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A purge, a cleansing, a purification or a catharsis....whatever you like. Cass and I began today to do just that in our professional lives, as today was set aside as a packing day for our imminent move from the classrooms we've occupied for 11 and 12 years respectively. Oh, what a mixed feeling! Glad to be free of unwanted goods, but awful wading through the dusty back crannies and crevices in our cupboards, bookshelves and drawers to discover the most ridiculous of "keepsakes". In a professional setting, we've discovered we've both hoarded the silliest things. We pride ourselves on our minimalist living at home, but we wonder what is lurking in those back cupboards and wardrobes!
I've been most conflicted about how to dispose of professional books and materials that have laid idle for up to a decade. I did many courses in rapid succession when we first arrived and the two master's degrees obtained came with a cost of at least one textbook from each course taken, sometimes significantly more. All up, I had more than 50 texts! The education sphere spins on a giddy cycle, and when it comes around again, the material, while not really ground-breaking, has been rebadged and packaged to appeal to the modern teacher's taste for something "new". So, therefore, these lumpy tomes are unwanted and superfluous. Luckily, a "picker" amongst our colleagues noticed the growing piles of said reference books and started some boxes to accommodate them: I filled three to the brim without another's contribution!
Kids' books and materials were a different matter: we are boxing them up to be sent to needier schools in Taiwan or overseas and the stack of boxes continues to mount. Well resourced schools like ours can afford to get the latest and greatest at regular intervals, but we don't have a purge like this very often. Due to the new high school building now being in full operation, the middle and lower schools are "migrating" into some of their old spaces. Cass and I are both sad to leave our current spaces, but we've been lucky to stay put as long as we have, I suppose. I'll be moving to a purpose renovated "half" class, split down the middle which will result in a long narrow room: not the ideal teaching space in my opinion but the powers that be have different ideas. Cass will move down a floor and away to the south. Her space is similar in size, but the orientation has thrown her a bit: it's the opposite to what she had before! The movers will move all the boxes over June/July while we're on our long break and we'll have all the immense joy of unpacking and setting up again when we get back in August!
This weekend was a soggy sock of a thing and although we managed to get out and away to the magnificent Pizzeria Oggi on Saturday, we stayed pretty much inside in the dry. We watched multiple episodes of the critically acclaimed "Top of the Lake" and were excited to spot scenes filmed in Queenstown and Naseby, reminding us of our trip there with Ross and Ains.
Even though the end of the semester is still 4 weeks away, there are signs (apart from our packing) that the school year is starting its inexorable hurtle downhill to the finish line. Cass is moving into the last units of study with her kids and I'm actually involved in one-on-one testing all this week. After that in the next couple of weeks, we'll be tasked with grading and report writing, all the while fulfilling our social obligations with the obligatory whirl of year-end parties and farewells. We'll definitely be ready to get on that plane in early June!
Photos: one of my 5th graders goes Spiderman near the toilets, that "stiletto" is actually made totally from sugar and adorned a colleague's 30th birthday cake! Cass cracked the next to last bottle of precious Peck's. Mary loves her box (specially imported from Germany with my "lost" puffy jacket inside!) while Virg yawns and poses for a facial close-up.