2/21/2014
Yesterday, I went
to School #2 to tutor an 11th grade student, help teach
the a 6th grade English class and help teach a concourse
class (like SAT prep class, only the test is only on English
grammar,vocab, reading,etc.). Students who are going to university
for majors like accounting, English teacher and medical have to take
the concourse exam. The score they get on it and various other
subjects necessary to the major, determine what school they can go
to. So each major in college has a set of predetermined entrance
exams that all students who want to apply have to take. Instead of
just having one standardized test like the SAT,ACT, GRE, ect.,
students only are tested on the knowledge that is most pertinent to
their future job. I like that system a lot. This causes students in
high school to start to take classes that will help them on these
exams and in university, instead of having to take a couple history
classes to fill education requirements like in the States, the
children specialize in the subjects that will help them succeed in
University. The only problem with that is that, many students do not
take English, which I think would help them in all occupations,
especially now that Mongolia is growing so fast and many American and
European countries are setting up shop here. Also, many of the
technology they use often come with English directions, which is why
I have also become somewhat of their go to person when it comes to
electronics. Which is hilarious, because before I cam here, I could
barely run my computer properly, but now I can fix printers, copy
machines, computers, projectors, also I can add amateur plumber and
carpenter to the list of skills I have acquired since being here.
For the sixth grade
class, I worked on their pronunciation and reading comprehension
skills. So I broke down the passages into smaller chunks, like half
sentences. I would read 4-5 words at a time and then have them repeat
the same words/sentence back to me. They were so cute. I just love
their accents. A lot of the books they work from are written so
poorly, that I find myself correcting the paragraphs as I read. For
all of them, it was the first time they had ever heard an American
read out loud, so it was difficult for them to understand me. They
are used to hearing English words in a mongolian accent, which as you
can imagine sounds completely different. Many of the sounds that we
have in English, they do not have in their language, and vica versa,
which is why learning Mongolian is so difficult. You have to train
your tongue and mouth to form sounds and pronunciations that it has
never made ever, and it is the same way for you.
In the concourse class, I taught American Idioms and synonyms for commonly used verbs. The funny part, was that alot of the idioms, were not American, they were in fact British and I had never heard them used in my life. So as I was going down the list of idioms they are supposed to know I found myself learning new ones and then trying to explain to them what they meant even though it was the first time I had heard of them. The best/ most hilarious ones to explain to the class were "Getting caught with your pants down" and "better than sliced bread". Neither one of these are relevant to Mongolian life, because A: bathrooms do not exist in most of mongolia, basically you can go wherever you want (and no they do not try to hide themselves behind a bush or something, if they have to go they just drop trouser) so they often are caught with their pants down. So as I started to explain this to them, giggles and eventually hysterics burst out. They could not grasp the idea behind the idiom, it was just so natural to them to go to the bathroom around others, that they thought it was hysterical that Americans have a saying like that and B: no bread is sliced in Mongolia,therefore trying to explain to them why Americans think sliced bread is so great was impossible. At then end I just said "Americans really really love bread that is presliced, so if something is better than sliced bread, than it has to be pretty amazing." That also got a lot of laughing. The next part of the class was to teach them synonyms for the verbs they already know. So I wrote out the verbs and than the synonyms. We practiced saying them a lot and then the teacher asked me to define each word. I told her that the whole point of synonyms is that they all mean basically the same thing. (yell, scream, screetch= all mean a loud voice), but she was not happy with that answer so i then proceeded to define each word separately, which was not an easy task. For each synonym group I wanted to use the other words to define them, but couldn't so towards the end I started to make up some definitions and began to say "well. this word is a more formal way of saying this word so it should be used when talking to people of importance" which was not true, but there was no way I could come up with 6 different separate definitions for 6 words that meant the same exact thing. So now I will have 20 students who think that certain words are used with elders/bosses because that was the only definition I could come up with.hahaha. It was a lot of fun teaching them the new words, even though it really made be have to think long and hard and come up with creative ways to say the same thing over and over again.
2/22/2014
So
today's entry is dedicated to my sister! Today she turned 22 years
old and I wish I was home celebrating with her! I was so lucky to be
blessed with not only a sister that I like, but one who has been my
best friend throughout my entire life and I know she will continue to
be for the rest of my life. She is the ying to my yang. She is the
outgoing one, always looking to have a great time, where I am more
subdued and would be just fine having a night with some close
friends. She inspires me in so many ways. She inspires me to be more
outgoing, to let loose and be more confident. Although, I am the
older sister, I always looked up to her. She has always had such a
confidence about herself. Ashley lives in the moment and really just
enjoys it. I always wish to be more like her, she is so funny, so
smart and beautiful. She is also one of the most caring,
compassionate, thoughtful people I know. For my 22nd
birthday, along with many gifts, she filled my bedroom with balloons
and attached a note to each one. There were 22 reasons why she loved
me. I remember this was shortly after I found out I would be leaving
for the Peace Corps, so it of course there was a lot of crying. She
is like this with everyone. Her gifts are always so planned and
thoughtful, her friends are so lucky to have her their life. I am so
lucky to have her in mine. She is always there for me in tough times
and is often the voice of truth that I need to hear. She knows me
like no one else and the hardest part about being away is not having
her just a phone call or drive away. I remember a couple of people
telling us that it would be good for us to be away from each other,
it would help us grow and learn how to be on our own. This whole
experience has really taught me to rely on myself in so many ways,
but I can tell you honestly, I do not like having to go through
experiences good or bad without her, it is so much easier to go
through everything life throws at you with a sister like mine. I can
not wait until I am back in the US and hopefully we will be living
near each other. I think that when I get home we will have an even
stronger bond and I am so excited to see what she accomplishes once
she graduates college this May. I am already so proud of everything
she has accomplished, she is Pledge Mom of her sorority, president of
one and sits on many committees and clubs at her college. Every time
I would visit her at school, I would be in awe of all the different
people that knew her. They were not just her sorority sisters, they
were people of a walks of life, who would call out a hello to her.
She is truly an amazing person and I am so extremely proud of her.
Happy Birthday and I love you so much Ash!!
2/23/2014
Yesterday, I went
on a nice run. The weather has been absolutely beautiful the past
week so I have been taking advantage of it every minute I can. During
my lunch break I would fill my travel mug with soup and just walk
around town and browsing the outdoor markets. There is nothing better
than being able to walk around, breathe in the fresh crisp air and
still feel your face. I would say about 90% of my time spent outside
thus far in Mongolia has been in a state of pain. My face always
frozen and hurting. But this past week I could walk around outside
without my face hurting, and was so happy about that! I through on a
full black spandex outfit and my hiking boots (still icy, learned the
hard way that my running shoes are not made for ice) and took out to
run the trails. It brought back memories of the many cold mornings
spent running at 5am rowing practices in college. I ran my normal
trail and at the end decided to take a little hike up one of the
mountains to this big flat rock I saw jutting out. In my mind it
looked like an excellent place to next a seat and reflect about the
week and then do some jumping jacks, squats and other exercises on
it. It would be like looking out over all the land, so I thought well
that would be inspiring and a cool place to workout. So I hiked up
the muddy and icy mountain side and came up to the rock, which was
actually not that flat, actually really bumpy and jagged, but I
climbed on top instead and found a little flat spot to sit and
stretch. The view was as usual beautiful. I watched a mongolian man
carrying coal on his back walk along the path below, children raced
down the path on bikes and a woman with her dog carrying a sack full
of something. I loved the perspective I was getting of life in my
town. After I stretched, I decided that despite the bumps and holes
in the rock, I would still do me series of exercises on it. As I
began my jumping jacks, I moved around the rock trying to find a spot
that was comfortable on my feet and knees, I can only imagine what it
looked like to people walking below. I jumped from one end of the
rock to the other, side to side, eventually after 100 jumping jacks I
gave up and decided I would just do some squats than walk down the
hill-mountain and finish my exercises on the path. So I
semi-successfully did squats on the uneven rock and then hiked back
down.
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