First day of class

Well we just had our first day of classes, and it was
quite a learning experience! Lesson number one:
nothing in Belize runs on time. Assembly was supposed
to start at 7:45 am. At 8:10, it started. The periods
were all shortened, but the bells to end the periods
were inevitably 10 minutes late. My last class was
supposed to end at 1:55, but they didn't ring the bell
until 1 after 2. Basically, this means I wrapped the
lesson up several times, realized I wasn't done, and
kind of came up with things on the spot to teach. The
periods are an hour and five minutes long regularly.
This, I have discovered, is a very long time. I have
two classes of boys, with over thirty in each class.
The number is not set yet, as kids keep wandering in
during the day. My first class was pretty wild, but I
guess I managed to scare them pretty good. One of the
teachers who has them later in the day said the
students think I'm mean! I'm actually glad to start
off with that reputation, because it means they will
probably behave. My other boys class is really quiet;
it is quite a contrast. I kind of like the wild class
better because they have so much energy, and I feed
off it. My end of the day class is 36 freshmen girls.
They are very sweet and quiet. Some don't speak any
English, so it will be challenging to teach them. We
started off with an experiment testing how long
different kinds of gum's flavor lasted (winterfresh
outlasted dentyne ice, if anyone is interested). I
really will have to work to draw these girls out of
their shells, they are so shy. In other news, today
we got shelves in our house, which is very exciting.
We haven't unpacked yet because we had no place to put
stuff! We still don't have any chairs, but one of our
neighbors who works for the school said we could
borrow some of theirs! People are very generous here.
That's all for now, I need to go home and sleep :)