Dan vs. Campus Involvement

Now that I am now officially "settled" into this strange new land, I figure I should start doing productive things. However, despite its popularity, going to karaoke bars and nightclubs at midnight and returning at 6am doesn't exactly appeal to me, so I've turned to some activities that are, shall we say, a little more creative.
First, I decided to join the worship team that plays for the weekly chapel services. fortunately, I play a very small instrument that can fit in my carry-on for the plane ride, and honestly, I think I own the only ukulele in this hemisphere. But it's fun to play and works for worship music. Unfortunately, worship team rehearses on Tuesday nights, when I have a very important evening class, so I've been coming to the last ten minutes of worship team rehearsal, then I go back to my dorm and run through the songs on my own, then I get up the next morning and perform them with the band. It's a great system, really.
On top of worship team, I decided to try out for LCC's production of The Crucible, and seeing as 10 guys auditioned for 9 male parts in the show, I got in. I'm playing Reverend Parris, the jerk of a pastor who first denies witchcraft, then later condemns the whole village, all to make himself look good. Oh yes, it's a change of pace from my usual comedic supporting role. The performances are in November, and I'm supposed to have long hair and a beard. We'll see how that goes...
As if that wasn't enough, my friend Brad and I have started a Swing Dance Club on campus. Not many Europeans have heard of Glenn or Benny or the Duke, but there was considerable interest so we met for the first time last Thursday and had a good turnout. Surprisingly, there were equal numbers of guys and girls - very uncommon for any event even remotely involving dancing. We taught some basic steps and a couple turns, it was pretty neat, and the Europeans really seemed to like it! Before you know it, people will start to rouge their knees and roll their stockings down, and all that jazz. I think we've started a cultural revolution.
Just in case I haven't earned my Campus Involvement Badge yet, I am doing one more thing. For my aforementioned TEIL class (for acronym overload and explanation, see previous post) I have to complete 40 hours of observation and teaching in a local High School, Ažuolyno Gimnazija. It's a public school in Klaipeda, and the teacher I am working with teaches English classes to 11th graders. Last week I was just observing and taking notes, but soon I'll be demonstrating my flawless pronunciation and neverending knowledge of grammar and linguistics by teaching some lessons. Actually it'll be kind of tricky, because although I can properly construct a sentence, I couldn't tell you whether I'm using Present Perfect tense or if my predicate parallels my subject phrase. I think I remember the preposition song, but I'm not sure if that will help me. There's alot about our language that we know how to do but we don't know how it works or what it's called. Hopefully I'll figure it out soon...
So, it's going to be a good semester. And oh yeah, I am taking classes too, as described in the last post. Don't worry I'll have time for, oh, what's it called, oh yeah - studying. Yeah that. I'll do some of that, I promise, Mom.
Next week we're taking a trip to Riga and Tallinn, the capitals of Latvia and Estonia, respectively, so I promise I'll have some new pictures of people doing weird poses in front of really old buildings, just you wait.