School update

I realized that I haven't written anything about my work at the school in a long time. I guess it is because things have gotten so normal that I forget to write about that. Marta and I are very busy working on the school's yearbook. The last yearbook the school had was in 2004, so needless to say the students and teachers are excited about having one this year. Two weeks ago, we were given the task of taking (and labeling) all of the students' and teachers' photos. This was a surprise to us, as someone else had already done this at the beginning of the year. We thought we were off the hook for this task, but apparently the previous photos were not suitable. So, after a week and a half of tracking down students and trying to figure out a system to record all of the names, we finished! At this point we are finished with the students' individual photos and the class pictures, so I feel pretty good about our progress. We still have much work to do, but it will get done. I am enjoying this work, although it is at times frustrating, because I am happy that I will have something tangible to give back to the school. All of the students and teachers have been so welcoming to me, and this will be a small gift to them from me.
The past few days at school were exciting and fun, as I went on 2 field trips. With Kindergarten through 2nd grade, we went to an amusement park in Hebron. The kids were thrilled by the sight of the playground and rides. I couldn't blame them...I was pretty excited myself! Going on rides with kids was definitely a highlight of this trip. Also, meeting the moms of some of the students was really fun. Since Marta and I hadn't planned on coming on this fieldtrip, we hadn't brought any food for lunch. A mother of 2 of the students in kindergarten graciously welcomed us to lunch with her and her children, and we were extremely grateful for the food and the company. Although she could speak English, she spoke mostly Arabic with us, which gave us an opportunity to practice our language skills.
Yesterday we went on another fieldtrip, this time with the 3rd-10th classes to Megaland, an amusement park in Tulqarim, a city in the northern West Bank. I have wanted to go there for a while but never thought I would go there to visit an amusement park! This amusement park was much larger than the one in Hebron and was equipped with a ferris wheel, haunted house, and bumper cars, to name a few. I went from ride to ride with the kids, stopping only once for a lunch break. Unfortunately, my stomach cannot handle rides like it used to, so I felt a little nauseous for part of the day, but it was totally worth it. While visiting Megaland didn't really give me an accurate feel for the city of Tulqarim, it was really cool to visit such a success story. Megaland was full of families and school groups, and it was wonderful to see a thriving business in a place that has dealt with its fair share of hardships.
On our way home from Tulqarim, we stopped in Nablus to try some of its famous Kanaffa. Kanaffa is an Arabic dessert that has cheese and a honey sauce. It sounds weird, but is actually pretty good. It is a very sweet and heavy dessert, so a few bites is definitely enough.
So, after about 6 hours on a bus and 5 hours in a theme park, I was quite exhausted. Luckily the checkpoints were not a problem, because that could have lengthened our trip by quite some time. On the drive back home, as I was watching the beautiful scenery and listening to the children, the song "You're gonna miss this" popped up in my Ipod and I defintely had a sense of anticipatory nostalgia. I know that I still have 2 months left here, but time is going by quicker than I would like, so I need to savor everything here...the place, the people, the language, the food.
Here are the lyrics to "You're gonna miss this", in case you were wondering:
You're gonna miss this
You're gonna want this back
You're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast
These are some good times
So take a good look around
You may not know it now
But you're gonna miss this