From Cornfields to Deserts, Iowa Music Teacher's Visit to the Middle East: First Quarter

I had a nice chat the other day with the superintendent who hired me. He asked me a rather pointed question, "Do you still think you made the right decision?" It got me to thinking about that snowy weekend in February; the day of the Overseas Teaching Fair in Cedar Falls, Iowa. After the first day of interviews I was pretty sure I would have at least three offers, which I did. One offer was to teach elementary music at a school in the Marshall Islands. I really liked the superintendent and the small school that he descibed sounded like the American school systems I have always taught in. The drawback was that there is no cell phone service and after school hours, teachers have to go to the cafeteria to use the internet. Also, I have come to find out that the sea has been encroaching on the islands and fresh water has become an increasingly scarce commodity. I'm really glad I didn't accept that position. The internet here was pretty bad for a couple of weeks and I was not happy! I was having to trek about a mile to the nearest McDonalds to use their wifi to talk to my family. My family enjoyed the Middle Eastern atmosphere, but I'm afraid if that had continued, I'd find myself at the local tailor getting all my clothes let out a few inches! The other school that offered me a position was another school here in Kuwait. The superintendent was from Iowa and I know I would have enjoyed working for her. The school had two other elementary music teachers and I would head the small department. It soulded perfect, but the only drawback was that teacher housing was about twenty miles from the school. Come to find out, those teachers get on a bus at 6:30 every morning for a 45 minute commute. I've been doing a 50 minute commute for the past nine years. When I heard that Universal American School provided apartments the street from the school, my decision was made. I canceled the two interviews I had set up for schools in China. The cost of living is extrememly high in China and the smog was terrible. So here I am. Nine weeks down and three more quarters to go. I'm still standing!

The The vegetable market at the Old Souk

I had my first program last week. I'm not sure if they have ever had elementary music programs here. Nobody could remember if they had, so I guess now is as good a time as any to start. I sat down with the principal and we decided to have one program every nine weeks. This last program involved the five sections of first grade. I chose a few Halloween songs and fingerplays and created an Orff arrangement of a Halloween song I found in one of the music series books. The hard part was getting the students prepared for a performance with just one music period every six days. And trying to schedule the auditorium and custodians to set up sound and lights and unlock various doors was a particular challenge. You can't just walk up to a custodian and ask them to help you. You have to have a work order signed by your principal and fill out a form to give to the person who schedules the auditorium who will check if the date is open and make the necessary arrangements. I was sure I had done that about a month ago, but on the day of the performance, of course, the auditorium and cafeteria doors were still locked and no one was in sight. Apparently, the custodian did not have a filled out form with my requests, although I was told by the person in charge of scheduling the auditorium that she would tell Philip what I needed. He did not have the form, but he was kind enough to let it go THIS time. Whew!!!

The Gulf of Arabia taken from the balcony at the Embassy Suites Hotel

This program had to be scheduled during the day. If you want an evening concert, you have to contact the ministry of education about nine months ahead of time and hope it gets approved. So we will have our programs during the day. The attendance was rather sparce, but I think that when parents see that we are actually having live performances more people will start attending. We also limited each student to just two guests because we didn't want to run out of space.

The program was very well received. Parents were proud and kids had fun singing and dancing for the crowd. I am glad to have that first program behind me, now on to program number two for the second

grade. I wish I had pictures if the program to show you, but snapping pictures wasn't on the top of my agenda that day!

I will leave you with a few shots of my favorite places in Kuwait.