A letter home from study abroad
On thursday, I visited my old Russian teacher, Olga Karp at her new
school. Apparently, she's somewhere between being a teacher and an
administrator there. The school building is the same as most other
schools in moscow, but it's got a completely different atmosphere.
Even though it's a public school, the place just screams MONEY!
The director's got beautiful wood paneled office with leather couches, a
video phone, a spiffy new computer, etc. There are plants (admittedly,
most of them are plastic) throughout the building. They've got modern
textbooks, teachers who care (and who speak good english), a modern
computer lab and other such things. Students learn english from the first
grade on and pick up german and french later on. Oh, and this is all free
to the students.
Olga asked me to come in to meet people and to talk to them about
giving lessons to the english teachers in American English. (Apparently,
they just want me to chat with them.) Once I arrived, Olga brought me
into a teachers' lounge with big puffy leather couches and sat me down to
chat with several administrators. The asked if I was hungry. I
said..."well, maybe just a little bit..."
Five minutes later, a girl showed up with a platter of meats and
salmon and caviar and other such things....I was introduced to her, she
stood there for a moment and then she left. As soon as she was out the
door, i was asked what I thought of her and whether I liked her.
Sometimes, this culture is just bizzare.
Afterward, I was introduced to their computer teacher, who had
apparently been a student at the school and gone on to get a degree in
engineering and was back to teach at the school. As soon as we left the
room, I was asked if I liked her. Then I was given a tour of the rest of
the school and invited to their 30th anniversary festivities some time in
november. Afterward, I helped Olga to correct the english version of the
school's brochure. It's now saturday...i don't really remember going out
thursday night...I'm pretty sure that I just came out and hung around for
a bit...