Now that classes have started (and students are actually attending), I have been able to establish a bit of a routine. This is just a temporary routine though since I will start teaching another class next week (hopefully the first year students will actually come to class on the first day). For now, I have found plenty to do to stay busy.
This week I joined the gym. I first had to go to the financial office to pay my membership fee (80 birr = $4.50 USD/month). This proved to be more difficult than I thought; every time I went there, the office door was closed and nobody would answer when I knocked. After a few days, I finally found someone and paid my money. The gym has very limited hours: Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday 6:00am-8:00am and 5:00pm-7:00pm. Since I paid my fee on Friday, I decided to try out the gym on Saturday. When I walked to the gymnasium building, I thought I was in the wrong place because the whole complex is in disarray; many of the windows were shattered and there was wooden scaffolding outside the premises indicating ongoing construction. I saw some lights on and was able to find the “gym”. I will have to take some photos of the meager facilities. While there are probably about 15 various machines, most of them are not functioning or broken in some way. There were three treadmills; two of them worked, but were both being used. I opted to use a stationary bicycle that had a broken seat and did not turn on. It was enough to get my heart rate up for a bit, but not enjoyable since I couldn’t adjust the tension and just felt like I was spinning out the whole time.
After 15 minutes or so of “biking”, I used some free weights. This is the part I was actually looking forward to the most. I’ve been wanting to do more arm exercises and work my upper body since I’m always biking and working my legs. I finished with some ab exercises and felt satisfied.
I went back to the gym Tuesday morning at 6am. It wasn’t easy to get out of bed so early, but I was glad that I did. The gym was much, much busier than it had been Saturday evening. The gym is composed of two small rooms. One room has the three treadmills and an open area for aerobics; the other room has all of the free weights, a few weight benches, and all of the other machines (most of which are dysfunctional). There were only two or three people in the weight room, but the aerobics room was packed! The gym manager whom I was introduced to on Saturday was leading a sort of fitness class. There were probably about 15 people there – mostly men, but two women and one young girl. It made me happy to see so many people working out and seemingly enjoying themselves. I already had my mind set on running, so I used one of the two functional treadmills. Next time though, I will probably join the fitness class to do something different. I ran for 30 minutes and lifted weights next door afterward. As for my routine, I am going to try to continue working out the three days a week that the gym is open. If I’m not able to wake up early enough, I can always go for a run around campus.
This week I joined the gym. I first had to go to the financial office to pay my membership fee (80 birr = $4.50 USD/month). This proved to be more difficult than I thought; every time I went there, the office door was closed and nobody would answer when I knocked. After a few days, I finally found someone and paid my money. The gym has very limited hours: Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday 6:00am-8:00am and 5:00pm-7:00pm. Since I paid my fee on Friday, I decided to try out the gym on Saturday. When I walked to the gymnasium building, I thought I was in the wrong place because the whole complex is in disarray; many of the windows were shattered and there was wooden scaffolding outside the premises indicating ongoing construction. I saw some lights on and was able to find the “gym”. I will have to take some photos of the meager facilities. While there are probably about 15 various machines, most of them are not functioning or broken in some way. There were three treadmills; two of them worked, but were both being used. I opted to use a stationary bicycle that had a broken seat and did not turn on. It was enough to get my heart rate up for a bit, but not enjoyable since I couldn’t adjust the tension and just felt like I was spinning out the whole time.
After 15 minutes or so of “biking”, I used some free weights. This is the part I was actually looking forward to the most. I’ve been wanting to do more arm exercises and work my upper body since I’m always biking and working my legs. I finished with some ab exercises and felt satisfied.
I went back to the gym Tuesday morning at 6am. It wasn’t easy to get out of bed so early, but I was glad that I did. The gym was much, much busier than it had been Saturday evening. The gym is composed of two small rooms. One room has the three treadmills and an open area for aerobics; the other room has all of the free weights, a few weight benches, and all of the other machines (most of which are dysfunctional). There were only two or three people in the weight room, but the aerobics room was packed! The gym manager whom I was introduced to on Saturday was leading a sort of fitness class. There were probably about 15 people there – mostly men, but two women and one young girl. It made me happy to see so many people working out and seemingly enjoying themselves. I already had my mind set on running, so I used one of the two functional treadmills. Next time though, I will probably join the fitness class to do something different. I ran for 30 minutes and lifted weights next door afterward. As for my routine, I am going to try to continue working out the three days a week that the gym is open. If I’m not able to wake up early enough, I can always go for a run around campus.
I try to get to my office by 8:30am or so every morning. I now have two offices – my original one in the social sciences building and my new one in the ELIC room (English Language Improvement Center). I have been spending all of my time in the latter; it is my new home. Since there is no full-time staff for ELIC, I was asked to move my office there. This way, ELIC can be open for students anytime I am here working. So far the arrangement is working out well. I met some of the English Club executive members who hold many of their events in ELIC. They are an awesome group of enthusiastic students. At the end of the week, they are hosting an English movie night, so I will attend that event and find out more about their organization and ways I can help out.
Every day I leave the office just before noon to go home for lunch. It only takes me 5 minutes to walk from my office to my house. Everyone is serious about taking their lunch break here; there are few people who work through the midday hours; public facilities, like the post office and bank, close during this time, too. Most people take at least an hour for lunch, but sometimes up to two hours!
I come home to a lovely home cooked meal prepared by Almaz. While I eat, I sometimes watch the news on TV, read, or continue whatever I was working on in the office. I usually have a cup of coffee after lunch and head back to the office by 1-1:30pm.
In the afternoon, I continue working in the office or teach my class depending on the day of the week. The past few weeks, I have been designing materials for my two courses. Although both of the classes have been taught before, the content has changed somewhat with the adoption of the nationwide harmonized curriculum. There are no textbooks for the course, so I have to prepare everything. Textbooks do not seem common at all here; there is no bookstore and even if there was, most students would not be able to afford to buy books. For this reason, most instructors or departments create “modules” for their courses. These are simply handouts prepared using either a word processor or by copying pages from a textbook; these handouts are then taken to the campus distribution center where they are copied and stapled together to form a module.
I finished preparing a 53-page module for my writing class and I am currently 25 pages into another module for my speaking class. It is a lot of work to think about all of the materials I’ll need for the entire semester, but it’ll save me a lot of time and hassle in the future. The fewer times I have to go to the distribution center, the better!
In addition to material development, I have been working on some specific activities and lessons for the class I am currently teaching. I have a lot of past materials, but many of them are useless here. For example, I have PowerPoint presentations that would be applicable for my writing class, but my classroom has no screen, projector, or other manner of displaying the PowerPoint for all of the students to see. Alas, I am writing on the chalkboard a lot and getting better at not breaking the chalk every time I write! I even have gotten into the habit of wearing a long, white lab coat like all of the other professors. At first, I thought it was a little strange and would be too hot, but now I’ve embraced it! By wearing the coat, I prevent chalk powder from getting all over my clothes and if I get hot n’ sweaty when I teach, no one ever sees my pit-stained shirt underneath!
Most people start leaving the office around 4:30-5pm. Most days, I stay a little bit longer than that…not because I’m a super hard worker, but because it’s a nice time to catch people back home to Skype. With the 8-hour time difference, I can usually get a hold of people who are waking up around that time. My hunger usually causes me to leave by 6 or 7pm though. Sometimes I eat leftovers from lunch and other times I join my buddies for dinner at the staff lounge. For 10 or 12 birr ($0.55-$0.65 USD), I can get a filling traditional style dinner (injera with some kind(s) of wot).
I spend the evening hours chatting and drinking coffee, beer, or soda with my buddies around the staff lounge or just hanging out at home watching a movie on TV. It took me a while to figure out all of the channels that were available, but one day, I was able to find about 3 or 4 English channels. If I missed a workout, I sometimes go for a walk or run in the evening.
It gets dark here around 7pm, so I end up going to bed relatively early. If I’m up past 10pm, it’s a late night! But then I’m back at it the next morning by 5 or 6 am!
Every day I leave the office just before noon to go home for lunch. It only takes me 5 minutes to walk from my office to my house. Everyone is serious about taking their lunch break here; there are few people who work through the midday hours; public facilities, like the post office and bank, close during this time, too. Most people take at least an hour for lunch, but sometimes up to two hours!
I come home to a lovely home cooked meal prepared by Almaz. While I eat, I sometimes watch the news on TV, read, or continue whatever I was working on in the office. I usually have a cup of coffee after lunch and head back to the office by 1-1:30pm.
In the afternoon, I continue working in the office or teach my class depending on the day of the week. The past few weeks, I have been designing materials for my two courses. Although both of the classes have been taught before, the content has changed somewhat with the adoption of the nationwide harmonized curriculum. There are no textbooks for the course, so I have to prepare everything. Textbooks do not seem common at all here; there is no bookstore and even if there was, most students would not be able to afford to buy books. For this reason, most instructors or departments create “modules” for their courses. These are simply handouts prepared using either a word processor or by copying pages from a textbook; these handouts are then taken to the campus distribution center where they are copied and stapled together to form a module.
I finished preparing a 53-page module for my writing class and I am currently 25 pages into another module for my speaking class. It is a lot of work to think about all of the materials I’ll need for the entire semester, but it’ll save me a lot of time and hassle in the future. The fewer times I have to go to the distribution center, the better!
In addition to material development, I have been working on some specific activities and lessons for the class I am currently teaching. I have a lot of past materials, but many of them are useless here. For example, I have PowerPoint presentations that would be applicable for my writing class, but my classroom has no screen, projector, or other manner of displaying the PowerPoint for all of the students to see. Alas, I am writing on the chalkboard a lot and getting better at not breaking the chalk every time I write! I even have gotten into the habit of wearing a long, white lab coat like all of the other professors. At first, I thought it was a little strange and would be too hot, but now I’ve embraced it! By wearing the coat, I prevent chalk powder from getting all over my clothes and if I get hot n’ sweaty when I teach, no one ever sees my pit-stained shirt underneath!
Most people start leaving the office around 4:30-5pm. Most days, I stay a little bit longer than that…not because I’m a super hard worker, but because it’s a nice time to catch people back home to Skype. With the 8-hour time difference, I can usually get a hold of people who are waking up around that time. My hunger usually causes me to leave by 6 or 7pm though. Sometimes I eat leftovers from lunch and other times I join my buddies for dinner at the staff lounge. For 10 or 12 birr ($0.55-$0.65 USD), I can get a filling traditional style dinner (injera with some kind(s) of wot).
I spend the evening hours chatting and drinking coffee, beer, or soda with my buddies around the staff lounge or just hanging out at home watching a movie on TV. It took me a while to figure out all of the channels that were available, but one day, I was able to find about 3 or 4 English channels. If I missed a workout, I sometimes go for a walk or run in the evening.
It gets dark here around 7pm, so I end up going to bed relatively early. If I’m up past 10pm, it’s a late night! But then I’m back at it the next morning by 5 or 6 am!