Day 4 - 26th September Discussions with senior students, traditional culture and another wedding!

Morning classesThis morning began with visits to English and life skills classes. Jan and Janet visited the English class with Teacher Fiona. Students were reading about a Malaysian wild life reserve. Their task was to work in a group to create a brochure to advertise the reserve for tourists. Students brainstormed some great ideas and then began their brochures. Work was done using paper and pencils - different from TSC where students would head straight to their netbooks and use Publisher to do the thinking about design and layout for them!

After the recess break we had a session with the Form 6 students. They were eager to find out about Tallangatta and Australian education opportunities. They were interested to know how the Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) operated in Australia and also about requirements to study in Australian universities which several were considering as an option in the future.

Monsopiad Cultural Village
In the afternoon we visited the Monsopiad Cultural Village. Monsopiad was a fearsome warrior who lived in the village of Kuai nearly 200 years ago. Monsopiad's main house is dedicated to the life  and times of Monsopiad and his descendants.Displays around the village demonstrate the way of life at that time including the rice barn and threshing process, blow pipes and dance performances.

In the evening we were privileged to attend another wedding celebration as part of the ceremonies liked to a traditional Malay wedding of the daughter of one of the SMKDPM staff members.
A traditional Malay wedding celebration extends over 3 or 4 days. The ceremony we attended was the evening before the actual wedding and involved the preparation and blessing of the bride, which still involved great ceremony and celebration.