Devon Cooper

1. If it was raining, but has stopped, and you are still huddled under your umbrella like hot lava is falling from the sky, you look like an idiot.

2. If you are an old woman, you do not look nice with bright purple hair. Or orange. Or pink. Or leopard spots.

3. If you are an old man and you are pushing an empty stroller down the street, everyone thinks you are creepy and weird.

Catchy title, eh?

Unit 8 of my favorite text book is titled “Heroes,” so I figured, all right, there are a million resources for activities on heroes, writing exercises, discussions, this will be a breeze. I expected a week or two of generic “my grandma is my hero” talks, and of course the frequent mention of Gandhi, Mother Teresa and so on. That is how it started out. No problem. For the characteristics of a hero, we came up with the following list: Strong, intelligent, generous, brave. So, a combination of Superman and Mother Teresa, right? I put a list of people on the board and decided to have a discussion. Are these people heroes? Some were controversial.... Madonna, Che Guevarra. People that are either loved or hated. And yes, I got a little debate out of them over these figures. Then I expected to skim through the other, more obviously benevolent people I had listed (Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, etc) Then, all of a sudden, one of my students said “I don’t think Gandhi is a hero” and I said “...okay.... why is that?” They continued by explaining that Gandhi was a very important person for the people of India, but that was the extent of it. They said that in today’s world, everyone can be called a hero, without really thinking about it. She said Gandhi was important, but not a hero. I asked her to add some “real” heroes to the list. Her contributions were: Mother Teresa, Pope John Paul II and the children/shepherds at Fatima. I pointed out the similarities in Gandhi and Mother Teresa, but she was adamant. I guess it turns out that in her world, all heroes are Catholic.

Okay, so it has been a scandalously long time since my last post. But seriously, the life of an English professor is not all glamour and lights! Alright, now I'm just sounding self-rightous. But I really have been extremely busy at work. The trimester ends this week and for each of my 9 classes I had to not only figure out how to finish all the material I had left (apparently my classes were moving a little slowly), but also create and give a final exam AND do all the end-of-the-trimester paperwork. It can be a little overwhelming. But it's all under control. It's really not that much work. It just feels like it sometimes. (Like every other job on the face of the earth.... teaching English is no different at all.)

Anyway, good news that the world has already heard (because I'm telling everyone)... Danny's sister and her husband just had twin girls! So Danny is a first time uncle. And although he's trying to play it cool, I know he's just as excited about it as I am.

More good news. This week at Danny's school, there is a film festival, so he has no classes (loser). But that's beside the point. He has been chosen, along with others in his class, to help shoot the new commercial for his school. So it is his first work (in a long time at least- he did similar things in Cuba too) on a professional shoot. He started out on the direction of photography team, but decided to move to the sound team due to a slight overpopulation of students vying for the attention of the director of photography. He says he's learning a lot. On Friday, hopefully, I will get to go and observe the shoot. Then there's a big party to close the festival.

So, that has been the run-down on what's going on over here. I am still looking for a job in Barcelona, and I have some good prospects. We'll see how it all goes!