. He is a good listener but doesn't like to speak about his work.

Some areas here, especially the alleys, are like, is there a war going on, bad. Lots of people her know my name. And I mean like some people whom I don't recognize shout my name as I walk. I am a bit afraid to talk about a book while I am reading it, but a sort of guru character in the book Infinite Jest says to be careful not to attract more than your own weight.

In other news, some students thanked me for teaching them at the end of the last class. It made me feel good like it sort of dissolved some anger I accumulated trying to be interesting for three months. Teaching was mostly fun, but I did sort of fall into habits that weren't so productive. So I am really happy that some students forgave me for this.

The teachers are pretty supportive. But Zoely stands out: she gives me lots of suggestions and she even lets me use her photocopies. It is great because it helps me deliver some things that the students expect.

I plan to go to Tsarasoatra later this month, to the home of one of Zoely's cousins. It is 60km north of Tana and there is a taxi bus stop within walking distance of the town. The rice harvest is coming up, but in Tsarasoatra rice is only planeted once a year so it wont be planted again until later in 2014 than I am able to stay due to my contract with the school. I plan on staying there for a part of the break in teaching from Dec 19 to mid April.

There is also wushu, which is fun in a big way. I get to listen to instructions in Malagasy. The master doesn't give us much time, but there are a few students who are leagues better than me. There is a good crowd there every weekend. We practice Saturday all day and Sunday morning. I am petitioning for a Wednesday afternoon session because a five day lapse leaves me wrecked when the training starts.