Going home today!

I'm boarding a plane Lord willing in about 3 hours! That is if there's seats available. (I'm flying standby) Today's the last day of school, and I played for the 4th Christmas program in a week. Busy busy busy, but fun. My volleyball team won on Friday, and it was a heart stopper. It came down to the last serve of the last game of a three game set. The serve hit the net, paused, and then rolled over. Quite an enjoyable game!
I'm beginning to get confused-I was told yesterday that my Spanish had a Mexican accent. I've been told that I have a Puerto Rican accent, that I have no accent, and I know for a fact that when I talk to someone from Spain that I pick up their accent. Oh well, good problem to have I guess. it's going to be so weird being home and speaking English in all the stores and everywhere.

2 weeks from today!

.........I'm getting on an airplane headed for Atlanta! (not that I'm excited to see my family for the first time in 5 months) =)
I have been putting off posting for so long because so much has happened, I just can't decide what to write about because there's no way I have the time to cover everything. So, this is what the last few weeks have been like-

School, turkey run, volleyball games, youth meeting, Priscilla flying home, trying to learn stick shift, failing, finding out the clutch is messed up (how was I supposed to know what a good clutch feels like?), waiting for my cell phone, church, getting rides with people, more school, riding with the Daniels in the morning and hearing VeggieTales the whole way to school (I know waaaaay too many of the lyrics), more school, practice for special music, listening to carlos tell jokes, more school, more practice for special music, more school, dragging the 7.5 foot Christmas tree upstairs and trying to figure out how to put it together with no instructions, Thanksgiving service, 2 baptisms, Carla came home, pie fellowship after church, conversation with Carlos, not being able to explain directions to my house (if the streets happen to have names, there sure aren't any signs), calling my family Thanksgiving morning, waiting in my garage for Mr Santana, going to the Santana's with Ryan, Andy, Walter and Nicole, spending all day eating talking playing games watching movies and enjoying good friendships, listening to Carlitos tell more jokes, singing around the piano at the end of the day, singing Christmas songs, doing nothing all day friday, cleaning all day saturday, playing piano for everything sunday morning, Chinese for lunch, listening to more jokes from Carlos, playing Christmas songs with 2 violins 1 flute and 1 guitar, playing for everything Sunday night because Mrs Jacobson's flight was late, Priscilla came back, more school, explaining to my students that I am not MRS Nething, more school, hearing my students trying to figure out why I'm not married, more school, my birthday, finally getting my packages after 3 weeks, parents vs teachers volleyball game, shopping at Plaza Las Americas and Priscilla spending an hour trying to find parking, birthday supper at Longhorn, Old San Juan at night with the Christmas lights and 2 cruise ships in the harbor, Nyler's second elevator ride (she still hates them), more church, hearing Pastor Fernandez preach for the first time since May, lunch at sizzlers surrounded on 3 sides by water, listening to Carlos tell still more jokes, more church, more school, trying to explain why Americans don't celebrate 3 King's day in January, more school, visitation, and more school!

So there you are. That's life in a nutshell, albeit a very large nut shell.

Time flies when you're having fun.....

......or for all you biology people out there, time's fun when you're having flies. =) The last couple of weeks have been busy, busy, busy. Last Friday I went to the church's ladies fellowship for the first time, and really enjoyed myself. I wasn't quite sure how it was going to be, with most of the ladies much older than I am. At home that's not a problem because I've been there so long I know almost everyone pretty well, but I was a little nervous about it here. We had a progressive dinner, with a devotional at the last house. The focus of the devotional was Thanksgiving, and it really prompted me to think about how amazing it is that I am here, and the amazing things the Lord did in my life to get me to this point. Some day I will have to post the story, but not now because it will take a really long time to type! Smart, extremely intelligent (cough, cough) person that I am, I drank a cup of coffee around 10 that night when I knew good and well that I needed to get up the next morning around 4:30. Yep, you guessed it, I went to bed very late. Exactly how late you may ask? somewhere around 2, 2:15. Long night's sleep, I know. The next question you probably have is "why in the world did you have to get up at 4:30 on a Saturday morning? Well, since we had a long weekend (we had Friday off for Veteran's Day), several of us teachers decided to take a day trip to Culebra.

We live in Carolina, which is fairly close to San Juan. Culebra is the smaller of the 2 islands to the east of Puerto Rico. On Saturday morning, Priscilla and I left the house at 5:30 so I could stop at the atm before we left for the trip. Using an ATM at the mall at 5:30 in the morning is not something I want to do again anytime soon. While I was using the ATM, there was some guy standing in the shadows at the mall entrance probably about 20 feet away from the ATM. He didn't look particularly threatening, but you never know with someone who is crazy enough to be standing at the mall entrance at 5:30 AM. The whole time I was drawing out my money I was prayimg for safety, and when I got back in the car, Priscilla said she had the phone in her hand ready to call if anything happened. Thankfully everything went allright, and we continued our trip to the school. We met everyone else there at 6:00, and were ready to go, when we remembered that we had invited one of the deaf college students (Nyler) to come with us. Aurys was elected to wake her up since she knows ASL, and we had to convince Nyler that she should come. Just as we started to leave, rain started coming down in buckets! The 8 of us loaded up into 2 cars to make the 45 minute trip to Fajardo where we would board the ferry to take us to Culebra. When we got to Fajardo, they had not yet started to sell ferry tickets, so we had a chance to walk around and take some pictures. They started selling tickets sometime around 7:30. Sarah Motter says that sometimes during the tourist seasons, the ferry tickets are sold out by 7AM, and other times they don't start selling till after 7, which is why we had to leave so early. Ferry tickets cost $2.25 plus extra for any large coolers, beach chairs, etc. for a trip that takes abotu an hour and a half. Several of us slept for a good deal of the boat trip, which was a good thing considering how much sleep I got the night before. =) When we landed at the dock, we unloaded everything and got on a bus (for another $2.00) that would take us to the other side of the island where the beaches are. The beach we went to was Flamenco Beach, and it was gorgeous! The water has many different colors, is very clear, and to my surprise when I got in, it was pretty cold! We enjoyed ourselves for a while in the waves and I discovered that our noses were not built to handle sand and sea water. Some of those waves were pretty nasty, but I survived. After lunch time, we walked a little ways around the beach to an area where we could do some snorkeling. While the others were snorkeling (we only had 2 sets of equipment), I just walked around in the water and watched the fish swimming at my feet. In that area the water was very still, and it was so clear that when I was in water up to my neck, I could still see my toes! I was a little nervous about the snorkeling at first, but once I figured out how the breathing worked, I was fine. Snorkeling was an amazing experience. I've seen so many pictures of coral reefs, and exotic fish in the ocean, but seeing it in person is another thing entirely. The fish were beautiful. We didn't see any big fish, but several small ones of different colors and designs. What amazed me the most was the coral reefs. How anyone can look at the coral and all the plants that grow around it and still believe it evolved is beyond me. Mostly I was just impressed with God's creation and the beauty that he has put on this earth for us to enjoy. After we snorkeled, we got on the bus to go back to the other side of the island for the trip back to Fajardo. While we waited, I was able to get some postcards at a couple of little shops there near the port. I slept a lot of the boat trip back, but when I woke up, enjoyed the view of the sea at night. As beautiful as it is during the day time, I think I prefer the night view. Once again, I was amazed at the beauty and intricacy of universe God has created.

This week has been rather uneventful up until today. We had the turkey run this morning. Each grade has a race for boys and one for girls, and the winner takes home a turkey! Quite an experience to hear 600 students plus parents and teachers cheering for children running around the parking lot. Also, today we had another volleyball game, and my girls won for the first time! I was so proud of them. They served well, and kept their bumps under control.

AHHHHH! I just looked at the time. 6:12! We are leaving in about 20 minutes to go to Rio Grande for a youth meeting, and I'm still in my volleyball clothes!

Encouraging Words

Yesterday I was muttering something about feeling old (I'll be 23 in less than a month). One of my highschool students happened to hear me, and dear, sweet Alexandra said, "You're not old, you're middle-aged." That helped me feel so much better!
Something kinda funny happened on Monday. We came back after visitation (to a family that doesn't speak English) and Ariel started speaking to me in Spanish. That was a little strange, because he usually speaks English to me, but I understand, so I went ahead and replyed in Spanish. He apparently didn't realize I know the language, he just always thought I understood a little bit. I stood there talking to him and Andrea for a while, and he made a comment about my accent in Spanish. I said "What are you talking about?" He repeated it slower, and I told him I understood the words he was saying, but I wasn't quite sure what he was trying to say. I finally figured out that he was telling me I don't have an accent in Spanish, in other words my Spanish does not have an American accent. Now that really was encouraging! I have been slightly frustrated at times because I'm trying to learn the language, and I can't get a lot of the college students around here to speak to me in Spanish because they're all trying to learn English! I have prayed for more opportunities to learn, and the Lord has been providing that.
I can't believe it's only 2 weeks until Thanksgiving, and that it's really almost winter! It does not feel at all like winter here, but that's to be expected. They have had the stores decorated for Christmas since the beginning of October, though. I'm still trying to figure out if they're trying to counteract the fact that it doesn't feel cold here, so they have to decorate the stores so we will trick ourselves into thinking it's the Christmas season.

Holidays

I love the way this school works! We just had three days "off" (I put it in quotes because we had our Bible Conference, which was not really days off), and this Friday we are off for veteran's day, and coming soon....Thanksgiving! In fact, this year I will get MLK day off for the first time ever-this coming from someone who lived in the Atlanta area (MLK's hometown) for 10 years!

Speaking of 3 days off for conference, it was wonderful. The Lord really worked in hearts, and it was such a blessing to hear so much good preaching this week. One very interesting message: Dr Brian Green from England spoke on the fish that swallowed Jonah. I have heard many messages on Jonah, but never a message on the fish, or more specifically, how we should be like the fish-it was prepared, etc. I was also able to see a friend from my 2002 mission team who I hadn't seen since we landed in Atlanta after the trip. He's from the Dominican Republic, and when you hear him speak, you can tell that. That's why it was funny to me when he told me my Spanish was sounding Puerto Rican. When I went to Spain, I really didn't speak that much Spanish, but since taking many more Spanish classes, and going to Spanish church, I have picked up much much more. So when he asked me how my Spanish was, and I responded in Spanish, he said I was getting an accent! Like he's got room to talk....on our team not even the native speakers could understand him when he spoke. =) It was good to see him again though.

Overwhelmed, but God is still good!

So it's been quite a while since I started this post because the internet has ben down, but it's kinda funny how the title is still quite appropriate.

Wow, it's been quite a weekend. The fun started on Thursday, when we got home, and there was no water. What made it really interesting, was that we had invited Avieria and Nicole over to spend the night since we had PTM the next morning. So, on Friday morning, we left for school early so that we could take showers in the dorms. It made me really glad that the school I work for includes a college with dorms. =) All day Friday until 6 pm we had parent meetings, then we took 4 college girls to the mall before we finally went home for the night. Friday night and Saturday morning we still didn't have water. On Saturday, we took one of the girls to the airport to buy her ticket home for Christmas, so we decided to go to Plaza Las Americas (the big mall) because we were over in that direction anyway. We took a couple more college girls and really enjoyed ourselves. When we got home on Saturday night, we had water! I did 2 loads of laundry because we're never sure how long the water will last. Sunday morning, I found out that one of my friends from my church in Greenville was killed in a construction accident. It's hard to find out about those kind of things no matter what, but it was extra hard hearing while I was sitting at the piano. Let's just say that my playing on the next song left a little to be desired. The young man was a Christian, but it's still especially hard on the church youth group because it is a very close knit church. Friends that are there say everyone at church is just walking around in shock. It's hard for me to believe, and right now I really wish I could be there with them, but I know God has me exactly where he wants me.

Now to more current events. There's so much I could say, but don't have enough time to, so I'll go ahead and start with this week. Sunday started the FBF Carribean Conference, and so far we've had 2 people saved, and 4 incredible messages that were very much needed. I'm especially excited to have Dr Bob Jones III here, although I must say that it was slightly scary to be scheduled to play the offertory last night right before he spoke! It went well, despite my cold hands. I was fine during the service before the offertory, because I was squished next to Carlos Santana (see picture on a previous post) and it was quite warm. When I went close to the front for the offertory, I began to freeze. They have to keep it very cold for it to be even comfortable with that many people in the church. Last night we were packed with people standing in the back of the church, as well as many people in the airconditioned tent that has been rented for the occasion. I'm really looking forward to this week and the things the Lord has in store for us. It has already been good to be in the house of the Lord.

Student quote for the day: "Teacher, you look tropical!" (this from Diego in 5th grade)

Grades

Grades are due today, so everyone has been trying to get to computers all day. My grades are done, and it was relatively easy. I only have 5 separate classes, only 2 different classes, to enter grades for. This means PTM this Friday-parent meetings. I probably won't have as many as most of the teachers, since I teach mostly piano lessons, and that doesn't go on their report card. The one nice thing about PTM is that we get to come in around 9 AM instead of 7 AM. We have to stay until 5 PM instead of 4PM, but I have always preferred staying late to arriving early. Yea for more sleep Thursday night!
It's raining again today. It's been raining all day. It's been raining every day except one for about the last 2-3 weeks. In fact, I emailed a friend today, and said "hello from the beautiful lake of Puerto Rico. Yes, I said lake, not island." So it's not really flooded, but there's lots of water everywhere. I really don't mind, though, since it makes a huge difference in the temperature inside the apartment.
We're stopping at the mall on the way home to get a hand made wooden top for Priscilla's mom, who starts chemo tomorrow. From time to time, different vendors set up booths in the hallways of the mall, and this week, its "Artesania Puertorriquena". Basically all kinds of folk art, mostly handmade. There's lots of fun stuff to look at.
I will close with the interesting student comment for the day. Ariel (a first grader) has been telling me in his piano lessons that he has a brother and a sister "in his mom's tummy". When he came to his lesson today, he said, "My babies are out! They are in my house." He was so excited about his new brother and sister. His brother Andre is at home, but his sister Ariana is still in the hospital.

Progress

Yesterday I had my first student learn to play more than one note with one hand at the same time. Exciting stuff! Charlene is in 4th grade and is doing very well with piano. She was a little overwhelmed with the new info, but I think she'll do well with it.
Something strange has happened the last couple of nights-I have actually been cold! Clarification for those who don't know-I have no air conditioning, and the only way I've been able to sleep is the 6 inch clip on fan I have in my room. Normally it's quite warm in the house, but the past few days it has been nice because of all the rain. Who knows how long that will last, but for right now I am really enjoying needing a blanket at night!
This weekend was nice. We went to El Morro, and after that to the beach, where I got sunburned, but not as bad as last time. Don't ask me which beach we went to, because I have no idea. We got a little lost (Priscilla was driving), and when we saw water and sand, we decided to stop. We figured all we had to do was follow the water and we'd get home eventually.
Here's some pictures from our grand adventure.

Walking up the lawn towards El Morro

One of the outside walls of the fort

View of the lawn from the fort

Doorways inside the fort- I love pictures like this!

What the fort looks like from inside the walls

The beach we found while we were lost =)

This weekend we have fall festival, so that's going to be really busy, but next week we only have 3 days of classes. Yeah for Columbus Day on Monday and Parent Teacher Meetings on Friday!

Kids are funny

Last week, one of my students asked me if I was from Texas. While I appreciated the compliment =), I had no idea why he asked. Turns out I said something like "Oooweeee, this is gonna be fun" with a thick accent. See, I don't normally have an accent, except when I'm tired, or talking to people with a southern accent, or certain specific words, but not all the time. Funny thing is, 10 years ago, I lived in Texas for 7 years. It's hard to believe it's been that long.

On Sunday, I was talking to Carlos, a third grader, about something. We were talking about when we first met, which was during Bible Conference at Bob Jones University, and a few other things. He was telling me that he knew that I lived in Locust Grove, Georgia, and I told him that now I live in PR. He said to me, "Well, when you graduate from your job....."I told him that until the Lord leads me differently, I'm in PR for a good long time. We talked about my sister, and when I told him she was getting married this summer, he said, "So then she will be your sister in law?"

Lizards and more

I never guessed it could be so hard to say the pledge of allegiance to the American flag.
This morning, it was. In chapel, I sit at the piano during the pledges, so I can be ready to play "My Country Tis of Thee" when they're done. The flags are sitting in the corner right next to me, and they're very close. This morning when I turned to face the American flag, a cute little lizard was looking out at me from one of the stars! I wasn't expecting it when I turned around, and I really wanted to laugh. It didn't help when halfway through the pledge it started moving its head back and forth, about the same time that a lizard crawled up the wall right outside the window. It's probably a really good thing all those kindergarteners couldn't see it, although I was enjoying it.
The mall this weekend was nice. There ended up only being three of us, but we really enjoyed ourselves. We left school at 10 and got back home around 7. We definitely got in our exercise for the day.
This weekend we're going to the beach, possibly shopping in old San Juan, and maybe even one of the forts. If we go to a fort it will be the one where there are tons of people flying kites on the "lawn" for lack of a better word. This time, I will use better sunscreen at the beach. Last time, I couldn't comfortably put on a seat belt for a week. That doesn't mean I didn't, Mom. =) Around here, no seatbelt is one of the very few things they will pull you over for. I guess they figure if you have a seatbelt on, you have a better chance of surviving any idiotic thing you do on the roads. And believe me, many idiotic things are done on the roads. Which reminds me, another item on the agenda for who knows when is learning to drive Priscilla's car-a manual transmission. Fun stuff, right? She's going home for a week during Thanksgiving to see her mom, who has cancer. So I'll be at home in the apartment for a week with the dear sweet cat, and the crazy car. Somehow I have to get to school, which is only one of the reasons I need to learn to drive that car.

Praise the Lord!

My violin's back! I was practicing for Sunday's offertory, when Mrs Santana and Carlitos walked in with my violin. I am so excited to have it back! And she won't let me pay for it. What a blessing from the Lord. He is taking care of my needs!

It's Friday!

Don't get me wrong, I love my job, but weekends usually mean sleep, fun, church, fellowship, more church, and maybe even some more sleep thrown in. And this Friday is payday. =) This weekend we're going to Plaza Las Americas, the big "American" mall closer to San Juan. Shopping has never been my favorite thing to do, but this is a really nice mall. I think my favorite part is the 2-floor Borders. Any books and music store that big is really dangerous. I could spend my life's savings, if I had one, at Borders. There's also a JCPenney's with 4 floors, multiple fountains, which I love, and right next door a freestanding Kmart that's the biggest one I've ever seen. Kmart with an escalator. It's a little strange, but nice. They also have pretty good pina coladas there for a halfway decent price. There's 5 of us teachers going, and it's going to be a lot of fun going anywhere with the group we've got.
This week has been pretty uneventful, unless you count the electricity going off this morning about 2 or 3. I woke up because my fan shut off at some point in the night, and I was starting to get really warm. So that made life interesting this morning, but we made it to school on time anyway.
Today I'm trying to finish the purchase order form for my piano books. It's crazy trying to order books and flashcards for 42 students of varying age and skill levels. It's been quite adventurous searching the internet trying to find ISBN numbers so that we get exactly what we want. That's why I'm actually sitting at a computer this early in the morning. Once we get books for everyone, lessons will be a lot easier.
As I'm sitting here in what will become the new library once everything gets set up, I'm listening to Mrs Rios teaching a 4th grader to read in English, and I'm reminded once again to pray for these children, especially the new students. It's got to be rough being thrown not only into a new classroom with new teachers and classmates, but also having everything done in a language you don't understand. They'll catch on quickly, but right now it's still really hard.
Almost forgot! I thought I'd post a link to the school newsletter since there's an article that I appear in. Enjoy
http://calvarypr.org/data/Crusader/

First grade fun

I love teaching piano to first graders. They are so funny! Alejandro reminds me of Chris Bagwell. Anyway, today Alejandro was wiggling around as usual, although he refrained from the usual cartwheels today. I asked him if he was going to be a gymnast someday. He said, "No, I'm going to be a missionary."
"Really? Where are you going to go?"
"Alaska."
"Why Alaska?"
"Because they have snow. I've never seen snow before."
Later on in the conversation, I asked him what he thought missionaries do. His response? "tell the gospel and ask for money."
I had to bite my lip really hard to keep from laughing at him. His mom enjoyed hearing about it when I told her.
I'm still working on unpacking some of my things. I'm really making progress, but not finished yet. Saturday, Priscilla and I had an adventure at the bank. We both needed to cash checks. Normally we go to the branch of our bank that's in the mall, and there are a couple of employees there who speak English. I do speak and understand Spanish, but some of the highly specific words you need to know in a bank and other such places I don't always know, and the bank is one place that I'm not necessarily willing to experiment on. The branch we went to on Saturday didn't have any workers that spoke English, but thankfully there was a man in line who spoke English who was able to help. When he started talking, I understood what he said, but I wouldn't have known how to say it myself. The thing that made me laugh about the whole situation was something the man said while we were talking. We had a conversation about how I'm trying to learn Spanish, and he was telling me I need to practice. I was enjoying using Spanish with him, but I just had to laugh when this man who was fluent in English says "Como se dice 'te amo' en ingles?" I knew exactly what he was trying to get me to do, and I wasn't about to do it. At least now I know some of the vocab I need for the bank.
At this present moment I am violin-less. I have not played my violin for almost 3 weeks. 3 weeks ago a small piece broke off of the tailpiece. I've never had any problems with it before, never had to do anything to it, so it really scared me when I opened the case and saw strings pointing every which direction. I figured out what was wrong, and spoke with a few people about repair places. Several people mentioned the music store in the mall, but there's something that makes me a little nervous about taking my violin to a store that mostly deals in drums and electric guitars. So I started to pray that I would be able to find someone who could fix the violin and fix it right. I was also praying that I could understand what was going on whether it was understanding the Spanish, or finding someone to help me understand. A week ago Sunday, Mrs. Santana (one of the ladies in the church here) asked me why I wasn't playing in the orchestra. When I told her my violin was broken, she mentioned that she might be able to find a place to get it fixed. Finally it worked out that her brother knows someone that does violins, and she was able to take my violin to this person, who apparently comes highly recommended. The Lord answered my prayers through an avenue I hadn't even thought of. I don't have the violin back yet, but she is supposed to bring it to me soon. God has been so good to me!

Hello world!

I have officially entered the world of blogging. Mostly it's because my family and friends all want to know what's going on down here. I don't intend to post deep thoughts, just what's going on. I don't know how often I'm even going to be able to post, but for right now, here goes.
For those who don't know, I'm in my first year of teaching music at Calvary Baptist Christian School in Carolina, Puerto Rico. I teach 42 piano lessons every week, and 2 violin lessons. I'm also teaching music to each 5th grade class (there are three) once a week, a music appreciation class for middle school, and in my spare time, I play the piano for 3 choirs, 3 chapels, and 2 church services every week, and violin for 2 church services every week. This week has been a bit lighter, because we're having school pictures. Since those are taken in the church auditiorium, we can't have chapel this week. I have also had 2-3 students miss lessons because of picture time.
This weekend Priscilla (my roommate) and I are hopefully going to finish unpacking boxes and fixing our apartment. Last weekend we got our refrigerator, and I don't know that I've ever been more thankful for an appliance in my life. When you don't have air conditioning, a refrigerator is a huge blessing......it means cold drinks, cold food, even ice cream!
I'm still working on learning all my student's names. I have somewhere around 150 names to learn. The smaller classes I know all the names, and the one class of 15 I know all of them mostly because I spend a great deal of class time on crowd control with that group. The other classes are harder, especially 5C. In 5C, I have 3 Chris's, 2 Paolas, 3 Luis's, an Ian, and an Ilan along with many others. It's coming along though. The kids are nice enough to be patient with me and remember that while they only have my name to learn, I have so many to remember.