Thanksgiving in Kuwait

This is Thanksgiving week in Kuwait, a country that does not have an official Thanksgiving holiday. For some official reason there are no big turkeys in the country this year so we are limited to small ones. We are talking crock pot sized birds here. At first everyone got upset. Then they got smart. Practice turkeys are being cooked all over the place. It should be quite the feast – either Thursday after school or on Friday. Typically we all have to vote on which day. Making firm decisions is not one of our stronger skills.

Lists are being made as to what we are thankful for. For me it is the traditional ones – family, health, being glad I did not go to Penn State. For the kids it is video games, mom and dad and money. Yes, even the 7 year olds are thankful for money. Since they have so very much of it, being thankful for it is very good.

We are now within a month of my trip to Sri Lanka and finally I have found where they give the typhoid shots. Genetics are going to prevent me from contacting malaria. Typhoid is another matter. While most people do not have such shots when they travel there I figure why tempt fate?
Things at school continue to be difficult. I love my new job and I love the people I work with. We are working through some printer issues this year and hoping for a resolution soon. Second grade has its own printer, donated by a friend, but I still have to provide the ink. We have cameras all over both our school and apartment buildings and are awaiting the arrival of smoke detectors. Building codes here are not what they are in the USA, which is both a good and a difficult thing.

Difficult does seem to be the word this year. We have new administrators trying to prove themselves, and not always understanding the quality staff they’ve got. We have an owner who is admitting all kinds of students into our school and not seeing the big picture. Not all students can be served by the same system, as the public schools are proving in the states. Here we have all kinds of students and not the system in place to teach all of them. The good kids get overlooked, the smart kids get ignored and one questions whether we really are serving the others in the best possible way? It is great to have a heart but you need to be honest and realistic as well. I humbly suggest cutting the budget , raising class sizes and admitting such a wide range of students is not a combination for success. We shall see.