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Reflections from the Slovak Republic

Reflections II: Got to admit it’s getting better... - Nov 22, 2004

As the title suggests, yes, it’s getting better. We’ve just finished our second month in Slovakia, and without a doubt the second month was easier than the first. In my last Reflections I spoke with you about a number of small successes. During that first month, those small successes were VERY important. For example, we were ecstatic when our church secretary forwarded an item from U.S.Bank to my office and IT ACTUALLY ARRIVED ­ our first piece of mail!! Now that we have our "permission to stay" certificates, our auto license plates (a whole ’nother story) and all of our pre-mailed boxes, most of the "institutional details" are out of the way. The small success are nice, but are less celebrated than before.

Life has attained to some sort of "normalcy", though "normal" here is quite different from "normal" in Kentucky. The alarm goes off at 6:15 (then 6:20, then 6:25...) every Mo, Tu, We, Th, F. Our children get ready for school and catch the 7:20 (commercial) bus to school. I am off at around 8:00 for my 15-minute walk to the office. Carol’s days are unplanned. She is taking a leave-of-absence this year from her teaching responsibilities at Model Lab. She is doing the wife/mother thing and has been reading a lot ­ catching up on stuff she wishes she had read years ago. She also is studying the Slovak language intensely. Although she is not a linguist by trade, she does have a Masters degree in "Teaching English as a Second Language" and has taught professionally at Texas A&M, the University of Kentucky, and at a number of smaller public and private institutions. She maintains that of all the languages that share our alphabet, Slovak is the most difficult language she has seen. She and the kids are picking up quite a bit, but there is still far to go. Carol has observed that one of the major problems she is facing is that the Slovaks are not used to foreigners learning their language, and that even the slightest mispronunciations can throw off their comprehension. She struggles but is determined to succeed ­ I keep reminding her that we have not yet completed even one-fourth of our time here. Small consolation ...

The kids are out of school around 2:00 pm every day (14:00 for you Europeans!). They’ve gotten to know a number of their Slovak classmates so they often hang around school a bit. Then they are back on the bus, headed either to our flat or to my office. At my office they use the Internet to do their Kentucky online courses. My three office mates have been extremely accommodating in helping Eric and Rachel meet their online needs. They often finish their own computer work early in the day, knowing that the kids might drop by. I could not ask for better office mates!! One thing really different here (compared to our lives in Kentucky) is family time. The kids seldom have evening plans ­ no soccer, no dance, no band, no football or basketball games to go to, no movies until the past two weeks (contract dispute between the movie houses and some other entity; we saw LOTR, ROTK this week!), so most evenings we share a meal together and either watch television or play Hearts. That aspect has been a wonderful unexpected pleasure. On weekends the kids are more active, Rachel off to the "ranch" and Eric off to the disco. Still though, even on weekends we share almost every meal together. If any of you (or your children) would like to read their personal reflections, you may do so online at "www.livejournal.com/users/time_to_mourn" for Eric and at "www.livejournal.com/users/the_loquitur" for Rachel. I told them some time ago that our relatives and friends might be reading their musings, so they’ve been keeping it clean...!

So, to my life... My teaching load here is quite small compared to back at EKU. I meet three sections of one course, each for ninety minutes once a week. And this term, because of unexpected holidays and such, we will have only eight meetings each. So, do the math: 3 x 90 x 1 x 8 = 2160 minutes compared to 4 x 50 x 3 x 15 =    9000 minutes ­ less than one-quarter the classroom contact time! But my major objective here is to write a textbook on "Economic Issues Facing the Slovak Republic", so my "free time" is hardly free at all. I’m making slow progress on that front, but the institutional items have taken a lot of time. Also, Carol and I have been invited by the Dean to a number of events ­ two field trips to local agricultural facilities (where we ate and drank to excess), two trips to the High Tatras mountains, a reception in our honor at a local restaurant, and two official university and college functions. One of my good Slovak friends, Elena, is a Vice-Dean (she and I first met in 1996 when we were both at the University of Delaware.) Elena sees to it that invitations are extended to us for any "worthy" occasion. She has also prepared a webpage related tomyvisit:"www.fem.uniag.sk/new/fem/index.php?lng=EN&mid=686&sid=884&show=884". Mostly you will find pictures there, plus a short intro blurb.

About my classes... This term I am teaching only economics majors, mostly second-year students, extending their "Principles" knowledge to applications related to policy-directed issues like international trade, the environment, discrimination, and so forth. I would say that my time in the Slovak classroom is not very different from my time in a Kentucky classroom. In any group of students, some are more motivated, some less motivated than others. Some are quick to respond, some hate to speak out. Some do well, some do poorly. The biggest difference is with the students who REALLY APPRECIATE the American in their classroom. You can see it in their eyes and they say it in their e-mail entries, "You have come so far just to teach us and we are very happy you did that." The exam results are similar to what I get in Kentucky also. I gave a take-home midterm exam last week. The average was 85, the range was from 51 to 100. Some students are just unmotivated to do well! Midterm exams are uncommon here, as they are in large parts of Europe. Mostly there is only one exam, typically at the end of the term but often only at the end of the academic year. Many professors have only verbal exams ­ no grading!!! So the students are not used to my style, with a written, graded exam so early in the term. It’s part of the reason why I gave them a take-home midterm, to prepare them for an in-class final exam.

This week is Thanksgiving, a holiday we will celebrate with other American "expatriates" here in Nitra. It will be unusual to have a holiday different from the Slovak holidays, but we decided that Thanksgiving was too important to us to just let it pass by. We’re hosting the dinner, the best we can do under the circumstances -- roast chicken instead of turkey, apple pie instead of pumpkin pie, and not a cranberry in sight!! Drop by if you like!! There’ll be plenty to eat!

And in less than a month, our two elder daughters arrive to join us for the Christmas holidays. We are ALL looking forward to that reunion. I will hope to post one more "Reflections" this semester, after the term ends. Please keep us all in your thoughts and prayers.