Life as a Boarder

Upon reading the boarding synopsis on her school's website, Emily decided to "edit" and create her own true to life version about life in the boarding house at her school.

Here is Bolitho's (Emily's school) and what they wrote:

During the weekdays, life is busy and full. Lessons are thirty-five minutes long and there are nine lessons during the day. Lunch is provided by our own kitchen with the choice of a hot cooked meal or salad bar. Activities such as orchestra practices, choir, pottery, drama, crafts, chess, juggling, gymnastics, judo, fencing and team sports take place during the course of the week. Day pupils involved in concerts or drama productions sometimes stay on in the evenings. They also take part in outings, excursions and occasional weekend events.

Pupils are expected to do homework every day – the time required depending on the pupil’s age. Parents are encouraged to supervise their children’s homework especially in the case of the younger children. They are asked to sign their child’s planner, adding any comments that they wish. Parents who wish to discuss anything with the staff are encouraged to do so at any time.

Emily's version:

Weekly Boarders Schedule

There is a person on bell duty who rings the bell at 7:15 everyone wakes up and has till 7:45 to get ready for school. At 7:45 the person on bell duty rings the bell again and we all get checked to make sure that we are presentable for school. Next there is a meeting in which you can bring up any problems, complaints and questions you may have. At about 8:00 they send us down for breakfast and we have breakfast till 8:30 and then we all go back up to the boarding house, and clean our teeth and collect our school bags, then we go into school. The school day is the same as a day pupils. When you get back from school at 4:00 the adult on duty will sign you in. You get dressed and then have till 5:50 to do what ever you need or want to do, you must make sure that your rooms are tidy the staff on duty will come around and do a room inspection, there is 1 common room that has a TV and a small kitchen some games and a table. At 5:50 the person on bell duty rings the bell and there is a meeting same as in the morning you can bring up any complaints, questions or problems. At roughly 6:00 we go to dinner and we finish dinner at 6:35 after dinner we go back up to the boarding house and get our school bags for prep. Depending upon your age group you will finish prep at different times, after prep the younger ones have showers and watch TV and ring the parents. Where as older ones will probably hang about chatting to each other and wait a bit to have a shower, but it is entirely up to you in the evening when you have a shower. The bedtimes are scattered according to your year.

There is an office phone that you can use at any time if you wish to make a phone call.

The youngest age you can board is 7 (year 3)

Bed times:

Year 3 8:15

Year 4 8:15

Year 5 8:30

Year 6 8:45

Year 7 9:00

Year 8 9:15

Year 9 9:30

Year 10 9:45-10:00

Year 11 10:00-10:30

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

After much contemplation regarding the name between Emily, Bunny and I, here is the new blog! I’ve dedicated myself to documenting the wonderful (and hopefully successful!) experience of raising my girls bilingually, using the OPOL method. For those of you who aren’t familiar OPOL is an approach to teaching your children a second language (or third)(or fourth), where one parent speaks the target language to the children (in this case Spanish) and the other speaks the native language (English). “One Parent One Language”, hence the acronym “OPOL”.

Whilst on a country walk in beautiful Cornwall on a sunny, Sunday afternoon, Emily, Bunny and I brainstormed the following names for the new blog:

Cheekychicas

Languagelearners

Childrenofchorizo (“chorizo” means “sausage” in Spanish)(I think Emily may have been hungry)

Dadadada (compliments of Leyla)

Chinesechorizo (at which point I decided it was time to stop and give Emily a snack)

Multilanguagemama

Bababababa (another hungry child)

Unfortunately, the title of the new blog still has not been decided. I really like “cheekychicas” but, some cheeky chica, somewhere in the world, has cleverly thought of this already and is using it with blogger and wordpress. I’m sort of warming up to “childrenofchorizo” (for it’s comical value) but would like to brainstorm some more. Consequently, this blog is UNDER CONSTRUCTION until a new name is decided. However, I will continue to blog, until I leave for America with the girls in two weeks, where my parents still live in the dark ages and do not have the internet, and than I’ll have to wing it…somehow!

Estamos en contacto…

5 Things I Love About London

5 Things I Love About London:

1. “You are here” – There are maps posted all over the city with red dots on them actually SHOWING you where you are. How great is that? How many times have you been in an unfamiliar city not knowing where you are? In London, you ALWAYS know where you are.

2. Double Decker buses – I love these buses. In London. What a novel idea; rather than overcrowded, sweaty, smelly buses, why not stack one on top of the other, cut down on the amount of buses in the streets and the fuel they burn, and double the people capacity. I love it!

3. Primark – Cheapest. Store. Ever.

4. Diversity – No Emily, the world is NOT made up of white people who eat pasties whilst walking down the street, REMEMBER??

5. Rolling garbage cans – In the train stations and airports, there is not ONE garbage (or bin) to be found. Apparently, this is for security purposes. Instead, you will find people dressed with orange jerseys that roll these bins around. So if you want to dispose of something, you have to chase these suckers down (if you are lucky enough to see one) and if not, well, I guess you are S-O-L[1].

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[1] Shit-Out-of-Luck!

Emily playing the drums!

Dear Readers (who don’t even exist b/c nobody reads my blog):

Due to the fact that I’m still in a post-baby haze, or daze, or both, I’m taking a hiatus from my blog.

Between my brain shutting down, and trying to cope with a baby and a pre-teen without my husband for six months, I’m going to wait until he returns in April to resume blogging.

See you in two months!

Dear Easyjet

Dear Easyjet:

I was quite nervous (ok, scared shitless) flying with you for the first time. I know you are a low budget airline and probably don’t give a rats ass about your customers nor the quality of care you provide. I’ve flown low budget airlines in the United States and abroad and to be frank, it totally sucked.

This aside, I was most nervous about the fact that my husband knows one of your pilots. Yes, he went through flying training with him in the military and the military told him he didn’t have what it takes to become a pilot. That didn’t stop him though and he went to the commercial industry, where they also told him he didn’t have what it takes to fly commercially. But rest assured, he did become a pilot and now he sits in the cockpit of an Easyjet plane.

This latter point is what petrified me. I was also scared you would lose the one checked luggage with all of the clothes I had packed for my daughter and I for our three week vacation.

Boy was I wrong. I was wrong about a lot of things. First of all, I really appreciated how we boarded on time and even better took off EXACTLY, to the second, on time. To boot we even landed ten minutes early. I was wrong about the level of customer service you would provide b/c the flight attendants were friendly and courteous, unlike the American flight attendants on the intra-continental flights in America who can be surprisingly obnoxious and just plain rude.

I was wrong about our luggage too. You didn’t lose it. It arrived. Do you mind me asking, WHAT THE HELL you did to it though? I checked it in at Bristol and I received it in Prague and there was a piece cut out of it. Do you often cut out pieces of your customers’ luggage? And why (excuse my language) the fuck did you do that?

There is a big difference between a dent or a scratch and a piece that has blatantly been cut out and is missing.

I hesitate to think what was smuggled in that space from one country to the other.

I expect FULL reimbursement for this luggage that is now absolutely USELESS and I expect you to take FULL responsibility for this incident.

Regards,
TJW

Daddy Lessons, Part I

This evening I decided to test my hubby's know how on what our lives will be like when baby arrives. I was fairly certain that I had debriefed him thoroughly on the first few weeks with our little crying/pooping machine. 

Man, was I wrong.

Our conversation went a little somethin' like this:

Me: (reading from a magazine) "When baby is born she will spend about 16 hours per day sleeping, split roughly 50/50 between day and night, punctuated with feeds about every two hours."

Him: What? (in a very cute Dorset accent, I must admit)

Me: Well what did you think would happen? We would feed and hang out with baby during the day and sleep at night?

Him: No, I thought she would cry at night but we would just give her a little cuddle and she would go back to sleep.

Me: (burst out laughing)

Him: Whot? (Dorset accent)

Me: (still laughing and unable to speak)

Him: You have to feed the baby every two hours? Even at night?

Me: YES. And it's very exhausting. We have to wake up constantly at night to feed/change/attend to baby.

Him: But...

After this enlightening conversation I shoved an article in his face titled, "I'm desperate for a good night's sleep" and told him to read it silently to himself.

The End