Once Upon A TYPE…

I can’t deny the fact that I am one of those people who loves photographs. I admire the lenses that brings out the best of the creature it’s taking. My daughter Andrea inherited one of my attitudes, it’s the love for pictures! Like me, she enjoys looking at them repeatedly without being fed up. Whenever I’m stressed from work or just feeling lonely due I’m far from my family, I always grab one of my photo albums and try to reminisce the things happened in the picture. Then smile will go out of my face again. Sometimes, I catch myself uttering words alone, not that I’m crazy but I remembered something while I’m looking at the pics, then more smile will be released

This is a typical student in Vietnam, they normally wear a white ao dai and rides their bikes going to school. Most foreigners call these girls as ” butterflies on wheels “, why? because they look gracefully while they are pedalling their bikes. When the sun is too hot, some of them wears non la, the traditional hat of Vietnam or salakot in the Philippines.

For almost two years in Vietnam, I can tell that men and women have equal rights here! what you can see on the picture is a woman who works as a road builder. In this country, not only males can lift spades and mix cements, females do as well, too! At first, I’m in total shock when I saw women working in construction but as my father’s an engineer, he told me that here in Vietnam, most men are lazy, and because of this reason, women are grabbing the opportunity to do the task and earn some money. It may be a heart-breaking job but as what you can see from the face of the young lady, she loves what she’s doing!

The life of a monk….A few days ago, I was thinking of going to a monastery for a silent retreat and when I saw this picture, my imagination worked so fast. I’ve learnt that monks do a strenuous training. They wake up as early as 3am then pray for 3 hrs and drinks soya milk for breakfast. Take note, drinks only soya, no bread or rice to eat. No wonder why monks are slim. Afterwards they meditate and do yoga till afternoon. Lunch is unappetizing as I listen to story of the tour guide but for them it’s heavenly, they always eat vegetables, no meat! Monks believes that animals have life of their own and that when we die we will be reincarnated into an animal based on the life that we lived while we are still alive.

Singapore has a population of 4million, they may not have enough space but they have plenty of beautiful places to go. This picture was taken at Sentosa Island. Nice, isn’t it? What a romantic scene to share with someone you love!

“Teacher, will you check this out for our yearbook and add comments about it” that’s what Duy Minh my homeroom student told me yesterday. He gave me his usb to view the page he did, it’s not finished yet but it’s striking. And this morning, during HR, he proudly told me that he’d already edited and the page is now ready to submit to our IT. I took the chance of seeing it first before anybody else, that’s how they love me and I want to share the great job my students did…

Kevin and I are proud to be HR teachers of 11R. The students respects us well and obediently follows our instructions. They maybe naughty sometimes but they’re very manageable. My only comment here is that they called me Mr. David instead of Ms. David, well I guess I look like a man, that’s why. As a giao vien (vietnamese word for teacher) it’s very fulfilling when you see that your students appreciates your work and effort a lot. It gives me more strength to better my job.

Last February 1-4, I went to Singapore together with 14 students and a colleague for SEAMC (South East Asian Maths Competition). I coached 8 students while my co-teacher coached 6. The competition held is the biggest one since it begun 6 years ago. Only international schools here in SE Asia can join, I wonder why ISManila didn’t participate! Well, 29 schools from 8 different countries is equivalent to 154 participants that made 54 teams to compete. It’s a good experience because I only trained VIETNAMESE students while my partner Rae trained expats. The committee organised various activities for the kids with different categories. On the 2nd day, the players got the chance to do their “Amazing Race-Singapore”. My students joined their buddy team from another school, a good bonding for all of them and a good chance to mingle and know more about the life of the other students in their own country. While the kids are away and playing, Rae and I toured the city with two other teachers. We went to Funan, a shopping mall for techie people. Everything that you need about digital things can be found there, too bad I’m not so good with these kind of stuffs I only know how to use that’s all. After Funan, we went to a small perfume shop where I got excited the moment we arrived. All of my favorite perfumes and colognes are present and believe me or not they’re pretty cheap! At a moment I was doubtful if it’s the fancy or fake one, but I was mistaken when I saw the label. They’re really genuine perfumes! So I bought a Coolwater by Davidoff… as a present to my cute little sister. Not so long we take a short walk to the MRT and went to Orchard road to continue our shopping. Surely, Singapore is a one-stop-shopping haven to shopaholics like me We went to Takashimaya, Paragon Siam and Orchard Plaza. Gosh, you must really have a deep pocket to go shopping here coz most of the things are expensive but you can’t deny the fact that they’re beautiful, though! I spent a lot for toys and clothes. I bought this cute dress in Plaza Singapura for the gala dinner in SEAMC, red in color and has white flowers. It’s so lovely. After long hours of shopping spree, we went to Night Safari to meet the kids and to stroll around, too. Based from the name, it only opens at night. They got lots of animals, the exciting part here is that they don’t have cages. The animals are free to roam around wherever they go. You might get scared with the animals but it’s so fascinating to experience them very close to you. This is once in a lifetime thrill, Singapore is the first and only country in Asia that has a night safari. 4 days was not enough for me to roam Singapore…hopefully I’ll be able to go there again with my special someone.

I’ve been here in Vietnam for almost two years and I’m living in the heart of Saigon, now known as Ho Chi Minh City. The climate is similar in the Philippines and the faces are almost the same. Maybe because South East Asians look familiar to one another. But I’m not gonna talk about the people, ‘eh! I wanna share my favorite ‘cultural dress’

Ao Dai (pronounced as - aw yay) is the national dress of the Vietnamese women. It’s worn by high school students, employees in the government and worn as an engagement dress by ladies before getting married. Usually, ao dai is made of silk and it’s fascinating to have one ‘coz it’ll cost you a lot, but of course you can also choose your own material for your ao dai. Now a days tailors use different kinds of clothes for ao dai. Normally, it’s tailor-made and only women with good figures can wear it, ehem, take note…ONLY women with good figures can wear it! Maybe you’re wondering why, ao dai may have long loose pants and long tight sleeves but the truth is ” AO DAI covers everything but it HIDES nothing “. Beautiful isn’t it? where can you see a dress that’s so tight in your body but it’s not malicious to see. It displays all your vital parts which makes it more elegant. As a foreigner, it’s a must for me to have one and because I really like it a lot now I have two beautiful ao dai’s. I still can remember the first time I wore my ao dai at school. It was pink and has little cute flowers in front. Since motorbike is the common way of transportation here, I asked my mom to send me to school for me not to make any wrinkles on my dress. I thought it’s gonna be an ordinary day, I told myself, Vietnamese teachers wear this dress everyday so why not me! When I arrived at the school gate I noticed people glancing at me and saying “dep” meaning “beautiful” in english. Then I entered the lobby of the school…to my surprise, all of the receptionist and even the visitors clapped their hands as I open the door. All of them told me that I was so beautiful in my ao dai and I looked like a Vietnamese. I dont know what to say so I put a big smile on my face and said thanks to them for such a nice greeting in the morning. Throughout the day, even my students teased me and told me that I should wear it everyday when I go to school. What a nice experience it is! Now I just wear it whenever there’s a special occassion like cultural programmes and I feel like a Miss Saigon when I’m in my lovely ao dai!

I wasn’t able to have a good sleep this past few nights and I dont know if its because of the diet pills that I’m taking since I arrived from PI or I’m just stressed. But how can I be stressed when I just had a very interesting 2 weeks break?

So many reasons came, they’re coming like monsters in the dark, haunting and sending creeps to me…whoa!!! What’s happening to me? So, while I was having my break earlier I thought of going to a monastery. Last December I spent Christmas with a friend in Da Lat. It’s the Baguio City of Vietnam and I could say that the place is really beautiful! The weather is lovely during daytime and it is freezing cold at night, if I’m not mistaken the temperature was 8 degrees Celsius during our stay. My friend and I booked a whole day city tour for Christmas as a gift for ourselves since were celebrating away from our family. We did a lot of sight-seeings and our eyes were so full of beautiful sceneries. Before we ate lunch we stopped to a 13 years old monastery. I was amazed with the place! It’s not just beautiful and relaxing, it’s ENCHANTING, that’s the right adjective to use! Out of my curiousity I asked the tour guide some questions regarding the monastery and I learnt from him that people can come there for a retreat and do some meditation if they want to. They do not have any religion preferences, everybody’s welcome. People do not need to pay for their stay but of course they must show some gratitude to the monks that helped them throughout their meditation by giving donations or offering some good deeds that will be benificial for the monastery.

Now that I’m troubled with the way my life is going, I’m thinking of going there and try to sort out the things that I needed to do in my life. I need peace of mind and the antidote to solve all the ailments I’m feeling inside. I want to free my heart from diseases, from the bonds of confusion and to recognize the possibility of bringing the best out of me.

I’ve read inspiring stories of people who went to a silent retreat like this and it helped me a lot to think whether I should go or not. Hopefully, I’ll be able to find the answers to all of my questions and may all the monsters that are haunting will go away after my own retreat

LoVE is a many splendored thing! that’s what some people say, hehe!

This afternoon, I did a relief lesson for a colleague who’s away and I enjoyed the lesson with my students. Maybe because the topic’s so interesting, it’s all about “LOVE”. My students are at their curious stage in everything, so love is one of the things that’s making them chill most of the time! I’m not a love expert but they just kept asking so many questions to me…it turned out to be a very interesting discussion, because everybody’s giving their own opinion about L-O-V-E. Then there’s teasing around and it’s me that they’re teasing. How can I say so much thing when my love life is on a test??? I feel happy and bitter at the same time for reasons that’s hard to explain. But I’m still looking at the brighter side, I know time will come that the right person will approach and tell me that he just wanna be with me, because he can’t live without me and will never get tired of loving me!!! Oh chills, chills, chills!!! what a nice feeling! I wanna melt again when the right time come…when? we’ll know about it but not now!!!

I hope I’ll be able to apply all the advices that I gave my students to myself… I know I can do it!!! I’m STRONG ‘eh

It’s Monday again, start for another week of teaching. I love my work so much and I’m really enjoying it a lot but there are times that I’m also sensitive towards my profession.

This morning, I had my Chemistry class with my Year10 students. I was so excited to introduce them the new lesson for I know that it’ll be an easy and interesting one for them. The lesson’s about “The Reactivity Series”, so it’ll include a lot of experiments!!! So I did my best to explain all the stuffs that they need to know before conducting the activity because we’ll use acid, so to eliminate accidents, I must brief them first and remind them many times that they have to be very careful. I did the first experiment with Mg to produce its oxide by steam, conclusion…it’s a success!!! A beautiful white powder was seen inside the test-tube, it’s MgO!!! Afterwards, it’s the students turn, they need to do the reactivity of medium reactive metals with acid, then came the chaos! OMG! my students just started to be very noisy. For a while I gave some space to them to discuss to their groupmates about the metals that they needed to test…but as time passes by, I can’t handle it anymore! They’re really NOISY and they’re POPPING my eardrums!!! There Ms. Joyce exploded! I wasn’t able to control myself anymore so what I did is get my book and hit it on my desk to catch their attention…BANG! all of them got surprised and stood quiet, they knew me well. I seldom get angry but don’t force me. Since I’m already pissed with my voice (having sore throat so I can’t speak well) and I prepared a lot to make this activity a special one, I simply do not deserve their childish actions. Verdict, I sent them all to detention and asked them to write an essay titled “ARE we LOUD enough?”

Again, it’s Monday…..terrible sore throat, got pissed, students hated me for losing their lunch time and spending it with the teacher on duty in the detention room. It’s gonna be Tuesday tomorrow, I wonder what will happen next. Hope that their not that loud anymore!!!

I am always  having problems when it comes to writing and now I’m experiencing it again. This will be my first time to blog-for-real, before it’s just nothing, taking it for granted, writing non-sense. But now, it’s gonna be different…there’s something inside me that’s giving me a strong drive to express whatever I’m feeling and it’s telling me that “Joyce, you need to write!”  Maybe, this is a good outlet, I can be me and do all the stuffs that I’m envying from other people. Yes, you heard it right! I really envy those people who can write and have interesting blogs. I enjoy reading them and now I am one of them, here writing my own post.

I owe this to a very close friend of mine. Thanks to you my dear! You’ve influenced me in a lot of things and I’m grateful that I have you as my friend:) I’m starting to have another outlook in life and I’m looking forward that I’ll be able to express it all here! Cheers