Yesterday Morning we took the 2 children to school for their first day back in School. As we sat in the gymnasium, I made a few observations that I hadn’t thought about before. My son, having just come from school in China had never seen a drinking fountain before, so he and his sister were fascinated by this, for about 30 minutes. They kept going back to drink every 2 minutes while we waited for a teacher to come and sort him into his class. He was shocked to find soap and a hand blow dryer on the wall of the bathroom. Now the school I left in China did have bottles of soap, but they were not fastened to the wall. So he thought this was cool.

Then it occurred to me that my son will be going to school for 3 hours less than when he was in China. While living in Beijing, We had to have him at school by 7:00, and he left school after 4:00. His new school he has to be at by 8:30, and he leaves at 2:30. So outside activities can commence. The playgrounds have about a dozen swings and 3 or 4 slides. His Chinese school had neither slide nor swings. (They both had jungle gyms)

And in other news…

Last Update, I told you I had been given a job. Well that job had fallen through. They decided to keep me as a teacher on call, but did not bother to inform me of this. I went to the school on Saturday morning to get my schedule for the week and discovered that I had none.

So. Yesterday a good friend of mine drove me to some Warehousing agencies, and I put my applications in there. I can work the days I want with most of them. While out I dropped by 2 ESL colleges  I happen to see, and they were both very impressed with my info. 1 Wanted me to do a trial class in Richmond at a later date. Then today I went to Richmond for a 3rd school’s interview, they want me to do a test class tomorrow afternoon (3~5pm) at their Surrey Branch.

I have been thinking about checking if there is 1/2 day work tomorrow for warehousing available, but I think I will use that time to prepare for the class now….

On Monday I had a very promising Interview, 2 actually. First part of the interview process I had to go to Kitsilano, an uptown section of Vancouver City, which takes about 2 hrs to get to from my house in Surrey. I got there, early, found the place and talked to the head office. They made me take an S.A.T. (Reading and Writing section) First thing I noticed was the archaic vocabulary used in the test. They were checking my grammar, but used words that, even after 16 years of teaching English, I had never heard of before. I had to infer the meaning from the context, which is something I have become pretty good at.

I then was asked to go to the local office of the company, for the 2nd half of the interview The local branch of the company is 1 block away from my house. So back I went to Surrey. I talked to the manager there. They want me to start on Monday. The manager mentioned that they would start me off as part time, but if the students liked me that they would supply more classes. And where are the majority of my new students from? China and Korea.

Yesterday I took my children to the School playground, because they had earned some fun time out. On the way to the school play ground we saw a group of teachers sitting outside the school, as they were on strike. My 2 Children decided they wanted to go talk to the teachers, and so we went up and talked to them. They informed me that as of 5am that morning the two sides (BCTF & The Province) had come to an agreement, and would be voting on it on Thursday.

Excellent, My children who have been anxiously awaiting the start of their first year of school in Canada. Their friends in China have been in school for nearly 3 weeks now. They are so excited.

My daughter turns 5 years old tomorrow. Unfortunately all we are doing tomorrow is Pizza Night. However, This Saturday the 20th is the opening of an indoor playground at the Guilford mall. (According to the very nice janitorial staff, my wife talked to ) So we will be there, Contact me to find out when, if you want to join us.

Have a great day.