Journey to the Colder Side of the Earth: Easter Update!

Христос Воскрес! (Christ is Risen!)

Hello again and a happy Easter to everyone:-) We are in an especially jubilant mood this weekend as spring weather has finally arrived. The bright sunshine and warmer temperatures fittingly echo Jesus' resurrection as winter is finally behind us (although we have been warned on many occasions that snow may very well briefly return again before summer).

While technically we have five weeks remaining of school, in reality we have less time than that. The last two weeks of the semester are taken up with special activities- the second to last week for final exams for grades 7-12 and the last week for special events like awards day, field day, prom, and graduation. For me, that means only three weeks left of regular classes, which means I'm on a mad dash to fit in as much extra history as we can fit in before exams:-) To add to the mayhem, next Friday is the drama production of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for the 4-6th graders. As always, this quarter promises to be jam-packed to the end.

Once its all done it will be nice to have a chance to sit back and reflect on our first year of teaching. It's hard to think that we'll have been doing this for a full (academic) year already. Its hard for me to go back mentally to what it felt like to walk into that first class in late August. By my very rough estimate, I'll have taught something on the order of 300-400 class periods by the time this first year is through. I'd like to think that I'm a better teacher for it, and I hope to take what I've learned this year and improve even more next year.

In addition to teaching, Amanda and I have been enjoying other events. Last weekend, the middle and high school band students put on a jazz cafe at our school. They did a great job playing a wide range of jazz standards and redecorated the third floor to look like a cafe, complete with students dressed as waiters and tables with candles. This weekend we enjoyed the nice weather by taking a walk through some of the islands in the center of the city. To top it off, we enjoyed taking in a roller coaster at Divo Ostrov, St. Petersburg's own amusement park. This morning was a lovely Easter service at our church, and tomorrow a new week dawns again!

Here are some recent photos:

The middle school band at Jazz Club.

The 4th-6th graders singing. Where else can you find American, Korean, Australian, Canadian, Swedish, and Japanese students join together to sing "Route 66"?

The high school band doing their thing.

The 1,000 ft. tall television tower that dominates the northern part of Petrogradsky Region of the city. The water is flowing in the Neva again! It is so nice to see running water again. All winter long the city looked like a desert as the frozen river was covered with an undisturbed blanket of snow.