Celebrate good times -- c'mon!

The first week of the new school term doesn't start till Monday the 3rd so last week we worked on the gardens at Anjali and our theme for general studies was celebrations.

The gardens had to be dug over, have new soil and compost added, have labels made and, eventually, seeds planted. Each class has its own bed so, hopefully, all the children will learn how to plant and maintain the garden. We've planted radishes, sweet corn, cucumbers, spinach and a couple of other local green vegetables. It was all a bit hit and miss as the seeds we bought with director Simone at the local market were packaged in Vietnam so noone couldn't read the planting instructions. However, the soil here seems to be very fertile so we are ever hopeful! If the seeds sprout before I leave, I'll add some pictures.

The only bad thing about the gardening was my feet getting badly bitten by the voracious local ants. Obviously, barang skin is much more delicious than the locals' as the children weren't bothered at all by them, and my super-strong insect repellant didn't deter them either. I was woken in the middle of the night with my feet feeling like they were on fire, and by the next morning had several large red bumps and many blisters. They're
recovering ... slowly.

The celebrations project plan I was given to follow with my intermediate class was a little ambitious but the simplified version went well and at the end of the week the kids had produced posters for various celebrations, like birthdays, Christmas, Chinese New Year and the local Water Festival.

Apart from that the kids drew their impressions of Christmas and the Christmas party, and we played a lot of games -- and I mean A LOT of games. The kids have so much energy that it's exhausting just watching them sometimes.