Megan and I arrived back in Mussoorie on July 23rd. This was the day before our weeklong staff workshop began. We are now living in a different house than we had last year. We ultimately decided to move because if we had stayed in our old place, Suncliffe, we would have had another roommate assigned to us. So Megan and I moved to South Hill, where Emily and Jared Hatch lived last year. They even left their projector here, so now we can watch movies on a “big” screen!
Students began arriving on August 1st and 2nd and school began on a Wednesday, August 5th. It’s been great to see most of the old faces we got to know last year and there are also quite a few new students. The Intermediate Band grew this year and it’s up to 53 students – we have 14 flutes, yikes!!! This year I am also teaching Beginning Band. At the end of last year, Emily and I had all the students that were interested in joining band come and try out the different instruments. There were more than 40 students that wanted to join last spring, which was almost double what the Beginning Band had been last year. The only problem was that Woodstock did not have enough instruments/working instruments for all of those kids to join band. Megan and I decided to take a bunch of instruments (17) home to get fixed AND some students were able to purchase a personal instrument over the summer break. So this year we have 39 kids in Beginning Band and I believe I could accommodate all of the interested students.
Students began arriving on August 1st and 2nd and school began on a Wednesday, August 5th. It’s been great to see most of the old faces we got to know last year and there are also quite a few new students. The Intermediate Band grew this year and it’s up to 53 students – we have 14 flutes, yikes!!! This year I am also teaching Beginning Band. At the end of last year, Emily and I had all the students that were interested in joining band come and try out the different instruments. There were more than 40 students that wanted to join last spring, which was almost double what the Beginning Band had been last year. The only problem was that Woodstock did not have enough instruments/working instruments for all of those kids to join band. Megan and I decided to take a bunch of instruments (17) home to get fixed AND some students were able to purchase a personal instrument over the summer break. So this year we have 39 kids in Beginning Band and I believe I could accommodate all of the interested students.
On Friday of last week, I handed out instruments to all the kids – with the help of one of our new music teachers, Harvey. It was pretty chaotic, but the kids were excited.
There are a ton of new staff this year (and it’s pretty cool not to be new this year and know what’s going on!). They all seem pretty cool and there are a lot of younger staff to hang out with. We have new neighbors, who are living in our friend Jeanne’s apartment from last year. Chris and Nicole are the neighbors and Nicole works with me in the music department – she teaches elementary general music and middle school choir and piano lessons.
There are a ton of new staff this year (and it’s pretty cool not to be new this year and know what’s going on!). They all seem pretty cool and there are a lot of younger staff to hang out with. We have new neighbors, who are living in our friend Jeanne’s apartment from last year. Chris and Nicole are the neighbors and Nicole works with me in the music department – she teaches elementary general music and middle school choir and piano lessons.
Yesterday was India’s Independence Day. Every year, Woodstock holds a big ceremony – usually it is outside by the school flagpole, but yesterday it was raining, so it was held indoors in Parker Hall. The student who has been attending Woodstock the longest gets to raise the Indian flag, this year it was a senior named Aradhana who plays flute in Advanced Band and will be taking lessons with me this year. She has been at Woodstock for 14 years (her parents work here and she started in ECP at a very young age). After the Indian ceremony, all of the Korean student mounted the stage to perform their national anthem and a dance/game to celebrate their Independence Day (India and South Korea share the same date of independence). We have a LOT of Korean students, so it was nice to see them in their national dress – I have posted some pictures with some Korean girls in their dresses.
After the Korean performance, Woodstock sponsored a fine arts group that performed a karnatic dance to a Hindi poem set to music. It was a little difficult to understand the overall meaning of the performance, because I have not learned Hindi…
After the dance was the best part of the day – FOOD! The school had different Indian food stalls set up in the decorated quad area. There were kababs and naan, potato patties (I forget the name), channa and puree (spell?), chicken and paneer, masala dosas and gulab jammin and jilabies – again I have no idea how to spell these things… I had the kababs (tasty, but a bit spicy) and naan, masala dosa and gulab jamming. Although I was bit greedy with the gulab jammin and attempted to have more towards the end of the day, but I ended up spilling it all over my sari – I took it as a sign to stop eating and leave the festivities. During the meal, it was fun to go around and see all of the students and staff dressed in mostly Indian or Korean national dress. I took a lot of pictures and you can also see students dressed in Japanese Kimonos, Tibeten Chupas and other forms of national dress.
I have also included some pictures of my new sitar! And some pictures of the inside of our new house.
