Happy, loved, and blessed... again

Thankfully, blogger saves your drafts. :)

Sometimes I have good days, and sometimes bad. And if you can't tell by the title today, it's one of the good days. It all started yesterday... (fade to black)

It started out as any other Fast Sunday does. I was hungry, and then I had a headache all afternoon from dehydration. Instead of drinking more water, I took some Ibuprofen and didn't feel much better. I had two parties to go to, and I was kind of stressing about the timing.

I went to the Los Alamos party for about 5 minutes, dropped off the tortillas, said hi to everyone, and promised to be back. Then I went to our dinner party.

One of our friends from Beijing, whose name is also Chelsea, had us over for Chinese food. It was wonderful-- and authentic! This is good, because she had learned how to make it from her Chinese Aiyi. Not only was there wonderful food, but excellent conversation as well. It's always nice to catch up with friends.

After dinner, we went to the Los Alamos party. I missed the breakfast burritos (Chile Works style, of course), but most of the people were still there. I got to talk about myself (my favorite topic, obviously), and also make a complete fool of myself by not being able to say the word "archeology." It's a hard word!

More than that, though, it was wonderful to sit in a room full of people I love. When I'm with my Los Alamos friends, I'm always so comfortable. I truly feel like they are my extended family. Some feel close like sisters and cousins, and others more like distant cousins, once removed maybe. But we all have a shared history and background. We all went to school together, know all the same people, and love and support each other. We're Mormons, we're from Los Alamos, and we stick together. We know each others' quirks and strengths, and we're friends despite/because of them.

Ok, so there are people in the "Los Alamos" group who are not *technically* from Los Alamos. Maybe they grew up in a different part of the stake, or maybe they've moved in since high school. But they mesh into our group so well that I can tell they feel the same kinship that we all share.

So for you LA friends who are reading this blog, here's the shout-out: I love you guys! You're my home away from home. :)

and then to today's good news:

I'm a little bit flustered about what I ought to do for my job next year. I would love to teach, but I am not certified. I could do an Alternative Licensing program to teach as I get my license, but I would have to find a (vacant) full-time Chinese teaching position... which, believe it or not, are kind of hard to come by. I have a minor in English, but I can't use that to do the Alternative Licensing program.... So there I am, back at the drawing board.

I called around to the Chinese teachers in the area (ok, just the one lady I've met before), and she told me about the ednet program. It's kind of a liason between BYU and the public high schools in Utah. Basically, there is a teacher at BYU who broadcasts a class to the various high schools offering Chinese in Utah. It's an interactive class, like a teleconference, and that lasts for half the period. Then the on-site facilitator (me) would teach the rest of class and be responsible for collecting assignments and doing grades... and teaching for about half the class.

It's not my ideal. Ideally I would be able to teach a full day's worth of Chinese classes on my own, since I'm sort of stubborn and independent. I mentioned this to the lady I talked to, and she says that's kind of her opinion. She would rather have more leeway for her own teaching method, since she doesn't always agree 100% with the way the broadcast teacher teaches (although he's really good). She warned me, though about the reaction she got when she voiced those concerns to the ednet directors. They seemed to take the criticism personally and be terribly offended she would have something negative to say about their project, their baby.

Hmm... That reaction reminded me of someone... Who is it again? Oh yes, it turns out the director of the ednet program is the director of the Chinese Flagship program... and was also the director of our Study Abroad program, the one where Kevin and I met.

I can deal with him. But he's only the director, not the broadcast teacher, so I won't be dealing with him on a daily basis.

PS: if you go to the ednet website, you can see some pictures, and they were all taken on our study abroad trip. So in most of the group shots there is either Kevin or me. :)