One reason why I like to play sports

So yesterday, I was a little stressed after my school day. Tuesday is rugby day so I walked down to the field and practiced with the team. After two and a half hours of practice I was completely relaxed.

Why was I stressed? Just a variety of annoying things happened yesterday. One of my co-teachers had repaired the dictionary in my class (the kids had largely destroyed them, though the ministry hadn't sent the best dictionaries ... they were pretty thick and broke easily in the center) and she was upset that the students in my class had written all over one of the repaired dictionaries. So she was urging me to keep the dictionaries locked up in the cabinets. However, my view is that if the dictionaries are in the cabinets they are never going to get used while if they are out in the classroom they will get destroyed but they also will be used. (I can hear someone being unsurprised that I'm unconcerned with my things getting ruined).

Also yesterday I had to go to the bank to find out why the money the government had deposited into my account hadn't shown up. This meant I had to figure out what I needed to say, stand in line at the bank for an hour and then try my hardest to figure out what the bank employee is slowly saying to me. After only 2 repetitions I found out that their was a second layer of security on my account that needed to be removed and that I had to go stand in a second line to do so. Fortunately, the second line was pretty small. Hopefully, now I can get my pay for the month of July.

I was also stressed because I agreed to help teach some of the younger students. One of the secretaries was subbing for the English teacher who was out that day and asked if I could help her. I agreed to help her, partially because the secretaries are always helping me out. However, after my regular day of teaching dealing with two full classes of 40 students was a little much. (My classes only have 20 students) Especially because they were little kids and especially noisy and screamy. Though it was stressful it was also fun interacting with kids that age ... for about half the class the secretary and I acted out a verb and the kids had to say the correct verb. The kids were very enthusiastic and I tried to keep them entertained by coming up with creative actions like farting or doing push-ups.

One of the goals of the English Opens Doors Program is to inspire the students to learn English by having them interact with the volunteer. The students of the school, despite having 5 volunteers in the past, are enthusiastic towards me. Everyday, I have about 50 students say hi to me and I shake at least 30 students hands. Students are always coming up to me and asking me questions (which I sometimes understand) and members of the rugby team always ask me if I'm coming to practice and try to teach me dirty words. This is probably the most rewarding aspect of the program.

In Chile instead of saying your mom, they say your sister. There is currently a beer commercial where people say things that can be taken innocently or not and after each statement a guy says your sister. In part of the commercial they are at a rugby game and a person says enter with force to the rugby players (which is then followed by the dude saying your sister). So of course last night at practice people keep telling each other to enter with force. Guy humor is pretty much the same all over.