shrum
Some folk reading this may not be aware of the "archives" bit of the blog, which at the moment is not very deep, but which will grow. Go down the right of this page and see where it says "archives" click "october" and there you are. Even more crap!
Jeez I don't know how I survived my teaching day today. Had about 2 hours' sleep last night. One of those Gawd-awful Sundays where you just don't feel rested at the end of the day and the prospect of the week fills you with a sick, sinking stinking dread and you just toss and turn, turn and toss. And then some truly absurd idea enters your brain as you toss and turn and just sits there for about an hour or three, going round and round and round. Anyway, muddled through there somehow and was embarrassed by a couple of old students who dropped in to tell me what a good teacher I am (apparently they're not so thrilled with where I sent them....it was supposed to be a promotion, really). Anyway, I didn't feel like such a brilliant teacher today but I suppose somebody learned something in spite of my relative lead-footedness. Actually, the diversity in the room is making a big difference now. Once all the Egyptians roll in you can't help getting carried away by the cheerful atmosphere they create, even if you feel kind of crap. And people are learning as well. An all-Thai classroom, fun as it is, isn't always the greatest environment for learning anything. The new crop of Egyptians have been like a blood transfusion to the class, and a life-saving one at that. Apart from the fact that they make it economically viable even.
How much do our circumstances dictate our lives to us. Noam Chomsky says that the same individual, given the right background, could be a saint or a gas-chamber attendant. We all have it in us to be either. If that's true, the society we've created isn't conducive to saintliness I suspect. The tone of discourse is getting steadily coarser, or so it seems. Being good seems to be an out and out liability. Money is the new God, even (especially perhaps) for so-called Christians.
In spite of modern capitalism's best attempts, in spite of the millions of tons of concrete that have been poured over our spirits, the spiritual life goes on somewhere and somehow. Drink lots of water, avoidbooze, coffee and animal products as much as you can, be still when you can and then be up at sunrise and go for a nice stroll and you'll see what I mean. It's still there everywhere if you concentrate on the quiet and avoid the noise.
Jeez I don't know how I survived my teaching day today. Had about 2 hours' sleep last night. One of those Gawd-awful Sundays where you just don't feel rested at the end of the day and the prospect of the week fills you with a sick, sinking stinking dread and you just toss and turn, turn and toss. And then some truly absurd idea enters your brain as you toss and turn and just sits there for about an hour or three, going round and round and round. Anyway, muddled through there somehow and was embarrassed by a couple of old students who dropped in to tell me what a good teacher I am (apparently they're not so thrilled with where I sent them....it was supposed to be a promotion, really). Anyway, I didn't feel like such a brilliant teacher today but I suppose somebody learned something in spite of my relative lead-footedness. Actually, the diversity in the room is making a big difference now. Once all the Egyptians roll in you can't help getting carried away by the cheerful atmosphere they create, even if you feel kind of crap. And people are learning as well. An all-Thai classroom, fun as it is, isn't always the greatest environment for learning anything. The new crop of Egyptians have been like a blood transfusion to the class, and a life-saving one at that. Apart from the fact that they make it economically viable even.
How much do our circumstances dictate our lives to us. Noam Chomsky says that the same individual, given the right background, could be a saint or a gas-chamber attendant. We all have it in us to be either. If that's true, the society we've created isn't conducive to saintliness I suspect. The tone of discourse is getting steadily coarser, or so it seems. Being good seems to be an out and out liability. Money is the new God, even (especially perhaps) for so-called Christians.
In spite of modern capitalism's best attempts, in spite of the millions of tons of concrete that have been poured over our spirits, the spiritual life goes on somewhere and somehow. Drink lots of water, avoidbooze, coffee and animal products as much as you can, be still when you can and then be up at sunrise and go for a nice stroll and you'll see what I mean. It's still there everywhere if you concentrate on the quiet and avoid the noise.
posted by Craig Armstrong at 12:05 AM
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