hello!!

sorry for not writing in this in a while...seem to have been busy recently and haven't found the time to fill you all in on sri lankan news...although this may be brief too as i dont have too much time to write this...

ok so think this may be mainly photos...but then again i always say this and get carried away!

last night we went to watch sri lanka v pakistan in the world cup in colombo. spent 2 nights in colombo with emer, tris and finn and had an amazing day at the cricket! although sri lanka lost by 12 runs it was so good - they are mad about cricket here and everyone was constantly singing and dancing! loved it!!!! pretty sky above too...

emer, finn and tris looking "cool" at the cricket...

emer and i with our sri lankan flags at the cricket

we have also been back to our highland families house for lunch and have been tutoring her daughter Ishara - trying to help her sort a cv and plan for ineterviews for jobs in agriculture.

We got stopped by a man on his motor bike in the street who then wapped out a big chunk of cow (or beef as you would usually say but this was practically a cow...) and emer screamed in her acting ways, went on to tell him she was a vegitarian and to put that horrible thing away, then he went on to swing the bag of cow in my face with my "veggie friend" close by...shes not an actual veggie just to keep it clear but funny all the same!

SGV sports day! loads of fun, had to stand at the end of each race and just "catch" 3rd place coming in to the end. Also emer and i ran in the teachers 200metre race!!....in our saris and bare feet! was halirous for us but even more funny for the kids watching.

Emer and the SGV boys after there football match against UMV.

from our room at umv - kids practicing dances for the parade they are doing this friday to the temple!

We have been practicing cycling on one bike...basically one person sits on the cross bar and one sits on the seat and peddles...all the sri lankans are awesome at it...emer and i fell of the bike 3 times in the space of 5 minutes....

we arranged a cricket match for Mhiripenna to play UMV - unfortunately we (Mhiripenna) lost but it was a great game all the same on there pitch - more like a field...did have a cow in it previously, also had a road through the middle and a hill...fun fun fun!

Emer and i went for a cycle to a temple we had not been to near by and met some kids for UMV (the cooks children who are always here after school so see them lots) - they showed us around and had a lovely time with them. then their dad climbed the coconut tree and brought us one each to drink...yummy!

Emer has taken on extra cowricular activities...she is mooooving slowly with her new... pupil

(emer wrote that cheesy pun NOT me.)

we attended a sri lankan grade 3 teachers training day - which we have found actually very useful!

we have been to lunch at 2 other families homes the last 3 weeks and to the post office as weird as it seems for a lunch/arms giving - community spirt!

we have found a new area of galle that is amazing - so different from main street!

we have also taught 2 great lessons outside! one with grade 5s doing directions using blind folds etc and the other with grade 3s doing colours...we had coloured bits of paper made some kids hold them in all areas of the play ground then made the rest stand in the middle while emer and i shouted what colour and they ran to it...this went slightly wrong when the kids with the paper decided it was even more fun to run away with the paper so turned in to a big chasing game...sorted it out well and think colours is going down a treat!

grade 1 still seem to cry a lot but are getting sooooo much better!!

all for now!!

hope everyone is great and having lots of fun! all great and fun here so hope it is with you too!

emers famiily - she is doing amazing, we are having loads of fun together, very lucky to have her! looking forward to meeting you in april!

love kirstin xxxx


emer here...feeling extra settled at the mo couldn't ask for a better partner, been very busy the past weeks (even teaching cows) as you have read. cant wait to see mummy, daddy and orla and to meet kirsts parents and anna banana. love to all e-mcdizzle!!! xxx

blog 9.....

hello!!

Quick question...what do you think do people want to just see photos and a little bit of writing or should i write lots too??? feed back would be good...

Right so don't think i have written a blog for 3 weeks now.

Teaching is now back up and running mostly in full swing, taught grades 1, 2 and 3s lots and split older classes with Alan - As it is a new year at school (school year from january to august) there are brand new grade 1s to the school...first class with them and 3 already cried - didn't realise we were quite so scary...may take some getting used to! As a welcome to the new grade 1s the old grade 1s (now 2s) put on a concert for them with songs/dances, speeches (weird for a grade 1 concert but sri lankans do love speeches) and a small parade - with a band wearing something close to green tartan...

day of grade 1 concert...

amazing coconut tree at SGV

love this photo of the

grade 1 mums in their beautiful saris

　
Teaching is now back to normal as sports meet has come to an end...we managed to make it back to UMV to watch the finiale of the sports meet...like a mini olympics! each house had to make there own hut...the winning house had made an amazing boat out of palm leaves - they could even sit on top of it, was insane! During the sports meet there was an arranged cricket match between UMV (Tris, Finn and Jo work here) and SGV (Emer, Alan and i work here)....it was great fun but sadly SGV lost!! Tris and Finn have been coaching the UMV team and are unbeaten so far!! We also managed to watch some athletics here...the kids are soooo FAST and don't even train and its around 30degrees sometimes...no idea how they did it...really wanted to join in too...

SGV v UMV cricket match

final day of sports meet

As sports meet has been on there was not a lot of teaching in January, so at Mhiripenna Emer and I will help from some children painted our english classroom!! keep in mind that this classroom used to be white with posters....

some of the pupils,

head of english and emer at our beautiful wall

Emer and the boys painting the first layer

 

and is now yellow and green (much to Tris and Finns disapproval) with animals (including bambi), fish, numbers and alphabet...not going to lie it looks pretty amazing - mainly due to emers awesome artistic skills on the drawing!! Hopefully it will make the kids want to come to our lessons...or just distract them...or distract Emer and i...



After painting the classroom one day Emer and i walked to the beach literally 400 meters away and ate our rice packets from lunch...we met some fishermen who offered to teach us stilt fishing...we still need to go along there to actually do it! they also showed us a small shark they had caught and put in a rock pool! We bought 3 very fresh (still alive infact) fish off one man to eat...mmm

man we bought our fish from

We have also had our first "music night" with the 6 of us (Jo, Alan, Emer, Tris, Finn and myself) and it was held in our house - at last we managed to make it look nice enough to have people in it! As some of you probably know i personally am not musical at all but everyone else was amazing! Tris and Emer sung songs they had written themselves and played the guitar, Finn also played the guitar with some pots and pans and drum parts and Jo and Alan did some great sing songs!
　

tris, finn, emer and i in our kitchen for the meal -tidy and with food for once!

Jo and Alan singing!

 

Last weekend was fairly busy - we met a girl, Fiona, from Blairgowrie scotland for lunch and listened to all her amazing stories about sri lanka. Then on Sunday we went to our "sri lanka ama (mum)" house for lunch. She owns the highland ice cream shop in Unawatuna so as Emer and i love the ice cream there so much we have got to know her very well so she invited us to her house for lunch, where she cooked amazing rice and curry, taught us to make egg rolls (sri lankan short eat...rottie things...) and we met her amazing family (husband, 1 son and 2 daughters) and her crazy dog - Bruno!!
　

me and the amazing highland ice cream family!

Last Friday was independence day = holiday, emer and i decided we would go for a cycle to the rock temple close by...we took a small detour to the really pretty mangroves (still finding so many new things even close by...)....then my bike chain broke completly...first thought of Emers was " ok kirstin you get on your bike and i ll push you as hard as i can down the hill and see if you can make it back some of the way..." hahaha we were about 2km home...as you can guess i didn't get very far and Emer very quickly caught up with me...so new plan "lets find some rope in this jungle..." ...only some old rags...oops they break -fail no.2! so genius use of the chain to tie on to the back of Emers bike while i held on to the other end on my bike...Emer cycled pullling me and my bike along (hard work) while i hung on scared for my life haha! We made it back to the bike shop with a lot of funny looks, got the bike fixed by a lovely man who didnt even want to charge us for it - kindness of strangers!

sadly no photo of this bike trip...

All and all the last few weeks have been great and sri lanka is still as amazing as always!

Although Emer and i are both very excited to see our parents and sisters in April! Hope they are too!

Hope everyone is great and having fun!

kirstin xxx

p.s is that too much writing????????? FEED BACK...

p.p.s Dear Kirstins Gran, Kirstin has continued for the past while to accept cups of tea regularly, happy days, mission nearly complete. On another note you are now on my list of legends for the nicest most thoughful xmas prezzie ever, i listen to her whilist i write letters, cheers! love to home, Emer x