I have saved the Afterward of five pages to read over my bagel at the Coffee Bean where the French Jazz has gone and thoughtless melancholy western pop accompanies the last few pages with poetic ease.
Stepping out of the air-conditioned comfort of the Coffee Bean the temperature is noticeably warmer today, a return to the heat I have not felt for a few days. It has been a steady low of 23 degrees and a high of 27 for the last four days but the outlook for the next week is a steady 24 to 32, not a huge difference in numbers but the humidity is up and it’s 29 degrees at 10am, it is time to sweat again.
I buy some tea light candles for the oil burner in my room as I head back to study for this evening’s class. I slam into a wall of verb-noun collations with past simple and present perfect grammar but repetition sees me over the wall of understanding until I almost know what I am talking about.
I catch up on some emails then doze for a while. I go to Lams for some lunch and bump into Ken. We have seen each other many times because we both seem to like sitting at one of the front tables for dinner at Dung Café quietly minding our own business, smoking and reading. (You can see him doing just that in the sweep photo from a couple of days ago of the front of Dung) I am already eating when he gets off a motorbike at the front of Lams today, we make eye contact and smile, I say “I think it’s about time I introduce myself – I’m Simon” he laughs and introduces himself. We have a chat for a while, he is a seventy year old who like Glen, is having trouble getting teaching work because of his age though he really doesn’t look it. He is American with a noticeable twang in his voice but not one of those loud “I’d just like to tell you” and “I’d just like to say” ones that I have encountered at every other turn. After a short chat I finish eating and leave him to have his lunch, we will be seeing plenty more of each other.
Though I promised the book lady I will buy my next book from her I browse through a book store but come up empty handed, no rush, the last book will be echoing through my head for quite a while to come and I must choose the next book carefully. I need something light this time, the author of “Zen-MM” has a follow up book written seventeen years after but my head would explode if I tried to tackle that or anything like it for a few months. Any suggestions?
I grab some condensed milk on the way back to my room for tomorrow mornings coffee. Miss Vai can do many things but so far, make a good coffee is not one of them, she uses some sort of “normal” milk that just does not cut it, especially in iced coffee. That is why I have been heading straight out after breakfast for a decent coffee. I have educated her on making it stronger than milk with a hint of coffee and tomorrow I shall introduce her to condensed milk. She is Vietnamese so I’m sure she knows and the milk she uses here is probably some sort of budgetary restriction but I will not stand for it any longer.
After a nap and another run through the lesson material I get ready for school and ten minutes before I leave it buckets down. Fortunately it is just drops by the time I get on the bike and five minutes into our journey it has stopped. I purposely time it so I arrive fifteen minutes early each day so I can go across to the little shop that sells me an iced coffee for a teaching energy boost, I am getting to know the owner lady though she does not speak a word of English, we are both trying hard to communicate.
Time for class and after an ABC of verbs warm up we hit the books. Within five minutes I realise that I am out of my depth. The third to last chapter of “Zen-MM” comes to mind where Phadreus as a student finally goes head to head with the Chairman for the Committee on Analysis of Ideas and Study of Methods, me the Chairman and the class Phadreus. It is not coincidence that I read that chapter today. I immediately take the position of confidence and reflect any questions back to the students – they know what “perfect present” and “simple past” is much more than I but I cannot let them know that, thank goodness I have the teacher’s book with the answers in it. I make four of them move during the class tonight. The boys and girls sit in groups across from each other so if I move the middle one from each group across the room the chatter decreases noticeably. The most trouble seems to come from the smartest student because they are always finished first and bored, so they spend most of their time chattering. In this class it is a stunningly hot young thing and who ever gave her her “English” name should be reprimanded – Cherry – highly suggestively inappropriate, or is it just me?
After the bum numbing ride home I change and go to Dung for dinner and a beer and return to my room exhausted, I will sleep well tonight.
