ghost city

maura ewing fails at blogger skills. more frequent posts coming sooooon. promise.

kids are cute, but also vampires of time and energy. that's my excuse.

anyways, the little devils are really starting to grow on me. there has been more laughing and less scolding recently, which i think is a relief for everyone involved. also recently the kid-Os have been trying to get at who this ms. ewing character really is... they've been asking questions like, "ms, have you wanted to be a fifth grade teacher since you were a kid?" " or "are you going to be a fifth grade teacher here for the rest of your life?" both of which make me feel like i'm keeping a dirty secret. and of course i only answer them honestly, "yes, i have wanted to be a fifth grade teacher my whole entire life, and i've been doing it for just about a hundred years already, so i don't see any reason not to do a few more."

what else? ramadan is about half way over now... i think i'm actually going to miss it. granted i'm not fasting, just observing. but i love the way it has synced the whole city: days are slooooow- no one really expects much of anyone else, it's like a communal understanding that nothing much is going to happen while the sun is shining. and then at night the city comes back to life full force- eating eating eating, laughing, yelling, singing...whatever.

but my favorite time is fitour time- the breaking of the fast. it's around 6:30 pm, just as the sun sinks away. this is my #1 favorite time to cruise the streets... EVERYONE is at home eating so the streets are mine! it's almost creepy. of course there are a few other white faces here and there, but in general marrakech is a ghost town. i like to do things like explore neighbrohoods in the medina on my bike and ride down the center of normally crazy streets. it's liberating if you can imagine. this precious moment doesn't last long- maybe 20 or 30 minutes... soon soon soon the sleeping baby of marrakech wakes up and is in full tantrum. the calm before the storm, whatever.

ok, back to real life. it is sunday afternoon which means time to get ready for SCHOOL next week.

kids

sorrysorrysorrysorry.

i'm back. i'll try to keep this thing up, but no promises... anyways, marrakech is lovely if HOT, and i'm doing well if BUSY. oh man.

teaching is going as well as to be expected i think... i've still got a lot to figure out. like for example how to make kids stay in their seats, also how to make them like, learn stuff. these are #1 and #2 on my weekend "stuff to figure out" list.

though they drain my energy, the kids also keep me pretty entertained. ha, so i think my home-town readers will appreciate this- i'm setting up a penpal system with our class and leverett elementary's... so i thought it'd be good to introduce leverett a bit, just like size (2,000), and geography (lots of trees, big hills) etc. so, one of the kids raises his hand and says, "and ms, do they have electricity in this village you come from?" hahaha.

ok, i'll do a better job of updating this soon. hope everyone is doing well!

p.s. happy ramadan.