You get my drift...

Well, you know how it is: One day (several days in a row actually) there's nothing but blooms and blossoms and blue skies and general merriment...


And then over night...


...it starts snowing pink petals...



...and the whole fairytale magic of it all seems to be drifting away, carried off by a gust of wind.

Fairy time.

It's just that time of year again, when everything explodes into pink!


It's also that time of year again, when I keep taking pictures of the exact same things (read: trees) as last year over and over again.


And it's definitely that time of year, when all you want to do is sit outside with a coffee and some friends and enjoy the spring sunshine.


So who's up for drinks?

A bunch of fireworks.

I'm painfully aware that amidst all the chaos and cajoling, the skirmishes, the reprimanding and the infinite shushing that is in a school day, I hardly ever get round to telling the kids, each kid, what they most need to hear:



"Do you know that there's still a chance for you
'cause there's a spark in you.
You just gotta ignite the light
and let it shine..."

I wish I could make them believe that with the power and confidence of that girl singing the solo! And I wish the world around them would not teach them otherwise...

P.S. Reloaded.

Well, since it's hardly ever that I manage to record something that I'm reasonably happy with (apart - of course - from all the obvious drawbacks of non-existent equipment and the resulting non-existent sound quality and all that), and since blogger won't let me upload videos of late and since someone specifically requested to hear this today - here's modest, unpretentious me graciously obliging and giving you...tadaa...the latest version of "The Hands"!

March Recap.

Well, well, well, another month almost over and I must have been really lazy or else March just whirled past in a blur, because I haven't told you about any of these breathtaking, fascinating, life-altering events:
It all started off with Carnival, of course, and despite my best efforts to the contrary the Rhineland must be starting to rub off on me, because I not only managed to stay in town until Sunday, I also almost watched one of the parades (yeees, almost, no need to rush things...) AND I bought myself a real fancy dress dress (so that I could be the Queen of Everything for a day). At the end of the day, the penguin outshone me mercilessly, but still...it was worth a shot!



Then there was one very ordinary Saturday afternoon, which out of the blue was filled with...I'd like to say music, but it was more of an earsplitting noise! Three men in traditional costumes, two with huge drums and one with what I guess was something like a shawm, started playing and marching up and down the street outside my house, rounding up people as they went. It turned out to be the preparations for a Turkish wedding! While the extended family, neighbours and friends, all dressed to the nines, got their convoy of cars ready, the musicians disappeared into one of the houses to meet and escort the bride and groom to the street. I wish I could upload a video to give you a real sense of that oriental spectacle, but alas, the blog-gods won't let me. So you'll just have to imagine the squawking and banging and general merrymaking...



The rest of the month, apart from that whirlwhind of a project week, seems to have consisted chiefly of sitting in our favourite streetside café, outside for the first time after the winter, sipping alternatively countless coffees, hot chocolates and passion fruit spritzers...


...and of views like these. Up on the roof...


...in the park...


...and a whole lot of sunshine!

Too bad I'm feeling all restless and uneasy and dissatisfied with I-don't-know-what... I wish I could tame the beast and channel all this restless energy into something useful...

Being there.

While the world as we knew it seems to be spectacularly going down outside, I, in the meantime, must admit have had one of the best weeks ever, and certainly the best of my teaching career.
After weeks and weeks of preparations that tipped our day-to-day routines into full-blown chaos, on Monday morning Gen Rosso finally came to our school with their huge musical project "Streetlight". And right from the start, effortlessly it seemed, they turned the chaos into an atmosphere buzzing with anticipation and creativity.
For three days our students danced and sweated, acted and sang, built and painted, rehearsed and trained, drummed and played, battled against their short attention spans, mood swings and lack of self-confidence and overcame their shyness and sore muscles.


Yesterday then was the big day of the big night of the big show. It's hard to describe the atmosphere that had the transformed gym humming with excitement all day during the final rehearsals.


I won't pretend that it wasn't also a fair bit exhausting to help coordinate everything and to try and settle down and answer the billions of questions of 400 bubbly, hyper pupils.


Then again, whenever I found a quiet moment I just found myself watching the kids and thinking what a huge, huge pity it is that the school system forces us into such rigid corsets that we hardly ever get a chance to see our pupils behave like this. To see them discover new talents and blossom under the appreciative looks of newly-found role models and friends, to watch them straighten up and broaden their shoulders with a new confidence and happiness they didn't know they possessed.


So, millions and millions of heartfelt thanks to everyone from Gen Rosso for sharing with us your boundless energy, your talent, your kindness, your optimism, your patience, for giving our pupils' faces a glow like this...


...and smiles like these...


...and for giving us teachers the opportunity to see "our" kids...


...in a new light!

The news tonight. And yesterday. And the day before...