Remember Your Knives!

According to legend, Lincoln filed away scathing letters for three days before finally deciding to post them or not. In the same spirit, I'm not posting the critical entry I initially wrote for today. At least not yet. If the weekend doesn't mellow me, an unadulterated version will still show up on Monday. But for now, we're keepin' it light.

Skip to preparations for last week's "First Annual MAN-Ngrambe Pumpkin Carving Contest." Students were given simple instructions: (1) show up and (2) bring a pisau (knife). If Indonesia were America, half of English Club would now be expelled and I'd have a court date. But Indonesia thankfully isn't America, and our school security guard is totally down with meat cleavers making it into classrooms.

I recruited a few teachers to help me scour the regency for pumpkins beforehand, so by Thursday, I had six delivered to my home. Some boys helped me walk them over after school, and then English Club began. Thanks to a new, handy Firefox add-on (courtesy of PCV Jay), I downloaded a few pumpkin carving tutorials off Youtube. The students watched these videos, and afterwards, my counterpart and I randomly divided everyone into teams and assigned pumpkins.

My students continually amaze me with their creativity. Even though they didn't have any prior pumpkin carving experience, it was astonishing to watch them quickly pick up on little innovations like using pre-made stencils, shaving the pumpkins' skins to create new textures and colors, and using smaller, more delicate tools like nails and scissors for finer cuts.

On Friday all six jack-o'-lanterns were put on display, and teachers voted to determine the top three. The boys took home 1st place, team Spongebob edged into 2nd, and team angry pumpkin came in a comfortable 3rd (photo #2). Oreo and M&M prizes were liberally awarded to these groups.

The photos tell the rest.