Thursday, November 16, 2006
Dies Tertius
I'm feeling better about things now, but the thought of staying here for the entire year is still not at all appealing. The people are really nice here, but I really miss home a lot. I realize that my entire career in Latin has been like a trickle compared to this flood. The regular schedule is about six hours of class beginning at 3pm with two half hour breaks. There is no English spoken, ever. Magister Miraglia mirabile auditu est; i.e. he can fill two hours with flawless rapidfire Latin. His manner of speaking is so clear and his syntax so pristine that, dispite the velocity, I can understand him better than the other teachers, one of which, if your not listening closely, you would think was speaking Italian, and the other is from France and thus speaks Latin with a French accent. I'll bet you can't guess what langauge they speak in Greek class. Oh yeah, it's what you think. What's really amazing is that some of the students here are just out of high school and can speak Latin valde fluenter.
There is no wireless internet here as I thought, ergo no pictures yet until I have the time to get them onto the computers here. Check out pics of the Keefer's party!!
Thanks for your comments:
AKirk: I'll try not to! I hope you're doing well and I'm praying for you all and your Mattie.
Gnette: It's pretty crazy how the most common phrases, such as 'perhaps' and 'I don't know' are being replaced in my mind by thier Latin equivalents. I'm praying for you and Chris and Ellis. What's up with Chris' job. Tell him to email me or post or some junk!
Josh: Consider foot duly lodged. I am praying that your studies are going well. I am seriously going to miss Sunday afternoons. Please email me.
Preacher Josh: That blog belongs to some teenage girl, unless there's something I'm missing.
Becki: I'm praying for you and D. Sola Dei Gratia!! You guys must watch so much TV now. Do you watch like a movie a night (where is the stinking question mark on this stupid martian keyboard, ahg... oh, there it is)?
Mama D: You're in the blog!! Whoah! Sike. Yeah, I did finish, but I'm curious to know what you both noticed!
Tempus est dormitum ire (dormitum: asleeping). Bonam vobis omnibus noctem.
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We both noticed that you wrote "arduus" instead of "arduous".
Hang in there. What you're feeling is totally normal. :-) I know I went through a similar array of emotions when I landed in a foreign country for immersion study. And I didn't even have a reading basis in the language before I got there.
Just remind your self that you haven't been there even a week yet. Before too long, you'll begin to feel more comfortable. There's something exciting about the one week mark, two weeks, one month, two months. By three months I felt super settled. Like I was functioning. It was sort of like home. So just get through this week.
Hope you can get pics up soon! :-D
Hang in there, Pete. All transitions are tough at first, but this is definately something you should do.
I mean assembly work is fun and all, but I think your future students will benefit a little more from Latin
immersion.
Keep rocking,
Joshua
Yep, I remember reading about Jeannette crying and crying when her friends left France a week after she got there and crying and crying when she ipsa had to go home!
As far as learning how to be a really good Latin teacher, you have struck gold, my friend. Nobody told me about this when I was Young! I was impressed with how H.O. treated Christianity with Lydia. And nobody seems to mind. We just got our new hardback books last week. I had thought the 6th and 7th graders would share, but that wasn't going to work, so I had to order more. They were pretty excited`
mamaD
Greetings from Oklahoma City, OK, USA:
Quam difficile est bona aut dulcia ex bello trahere!
Hey! Remember Wheelock's Latin? Crazy. Thanks again for your help.
It was good to see you at B & D's wedding. Wish we could have been there for your send-off, too!
Have fun and study hard,
Adam (and Amy and Caleb)