my cluster

I can't sleep so here I am at the blog.  Excited about my cluster because I have been given 5 schools and two of them are very unique.  One is 100% Malay, which means the students will be very low on English and very little knowledge of anything but their immediate surroundings.  Probably why they students were staring at me like I was something in a zoo.  They were so curious, and completely adorable.  The would giggle when I waved and smiled at them,  I can see this is going to be very enjoyable.  The other unique one that I have is a full aboriginal school. This group is known here as the Orang Asli,of which there are 18 or 19 different sub groups. Much like our Canadian aboriginals there tends to be times of the year when the students do not attend school. These times are when they need to go with the parents to go hunting for food.I really hope I am not invited to dinner. I think I will be a vegetarian at that time. Not sure how we handle this, or if we handle it at all.  But I can see these are the areas where we need to focus our attention so that the children can experience the value of the education without spoiling their heritage.  Today in our travels we saw numerous monkeys on the side of the road, a very long lizard, probably about 4 feet long, crossing the road, and some crazy cows warming their bellies on the road.  I have been advised to not go to my northern schools first thing in the morning. Why? Because I will be driving in the dark and the crazy cows that are all black cannot be seen on the road at that time of night/day, and I would definitely hit one or more.  So, I have to save that area for when there is daylight giving both of us a chance to avoid a collision. Because Jeff and I have to cover the third cluster until someone shows up (I hope), we have decided that we will head down there on Thursday and spend the night in a hotel because we need to be there Friday morning as well. He has calculated that the cost of a hotel is less than the cost of the gas to get there and back. Glad I have someone with me who thinks of these things. So that looks like the pattern we will have until we have the 3rd mentor join us.  Maybe we can get in a round of golf there, as Friday afternoons are free time anyway.Oh yes, lunch, Our district liaisons who took us on the tour are very much the culture here. Everyone here eats with their right hand. I cannnot  believe how skilled they can all eat with fingers and not have their clothes and arms dripping with food. Lucky for us, they used this little teapot on the table before we reached for it to fill our hot water cups.  It looks like a teapot with a raised trivet that has a reservoir beneath it. What it is is a finger washing station for eating, Wouldn't we have been cool drinking from the pot? We also dropped into the store that Jeff checked out to buy beds. The deliver them but we realized we didn't know our addresses. oops