The Beginning of the End ...

It’s crazy, but I have officially begun my last full week of teaching! After this week, we have two weeks of vacation at the end of April, followed by 3 days of teaching until the end of our contracts on May 1^st. The time has absolutely flown by! The first few months were hectic with administrative paperwork and just getting used to new friends, new job, new living situation, etc. Three weeks into teaching we already had 2 weeks of vacation, and then after that the Christmas holidays came and went. January was full of planning for the February vacation, then March passed quickly, and here we are in April. It seems like I’ve just recently gotten totally comfortable with teaching/efficient with preparation/etc … and it’s soon to be over! The first assistant left last weekend to go home to Russia, and the rest will be leaving at the end of this week (with the exception of the Spanish and Chilean assistants, who are also sticking around for part of May). The assistants from Europe all got permission to not come back for the official last 3 days of our contract in May, after the spring vacation. I think the end is definitely bittersweet for us all. Above is a picture of the 9 assistants (only 7 of us live together at the school; the 8^th is an Austrian who lives in a nearby city and the 9^th is a German who lives at the school next door) at our last lunch all together in the cantine.