Safe and sound in The Netherlands
I arrived safely in The Netherlands today. And, I've already had:
* yummie beer
* yummie wine
* yummie food
The only things still missing are coffee and milk, but well....we can do something about that, can't we?
The flight went smooth: no annoying custums officer, I retained all my luggage (in fact, didn't have to wait for it! I came in the baggage hall and there it was already circling around at the conveyer!), and at about 15:00h I was drinking a delicious beer with my brother, my uncle, and a friend of mine.
Hot again
It is hot again! Average temperatures: 40 degrees Celcius. But well, it is nice as well, because at least I can get a little bit of tan again ;)
Cheese please
Some time ago, I felt myself very lucky: I'd found cheese! And not just a random local cheese, no 'Gouda' (гуда) and 'Edammer' (едам).... unfortunately, only the name had only a 'Dutch flavour' (in fact, all the cheese taste the same).
Beautiful Metro
In Tashkent, it is easiest to travel by metro; it is not that warm and it goes rather quick.
And additionally -in stark contrast to the carriages though- the stations are real pieces of art! The космонавтлар (cosmonaut) is my favourite: you really feel in space! Several teints of blue, and starts and planets..beautiful.
Watching footbal this evening?
Last weekend, I was all set to watch the match Oranje - Romania (Oranje = Dutch national team).
But snif-snif...instead they broadcasted some other veeeeeeery interesting game; Kazachstan versus ......
(forgot, just another 'top-squad')....
Hopefully, I will have more luck this time (however, I am a bit sceptical...)
Russian 'literature'
I've started to read my first Russian book: "красная шапочка" (I bought both "красная шапочка" and "чаревна-лягушка ") It's real literature! The one I started with ("красная шапочка") can be translated as 'Little Red Riding Hood', or in Dutch: Rood kapje. Yeah, this is appropriate literature for a graduate of the university....hahaha (especially when you see this 'book' - it's this colourful, booklet for children that start reading)
boom-boom swimming
Everybody knows boom-boom cars, right? It's fun and particularly as a little child, I liked it. Now, I kind a 're-live' my childhood, but now in the swimming pool. It's in swimming pool 'Mitrofanov' and it takes me 20 minutes by metro and and additional 10 minutes walk to get there. I pay 1.500 сум and then I can swim for 1 hour. There are however some drawbacks: everybody likes to swim in random patterns.... I like to swim in a straight line (in one lane).... I guess you can predict what happens if these two styles are used in one pool....
At the computer centre (again)
Finally, I've installed an English version of Excel, so, now everything is fine! Woehoe!
Now I'm playing with the Excel 'solver' - somebody told me that it's rather handy, but I must admit that I've never used it (actually, when he told me about the existence of 'solver' in Excel, I was rather surprised: "Oh, does such a tool exist??")
Well, I've spend enough time here in this computer lab, so it's time to have lunch - I think I'll have some 'плов'....
Пока!
Weekend is short !
Today, my students had listening comprehension.... Yup, on Saterday. Actually, their only free day is Sunday. But well, I only teach three times a week, so I can 'plan' my own free days...
The listening comprehension went well.....I don't think it went very well. I thought it was 'do-able', but I'm afraid that for a lot of students, it was too difficult (for the insiders, it was a TOEFL, model 7 listening test). So, the only thing left for me to do is correcting the CV's and application letters.... (of course, after one week, we start the thermodynamics part, so I think the course break won't be a real break...snif-snif)
By the way, again, the weather is extremely hot! It feels as if you are walking in an oven! I'm not a person that starts complaining quickly when it is hot (yup, I'm a 'kou-kleum!'), but even I think that it would be more comfortable if it was a bit cooler... (now it's between 40 and 50 degrees Celcius).
Exams (job interviews)
Today was a very exhausting day because we had exams today. What kind of exam? Well, it was 'English in use'. In this case, we did job interviews. So the students had to apply for a job (they had already prepared a CV and an application letter). And I can tell you: having interviews from 09:00h till 13:00h is a rather exhausting activity!!
But I think they have learned a lot (so that's what I'm here for, right?) The results were fairly ok - some could have done much better, whereas others really performed above their average level - quite interesting to see how human unpredictable people are (if you do not choose a proper frame of reference)
So, is this it? Nop. On Saterday, they have listening comprehension. So, finally, their mark consists of four parts:
* CV
* application letter
* job interview
* listening comprehension
So, 1 down, 3 to go....
