the whole month of september went a little like this:
teach, plan, make copies**, get sick, teach, plan, make copies, take care of a stranded puppy in the stairwell, teach, plan, make copies, memorize Bible verses in mongolian, teach, teach, receive news another friend is pregnant, plan, teach, make copies, get over illness, walk, walk, walk**, worship with young mongolians, receive news my sister-in-law is pregnant, teach, plan, make copies, have another class added to my schedule 3 weeks into the semester, endure the first snow of the…autumn, teach, teach, find out my new class is a nightmare, make copies, sleep, shower, realize in 6 months i’ll not be in mongolia, freak out a little, teach, plan, make copies.
there. skimmers can enjoy the sweep of generalities i’ve just mentioned and those who delight in details can read the asterisks below. look for october to come in november....i'll try my best.
make copies** - i don’t use text books in my lessons. mostly because i think the texts available stink. so being the self-righteous control freak of a person that i am, i make my own curricula. that means i also have to make hundreds of copies almost every week. this wouldn’t be a problem except that there is no copy service for teachers offered by the university. so you have to go out and find your own “Canon” shop (Canon is the general term for copy machine). this, too, is a bit tricky as the copiers are generally 50 years old and have to be re-started after 10 consecutive copies are made. i found myself having to divide my documents between three different copier places because of this. fortunately, after some more hunting, i was able to find a little Canon shop behind the school that has a shiny, newish industrial copier which can shoot out 100 two-sided copies in 5 minutes for 5 cents a page. what’s even better is that now i’m on a first name basis with the copy place people and they share their private stash of arig (fermented horse milk) and candy with me while i wait.
walk** - the main street that runs through UB is called Peace Avenue. it’s a very ironic name because peaceful is so very opposite of the truth. chaotic or filthy or, if I want to be melodramatic, deadly, would be three fairly accurate descriptors. anyway, all through september there was road construction along the avenue which redirected four-lane traffic on to two-lane side streets. a 15 minute bus ride now took about 45 minutes. even lessons were pushed forward an hour and half because students were facing 2 or 3 hour bus rides every morning. so my legs became the most efficient mode of transportation for me. now, i get to see all kinds of things on my way to and from work that i’d completely miss if i was on a bus – things that seem to make my day complete. like funny mongolian fashion (a saw a man wearing a track jacket that had “The Hand of God” written on the back), countryside people selling milk, a guy passionately singing opera out his car window, chubby cheeked kids dressed in smart little uniforms marching off to school, deel clad old people out for a stroll with their fluffy dogs. i got to experience the change of the seasons in a way i haven't been able to as summer died off and fall set in. i think it’s been over a month now since i’ve set foot on a bus.
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