Well my darling Sam Sam returned from his 3 week long holiday in the South Americas with his parents. But he hasn’t been taking the adjustment well at all. He’s only just recovered from his jet lag yesterday but after three weeks of having his parents undivided attention, he’s been clingy for them and only just wants to be picked up and held at childcare.

He’s learnt how to say “Noooooo” in the cutest way. Which is annoying as it is obstructive, but still he’s just absolutely gorgeous. It’s very unlike Sam Sam behaviour to just cling onto my leg whenever I put him down (not that I don’t like it, because I love holding onto him). It’s slighly worrying =(.

He smiles whenever I come and pick him up and he climbs into my arms without murmur. I like it, but he used to not do that before. Before he’d grin and then try to run away from me resulting in me chasing him. The change in behaviour is a little worrying, but I’m assuming that he’s just having to adjust to not having the undivided attention of his parents and not spending time in their company.

In the three weeks he was gone, he seemed to lose his puppy fat and grow taller! It’s amazing how fast kids grow. It’s actually his birthday Saturday week and he’ll be 2 years old.

I love my Sam Sam. I can’t wait to have kids of my own.

Well as much as I enjoy that song from Blondie, my home line has borked. We can not hear a dial tone, but calling in, we can hear a ring tone. With no dial tone, we can’t call out. Telstra claims they’ll track down the fault within two business days and so all incoming calls to my house will be directed to my mobile.

I’m glad we have an extra mobile lying around, I’d hate to think my mother having no way of contacting people if she really needed it or Tim or myself being unable to get in contact with her in an emergency.

So I’m hoping Telstra earns their rental fees and fixes the problem.

I went to see CSE Revue on Thursday – funny story I bought a ticket for Tuesday but turned up on Thursday, because I always turn up to Thursday night shows. So alas, I missed my seat. But I loitered in the back corner and Front of Housed it up. I managed to sell 5 DVD’s – I’ve been told I’m a hard seller.

I sat on the candy bar while waiting and Ben told me I was the “eye candy” of the candy bar. Awww, isn’t that sweet? Lol, another pun.
The show was excellent though. They went more towards gamer and math nerdy as opposed to strictly comp sci nerdy. It was a good branch out though – there’s so much more material and it’s a lot more accessible to the audience. That is not to say there wasn’t any of the CSE nerdiness! It was still there, just understated.

My favourite sketches were the D&D send ups and the math romancing sketch (lol, he even used term that I’ve used myself while actuarially blogging!). Nancy aquitted herself well, playing the rather emo poorly singing character very well. One thing I do notice is that though everyone gets a chance to act some are used more often then others – I guess it’s the acting ability and the stereotype you can easily project yourself to be. For example Justin was extremely suited to be the horribly nerdy Maths dude squeaking formulaes.

I was surprised at how well Ryan rapped “Grammar Time”. He said he spent ages practicing it and it really did pay off! It just rolled off his tongue and his voice was just the right kind of tone that made it credible. The prescience of the directors was quite astonishing. I agree with Ali that the singing in the first half was better than in the second. Ryan definitely tipped the scale for me there.

It was really good actually to be a first time watching the show. I haven’t seen any of the sketches during costuming except for snatches of the dances and hearing the singers practice in the SOCs office as Jane and I bashed at the costumes relentlessly. I didn’t see all of it because I helped out at FoH – but I guess in a large way I’m over going to revues and stuff.

Maybe it’s cause I’ve gotten very tired of the politics I’ve had to deal with and that’s tempered my enthusiasm somewhat.

After the show I caught up with Marc Chee and Timl and Marc made the comment “So you’re addicted to work huh” when I told him I was helping FoH just cause. All the old revuers are – addicted to work. I can’t really just sit there and relax.

One of the things about Revue for me has been the work. I love costuming (oh, and bitching really loudly at the sewing machine) , I love cooking, I love helping people and yes, I love the hard selling. It’s always been that for me, the friends have just been a great bonus. (Did I mention how much I love you Jen and Nancy?)
Some of the people I’ve had to work with have really disappointed me at times – and now, no longer in the heat of anger and having distanced myself away from it – I can see it with just a bit of regret. I still love CSE Revue very much – but some of the people there, in my opinion, have been real assholes to me. In a way I want to come back next year, but I don’t know who will have the power and be delibrately obstructive and somewhat cruel. I suffered a lot of hurt, anger and I still hold a my fair share of bitterness.

I saw Alex after the show, and as usual we didn’t have much to say to each other. It dissappoints me that I’m left unable to hold a conversation with him. I realise it’s futile to as we don’t really have much to say to each other and we don’t have much in common at all. But I still hold regrets that I can’t really talk to my ex-boyfriends anymore. Though our romantic relationships are over, I still want to maintain some kind of relationship as opposed to the whole hi-bye kind of thing.

I even took my 5 seconds of fame and went on stage during the Costumes call. This year has really consolidated my thoughts that I’m not cut out for the whole acting spotlight thing. I’d rather work behind the scenes and contribute that way. I would just like to be appreciated for the work that I do.

*sigh* But the show was indeed t3h awesome. However, as someone did say on the night, sad lack of penis and ya mum jokes.

So yesterday was the last week of Sunday School for Term 3. Yay!

On Friday night, Christina, Liz and I trotted out to Lakemba for the Confirmation mass. It was a long tedious mass but Cardinal Pell gave a funny homily. He said “On the way here, I realised we were going to be late, so I asked Father Liem if Vietnamese people were one time or sometimes late. Father Liem replied ‘I think they are sometimes late.’ So I apologise for being late on Western standards, but being on time via Vietnamese standards.” Lol

I liked that the Cardinal made the effort to take his time on the anointing of the oil with the kids. He blessed them and then put his hand on their cheek and smiled at them. It wasn’t of the quickly in, quickly out kind of thing which is what can happen when you’ve got so many people around, and sadly is often the Vietnamese style of things.

We left the mass with us heading to Paul’s house for a quick party. We had yummy butter pan fried beef in rice paper rolls. It was nice to hang with all the Sunday School people and have time to catch up with Bob as we don’t get to see him much anymore after he left the school this year. Unfortunately we always have cake for the TNTT birthday events and we had a lame procession of chocolate topped cheesecake. I piked early because I had to do my Databases assignment.

Saturday was the NS picnic. I came along for it and caught up with Viet Anh =D. (She gave me a French Manicure set as a belated birthday present, bonus!) There was way too much food and we had some girls with attitude at the picnic. Picture this, there was the girl with blonde dyed fringe and streaks (it *always* looks tacky and trashy on an Asian) and wearing a black t-shirt with a loosely knotted tie and fuchsia short-shorts and thongs. So much class for a picnic. I’ve always been the advocate of easy to live in clothes at Sunday School because you do know that you’re going to be made to run or do dirty things as required.

The second half was bowling! Christina made a bet with the other Principals to a dinner shout, but alas, she lost rather spectacularly, only scoring 61. She’s promised to shout them after the camp in a couple of week’s time. It was great fun, I managed to beat my Adelaide score of 58 with 62 and 68 (geez, how much a strike can save your ass). YAY! Paul was the overall highest scorer and one of the Bankstown kids was the overall worst scorer.

I find it worrying that our kids tend to be very introverted and don’t really want to socialise with kids from other schools. But I guess at that age, most kids are very insecure and it’s hard to crack into established social groups that may already exist from other schools.

On Sunday I prepared my lesson for my kids, making up a sequence of codes. I had hoped for no spelling mistakes this time but alas, it was not meant to be. My Level 2, 3 kids acquitted themselves by finishing first despite their cipher text needing a bit of thinking to crack. I had to send 4 boys out for playing with the maths equipment in the classroom and they met the wrath of Paul and Chris – Paul had them kneeling on the hard concrete for about 15 minutes.

Then there was a crisis with poor Monique tripping as she ran and hit her mouth on the corner of a bench. She managed to hit it so hard, that she had gotten her right front tooth jammed all the way up into the gum. Poor darling! She was crying really hard and Christina and I took her to hospital. And when we got there, I told her that her mother would arrive soon and she tearfully said “I don’t know what she’s going to say!” She was so scared her parents were going to yell at her. =( I told her of course there would be no yelling – we’re your teachers and we’re not mad at you.

We finished off with the end of term party. Chaos ensued when we made the call for seconds of chips and drinks; fully 90% of the students ran off to the food table and grabbed more. *sigh*

So schools out for term 3. We have 2 weeks left to prepare for the upcoming Sydney-wide camp. We’re building the gates for the campsite and preparing the liturgical stuff for the masses. I’ve already had 8 kids from my class hand in notes; I’m expecting a record attendance. It starts rather early, 4pm on a Friday. I’m looking forward to it even though the kids can wear me out at times. Dan Thanh was whinging about the food already, despite the fact we haven’t even got there yet! I’ve told them not to bring MP3 players and I will confiscate them if I find them.

But in other unrelated news, Bryn has pointed out to me that I can become a Big Sister. I’m really interested in doing it and signed up straightaway. They have a really stringent processing criterion though. Looking after Sam has been a strain on my time but I hope to look after him as long as it’s feasible for me. I love my Sam Sam. He’s back today after a 3 week holiday in the South Americas. =D

Been meaning to blog about this so it’s a bit old news.

On Saturday I went to support the kids who were receiving Reconciliation before their Confirmation this Sunday. The kids were a bit lax what the term ‘proper’ uniform constituted – but that was alright because it wasn’t the actual mass. There was this cute girl from Cabramatta who was crying really badly when everyone had pretty much had gone. She was so incredibly upset. And it was apparently because she remembered a few sins she forgot to confess! The nun tried to console her, but she only felt better after she went to Reconciliation for the second time.

On Sunday it was as usual, beack to teaching. I was a bit tired and could of injected a bit more energy in my teaching – instead I got infuriated at my leadership training class – I had to confiscate a flag from one of the girls, kids who’ve been there for *years* still don’t perform the basic manouveres correctly and the drills I’ve given them on proper flag style hasn’t sunk through. So I told them to teach themselves and come back to me when they’ve mastered the basics. Trung, the one in charge actually made an effort to teach his younger peers. He even ‘rewarded’ them a lap around the school for impertinence.

But my mood considerably lightened for my teaching my Level 2+3′s. I only had about 6 kids, but I like my classes small. We went through the purpose and idealogy of TNTT and a quick run through of songs and ‘Guidelines for Living’. I sent a kid out for eating the worksheet I prepared (he actually like tore off the corners and put them in his mouth) which pissed me off but the other kids in my little class were hilarious.

Me: “… this tells us that we should be good people and be friendly to each other.”
C: “Chi Nhu I’m friendly! The new girl a couple of weeks ago, I was talking to her and asking her to speak Dutch” (the girl just imigrated from the Netherlands)
T: “Yeah my cousin said she didn’t want to come back, she said that you were being really annoying.”

lol lol lol

We’re having a crisis with one of the kids in Liz’s class (as I’m in charge of the whole age group). Liz and Peter are fed up with his lack of participation and insolence and want to shift him. Talking with Anh Trung, we’re going to follow textbook procedure. The problem with this kid is that he’s old enough to be in the elder class, it’s just that he consistently has failed all tests put to him and I refuse to advance anybody till they pass. I don’t set my tests very hard – you can pass simply by participating in class throughout the year and re-reading your notes once before the quiz.

Peter thinks advancing him now might be an idea so we don’t have to deal with him. But I’m totally against the idea of advancing. Does the elder class even want him? This kid has been classified as a problem case. I’ve already given him an opportunity for early advancement. I told him if he wanted to advance early to be with kids in the same age, do the quiz again at the end of Term 1 and then sit in my Level 2,3 class with a view of fastracking. He didn’t pursue it. He’s been made a leader of his group and he fails to turn up to my leadership training class which at this point would be a critical issue to get beyond the basics and into the elder class. Also, the issue with precedents. If my action because I can’t handle this kid would to be advance him, what would that say to the other marginally problem kids who are in the same boat? Just behave badly enough and I’ll let you go up?

My age group, the blues (10-12 years) are mostly still primary school aged. They are still treated as kids with a lot of guidance. The yellows (teens) are treated with a great deal of laxitude and responsibility. The dynamics are that us teachers have figured that the yellows are old enough to look after themselves and make decisions within reason. But the yellows are also because of that are on call to us if we need help at any time – to put up decorations, clean up the school, look after the younger ones while we need to be away for a minute. With the view of perpetuation, we encourage this because we hope that they will stay on to be a teacher at the end of their teenage years.

I can see from the kids point of view that he chafes at being in my class when he could have more freedom in the yellow class. Whereas I’m the opinion he doesn’t even deserve to be in the yellow class due to his failure to pass my quizzes and failure to contribute positively to the classes.

And on that, I talked to a parent about her kids in my class. It was hard because I talk in English as I can’t articulate myself in Vietnamese. I’ve spoken sharply with her kids, but I thought their problems were mostly on a social scale rather than a discipline problem which is why I spoke to her. I’m always surprised about how nice parents are when you talk to them about their kids – even when you are not-so-nice things.

This whole month looks hectic on the TNTT side. At the staff meeting we had that afternoon it was intense. We’ve got the Confirmation mass this Friday night followed by our teachers social, NS Picnic on Saturday. Week after is preparation for camp as we are building the gateways for camp the week after. Thank God that the last week of term is this Sunday.

But before I end this entry – I just want to say that I don’t agree with getting confirmed so young. I was confirmed at the age of nine myself – but what did I know at the age of nine? Chi Hang has had a nightmare untangling the issues with our Confirmation kids. I hate how nowadays Communion and Confirmation are viewed as church obligations – and not events of spiritual advancement. I think being a Catholic/Christian is about so much more than that.

Personally, I never partake in Communion. I only receive Communion when I am in the right frame of mind to be with God. Of course with the stresses of Sunday School, that’s rarely during mass right afterwards. I guess seeing how my mother is so blase about it and expects me to go irrespective of my personal feelings like it’s an obligation worries me.

Faith is about a journey. I can’t say I’m sure which road I’m walking down at the moment – but I know that I don’t want to ever treat my beliefs (whatever they may be) like that. I remember that at Nang Hong, Cha Nguyen told me that it was always enrinching to reach out of our spheres to shape our beliefs – but remember to hold onto your inner core and never let go. I guess I fail to see how enriching it is to push people along the system.

When I taught catechism last year, the kids (aged 10) were not of the age that they could really articulate their ideas about faith and parroted everything you said to them. But it was important to me that I was doing it *right* by encouraging discussion and going back to the basics in the bible. (Admittedly I was doing the old testament and there are a *lot* of twisted stories in it).

I guess that’s my rant for the month. But I am looking forward to seeing my kids this weekend.

With love,
mia