This is the very first travel update from Judy... just as I am coming to the end of my trip. Great timing but here it is none-the-less. Only 4 more days left in Istaravshan (the town where I've spent the last five months) then I'm off to a very villagey Tajik village to stay with some Australians in the north, after some time there I'll head south - ward and stay with an American family (with 5 children!) before going to the capital, Dushanbe for a few days and then flying back home to England.
Where to start? Living here is amazing and teaching English is a great, but sometimes frustrating, experience. I've been teaching two classes at elementary level which means they can understand me most of the time (...I think) if I simplify my speech a bit. Both clases are 90 mins and because they are the same level I only have to plan one lesson and I can teach it twice which saves a lot of time. That does mean though that my second class get the better deal because I can cut out the stuff that doesn't work with the first class and make the lesson more interesting. I have enjoyed the teaching (although trying to control a class of teenage boys wasn't the easiest thing), the downside was the homework marking. Ugh, I really pity my old teachers now. It takes up so much time. Only one more lesson to now and I have the mammoth task of trying to sort out all the bits of paper that have accumulated on my desk over the past 5 months...
