Yesterday

Yesterday was a mixture.

It was last classes for two of my favourite groups of students. With one I went out for coffee and the other stayed and had a farewell drink in school. I'm going to miss all of them and I felt sad about saying goodbye.

On the other hand, it was the last day of regular teaching. I've given reports to all the students who turned up (including telling those who failed what their options are) and done all my paperwork, cleared my locker, level board, register and homework file. I have nothing left to do (touch wood) until we start teaching intensive courses on Wednesday. So that means I feel relieved.

Then again, I have nothing to do, no last minute making good, no 'forgotten' files, no undone extra-curricular responsibilities. I'm a bit bored.

Finally, in three weeks time my holiday starts - and I haven't got the slightest idea what I'm going to do to fill the time. I don't have a lot of money so I won't be going away (maybe a couple of daytrips) and this is the summer holiday here so prices have gone through the roof. I anticipate being lonely.

I'm not in a good place at the moment.

A couple of bright spots: I received a Dr Who calendar from Mauro yesterday - to give me something to look forward to in the new year and as proof that someone cares for me. Many thanks my friend. Also a certain combo from Blackhorse Lane have sent me a book on birds of Argentina - at last some way of identifying the feathered things around me. Much appreciated, Jayne, David and Robyn.

Knowing you are all there and that you care is what keeps me going.

Phone call

Phone call from reception "Shiralee, there's a friend here to see you"

A friend? Could it be?

It was a student come to collect their results and say goodbye.

Hope is a treacherous beast.

Woe, woe and thrice times woe!

I was just checking my blog, as you do when you're bored, and I realised that in the last post I told you I had a bout of sinusitis and I've also realised that I haven't had a single comment or expression of sympathy - from anyone! Not a single 'poor dear' or 'I know how bad it can be' or 'there, there', not one, not from anyone (can you tell I'm a bit peeved by this?). Come on people! - I took painkillers!! And you should know how rare an occurrence this is!!! (punctuation abuse is a further indication of my peevedness)

On top of that, because I was so busy taking care of my sinuses, I neglected my feet and now have a crack on the ball of my left foot where the skin got so dry it gave up.

Pain at both ends.

Now I know people read this and I can understand the desire to hide behind anonymity, I do it myself. It's the blogging equivalent of hit and run (I call it lurk and read) but is it really beyond your capabilities to leave a comment of sympathy? All you have to do is click on '0 person(s) raised their hands' and type something nice.

Go on, give it a go - make my day

The Weekend

I spent the weekend at Santa Clara del Mar last weekend.

Positive things: the sun shone, I exposed my belly to the sun for the first time in more years than I can remember.

Negative things: I got a bout of sinusitis, I was bored out of my mind.

I won't be going back again.

Childish Things

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
1 Corinthians 13:11

I've been pondering on whether to post on this subject. I don't know if I want to post because I need to express my feelings or whether it's because I'm hoping the person in question will read this and act on it.

Some of you will know that while I was in Italy I met and fell in love with someone. Of course, as is the nature of my life, he was (is) married with two daughters. He is also a workaholic and emotionally unavailable. Although I tried to find compromises which would not impact on his family and work, ultimately it wasn't possible. I was willing to compromise, he wasn't.

This man is the only one I've ever really been in love with, the only man who I've ever wanted to have children with - and I realise that this is never going to happen.

One of my reasons for coming to Argentina was to put distance between me and him; to see if my feelings were true; to see if he had any real feelings for me; to give us both breathing space. And what I've come to realise is that no matter how I feel, the feelings are not reciprocated.

So now it's time to move on, to remove his photo from my phone, to remove his hold on my heart. I've only a few more tears to shed, a small flicker of hope to extinguish and several deep breaths to take.

Wish me well.

Feeling hot, hot, hot...

Oy vey!

Another almost sleepless night (but not totally). The temperature here in BsAs is high and made much worse by the 753% humidity. Luckily, it's overcast this morning which means the temperature is bearable.

Yesterday I did some shopping for a friend and that meant popping in and out of shops and malls. And everytime I opened a door I was blasted in the face by ice-cold air conditioning - my right sinus is still considering suing me for physical and emotional distress (either that or planning some cruel and unnatural punishment in retaliation).

I hate air-conditioning. Using it means your body can't adapt to the real world temperature, it's either too hot or too cold and lots of germs go flying around in the recycled air.

Today's weather report was brought to you by sleepy and grumpy, and the letter Bah!

Ten Things

I found this while reading another blog and I thought I'd give it a go...

The exercise is to list ten things that, for whatever reason, you think but would never say to a particular person in your life. Don't name the person to whom it's directed, just the comment.

1) Why does everything have to be done at your pace?

2) Just because you say it, doesn't make it so.

3) Oh would you just SHUT UP!

4) No I didn't answer your email. Why? because I have nothing to say to you.

5) Please call me, I miss you.

6) Don't second guess me, you're always wrong and it annoys the p*$$ out of me.

7) Stop whining - the reason it's difficult is because you don't do any work.

8) Please stop making promises that you have no intention of keeping, I'm bored with them

9) Welcome to my reality.

10) "Man's milk" is the most disgusting phrase in existence, don't ever use it again.

Gymtastic

You don't half see some funny things at the gym. Normally I go quite late in the evening when it's relatively quiet but today, being Friday, I thought I'd go a bit earlier, get it out of the way so to speak.

OH MY GOD!!!! (sorry about the punctuation abuse but OMG!!!)

A bit of background here: I'm not very adventurous at the gym, I have a treadmill I like and I pound the hell out of it for about an hour - no, I don't run, I just walk quickly. All the treadmills are arranged in fours; two side by side facing another two side by side with room for people to walk down the middle (oh work it out for yourselves, it's standard gym stuff). Anyway, the upshot is that you end up staring into the face of someone who is also using a treadmill. Now many people are able to look around when walking/running but not me. I have the most terrible sense of balance and even moving my head puts me off kilter so straight ahead is where I look, always.

So I'm nicely settled in, mini-disk blasting away (I hate the music the gym provides), staring straight ahead and a women gets on the opposing treadmill. Nothing unusual there I hear you say, true I reply except she is still carrying her handbag and as she starts the treadmill going, the handbag is hanging from her shoulder. In fact it stays there until she works up a sweat and has to take off her fleece whereupon both bag and fleece are casually thrown on the floor regardless of the inconvenience to others. Then, once warmed up, she starts running. Now I know that men find it difficult not to be distracted by breasts but I thought I was immune (after all I have a fine pair of my own) however I could not stop watching this woman's boobs. Bouncing up and down, up and down - and not together - and I started getting dizzy; bad balance and bouncing, not a good combination. I wanted to shout 'Get a decent sports bra' very loudly and several times. Unfortunately I don't speak Spanish so I just had to adjust my sights and concentrate on the handlebar in front of me.

After twenty minutes she upped and left. Whoopee I thought but, no, oh no. Who should get on the treadmill next but an elderly gentleman in shorts and singlet. Ok, not a problem - he looks old enough to be my great grandfather. He's stringy but obviously works out regularly, and being stringy, he won't bounce. And indeed he didn't bounce. What he did was incorporate moves that would have made a baton twirling majorette proud. I move my arms as I walk (if I don't the blood collects in my hands and they get stiff and swollen) but this guy was flinging his arms high over his head so that at their extremes they were 180 degrees apart. This manuveoure meant that he had to walk at the end of the treadmill and I swear it was only luck that stopped him from falling off. After 30 seconds of this my eyes were firmly fixed on my handlebar lest I burst out laughing, fall sideways off the treadmill and make a bigger fool of myself than he was making of himself. Luckily, he gave up after about ten minutes and was replaced by a rather well-built, muscular young man.

There is something very satifying about watching a well-built, muscular young man run.

Good

I done it!


Ok, lousy grammar but... I done it!


Quite pleased with myself because.... I done it!


What?


What have I done?


Oh, right, my input session for teacher development (on discourse, actually, seeing as you ask)


And ok, it wasn't just me, N did a lot of the work and he came up with most of the ideas but...


I done it!


I will now take a stroll to the gym with a big grin on my face because...


I done it - and it was gooood!

Hair

Argentina is supposed to rate second only to Brazil for the pressure on people to look beautiful. I don't know, there are some very good looking people (men and women) here but they tend to be both rich and young. As people get older or poorer the level of attractiveness goes down.

Despite this, advertising abounds with products on improving your skin, reducing or removing your cellulite and, most of all, having fantastic hair. Like many other nations, there are shops solely dedicated to cosmetics (with none of the workaday stuff we all need like soap, deodorant etc), all of which seem to do a roaring trade. To be honest I'm a bit intimidated by them - and the lack of Spanish doesn't help.

In addition there is Farmacity, which is like Superdrug, for all your everyday needs. And here's the funny thing, every store has shelves upon shelves of shampoo and conditioner. Just about every combination is catered for... except mine (fine, flyaway in need of volume and getting thinner by the day). It was fine until recently, I could get the Pantene ProV which adds volume but they've just redesigned the packaging and my preferred combination doesn't seem to be available. So I've had to resort to a local brand - I'm now on my second 'type' - I have no idea if it's what I should be using but the word volume is somewhere on the label so let's keep our fingers crossed.

Oh, and I've got to get my hair cut again. Do you have any idea just how traumatic this will be for me? well, do you?

And singing and dancing

...so where was I?

Oh yes, San Antonio de Areco. As the coach was driving into SAdA the rain started and, unfortunately, as we walked into the town the rain just got heavier and heavier. We did manage to see the end of the horse parade.

(see flickr for more photos)

Finally we stopped for lunch (ok but not brilliant) and made it last about two hours - I even had a coffee.

Despite our delaying, the rain was still dropping out of the sky, so on went L's jacket (to keep her dry) and up went L's umbrella (to keep me dry) and off we trudged. Over the river to the park where it was all supposed to be happening. Lots of horses everywhere, looking a little sorry for themselves - although they were generally tied up under trees they were still getting wet.

Anyway, we made our way to a hall where people were congregating and were ushered in. There wasn't really anywhere to sit and we annoyed some locals by blocking their view. This wasn't done on purpose, we just didn't know what to do. In the end, one of them offered a seat to L and I managed to get out of the way. There was music and dancing then some speeches (I have no idea what about) and then they brought coffee and food around. As we'd just eaten we declined. We noticed that almost everyone else was wearing a green wristband with INVITADOS on it so we were pretty sure we weren't supposed to be there but there was nothing else going on.



After an age of speeches we left and walked back into town and had a look around the silver workshops. Finally we stopped for tea and then back to the coach station and the bus home.

All in all, not the day we had hoped for but still much better than being stuck in my flat on a rainy BsAs day.

Update: Wednesday 8th November - I've just re-read this and it is so gloomy. I did enjoy the day but not getting wet.

More horses please

Just a quick post as it's late and I'm tired (and it isn't even 11pm yet).

Today L and I went to San Antonio de Areco, a gaucho town two hours outside of BsAs. As I'm sure you know gauchos are the South American cowboys (some would say the original cowboys). They spend the summer farming cattle out on the plains of Argentina, preparing all that lovely beef for me to eat. However, traditionally, they have gathered in the winter in towns to sit out the winter doing normal human things (marrying, having children, drinking, telling stories etc.). Now don't be mislead, if you didn't know it was a gaucho town, you wouldn't know. The houses are made of brick, the roads are sealed, people have cars etc. The major difference seems to be that there are lots of horses. Every gaucho needs his horse (and they are 'he' - this is a traditional society) preferably more than one.

Of course, the owning, breeding, riding and care of horses is very important to this group of people and this is reflected in their traditions. Soon the gauchos will be heading back out onto the plains for cattle husbandry and this weekend they had a grand fair at which they planned to show their horses, have a rodeo and lots of singing and dancing. Dancing is seen here as a very masculine thing to be able to do (ladies, you know how you feel when you see a man who can dance well) and everyone from about the age of ten upwards learns and participates.

This is what L and I went for. It didn't work out quite the way we hoped but more on that later....

Best Year Yet

Many years ago I bought a book called Your Best Year Yet. It is a self-help book designed to help the reader fulfil their dreams. I know it sounds trite but it is very useful, if only because it sets a framework which allows you to decide which desires are achieveable and which are pipedreams. From there, it gives a series of steps which help you work towards making your desires reality. I used the book for about four years, but always got a little lazy about mid-year, so while I achieved some of my desires I never reached the goals I really wanted to.

Unfortunately, after a couple of house moves I managed to lose the book. I still had the notes from previous years but it didn't feel quite the same. Anyhow, last night I was searching the net and I googled Best Year Yet - and guess what popped up? Yep, an online version. So I worked through it and came up with my goals for the coming year. A lot of them are to do with looking after myself, improving my health and fitness, as well as sorting out the mess that is my personal life.

I really recommend this book/website especially if you're looking for a way to 'unstagnate' your life. If you do it properly (and honestly) it helps you take a long hard look at what you're doing and why, what you really want and what's stopping you from getting it. The book/website doesn't offer any magic solutions but it can be a powerful tool for changing your life.

I'll keep you updated.

Honesty

Ok, where do I begin?

When I set up this blog it was to serve two purposes. The first was to let everyone know what I was doing in BsAs and the second was to reassure those who love me that I was fit and well and not going mad. I know it hasn't suceeded particularly well in meeting those purposes.

Partly this is because I don't really do very much here. My journey to work is so short that there isn't time for anything interesting to happen - how many times do you want to hear that I stopped at the kiosk to buy water and waved to the encangardo in the adjoining building? - and, often, I just come home from work and crash in front of the computer.

In addition I haven't been completely honest. I have a habit (and I'm not going to discuss how this came about) of concealing my feelings. This is mainly because I don't want to worry those who love me (yes, mum, I'm talking about you) but also because I don't like having to deal with the distress of others when they find out I'm not a 100% happy bunny. I find it more draining to deal with another's need to talk about my feelings and 'solve' my problems. Often my problems aren't solveable, they just have to be endured until they have gone, and I'm very good at enduring.

However, being so far from friends and family, I have realised I need some kind of outlet for my feelings. The more perceptive of you will have picked up on my allusions to loneliness and lack of like-minded people but I hope I've been careful enough that this hasn't been a recurring theme in my blog. But this is my blog and I should be free to write whatever I like, without having to deal with other people's emotional fall-out. I know from experience that writing about how I feel brings relief and also puts things into perspective for me. Often, the mere act of putting pen to paper (or keyboard to software) is enough to shift me out of whatever downer I'm in.

So I guess this is a heads up. The blog may get a little more whiney, more 'poor me', more 'what the bloody hell am I doing in this godforsaken country'. Should you feel inclined to try to discuss those posts with me, ask yourself this question...

Am I (the reader) doing this to try and help Shiralee or to reassure myself?

Cycles

OK, what's going on?

Monday I felt completely flat - not enough sleep, even with an afternoon siesta; uninspired - thank god we're near the end of the year; and not inclined to be more than minimally civil to anyone.

Tuesday I had a long lovely lie in, so relaxing, and my students accuse me of being hyperactive (not that they used that word, more like crazy waving hand gestures). Of course by the end of the day all I want to do is sleep again and I'm still feeling quite anti-social.

Tomorrow - who knows.

The only thing I do know is that I really don't want to make any effort at all. I would expect this to happen over the course of a month, not over a couple of days.

Must check my biorhythms.