case of the mondays

This is the third time I've tried to post about my first day of teaching due to a ridiculously slow and annoying computer, so my account of today may or may not be more dramatic and pessimistic than the actual events that occurred.
Today was the first day of a 1 week English camp that I'm working at in a private school in a really beautiful area north of Taipei City. I made the hour and half commute this morning on maayybee 4 hours of restless sleep involving dreams of Taiwan, teaching, and friends and family from home which caused me to be only slightly homesick and a little unenthusiastic about having 22 twelve and thirteen year old girls stare at me for 6 hours like I was the most insane person they had ever seen. Before that, the first hour was spent in an opening ceremony where they sat like sweet angels in awe whispering questions to me like "How old are you?...22? soo young, soo nice Teacher. He your boyfriend (to every male staff member ages 16-50)?" Naturally I thought I was the Divinely Chosen teacher that had been blessed with girls that would hang on every perfectly understandable English word that flowed forth from my lips....ahem all teachers forgive my ignorance.
My first blunder was asking the girls to stand in a circle to play a "name game" involving making up your own silly action to help us remember each other's names. After explaining the concept for 10 minutes, making myself look like a fool, attempting to encourage the first 3 girls to give it a try, and many Chinese protests I could not understand, I realized that it was hopeless and that looking silly for a 12 or 13 year old Taiwanese girl is worse than 10 pages of homework. "Let's have fun, right?" I said... 20 pairs of eyes stared at me blankly (the two that I knew grasped the idea rolled their eyes). The next couple of hours we went through the coursebook doing lessons which was apparently less painful as they occasionally participated and tried to get ahead in the written exercises in the book by hiding their pencils in their hands and filling in answers when they thought I wasn't looking.
After lunch and naptime (yes naptime here is huuuge. even the gym I'm joining has a nap room!) we had the most serious and calculated arts and crafts session I've ever seen. The task was to make a flag for this imaginary State each group will be creating over the course of the week. Brainstorming ideas to put on the flag was like pulling teeth. In the end most of them ended up being versions of their favorite Japanese animation character. I'm rethinking my special interest group topic of "English and the Arts" for the Fall with the course description I wrote as "a chance to use your own creativity... release your inner artist!" hahaha silly hippie Westerner I am. Truthfully they ended up being gorgeous and I was impressed with the colors and attention to detail.
Finally the last activity of the day was learning phrases and slang for songs. The song list we were given included Nirvana, Britney Spears, Black Eyed Peas and Gwen Stefani's "Holla Back Girl." I tried to pick an Avril Lavigne song with as few curse words as possible since going over some of the lyrics would involve going into territory I wasn't prepared to do for my first day. Most likely never has a more in depth and imaginative explanation of Avril's "So Much for my Happy Ending" song been given. The background I gave for the song: "You see, she's upset because they had good times together. He held her hand on a walk on the beach one time. He left for America the night before they were going to get he married. It was not a happy ending." Finally I saw a few sparks of genuine interest and the girls actually started to sing! Of course I tried to take it too far by telling them to stand up to sing louder and even suggesting that they - gasp- move while they sang! Grab a pencil- use it was a microphone! I took the one girl tapping her foot as a victory.
A 100 person jammed packed bus ride and 2 bleeding and blistered heels later, I am home still covered in paint and awaiting day 2. I'm hoping tomorrow I will be able to better determine whether the girls are confused, shy, bored, being "fresh" as we say in Philly or some mix of all four.
Don't worry- every day won't be given in such detail!
Right now it's pretty quiet around the house since the other Kathleen is in Bali and Singapore for vacation and Louise is up at the same school, Sacred Heart, overnight for a different type of course. Julia and I have been occupying ourselves with some American comfort food and a night out dancing until 5am this past weekend. Once again I'll reiterate how bizarre it is to go out here. The night involved a performance by Taiwanese rappers, a choreographed boy band and lastly a Taiwanese R&B ballad star. This time we definitely weren't the only Westerners in the place-- there were 10-15 gorgeous but rhythm-lacking models 6 foot and taller with big time rollers. Apparently "Taipei is so hot right now."