I still have more to catch up on from before this entry but I just thought I’d write a quick one about what we did this past weekend & the latest news on the job front. Pics are all up on Flicker & our vids are on YouTube aswell…
So the end of last week was pretty exciting. The week before that I had found an ad in the paper for a Maternity leave position at a nearby school called The Abbey School. It is a private all girls school about 25 minutes walk from our home in quite a lovely area with tree-lined streets along the way. http://theabbey.co.uk/magnolia/junior_school/
I applied for it in a bit of a panic (I like to get these things in early & it was Wednesday evening when I found the ad & applications closed the following Wednesday). Luckily I didn’t need to rely on our Royal Mail service to get my CV details to them- they’re quite au-fait with technology so I was able to email them everything.
The following Wednesday evening I received a phone call from Jane Tuckett asking me to come in for a tour. Afterwards I would give a 30 minute mathematics lesson then they would interview me. I said sure & we arranged for the following day as I would be at Euro-Disney for a long weekend. I hung up the phone & then set about going through my teaching notes to see what I could plan.
Then it all hit me & Bodra came home to a very distressed wife. I didn’t know what to do & I was so shocked at the sudden expectation. Bodra calmed me down & we talked about the situation as rationally as we could, & came to the agreement that perhaps this meant it wasn’t something I wanted to do. So I called them the following morning & cancelled my application.
But then the Head of the Junior School- Jane Tuckett- phoned at shortly after that & conveyed her understanding, saying that it was very sudden. She convinced me to come to the school & meet her & then see how I felt…
The school is amazing- colourful & clean, Interactive White Boards in every room, specialist teachers for PE, Science, French, ICT, Geography, History, Music & Singing, so much space, a permaculture garden with veges & a Magnolia tree (the school emblem & my fav flower!!), polite girls who hold the door open & use their manners, the atmosphere was so peaceful & light… I went in again yesterday to observe a Year 5 teacher- Mrs Tamara Hunt- & her Upper Two class. I watched numeracy & literacy, then science with a different teacher- Mrs Piper. They have all sorts of different text resources & the interactive white-board allows the students to have a much more lively visual representation of the lesson. Most of what was happening in the classroom was still very familiar to me & I definitely felt comfortable. I walked around the room talking to the students & helping them with their lessons.
So the next step is to plan the maths lesson. Tamara directed me to a fabulous website http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ so I’m not so lost for resources now!
Last Thursday evening Bodra & I caught up with a few friends at Ping Pong- Kim & her mum Hilary, Ezra, Nik, Stephanie & Luke. We had a yummy dinner & even yummier cocktails! Then we went to Rachael & Paul’s house in Wimbledon & stayed the night.
The following morning we were up very early & off to Waterloo. We met Sarah at the station & jumped on the Euro-Star for Paris! It was quite a fast journey & by mid-afternoon we had our 3 day passes in hand & were already in the middle of the parade. As Halloween was only just prior to our arrival, the first parade was themed accordingly with pink Witches & Jack’o'Lantern headed & witchy-costumed characters. The park was littered with all sorts of halloween inspired decorations.
We stopped for a little afternoon tea at Captain Hook’s Galley (doughnuts with jam inners & hotdogs), then made our way to our first ride in Adventureland, “Pirates of the Caribbean”. Rachael told me that this ride is where the Captain Jack Sparrow movies had come from. This reminded me of the “Log Flume” ride at “Rainbow’s End” as it was a relaxing indoor boat ride. We floated through a lagoon then caverns displaying a pirate adventure of war-at-sea between a Galleon & a fort, a village plundered & on fire, skeletal remains of unfortunate pirates, treasure & drunken pirates. During part of the ride we went through the “Blue Lagoon” restaurant similarly themed- we had our lunch there on the last day. It took nearly 10 minutes. As it was quite dark & things moved around so much I wasn’t very successful with my photographs.
Before 6pm we were queuing up for our second ride in Adventureland “Indiana Jones & the Temple of Peril”. I think we had fast passes for this one. The queues at Disneyland are designed so you can experience the theme of the ride. So for this ride the queue meanders through an abandoned base camp,then wanders toward the temple where we climb a staircase to the temple entrance. Then we board a mine car. The ride itself was only about a minute and a half but it was pretty fun for a little roller coaster, including an inversion. Here’s a really good video of what it is like:
Next we went into the Phantom Manor which wasn’t that scary at all. You walk through part of the manor & notice strange things happening in the portraits & mirrors along the walls. It tells the story of a would-be bride who is waiting for her groom, but he has been hung by the rafters in the attic- perhaps by her father. We boarded Doom Buggies (Omnimover vehicles) then carried on through the manor & a graveyard. One of the rooms had a tilting table with a disembodied head inside a crystal ball.
I think we then climbed the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse in Adventureland, which didn’t involve any queuing. It wasn’t a real tree- just made of concrete & fake leaves.
Rachael & Sarah shared their sherbert with me & I got a bit hyperactive- we next went to Frontierland & hopped on “Big Thunder Mountain” but I couldn’t remember the ride at all. Luckily we went on it again on Sunday. This was a mild roller-coaster ride themed with a runaway train careening through an abandoned mine complex. We went through dark mine shafts & caverns, outside around the mountains & past tracks exploding with TNT. It lasted nearly 4 minutes.
The following day we started off at Walt Disney’s Studio Park. We queued up for Crush’s Coaster while Paul went & got us Fast Passes for the Aerosmith Rock’n Roller Coaster. We queued for probably about 20 minutes only to find out they were having technical problems with Crush’s Coaster. So we left the queue & went on the Studio Tram Tour. We saw props, vehicles & costumes from different movies like Dinotopia, The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe & Pearl Harbour. The highlight was going through Catastrophe Canyon which is a special effects set with pyro, water and motion effects. The tram tilts & shakes as if it is experiencing an earthquake & then the canyon floods & explosions go off around a truck. We also went through part of the set from “Reign of Fire” which shows a burnt London and a plume of fire shoots out towards us. We didn’t have to wait very long for this tour so we weren’t to disappointed by it’s mediocrity.
Then we got back in line for Crush’s Coaster. The people working there weren’t very good at organising the crowd. There was a point where they were opening up a larger part of the queuing system, & whilst we were following through the queue, a huge crowd of people jumped over the queuing rope & cut ahead of us. Rachael & I managed to maintain our places somewhat & evetually Bodra, Paul & Sarah caught up with us. We were all pretty pissed off with the sleaziness of the other queuers.
But Crush’s Coaster was worth the wait- a long, long wait! Visually it was really fantastic. It is mostly all indoors & has the theme of Finding Nemo where we travel along the dark, underwater, swirling East Australian Current. We rode in a 4-person turtle shell that spun around so you become quite disorientated. We saw jellyfish, Bruce the shark & clownfish & went through the submarine. The ride lasted a little over one minute so we were really sad when it finished so quickly… I filmed it but all you could see is darkness & hear my funny laughter & squeals. We had a second ride on it the following day & it seemed to go even quicker. 
Next we went on the Rock’n Roller Coaster starring Aerosmith. We used our fast passes but we still had to queue for a wee while. We first waited in a lobby with guitars on the walls, then we went through a hall with rock posters, then into a recording studio where Aerosmith were projected. Then into the boarding room. The ride starts off with a 3,2,1 countdown & then the roller coaster accelerates from 0 to 57 miles per hour in 2.8 seconds- making it the fastest ride at Euro-Disney. The ride theme is like a music video with lasers, flashing lights & loud rock music coming out of the speakers in our headrests. We experienced 4.5Gs as we entered the first inversion, more than an astronaut does on a space shuttle launch. Double rollover & a corkscrew included. Initially I definitely felt my stomach in my mouth but I think that was more the anticipation of a proper stomach drop as I kept thinking there would be one to match the “Go-ing dooooooown” lyrics to Love in an Elevator. Denied! Anyway, over one minute of adrenaline pumping fun!
This shows the gallery of guitars.
This shows the launch.
Then we took in the Disney Cinema Parade while munching our lunch. We saw Goofy, Donald Duck, Minnie & Mickey Mouse, Chip ‘n’ Dale & a few others. 
Next we went on to see the Animagique show. I was feeling pretty exhausted by then so I had a wee snooze & missed the gist of this. There were puppets & Donald Duck & Mickey Mouse.
I definitely didn’t snooze through the next show- “Moteur Action Stunt Show Spectacular!” We sat in a grand-stand & watched cars & motorcycles perform different stunts like 7 cars choreographed to race around & spin at the same time (almost looked like a dance!), wheelies, ramp jumps, skidding, sparks flying from guns, high-speed chases, cars speeding around in reverse (but it was actually just a car designed to look backwards), a man falling from a rooftop & another man on fire. 
For the evening we decided to go to Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show at Disney Village. We were all given cowboy hats to wear (eekk!!) & were seated at the Gold Star ranch. While enjoying our dinner of corn-bread, chilli beans & sausage, chicken & smoked ribs (pasta & green beans & spuds for Bodra & I) we watched target shooting, cow lasooing, buffalo chasing, Indian rituals, a rodeo with stunt riding & a stagecoach race. The Indians were all authentic, being from different tribes across America- Blackfeet & Crows from North America, Sioux or Crees from Canada, and a few Cherokees and Shawnees from the Mid-Western. 
After the show we managed to cajole Bodra & Paul into doing soe Bull-Riding for our enjoyment. We had been watching it the previous night & Bodra had said he would do it. They both managed to hang on for quite some time & were very brave. 
Our final day at Euro-Disney started with Discoveryland where we waited for the Space Mountain: Mission 2 ride. It started off with a 1.5G up hill launch through the Columbiad Cannon & included two inversions- a sidewinder & a corkscrew. It lasted over two minutes & really gave my ears a good boxing. 
http://www.spacemountain2.com/
Next we waited in the spaceship boarding terminal for the Simulator motion-master “Star Tours”. Once onboard to travel to the Forest Moon of Endor, the ride lasted over four minutes. We sat in seats & were moved about while watching a projection of us going through a tunnel towards a maintenance yard on the ship, then out into space, through an asteroid field, encountering the Star Destroyer, battling against the Death Star & a few light speed jumps.
I was quite jealous of the kids seated behind us who were screaming the whole way through, as I found the entire experience incredibly weak. 
We had our lunch at the “Blue Lagoon” restaurant which had a great atmosphere. All the Waiting Staff were wearing Pirate costumes. We could see people floating along the flume.
I think we had another ride- maybe Big Thunder Mountain- then went to the Videopolis Theatre to see the Legend of the Lion King show. Kids would’ve loved this, great costumes & all those familiar tunes- but I’ve never been a fan of musicals. I really liked the ‘water curtain’ which they used as part of the stage back drop to create a waterfall effect. 
After this we had a good walk around through Fantasyland, past Sleeping Beauty’s Castle & over to La Tanière du Dragon- The Dragon’s Dungeon. We walked through a cavern to find a pool where a slumbering dragon dozed- not Albie- every so often swaying his head & snorting out smoke. 
Then we stumbled on another parade this time featuring Pinocchio, Alice in Wonderland who was stuck in a house, the Mad Hatter, Cheshire Cat, Winnie the Pooh & his friends Tigger, Piglet & Eeyore. Our camera ran out of battery so we were unable to snap these guys. Later on we found Sully from the Monsters Inc. & Paul & Rachael took a photo of Bodra & I with him. 
To end our final day we went for another ride on Crush’s Coaster & then fatally squeezed in the Rock’n’ Roller Coaster too. This made us horrendously late for our Euro-Star. Whilst Bodra & Paul went back to the Explorer Hotel to get our baggage, Sarah, Rachael & I rushed around trying to find last minute merchandise. We got to the departure point at 6:15pm but there was no sign of the boys. They arrived just after the train left- Sarah had her passport so she was fine to go (although we had all her luggage). Luckily we didn’t end up becoming too out of pocket as they were able to change our tickets for a later train- we were put in first class too! We had to take a train to Paris Nord but we were on time. We were entitled to complimentary food & drinks which kept us all in bright spirits- & there was a little more leg room too.
Bodra & I didn’t get home until after midnight but we were all in one piece so no harm done…
Ok- it’s after 2pm now so I better get on with some lunch & lesson planning! This wasn’t the quick entry I thought it would be!
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