Holy mother of God

I hate cockroaches.

I hate cockroaches.

Jaysus I can barely even get my fingers moving to type...

As soon as it starts warming up in Queensland, these filthy, repulsive, devil-bidden bugs start crawling out of the pits of hell and up our walls...

Not only that, but (for the unitiated), Queensland cockroaches @*!?%# fly...big fluttery, paper scratchy WINGS.

I hate them.

I am almost reduced to tears just typing this, but I have to get it out. We had one in our house the other morning. It was dead (well, lying on it's back by the bathroom door and giving every appearance of being lifeless) but it still managed to wrest a scream from the depths of my soul and turn my legs to jelly.

I am fairly sure I have a cockroach phobia. I have an aversion to all flying insects and most creepy crawlies but the one that reduces me to tears and hysteria like no other is this guy. They are simply gruesome - the murky brown colour, the crunchy shell, the spiky legs, the looooong waving antenna...simply the way they move around the room...and the way they FLY. Why oh why, God? Why do they have to FLY?

Just before my 5th birthday, my first brother was born. It was a hot December morning and somehow I had managed to get him out of his cot without my parents intervening and had take him into the lounge room for a nurse. I was sitting on the edge of the brown couch when I felt something on my leg. Looking down I saw a gruesome beast making it's way up my leg. All I recall after that is my dad coming out (probably in response to my screams) and letting go of my newborn brother.

On another balmy Queensland evening my extended family were out at a resort in Surfers Paradise. Having stuffed ourselves senseless at the buffet the kids and uncles were wandering through the resort pool and gardens. The moment is burned in my memory and I recall that I was wearing my puffy blue and white polka dotted "Shirley Temple" dress. I felt something at my throat. It felt like a scratchy leaf. I reached a hand up to flick it away and instead my hand closed around a flubbering fluttery bloody giant of a cockroach. I screamed, of course.

As her four children started to get older my Mum decided to enclose a section of verandah to create an extra bedroom. It was properly constructed (walls, not curtains) but for some reason the bugs simply refused to relinquish what had previously been open air verandah. On a number of occasions I woke up with something crawling on me. Flicking on the fluro would reveal the hideous brown nighttime visitor. I recall one night that I woke up to a sound and when I switched on the light discovered a cockroach was not even ON me yet - I'd become so paranoid that I could hear the tiny scritch scratch of their spiky feet on the wall.

Since then I've had various other close encounters but I believe these were the ones to really concrete the phobia into my psyche. Whilst at uni I used to phone my old flatmate (Kim) to come over to my new place to remove cockroaches. She'd grown up in PNG so was braver than I - I who would be reduced to a shaking, clammy, sweating mess at the mere THOUGHT that I might have glanced one out of the corner of my eye...

Oh, I had another episode when I lived in one of the last dodgy little duplexes in Mermaid Beach (off Hedges Ave aka Millionaires Row). The screen door had been taken away and the Giant Winged Variety used to make their way in and get comfy. The night before I was due to start work in my first ever REAL teaching job, one flew into my room as I sat up preparing. Now, technically these beasts are not supposed to like the light but this fella was quite keen. I phoned my Mum (she was 2 hours away, it was midnight and NO she would not be coming to kill it) and in the end had to resort to sleeping in the 2nd bedroom (this was before I had a flatmate) which had only an old stinking, double ensemble left over from the previous tenant and a newspaper in it. I squashed the newspaper into every crack and crevice, laid some out on the bed, curled up on top and had a fitful sleep. I was also late to my first day at work.

My fear of the beasts is all consuming. I lose all sense of reason and rationality. From about mid-thigh down I lose feeling. I taste vomit. My hands shake and my palms sweat. There have only been a few (VERY few) rare occasions on which I have not had this physical reaction to a roach sighting and nearly all of those involved me having something to drink first. Last summer one flew in and I ran straight out the door, leaving my 2 year old to defend herself. I could not bring myself to go back into the house.

In Scotland I discovered something magical (and indeed, this may be the primary reason for my enduring love for the bonnie northern land). THERE ARE NO COCKROACHES IN SCOTLAND!!! Okay, so maybe there are some of the pale wee German variety, but those I can handle. It's the big brown winged beasts that send shivers down my spine.

It took about 6 months over there but I finally freed myself from the compulsive habit of entering a room/switching on a light and automatically checking the ceiling, cornice, every corner, edging and floor before entering. I didn't have to throw back my covers before hopping into bed. I could leave my window open WITHOUT A SCREEN!

And now I'm thinking about going back to Scotland via Asia and Europe. I had spoken to a friend who spent time in various places in Asia and she reckoned the roaches weren't that bad, and on this I have put my trust throughout the TESOL journey. Until my Mum started laughing at me yesterday, thinking about me taking on the roaches of Asia. So I sat down and googled, and sure enough, Mum is right. Not only do they have filthy flying bat-like roaches, they even have the German ones. They fly in, they come out of drains...they are in restaurants, in garbage...

My worse nightmare would be to survive the nuclear holocaust - and be the only human survivor...because there would be nobody to call to come kill the critters!

Beast shown is actual size - AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

*@!?&*@

Just typed a whole bloody post and suddenly it highlighted itself and promptly disappeared. FFS! As if I'm not p*ssed off enough at the moment without adding to my annoyance - but of course, that is PRECISELY what the Universe prefers to do - wait until we are sweltering in 600 degree heat as this stupid country's stupid summer kicks in, throw in a teacher recruiter who has taken a dislike to me (actually I don't think she ever had any 'like') and a million jobs but once again the ones I am not fussed on are the ones who want me and the jobs I am really keen on are proving elusive...

I think I've blogged already about my recruiter - who wouldn't respond to any of my requests to be put forward for jobs until I contacted another recruiter to ask if there was a problem? Anyway...as soon as I did that she promptly zinged to attention and a dozen interviews were lined up. Then came the realisation that hobnobbing at expat schools would demand at LEAST 2 years of my time. At this point this is not what we want to do. Perhaps in 6 months I will have discovered that we love Asia and want to stay longer etc etc but right now...NO.

So I'm in the pile on the floor again...

Until a brilliant job came through for a school in Japan looking for an early years teacher for only 6 months! Fantastic! But that was a week ago and still no response from them. I found the school online and I am sorely tempted to email them directly as there is something about recruiters. I had another group (workforce on tap or something like that, randomnly based in Bendigo, Victoria) who advertised for ESL teachers. As they were offering 6 month positions I emailed them for more info (there was very little in the ad) and the guy told me they didn't have any but I could ask all the questions I liked of the school when I submitted my CV and they phoned me. I don't like submitting my CV and personal details before I have any info but 6 month contracts are rare, so I did it. Again - no response! What the hell is going on???

The only school that WILL get back to me is in China. Although I am satisfied they aren't dodgy, they are only offering 10000RMB a month - about half what international schools in China were offering me. I kept putting the 6 month contract idea to them but they've ignored it - not only that, they told me they were really looking for someone to stay 18 months. For the love of God, why would I do that when I just gave up the chance to work an 18 month contract at an expat school for 3 times the money and an awesome package???

Which makes me wonder: why did I pass up that school? I didn't want to sign up for 18 months. I can understand schools wanting a longer commitment but surely it can't be that unusual for teachers to want to experience life over there first before committing to long term? And it's not like 6 month contracts are unheard of in western school systems - far from it!

China job has also informed me of their working hours, which are phenomenally high (for teaching). 40 contact hours per week, no planning or prep time (this is supposed to be done while children are sleeping!) for 10000 RMB. One of my hesitations for expat schools was the high demands on time, but at least they stuck to a regular 9 - 3 school day - none of this 8am starting.

In the absence of Japan job getting back to me (which is not a good sign, I'm sure, as other schools got back to me within a day or 2), I'm beginning to wonder if grabbing any old job at a language school might be a better option...

Oh, and I also had a call from a job working with Indigenous kids in remoter parts of Australia wanting to interview. So far I've left a couple of messages but not heard back...

I have a killer headache and I don't know if it's the heat or the stress!

I just want:
a great school: smaller size, flexible, helpful, younger kids,
decent accommodation
enough wages to save a little bit
helpful other staff and friendly kids
short term (at least at first!)

fingers crossed...

Asia

I have never considered going to Asia.

I have cousins who travel there a lot and a few friends and people I met whilst backpacking Europe who love the place. I have friends who grew up there and some who have worked there. When I worked at Movieworld on the Gold Coast during uni I spent quite a few shifts in the infamous ITG (International Tour Groups restaurant). It was more of a wild, chaotic feeding hall than a restaurant. To move the diners along they would drag Wile E Coyote or Tweety or Bugs round to the main door and there would quite literally be a stampede. Staff (including myself) would be pressed up against the walls in terror. I was shouted at by crazy Asians chefs for making the rice taste burnt (eh?) and nearly set on fire trying to hand out Japanese quisine. Once you have scraped the goopy remnants of corn soup from 150 tables for 3 days in a row...well, that's about all I ever wanted to see of Asia.


However...


If you have been reading any of this and not just scrolling through to look at the pictures you will know that an Turas - the Journey - is all about returning to Scotland. After nearly 4 years of trying in vain to get back there directly from Australia I realised it was going to take a more creative approach. It was then I decided to follow my mate Ewan's advice (pictured - teehee :-) and take the long way round. Hey, I've always thought Mongolia would be fascinating.


The original plan was to head to Europe to teach English. I started a Tesol course to facilitate this and it was during this stage that I kept coming across references to Asia and encouragement from other English teachers to try it.


When my recruiter (finally!) started responding to my emails last week, every single job was for China...so now we are looking at Asia as a definite plan. I don't want to spend more than a year there as I am looking at 2 years in Europe before heading back to Scotland...and I would dearly love to be in Scotland before I am 30. And before Miss M is too far into her schooling to be disqualified from Gaelic classes.


But China? China! My family are horrified. Even my GP was distressed, and advised me to head to Mongolia instead (as he handed me 2 pages of vaccinations recommended for Aussies travelling to China!!!!!!)

To balance - a good book

A long time ago, in uni, or perhaps even the end of high school, I remember a very short friend of mine (not that her height has anything to do with this...) spending a very long time (but that was neat!) reading a very thick book...

I think it may have been part of our English curriculum as my recollections of the film are all stop start and broken images which usually indicates that the film was "studied" (ie: mercilessly destroyed of any chance to be appreciated by mad English teacher with a remote). The only part I really remembered from the film (which may actually indicate that even WORSE than "stop-starting" the teacher only let us watch "segments"...god how that used to irritate me!). I can't imagine...oh, forgot to say the part. It was the beginning, where the girl is forced to marry/sleep with someone she doesn't want to and she runs away.

Anyway, I can't imagine that it was on the school reading list. I would have read it as I did not start skipping the reading of books until uni - ironically when I started my English literature degree, so outcome achieved by the uni!

Anyway, Katherine carried this book around for so long that it is forever associated in my mind, with her. A while back I found it on special for a few dollars and I bought it...but despite being a confessed bookworm/nerd/avid reader, it has sat on my shelf for well over a year. It is just so frikken THICK!

However, all this talk of teaching English overseas and possibly going to Asia reminded me of the book. Plus I am trying to cut down on my consumption of murders and crime shows, which is all that seems to be on TV at the moment (I am watching City Homicide, Bones, The Strip, Taggart, Rebus, The Bill, Midsomer Murders (which I swore I'd never watch!) and probably some others I can't even recall...sad, sad, sad!). The only show outside this genre is Shameless, which although possibly the most brilliant show ever made, is pretty much all about crime (drugs, prostitution, underage drinking, child neglect, welfare fraud...)

So I read it and it is brilliant. An amazing book - why did I not read it before? Although I am glad I did not as I may not have been as receptive to learning about Chinese culture as I am now that it is a possible home for us next year. It is so insightful into the Communist regime that I understand why it was on our English reading list (in fact I can feel the English teacher rising up inside of me shouting "YES! Put that one on the list!" and I even had a few scary moments of imaging activities to convey the lessons in the book to students...argh!)

The book was a bit of an epiphany to me. If I can speak in the language of my CHC lecturers, it produced a paradigm shift, altered my worldview. It made me feel like a lazy fat Australian slob and I admit that when I see people who have Asian features in the street or the shops (not so common in Noobah but I do get out of this town sometimes!) I can feel myself perceiving them in an entirely different way. I don't want to sound like Tamara but I really was a bit like her in terms of thinking about Asia and travel in that region. Blind, ignorant and awfully condescending. My heritage is in Europe and since travelling there my future is there also, but I that is no excuse for being ignorant of the rest of the world. I think because of the vast numbers of people living in the Asian regions, as well as (what I think is) dehumanisation of them in our media (ie: desensitising us: thousands die in an earthquake in Thailand and it is glossed over UNLESS there happens to be a 'westerner' in the rubble).

I don't want to speak too soon as I don't actually have a job lined up yet, but it is feeling like deciding to go to Asia next year was a good decision, or even the 'right road for us to be on' if you want to get all freaky like that.