Santa Lucia

I've never felt more lucky to be where I am. Part of working at an international school is celebrating holidays from all over the world. Last week we celebrated Saint Nicolaas which is traditionally a Dutch and Belgian holiday to honor the man after whom the holiday is named. We all got to visit St. Nicolaas himself, sang a French song to him, and ate loads of chocolate, mandarin oranges, and pepernoten, which are kind of like gingerbread balls.

Today we celebrated Santa Lucia, which is normally celebrated in Sweden. We gathered into the lobby to listen to the Swedish children from all grades sing traditional Swedish Christmas music. During their performance, I suddenly got this immense feeling of gratitude. I found myself with a lump in my throat, thinking about how lucky I was to be seeing such a performance, and wondering how on Earth I got here. Some days I struggle to have the energy to work with dozens of 6 year olds, and other days there is no where else I would rather be. Will I ever find this much cultural diversity ever again? I worry about how I will handle going back to the states where schools are becoming homogenized and any celebrations are completely generic, without regard for religion or culture. Instead of worrying about that, I think perhaps it would be best to look around at my Swedish students who are still glowing in their Santa Lucia glory, my Israeli students who are getting excited for Hannukah which starts Friday, finish eating my pepernoten from my Dutch and Belgian students, and not be afraid to wish many of my other students a Merry Christmas (while I am still in a school where we are allowed to give such wishes).

Ein bratwurst, bitte

Hmmm...I suppose I owe an explanation for my lapse in entry writing (for all 5 of you that read this). And, well, I have none. I constantly have these "ah-ha!" ideas to include in my blog, but when it comes time to type them, I suffer from this incurable disorder called "laziness." There is no known cure and symptoms are especially severe during winter months.

But here we are! It is almost the middle of December, and while my countdown continues of days until I go home (10!) all of the days in between are filling up quite quickly. This last weekend I got to visit two Christmas markets, one in Brussels and another in Aachen, Germany. The German market, as expected, was gloriously cute and bustling and filled with cute stands and bratwursts and a tasty mulled wine they call Glühwein (pronounced gloo-vine). I traveled with a group of about 30 other teachers from ISB and I got to spend the day shopping, smelling delicious German cuisine, and utilizing my German-speaking skills which have been FLOURISHING since my fall break (I can say "danke schön" without hardly any accent now...hooray!). If you want to see more about the festival, check out this informational little tourist website:

http://www.aachen.de/EN/ts/90_festivals_events/90_30/index.html

At school, the next eight school days before break will be spent preparing for student-led conferences, visiting the Grand Place with a group of 80 first grade students for a class field trip, and planning and participating in a first grade wide Christmas party. I was pleasently surprised they celebrate Christmas in such a multi-cultural setting! This celebration is being banned in schools all over the states and most other countries, so I am going to go all out knowing that this will probably be the last time I get to celebrate Christmas with my students!

The choir I am in has two performances this weekend for our Christmas concert, and I can hardly contain myself I am so excited! It certainly won't be Christmas at Luther (what could possibly compare?!) but it will be so great to sing holiday music again! My netball team has also qualified for finals, so I will be bringing out the game face for that on Monday. Oh! And at some point during that time I have to finish my Christmas shopping. These next 10 days are going to fly by!

One more quick update (since I have no idea when I will be inspired to write my next blog). After one week at home, I will be coming back to Europe for my second week of holiday break. I will be spending New Year's in London (WHOA!) with some high school friends, and then heading over for Barcelona for a few days before I return back to Brussels. I am particularly excited about visiting Spain, and have found this ingenious tool called Google Earth which lets me see a satellite image of the city so I can explore the city from a safe distance before I get there. It's quite amazing, really. I've even found my hostel!

Until next time...

Bonsoire, Gut Nacht, Buenas Noches, and Goodnight