Diana At the Crossroad: A Lesson on Chocolate and Peanut Butter

I threw a small party for my Honor Society students. It was was an end-of-the-year-congratulations thing. It went pretty well.

I promised them that I would bring some American food for them to try, so in the morning I bought a gas stove. It’s a pretty good one and it only cost like 10 dollars. It’s a good buy, because starting in August, I have to cook for myself for lunch. But, I digress.

I made spaghetti and sauce for them. Well, the sauce just came from a can. I also brought some muffins, peanut butter, bananas, and chocolate syrup. I brought that all to school.

The first hour or so was for eating. I had about 17 students come to the party. 5 students like spaghetti. The rest hate it. They complained that it was sour lol. But the 5 people who like spaghetti finished it all! I was so surprised! Haha. The muffins were gone in like .3 seconds, so I’m assuming they liked those. Then they were really confused as to why there were bananas. I showed them to either dip the banana in a cup of chocolate syrup, or spread some peanut butter on it. Well, those bananas were gobbled up in seconds flat. But the students were hungry for more! So what did they do? Well, I caught one just drinking the chocolate syrup from a cup. And then I saw like 6 or 7 students throughout the rest of the day with a cup of syrup and peanut butter mixed together in a dark, gooey, delicious paste. Brilliant, these students are. That’s why they’re in the honor society.

Unfortunately, they ate an entire jar of peanut butter and almost all of my syrup too. And all the muffins and spaghetti. No more comfort food for teacher… why do I share??

After the eating, we played musical chairs, which was lots of fun. They all squealed every time the music stopped. Toward the end, the students were cheating. They would pick up the chair and put it under their butt lol.

I had some things to give students at the party. My mother had sent pictures from their visit, and also a thank you letter for each of them. So I put these out on the table. I put the pictures from Prey Veng on the table, and kept the rest of them in the pack. Well, when I went to go check on them, I found that students were going through all of the pictures, and just taking whatever they pleased! Haha, it had nothing to do with whether they were in it or not, which I thought would be obvious for them. They just wanted to get their hands on any picture with me in it. I managed to salvage some of the stolen photos so that I can give those to the appropriate people.

Of course, there was also dancing. Most of them already knew the Cupid Shuffle, Asereje, the Macarena, and the Cha Cha Slide, so of course we did those. I also introduced them to the Electric Slide, Cotton-Eyed Joe, and even the Hokey Pokey! They were pretty good at the electric slide. They couldn’t do the Cotton-Eyed Joe, but they got a real kick out of watching me do it. They thought the Hokey Pokey was just stupid haha. I agreed.

I also did the Chicken Dance for a little while. And, as it would be, that is the moment (while I’m flapping my imaginary wings) that my grade 12 students decided to come and give me gifts. So I put my wings away and paid attention. Pamela wrapped a yellow and green scarf around my neck and gave me a cute key chain with flip-flops. Sean gave me a bracelet that says Cambodia. Steven gave me a notebook, with a little note inside thanking me and wishing me health, luck, happiness, etc. It was really really sweet and unexpected. After that, I pulled out the certificates and handed them out. I also had letters of recommendation for my graduating seniors. I hope they will figure out good opportunities to put those into use. So I gave the seniors my phone number and told them to keep me updated on what they do next year.

More dancing. Students started leaving.

I don’t believe that this is goodbye for real for my graduation seniors, but they seemed to think so a little. Their goodbyes were pretty heartfelt. Especially Pamela. She came over and said goodbye and just looked at me for a while. Then she gave me a hug, which was super sweet. I then asked her if she was going to study with me this summer. Sadly, she said “perhaps not” and then she looked at me for second again, and then went in for another hug. Well, I didn’t know she was gonna try to kiss my cheek, so I went in to hug her too, and she ended up kissing my ear. This wouldn’t have been awkward at all if the entire class wasn’t watching this whole exchange and laughing. It’s okay, we brushed it off, and I’m just honored that Pamela feels so much about this goodbye.

For the record, if I believe these goodbye were for real, I’d be balling my eyes out. But I don’t. And I won’t let myself. After all, I know where they live.

It was a fun party, although a lot of work for me of course. Maybe I’m an old lady. I can’t host a 3 hour party without needing to take a nap afterwards.

Anyway, this Honor Society has been exactly what I needed her at site to feel welcomed and productive. These kids are my everything here. I am so proud of the work they’ve done this year, and I’m looking forward to next year very much.

BTW, sure enough, later that night Pamela called me. She just wanted to ask if I had dinner yet. She told me she missed me already and she “wanted to hear my sound.” Lol this is not goodbye.

*Mom, the shots of me and a student and the group shots at the end would be great to print and send to me. As per request of my students... but no rush on that. take your time. Might wanna wait for me to have posted more pictures that I'd like you to send.