Today I got to experience the role that is substitute teacher. I think I got a good glimpse of all the reactions - one group was quiet, well-behaved, pleasant, and willing to participate. Another group was very keen to participate, louder than the previous. The third group took advantage of the situation and spoke too much Polish, but they had a good time (some may call this noisy) and were happy to be involved. The last group was the timid, don't-know-what-to-say-because-I'm-nervous-around-a-new-teacher sort. It was alright though. All in all, a decent experience. I covered Irene's classes; bosses call. I haven't had to cancel any classes yet, so they cancelled my Monday routine. This would have been Irene's third or fourth cancelled Monday. Angry parents were involved. I missed my Koz classes today!
Had a most FABULOUS weekend in Warsaw. Really. Always fun catching up with Martin. Heather and I caught a train out of Radom Friday evening...the last one leaves at 9:26pm; we arrived at the station straight from our schools in Kozienice and Pionki. The teachers I drive with on Fridays were kind enough to pick Heather up on our way back to Radom, and drop us right at the train. We bought our ticket, and boarded when the train arrived. When the train attendant came around to collect tickets, she said ours was the wrong kind of ticket, and that we had to buy another on the train - twice the price of what we paid. With the help of the woman sitting with us and Heather's dictionary, we conveyed that it's not our fault - the woman at the train station sold us a ticket for the train! It arrived, and we got on! So the attendant goes and has a bit of a shouting match with someone more senior, I presume. So the second attendant comes, and is now telling us we must pay for a new ticket (and his price has gone up from the first attendant's). We can't pay the difference, we need a new ticket entirely. The train station will refund us our other ticket, he says. We stand strong and say it's not our fault. This goes on for a good twenty minutes. He finally walks away, after we hear the words police and passport. The woman sitting with us says that we must find him and pay. We decide that he can come to us. The woman is so apologetic, that we had to deal with that. We were the same, feeling bad that she had to get involved. Time passes, and we're approaching Warsaw. Hey, the train guy hasn't come back...! A few minutes before arriving though, he is back, ranting on in Polish (he should know by now we don't understand!) about (later translated by lady) this being his livelihood and his job...in the end though, he dropped the charge for the new ticket. GOOD!
We got to our hostel just after midnight, woke up Martin to say hello and goodnight, and drifted off to sleep. Saturday we spent having a leisurely breakfast (we packed food) at the hostel. Then we ventured out to the end of the street, to have coffee. After this we went to the movies - Sherlock Holmes SO GOOD - then went for an early dinner. We grabbed some drinks to take back to the hostel, and settled in to the common room to relax (because we had such a hard day)! Haha We put on "Four Weddings and a Funeral". The gal working at reception totally made popcorn for us! We headed out to our fave bar for the night, and drank too much. But boy did we have fun. Blame the Brits! *coughMARTINcough*
Sunday we made our way to the mall for our respective trains - back to Bonn for Martin, and Radom for us girls. We had intended on a relaxing weekend, indoors away from the FREEZING cold weather we've had. And that's just what we did. The return to Radom on Sundays gets sadder and sadder. Thank goodness the sun was beautiful.
Had a most FABULOUS weekend in Warsaw. Really. Always fun catching up with Martin. Heather and I caught a train out of Radom Friday evening...the last one leaves at 9:26pm; we arrived at the station straight from our schools in Kozienice and Pionki. The teachers I drive with on Fridays were kind enough to pick Heather up on our way back to Radom, and drop us right at the train. We bought our ticket, and boarded when the train arrived. When the train attendant came around to collect tickets, she said ours was the wrong kind of ticket, and that we had to buy another on the train - twice the price of what we paid. With the help of the woman sitting with us and Heather's dictionary, we conveyed that it's not our fault - the woman at the train station sold us a ticket for the train! It arrived, and we got on! So the attendant goes and has a bit of a shouting match with someone more senior, I presume. So the second attendant comes, and is now telling us we must pay for a new ticket (and his price has gone up from the first attendant's). We can't pay the difference, we need a new ticket entirely. The train station will refund us our other ticket, he says. We stand strong and say it's not our fault. This goes on for a good twenty minutes. He finally walks away, after we hear the words police and passport. The woman sitting with us says that we must find him and pay. We decide that he can come to us. The woman is so apologetic, that we had to deal with that. We were the same, feeling bad that she had to get involved. Time passes, and we're approaching Warsaw. Hey, the train guy hasn't come back...! A few minutes before arriving though, he is back, ranting on in Polish (he should know by now we don't understand!) about (later translated by lady) this being his livelihood and his job...in the end though, he dropped the charge for the new ticket. GOOD!
We got to our hostel just after midnight, woke up Martin to say hello and goodnight, and drifted off to sleep. Saturday we spent having a leisurely breakfast (we packed food) at the hostel. Then we ventured out to the end of the street, to have coffee. After this we went to the movies - Sherlock Holmes SO GOOD - then went for an early dinner. We grabbed some drinks to take back to the hostel, and settled in to the common room to relax (because we had such a hard day)! Haha We put on "Four Weddings and a Funeral". The gal working at reception totally made popcorn for us! We headed out to our fave bar for the night, and drank too much. But boy did we have fun. Blame the Brits! *coughMARTINcough*
Sunday we made our way to the mall for our respective trains - back to Bonn for Martin, and Radom for us girls. We had intended on a relaxing weekend, indoors away from the FREEZING cold weather we've had. And that's just what we did. The return to Radom on Sundays gets sadder and sadder. Thank goodness the sun was beautiful.
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