Yesterday was a one to one session with the shyer of the 2 women who come to me for English tutoring. The other one is away and I've been very pleased that she has been brave enough to come on her own, and extremely frustrated that nothing seems to have gone in, however many times we recap.
So it was with mixed feelings that we met yesterday, me feeling it was time to stop, mainly because its hard to fit it in with all the other stuff, and, to be guiltily honest, also because we seem to make no progress. We walked up the road - usually I ask her about what she can see and she says "no" (I've regretted teaching her "no") and it was amazing! Its all suddenly clicked! She has really got it and could tell me all sorts of wonderful things - she has 2 legs, as do I, and the dog has 4. There were 2 blue motorbikes and one red one and whats more her jacket was blue and mine was black. And really brilliant was the man who was sitting on the steps (we've only managed to go up and down steps til now, and that with great difficulty and much prompting), and the fact that there were 4 steps up to the hotel we were walking past. And the steps were black and white. Steps is very hard to say if you are Tibetan - so hard its virtually unrememberable. Til yesterday!
Oh joy! Perhaps I could get into this teaching lark after all. Just not with 30 at a time!
I feel so proud of you, Jenny - or perhaps I should say so proud to know you and to participate on the far-flung edges in your grand adventure. Your happiness and excitement with life is so infectious. What am I doing sitting here in freezing England? You have wafted in whole arrays of sounds - tinkling, gentle, human laughter and chatting as well as raucous, sozzled singing and partying. Congratulations on your beautiful, clean hotel room with its wonderful, vast vistas. On all the friendships you've made so quickly. And on all the new things you're plunging in and doing. I have a friend a year or two older than you who is currently in Antigua teaching English to 6 year-olds - she finds that a challenge as she'd previously been a secondary school teacher of 16 year-olds. Well, I think you've made a far greater leap into the unknown. Three cheers for Jenny!!!! Much love, Rosie
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