Sara Holbrook author/poet/educator
February 21, 2008
Whatever happened on super Tuesday?Has another snow storm hit Cleveland?Is our house still standing?Do I have everything in order for school next Monday?
Thoughts of elsewhere dart into my mind like now you see ‘em now you don’t geckos. Not the geckos on commercials who casually offer tea and jam with insurance quotes, but
February 21, 2008
I’m three weeks behind in blogging and over flowing with images and notes about our trip to SE Asia. Like a series of red roofed pagodas, Jakarta Airport sits surrounded by palm leaves and blossoming trees. Another American on board shows us how to scoot through the process of purchasing visas and before we
February 2, 2008
Check out the Hello Kitty lounge for girls and the video game lounge for boys. Please also ch
eck out how calmly the kids are playing. We have been traveling 20 + hours and have 4 or 5 more to go — if we totally understood the time changes, it would make calculating
January 31, 2008
I forget when I first dreamed of being a writer. I’ve always being a note taker. One of my earliest writing recollections was when the principal came over the loud speaker while I was in math class and announced that President Kennedy had been shot. This was before there was a TV in every classroom
January 29, 2008
“How much does this CAT scan cost?” I asked the lady with the clipboard. “I have no idea. Please complete the form on both sides.”“I mean an idea. Ball park. Say if I didn’t have insurance.”“Don’t forget to sign and date the form. I really don’t know.”“Oh.”“How much does this cost?”
January 25, 2008
“A clock is a ticking thief
stealing life daily, taking it unnoticed,
so that without love and constancy
life is nonetheless just fleeting deception.”
Abai
Do you think now that (for the most part) we have taken the tick out of clocks and replaced the relentless
January 24, 2008
At the open air market place, some vendors keep candles in their vegetable cases to keep the cucumbers from freezing. That’s how cold it is. Imagine doing your marketing outdoors at minus 20F. We did visit a couple of modern malls, but couldn’t afford anything there. In fact it was at the Green Market,
January 21, 2008
Alamty, Kazakhstan does not have soft edges. It is not warm and fuzzy. The sharp air that pinches the nose matches the looks from strangers pushing in line and the spike heels on the women’s boots. The straight lines of the Soviet style high rises are persistently drab in a public housing
January 20, 2008
This was a fun two days. Teachers from five locations in Central Asia were in attendance, some coming in on delayed flights and others after their bus was hung up at the border. Conference coordinator Maura Martin had requested that we bring coffee for the start of the conference. Coffee? Isn’t that a staple found
January 16, 2008
Inside the airport a gray mist hovers, gathering in intensity toward the vaulted ceiling. It is -30C/-2F outside and dark outside with few lights and no moon to reflect on the snow when we land at 5:30AM. The first person we are greeted by is a fellow in a soviet style wool grey uniform with
