I hope everyone is doing well. This is my third day at my school and I'm currently watch ER on pay tv which is in the house im staying in. hahah in other words my accommodation is a lot better than I thought it would be!
My school here is in Kepala Batas, a small town about 20 minutes out of Butterworth which is across from the island of Penang. It is one of about 60 selective schools in Malaysia and only opened in 2007. The facilities here are really new and nice. In the english department we have our own desks and access to computers and the internet. The facilities in selective schools here are a lot better then the non-selective ones. For example we have tennis courts, netball courts and other sport fields, a decent amount of sports equipment and we even have wireless internet in out room! But in a non-selective school they have minimal facilities and equipment and have classes of up to 45-50 whereas in my school the classes are about 25-30 students.
I'm staying in a apartment with Rachel and one of the english teachers. It is really nice we have a kitchen, a tv with cable, our own bathroom and Rachel and I get our own rooms as well. It's a strange though becuase although we have all these nice facilities, we still only have cold water. It just doesn't seem to be a priority for Malaysians. I'm getting used to cold showers! Also the teacher we are staying with is super lovely and Indian so she can cook us daal and roti! YAY.
We haven't taken any classes yet because it is orientation week. All the teachers seem super supportive and friendly and the students seem nice but a bit shy at the moment. I'm getting used to being stared at whenever I go out of the house. We have been told we won't be teaching grammar which im sooooo happy about. We will be teaching mostly spoken english to all classes (from 13 year olds to 17 year olds) which works for me.
That is all for now. More later, Love han ox
P.s Malayisa is 3 hours behind Melbourne if anyone was wondering.
