No snow days, just random holidays...
So yesterday, my boys kept bugging me, insisting that we had today (tuesday) off from school. I had heard nothing about it, and since my boys are always insisting we don't have school whenever I assign them a project or quiz, I assumed they were just fooling around. Just to make sure, I sent one of the boys to ask the secretary, and he came back saying she didn't know, which I took as his interpretation of "of course we have school tommorrow." I spent the last 5 or so minutes of class threatening the boys with death and/or failing grades if they did not show up to school the next day. This senario was repeated in my other two classes. Well, when I walked into the teacher's lounge after my last class, lo and behold, there on the board is a note saying there are no classes tomorrow! I later found out that it had been written on the board at the begining of 5th period (the last period of the day, which I was teaching and therefore not in the teacher's lounge). So I then had to chase down a few of my students, and tell them to spread it around that we didn't have school the next day. One of my students came up to another teacher, confused, and told her that my class was the only one that would be held the next day! Why weren't the teachers told? Cause this is Belize! And the occasion for the holiday? Apparently, a hundred years ago to the day, Benque was declared a town. Now, the centential celebration is nothing new, they have been celebrating it since I have been here with random parades and other events. But apparently this prestigous day merits no school! We were woken up around 7 am by the sound of drums from a parade, but otherwise the town looks mostly asleep- I think most of the partying was done last night. Alison says she doesn't really know what they are celebrating, as the town is probably exactally the same as it was 100 years ago, except for the addition of cable tv. I have to agree with her there :) But I'm enjoying my day off, and the fact that we have internet because it is a bright and sunny day. Yep, we just found out that the reason internet goes down so often is the weather. Apparently, the satelite can't transmit whatever it transmits through the clouds. The fact that we have only had 2 five-day weeks since we got here is definately nothing to complain about- I wasn't really looking forward to my first full week of teaching in months, and now it will be put off for a while!