Counting down the days

Hi everyone! How are things going? I'm well, hanging out in Viña del Mar again. Today (Monday) is a holiday (or feriado) in honor of St. Paul and St. Peter (San Pablo and San Pedro). It's been so wonderful to have a long weekend!

Classes went pretty well this week, but I was very excited for a three-day vacation. My students are adjusting better to the change in teachers now, so hopefully we can make some good progress before winter break. As I've told many of you, one of the English teachers I work with has been out for almost a month now. The first couple weeks she was out, my classes that I usually have with her were pretty chaotic. No one knew why she was out and whether or not we would continue with classes. Even though my teaching contract states that I'm not supposed to teach classes alone, I didn't want my 10th-12th graders wasting their time. I took over a few classes and then another teacher was brought in to help. Unfortunately she can only be at our colegio in the mornings because she does classes somewhere else in the afternoons. So I was handling the afternoon classes alone for a couple of weeks. When we found out that the regular English teacher won't be returning until next semester, the school asked one of the student teachers if he could work with me during the afternoon classes. So now my students are having to adjust to two new teachers each week. They're doing a great job though, and I appreciate them being patient with us. As you can tell, there aren't substitute teachers readily available down here, so normally students just have free classes when a teacher can't come to school (well, at least for the older kids I work with). Also, unlike the U.S., teachers don't have readily available lesson plans for replacements, so that makes it even more complicated. Luckily I was able to update the new English teachers on our lessons, so after about two and a half weeks of chaos, we're finally getting into a rhythm. The poor students...they're stressed out enough as it is because they're taking final exams for the semester, so I know they are annoyed at the disorganization of it all. At least I'm still with them and they know me, right?!

Anyway, after another long week at school, I went to a going-away costume party Friday night for a couple that has been in Santiago for about three years working at El Oasis. I didn't want to spend any money on a costume, so of course I pulled together some 80s attire quickly and dressed up as an '80s aerobics instructor'...just like Paula's birthday party this past year, haha. It was a fun party...some of the students put together a wonderful slideshow of pictures from the Mosby's time in Chile. What wonderful memories they've made down here as mentors for these university students. I really admire them for all that they've done!!

On Saturday I met my friend Hillary for breakfast at our favorite 'gringo' spot to say goodbye. She got on a plane Saturday night to go back home to New York. She starts Law School at American University in August, so I know she was excited to get home to spend time with her family before going back to school. After breakfast, I got on a bus to head to Viña to hang out with the fam. As always, we ate lots of food and hung out with wonderful friends the entire weekend. We got together with friends Saturday night and played team Scrabble (it's quite harder in Spanish) after eating bistec a lo pobre (steak with french fries, grilled onions and a fried egg...mmm talk about clogging arteries!), a classic Chilean dish. Then on Sunday we went to church and relaxed most of the day before getting together with friends again last night. This time we played Pictionary (yet again in Spanish). Surprisingly my team won both Saturday and Sunday night!! Maybe I'm better at games in Spanish than English? I never win at home!

Today we've been hanging out and planning for our visitors in a couple weeks! Paula and Amelia arrive on Amelia's 2nd birthday (July 9) and Mom gets here on July 16. Amelia's Tata (grandfather) has a birthday on July 10, so we're going to celebrate his birthday on Friday and Amelia's on Saturday (she's only two, so she won't know if we celebrate a little late, right?) We're all so excited that they're coming...even though I'm bummed my Dad can't make it anymore :( Poor Dad, he needs a break from work!! Oh well, we're still counting down the days and looking forward to spending lots of time together. Sonia and Panchy already have some great ideas of things to do when they all arrive, so I can't wait to come back after school gets out for winter vacation on the 10th, woo hoo!!

I'll be getting on a bus to head back to Santiago in a little bit to say goodbye to my other friend, Jaclyn. Everyone is leaving me!! It's okay though...I have lots of visitors to look forward to, and I can always come to Viña when I need family time :)

I hope you all have a wonderful week, and I'll talk to ya soon.

Love,
LG

P.S. My camera broke on my last trip to the dunes...being the clutz that I am, I fell carrying my camera and sand got inside. Now, the lens won't even open. Until Mom gets here and I can use hers, I'm going to have to steal other people's pictures I guess. ¡Qué torpe!