Feliz Navidad

We were a little unsure, and maybe a bit scared, about how this Christmas would go. Our fear was that it would come and go just like any other day without us having enough time to realize it was actually Christmas. Well, it did and it didn't. We got to enjoy a beautiful Christmas banquet with the entire school on the evening of the 23rd. The banquet was at the River club, overlooking the rushing river, swinging bridge included. We had great food (rice, tostonies, chicken and some kind of spiked fruit salad). There was a skit and some not so good singing. Ending the evening was the conclusion of our Secret Angel exchange.







The 24th, despite my protests, was school as usual. I volunteered to organize a games day but some un-fun people thought that we should let the students catch up on school work. We did watch 'It's a Wonderful Life' in the afternoon. That evening we had a candlelight church service and then we went home to open our gifts. Of course, it wouldn't be Christmas unless we slept under the tree.
This was the first Christmas we were actually able to sleep in. We made a big breakfast and then left for the school around 11:00. We were joining my house to open gifts with the boys. I had bought them Cranium as a house gift and played that in the afternoon. We stayed for an early Christmas supper and came home stuffed and exhausted. We spent the rest of the evening eating leftover pizza and watching a movie. The next day, back to work as usual. The 27th was the school's Boxing Day. We were each paired up with one student and 800 pesos to spend. We got in buses and all headed off to Santiago. This is part of the students Christmas gifts and they actually have to spend it all, and it can't be on food. It's tougher than you'd think. Especially if you have a student that can't really find anything they really want.
The most interesting part of the whole day was the ride there. We were on a tour bus which hadn't been cleaned out for a couple trips at least. One of the girls saw a black bag in the pocket of her seat and opened it up to see what it was. Well, it was a bag of puke and it started to drip on her foot. She freaked out and dropped the bag all over the floor. One of the staff members had to come and clean it up for her. It was pretty disgusting.
This is our last week of school before we get a small break. Next week the kids go out to work all day for four days and we teachers get a chance to catch up on marking and getting our classrooms and classes ready for next semester.



This is me opening gifts with my house on Christmas morning. We all got matching "Huyck House" t-shirts. (ahh, how cute)