Making My Own Way

Spent the last 2 days setting up websites and stuff for tutoring! The owner of the DIY shop down the street said he'd let me put out fliers if I had any, so of course I had to make some! And then set up a website so it looks more legit. Website requires pictures, which requires digging through all my online places looking for them, and then figuring out how to use GoogleSites and Picasa and why are Picasa and Google+ Photos the same thing but set up differently?! WHY REDUNDANCY GOOGLE?!

Anyway. Oh, and not being able to type in Chinese on account of my lappy being dead (I 'typed' everything in GoogleTranslate -- not recommended). It works again, by the way. It decided to work this morning after I inserted a flash drive with the new Ubuntu on it, but I don't think that actually did anything, since it didn't install the new Ubuntu. It just worked. Thank the lords. So I got to set up my language tutoring site with the super-helpful aides of Chinese language input, GoogleTranslate, and Perapera-kun.

So yeah, here are the sites:

DanDan DIY for U.S.-style home-made desserts.

DanDan Language for tutoring in American English or Japanese.

/shameless self-promotion. _{I don't think anyone reads this blog anyway, so it's probably not a very good place to be shamelessly promoting oneself ;P whatever}

Getting [Partially] Fired and Other Things

So instead of actually training me my work decided it would be best if they had the former teacher go back to teach the classes I can't handle (which, honestly, were doing pretty dismally under my tutelage). Honestly, I am actually very glad. I've still got 8 hours at the kindy, but those are just 20-minute general English classes which are MUCH easier to deal with. This puts a bit of pressure on us financially, but we've got enough saved up from last month and our start-up fund that this month (and probably next month) will be alright if we really scrimp (no more peanut butter! Or almonds, which I've been secretly saving up for).

This actually comes at a fairly convenient time, since my dad and the whole boatload of relatives just came back for 2 weeks, and preparing for the Relationship Fulfilment class support has been mad crazy, on top of which it's my mom's birthday on Saturday @_@ I'M SO SAD I CAN'T MAKE HER CAKE!!! Even steamer cake recipes require a mixer T_T

So yeah, life goes on and I am SUPER BUSY :D

The Day of Getting Ripped Off

This excessively unattractive picture accurately portrays my current emotional state. This image was actually taken to portray the feelings associated with getting ARC through marriage, more about that later :D

First off, it was payday and my work did not compensate me for classroom preparation time, even though the hiring person I talked to said they would give me NT$300/hr for up to 5 hours of classroom prep time a week. This is not asking a lot. I have put in over 40 hours (40.86, to be exact -- I keep track) this week alone. I teach for 20 of them. This does not include the 19.8 hours I put in last week, of which only 5 were compensated at the classroom prep rate. Granted, it was the first week of teaching for me, and they didn't give me all the information (or most of the curriculum), so it was kind of hackneyed, but that is not the point. The point is we had a contract and it was not fulfilled. I don't care if none of the other teachers get paid for it, or it's not what they do in Taiwan (which is total bullshit, because another job I applied for totally said they'd pay me half-time for classroom prep), or whatever other lame-ass excuses they're pulling out their asses. I'm thinking a long talk with the HR is in order. Tomorrow.

Secondly, we went to eat at Raohe Night Market 'cause Tai really loves the chicken naan wrap from Ala-Ding, and I thought I'd try the chickpea curry, 'cause I saw it on their sign. Turns out it's NT$200, which is kind of pricey, but it was really really really really really really good. So that was okay. The kicker was the waiter asked me if I wanted an order of naan with it, and i said I didn't, 'cause the dish was already expensive and I'm totally down to eat curry straight, but then the superchill guy at the front, who makes the naan, gave us some anyway, so I thought it came with the order, 'cause why the hell wouldn't it. Then when we went to pay the bill, it was NT$50 more than it was supposed to be, and the waiter said it was because of the naan, which I didn't order. Lame sauce. Fuck that waiter. The naan wrap with chicken is only NT$40, why the hell would plain naan be NT$10 more?! Stupidness. Next time we're just getting the wrap; that waiter guy can go fuck himself. If anyone else goes there, don't get the Chinese waiter. Get the Indian guy.

WORK, I have it in abundance

Today was my first day of teaching. I think I'm going to lose my voice.

Also, I think TPR (Total Physical Response) should count as exercise. I am pretty sure I will be sore tomorrow. @_@

On the upside, pre-school-ers are a-freaking-dorable. Even when they are being filthy little nose-mining twerp-nuggets.

Total hours worked today: 12, mostly classroom prep

Hours worked last week: 19.8, all classroom prep.