To this day I can still remember quite vividly as a child sitting in my mom’s mini van, about to go a sleepover or party , and being told the consequences of not using “proper manners” to the adults present. To be clear “proper manners” means using ma’m and sir and referring to all adults as Mr. or Mrs. To be even more clear these consequences usually involved being hung upside down for a few days, stuck in a dark room with no food whatsoever for days on end or being spanked by a chucky cheese paddle (c’mon what kind of parent turns your paddle ball toy into a means for punishment when it is broken) No wonder I remember this so vividly. The fear of God was struck in me. Apparently Australian children do not get a similar talk from their parents. I just thought this was something every kid had to endure-like a coming of age necessity. In Australia, things are much more lax. Most kids here call the adults by their first names. Saying ma’m or sir can get you into some trouble because this is often viewed as a smart elic thing to say. I don’t even know the last name of some of my college professors because everyone just calls them by the first name. Needless to say, the first month here was tough. I was even told by the pastoral care worker that it’s ok that I slipped and used the word ma’m. It was if to say that she understood and was not offended. Ha! My pastor is refereed to as John. Not brother John, Mr. Haige, or even Mr. John. Nope. It’s John and sometimes Pastor John. It’s just a cultural difference that I have to get used to. To this day I still have trouble calling everyone by their first name but I’m getting better at it. I still have a mental image of my mom sneaking up behind me with a chucky cheese paddle-even if she’s actually thousands of miles away. Childhood scars.
I don’t think there’s anywhere else in the world where an elementary student asks the teacher for a rubber and the teacher never bats an eye. They do this all the time actually. Not saying ma’m and asking teachers for rubbers. Man oh man. I failed to mention that a rubber here is what we call erasers in America. However, it sill got me the first time I heard it and it took special effort to refrain from looking shocked or cracking a smile in the middle of teaching. I go into the schools on Mondays and teach third graders bible lessons during class time for an hour. The government allows you do that here so I thought I’d take advantage of the opportunity. I find this to be a neat experience but I’m completely out of my element. I am not destined to become a teacher as this experience has shown me. But I do alright I guess. I would have never dreamed that I would be sitting in a chair while a bunch of third graders gathered around me on the floor, anxiously awaiting what I’m going to say next. Must be the accent.
It’s spring here in Melbourne. I can’t seem to shake the feeling that I’m being robbed of my favorite season of the year; fall. The good thing about Melbourne is that it actually has 4 distinct seasons instead of the typical Texas seasons, kind of hot and hell (saying stolen from Stephen Jones). Each season here gets about 3 months of showtime. The bad thing about Melbourne is that in spring, the wind knocks you down if you are less than 100 pounds (45mph!) and birds try to poke your eyes out with their beaks. You’re having a bad day if you experience both of these simultaneously. Let me explain: In the span of 10 hours I was “dive bombed” by birds on two different occasions. They tried to take my head off. Quite alarmed I asked the locals to explain their strange behavior (Behavior of the birds this time, not the locals.) Apparently it is mating season for a particular bird called a magpie. The magpies are very territorial and if you happen to walk under their nests they try to poke your eyes out or at least get you with their beaks. My goodness even their birds here are dangerous! Aw spring, the season for warm weather, pretty flowers, blue skis and birds that try to poke your eyes out.
I finally got it! Difference between tea, dinner and supper: Read carefully. When someone says “come over and we’ll have tea together tonight” this means we are all going to eat a meal together at night. But if someone says “hey what would you like for supper later tonight?” then they are asking you what you would like for a late night snack. However, you know you hit the jackpot whenever they say “we’re going to give you dinner tonight!” because this means you’re going to get a very nice meal with many courses served. If somebody asks you over for breakfast this means you’re having…….breakfast.
~ I’m just joking about those aforementioned consequences. My mom would never do that! Well actually the chucky cheese paddle is completely true.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Happy Father's Day!!!
Happy Father’s Day!
I believe there comes a time in every person’s life when they realize, at that particular moment, that they must look completely ridiculous. However they fail to do anything about it because they are having so much fun. I must admit that I’ve had more than my fair share of these moments in my own life but one particular instant came up just a few days ago. It involved me being taught an Australian dance by a few 12 year olds while trying to imitate the Australian accent, failing miserably, with icing spread on my face like Indian war paint. I had that moment. You might ask how this comes to be. All I can say is you might be in the same boat if you volunteered to make dessert with a bunch of 12 and 10 year olds. Kids don’t just make dessert and go home. Nope. Kids make dessert, lick the beaters, drop icing all over the floor, have a food fight, spread the icing all over face, learn new dance moves with icing on face, coax double left footed youth leader to learn the same moves, spread icing all over neighbor’s face, attempt to drink raw eggs, make a cooking show and take 108 pictures of the experience. If only I had this much fun every time I cooked. We made a popular Australian dish called “Pavlova”. Everyone was completely amazed that I’ve never even heard of the dish much less tried it. After trying it I decided that I have to move it to my famous "Wagley's top 10” favorite dessert list. It melts in your mouth and contains zero calories. Just playing. But it really does melt in your mouth.
The big expo night went smoothly. We had a turnout of a little over 100 kids. They all seemed to enjoy it. 90% of the kids responded to the “alter call”. I call it “altar call” because I honestly feel like the well intentioned speaker did it in a very deceiving (not intentional) and vague way meaning that most of the kids had no idea what they were doing. It went something like this “and now if you would like to throw away all the baggage in your life to Jesus come to the front and we’ll pray for you. Please Lord accept their baggage.” Since I’m in charge of follow up my main goal will be to clarify a few things and explain what a Christian is and how one becomes a Christian. My job with follow up is to have a weekly session for the kids wishing to know more about what they did and to help them grasp a basic understanding of Christianity. I’ve had the first session already and out of the 80+ kids who came to the front only 3 came back the following week. This might seem like a failure but I have to remind myself that numbers are sometimes an inaccurate way to measure success. Sometimes it’s about sincerity of heart and if we have even one new, serious believer out of our efforts on expo then it’ll be worth it. Plus I’m the type of person to do better in a small atmosphere and frankly I was a little intimated and freaked out about leading a session with 80+ kids. Yet now I’d say that I’m about 90% inspired and 10% overwhelmed about leading this. A great place to be I must say. So I guess we’ll continue to have the sessions once a week and hope and pray that it’ll grow.
~I’ve been having such a great time with my new bike. However, I find it a bit daunting when I continually get passed by old men on mountain bikes that seem to be out on a midday stroll. They smile at my out of breath and sweaty self and say “g’day” as they slowly pass by me. Grrrr
~I’m leading a skit for the youth to do on Sunday morning church. Yes yes I know please don’t laugh. I’ve had absolutely no experience with drama much less leading a team of overly energetic and caffeinated 14 year olds. But all has gone well so far. C’mon what’s the worse that can happen?
~“What are S’mores”? Yes I was actually asked this by several people in response to an idea I had about roasting marshmallows over a camp fire. This question might actually be even more surprising than the “what are hershey bars” question. I thought everyone knew! Yet this time I was more prepared and gave a much better response. It went something like this: “S'more appears to be a contraction of the phrase, "some more". The informal nature of this term reflects the environment in which s'mores are traditionally served and its meaning hints at the desires of campers who are not satisfied by just one s'more. Some have jokingly surmised that the name originated from people who were so busy eating the tasty treat that they did not have time to speak in complete sentences” Just joking. But I did explain it much better.
~I can’t believe that my classes are almost half way over. I’ve really been enjoying them and find that it’s been such a learning experience for me. All my classes consist entirely of essays. This is essentially a good thing because that means there are no late night study sessions but at the same time I feel like half my life is spent writing away (essays, emails, blogs, facebook, etc...) I bet I’ll become quite good at it in the end.
~Happy father’s Day dad! I know we’ve already celebrated it in America but Australians celebrate it today. Sorry mom (or should I say mum?) but mother’s day is the same day in both places.
~If I’m having a phone conversation with an Australian there’s a 90% chance that there will be a miscommunication in one form or another. To be honest, I have trouble understanding Australians as it is but on the phone I don’t have the benefit of reading their lips and smiling sweetly. There’s only so many whats, huhs, and pardons that I can do before I give up. Texts messaging has helped me tremendously.
~I have just returned from the ever popular AFL game. AFL stands for Australian Rules football and everyone here is absolutely crazy about it. September is the most intense month and I can’t go anywhere without hearing about it or seeing both men and women decked out in appeal. The best way to describe it is to say it’s a mix between soccer and football. They do not wear padding or helmets and it’s often called footy for short (Australians shorten everything). The first few days I was here in Australia I kept referring to it as “footsy” instead of footy. Needless to say that’s been taken care of.
~Australia is so stinkin' expensive
~Sometimes it’s not about the things you marked off your list that day but the relationships that you formed or the time spent with someone else.
I believe there comes a time in every person’s life when they realize, at that particular moment, that they must look completely ridiculous. However they fail to do anything about it because they are having so much fun. I must admit that I’ve had more than my fair share of these moments in my own life but one particular instant came up just a few days ago. It involved me being taught an Australian dance by a few 12 year olds while trying to imitate the Australian accent, failing miserably, with icing spread on my face like Indian war paint. I had that moment. You might ask how this comes to be. All I can say is you might be in the same boat if you volunteered to make dessert with a bunch of 12 and 10 year olds. Kids don’t just make dessert and go home. Nope. Kids make dessert, lick the beaters, drop icing all over the floor, have a food fight, spread the icing all over face, learn new dance moves with icing on face, coax double left footed youth leader to learn the same moves, spread icing all over neighbor’s face, attempt to drink raw eggs, make a cooking show and take 108 pictures of the experience. If only I had this much fun every time I cooked. We made a popular Australian dish called “Pavlova”. Everyone was completely amazed that I’ve never even heard of the dish much less tried it. After trying it I decided that I have to move it to my famous "Wagley's top 10” favorite dessert list. It melts in your mouth and contains zero calories. Just playing. But it really does melt in your mouth.
The big expo night went smoothly. We had a turnout of a little over 100 kids. They all seemed to enjoy it. 90% of the kids responded to the “alter call”. I call it “altar call” because I honestly feel like the well intentioned speaker did it in a very deceiving (not intentional) and vague way meaning that most of the kids had no idea what they were doing. It went something like this “and now if you would like to throw away all the baggage in your life to Jesus come to the front and we’ll pray for you. Please Lord accept their baggage.” Since I’m in charge of follow up my main goal will be to clarify a few things and explain what a Christian is and how one becomes a Christian. My job with follow up is to have a weekly session for the kids wishing to know more about what they did and to help them grasp a basic understanding of Christianity. I’ve had the first session already and out of the 80+ kids who came to the front only 3 came back the following week. This might seem like a failure but I have to remind myself that numbers are sometimes an inaccurate way to measure success. Sometimes it’s about sincerity of heart and if we have even one new, serious believer out of our efforts on expo then it’ll be worth it. Plus I’m the type of person to do better in a small atmosphere and frankly I was a little intimated and freaked out about leading a session with 80+ kids. Yet now I’d say that I’m about 90% inspired and 10% overwhelmed about leading this. A great place to be I must say. So I guess we’ll continue to have the sessions once a week and hope and pray that it’ll grow.
~I’ve been having such a great time with my new bike. However, I find it a bit daunting when I continually get passed by old men on mountain bikes that seem to be out on a midday stroll. They smile at my out of breath and sweaty self and say “g’day” as they slowly pass by me. Grrrr
~I’m leading a skit for the youth to do on Sunday morning church. Yes yes I know please don’t laugh. I’ve had absolutely no experience with drama much less leading a team of overly energetic and caffeinated 14 year olds. But all has gone well so far. C’mon what’s the worse that can happen?
~“What are S’mores”? Yes I was actually asked this by several people in response to an idea I had about roasting marshmallows over a camp fire. This question might actually be even more surprising than the “what are hershey bars” question. I thought everyone knew! Yet this time I was more prepared and gave a much better response. It went something like this: “S'more appears to be a contraction of the phrase, "some more". The informal nature of this term reflects the environment in which s'mores are traditionally served and its meaning hints at the desires of campers who are not satisfied by just one s'more. Some have jokingly surmised that the name originated from people who were so busy eating the tasty treat that they did not have time to speak in complete sentences” Just joking. But I did explain it much better.
~I can’t believe that my classes are almost half way over. I’ve really been enjoying them and find that it’s been such a learning experience for me. All my classes consist entirely of essays. This is essentially a good thing because that means there are no late night study sessions but at the same time I feel like half my life is spent writing away (essays, emails, blogs, facebook, etc...) I bet I’ll become quite good at it in the end.
~Happy father’s Day dad! I know we’ve already celebrated it in America but Australians celebrate it today. Sorry mom (or should I say mum?) but mother’s day is the same day in both places.
~If I’m having a phone conversation with an Australian there’s a 90% chance that there will be a miscommunication in one form or another. To be honest, I have trouble understanding Australians as it is but on the phone I don’t have the benefit of reading their lips and smiling sweetly. There’s only so many whats, huhs, and pardons that I can do before I give up. Texts messaging has helped me tremendously.
~I have just returned from the ever popular AFL game. AFL stands for Australian Rules football and everyone here is absolutely crazy about it. September is the most intense month and I can’t go anywhere without hearing about it or seeing both men and women decked out in appeal. The best way to describe it is to say it’s a mix between soccer and football. They do not wear padding or helmets and it’s often called footy for short (Australians shorten everything). The first few days I was here in Australia I kept referring to it as “footsy” instead of footy. Needless to say that’s been taken care of.
~Australia is so stinkin' expensive
~Sometimes it’s not about the things you marked off your list that day but the relationships that you formed or the time spent with someone else.
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