It pays to keep in touch with old classmates. Gaurav took Spanish back when I was taking French in our school days together, and apparently he's putting it to use now! He's on a
Fulbright in Argentina doing research, but
guess who took the time to talk to two of my classes FROM Argentina today? (That was a gimme, but go ahead, guess.)
Some time ago he had mentioned to me that he was excited about coming back and sharing with his (our?) old teachers about his experiences down there, "because i feel like that opportunity - which you have each workday - is
one of the best ones available to me to share my perspectives and hear
those of other young(er) people." (Don't you love it when people doing prestigious international work envy you? We are kind of enviable, aren't we, teacher friends?)
If he's so excited about sharing, I thought, maybe he'd share with
my kids too! Knowing that my amigo lives
nowhere near NC and missed my wedding a few years back for lack of transportation there to here, I was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to make it here to speak to the kiddos in person. But how cool would it be if he could talk to them while he was IN Argentina?
So about a month and several emails later, we pulled it off.
I passed on some points of curiosity from the kiddos, invited Noriega and her 3rd & 4th period classes, downloaded
Skype, downloaded
Audacity to my laptop, got Sr. Huertero to pick up a microphone from his
place of business, and eventually got it cleared with the
big man (one false start because he had to check it out with tech services to be sure all was kosher), and hooked my laptop up to the speakers usually used for listening to Spanish music.
We had agreed on 15 minutes per class, but it all was too awesome for only 15 minutes. Gaurav talked to 3rd for about 25 and then 4th for about 40. I played the 25 minute one for my folks, and they enjoyed it, and not just because they remember Gaurav!
I'm working on making little podcasts out of both presentations (fixing the sound quality, as I had to hold the mike up to the speaker to record him--did not download the un-free skype recording program...plus, I love you Gaurav, but you said "um" about 20 times in each class!). I'll be posting them here and on my class webpage as soon as they're ready.
PS check out some of the children's books from this semester! The best will be read on family reading night in April. 
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oh, and did i mention that Gaurav's a hottie?