Teaching, Traveling, and Thai

Time seems to be moving faster – I can’t believe two more weeks have gone by since I last posted an update! What’s even happened the last fourteen days? Well, the week of September 28, my kiddos had math and reading testing they had to complete on Monday and Tuesday. It was on a computer so they were pretty excited! The weather was a mixture of nice, sunny days and gloomy, rainy days. However, if it was raining during the day, it was usually sunny by the end of the school day which was nice for when I had to walk up the hill to dinner. My funny from that week was overhearing one of my students explaining soccer injuries to his friends. He said, “No. Kids can’t die playing soccer. Only adults can. We can just get hurt.” #kidlogic I guess I better be extremely careful playing soccer from now on!

The week of October 5 was busy, stressful, and satisfying. There were no classes on Monday, so we had a day to ourselves which was awesome! I was able to prepare for Tuesday and Wednesday because my supervisor was here to observe me teach. On Tuesday, I was really nervous and went to my classroom an hour before the school day was supposed to start! I taught my math lesson and it went great! One of my kiddos was in New York for the week and two others were home sick so I only had eight students – I know, I know…awesome right? On Wednesday, I taught Language Arts for 90 minutes. It went well considering I wasn’t as comfortable with the content as I was with my math content. After that, I was able to relax as my observations were over! Now that I’ve survived my observations, I can move on to preparing myself for full time student teaching (AHHH!). 

Random Story from a few weeks ago: Most of you know of my extreme dislike and fear of spiders. Well, one day during lunch, one of my students said, “There’s a spider on the ceiling!” I looked up and sure enough, there was a spider chilling above our table. It wasn’t a tiny spider either (in my opinion). So the kids kept looking up and saying, “It’s going to fall on my plate!” or “Move the bread so it doesn’t land on it.” etc. And I’m just eating my salad, hoping the spider stays up there until lunch was over. After the kids kept saying, “It’s going to fall!,” I started to tell them it wasn’t going to fall and they should just finish their lunch. BUT, right in the middle of me saying those things, the spider FELL ON THE TABLE! The kids freaked out and I had to be the hero and smoosh the stupid thing. Inside I’m freaking out, but I got it before it crawled or jumped somewhere and we were able to eat the rest of the lunch period without worrying about the spider on the ceiling. Anyways, that’s my spider story. I still hate them but for 30 seconds, I was able to put my fear of spiders aside for the greater good of saving 11 first graders from having a spider crawl onto their plates of food. :)

Besides teaching and killing spiders, here's what I've been up to the past couple of weeks.

Sunday, September 27

My roommate and I went with a group of people from TASIS to Alba, Italy. We left the school around 9:00 and got to Alba about three hours later. There was a wine festival that day so we were able to pay an entrance fee and try many different types of wine (red, white, sparkling, etc.) The weather was sunny, but cool so it was perfect for being outside all day. Alba is a really cute place with cobblestone streets and little shops to go into and browse. I was able to find an Italian kid's book for about $2! I also had delicious gelato that I was pretty excited about - even more than the wine! I found a theater there and the price of a ticket during the day was $22! Crazy! Overall, we had a really fun day exploring Alba and trying out new foods and wines.

Lunch: Small, meat ravioli - YUM! We also had a variety of bread and thinly sliced sausage. It was the waiter's birthday, so he opened a bottle of moscato wine to share with us! It was a lot of fun!

Wine Festival - There were many, many stands set up along a street and you basically just went from one to the other trying their wines if you were interested in what they were offering.

Enjoying my gelato! Yes, they gave us a wine glass pouch to hold our glass when we weren't tasting the different wines. It's a real classy event... :)

The ceiling of a church I went into.

San Lorenzo Cathedral


We met a fellow American from California!


I went into a bakery to buy a treat for the ride home. I settled on this nutella-filled pastry. It was delicious!


Tuesday, September 29

Today was National Coffee Day! We also had a faculty gathering to celebrate the first few weeks of school. I was able to go up the tower at Casa Fleming and look out at the beautiful Alps. Even though it wasn't a clear day, the view was still incredible.

It was fun to see the Alps from a different perspective. I'm still amazed by this view each time I see it.

An awkward picture of me, but the only one that turned out with me and the Alps in the background!

Picture Perfect

Celebrating "National Coffee Day" with tiny macchiatos ! :)

Friday, October 2 - Monday, October 5

Because we had Monday, October 5 off, many students and faculty traveled somewhere to spend the long weekend away from Lugano. I took a trip with four others to Prague in the Czech Republic! When I was planning on living in Switzerland for 10 weeks, I knew I wanted to travel to other countries but the Czech Republic was not on my list of places to see. However, I fell in love with Prague and definitely want to return there in the future. We flew out of Milan, Italy Friday evening and landed in Prague after about a 90 minute flight. It was raining in Lugano and Milan, but it wasn't in Prague! After landing and getting our luggage, we took out Crowns at an ATM before catching a bus to take to the Metro Station. The conversion rate between US dollars and the Czech Crown is 1-25 so 25 Crowns is about $1. We booked an apartment through airbnb that was pretty close to the main tourist area of Prague. The street our apartment was on was full of graffiti - a much different view than the clean Switzerland I was used to! We were able to spend Saturday and Sunday walking around Prague and seeing the beautiful architecture of the city. The public transportation was awesome and cheap. There were trams everywhere so the lines often obstructed the pictures of buildings I wanted to take...oh well! My favorite thing was the "onion domes" on many of the buildings. I also enjoyed the Astronomical Clock and a park with maple trees I found while walking one day. On Sunday, we ate breakfast at this small restaurant with specialized pancakes - so delicious! Our time in Prague was too short, but I'm so glad I decided to travel there! I took over 200 pictures so the ones below are just the highlights of what we did.

 Left:

 this was one of the first buildings I saw Friday night, as we were searching for our apartment. 

Right:

The door into our apartment building...interesting I know!

Incredible view from a bridge

Some of the buildings in the main tourist square area

The unique Dancing House

A fountain we came across while walking

Left:

The famous Astronomical Clock - so beautiful and intricate!

Below or Right (the formatting is weird):

Me standing next to a tiny door underneath the clock.

A shot of the inside of a church - the detail put into the ceilings, walls, and lighting is incredible.

I was so excited to eat this! It's called Trdelník and is basically rolled dough that is wrapped around a stick, then grilled and topped with sugar and sometimes crushed walnuts. YUM!

Beautiful sunset

Left:

Umbrella man hanging above the street near our apartment.

Right:

Me standing in front of the entrance to the famous Charles Bridge.

Pictures of Czech Crowns - I love foreign currency! Except it often feels like I'm spending Monopoly money because it's so different from our currency in the USA.

Enjoying breakfast at Den Noc - I highly recommend going here if you ever travel to Prague!

My delicious pancakes - cinnamon, brown sugar with banana. 

Left:

We came across this small church inside a fenced off area. It was almost like a secret garden area. We were shown the inside - it was simple, yet beautiful in its own way. However, it did smell pretty musty! (Again, the formatting is weird - it looks alright when I'm editing it but different when it's actually posted...sorry!)

Right:

Another church we came across - look at the architecture!

Selfie at the Lennon Wall - it's hard to see but I signed my name next to the phrase "ALL WHO WANDER ARE NOT LOST" I only had a pencil with me so it won't last long! My name is beneath the word "NOT".

Posing in front of the wall.

Charles Bridge

Saw this and had to stop to take a picture! Loved the different sights of Prague we came across during the day and at night!

When the girls found out I had never tried Thai food, they decided we had to eat Thai our last night in Prague. We went to the Lemon Leaf and I had Pad Thai and Spring Rolls with homemade lemonade - delicious! I will definitely be eating Thai food in the future! :)

Saturday, October 10

I went with TASIS to the Milan EXPO today. I helped chaperone the elementary school kids. The EXPO is overwhelming - I had no idea what to expect and was amazed at what I saw. The theme of the EXPO was "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life." 145 countries participated in this event and most built these crazy awesome pavilions interpreting the theme in their own way. The work that goes into the EXPO is unbelievable and at the end of October, it will all be over. Switzerland had a pavilion and TASIS presented dancing, art, science, and singing related things during the day. I joined a "flashmob" the dance instructors organized. It turned out to not be a true flashmob as we danced behind a roped off area - oh well! It was a super fun day and I was exhausted by the time I got back to campus. 

Left:

Picture of the main road while walking to the Swiss pavilion.

Right:

Abstract sculpture by the Italy pavilion.

One of the pavilions created by Italy - this is what I mean about crazy awesome pavilions!

This was Poland's pavilion - made out of crates!

Left:

Selfie with the Tree of Life

Right:

Funky benches provided for people to sit on near the Tree of Life.

Funhouse mirror fun.

Art in the Swiss pavilion.

Switzerland!

Left:

The coffee tower in the Swiss pavilion. There were three other towers: apples, salt, and water.

Right:

Fries I bought at the Netherlands' food area! So good. :) 

Click the link below to see the "Flashmob" Dance we did!

"Flashmob" Dance

Well, that's all I've been up to for the past couple of weeks. This week I start full time student teaching (oh boy), so it'll be a stressful but rewarding week of work. I only have three more weeks left in this beautiful country - I can't believe it! There's still so much I want to see but know I won't be able to. I guess I'll have to come back! 

Ciao!