A Surprise For Class I!

Hello friends, Joe Crow here. I hope you're all well. As you know, I've been living in Bhutan since January. I've seen many exciting and interesting things, and learned a lot about Buddhism, schools and the country.

 

You can see the snow on the mountains.

But most of all I have been working my feathers off trying to help the children at Samey Primary School to learn English. My friend, Mr. MacInnes, has been helping a little bit. I think we're doing a good job, and the children are so much better and happier talking English to me than they were at the beginning of the year. They are proud of themselves too!

It's the end of October now, and it's starting to get pretty chilly here in Dagana. Winter in Bhutan can get very, very cold indeed. That is because it is a mountainous country. When you're living at higher altitudes the weather gets much colder. In the high mountains of the Himalayas, the temperature can get as cold as -20°C, or colder!

Dagana is in the southern part of Bhutan, which is hotter than the north, but as Samey is quite high up it gets very cold at night. The daytimes are still quite sunny, but in the shade it can still be cool. When there is no sunshine, it really is cold!

So, as we're moving into winter now I've started wearing my new winter hat in the evenings! I'm also keeping my nest well padded with old feathers to keep the wind out. Mr. MacInnes is making more use of his winter jumpers too!

Me and my new winter hat!

New Zealand is the country coloured red.

A kiwi bird; one of Kia Ora's friends!  (cdn.phys.org)

The thing that worried me was weather the children had enough warm clothes for the cold winter months. Quality winter clothes can be hard to come by in this part of Bhutan, especially as some of the families don't have much money to buy clothes with. But – and this is really exciting – I made a new friend who sent a special surprise for the children in Class I! This friend is called Kia Ora (which means hello in Maori), and she is a Kiwi bird who lives in a country called New Zealand! She saw my blog about Class I and really wanted to do something to help the children! Isn't that kind?

So Kia Ora sent a special package, just for the children in Class I. Inside it were lots of useful teaching aids, like flashcards, books, pencils and more. She even sent plenty of information about New Zealand, so the children can learn about her home too. But most importantly, she sent them all a set of nice warm clothes for them to use in the winter! They were very happy! Most of them wore the new clothes the very next day!
Have a look at the photos of me giving Class I their gifts. We were very thankful to Kia Ora and to her friends in New Zealand! 

 

That's all for this time, friends. I'll be back again soon so we can compare Bhutan and New Zealand!

Take care,

Joe :)

Altitude - The height of something above sea level.

Mountainous - A place having many mountains.