Selangor

We ended up not going to Kuala Lumpar after my last update-- we were so jetlagged that we crashed at the apartment. The time difference has really taken its toll on us (evidence of how tired I was: I put my wallet in the refrigerator and didn't find it until the next morning!) Speaking of our apartment, we actually got a room (owned by MFD) in the building next to the office. We have a living room, kitchen, bathroom and bedroom. It's great we have our own space but its not exactly modern (no cold water, hard cots, etc.) so it does feel like camping!

We just came back from a weekend at Selangor Deaf school (SKPKS) and now our job description seems more clear-- we'll be traveling to a different Deaf school every weekend and teaching English at each, preparing them for their national exam (UPSR). There's a total of twenty-five Deaf schools in Malaysia and we'll see about eight of them.

My very first teaching experience was overseas! I don't know if I can find many people who can say the same ;) but it was quite interesting. We went to Selangor without knowing the students' educational background or what English level they were on. We just put together something before we left and to our disappointment-- they were already pretty familiar with the English words we chose so it was more of a review for them and a learning experience for us. We taught a group of students around the age of 14 with the reading level of around 7 years old. They were such an energetic group but so disciplined! They were able to sit quietly through a hour of lecture-- a big difference with American kids. Suffice to say they were as fascinated by us as we were with them :) They kept asking questions about America: "Do you guys swim there? What is snow like? Have you met Spiderman?"

After closing ceremony, we promised to visit since it is less than half hour away from the office.

One down, eight to go.

the day has come

After four foreign plane meals, an international movie, a stop in Turkey (Turkish Delights!), a magazine and several arcade games-- we're finally here! It took us a twenty hour flight around the world to reach Malaysia and I can say it is both what I expected and did not expect. The good part is that we've been picking up facts here and there (the Kuala Lumpur Airport has been voted the best airport in the world three times in a row!) and we've been treated with nothing but good ol' Malaysian hospitality :)

We learned that the Malaysian Federation of the Deaf was established only thirteen years ago (as opposed to NAD's 130 years!) so it is still pretty new. But I have to say that the progress they have made over such a short time period is pretty impressive-- a proposal was made to the government in order to make MySl (Malaysian Sign Language) an official language. It was passed in only two days.

We'll have internet access at the MFD office everyday so I'll be updating more often than I thought. We'll be checking out Kuala Lumpur later on today and see where it brings us.

It's already June 3rd-- I just know this summer will flash right before my eyes.

--Amati