Elsien's Traveblogue

Past and Present

Class yesterday: 2 of the 8 absent. 2 of the remaining 6 were on time. 2 arrived without a book. What can I say?
I dwell in the past again: below some pictures of Egypt last year. The one of the 'hole' is the scary entrance to one of the pyramids at Gizah, near Cairo. To go inside, you have to crawl through a dark, dank, hot and humid passage that's only just big enough for 1 person. It descends fairly steeply down into a cavern where there is litle to see. Claustrophobia rules OK.
One of the river views is the Nile at Aswan. You can see just about to the Sudanese border from the vantage point.
By the way, that poor teacher in Sudan, Gillian somebody: I do feel sorry for her, although her blog from prison must be quite entertaining. She'll never be able to say she's only 51 again, as she always seems to be on the news as "... a 54-year-old teacher ...". Before we all break into indignation about her plight, let me say that plenty of teachers in UK are regularly accused of equally absurd transgressions. I remember an ex-colleague who was suspended for months for receiving and accidentally forwarding some 'cute' pictures of babies sent by the Turkish cousin of his wife. I saw them, they were definitely not pedophile material! Granted, he wasn't threatened with flogging, but prison was not entirely excluded. The disciplinary procedure was as dubious as what's happening to Gillian.

Labels: Egypt - last year October

Teacher's Rant

Teaching can be the most rewarding and the most depressing job.One of the things that makes my current job depressing is the fact that my Psychology students should be he brightest of the bunch, but are only just about average and this is probably flattering them.

This would still not matter, if they were enthusiastic, hardworking and motivated. This they are not, although they seem to think themselves that they are: they are always telling me that they really enjoy the subject. Some of them even want to go and study it in more depth, either at University or doing a Counselling qualification.

Their protestations are very unconvincing, as far as I am concerned: they miss lots of classes, arrive invariably late for classes that are not even starting that early: 11am on Tuesdays and 2pm on Wednesdays. Their assignments are never in on time, if at all, and they don't seem to do any reading up on notes or in their textbook either before or after classes. They do not bother to bring the textbook to classes, if they have a textbook at all. Get the picture? Yet, they unbelievably seem to think that they will pass their exams with a good grade??? They didn't pass any exams last year with a good grade – most of them have to resit all or most of last year's Psychology exams as they barely got a recordable grade for them.

The most depressing thing of all this is that I cannot even be brutaly honest about this: I'd probably lose my job if I told them they are an ill-motivated bunch of no-hopers. The best of the lot are OK compared to the worst of them, but in any class more representative of the total spectrum of students, would barely score above average.

This perception problem between what they think they are doing or can do and what I think they are doing seems to also exist in my tutor groups. According to what they produced last year in their GCSE's at Secondary School, they are only just about average. Again, this wouldn't matter if they started to work, revise, take notes, do homework, revision, preparation etc., but they are not. Moreover, they condemn any lecturer who states that their attendance, achievement, even punctuality is below average as mistaken, misguided: the lecturer must have confused me with someone else. Where does all this come from? Are we giving our children an abundance of cocky over-confidence or is this a case of over-compensation by the students for a lifetime of semi-failure?

Labels: This is what I was doing this time last year ....

Views from the Nicholls Tower – November 2007

Why am I not happy? I have just transferred my pictures from India, Pakistan, Oman, Egypt and Greece from CD to this computer and I feel like there is a big hole inside me. I was happy there. Every day I woke up, I felt happy. I felt as if I were doing what I wanted to do and I looked forward to another day. Never mind that sometimes I felt tired, or that sometimes I missed my family or wanted to talk to friends, sometimes I even wanted to stop travelling and settle somewhere, but the overall feeling was one of perfect happiness and fulfillment.

I do not feel happy now. This seems strange, as I have much more to feel happy about.

I have a great relationship with a lovely man who seems to care about me a lot. Granted, I only see him one weekend in two on average, but I wouldn't want to be tied down to anything more at the moment and I speak to him every day. We have agreed to spend a week together at Christmas – I enjoy being with him, we have lots of good conversation, fun, nice dinners, companionship, we enjoy arguing about politics, philosophy, the meaning of life, the Universe and share a love of literature, theatre, movies, music and great sex, what more do I want?

He has set up for me to have an interview for an extremely prestigious job, so why can I not feel more excited about this? He has asked me to come and spend a week or so on some idyllic Swedish island with him in the summer, he is going to meet my family in another 2 or 3 weeks – everybody is excited about that, what is wrong with me?

I have a lovely flat which is warm now as well – the views are great, the place is comfortable – why don't I feel more happy?

OK, my current job is not wonderfully inspiring, but it's only 2 days a week, it brings in enough money for me to live on. I like my colleagues there, I even quite like the evening class and from time to time the Psychology work. I have enough savings to support my youngest son for a bit and I shouldn't have to worry too much about replenishing them – he has always been good at repaying, the Inland Revenue still owes me money (just have to fill in and send off the form, will do that tomorrow and I'll have another month's rent. I am still on the emergency tax code, so that means they owe me another £500,- in tax already); I have a good relationship with my other son as well and I have loads of friends, get on well with my family – WHY AM I NOT HAPPIER?????

Comments please!

Pakistan

Upset to hear about the return to martial law in Pakistan. The arrival of Benazir Bhutto, her triumphal return to Karachi ...... Did you ever wonder why she returned to Karachi, while the country's capital is Islamabad? No, the BBC didn't mention that either.

Fact is, her family comes from Sindh, the province in the south of Pakistan of which Karachi is the most important city. They have a huge supporter base there. Their family home is in Larkhana, near Moendjodaro, one of the faulous ruined cities of Pakistan, with amazing remains of the ancient Indus civilisation (4000 or so years ago). I didn't go to Moendjodaro, because Sindh is one of the provinces that is declared unsafe for foreigners. You can apparently only visit Moedjodaro with an armed guard.

I have been to Karachi though, see earlier blogpost, and I have also stayed in the house of Malik, Benazir's erstwhile press secretary. They will be undoubtedly enormously upset about the suicide bombings and the latest events. Lahore, where they live, has a massive Law Faculty and all manner of legal institutions. Lawyers and law students are everywhere, all walking around in black gowns, white bibs and even wigs. I loved Pakistan and the Pakistanis, and feel sad about events there.

What I relish most about my travels now I'm stuck in UK, is my sense of connectedness with the news from distant places. I love this feeling of knowing almost first-hand what is going on in the world, because I have been there, met people, talked to them and seen with my own eyes what it looks like!

I feel the same about China where the 5-year Congress has just taken place. I miss this sense of history unfolding, of being involved in events here in Europe. I have met my local MP once or twice and even spoken to him, but somehow it is not the same! Even when I go to Brussels, I have no sense of the country almost splitting in two, as no one seems to particularly care about it, in the same way that no one here cares about what Gordon Brown and David Cameron are up to.

Here are some Pakistan pictures – I couldn't put them on the blog before, but now I can! To my eternal egret, I didn't take any pictures of the filth of Karachi – I wonder if they cleaned up for Benazir's arrival. The only pictures I could find on Google were sanitised tourist pictures. I'll include my own, which I think are much more typical of the human and architectural chaos of Pakistani towns, villages and cities ...... Would love to go back, but no idea when.