19 Jan

I have been getting on with the teaching and am enjoying it. The students are friendly and responsible and as their potential English qualifications are their tickets to work, they are committed to studying. They have five classes a day and do self-study in the evenings. I'm currently on duty for an hour to help anyone with questions about their work so I have to be available for them. As it is even colder today than earlier in the week, some of the girls have become ill and are wrapped up in bed.

For me, to go back to being an English language teacher is interesting. It has been more than 10 years since I last did this so it's funny to work in this way again. I find that because I'm used to teaching young children, I tend to be more sensitive to their needs than I need to be! However, I know that some of the students are not very confident so sometimes it is useful to be like that for them.

I am finding it easy to back to teaching grammar and vocabulary like in the 'old days' and feel that I am helping the students because I know how to explain things clearly.

To give a few observations about Tibetan culture, when we eat together (we often eat noodles in a soup), they slurp their food with no concern for the noise they make and they also put their mouth right to the edge of the bowl. It's quite amusing to see this cultural example. But they are polite with each other and sharing is a big part of their lives. If someone has sweets or chocolate, they make sure they share them with everyone in the vicinity.

Another thing is they will thank you at the end of the lessons and tend to wait in their seats until I say they may leave if they want to!

With this current cold, I am planning to go away for the weekend just to stay in a slightly warmer place and get a hot shower. As I've been to McLeod twice, I will go an hour south to a village called Kangra, which is supposed to have some nice places to visit.

One of the students, Tseduk, came to my room to ask me to check his work and we ended up talking about philosophy and the Tibetan identity and culture for an hour. He likes to talk about deep things and this is one thing that I wanted to come here for. I hope to have more conversations like this to learn more about the Tibetan people.