Teaching a Seminar... Christmas plans.

This past Saturday I was able to teach the high school teachers from Bohol Deaf Academy through and interpreting seminar. I was VERY nervous. I always remember wanting to be a teacher, but I realized that I don’t really have the skill it takes to be a teacher. As I took the past couple weeks to gather relevant information I became more and more nervous.
But as Saturday morning arrived I woke up at 5am:
This is even a little later than many Filipinos wake up. The best bread is sold at this time. Which means many women wake up at 3 or 4 to prepare it. Everyone is smiling. The air is not too hot, a little more comfortable. The sun is already beginning to peak, beautiful view over the ocean no matter what colors it gives off.
I spent about 30 minutes exercising, took a shower, made my coffee and spent another hour reading and reflecting on my morning devotions.

I arrived at the school an hour before my class started. I was able to chat with a friend from home who had many encouraging things to say before my class began. Originally I was not supposed to start the class. Lee had prepared some things to present for the first half hour. However, he was running a little late. Feeling confident at this point I began teaching. The principal of the school decided to attend. She is Deaf. This meant that I now had to teach the seminar in FSL. Before you shrug this off as an easy challenge, I want to remind you that this is my Third language.
How am I going to articulate all this information in my third language? A short moment of panic, but then I remembered that this is really only fair since FSL is the third and even fourth language to many of these teachers.
Accepting this challenge was such a blessing. It was an amazing day. The teachers were very attentive and asked many questions. I actually ran out of time. The past couple days more and more questions about what I taught have been brought to my attention. I have been asked to put together another seminar where I will teach linguistics of sign language more in depth. I do not feel qualified for any of this. But I know that by accepting this challenge I learn and they learn. So, win win.

Today was the start of another intensive week for the 5 trainees from Leyte. They survived the two week immersion at the elementary schools and have improved greatly in their signing skills as we had hoped. Many more activities are planned for this week and next week they will be on break before returning to their respective elementary schools for more observations.

Some good news:
My boyfriend is going to come and spend three weeks of December with me. He is going to help with the drafting plans for the extension of the Dao Diamond Hotel, run by the Deaf here in Bohol. I am very excited that he will be able to share all these amazing things with me.

I will be going to Indonesia from December 23rd until January 4th. A foreign exchange student from High School lives there and offered her home to me. This will be a little challenging I expect since they are muslim. And spending Jesus’ bday with Muslim people is never something I imagined for myself. But none the less God will use that time.