Kids, kids and more kids!

After 15 years in the commercial real estate industry, I left the Washington, DC area to accept a teaching position with Heritage International School located in the Beong Keng Kang I area of Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

I am now responsible for educating 48 Khmer kindergarten students in the basics of the English language. Talk about stepping out of a comfort zone!  I'm in completely new territory.  Volunteer tutoring and assisting in computer literary course work is nothing like teaching 2 classes of 24 wiggly, snotty, squirmy little bundles of joy!  These little ones are dependent upon me to guide them through learning to read, write and be responsible little people.  Since becoming a teacher, I have even greater respect for those teachers who care and take the extra step to ensure the students are learning.  It really is a under appreciated job.

I've found so far in my brief time teaching that you're constantly "on".   I'll be completely honest, those first 2 days of teaching, I came home so frazzled that I wondered if I'd made a huge mistake.  All I wanted to do was sit in complete silence.  I could no longer be the grumpy, don't talk to me until after 10 am, I haven't finished my coffee, unsmiling face.  Those kids don't deserve that person and I refuse to be that person.  I've never talked or smiled so much in my life.

Kids manage breathe life into the gloomiest of days.  They also manage to breathe germs onto and into you as well.  I'm recovering from what I'm calling a cross between a cold and sinus infection. I was torn between banning the kids from ever touching me again to realizing I'd miss out on one of the best parts of my day!  The hugs!

The first weeks of teaching you're establishing rules and boundaries so these little people can have structure.  In addition, you're wiping noses, singing songs and passing out hugs.  The hugs and story time are by far the best parts of my day.  I'm trying so hard not have favorites but there is this one absolutely adorable little boy who gives the best hugs daily!  He's quick to curl up in your lap or surprise attack you from behind with a leg hug.

This past week, he gifted me with a rumdul flower necklace.  Talking about learning to woo early!  Rumdul flowers have a very lovely fragrance and are the national flower of Cambodia.