understanding aussies...

As part of my effort to spread love and understanding I try to educate the world (one classroom at a time!) about Australia, Aussies and, of course, our wonderful sense of humour. To that end I have inflicted Priscilla, Queen of the Desert on some of my students, and I think The Castle should be next in the line up. There are also any number of www sources to help with this process. I was recently sent this:

Aussie surf lifesavers

which my darling students didn't really get much of! But at least I got to laugh a bit. (If you ever come across wonderful bits like this one please let me know - always good to get a little outside input into my English lessons.) Also on the subject of being an English teacher... thanks to all of you who didn't comment on my spelling and grammatical errors in the last post - very kind of you not to embarrass me in this giant forum!

What a good Friday I've been having... a nice long sleep in (preceded by a very early night as I was completely knackered even though it was a short week), a lazy breakfast, 3 skype calls to friends around the world for a total of 2 hours, lunch... even managed to do the dishes and wash some clothes! And a couple of friends just dropped by with a bookshelf which they no longer need - for the first time that I can remember I have more bookshelf space than books - time to go book shopping! Or I could maybe get some of the ones in Oz... only 18 days to go, but who's counting.

Easter, for teachers, means not just 4 days off work, no, it's a whole week of hols - yay for me!! Looking forward to taking it very easy, sleeping, whiling away hours in cafes and continuing the rehab on my knee. Well, I'm not really looking forward to the last bit... I am looking forward to it being better though. Found out on Wednesday that I need to have the brace on for another 4 weeks (as well as no full squats for 3 months after that!). So all of those in Melbourne will get to see it - but at least I can almost throw away the crutches. The holidays and the travel also means that yesterday was the last taxi ride to school... and also the most enjoyable one for two reason, 1 - the driver was very friendly, turns out he lives in the building opposite mine with his family and his son spent last year in Australia, played rugby in Sydney and has now just made the Swedish Team! 2 - got a call from Alex in Melbourne whilst in the taxi and realised that it won't be all that long before I am there. The funniest moment from this week's taxi rides was the guy who was complaining about drivers not following road rules, especially the lower speed limits in residential areas, whilst doing 70 in a 50 zone. I chose not to point out the hypocrisy of the situation instead employing the "smile and nod" strategy that works in so many situations.

Many of you probably don't know, although won't be surprised to hear, that I am involved in one of the swimming clubs here. I swim a little bit (although not now due to the knee) and also help out coaching the club's elite group 2-3 times a week. I started about a year ago when a friend of mine, Johan, had the group and I could see he could do with some help. He has since moved to Göteborg but I stayed and now help Anne, the coach the club have appointed to replace him. For me it's a way of staying in touch with elite swimming without having to do 10 sessions a week. The club had 6 members on the Swedish team in Melbourne for the World Champs (1 team doctor, 2 coaches - Anne and Walle, 3 swimmers - Therese (gold and silver), Stefan (bronze), Petter (semi-final)). So everyone was pretty happy with that!
It is also to great to have something away from work that I am involved in - it forces me not to stop thinking about work. I have also met a bunch of great people, one of whom is having a 30th birthday party tonight - so I have to get ready for that very soon. Quite possible that tomorrow morning will be a little bit on the slow side...

Aussie it up!

rich.