Christmas and performances and things

Merry (slightly belated) Christmas everyone! 

Michael and I took a trip through Laos and Cambodia with a couple of our friends for the first 8 days of our break - We've only been back for a day and a half, and I haven't organized those pictures yet, which means that more blog posts will be coming sometime in the near future, because we've got TONS of great stories about that trip to share with you!

In the meantime, I thought I'd share a few pictures from our annual Christmas program with you. The program, like last year, was divided into three nights: Nursery/Kindergarten, 1st-5th grades, 6th-12th grades.  One of the more unique things about this year's program is that we had an area set up with some sheep and goats for kids to pet. Sheep and goats are very interesting to people here, considering the fact that we live in a big city and people don't generally see these kinds of animals.

 It wasn't exactly our favorite idea at first, I'll admit, but whatever company brought the animals did a really great job of keeping them contained, clean, etc. The kids seemed to love petting and feeding them, so I guess it was a big hit! They even put little hats on most of them, which made me laugh quite a bit.

The kids did a great job on their performances this year, too! We had some Thai dancing (by students who ranged from kindergarten to 9th grade):

 Michael's 9th grade class sang "We Wish You a Merry Christmas":

10th grade boys rocking out to their music (after the girls did a performance to "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas"):

 And the 12th grade performance (a skit): some thieves tried to steal presents from the children while Santa was off eating cookies and milk, but Santa came back and saved them all by winning an epic battle of Rock-Paper-Scissors:

Also, the middle school English teacher and I acted as the MC's for the outdoor portion of the program for two nights. We decided to make "our thing" telling stupid Christmas jokes - let me tell you, the were exceedingly stupid Christmas jokes, but at least a couple of the people in the audience pretended to appreciate them, so I guess we did our job!





The highlight of the whole program (for us, at least!) was the foreign staff performance. Every year we have to do something, and often times it turns into a chore to figure out how all of us are going to do a performance together. This year, though, one of the teachers took over and directed the rest of us. She wrote a Christmas parody of the two most popular songs that the students in our school listen to: "Call Me Maybe" (by Carly Rae Jepsen) and "Gangnam Style" (by PSY). We called the performance "Santa Maybe" and lyrics went as follows:

I sent my wish in the mail
Praying that it will not fail
And back to me it will sail
With presents Christmas Day

And now that you have my list
Deliver this, I insist
So that I will not be missed
When he comes Christmas Day

Red cap, cheeks are glowing
White beard, dimples showing
All those gifts bestowing
Could he be Santa, maybe?

Hey, Mr. Postman, I know it’s crazy
But here’s my letter for Santa maybe

I know the postmark is kinda hazy
But can you bring this to Santa, maybe?

Hey, Mr. Postman, I know it’s crazy
But here’s my letter for Santa maybe

I know the postmark is kinda hazy
But can you bring this…Hey, I’m Santa, Baby!

(music scratch)

Christmas Gangnam style!

Michael and I played pretty decent sized roles in this performance - usually we're the ones in the background on stuff like this! The video is below - please check it out:




Needless to say - it was a really fun performance!