Nap Time Thoughts of A Preschool Teacher

Nap time. One of my favorite parts of the day in school right now. A lot of random thoughts usually run in my mind during this time as I watch my students sleep beside each other,

I wonder how many of them will actually meet again maybe 15-20 years after their kindergarten days and fall in love with each other? What are the odds? Probabilities?

I wonder if they will ever remember that they once slept beside each other during nap time in preschool before. Will they ever remember that they once shared a spoon of ice cream just because the little boy still wants some ice cream and the little girl was kind enough to give him a spoonful of it? Will the little boy remember that he once grabbed the toy truck from the little girl just because he thinks trucks are just for boys? Will the little girl remember that she once cried so loud because of that little boy or will she just remember how she laughed at the funny antics of the little boy when they were playing with the wooden blocks at the construction corner? Will both of them remember how they made a good team trying to build a tower with those blocks and not letting their other classmates join in on the fun just because that moment was exclusively theirs?

How many of these kids will have their hearts broken before they even reach their puberty stage? The kind of heart ache that seemed just a tiny piece of wound but could actually give so much effect in his/her growing up years? The kind of wound that you thought you have forgotten already but could actually haunt you and make you remember that pain once you meet someone again and try your chance on falling in love again. I wonder who among them will end up best friends for life? Or who will end up as “just friends” just because they tried it but they realized they are better off as friends?

I have more than a dozen young, innocent souls in my classroom of happiness now. Each of them has a distinct personality that makes them different from one another. Each is special in his/her own way. Each of them amuses me in their own lovely way. Sometimes while waiting for them to close their eyes and fall asleep during nap time, I just can’t help but imagine how the romance part of their lives will turn out to be. Who will fall in love with who? Who will have his/her heartbroken by who? Who will end up getting married to each other? Will there be someone from that class who would actually try to look for his/her classmate after so many years just to let him/her know that he/she once a had a huge crush on him/her? Will there be someone who will be bold enough to confess his/her feelings?

Maybe I am just a plain hopeless romantic that even at those down times when I can just rest my body from half a day of extensive work in school and prepare myself for the next half to cap off the day, I just can’t hold off my mind from thinking about those random stuff.

Or perhaps, deep inside my heart, I just want all of them to experience the kind of wonderful love they all deserve. Because they all deserve to be loved in a special way. No matter how they piss me off sometimes with their rowdiness, I have to admit that I’ve grown so fond of each and everyone of them. And yes, I do love them. I love the fact that I am their teacher and they think of me as their mommy in school. And like a real mommy, I want them to find the love they all deserve in the future. If only I can shield them from heartbreak by teaching them about the Dos and Don’ts of falling in love, but even me myself is still a student of that lesson. I am still learning. I haven’t mastered that yet, and perhaps I never will. I just hope that no matter how many heartbreaks they will experience or how deep the pain they would experience in the future, my little angels will still continue believing in love and that they will not lose hope that they can also find and experience true love. I hope that when they get their hearts broken, they will remember how they were in Kindergarten — cry so loud and then move on like as if nothing happened. I hope they will not dwell too much on the pain but instead, use those pains to become a better person in life and in love.

If only I can tell these to them. But I’d rather not spoil the mystery of life and love to them. I will let them discover on their own how wonderful it is to live, to find love, to fall in love, to lose it and find it again. Anyway, they are still too young to fathom the complexities of it all. For the meantime, I will just let them play and enjoy the simplicity of life in their little perfect world.

Of Sunday Mornings and A New Heart for Vietnam

Sunday morning. Some couple of months ago, Sunday mornings meant a lot different to me. It meant waking up early and prepping up to attend Sunday service in our church in Medan, Indonesia. It meant preparing the sound system to make sure that the audio works well and some minor preparations before the service starts. It also meant meeting and spending time with my spiritual family there. Most important of all, Sunday mornings meant hearing God’s word and listening to the preaching of our pastor there.

Well Sunday morning took a kind of different turn for me now. Instead of prepping up to attend a Sunday service, I woke up early to wash my week’s worth of clothes and met my new Vietnamese friend who will take me to the street where our church is located here in Ho Chi Minh City. Well we did find the address but Im still not sure if my church really holds service there so I still have to go back a little later for the English service schedule. My friend had to leave me since she has a scheduled date with her boyfriend so I had to brave the streets of District 3 going to District 1 alone.

Almost 5 months and a lot of things have changed. From always having someone to be with me wherever I go, I now find myself doing everything on my own. Well, I do have some friends here who were kind enough to drive me around the city but still, there are just some things you got used to that you will long for every now and then. I’m missing those times when just a single call or text and there’s already someone who’s very willing to go with you wherever.

Being on your own has its pros and cons. Well, I could go out anytime now without having to think about whether someone’s waiting for me to go home or not. I can go wherever I want randomly. I can choose to eat or not. I can choose to sleep the whole day or just go around the city the whole day. Everything is totally up to me. Sometime ago, I dreamed of living this kind of life and I’m totally experiencing it now.

When I first set my feet on Vietnam, I didn’t know anyone. Everything is really unfamiliar to me. I haven’t even been to this country before. I don’t have any idea what’s in store for me here. I just know that I need to take this certificate course if I want to teach overseas and Vietnam’s a good choice. It’s like I’m in one of the biggest and exciting challenges of my life and I only rely on God’s grace every single day. But from Day 1 up to this day, I think I am loving how I am seeing myself now. I am discovering things about myself which I never thought I could be before. I thought I wouldn’t be able to fit in with the group of people from other nations, but it turned out I could and I could even be just as weirdly normal to them as I am with my other friends. I thought I’m kind of shy when speaking in front, but I realized that I could very well do it when the need arise and I don’t feel uncomfortable at all. Never mind if I have to speak to a group of people with different nationalities, personalities, and perceptions. If I need to do it, I would do it.

I have to admit, though, I still miss the people I used to share my Sundays with in Indonesia. A big part of my heart is still longing that one day, I would still be able to attend Sunday services with them again. I miss hearing people talking in Bahasa because Vietnamese language is really different. I couldn’t understand a thing since there’s almost no similarity with the Filipino language.

I am praying to God to give me a new heart for this nation. I want to have a new heart for Vietnam and I want to love this country as much as I am loving Indonesia. This is just my first week, though. I know that there are still a lot about Vietnam that I have yet to discover and love. I am opening up my heart to this nation and I’m pretty sure God has a special reason and purpose why I am where I am now. I’m just excited for I know that wonderful things are up ahead of me:-)

I am alone in this city but I am not lonely. I’ve gained a lot of new friends in just a matter of week and I know I will still have more as days go by. And who knows? Maybe finding a new love will be on its way:-)