virtual diaries

Un petit peu de soupe

Hello to you all,

The title is "a little bit of soup" because we had a large roast chicken lunch today in what is fast becoming a tradition for us, and we've been pretty lazy otherwise today so not much need for anything more substantial. Aurelie has just asked me to point out that it's delicious (it is, our little electric oven does it nicely).

Aaanyway, thanks for your comments below. Aurelie and I really are very happy, although we still can't quite believe it! Nor can we wait - 6 months seems such a long time! But of course, it isn't really, and very soon quiet nights will be a thing off the past, along with a flat that smells nice. Because babies smell, let's be honest. Ah well,I'll get Aurelie to change the nappies, she won't mind.....Only joking babe!! Haha! I promise to do my fair share, of course.

She's getting on well, by the way, feeling less sick recently. Her belly is certainly starting to show a bit now too. Or maybe that's the chicken and nutella..? Work's going well for her too, so we're happy about that too.

I started my new job on Tuesday, and struggled a lot with sleep for the first 3 days, but back to normal now. It really is most horrible to suffer a sleepless night, and 2 or 3 in a row is terrible. When all you want to do is sleep, but you just can't get comfortable...then you just can't drop off...messes you up for a long time after too...I'm still feeling very tired. I wonder how things will turn out when the baby arrives...I think for the better, as I'll feel different somehow, I can just feel it. It will make such a change, something of greater importance to us than anything else in the past ever. And I think that sleeping will just become a case of getting it while we can! Of course, I don't have breasts either, so it won't be I who has to rise during the night...unless we put it in a bottle? I don't really know how these things work to be honest.

Well, anyway, we'll see how things go...we are both looking forward to this period in our lives immensely, we really are. So, I was writing about my job. As I may have mentioned, the school is based on the 'Multiple Intelligences' theory postulated by Howard Gardner. The theory is, basically, that we all have different types of intelligences (7 in all I believe) ranging from literary and language awareness to inter-personal intelligence.

With that in mind, the school has some children who, let us say, don't learn in the 'normal' way - basically they didn't get on with the traditional, memorisation learning that goes on in Asia. Most of the children aren't different however to other children...'normal', if you'll excuse the connotations. So the school try to teach children in another way, and concentrate on more than just filling their heads with facts. Basically, end result is that there seems a strange lack of discipline in the school...but of course the kids have to be respectful, and they all are. I'll write more on this later, there's too much to say.

On the first day, I was 'invited' (told) to introduce myself in front of the school (100 students)...I didn't see that one coming, I can tell you! But I got a large round of applause, which put a big smile on my face!!  Then I taught a few impromptu lessons there last week (kids were ok-ish, but rather high-spirited - which is fine, but sometimes they have to listen!!!!!!) and also visited the primary school, a 15 minute ride away,on Friday (I have to go there on Mondays and Fridays). I met the kids there too (another 100) and they're so sweet! One class even started singing for me!! It's such things you remember with a big smile a few years down the line...

So back to work tomorrow...gonna try and read more about MI, and help them develop that avenue as much as I can. Oh and another thing - Wednesday is sports morning, and I get to play football with the kids all morning! What else..there seems so much now I've started typing...but I guess your eyelids are drooping by now. We gave back the scooter to Aurelie's boss today, and so rented one again, a nice nifty little white one. Of course, we're well aware we'll need a car not too far into the future...more expense, which really tests our commitment to being here even more. I think about returning to Europe most days...but we're not for leaving just yet. I feel a certain frustration and getting to know everyone at the school, getting comfortable (a lot of effort), then giving it all up again...

Anyway, that's it! My last thing to say is that I spent almost all of yesterday reading "Endurance" by Alfred Lansing, a journalistic account of Sir Ernest Shackleton's ill-fated trip to the Antarctic circa 1914, aboard the Endurance,with his crew of 28 men. I was seized by this awesome story at once when I picked it up last week (I already knew the outline) and it didn't let go till I finished it yesterday. It is truly incredible.

So, goodnight, I'll try and post some photos next week.

A new picture for you...

Well, here is a new photo which we received yesterday.

IT'S OUR BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  AURELIE IS PREGNANT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes it's true!! We in fact found out about 3 weeks ago by accident when Aurelie had a medical examination for her work permit - that was quite a surprise I can tell you! We had a scan that day, and saw our baby.

We wanted to wait a little while before telling everyone though, until we had another scan...so there you are! She is in fact 11 weeks 5 days pregnant, meaning she's due on the 16th January (all very precise, no?)

We are starting to see her belly just a little bit now - apparently the baby is about 65mm from head to bum. We've already thought of names - for a girl we like 'Libelulle' which means 'dragonfly' in French! We're not sure we'll actually be allowed to call her that though. For a boy we aren't really sure yet...any ideas? Aurelie likes 'Jeremy', but I'm not so sure. We also like 'Yoshi', but we'd never give our child the stigma of being named after a computer game dinosaur (we're a bit weird, I know).

So this is pretty big news for us obviously. At the moment, we've decided to stay here in Malaysia and give it a go. As you can imagine, these decisions aren't easy, and they are not taken lightly. But we've been doing a lot to make a life here (even if it's only really temporary) and we don't want to just give up. Plus things wouldn't necessarily be so simple going back to France...

...additionally, I had a job interview at a school here, and they've offered me a job! Looks like I'll be starting as soon as next week. It's very interesting to me, as it's a small school, and they are different to other schools in that they take a very holistic approach to education, working on 'mulitple intelligences' and developing children in more ways than solely increasing knowledge. It's full-time, but I won't be teaching all the time, I'll also be working on curriculum development and other similar areas.

Aurelie doesn't wish to just abondon her position either - it's a great opportunity for her, although she'll be taking a bit of time off soon! Her employer has been very understanding about everything, which is wonderful for us, of course. The pregnancy also explains Aurélie's adversion to the food here! Right now, we eat mostly western style food (we bought a little oven so we can make roast chicken) although I eat fried rice or tandoori chicken pretty often (cheap and delicious).

So, well, we just have to see how things go in the next couple of months...perhaps the heat will end up being too much for Au in her grossesse. But the medical services here are excellent, so there's no problem there - in fact we live opposite the hospital we go to! The baby can also have two passports! Perhaps even a third, Malaysian one?

Well, there you go...visits to see big bellied Aurelie soon or screaming baby in the new year will be most welcome!

Back to Georgetown

Hey, great, I've got a title for my post this time! Yes, indeed we are back from our little trip to Singapore. We arrived there without any problem on Tuesday morning, and managed to find our way around on the buses and metro / transit system.

In fact, Singapore is a pretty small place, and it is very well run and organised. It is also an incredibly clean city - there is virtually zero rubbish, and it doesn't smell at all, despite its tropical climate! No doubt its size allows things to be tightly managed, as well as threats of fines for nearly everything (don't chew chewing gum!). We both quite liked it actually, a welcome break from the chaos of Georgetown. It's rather weird, to have this 'oasis' of a very safe and highly developed country, where everyone speaks English, sandwiched between Malaysia and the even poorer Indonesia.

On Wednesday, we took the train from Singapore to KL - it took about 8 hours! Not particularly pleasant as it was so slow, and kept stopping for long periods. Also the air-conditioning made us freeze. Never mind. So then, we stayed in KL for a little while, picked up our huge heavy suitcase and got a bus back here on Thursday.

And today is our one year anniversary! One year since we decided to be together. We just had a lovely dinner at a nice restaurant to celebrate. And now she is doing a little bit of preparation for her first class at the Alliance Française tomorrow, and she tells me she's almost finished. I'm going to go with her, because I'm allowed to have free French classes! :) Not with her, but a different teacher. Au's going to be teaching the beginners, et moi, je ne suis pas debutante!

Next week, I have a couple of interviews lined up too (teaching at private secondary schools), so hopefully something will happen there. And now, it's bedtime - I'll try and post some more photos tomorrow after class! :)

Hello!

Hello dear friends and family, My apologies for not getting on here sooner. So what's been happening? Well Aurelie and I are still on 'holiday' - she doesn't start work until Saturday, and I'm still looking for work. I have two interviews sort of arranged for the coming days, so I'm hopeful something will happen soon on that front. I played football again on Sunday, a little better than the previous 2 times. It helped that I found a school playing field a little way from here that I can get on to, where I can run around and kick a football. An autonomous training regime, you might call it. And today, I went down to the botanical gardens and ran past the monkeys.

Tomorrow morning, we have to get up bright and early because we're going to Singapore to renew our tourist visas. The plane leaves from the airport at 8.50, so we've arranged to have a taxi pick us up here at 6.30 am. Then we stay there till the afternoon of the following day, when we catch the train to KL. Stay there one night (to get our large suitcase), then travel back here on Thursday. I'm going to try and enjoy the trip as much as possible, despite its functional nature.

Aurelie and I are both rather preoccupied with the cost of the trip, and our imagination of a hot concrete jungle. But I'll try and be positive about the experience, and help Aurelie to be so too. I hear the hotel (YMCA actually) has a large pool though, so I'm looking forward to that. There seem to be 3 YMCAs in Singapore, in fact, all new, gleaming and very expensive - weird...

Well, it was my intention to post some photos this evening...but again time has flown. We have lots of time at the moment, but there always seems to be something to gobble it up. For example, I just read a book entitled 'A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian', and I enjoyed it a lot. Also, posting photos does take a lot of time - I have to select the best ones, then resize them, then upload them. Anyway, no whinging Ben! I enjoy doing it in fact...it's just one of those things that seems to be unappealing until you actually sit down to do it, but I always have had a lazy streak.

Let me try one...

 

OK, that didn't take too long. So the pictures start a long way back, in KL afterwe got back from a month on the beach. Aurelie is holding a worrying looking fruit called Rambutan which is in fact of course delicious and a bit of a national pride here, much like chips in the UK. They are similar in taste to Lychees, but smoother and richer.

On the next one, you can see what it looks like inside.

And here is a close-up of the wonderfully shaped and coloured fruit.

So,we then left KL for the rather cooler climes of the Cameron Highlands. This is a photo of a mock-tudor building, quite common around the region. This was in a botanical research station near to the main town.

Next we have a waterfall, located half an hours trek away through the jungle.

Here, Aurelie gave me her best smile (guess she was a bit pissed off at all the walking...)

Next day, we hired a motorbike to see the area with greater ease, and because I found it exciting. The bike is a Honda EX-5, with a semi-automatic gearbox (no clutch). They are absolutely everywhere here in Malaysia, easily the most popular bike.

First stop was the 'BOH' tea plantation. Here is a nice view...

Then, here is me and her together, at the tea plantation tea house. And the tea was really good! In fact I buy the same brand here. We were on a kind of over-hanging balcony, with splendid views of the whole plantation.

Then, here is a great photo (I think) of my girl.

And here's one more for tonight...and then I'd better go to bed. Aurelie smiling at me making a fool of myself probably. We were in the tea factory, on their tour. Pretty interesting in fact, especially if you like tea!

OK - a couple more! I'm enjoying myself...here are some girls, obviously not posing for me, but I couldn't resist!

So I have a few more from the Cam. Highlands, but I'll post those next time. I thought you might like to see me again, so here I am feeding a monkey at the botanical gardens here. I'm the one on the left, before you ask! :-D

Ok, good night all, more in a few days upon our return from Singapore!

Why do I need a title?

This post does not really have a subject, therefore giving it a title is difficult! It's getting late again here...been a rather lazy day. I slept a little better, but still haven't got round to sorting and resizing photos. I'll try to do that tomorrow.

I went jogging briefly today, to try and build up a bit of fitness for the football, and boy did I sweat! I bought a guitar the other day too, so I've been playing on that, working on making my fingertips hard again on my left hand...it's rather painful at this stage. But it feels truly wonderful to play a few tunes.

Then this evening I, for some reason that I cannot fathom, took Aurelie to the cinema to see 'Drag me to Hell.' I really don't know why, because I cannot take horror movies, I just sit there with my hand over my face for the whole film...but something compels me to watch them anyway. So it was a very good film, scary and funny, very enjoyable (if you like that sort of thing - and I still don't know if I do or not!)

Sorry for the lack of recent updates...

...but all is well here with us in Georgetown. I still haven't found a job, but I had an interview on Friday so fingers crossed.

It's too hot all the time...I've found a football team to play for - ex-pats who play a game every Sunday. I played yesterday and the week before. It's sooo hard! I thought I was pretty fit, but, well I'm not! You have to take into account the sun too - we play around 5 pm, but it's still boiling if the sun's out, and only slightly less murderous if clouds shield us from the sun.

This must also be a brief post, as I had difficulty sleeping last night and feel very tired. Promise I'll write more tomorrow or the next day!

We've found a flat...

So, sorry for the lack of news recently - nothing to blame but my own laziness. We haven't been doing a great deal, but we have found a flat we both like. It's reasonably close to the centre, nicely furnished, with 2 large bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. We have to meet the owner tomorrow, where we'll finalise the deal hopefully, and move in by the end of the week. I'll post some photos as soon as I can.

Aurelie had a successful class the other day - the director of the school wanted to see her teaching, and it went well. She still hasn't signed the contract, but that'll be done soon. We are in fact at the Alliance Francaise now, as Aurelie was asked to do some translation work. I'm going to put off getting a job for a couple of weeks, because we both have to leave the country before Aurelie starts her job, as we need to renew our vistors visas, because although she'll be getting a working visa, it takes some time to organise. We also have to go and pick up a large suitcase in KL.

So we can't wait to get into our flat, then we can start trying to get into a routine. We can also cook for ourselves - we've been eating too many noodles and too much bread recently. Aurelie has problems with the spicy food too. This has led to both of us having a few tummy troubles. But soon, we'll be able to please ourselves. Part of this routine for me will certainly involve exercise, such as jogging in the botanical gardens, which I did yesterday evening.

Well, that's all for now, hope you're all doing well :)

Hot and sweaty...

I'm sitting in a small restaurant on a street called Jalan Chulia in Georgetown. Aurelie is opposite (with her laptop) eating a vegetable omelette. Jalan Chulia is one of the main streets here in Georgetown, so lots of traffic behind us on the street. It's hot and humid too, as ever here. It hasn't rained yet since we've been here, and it would be wonderful if there were.

We've been out exploring on the moped - we went to a beach called Batu Ferringhi (or something similar - it's on the North coast) and it was awful. Once, it must have been so beautiful, but human activity has destroyed its beauty. The sea was grey. A thick dank slimy grey. Apparently this was caused by the building of the Penang bridge which links the island to the mainland. Lots of people there too, drinking, smoking, leaving rubbish. Well I could go on. It was horrible and it upset me a lot. So if you come to visit, go to a different beach. We'll go and explore the other parts of the island later...must be better. Don't worry though, we are in easy reach of some wonderful other places, with great beaches, just a few hours away.

The day before, we went to the botanical gardens and fed the macaques. And yesterday, we went up to Penang Hill on the funicular train. That was very nice - it's a bit cooler up there. Got some lovely photos to post a bit later. It really is very hot here...33 degrees in the day, perhaps? At night, we need to use the air-conditioning in our hotel - can't sleep otherwise. Don't think it goes below 25 degrees at night. Air-con is a must, at least for now. I'm sure we could get used to the heat at night though.

We've started to look for a flat today. That's going to keep us busy over the next few days I'm sure. We want to get that sorted out as soon as possible, to have our own place, to cook, relax....so many things. We'll be sure to get a spare room for visitors! We looked at a house today - it was great but completely unfurnished - no good for us. Like I said, we'll try to get air-con...though I'm sure we'd get used to the heat at night eventually. So I'm going to go now...time for a cold shower. Oh,and now job news for me...but I haven't really been looking very hard! Don't worry Mum (see comment below) - they got me down for a bit - but not too long! Take care all.

Georgetown...

So, the reason for yesterday's rather breathless post was that as I was writing it, I saw that the British Council here in Penang were looking for an English teacher. There's no doubt that they're a good organisation to work for, and they offered a good salary.

It was a real coincidence, as I was going to go there yesterday anyway. So I saw the advert, and dreamt to myself that I could have the same experience as Aurelie. She went to the AF and spoke to the director and got herself a job on the spot (she hasn't signed the contract yet, but we're pretty sure she's got the job).

I did fear the worse however, as I know that the BC have their systems for recruitment and so on, and thought I'd be given short shrift, which unfortunately turned out to be the case. It's a long story...but I spoke to a lady to whom I explained my situation. She went off to talk to someone else, who then must have told her what I feared would be the case - that I must apply in the same way as anyone else. This meant filling in their online application form, although I was standing right there in their offices, fulfilling all of their criteria, ready to work. I certainly didn't get to speak to the director!

You might say that that is fair, that I deserve no special treatment - but surely it would've been also beneficial to them - to recruit someone who is here now, rather than having a telephone interview. But I knew it would happen like that. The lady was frosty and wasn't generous with her time - she wanted me out the door. But they have their all powerful systems, which must not on any account be circumvented. I also rather feel on the receiving end of 'positive' discrimination (they prefer to recruit disabled people and people from ethnic minorities). I hope you appreciate that I wouldn't say they don't deserve the same opportunities as anyone else - and I can appreciate why the BC do this. But perhaps it does serve to impede someone like me, who just wants a job, and is here, ready and available, from getting a job for which I'm suitable.

Anyway, upon reflection I don't want to work for them considering their overly professional and robotic ways. I'm sure I'd hate it. Plus it was 38 hours work a week, including weekends, teaching kids mostly. I'd rather find something with a bit more freedom and enjoyment for less money.

So, anyway, after Aurelie's amazing experience at the AF, we went to the opening of the French film festival, organised by the AF here in Penang. We had a great evening, with free food and Cognac, and met a lot of interesting people. We wore our best clothes (not that great) and we were the only ones in flip flops (it was either that or yellow running shoes). The French ambassador was there, as well as many other dignitaries, and we heard them each make a speech before we watched the opening film called Le Crime est Notre Affair.

And that's about it for now. I'll be looking for a job over the next few days - it seems there are some interesting possibilities around the island. We're still in the hotel for the time being, but Aurelie's new employers have put us into contact with a lady with a small flat to rent. And I hired a scooter yesterday (automatic this time - no gears) so we might go for a ride today - I fancy going to the botanical gardens, or the beach.

Bye for now!

Georgetown, Penang.

Hello all,

Thank you very much for the comments, it seems the photos were enjoyed by everyone, so I'm very glad - I certainly enjoyed selecting the photos and writing the comments!

Well, we went to the Cameron Highlands and had a nice time there - it was nice and cool up there. We hired a moped which had gears (which I learnt to ride in a few minutes) and did a tour of the area.

So now we're in a place called Georgetown which is on the island of Penang on the West coast of Malaysia. We came here because Aurelie saw there was an Alliance Francaise here and she wanted to try and get a job there, as she was a bit fed up of moving around all the time.

And yesterday, we had the most crazy day. We went to the AF and the director told us that that very day she had put out an advert for a French teacher! And she loved Aurelie! So to cut a long and amazing story short, it seems she has a job! And I've also just seen a very interesting job, so I must rush. There's a lot more to tell, but you'll have to wait. But things are looking up! :)