What is this all about?

(I wrote this update last week, and I'm finally uploading it. Sorry for the information overload, but I've finally gotten around to uploading my updates for family and friends)

What a whirlwind it has been. Life is fast, unpredictable, and exhilarating here in Jakarta. We’ve had the chance to explore Pluit Village. The food has been incredible. I think my favourite so far has been the chicken sate. We are moved into our apartments, so we’ve been doing a lot of shopping for our places. My best find was a set of cool canvas prints for the space above my couch that was previously occupied by some slightly unfortunate “art”. This first week has also included familiarizing ourselves with the school, the wonderful staff (I can’t say enough how great they are), and discussing the vision of Sekolah Pelita Harapan International. 

Let me tell you about the organization because I just got the full run-down on it today, and I’m so pleased and encouraged. The SPH coordinator who is like the superintendent, Philip Nash, came today during our morning devotions and talked with us about SPH. First, the organization runs three different types of schools: Sekolah (school) Pelita (lighthouse/spotlight) Harapan (hope) International, Sekolah Dian (medium light/lantern) Harapan, and Sekolah Lintera (small light/candle) Harapan. Each school targets a different audience, thus the different words for light. 

Sekolah Pelita Harapan International

Sekolah Dian Harapan

Sekolah Lintera Harapan

SPH targets the wealthy in Jakarta, and our schools teach an International curriculum in English. The SDH targets the middle class and their schools teach the national curriculum through an international lens in Bahasa. SLH targets the lower class and teaches in the local language in the village schools. Expat teachers can only teach at the SPH schools, and national teachers are equipped (through our teaching college) to teach at the other two organizations of schools. I think one of the most unique things about this organization that I was super pleased about was the vision to provide quality education in SPH, SDH, and SLH. The difference is that each “light” is different because of varying states of influence. A student at SPH comes from a wealthy family, and so they can have more influence on society at an international level. SDH and SLH graduates have influence, too, but it’s on a different level. Mr. Philip explained a key thing though: each school branch has the same Harapan, or HOPE. I love this.

Another interesting fact about the organization is coming up. Paying attention? This is key. The fees and tuition at SPH are very very expensive, but the Yayasan (the organization) is transparent about where that money goes: the Dian and Lintera schools are completely subsidized so that a family at that socio-economic level can send their children to school. How amazing is that? Mr. Philip described it as a bit of a Robin Hood concept.

I think it is incredible that such a prestigious organization in the international education field also has established and continues to support schools for the middle and low income families. The vision comes from the founders who wanted to see quality health care and education throughout Indonesia. I wish I could remember the ultimate goal for how many schools they want to establish in all three branches. I know that they want to establish 10 SPH schools around Jakarta, and guess what? Pluit Village is #5! I am so grateful that I have the opportunity to be a part of such a beautiful movement. 

Finally, here is my absolute favourite fact about SPH. Are you ready? We have the unique experience of living amidst a Muslim and/or Buddhist community, meanwhile showing our students the love of Jesus Christ and teaching them about the call to come into a personal relationship with him. How freeing! 

It is so evident that this is an organization of integrity, love, and commitment to quality education. It is truly blessed. 

It Has Begun!

Alright, so I've been doing this blogpost in intervals. I sit down to write a few paragraphs, and then I have to go somewhere, I have to catch a flight, I fall asleep, my internet cuts out, or I just get distracted for no reason. If you want the summarized version of my exciting airport adventures, scroll down to the part where I got a little bit lazy.

On July 11th, I got up at 3:00am and drove to the Charlottetown airport with my mom and dad to catch a flight to Toronto first. Having to get up at that hour is just absurd and will never ever be okay. As soon as we got there though I basically guzzled down a cup of coffee and inhaled a bagel whilst taking things out of my checked luggage because it was over the weight allowance. I may have packed expertly light on my trip to China, but this time was very very different. I ended up having to leave a couple mugs at home :( (But today my new bank in Jakarta gave me a mug as a thank you for opening an account; I doubt they've ever seen someone look so happy about one of their mugs).

I said see you later to my parents and Emily (my kindred spirit who came to see me off as well), and then I got on my plane to Toronto. It was lovely to fly out of Charlottetown and finally see the Island from the air.

Now, the next part is about the Toronto airport. I warn you travelling types who are going through Toronto: things have changed! When you are going through US customs, it's all automated now, and supposedly it should have sped things up. I don't know about everyone else, but if something is different in navigating airports, I start to have a minor panic attack. Permission to call me a creature of habit granted. I'm calmed though immediately if I see someone freaking out more than me. Thank goodness for the lady with the fanny pack in front of me who had been "going through this airport since basically it's opened" and was flagging down customs officials every five minutes. (But you know what, that's probably me in 30 years).

After this though, it was smooth sailing. Here is the shortened version of my thoughts on the rest of my travel to Singapore.

See above for Toronto adventures.
Slept one hour to Chicago.
I had an incredible pesto chicken wrap and another coffee in the Chicago airport.
Got on a flight to Hong Kong.
Sat in one place for 15 hours with minimal pee breaks because of the two sleeping, heavily drugged, snoring Asian gentlemen on either side of me.
Asian gentlemen's sleeping helped me sleep for five hours altogether.
Got to Hong Kong.

Back to the expanded version. I arrived in Singapore, and I admit that I was pretty nervous about everything that I had to do between getting off the plane and getting to my hotel room. I’m grateful that it went as smoothly as it did! I got into the terminal, went through immigration, and got my bags. I was fortunate that I could leave my checked bags with “Left Baggage” at the Singapore airport as I’d be in Singapore for the next two and half days. I did not want to lug around that many suitcases. I grabbed a cab, and it took me to the hotel. Easy peasy. I had no need to worry. English is even one of the main languages in Singapore, so all the signage is in English!

I met up with a few fellow SPH teachers, and we spent the next day relaxing, hunting for free wireless (this does not exist in Singapore by the way), and trying to eat for as cheaply as possible. This is something we learned fast about this little island-city. They may as well ask for a piece of your body when you’re paying for things; it is ridiculous. At one point, we went out, and I realized that I had not put sunscreen on. As soon as we got to the mall, I went searching for sunscreen. Place #1 had some - price: $52.00. Place #2 had a travel size of banana boat stuff - price: $15.00. I bit the bullet.

That night I explored the bayfront with Hyunge, a teacher from South Korea who would be at a different school. Singapore is a very posh city with towering modern structures. It is a very interesting city with a Merlion spitting out a fountain of water into the river. I know you’re wondering what a Merlion is; well, it’s exactly what it sounds like: a creature with a lion’s head and a fish’s tail. Across the river is the famed Marina Bay Sands hotel which honestly looks like a space ship (think Star Trek Enterprise) with legs. 

I woke up a little later the next morning, and went down to breakfast at the hotel. I found a table full of SPH teachers to sit with. After introductions (and my first coffee), we agreed that we needed to explore the city some for the day. So we navigated our way to the subway station. After a few wrong subway stops and escalator choices, we arrived at the Gardens by the Bay for a couple hours of exploring. It was beautiful! So many gorgeous flowers and incredible trees to see. We needed to get back to the airport in time, so we only saw probably half of it.

Later we arrived at the Singapore airport in a big thirteen seater taxi-van. We checked in nervously. The reason we were nervous is that we found out about some weight restrictions we were unaware of for our Garuda Indonesia flight :/ We planned on pleading, begging, smiling, and reasoning our way through being waived the fees. Unfortunately, no one was successful and we all had to pay for the bags we had that were overweight. After this, we explored the Singapore airport.

Most airports are pretty boring, but Singapore is the exception. We managed to go into a two storey butterfly house that is attached and get foot/calf massages for free! You could also go down the biggest indoor slide in the world (I think); you could watch a movie in the movie room; there were so many options. We all have to go back again to finish our visa process, so we won’t be bored in the airport. 

Once we arrived in Jakarta, we completed VOAs and everyone was met by some of their school staff! Because there are five SPH schools, we were met by our own school and taken to our accommodations. Jen, Dylan, Zhang Li, and I are the new expat teachers at SPH Pluit Village. We were met by people we’d come to realize have some of the biggest hearts you’ll ever meet. Alexis, our lead teacher was there, and Alex, the head of all our departments was there. Yes, he is head of all departments because our school is in its pioneer phase. Somehow he still makes time to do things like take us out for dim sum and make sure that I’m not going to electrocute myself in my kitchen. Then there is Alexis. She is our lead teacher (she performs principal duties); she is our unofficial Bahasa Indonesian teacher and translator; she is our shopping buddy; and she just has an incredible heart for the vision of SPH. We are truly blessed to have her as our leader, and I’m so grateful for her. Plus, she loves Anne of Green Gables!! :)

Okay, so that is enough for my first post. I’m seriously behind in giving full updates. I will get better at this, I promise! 

Avoid the Big Mistakes

There is so much for us first year teachers to learn and think about. Every now and then, I'm hit with a new realization that I'll need to plan this or do that. Yes, it can be daunting and very nerve-wracking. We need to accept that we will make the occasional mistake and then learn and grow from the mistake. 

I've had a few friends who have already gone through their first year of teaching give me some advice, all of which I greatly appreciated. They shared with me some of the mistakes they made so as to help me avoid them. I know I'll make mistakes all of my own, too.  Recently, I came across an article that explained a common mistake teachers often make on their very first day of school.

Here is the article. I hope you take something from it, like I did. It's a mistake that is totally innocent and could have happened to me without even realizing it! I'm thankful I stumbled upon this article.

Rookies Helping Rookies

Everyone has a first year of teaching, and everyone has a different story to tell. I know that some people think I'm not only crazy for going overseas for my first year, but for going overseas and helping to pioneer a new school in a third-world country. Maybe it is a little crazy, but I can't imagine anything else for my upcoming first year of teaching.

I can't wait to fill this blog up with stories about my school life, how my students are learning in and out of school, and how I'm learning in and out of school.. For now though, you (and I) will have to settle for posts about how crazy excited I am and for what I'm doing to prepare.

I want to help out other rookie teachers in the next year through this blog. I hope that I can help you relate and see that you're not in this alone as we navigate our first year together. I know we'll face some of the same problems and some that are completely unique to our situations, so I hope you'll share your thoughts with me as you read my thoughts. I will ask questions. I will be honest. I will celebrate. I hope you will, too. I will definitely need help (from my PLC and from the online community) as this year progresses. In return, I'll do my best to offer help as well.

My first step is sharing my go-to website lately. I've been purchasing her products on Teachers Pay Teachers, and reading her blog quite regularly. It's such an incredible site called The Clutter-Free Classroom. You may have heard of it or come across it but never really used it; well, I recommend you use it! Download her product catalogue and look through the products she has available. They are all very reasonably priced, and some are even freebies! Once something catches your eye, go to her blog first and search for it. She'll likely have a dandy little post (and maybe a video) which explains the product. Once you think, "This might work for me," go to her Teachers Pay Teachers store and check out the product using the free preview. Then download it! It'll be worth it. I've already downloaded a few of her products.

My favourite product thus far is her Classroom Procedures and Routines Manual and Workbook. Here is a link to her post and video which explain what the product is and how you can use it.

Trust me, Rookies and non-Rookies as well I think, you'll love The Clutter-Free Classroom!

Non-coincidental Moments

I'm in a waiting phase of life. I was in China for four months, then I moved home to work at Wee College in Moncton. Suddenly an opportunity to teach in Jakarta, Indonesia presented itself. The thing I've been loving about the time leading up to starting my teaching job in Indonesia is that this is a waiting phase.

More often than not, I've wanted to hurry time to the "next big thing" in my life because I've been so excited about it. This time, I find that I want to add extra days to my time remaining in the Maritimes, but I also want to skip days to fast forward to the next adventure.

I decided a month or two ago that I was not just going to sit back and wait excitedly until I start my new job in a new country. I'm not saying that I'm not also excitedly waiting, because I am. But, I've also taken this waiting time to strengthen relationships, learn to love a group of 14 incredible little three year-olds, appreciate the beauty of the Maritimes, and prepare spiritually, mentally, practically, for a huge life shift.

The phase of life you're going through is not a coincidence. There is meaning to it, regardless of the difficulty or ease that comes with it. What are you going to do in this time of waiting?

I'm reading a book called A Million Little Ways by Emily P. Freeman. In this book, she talks about what it means to live life as an "artist", to find your true calling, to do this all as a way to give honour to God! It's been eye-opening, as her writing often is. The chapter I read last night was titled "Wait". She ends the chapter with these words:

Show up in the place where you already are fully alive as the image bearer God made you to be. Embrace the mysterious, invisible work of Christ even when it seems like nothing is happening. You are an image bearer and you have a job to do - whether you see the results or whether you don't.

My Book Plea

Hi friends, I'm about to mooch off of you, but it's for a good cause.

I need your books.

Read on. Or, if you don't feel like reading on, please at least glance at the list at the end of this post.

Pluit Village School is a new school campus that is a part of the Sekolah Pelita Harapan International (SPH) network of schools in Jakarta, Indonesia. This means that it will be very hard to come by English books at the grade level that I need for my own classroom library, and the ones that are available are expensive I'm told. A lot of teachers who have been teaching for several many years may have built up their classroom library over time. This, however, will be the first class that is my very own, and it's in a developing country.

Next weekend, I'm going home to my parents for Easter weekend, and I plan on doing an archaeology dig into my childhood. I'm going to scour every nook and cranny for my old chapter books (and possible my brothers' old books too). I'll bring every Newberry Medal book I can find. I'll find some great read alouds that I can read to my class just like my grade four teacher read Silverwing, Harry Potter, and Charlotte's Web to us on her banged up wooden stool. I'll snag whatever seems relevant.

Reading is obviously a fundamental part to a child's early education, and I want to do everything I can to provide them with different reading opportunities in my classroom. I'm still not entirely sure how I'm going to pack a classroom library into a suitcase to bring with me, but if you know me, you know that I've been refining my packing skills for many, many years. Worst case scenario, I send some on the slow boat to Indonesia..... Or I'll find Mary Poppins' bag.

Pluit Village is in a transition period, and this school year will be the transition year between it being an early education center and becoming a full K-5 school in the center of Jakarta. The transition school we'll be at this year will be in the Pluit Village Mall. This will be a challenge at times, but I know that it's a challenge that is well worth the efforts we'll be putting in.

I'm so excited for the challenge this year brings! I can't wait to get to the point where I have a unique and diverse classroom library for my students, and I get to see them debating over which book to take home to read.

I know that it'll come together, but I may need a little help. Here's how you could help if you feel so inclined.

1. Point me toward different book sales at schools in the Greater Moncton Area and even on PEI. This will be my gold mine, I'm hoping.

2. Look through your old chapter books, novels, picture books, and send me an email or message with a list of what you think you'd be willing to donate to my classroom. 

3. SPH is a Christian international school network. If you know of any books that would be helpful for the spiritual growth of children (ages 7-11) and interesting to read, please send me the titles of these books. Even better, if you have some that you don't feel you need anymore, you could consider donating them. 

4. Give me some tips or pieces of advice on how to accomplish this task!

5. Pray. 

Email me or message me on Facebook.

Here's a link to give you an idea of what kind of books are around the grade three level.

Love God. Love Others. Love Indonesia.

How do I start a blog post about my recent life changing decision?

Let's go back to ten year-old me sitting on the couch after church with my mom. The all familiar World Vision commercials flashed across the screen, and I admit, they got me. While the commercial showed adorable kids in tough circumstances, a voice asked a simple question: "Do you have room in your family for one more?" Mom tells me that I turned to her and asked, "Do we?" How could she resist that? ha ha.

This is how our family came to sponsor Putri Maisaro, a six year-old girl from Indonesia. This is also how I came to be very interested in this faraway country. At the time, Indonesia seemed as familiar a place to me as Narnia or Bear Country (come on, Berenstein fans). I used to dream about meeting Putri someday, and by the time I was in high school, it was near the top of my bucket list.

What else was near the top? "Become a teacher." This was always at the top of my list, and it was always the same answer when someone would ask me that obligatory childhood question: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" My answer never changed except for a brief time near the end of my Arts degree when I reconsidered my career choice. I wanted to make sure that this was what I was meant to do, that it was part of God's ultimate plan for me, that I wasn't just pursuing that because I'd always wanted to. So I took a year to teach English in Quebec, and I found that I loved teaching. During that year in Quebec, I also heard about this school in Indonesia where some relatives of some relatives were working, so I emailed them.

I asked what I needed to do to work there. I asked what kind of education they required their staff to have. Unfortunately, I did not meet the requirements at the time. I can't properly explain my feelings towards Indonesia or why they existed, and it took until now to see God's hand in all of this.

I just want to take a minute to emphasize that too often we stress about God's plan in our lives. A friend recently quoted another friend to me. God's plan for our lives is fairly simple, for the Lord gives two commandments. To love God. To love others. It's very clear in the Bible that if God cares so much for the sparrows and the lilies, then how much more must he care for us? I've made the mistake before of stressing what I'm "supposed" to do. We're supposed to love. So, stop worrying; take it from a first class worrier, it does nothing. Just trust. Find peace.

Anyway, fast forward three years after my year in Quebec, and this past fall, I started worrying about what I'd do after finishing my B. Ed teaching practicum. I know, there I went worrying. But I assure you, worrying did nothing. After my practicum, I could either take the job offer from the school I did my practicum at in China, or I could return home and go from there. So, after prayer, consideration, and some wise words from friends and mentors, I returned home. This was a very difficult decision and disheartening in many ways. The upside was that I was coming back to a great workplace at Wee College where I've been very happy working. I still didn't know what the next year would bring though, and I had decided to just trust. It seems simple, and surprisingly, it was.

Remember that school I had inquired about in Indonesia. Well, I applied there. I prayed a lot about this decision, and I continued praying in the months following my application. The Lord surprised me over and over again as things came together. I felt so at peace with the whole thing, and even if I didn't get a job offer, I felt good about the process. I had no feeling of dread or stress because I knew so surely that regardless, I would still love God and others in the outcome.

Now, I won't lie and say that I was indifferent to whether I got the job or not: I so badly wanted this. Yes, I was nervous to hear whether I had the job or not. Yes, I was borderline a nervous wreck the night of my Skype interview, but it was a nervous excitement. I ultimately felt a peace about whatever the result would be.

A few weeks ago, a package arrived in the mail for me. Inside was a contract. Wahoooo!!! While I'm scared about many things in this decision, and there were difficult sacrifices that came with it, I know that this is the right decision and it is a blessing. God is faithful, and I can't believe that I am finally a teacher. I can't believe that I have the chance to love God, love others, and love Indonesia.

So, as of July 14th, I will be in Jakarta, Indonesia as the third grade teacher at Sekolah Pelita Harapan International School.

One last thing. A quote I saw on facebook yesterday:

“You get a strange feeling when you're about to leave a place, like you'll not only miss the people you love but you'll miss the person you are now at this time and this place, because you'll never be this way ever again.”
― Azar Nafisi