Monday 22nd October, 2012        1240

The muzzle was unfortunately a waste of 20y. The “collar” was just big enough at maximum extension but even making the snout cover the biggest possible Robin would not have been able to drink so I have had to shelve that idea.

It rained all night and although it stopped just before I left for class it is still a gloomy, dismal day. Had it been fine I would have taken Pepsi in for more injections but now it will have to wait until Wednesday or Thursday. Instead  I will meet Happy a little later to go through some exam preparations. That will of course go unnoticed by the school, sadly the fact that I just let my last class leave one minute early did not escape attention. I suppose I should have known better seeing as Prof Fang was teaching next door, for she came out and made a point of telling me the bell hadn’t gone yet. I was so surprised at this that I wasn’t quick enough to point out that on a great many occasions when we have activities I often overrun by five minutes. Maybe swings and roundabouts are not a concept here but anyway it won’t happen again with this class because today was the last lesson. Over the next fortnight I am giving them their final exams before graduation.

1800

I gave Happy nearly two hours of my time this afternoon, with more to follow. We worked our way through certain sections of past papers that I can possibly help with - there are some such as listening that you simply can’t teach - and to be honest it is hard! Ok so it’s multiple guess (any one from four) but with most questions - they have to pick the best answer - there were two or even three of the possible answers which could be used. As a native speaker I must confess that I would not have scored 100% as I could have been forgiven for expecting to. No wonder these kids fail when the answers are a bit ambiguous.

2300

Winding down for today but just before I go, Kevin sent me a link just now. There has been a murder here in the city. A female’s remains were washed into the local river by the recent rain. So far they have recovered 67 chunks of the lady, age unknown. My opinion is that there will be a cursory investigation which will come to nought and we will never hear any more about it. With that many pieces - and the report never specified what percentage of the corpse it represents - someone went to great lengths to conceal the murder. In a developed country those lengths would seem pitiful and lead to an arrest, but here?

Tuesday 23rd     1245

A damned good start to the day! I woke up to arthritis in my left knee so limped in and showered. When I emerged naked but for a pair of rubber sandals I trod on Pooh. In his haste and panic to extricate one of his hind legs from under 100kgs of prime pork he succeeded in so doing by using my second toe on the right foot as a purchase point, slashing the flesh as if with a scalpel. Today I am hobbling around with two defective sets of undercarriage.

2030

Six lessons with gammy legs is not to be recommended. It was a shame really because today was fine and sunny but not too warm and would have been ideal for taking the classes outside. I didn’t fancy wandering around on grass though for two and a half hours so instead we still did the activities but in the classroom. They all seemed to enjoy this week’s, which was to stage an armed bank robbery. One group even provided the humorous scenario of the robber answering his mobile phone to his daughter whilst holding a hostage and with the police pointing guns at him.

Although I can’t really be bothered cooking, tonight is sardines on toast - purely to use up some of the bread. Because the smallest loaf my machine makes is a pound and a half (the biggest is nearly double that) I usually end up chucking half of it away. And the diclofenac is making my knee tolerable plus the good news for me is the hotpots are back, so I at least have something I like being cooked on campus.