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[zanderson48]

Two week update:

Sorry for the delay!

Week of 2/24

-Had a good week in the classroom and started really diving into my speaking workshop

-Got a visit to my room from Form 2 students, who are beginning to be less shy

-School wide sports day

-First visit to Kapas Island

-First Terengganu FC soccer match

Week of 3/2

- District track meet

-Malaysian McDonalds

-Second trip to Kapas Island

- Started playing pick up soccer nightly with local guys

- Site visit with Lindsie and Charlie

I have been happy to continue to spend more time in the classroom, developing lessons and getting to know my students more. However, March is going to be disjointed due to the week-long district track meet and the upcoming school holiday. However, I am hoping to build some momentum going into April so that I can hit the ground running and try out some new lesson ideas I have. I have also been able to find some community by playing soccer near our house, which has helped me feel more connected to our town, something I had been missing. A former Lewiston student reached out to me wanting to start a pen pal program; I am very excited about this and hoping that we can get the ball rolling soon! This Thursday I am heading to Cambodia for a week with a group of Fulbright friends so I will be sure to post lots of pics!

Best,

Zack

[zanderson48]

Weekly update:

2nd speaking workshop was fun as we played games, did a transcription activity, and read through a play!

I assisted with inter-house sports after school, helping to run the long jump station for the girls. It was a quite muddy affair!

I began learning Arabic with daily lessons from one of the Islamic studies/Arabic teachers at my school! I am practicing my flashcards and slowly learning the alphabet!

I began working at my school’s koperasi (co-op school store). This was quite a shock to some of my students, but it is a new space for them to practice their English skills!

Finally, I met up with Daniel and Savi in Penang! This was the first time we saw each other since national orientation. We ate our way through town, sweated all the way up Penang Hill, and explored historic Georgetown!

Sports day tomorrow! Looking forward to unknowns of another week! :)

So long for now!

-Zack

Also just finished reading A $500 House in Detroit. A real interesting read if you’re interested in sustainability, urbanism, or gentrification!

[zanderson48]

Weekly update:

I taught my first self created lessons on Black History month with my Form 3 and Form 4 students. I was impressed with their knowledge of famous African Americans and their excitement to learn more!

I also held my first speaking workshop in which students learned about Malcolm X and practiced writing and delivering their own speeches.

School wide sports day happened on Tuesday afternoon and I got to see my students run, jump, and throw out on the field.

I was given my own office/ room (bilik Zack) and my lovely Form 4 students painted murals and spruced up the room with lovely decorations!

Lastly, Greg and I met up with friends from Kedah in the Cameron Highlands where we ate strawberries and did a very steep and muddy hike!

Looking forward to the adventures of a new week!

Cheers,

Zack

[zanderson48]

Second week in the books at SMK Merchang!

This week consisted of:

District netball championships (like basketball and only played by girls)

Grammar lessons with new classes

Hiking in Besut at Bukit Keluang

I am starting to adjust to the heat here and figure out my life at school. Schedules are not adhered to very strictly and change often; however, this is fun and exciting for the moment. I will be heading to Cambodia in March for our first break, and I am really looking forward to explore another country here in S.E Asia!

Best

-Zack

[zanderson48]

I had my first week of school this past week, and I received such a warm welcome from everyone at SMK Merchang! It was great to meet and take lots of photos with some of the students I will be spending the next few months with. Highlights include:

Nasi, nasi, and more nasi! (Rice, rice, and more rice)

Leading the whole school in stretching during sports day

And

Playing English language games and icebreakers with form 5 students

Everyday seems like a new adventure and flexibility will certainly serve me well over the next 9 months here! I am excited to really start teaching this week!

All the best,

Zack

[zanderson48]

Melaka

1. Christ Church Melaka

2. Melaka River

3. Mango shake at Jonker Street Night Market

4. Cheng Hoon Teng Temple

5. Melaka Straits Mosque

6. Sunset from the Melaka Straits Mosque

[zanderson48]

1. Thean Hou Temple- Kuala Lumpur

2. Cate’s birthday- Kuala Lumpur

3. Kristal Masjid- Kuala Terrenganu

4. East Coast Orientation- Kuala Terengganu

5. The Silver Bullet at our House- Marang

[zanderson48]

So the past two weeks have been quite eventful!

Last week was our second week of National Orientation, where we focused on learning Bahasa Melayu and improving our teaching strategies. We did lots of language practice and worked with the teaching fellows from Teach for Malaysia to improve our English pedagogical skills. This went by much quicker than the first week of orientation due to the fast paced and interactive activities. On that Saturday we said our goodbyes to some of our friends as we headed to 4 seperate state orientations. My orientation was in Kuala Terengganu, about 30 minutes away from my placement location. Over the course of three days, we explored Kuala Terengganu, met our mentors, and did a series of workshops to get to know each other better and plan for the upcoming year. On Tuesday night we had a reception with senior officials from our respective educational district offices that turned out to be quite an event; Wednesday morning we went to our placements and moved in. Greg and I moved into our house in Marang, picked up our car (The Silver Bullet), and saw our schools for the first time. After moving in hurriedly we departed the next day for Melaka, a historic city on the southwest coast. We spent 2.5 days here exploring the vast history of the city through museums, temples, and mosques. We also were able to witness Chinese New Year’s celebrations because Melaka has a significant Malaysian Chinese population. We returned to Marang yesterday to get organized and do some shopping before our first day of school tomorrow! I am excited to get started and see what this year will hold! :)

Best,

Zack

[zanderson48]

Batu Caves, US Ambassadors residence, English camp at SMK Seri Tasik, Vertigo rooftop bar

[zanderson48]

First week

I have officially been in Malaysia for 9 days now and it feels like a month already. After my two days of travel, I made it to KL and spent last weekend exploring the city a bit before we began the formalities of orientation. In a lot of ways, it feels much like freshman orientation in college with lots of procedural formalities and social events with a group of 100 strangers. However, in just over a week I have met lots of super interesting people and begun to build friendships that feel longer than a week old. We have had many representatives from the state department and the Malaysian government come to speak and it seems like there are some competing ideas of what this program looks like to different stakeholders, which will be interesting to follow throughout this year.

 At the end of this week, we found out our placements for the year. I am placed at a high school in the village of Merchang in the state of Terengganu on the northeast coast of peninsular Malaysia. My roommate, Greg, and I will be living in Marang, a fishing village on the coast, within a 10-minute walk of the beach and only 40 minutes south of the capital city, Kuala Terengganu. We have plans to spend lots of time at the beach and become ardent supporters of Terengganu FC, the local soccer team! It should be a great time and I am excited about what is all to come. 

On Saturday we had our first taste of what this year is truly about, working with Malaysian students. We held 10 different English camps at schools in Kuala Lumpur. My group's camp was centered on the theme of Music and Movement and I led a station of musical chairs, which introduced me to all the American and K pop enjoyed by Malaysian teens. We shared many laughs and took many selfies together, prompting me to create a teacher Instagram account (cikgu_zack48) which I plan to document pictures with my students, fellow teachers, and ETAs. 

 This next week of orientation consists of a lot more education-focused training and lessons in Bahasa Malay, which hopefully will be more exciting! 

So long until next week! 

Best, 

Zack

[zanderson48]

Happy New Year’s! I am sorry for the lack of content over the past two months, but I will try and summarize what I have been up to. Since my last post, I left India and have been around the US trying to pack in as much as possible. I visited friends in San Francisco, Boston, New Hampshire, and Arkansas, reflected more fully on my time in India, and spent quality time with family over the holidays. Despite all that I managed to fit in over 6 weeks, my time back in the US seems so short. As I sit here in the Buffalo airport preparing for my day and a half of travel to Malaysia, I am feeling both excited and nervous for my 10-month Fulbright adventure. As my New Year’s resolution, I am aiming to post more regularly here, sharing my thoughts and reflections on this experience! (Hopefully, I can stick with it!) 

Goodbye, Western New York; Hello, Malaysia! 

Cheers! -Zack

[zanderson48]

More pictures from Manali, Darjeeling, Kolkata, and Rishikesh. 

[zanderson48]

Well, procrastination and lots of traveling have gotten the best of me so here is my summary from essentially all of October:

Manali (Photos 1&2): Right after returning from my school trip to Ahmedabad and Gujarat I embarked on a long-weekend solo adventure to Manali. After a twisting and turning 14hr mountain bus ride I made it to “India’s Mountain Bike Capital”. Given this I really had only one goal for the weekend: to bike as much as possible. Delhi has often made me feel restricted and this escape to the mountains was just what I needed. Although, home to really only one real trail I managed to have two decent days of riding around the town. On top of this, I ate great food at Dylan’s Toasted and Roasted (a Bob Dylan themed cafe) and Tibetan food at Chopstick’s Restaurant. I also made friends with Naveen, owner of the Himalayan bike bar, and I would recommend him and his shop to anyone interested in biking in India. 

Delhi: I came home from Manali for about a week and a half of school before embarking on more explorations. However, this short time back in the city allowed me to get back on the field with my friends for Wednesday and Sunday night soccer. I didn’t know then, but, the picture above was probably my last match in Delhi (thanks air pollution...). I also had the chance to grab dinner with my Indian Fulbright friends (Abby, Natasha, and Narayan) who were in Delhi for a few days for mid-year training. 

Darjeeling (photos 4 and 5): On the 18th, I left Delhi again for leg one of my final big trip in India to Darjeeling, Kolkata, and Sunderbans, and this time I wasn’t traveling alone. Mary Buford offered to join me as part of her own trip in India. We spend 4 days in Darjeeling touring tea estates, drinking tea, going to museums, eating great food, biking, watching sunrises, and generally exploring Darjeeling. I think we drank over 20 different types of tea, and I am thoroughly sold on the statement that tea from Darjeeling is the “champagne of teas” or as I read in a tea book, maybe champagne is the Darjeeling tea of wine. Anyways, besides tea, I really loved Darjeeling for the Tibetan Buddist influence including many temples and stupas and a museum all about Tibet with items from the Dalai Lama. Also, Darjeeling has a very rich mountaineering history, including being home to Tenzing Norgay, who made the first ascent of Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary in 1953. I happened upon a copy of Tenzing’s autobiography and, I would highly recommend it if you have any interest in mountaineering or mountaineering history. Darjeeling is also home to the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, which Tenzing became the director of, which has a great museum also.

Kolkata: We made our way south from Darjeeling to Kolkata, which was my first visit to an Indian megalopolis beyond Delhi. Kolkata felt distinctly more colonial than Delhi, which isn’t surprising given the fact that it was the capital for the British (As shown by the palace dedicated to Queen Victoria in photo 6). We explored Kolkata for a day and had great Bengali food, however, Kolkata was really just a jumping-off point for Sunderbans. 

Sunderbans: This mangrove forest shared by India and Bangladesh is the largest mangrove tiger habitat in the world and home to 80+ tigers. We signed up for a day-long tour with hopes to maybe get lucky and see a tiger (despite there being a lot of tigers in this area, they are very rarely seen). Our trip began with an adventure as we had to navigate around a broken-down truck that shut down the only road and stopped an entire village. However, we made it to the boat (photo 7) and had a great cruise around Sunderbans. We saw many kingfishers and deer, but sadly no tigers. It was a good adventure nonetheless. 

Delhi: We went back to Delhi for one day so that I could attend my school's Annual Day function: a celebration of all the achievements of the school and the students over the past year. It was quite the show and the dances, songs, and theatrical performances were great. It was really fun to see my students outside of the classroom setting! 

Rishikesh: After Annual Day, Mary Buford and I set out north to Rishikesh to escape the Delhi pollution for Diwali. Rishikesh is known as the yoga capital of the world and is famous due to the fact that the Beatles came here to study meditation and write almost the entire White Album in the late 1960s. Rishikesh was by far the most touristy place I have been in India and maybe this is just due to my visits to other places being during offseason. However, walking around Laxman Jhula felt as if I was walking around Brooklyn. Here men with dreads and yoga teachers from all over the world eat smoothie bowls and invite you to their Ashram to align your chakras. In many ways, it felt a lot like my time in northern Thailand. However, we were able to escape the Whole Foodies and explore around Rishikesh hiking to a waterfall and different temples. Although I will admit the cafes were all very good, even it did feel like I was in a hipster Whole Foods enclave. 

So now that I am back in Delhi, my big travels in India are over. I am wrapping up all my work here at school this week and early next week, and Mary Buford is off to explore Agra and Rajasthan. I will add more pictures that I couldn’t fit in this post shortly. 

As I get ready to head back to the US I will post some concluding thoughts about my time in India and start looking forward to what is to come in Malaysia. However, right now all I am dreaming of is some clean air! 

Best, 

Zack 

[zanderson48]

I just returned for quite the adventure of a trip to Ahmedabad and other sites in Gujarat. We traveled by train from Delhi to Ahmedabad, which was quite a start to the journey! The day after arriving we visited the Unity Statue, the world's tallest statue, and ISRO (the Indian Space Agency). With a short rest, we then took a seemingly endless bus journey to Gir Forest. The following morning consisted of a safari in which we saw Asiatic lions and leopards! The rest of the day was spent at the beach in Diu, before returning to the hotel. The following day consisted of a rough bus journey back to Ahmedabad and a stop at Gandhi’s ashram on his 150th birthday! We then headed back to the train for the 18 hr journey home. I returned exhausted but glad I went on the adventure. Chaperoning 30 high schoolers is quite a feat, so props to all of my former teachers that accompanied me on such trips. I am off to Manali now so sorry for the brevity! The next post will hopefully be longer and feature many mountain pictures! 

-Zack

[zanderson48]

Sorry for the lack of content for the past few weeks! I kept putting off posting, but now I am back! 

Since the last update I have: 

Participated in Teachers’ Day

Traveled to Amritsar and the Wagha Border

Ran a Half-Marathon

Explored Delhi more with friends

1.) Teachers’ Day- A national holiday in India that celebrates the contributes of teachers to society. It is celebrated on September 5th every year, which is the birthday of India’s second president Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a celebrated teacher himself. On this day, there are celebrations and senior students take over teaching duties for all classes for the day. At Bluebells, this day consists of an assembly to recognize teachers and their achievements, a performance of dance, theatre, and music for the students, and finally another assembly and dinner in the evening for teachers’ families. I was part of the orchestra that played a rendition of Soul Sacrifice by Santana, contributing by playing the congas (I am still working on acquiring a video). The first two photos are from our evening performance (1. the whole band 2. My contact and advisor at the school Ms. Preeti Puri and I) 

2. Amritsar- Following Teachers’ Day I traveled to Amritsar in the state of Punjab. Amritsar is home to the most famous Sikh temple (The Golden Temple) as well as the capital of Punjab. I had the opportunity to visit the Golden Temple late at night and it was truly a beautiful sight (there were signs requesting that visitors don’t take photos but here is a link to the Wikipedia page ). I also learned a lot more about Sikhism and the history of this temple from the various pilgrims all around the temple who were eager to teach me about their faith and history. The following morning I went to one of the other highlights of Amritsar: the Partition Museum. This museum documents the build-up, events during, and aftermath of Partition. The combination of personal artifacts, historical documents, photos, and videos was extremely well put together and immensely informative. I would highly recommend this museum to anyone who is traveling in India because it gives such a great account of such a violent and influential period of Indian and Pakistani history that greatly influences the relations of these two countries today from culture to politics. 

3. Wagha Border- After learning about Partition and the basis for the tensions between India and Pakistan I got to witness this first hand at the Wagha border. Here at this very small stretch of border India and Pakistan put on a daily theatrical military show of force and national fervor. I have never seen anything like it; it was terrifying, humorous, and captivating all at the same time. Vox Borders does a really good feature on this that I highly recommend (link here). In the third photo above, you can see an example of the theatrical high kick performance by both the Indian and Pakistani border guards.  

4. Half-Marathon- As a result of my frustrations around finding ways to be active in an unfamiliar and chaotic megacity, I decided to register for a half-marathon here in Delhi. As I trained for weeks at the crack of dawn running laps of my small neighborhood park in the still blistering heat, I often questioned my decision. However, when the race actually came last week I was really happy I decided to enter. I finished sub-2hrs despite crashing around 12-13km and overall enjoyed the experience despite what my face may say in the above photo. I still prefer bikes to running, but in a bind, I am glad that I can run to be active.  

5. Friends in Delhi- Over the past month or so I have developed a network of primarily ex-pat friends here in Delhi. This has provided a nice social outlet forcing me to leave my rooftop suite (I live on the roof of the school haha). We have explored the food scene around Delhi, gone bouldering, and just hung out. Many of them work in the development sector, which has given me exposure to a field I didn’t really know much about before this. I even went to one of my friend’s presentations about rural sanitation (latrines) this week. It is an interesting position to be the outsider amongst this group, given that I do not really know where I stand with regards to my viewpoint on international development, particularly economic development. But my friend Andres (above) has been happy to engage in these type of discussions with me! 

Life at school has been pretty slow the past two weeks because high school students have been taking mid-term exams and not attending classes because of this. However, my 8th-grade classes have been making laudable progress on their climate change projects so I am excited to see their presentations in a few weeks. 

Next weekend I am going on a 6-day school trip to Ahmedabad and other areas in Gujarat; I am excited to see a new area and one that is not often frequented by foreign tourists. After that, I am heading to the mountains for some fresh air and mountain biking (one of the things I have been missing the most recently). 

Other than that, the lack of class time has given me free time to think about the end of my time here, my return to the US, Fulbright, and post-Fulbright; this has produced many ideas and thoughts which I am eager to keep exploring and thinking about. 

I have also been able to connect a bit with friends in the US, who I have been missing lately, and I would love to hear from more friends, so feel free to reach out :) I miss Maine and Lewiston, particularly now during my favorite time of the year to be in Maine, but I hope to make it north during my two months back in the US before I leave for Malaysia!

Okay, this has been long and rambly so I am cutting it off! I will try and be more punctual with the next post to keep it shorter! Off to play some pick-up soccer! 

Much love, 

Zack 

[zanderson48]

The past week: 

- I made more American friends in Delhi with whom I bouldered, ate, and partied. 

- I was recruited for the Teachers’ Day musical performance of Soul Sacrifice by Santana. I am playing the congas and hoping to channel some of this musical magic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKcI2mcsueM. 

- I gave a presentation to the entire 8th grade class about plastic pollution as part of the UN Plastic Waste Challenge.

- I went to Agra and visited the Taj Mahal (pictures 1-3) and the Tomb of I'timād-ud-Daulah also called “The Baby Taj” (pictures 4-7). Both were very impressive for their craftsmanship and beauty; however, I would not recommend spending more than a day in Agra. If you do go, I have a great cab driver to recommend!

The week to come:

- I will be doing a lesson on GMOs and Pesticides with 8th grade. 

- Teachers’ Day (Thursday, September 5th)

- Weekend Trip to Amritsar, home of the Golden Temple (the most sacred place of Sikhism)   

[zanderson48]

My weekend of explorations around Delhi.

1.) Qutab Minar (Photos 1-4) - a minaret that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

2.) India Gate (Photo 5) - a memorial to soldiers of the British Indian Army from WWI 

3.) Gandhi Smriti - A museum at the home where Gandhi was assassinated in 1948. (Photos 6-9)

4.) A bicycle rickshaw just for fun! (Photo 10)