it's beginning to look a lot like...well, New Year's (the big winter holiday here)

First off, a very merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates it on December 25th (ie everyone not in countries where the primary branch of Christianity is Orthodox...it's on January 7th over here, except for the church the K family goes to, who celebrate it on December 25). I hope to be able to get to the post office on Monday, but who knows?

This week has been composed of end-of-semester tests, which has meant that I've had little lesson planning to do, but a lot of test booklets to check. I try to keep reassuring myself that the (abominably) bad grades have a lot to do with the fact that we use standardized test booklets that don't exactly correspond with the books we use, and definitely don't correspond completely with how I teach.

Still, they're really bad. Except for my 7th form, who almost unanimously copied from Kostya, my best pupil in that class. How do I know they copied? He's the only one capable of doing as well as he did, and they all have the same mistakes.

Plans:

Sunday: church
Monday: teach (boo), attempt to be Christmassy, open my parents' package if it shows up (they sent it over a month ago...I'm getting worried), maybe go to the K's church if they have an evening service
Tuesday: teach, head to Kharkiv in the evening and then overnight to Kyiv
Wednesday: arrive in Kyiv, have a meeting with my regional manager and lead specialist to talk about various issues, pick up Jason at the airport, take the train back to Kharkiv (and then on Thursday take the elektrichka from Kharkiv to Balaklia)

I get to see someone from home!!! And it's Jason!!! *does little happy dance*

As I said before, merry Christmas!