Super News

Last month I took 3 sections of the Praxis exam (a standardized test for educators). Today I got 2 of my scores back (the 3rd section is graded by hand, so it takes longer) and I passed! Actually, it's not a pass/fail system, but more like a scored system like the SATs. I more than met the cut-off score for DoDDS, which I'm using as a benchmark. Having this test under my belt will (hopefully) make it easier to get licensure in whatever states we move to in the future.

I still have one more section to take in January, but I'm not worried about that right now. I'm so elated! Yippee!

Educator Day

Today is Educator Day. While I don't really know if this is an "official" day, DoDDS treats it as such and subsequently dedicates this day to educating all the educators in the system. So, basically, all the DoDDS educators spend a day in overcrowded classes.

Normally I don't acquire much information from these mass seminars, but today I was fortunate enough to sit in on a class about the handling and keeping of "critters" in the classroom. The best part of the class was winning a door prize! Check out what I won:

MEALWORMS! I know there's only one pictured, but there's actually several burrowed in the oatmeal that I couldn't coerce to come out. We're going to watch and study them at school. I'm really excited about our newest class pets - the kiddos are going to love them!

After our classes, Teresa and I decided to treat ourselves to Cocoks afterwards. We had a blast. Here are the results:

Finally, we just had to stop at Starbucks <again> on our way home. I had to stop in to use the restroom while there and remembered that I always wanted to take a picture of the hand dryers in Japan for the blog. They are much better than the ones in the states. I'm used to the ones where you push a button and air comes out of a nozzle. Usually, these dryers do not adequately dry my hands and I end up wiping them on my clothes. The Japanese ones are far superior. You put your hands inside and the air blasts your hands dry. Your hands only drip into the basin, thus keeping your clothes and the floor from getting wet. Plus, the air turns off as soon as you pull your hands out, which is energy efficient. So, here's my photo from the Starbucks bathroom*:

Sorry for the random tangent - it's a topic much overdue.

Finally, I leave you with a beautiful sunset from the balcony.

Happy Educator Day!

*Teresa: I know you are just going to die when you read that I was taking photos in the bathroom today!

In-Between

We're in-between typhoons right now. Typhoon Nari hit us this weekend (a minor storm, however, the students did get dismissed early on Friday!). Another one in headed to the west of Oki, but we are feeling the effects. It is super windy and rainy today. Over the weekend, I tried to capture the "raging" seas outside our building. Usually, it's calm, but not now.

Adventures at Chinuman

We went out to eat last night with Rob and Kim. We decided to try a local restaurant that had been featured in one of the military publications called Chinuman. It was definitely a unique place. We sat in a tatami style "room" surrounded by bamboo bars. The funny thing about dining this way is that Noa always has trouble sitting "criss cross applesauce" (as we say in Kindergarten), so he's always looking for new ways to sit. Here we are in our booth.

Kim decided to order umibudo, or sea grapes, an Okinawan specialty. These were described in the article has giving a "splash of exotic flavor" when you bit into them. We all decided to try it.

I didn't care for them.

Here are some random photos from the evening:

more food: buttered asparagus

Red tuna sushi (left) and eel sushi (right)

Strange menu items

Finally, an amusing Engrish sign on our way out.

Our Peaches

This blog entry is sort of in response in Jess' peach bake-off. I won't be baking many peach cobblers in the near future with prices like these!

It's tough to get seasonal fruits at good prices here. I miss peaches, nectarines, strawberries, cherries, blueberries, and raspberries. I have had watermelon....after paying $10.00 for it.

Okinapa and Eyeballs

This weekend was the semi-annual Okinapa event here in Okinawa. It's a wine tasting event held at one of the Officer Clubs with music, food, and an array of wines. We went last year not knowing too many folks since we were new to the island. This year, however, we had our own crew with which to socialize.
Overall, the wine was good, the food was tasty, but really I'm just happy to get dressed up and have a night to spend with good friends. I did manage to get a few shots of some of the friends there that night (sadly, I didn't get to get a photo of Megs, but she was there too, as were some of my teacher friends from Kinser).

The Guys:

The Girls:

The following day, I developed some sort of allergic reaction to my eye makeup from the previous night* and woke up to some seriously swollen eyelids! It looked like I had been punched in the eye(think of the scene in Hitch when he eats shellfish and has a reaction - it was the same thing, but just on my eyes). However, our fridge and cupboards were very empty and Noa and I simply HAD to make a commissary run regardless of my "golf ball eyes." So, I stuck on my sunglasses at 5:00 pm on a rainy day and headed into the commissary with Noa. I played the diva role and acted like everything was perfectly normal - I even ran into a friend from church! I continued to wear them into the shoppette and Taco Bell. I'm sure I looked ridiculous, but it was necessary. Sorry, but I didn't take a picture. I was too focused on trying to reduce the swelling and then coming up with a plan to hide the scary sight.

Today, they are still slightly puffy, but almost back to normal.

*Yes, I did take off my makeup upon returning home that evening(for those of you who were wondering).

Done, Mostly

Well, almost 3 weeks of work has proven to become an almost complete classroom. I think it's not completely finished because of my it-just-has-to-be-perfect-even-if-it-is-labels-for-extra-clothespins-type of mentality. Still, I'm pleased with the "almost finished" results. The kids start tomorrow and I'm SUPER nervous. I have a much tougher crowd this year in terms of behavioral and learning difficulties.

Since there are so many photos and I'm part of an online teacher forum, I created a Picasa web album to view all the classroom shots. Warning: those of you non-teachers may get bored to tears.

http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/juliehammer

One Man's Trash

There are a lot of stores here on the island that sell used American goods. My guess is that they are popular, but I haven't actually been in one yet (I have visited one that sold reupholstered/repainted government furniture). While walking in American village, I noticed this sign for what I think is one of these stores - or it sells goods that didn't quite make the cut in the US. We didn't go in, but I had to take a picture of the sign for it.

Overloaded

We celebrated our friend Rob's birthday recently at Tony Roma's. The goal here was to fit all the birthday candles onto the brownie. As you can see, we were sucessful!

Happy Birthday, Rob!