Something Odd, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Huge

 Something Odd: Why is there a bunk bed frame upright in the hallway? you ask. Well, this was the result of our hour-long attempt to move it from my bedroom to the guest room. The next day a power drill did the job in 5 mins.

 Something New: Living out of a suitcase. I've done it while on vacation - not the most fun, but you deal because you aren't at home. Now I am at home and am living out of a suitcase. We don't have shelves or dressers... It works. After a while, you kind of forget.

Something borrowed: Our refrigerator. It's almost full! Pretty exciting stuff, for sure. Nice to have food in the house. =)

 Something Huge: An avocado. Yes, for all of you who know what an avocado is, feast your eyes on this monster! It's not the same kind grown in Fallbrook, CA. It tastes great and is simply the largest thing I've ever seen. Makes great guacamole, too.

Ready for school!

That's right - tomorrow is the first day of school for St. John's Lutheran School! Are we ready? Sure... about as ready as we will ever be. We have been attending faculty meetings since Tuesday, August 16. Items on the agenda have included the faculty handbook, the school calendar, the division of duties between our principal and vice principal, school-wide procedures, management for the first days of school, and many other things. Our school visitor, Mr. Landwehr, has been here since Sunday evening, helping us to prepare for the first day of school. He will be here until Friday when he will go home to St. Lucia. He visits us once a month to observe us in the classroom, give us constructive criticism on where we do well and where we can improve. He is very knowledgeable and is a pleasure to work with.

Classroom library

Student cubbies and textbook shelf

Desks are ready!!!

My desk - I only have one drawer, so
I will have to keep the top very neat.

I have taken much time to prepare my classroom for the start of school. I have been at school, Monday-Friday, for the last 4 weeks, cleaning, sorting, tossing junk, planning, making copies, creating bulletin boards... you name it. I averaged 7-8 hours a day, some more, some less.

Thursday, August 25 was Parent Orientation. All school parents were expected to attend. We began with a devotion and meeting in church. The faculty was introduced and Deputy Principal Mrs. James strongly reminded all parents about the requirements for student uniforms. After this, parents went to the classroom of their children where they filled out registration information and were briefed by the teacher on expectations for the year. Policy here is that if the parents/guardians did not show for Orientation, their child would not be allowed to attend the first day of school! We have had a grace period up through today (Wednesday) to let parents come in and register. On Thursday, I only had 16 families show. Since then, 10 have come in and I found out that 2 will not be returning (would have been nice to know before yesterday...). As of this afternoon, only one child is not registered. I am grateful because that means less hassle for me as parents come in the morning, wanting to register their child. I am also grateful that tomorrow is a half day - I can teach some procedures, get supplies put away, and then let the children out so I can collect my thoughts on the day.

          Here is the theme for our school year, based on Philippians 1:27. We will even have song, written by a member of the congregation, serve us through the year.

                   

Here are some of the little posters in my classroom, helping to highlight procedures that, Lord willing, will make the day to day operation run more smoothly so we can focus on learning and not on what we should (or should not) be doing. We will see how things go! That's what the first days of school are for.

Tropical Storm Irene

Just wanted to let you all know...

There was a tropical storm, misnamed Irene, that came through the Caribbean this past weekend. Sunday am from midnight to 8 the wind and rain was pretty constant. Church attendance was 17 and members had called us to warn us to stay inside to avoid the storm. Classrooms got some water, but no damage was done. I believe there were no major problems on the island. We have definitely had a lot of rain this week, but we are all safe and well. I understand the storm has become a hurricane and now is State-side. I must say I am very grateful that most of the systems that come through the Caribbean don't gather strength until they pass Antigua. I pray it will continue to be so. Prayers are with those who are taking the blast of these storms.

Adventures in the World of Food

Moving out on your own can be an interesting adventure if you are not accustomed to cooking all your meals all the time. Food is one of those essential things for life, oddly enough. And, believe it or not, the food in America is super convenient and reasonably priced– the stores, the packages, everything. When one moves to another country, things have a good chance of being different. Case and point: there are 2 grocery stores that similar to grocery stores in the States. (Unfortunately, as we don’t have a car, Julie and I beg rides from Pastor or couple the outing with other errands we are running around town.) Food is more expensive here; the more processed and packaged it is, the higher the price. Frozen pizza? Around $4. A dozen eggs? Around $3.50. Peanut butter? Don’t ask… We were told that eating Antiguan consisted of eating a lot of chicken, rice, and beans (the chicken and rice being a run-on joke I have had since high school, thank you Izzy). So, our first outing to the grocery store, we bought 10 lbs of frozen chicken breasts, two bags of frozen veggies, a bag of rice, a bag of black beans, some bananas, a few apples, some oatmeal, a gallon of milk, a dozen eggs, and some cooking oil. That and some cleaning supplies brought our first grocery bill to 216 E.C. (Eastern Caribbean dollars), roughly $90 US. Mom generously bought 4 giant jars of PB before we left the States, and Pastor and Mrs. Johnston had some frosted flakes and bread waiting for us in our refrigerator.

Our first night of cooking, I cooked rice (without directions), boiled chicken breasts, and cooked some frozen veggies. We hadn’t really thought of seasonings or anything of that nature while we were shopping. The result was a healthy, yet bland, first meal. Lunches were (and still are) a peanut butter sandwich and a banana. Before Mom left, she had walked to a market not far from our house, purchased some onion, tomato, salt, pepper, and all-purpose seasoning. Yay for flavor!

Julie and I try to think of different things to do with chicken, rice, and beans. We cut up and fry different veggies to go with the chicken. Week 2 we purchased garlic powder (awesome stuff), green pepper, salsa, and some limes. A neighbor had given us a large (and I mean huge) avocado. Our next adventures included different ways of frying up the chicken to keep in more moist, fried bananas, banana pancakes, cooking black beans, scrambled eggs for dinner, French toast, homemade guacamole and homemade tortillas . Biggest success? Guacamole! The avocado was the best I have ever tasted, and the limes were perfectly tart and juicy. Biggest challenge? Black beans! Again, there were no directions at all as to how to cook the black beans. After a failed attempt, I asked Yvonne, our landlady, how she cooks them. Well, turns out after you have soaked them for a few hours, you need to cook the beans on a low heat for 45-60 mins. Long time! So we have taken to cooking large amounts of rice, beans, and chicken and having them on hand to reheat. Coming in a close second for a challenge was the tortillas. They were rather sticky through the mixing and kneading, and we lack certain kitchen utensils that would ease the process – simple things like measuring cups, measuring spoons, and a rolling pin. Our tortillas ended up a little thick… Hopefully we will soon find a rolling pin and try again.

Eating out: shawarma – a Syrian wrap consisting of shaved meat (usually chicken), cabbage, hot sauce, ketchup, some other stuff, all in pita. Good stuff. Subway! Normally their 6” subs start around $6, but after 5pm every day, they have a sub of the month you can get as a $5 footlong! We get a footlong each. eat half, and save the other half for lunch the next day. We tried a deli near the house – prices weren’t too bad and the food was good. There is also a Chinese restaurant (very tiny) near our house that is known for it’s fried chicken and French fries. Good stuff!

This week we purchased groceries in bulk so that we could maybe not make so many trips to the big grocery store. (We do make frequent trips to the market nearby for bread and bananas.) This time we got pasta and pasta sauce, more salsa, BBQ sauce, Cajun seasoning, cheese, ingredients for chicken salad and splurged on tortilla chips and off-brand Oreos. =) The possibilities, while not nearly endless, are expanding pleasantly.

The one other quirk involves the environment. Ants really, really like to get in. Any foodstuff left out and not vacuumed sealed is immediately converged upon. This includes rice, flour, unwashed dishes, cooking oil… I fought a hard battle with ants the first week, spraying wherever I found them entering. We do dishes every night (rinse whatever dishes we may have during the day). And… we keep everything in the fridge. The flour, the rice, the beans, the salt, pepper, and seasonings, the bread, the peanut butter, the sugar, everything. The only thing not in the fridge or freezer is the cooking oil (we scared the ants away!). Maybe by the time we leave, we will be able to keep the rice and flour out, too…

Beautiful country and more

My tour buddies, Julie Boggs and Annie Scharf

A view of the jeep from the back

A church in one of the towns

Beautiful countryside

A panorama of the southern part of the island

At the donkey sanctuary

The sugar mill at Betty's Hope

A view of the exchange islands, small islands off the coast sitting between
the Caribbean Sea at Atlantic Ocean

Making friends with one of the drivers, Colin

Saturday Julie and I joined Annie Scharf (sister to Pastor Johnston's wife, Cindy) on an Island Safari around the island of Antigua. Rode in a jeep down to the southern part of the island, then up to a donkey sanctuary, a  historic sugar mill. Then we went out to some mangrove islands where we did some kayaking, out to Great Bird Island where we did some snorkeling and saw both the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean at the same time. The whole day was just beautiful! It was kind of fun to get out and see the country. On the way back our jeep stalled in the middle of the road. Pastor Johnston was nearby and was able to pick us up while our driver, Bill, had to wait for his buddies to come at get the jeep started. As Pastor was dropping us off at home, he said, "And tomorrow. Oh, by the way, you will be installed tomorrow." Oh! Good to know...

Sunday at church, Grady Robert Johnston was baptized into God's family. Later in the service, Miss Julie Boggs and Miss Nicole Rosenbaum were installed as teachers at St. John's Lutheran School, St. John's, Antigua. I got someone to video it, but I haven't quite figured out how to get the file onto this blog (something about a server error while it was loading). Maybe it will eventually find its way up. Sunday afternoon, Julie and I spent the better part of an hour trying to move half of a bunk bed frame from my room to the spare room. Got it out into the hallway but needed power tools to take it apart to get it in the other room. (Our handyman Elvis was able to do it Monday afternoon in about 5 mins.) Then we got a call from Pastor - had we made any plans to celebrate our installation? No, we were just sitting at home. Well, would we like to come over for a grill out? Sure. At the Johnston's we had burgers and dogs and enjoyed the company of Pastor Richards, Pastor Sternhagen and his family, and the Johnstons. It was a very nice evening.

Monday was back to work at school. Monday evening I was working at school, labeling books. I was planning to call some people on Skype while I was doing this mindless work, only to find out that the microphone on my webcam wasn't working! Long story short, I believe I have worn out the mic wire from carrying the camera around too much. Dear friend MyKayla is in FL and is kind enough to do some shopping for me to send me a new one. Don't know how long it will take to get down here... Bummer that I already ruined the camera and there isn't a Best Buy nearby to replace it. Guess I will just have to be much more careful. (Almost forgot: the exciting purchases of today were a 5lb bag of brown sugar and a case of 24 rolls of TP!)

Tuesday was our first faculty meeting. The meetings here are so very different from any I have experienced in the States. Here people show up half an hour late, speak their mind (very strongly at times) whenever they want, sometimes even talking over others who are speaking. There is no disrespect meant... It is just how they do things. Wednesday was working on bulletin boards in my classroom, and today (Thursday) was another meeting to go over the school calendar. Was treated to some local fruits by my teacher, Mrs. Titus (she is the grade 2 teacher whose classroom I am taking for the year). I have never seen them before, but they sure are sweet!

Friday evening we have an invite to the Sternhagens' for dinner. The people here are just wonderful, always checking up on us, making sure everything is going alright. It is truly a blessing to get to know these people.

My house

My new home!

Our front porch

My bedroom (although, the bed with the light colored sheets will be moved  to the spare bedroom soon)

Other view of my room, my picture wall, and the windows, made of glass (or in this case, metal) slats
that can be opened with a crank to let air in

Julie's room

Spare bedroom

Dining room

Living room

Kitchen! One of the most important rooms in the house!

So, here is where I live. Pretty nice, isn't it?! There is tile throughout the house, many windows which all have screens, and clean white walls. Some interesting things about our home?

Some of the screens had holes at first, so those were letting in the mosquitoes. Fixed now, so that is a blessing. Our oven doesn't work because it is missing a part. Stove works, though, so another blessing. Ants appear out of nowhere, so all of our food, including flour, rice, oatmeal, salt, pepper, bananas, are all in the refrigerator. We wash dishes as soon as they are dirty and wipe down the counters very carefully every night so we don't invite the little things back.

Our living room has nice clean white walls but no pictures (with the exception of a little one Mom received as a gift on her tour, which she is kindly loaning us for the year). We need to find things to decorate!

We don't have hot water... It would seem like a big deal but there are 2 benefits: 1) it is so warm and sticky right now, it is quite refreshing to take a cool shower 2) it takes quite a bit of expensive electricity to heat the water so we are saving money! and 3) the tap water is much warmer than it is in the States, so sometimes you don't notice it. (I know I did 3 benefits, just for fun!)

We used to have gaps under our doors to the outside, letting in some lizards, but those have been fixed with boards nailed to the bottom, so no more of those visiting us.

Our neighbors have goats and roosters. If you are like me, that equals not sleeping in very late =)

The windows are slats that are similar to the slats of blinds, but much broader. They are nice to open and let the air in as long as you have screens in place to keep outside outside. The burglar bars you see over the windows are to protect from hurricanes, not thieves. We can't stop the wind and rain from breaking windows, but we can use the bars to prevent tree limbs and other debris from coming in and damaging the rooms.

We do have a spare bedroom and the couch in the living room pulls out. Want to come and visit?

Back of my classroom, in the process of cleaning and sorting out everything.

Side of my classroom with windows and screens

Side of my classroom that has cinderblock windows, open air (no screens) all the time, so we do get
creepy, crawly visitors from time to time

Front of my classroom: white board, black board, and 2 plywood bulletin boards

The door to 2nd grade!

View of the back of church from my classroom

The building housing gr 1-6 and the school office

The belltower in the lawn in front of church

St. John's Lutheran Church, Antigua

View of the harbor where the cruise ships dock, from the lawn of church

View from the lawn of church, looking into the valley

Church office, belltower, and church building

Ok, here are some pictures of my new church and school. I spent the last week, cleaning and sorting my classroom to get it in shape for the new school year, starting on Sept. 1. On Tuesday, August 16, we will begin meeting together as a faculty. I am excited/nervous... There is so much to do to prepare for the new year, and I do not know any of my students! Soon I will and things will settle into a routine. Friday afternoon, we received the workbooks that accompany the A Beka curriculum. I have 31 workbooks for 9 different purposes. So many books! And in the past, the 2nd grade teacher has kept the workbooks at school to minimize the chance of the books or their tear out pages being lost or forgotten at home. If I continue this, I will be hard put to find room for nearly 300 workbooks in my classroom!

I hope to soon post pictures of my clean classroom, with the beginnings of the new bulletin boards.

First week down...

Hello All!

Saturday, July 30 - I was at the airport in LA at 4:00am, checking in with 2 bags weighing 46 and 47 pounds, a roller duffel for the plane, and my laptop. Managed to sleep through most of my first flight (to Miami) and about half of my second flight (to San Juan, PR). Met Julie in the airport there where we waited for our plane to take us to Antigua. For some reason or another, it was delayed about an hour. That was OK for us, but I felt bad for my mom who was already in Antigua, waiting for us to arrive as she had come down on a different airline. When we arrived, we were met by a wonderful lady, a mother of a fourth grader enrolled in our school, who works immigration at the airport. Mom had been waiting for 8 hours outside of customs because she did not have an address for where we would be staying. We got through immigration and customs easily, and Pastor Andrew Johnston and his wife Cindy were there, ready to take us to our new home.

Sunday, July 31 - Worship at St. John's Lutheran Church is quite an experience. Lots of music (including steel pan!), very personal message in the sermon, friendly greetings from all the members, very liturgical with Antiguan flair. Julie and I have decided this will be our favorite part of the week! Went to the Johnston's for lunch, met daughters Aida(4) and Sienna(2), and Cindy's sister, Annie Scharf. After a lovely afternoon of visiting and getting acquainted, Cindy took us to First Choice, a grocery store, for us to get some food in the house. Everything in Antigua is expensive because everything is imported. The more processed and packaged it is, the more expensive. A box of cereal (off-brand, frosted flakes) runs close to $6 American. Mom was amazing, helping Julie and I figure out what essentials we should buy first and then said she would treat us this once, but she wouldn't be taking us out to eat =)

Monday, August 1 - Fighting the lizards, ants, cockroaches, and mosquitoes has become routine. One of our purchases was ant spray which we use regularly. Monday morning Julie was already going up to school to meet with her teacher, Mrs Greaux (pronounced Greer), so Mom and I went wandering around the neighborhood, trying to get acquainted with the area. We walked up the hill to school and around and down and around... In the afternoon, fellow MLC student and friend Joey Molyneaux took us to Dickinson Bay to go to the beach. For dinner, I tried cooking chicken, rice, and frozen veggies. Fairly successful, however we had no spices (not even salt), so dinner was a little plain.

Tuesday, August 2 - Julie, Mom and I got drafted to help Joey paint some of the classrooms at school. Joey had taught for a few years at St. John's before going up to MLC and will be the principal when he graduates this next May, so he was doing a lot to help St. John's look fresh and clean. In the afternoon, landlady Yvonne Joseph came over to visit and tell us about herself and the people of Antigua. In the evening, Joey took me and Julie into town (St. John, the capital and only real major city of Antigua) to see Captain America. Mon-Wed, the movies in town are very reasonably priced. That was a fun experience, hearing how the people of Antigua talk through the movie, just thoroughly enjoying themselves. For dinner we went to a Syrian restaurant (there is a considerable Syrian population in Antigua, including some of our neighbors), and had his favorite food: schwerma. Ok, I didn't spell that right. Basically, chicken, lettuce, tomatoes, a bunch of sauces, wrapped in pita. Very good.

Wednesday, August 3 - I was supposed to meet with my teacher, Mrs. Titus, at school. I didn't know when she was coming in, so Mr. Samuel, our school volunteer handyman, let me in the classroom where I proceed to sweep and dust for a good 3 hours. Mom was wandering through town... I met Mrs. Titus in the afternoon and we decided we would get to work the next morning because Julie and I were meeting with Pastor to become more acquainted with Antigua, the church and school history, and what our roles are for the year. Pastor then dropped us off in town to explore and find places to get phones (a company called LIME, does prepaid SIM cards...) and internet (still working on that as neither Julie nor I have Antigua social security numbers...). We managed to make it back home without getting lost! Then at 7, we went over to church for Family Bible and Game Night. Met some new people, showed off Grandpa Rosenbaum's card trick to the utter amazement of the teenage boys... Lots of fun!

Thursday, August 4 - Spent a lot of time learning about the A Beka curriculum used here. The teachers here really don't like it at all. I have yet to really understand it... I know cousin Amanda uses it and likes it, my dad is not fond of it. The major bummer at first glance (ok, 2 bummers) are that it is an American curriculum trying to teach Caribbean children and everything seems a little disjointed and not super coherent. Oh well... Joey took us to Fort Bay to visit another beach. For dinner, Julie tried a little bit of stir fry with some veggies Mom found at a local market.

Friday, August 5 - Mom took a tour of part of the island while I went to work on scrubbing the paint drips off my classroom floor and chiseling cement off my walls. Hard work, but now my classroom walls and floors are clean. Mom got a painting from the tour guide (actually a church member) for free and is loaning it to us for the year so we have something to decorate our house with. For dinner, Mom and I walked into town and bought $5 footlongs from Subways (a super deal, because normally, their 6" subs start around $6!) It was really nice to have this American food... kinda like comfort food! Joey left Antigua to go to Atlanta to visit his brother before he goes back to school at MLC. Julie and I were a little sad, because he was wonderful in telling us about Antigua and showing us around. OH! And Cindy Johnston had her baby, son Grady Robert. =)

Saturday, August 6 - Spent the morning playing card games with Mom before Pastor Jason Richards (the Antiguan pastor here at church) came to take Mom to the airport. Julie and I went into town to see the Carnival Parade which had been postponed from Tuesday due to rain which has been uncharacteristically present all week. Um... yeah. I now know what it is like and would not really want to go again. If you want more details, I will tell you in person. Went up to school in the evening to use the internet from the school office.

Sunday, August 7 - Church again. Nice to know some faces this time around. I swept and mopped the floor and then started to sort through the chaos this was my classroom. Mrs. Titus has been around for a long time and doesn't like to throw away things with the thought that someday things will come in useful. And she is not super organized. So... This week we have working together to sort through materials, what is useful, what is not, what she wants at home, what I need for this year, what can go where. We are making definite headway!

Monday and on... Julie and I have been spending a lot of daytime at school, working with our teachers and getting ready for school. Classrooms are nearly in working order and we will soon be learning about the curriculum to begin blocking out our lessons. We walked into town on Monday withdraw money (Eastern Caribbean dollars) and explore internet options again (still not working...) and purchase some bananas and bread. Had a stray she-dog follow us home. Thankfully today she was gone. Wednesday, we are going with Pastor Johnston (also the principal) into town to begin the process for our visas that will permit us to work here for the year. After that, we will go to the Johnston's for lunch, laundry, and a little bit of grocery shopping.

Hope you made it through all of this! Soon I will post pictures of my classroom, school, church, house... as well as stories about our adventures in cooking!