The Silent Week

Sunday, March 8, 2010

I guess it has been a while since my last entry. It has been difficult for me to get motivated to write what has been happening. Especially when I feel like nothing really is happening. Although, I guess stuff has happened...like the interview.

Okay so the interview was interesting. I really didn't know what to expect, because the only interviews I have had were for teaching. I felt nervous at having no idea how to prepare. So I walked all the way to this toy store and had to go through a roundabout. For those of you who don't know what this is, it is a circle in the middle of a busy road that has spokes coming out of it. You have to chose which spoke you want in the direction you are headed. I really don't like them, and they are confusing when you walk. Personally, I think they are just confusing in general. I guess it is like a whole bunch of exit and entrance ramps all in one circle. Anyway, I turned on the wrong spoke (so I thought) so I turned all the way around and headed in the opposite direction. Then I realized I was originally correct, so I had to turn around again. I then made my way to the street it was on. It took me a while to realize that the map search I wrote down had the wrong street. Basically no search engine knew the real address of this location. Fortunately there was a sign and I was able to locate the store. It was good that I allowed for an extra hour for "lost time."

Anyway, I went in and they immediately had me fill out an application. Then I had two people with a packet of paper that they were using as a guide to question me. They were asking me questions, but all my experience was in teaching so all the examples they wanted me to give, all my stories, everything was about teaching. I kind of felt like my experience is in the wrong field. You would think I could interview fine at a toy store. Anyway, they questioned me for over an hour, and they were pretty intense questions. In the interview, they asked questions that forced me explain programs for teaching. The thing is, these programs and stories are in another country, so it took even longer to explain things, because they don't understand some of the language. For example: I mentioned something like "in second grade." Well, for one thing, they don't have grades here. They are years. For another thing, their year 2 is more like 1st grade. Hope this gives you an idea. It frustrated me that as I was getting interviewed, I was feeling "unqualified" again...for a toy store for crying out loud! I actually have had experience as a cashier too! I just felt like a horrible interviewer. It seems like I can't say anything right. There were several other things that bothered me about this...actually about myself...but I can see this entry is already going to be too big. So moving on...

I know I made this sound really bad, but all in all the interview I guess was okay. I did my best anyway. I wouldn't be surprised if I didn't get the job though. I asked when I would hear about the job, and they said in a couple days (which would be Friday). Today is Monday and I still haven't heard from them. I was trying to figure out what to do, because the preschool owner asked what I wanted to do. I kept going back and forth trying to decide if I really wanted to work at the toy store or the preschool. There were so many advantages and disadvantages. I wasn't sure if I really would get the job at the toy store, but then it would be a full time job. Although, the preschool owner was holding the position for me, and I knew she needed to have an answer soon or else she would post the position. The preschool is more related to my major, and it would give me more experience, but it would only be two days a week. It was so frustrating and the days went by. I finally decided that I would let the preschool owner that I would take the job. It does work better for me in terms of experience, I really like the school and the teachers, and maybe I could find another part time job. I don't know. She was happy and was supposed to call me today, but didn't. We will see what happens there.

So now there is the job situation at this point. Now to the other stories. One night Alison worked until 10:30, so we decided to meet at her restaurant and walk to Denny's for a $2 breakfast from 11pm to 11am. Then we walked all the way back and crashed. It was a very late night. 2 am.

Also, we came to a point where we had to do laundry, even though it was raining. We put our clothes in the dryer, but the dryer wasn't working, so we had to spread everything out in our room again to dry. It was crowded.

We also decided to do major cooking...as in no salad or pasta. Well, I guess pasta was included, but we used the oven. We made chicken casserole (one of my favorite dishes at home). We put all the ingredients together, but had to put it in the oven for 1/2 hour. Well...we realized later that the oven only went to 250 degrees. I figured that our ovens went up to around 500 degrees. So if I needed to put the oven at 350 degrees, I would put this oven at 150 degrees. That was my quick reasoning. Well, amazingly enough, it did work and I didn't burn anything up. It looked and tasted amazing. Our first big meal that we made. It didn't last long. We ate it in two days, although we did have someone else helping us eat it...

Also, we have quite the canary in our flat. Constant singing..at ungodly hours in the morning.

We also went to New Brighton (the other beach area). It was really cold that day, so we didn't go to the beach for long. We looked around a while and then just came back.

In the Church department, we went back to the Salvation Army. We went to the morning and evening service. We met a couple more people there and they insisted on having our name and number. They greeted us from the pulpit. Also, it was considered National Children's Day, so they had all the kids come up and they blew bubbles for like 10 minutes while they told a story. We sang a bunch of children's songs like "If I were a Butterfly." The night service was interesting. They had an ice breaker. We got into teams of 6 and each person had an edible item. I chose a banana. Alison had juice. So the first person would have to stand up, eat or drink whatever they had as fast as they could. Then they sat down and the next person would do the same. It would continue until everyone was done. So the first person was a lady eating some kind of chew candy. It took quite a while. Most of the other teams were close to finished before she could finish the candy. They guy who started this icebreaker eventually took pity and had the second guy go. This guy had some kind of granola bar or something. He took bites fast, but he couldn't swallow it for a long time. By this time all but one team was finished. Then it was my turn. The first bite was too big and the banana was centered in my mouth and I couldn't rotate it to actually chew it. After a while I finally was able to and took smaller bites after that. Well, I finally got to the last bite and sat down, but realized I was not supposed to sit down until I swallowed so I started to stand up, but the guy said that was okay (considering all the other teams were done). Then Alison drank her juice, the next guy drank a bottle of soda (we were all impressed at his quick drinking), then the last lady ate marshmallows. It was quite interesting. The sermon was very good and quite deep about is God in control? We enjoyed it and like this Church better each time we go, but we are probably going to go back to the Baptist Church and compare.

Well, there is my week in general. Let see how this week will turn out. So many possibilities!