Questions and Crazy

There comes a time in all of our lives when we ask ourselves why in the hell we have chosen the path we're on. And then we start to think, "Did I choose this path or did this just sort of happen to me? Am I truly responsible for my own destiny or do the mysterious hands of fate dictate my every move and decision? Does God have a master plan in which I'm involved and is it absolutely necessary that I need to be right here, in this place, at this moment?"

Then something shiny catches our attention and we forget what we were thinking about.

I've decided that I absolutely love and adore my students (most of them) and that I will cry my eyes out when I have to leave. But they drive me crazy! Up the wall, pulling my hair out, wanna cry, scream, curl up into a ball kinda crazy. Why am I here again? What compelled me to move halfway around the world to teach English to small children? Do I even like small children? If, right in the middle of teaching a lesson, one of my students yells, "Мис Хадауей, каква страница?!?!" one more time, am I going to throw them or myself out of our third story window?

I have another question: why do my students think I'm stupid? Seriously. When I put a pack of balloons in the back cupboard and tell them not to touch and then 10 seconds later I see them huddled in the corner with their backs to me, do they honestly think I don't know that they just went and grabbed a balloon each anyway? Do they think I'll just go, "Hmmm, there must be something interesting in that corner today, I'll just continue with my business..."? I mean, come on! (Though, to be fair, it may have been stupid of me to put balloons in the cupboard in the first place) When they command, "Misses, say (insert inappropriate Bulgarian word here)!" do they really think I'm going to say it - just mindlessly repeat them so they can giggle even louder? Was I like that when I was 12?

I often wonder at my own insanity. Because it must be insanity. My students aren't crazy for taking advantage of the lack of structure and discipline prevalent in Bulgarian schools - any child, anywhere would do the same. My colleagues aren't crazy for choosing teaching as their profession - this is a pretty typical "academic" environment for them. No, I must be the crazy one. I've chosen to do this, I now call it "life" and I laugh when my students write different English words for male genitalia on the board during math class and, when I pass by in the halls, say, "Мис, Виж! Хахахаха!!!" It's official, I'm crazy. And I'm convinced it's a necessary step in this whole Peace Corps adventure. Pure and accepted insanity. 

I have to go coach girls' volleyball now. I have to lock us into the gym so the middle-school-age boys don't come in and steal all of our balls and try to slap all the girls on the ass. Yup.

-Age