…a mug of hot chocolate would be nice!

The Winter Break is here! We wish you all a lovely holiday, filled with good food, quality family time, lots of fun and even more rest.

See you in the New Year!

Best,

Tarun, Manu, Zach, Steph, Jack and Victor

For his Sports Science class, Joao was tasked with cooking a high protein meal with plenty or iron and potassium to help with recovery after sport. He had to buy all the ingredients, cook them himself and plate it up!

He did quite a good job and made a very delicious and nutritious meal (details & recipe below):

Meal: Grilled Chicken Quinoa Bowl with Roasted Vegetables

• Carbohydrates: Quinoa and roasted sweet potatoes for glycogen replenishment.
• Proteins: Grilled chicken breast for muscle repair and recovery.
• Fats: Avocado slices for essential fatty acids and energy.

Micronutrients:

• Iron (from quinoa and spinach): To improve oxygen transport in the blood.
• Potassium (from sweet potatoes and avocado): To support electrolyte balance and prevent cramping.

Ingredients

• Protein: 150g grilled chicken breast (skinless, boneless)
• Carbohydrates:
• 1 cup cooked quinoa
• 1 cup roasted sweet potatoes (cubed)
• Fats:
• 1/2 avocado (sliced)
• 1 tsp olive oil (for roasting)

Micronutrient Sources:

• 1 cup steamed spinach
• 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes
• Seasoning: Salt, pepper, paprika, and a squeeze of lemon (vitamin C aids iron absorption)

Preparation

• Grill Chicken: Season the chicken with paprika, salt, and pepper. Grill until cooked through.
• Cook Quinoa: Rinse and cook quinoa according to package instructions.
• Roast Sweet Potatoes: Toss cubed sweet potatoes with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Roast at 200°C (400°F) for 25 minutes.
• Prepare Vegetables: Steam spinach lightly and slice avocado and tomatoes.
• Assemble: In a bowl, layer quinoa, sweet potatoes, spinach, and cherry tomatoes. Add grilled chicken and avocado slices. Top with lemon juice.

Nutritional Profile (Approximate)

• Calories: 600 kcal
• Carbohydrates: 60g
• Proteins: 40g
• Fats: 20g
• Iron: 6 mg
• Potassium: 1200 mg

Verdict: delicious.

..The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”

This evening we gathered once again for our biweekly reading club. It was cozy under our newly put up Christmas decorations.

It was quite an interesting session! Fanbo noticed that Enid Blyton likes to use the word “Excitement” a lot, sometimes 2 or 3 times on a page, which led to us talking about how there are programs that can scan an author’s entire works and identify their favorite words and phrases.

We talked about the names of things, and characters that we like because they remind us of certain people.

Adrian is particularly (that’s one of our words today!) liking the Outsiders, though he has correctly identified it as quite sad so far.

Rodrigo has been learning about Bag-End, Bilbo Baggins house, as well as Bilbo’s frustrating extended family.

Here are our words for today: Excitement, Particularly, Promising, & Marooned.

This weekend a whole Concha contingent headed over yonder to Disneyland Paris to enjoy a wonderful day of roller coasters, fireworks and Disney magic!

The Disney Crew at the gates of the Magic Kingdom!

“WE’VE GOT A HULK”

At the entrance and raring to go!

Simbaaaa

Out there, somewhere, there’s a Mickey missing a hand.

Pixar’s newest animated character in the movie “Tortuga”, we haaaaaaave Rodrigooooooooooo

“I’ve got little arms!”

La Piece de Resistance

The castle lit up beautifully, but just wait, they aren’t done yet!

A special show for the winter season! Absolutely stunning.

FIREBALL! What an impressive shot

The boys came back with some spoils of war from their trip to Disney (not pictured below is the coolest little baby Yoda figurine)

THEY ARE WORTHY!

Shunyu’s Creepy Crawlies

All in all, an incredible trip that I’m sure will last in their memories for a lifetime

A frosty, fiery, sleepy-head.

Blinks but an hour or two; and then,

A Blood-red orange, sets again.

– From Winter Time by Robert Louis Stevenson

With most of the boys away to Disneyland Paris this weekend, the house was very quiet.

Our boys enjoyed some basketball on Saturday morning…

And a lovely trip to the Montreux Christmas market on Sunday!

Quique and Firdavs with the glorious mountains in the background, and view over the Montreux shoreline that Deep Purple sang about in “Smoke on the Water”

Mr. Victor and Ms. Tania enjoying the Montreux market!

Some of the many food and crafts stalls for people to enjoy

This evening we had our Awards night!

There were three awards to be handed out:

The Boarding Life Awards, given to our boys that represent what it means to be a boarder here in CDL, which includes being passionate, responsible, kind and athletic.

Very deservedly, Sam, Eduardo and Alex won the awards for Concha.

The Activities Awards, given to our boys that are the most active, during the week and especially during the weekends! When they show up, they show up enthusiastic and ready to give it their all. These awards were given to Joao, Tim and Fanbo!

The Academic Award, given to the highest GPA in their entire grade, and with a 4.19 Sam blew the competition out of the water!

We are all very proud of our boys and what a wonderful way to celebrate their achievements!

And for those that were super close to getting them, don’t worry!

There’s always next semester 😉

This evening we enjoyed some lovely food from Portugal!

This evening, pretty much all of the Olympus basketball court was occupied by our Concha boys, there to play volleyball, basketball and badminton with Mr. Eleador.

Fanbo and Fanyang vs Gianni and Adrian

Zhengtai and Jiarui studying some racket science

Back in the house, some of our boys attempt todays Fitness Challenge – the Wheelbarrow Hold!

They got 1:45!

These two got 1:02!

This evening, we enjoyed some delicious food from Ghana!

We had a spiced beef & egg ragout with Waakye (peanut rice) and plantains for our main, and some Boflots (beignets) with a mango coulis for dessert.

Can anyone spot Mr Ronan?

The Readingmoot convened once again this evening.

Sam read through some of Kensuke’s Kingdom, and without knowing the name of the book, his description sounded like Life of Pi to Mr. Jack and the novel version of Castaway to me!

Rodrigo has been reading through the Fellowship of the Ring, which I am quite happy about as it’s one of my favorites! Tolkien loved to make up a bunch of quirky words, so Rodrigo came across words like mathom (an item that Hobbits have no immediate use for, but are unwilling to throw away) or a smial (the name for the hobbit-holes dug into the sides of hills)

Here are some of the new words that the boys wrote down and that we went over:

Ambush, Veranda, Gangway, Concentrate, Shawl, Delighted, Pridefulness, Crescendo, Encyclopedia, and Conflagration.