Click on the image and it gets bigger.... it's even better when it's full size!Yesterday I invited my class to my house for a little party. We didn't have school because it was "ISE day". I thought it would be fun to visit with my students outside of class. Also, they have been so wonderful to me throughout the semester and I thought it would be nice to entertain them at my house. About 16 of my 25 students were able to make it. Some of them live far away and some of them have to work, but the turn-out was great!
For the occasion I made pizzas, banana bread, cookies, and brownies. My students each brought something to eat as well. We had tons of food! I had students bring bean dishes, couscous, cakes, rice, and much more. I was great.
My students showed up at 11am. Cape Verdeans have specific things that they do at parties, so I just sat back and enjoyed the events as they took over. First we played several games including charades. Then after about 2 hours of game playing and waiting for everyone to show up, it was time to eat. Everyone ate and drank lots. After eating everyone sat in a big circle and they took turns telling jokes and funny antecdotes. This was great because they were telling stories in Crioulu which helped me learn more words. After about an hour of story telling they began to clean up. Now this was an impressive production. First, they put on some really good dance music, then the boys grabbed brooms and dustpans and started sweeping and dancing all at the same time. The girls took to doing the dishes and divying up the food. Within about 20 minutes everything was sparkling clean and before everyone left, they had to DANCE. The boys and girls all danced for a bit and even got me in on the fun. It was a blast. I love hanging out with my students and getting to know them. It was great to speak to them in Creole rather than English for a change.
Well, in two weeks, they are throwing a "jamaica" party/dinner, and I am invited! I'm extremely excited about this! It should be a blast! I'll be sure to let you know how this all goes!
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, so I hope you are all spending Turkey day with those you love. I wish I were in America now to see everyone. It's hard to be soooo far away on the holidays. Miss you.... txau, ti logo.
2 comments:
Casey,
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! It is 7am here in Colorado, and for some strange reason I am wide awake. I must be looking forward to eating Thanksgiving dinner (if you can call a meal at 1 pm a "dinner"), trying to digest the 4500 calorie meal (no joke), and then watching the Broncos kick the Cowboys' arses at 2pm (hence the 1pm dinner I mandated upon my mother).
Things are going well here. I only have two weeks of school left, and I am well ahead on grading, so all I have left is the commemorative speech to grade (which we all know is a joke) and the final (which we all know sucks).
Speaking of school, I am ranked number 1 in my spanish class.
In other news, a recent poll at CSU shows that 90% of all undergrads HATE older non-trads who come to class everyday, study ahead of time, and know all the answers to everything.
Moving on...
We are doing Christmas at Tyler's house this year. I am trying to buy people cool presents but without spending a shit-ton of money. Hello used bookstore, or possible that favorite charity of George Costanza, "The Human Fund".
One of the reasons for my scrooge-ish approach is that I am going to have to spend about $2000 on my car getting it fixed and up-to-date. That wouldn't be that bad I guess, except for the fact that I will be parking my car for the next 6 months.
Actually, spending $2000 to fix a car ALWAYS sucks.
The other reason I need to save money (and the reason I am parking the car) is that I recently booked tickets to Costa Rica. I am heading down there Jan 10th to go teach english (again) and to continue aprendiendo espanol. I also want to surf, hike, scuba, travel, and so on.
Hopefully I don't catch malaria or anything. Of course, I could stand to lose a few pounds, so maybe a little dose of it couldn't hurt.
Also, I am hoping to have carnal relations with one of those unbelievably hot latina women I always see on Telemundo and Univision.
Speaking of carnal relations...
In other news, my friend Jack had ANOTHER baby (boy) with ANOTHER young woman that he doesn't really like and will soon lose yet ANOTHER relationship with one of his Babies' Mamas.
Taylor started his own company and is making like $300k a year. He bought a brand new (beautiful) house RIGHT NEXT DOOR to Dave & Carrie's brand new house. Carrie is thrilled to death (I write that with a hint of sarcasm). Did I tell you that Carrie is on bed-rest due to complications in her pregnancy?
Did I also tell you that not only is Carrie pregnant, she is also now exceedingly fat and lazy?
Well, sorry to hear that you keep breaking things. Hopefully, since things run in "threes", you are done with that. If it is any consolation, I recently broke my favorite Barry Manilow, Michael Bolton, John Tesh, and David Hasselhoff greatest hit CD collection.
Well, I am off to go do a three mile run so that I can
a) freeze my clams off
b) get blisters on my feet
c) re-aggravate old high school football injuries (god I was a STAR then)
d) improve my chances of not feeling guilty about a glutenous day of celebrating the pilgrims ingenious idea of tricking those CRAZY RED SAVAGES* into teaching those Crackers how to plant some corn so that all us honkies wouldn't die so that we could later
A. give those CRAZY RED SAVAGES* cozy blankets infested with smallpocks
B. shoot all their buffalo
C. give them PRIME real estate in such exotic locales as S. Dakota and Utah
D. Name all our sports teams after them
Well, happy thanksgiving!!!!
*Note to all my Native Brothers: I use the term CRAZY RED SAVAGES with only slightly racist undertones and mostly sarcastic overtones.
Love,
Kurt N
(THE CRAZY WHITE SAVAGE)
www.insanederanged.blogspot.com
Hi Casey!
Happy Thanksgiving :). We will send you some fried turkey. Hmmmmm... fried. You know that is really American. We miss you.
jILL, Madison, and Mary
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