Testing, Tryouts, and Tasty treats! (February 24, 2011)

Well, I don’t know when exactly it happened, but at some point, Kaunda started to feel like home. Perhaps it was when one of my classes was interrupted by a student sent by another teacher just to inform me that there were avacados for sale for the first time. Or maybe it was when I was hanging out with some of the teachers one Friday night and witnessed them all devour some cooked pheasant pieces that someone brought by, reminding me all to well of my roommates and I devouring Panera’s baked goods that Teresa used to bring back to the house on Friday nights. Or maybe it was when I started to feel comfortable asking the students to do anything for me- I asked a few who stopped by asking me soccer questions to go and get me some water, and a few minutes later, I had another girl come by begging for another bucket because she wanted to go get some for me, too. Regardless, I’ve started to really love my community and am glad to be feeling so positive about everything right now!

As we say here in Mozambique, things “are walking”- classes are in full swing, I am definitely feeling like I have friends in the community, I’m holding soccer try-outs next week, and my house is getting a little more full every day. I am nearing the end of another long stretch at site, and it was way more bearable than the last time I spent this long at site without leaving. I’m heading back down to Moatize for the weekend, and although I am really excited to see the Tete girls again (and to be back in cell phone service), I’m not as anxious to leave as I used to get. I’m still excited to see what civilization is like again, but I don’t have as much of a count-down mindset as I did at first. And that’s a good thing! Here are some highlights of the past couple weeks:

*Lunch with the Peace Corps Regional Director for Africa. He was touring several African countries and it was interesting to hear how Mozambique compares with other countries. Apparently in Zambia, all volunteers co-teach with a Zambian teacher in the classroom. Also, we’ve heard this before, but apparently the Mozambique program overall is a little less rough than other countries’ programs. Most other African volunteers live in much more rural communities… like Kaunda…

*The start of local dialect lessons. Another teacher is meeting with me twice a week (for free) to teach me the language. So far, we’ve just learned greetings and a little bit of how verbs work. If we keep going at the rate we are, I should have a pretty decent vocabulary after 2 years – I’m pretty excited about that! Still, sitting in a classroom getting local dialect phrases translated into Portuguese so I can understand them just blows my mind a little.

*Learning the phrase for “wedgie” in Portuguese. This wasn’t even intentional. I was sitting at one of the little bars Friday night with some professors, and one of them was standing up (and had a pretty bad wedgie) so another one commented “Hey Carlos, your pants are meeting,” to which I couldn’t help but crack up.

*Mozambican cooking lessons with one of the fellow professoras. Not that I have any real interest in learning how to make cooked pumpkin leaves and xima, but I figured it was a good opportunity to start hanging out with women more. Plus, cooking in Mozambique kills a good 4 hours from start to finish, so it was a nice way to spend a Sunday. Her husband is the somewhat-condescending “counterpart” figure, but he wasn’t home for most of the time, so it was nice to just get to chat with her. Sure enough, when he got home, it took about 5 minutes before he felt like he needed to lecture me on article agreement for feminine/masculine nouns. As if I haven’t ever learned this before. Grr.

*Opening up the world of English speaking with other professors. They ALL want to learn English. Until now, I’ve been pretty insistent on speaking only Portuguese, but now I’m feeling comfortable enough with my language to start humoring their attempts at English conversation. When I sneezed today, one of the professors thought he was being so polite as to declare “My God!” for me… I corrected him that it is actually “God bless you.” This also brings up some pretty interesting topics. I have translated Eminem songs, explained that no, Westlife isn’t really popular in America anymore, nor were they ever that popular, and been able to answer that it is, in fact, a lie the condoms contain the HIV virus. Lucky me!

*Successfully making both granola and hummus. I’ve been thinking about these for a while, and finally got all the stuff together to make them. Delicious! I also made some pitas to eat with the hummus, and then topped them off with cucumbers, tomatoes, and some parmesan cheese. It’s funny- I wonder if some of the things I used to buy back home I’ll start to just make for myself, like these things, or tortillas, or pasta. They really aren’t hard. I’ll get back to you in 3 years on that one.

*My first biology test. Out of all 5 classes, I had 4 students pass (and to pass you just need a 50%). I thought I would be a little discouraged, but I’m surprisingly not too down about it. It was not a difficult test, and they all admitted to not studying, so I don’t feel bad. I am looking at it more as an opportunity to show them that they will actually need to prepare for tests in biology. I also caught probably 20 cheaters, and it felt good to show them that they can’t get away with that stuff in my classroom. I am giving them the opportunity to do corrections for homework, so hopefully that will help them get a little closer to passing my class. I talked to another teacher, and he explained that it’s not bad for them to fail, that many of them should not be moving on to the next grade if they can’t even read or write. “Students of the farm,” is what they refer to them as. I feel guilty, but I’m here to teach, not to just advance students that do not deserve it. Hopefully the scores improve as they get used to me, though.

*The start of sports. Yesterday we had our first “sports department” meeting, where they mostly discussed where they were going to put the various fields and courts. I’m anxious to see how basketball goes in the absence of baskets, but I’m hopefully going to get something worked out with Audrey and Helen’s technical school to get the welders to make us some hoops. When they told me I was in charge of sports, I assumed I’d just be playing a bunch of pick up games. Apparently, though, we have actual tryouts next week that I am judging! Or so they say… we’ll see what actually happens. I hope I don’t sound cynical already, but I do know that people in Kaunda talk a little more than they act. For example, my fence gate that was supposed to be built like 4 weeks ago just started being built today. But I’m still super excited about it!

Well, that’s about all I’ve got for now. Not sure when this post will actually get posted, but hopefully fairly soon! I hope, as always, that things are going well back home and that spring is starting to find you all. The song for the post is “Take it Easy” by The Eagles, just because it’s a happy song that always puts me in a good mood. And I’m in a good mood now!

Lesson planning, Latrine guarding, and Lame stories (at least you were warned…) -Feb 9, 2011

Wow, what a short week! It’s only Wednesday, but seeing as I’m leaving tomorrow afternoon, it feels already like the weekend. I have been going down to the city on Saturdays to shop, so pushing that up to a Thursday really cuts the week down. All of the sudden, I’m actually kind of busy! The past two days have been fairly full with lesson planning, teaching, and grading. I decided to collect my first homework assignment this week. I warned the students about it at least 20 times in each class, yet still had probably a 50% completion rate. I was expecting this… we’d been warned about it by every volunteer who came to training. Still, it was hard to not get bummed at seeing the number of students who just ignored the assignment. In one of my classes, I maybe had 10 out of 40 actually try. And who knows how many of those just copied it (hmm, they all have the same wrong answers, interesting…). I was feeling like kind of a failure, but then my next class seemed to take it more seriously. My teaching day ended on a high note, too, when I actually got the students to laugh at a joke. I’d been trying so hard to get at least a smile. Finally today when I did my usual “you have to do homework to pass” lecture, I also added my usual “and you all want to pass biology don’t you? Because it’s your favorite subject?” and they finally gave me some giggles. You have no idea how good that felt.

Since I wrote a longer entry just last week, I don’t have all that much news to share. I do have some interesting stories, though:

*Bank drama: When I was down in Moatize, I decided to hit up the ATM on the way out of town. Audrey went before me with no problems. I put my card in, enter my pin, and then wait. And wait. And wait. And finally see that the ATM has frozen, with my card and pin happily inside. Great. Eventually the screen unfroze and went back to the start, but my card decided to stay in. Since the bank wasn’t opened, this prolonged my stay in Moatize an extra night so I could go to the bank the next morning. The next day, I headed over with my passport in tow, ready to fight for the card back. I’m not sure if “fight” really ended up being the correct word. I just walked in, said the machine at my card, and they handed me the card that was in the machine- no question of my name, identity, nothing. At least I got it back, although I can’t say my trust has deepened in the Mozambican banking system.

*Menina drama: I wrote before about getting a “menina” to help me with water. Well, it’s been nice… when she shows up. I usually have to go out and find her and ask her to come to my house, which is just as much of a hassle as actually getting water myself. I am perfectly capable of doing that, though, so if she doesn’t show up I just head over to the pump. One of my students apparently saw me, and approached me later in the day asking if I needed a menina in my house. I told her I already had one, but she kept asking me questions and I thought she was telling me she wanted to see my house. Thinking she was just curious, I told her she could stop by the next day to chat at my house if she wanted. Sure enough, she showed up, and I explained once again that I did not need any help around the house. She kept asking the same thing, and I could not understand what she meant. Finally, I realized she was asking to live with me. I politely turned her down.

*Latrina drama: Living close the school is great, except for the fact that my latrine also lives close to the school. The school has bathrooms (bathrooms meaning outdoor latrines), but I don’t know how clean they are. Sometimes the other teachers ask to use mine during the day, which I’m fairly okay with. I was washing clothes the other day, though, and noticed a couple students coming out of my bath house (not my latrine). I asked them why they were in the bath house and not the latrine, and she told me that she only had to pee. Great. She didn’t poo in my bath house (that’s only the goats), she only peed where I shower… so much better.

Well, my life just isn’t that exciting, I’m sorry to say. I’m glad things are fairly easy and peaceful right now, but I do wish I had some funnier stories. Ah well, there’s always next week. J

Tomorrow I will head down to the city in order to catch the early morning bus down to Chimoio for the weekend. Fast internet, Shoprite, potential packages to pick up, Indian food, pizza, friends… the only thing that could get me more excited was if a Dairy Queen magically popped up in the middle of Chimoio with the limited edition Tag-A-Long blizzard toppings fully stocked. If wishes were fishes, right? Anyway, the song for the post is “Little Secrets” by Passion Pit. I’ve had this on my iPod for a while and just still can’t get enough of it. Enjoy!

Funky days, Feriados (Holidays), and Full Classrooms- Feb 4, 2011

It’s hard to believe I am starting my 5^th month here in Mozambique! Crazy. I’m happy to say things are going as well as I hoped they would be by this point, if not better. I really feel like Kaunda is a good fit for me, and I really do enjoy teaching. I don’t get the anxiety before teaching that I thought I would get and am even able to be myself in the classroom (even if the students just give me blank stares). 8^th graders are just still pretty little! It’s a little deceiving since my school only goes up to 10^th grade- the 8^th graders seem close to being “done” with school. I have to remind myself of how young they are. I think of myself in 8^th grade- with my full braces, cheerleading uniform, and extreme self-consciousness. Perhaps expecting my students to fully understand me when I talk about where the genetic material is located in a prokaryotic cell versus a eukaryotic cell, especially since I am explaining it in a language that is foreign to me and maybe a quarter of my students, is asking a little much. I’ve found there are other things I can emphasize, though, and feel good about it, such as making sure I tell them they are intelligent many times throughout the class. I also frequently say things such as “You all love biology” or “Biology is your favorite subject with your favorite teacher” hoping that those little sayings will stick, as well. Guilty. I’ve already found the students I think will really get to like. There’s one girl in one of my classes that I think may be the only one who has understood and completed my homework assignments out of all 5 classes. It makes me really excited to get the secondary projects started so I can have some more interactions with students like this girl!

Outside of the classroom, things are going pretty well, too. I had a really fun birthday weekend down in Moatize. My little town wasn’t as hopping this week now that the first week is over. Several teachers just weren’t here Monday or Tuesday, something to do with their money being delayed. Since they have to go to the city to go to the bank (as do I), this was apparently an excuse for not coming to work. Who knows. Regardless of their reasons, there are several periods that the students just don’t have a teacher. While this is not a good thing, it may actually work out well for me if I ever want to travel for the weekend- I can give my classes at other times if I have to miss any days of teaching. But anyway, many teachers seemed to be absent this week, and I’m thinking that’s what most weeks are going to be like. I have found a few social outlets, though. On Monday, I was in kind of a funk after such a fun weekend, so I forced myself out to find SOMEONE to hang out with. I ran into one of my favorite female teachers (secretly hoping she’ll become my “Monique,” for those of you who get what that means) and asked if I could accompany her to her house so I would “know it.” She gladly invited me over, and showed me her TV and satellite dish. She put it on CNN, and immediately asked if I understood it (it was in English). Although everyone in this town tries to speak English with me, they all find it necessary to ask me if I understand anything in English, like music or TV. Yes… I speak English… I understand it.  Anyway, I stayed there and chatted with her for a while, and it definitely helped me get out of my weird little funk. I think those are just going to happen every once in a while.

As I was teaching Wednesday, one of my students also informed me that Thursday was a holiday and we didn’t have school. Would have been nice to know. I was pretty bummed, since Thursday is usually my busiest day, but it turned out to be a pretty fun holiday! There was a ceremony and “cultural activities.” Everyone told me that things would start at 7. So, taking this into account, I planned to be ready by 9, which is when it would probably actually start. Well, 11:00 finally rolled around and they decided it was time to get things going. The first thing to do is read the agenda out loud, which is always one of my favorite things to hear. It’s 11:00, and someone starts reading “At 8:00, we will have this, at 8:30, we’ll have this person talk, at 9:00…” and so on. So formal. I hope no one notices my smirk as this is going on. It was pretty cool to see the cultural dancing, though, and afterwards I spent the afternoon hanging out with the other professors. I did have a beer at site for the first time, which everyone was pretty excited about. There were other female professors drinking, so I thought it was culturally acceptable. They were all shocked at how long it took me to drink one beer, too, so I don’t think I’ve gained a lush reputation. Sure enough, at school today, about every teacher I ran into, whether they were there or not, commented on how I drank beer yesterday for the holidays. Kaunda talks! It’s similar to how everyone in town knows I do not eat meat. Oh, living in a fishbowl, the joys. They were not judgmental about it at all, though. Rather, they seemed excited that I do something that they like to do, too. Whatever it takes to make me seem normal, I guess. Even so, I think I’ll save the drinking at site for the holidays. It was fun to just hang out for the whole afternoon with the other professors.

Another high point of the week was that, because I stayed out later than I ever have before (which was only 7:30), I got to really take a look at the stars for the first time- and let me just say- WOW. If you really want to see a full night sky, head out to the African bush. It was phenomenal. I’ve looked at them in Moatize, but that’s not nearly as isolated as this is. So, the song for the post is “Yellow” by Coldplay.

Well, as usual, I hope things are going well back home. Thinking of you all frequently!

Biology, Bean burgers, and Birthdays!

Biologia, Bean Burgers, and Birthdays!

Well, folks, it’s official. I really am a teacher in Mozambique! The schedule was finally finished last week on Thursday, and we started actually giving classes this Monday. I lucked out (although I don’t really know how much luck was involved when I mentioned wanting either Mondays or Fridays off about 15 times) and only have night classes on Mondays, so I got back to site after a weekend away on Monday morning. I was a little nervous, seeing as I have to walk right through the school to get to my house, and I was still a little unsure of the rules on not being present for the start of the day when you aren’t actually teaching. I clearly looked as nervous as I felt, trying to avoid eye contact with everyone. Fail. One of the teachers hissed over to me (that’s how you get someone’s attention here, have I mentioned that? Yes, I have actually hissed at a waitress to get her attention- guilty) and gave me a thumbs up. So was I good? Maybe. Still a little nervous. I put my things in my house and immediately went out to greet the other teachers, hoping that it would look like I was just strolling out of my house after sleeping in a little late. I found a group sitting under a tree, my director included. They all seemed fine, and when I mentioned I didn’t have class until night time, they all questioned as to why I was back so early. So, I’m cleared. I can get back to site Monday afternoon and be safe if I ever want to leave for the weekend.

Kaunda is quite the place when school is going! People were not lying when they claimed it would be full once school started. It is true. And I absolutely love it. Even if I’m not teaching, I can just hang out outside of my house and there are guaranteed to be teachers around. There are 4 buildings to my school, with 11 classrooms in total. The secondary school all meets in the morning (6:45-12), along with a couple middle school classes and primary classes scattered throughout the town (I think some meet in churches). The afternoon is mostly primary school and the rest of the middle school. The night courses, which is one class each of 8^th, 9^th, and 10^th grade, meet in the only building with electricity from 6-11:45. I have morning classes Tuesday-Friday and I have the first night class on Monday and Tuesday nights. My schedule is pretty spread out, but even with 10 hours I feel pretty busy! As it turns out, it’s fairly exhausting to teach biology in a foreign language to students that don’t even speak that language!

My classes have been going pretty well. I feel that I am improving with each one. The first one was quite the struggle- participation is non-existent! I had a great class planned with lots of interaction… not going to work here. I adjusted accordingly, though, and the rest of the week went much better. I have yet to get any laughs, but I think that will come. 8^th grade biology is mostly systems, so it is not too much theory, which I am glad about. I think that would be pretty challenging with these kids! They are still pretty little at 8^th grade. There are several students who only speak the local dialect, and another handful that can’t read or write. So, I am glad that this year I am mostly just presenting information that they have to memorize. I am still going to try to make it fun and interesting, though! I tried to suggest that biology was SO interesting to my class this morning, though, and I didn’t get too much of a response.

I’ve been staying pretty busy when I’m not in the classroom. I usually “rest” from 12-3. I’m sure the whole community assumes I’m just sleeping (that’s what they do, I think), but I am usually cooking, reading, lesson planning, or something like that. Around 3 I usually head out to “passear,” which usually means just finding someone to talk to for an hour or so. I’ve been successful every day! Today is the first day I’ve allowed myself to just relax at home for the afternoon. I wanted to clean up before I leave for the weekend, and wanted to write this blog post!

Tomorrow I will head to Moatize for the big birthday weekend! It has never felt less like my birthday. I can’t stop sweating, for one thing, and I’m pretty sure my mom isn’t sending flowers all the way to Kaunda. But, I do have fun plans in store. All the Tete volunteers should be meeting up in Moatize for a little celebration. I’m pretty excited! We’ll see how “Hotel Moatize” (as we called it at Christmas time) functions now that it has a Mozambican man living in it! I’m sure you can read more about that in Audrey’s blog…

Some other interesting tid bits of my last week:

*The goat that would not leave my latrine. I had to find a crianca to help me get it out of there.

*The goat that got stuck in the iron barred door that I had closed as it was trying to get into my house.

*A drunk dial from my principal and counter part.

*The addition of a “menina”- one of the teachers arranged a student to help me with water. Everyone is convinced I cannot possibly do all this “work” by myself, so they went ahead and got me help. I’m sure I will come to be pretty thankful for it!

*The switch of the focus from the fact that I shouldn’t be sitting alone (finally proved them wrong! I do socialize!) to the fact that I shouldn’t be eating alone. In other words, the other teachers would love for me to cook for them.

*At least 4 more people who have told me they would like to run with me in the morning and made plans to meet me. No one has showed up yet.

*A cockroach playing my guitar. I woke up around 2 am to my guitar strings being plucked. Hm… It’s now dead.

*A fantastic trip to Zobue including, but not limited to, bean burgers, hummus, cinnamon rolls, goodies from America, a trip up a mountain, and fantastic company! Tete is on the map.

So there it is! This probably won’t be posted until Monday, but I hope you all are doing well! I hope you are eating lots of cheese, wearing lots of sweatshirts, drinking lots of cold water, and sitting on lots of couches. Those are things I would like to do.

The song for the post is “Campus” by Vampire Weekend. It’s super catchy. That’s all.

Charcoal, Car rides, and Confusion - January 18th, 2011

What a week! I am nearing the end of my longest stretch at site without jetting off to Tete City for a day (or a couple of days…) to find the comforts of cell phone service and “take-away” food. Instead, I challenged myself to see how long I can stretch out my fresh vegetables and how sane I can really stay without any other English speakers or a cell phone I could call another English speaker with. Besides a quick trip down to visit Eden for an afternoon, I’ve just had the other professors, the criancas, the goats, and myself to talk to. And I’m doing fine! I’m not quite sure when I’ll get to post this, but here are some highlights of the last couple weeks:

*Tuesday: My first experience with a charcoal grill. We didn’t have power for a few days last week, which is normally no big deal… when I am stocked with bread and peanut butter, that is. I was looking at a couple green peppers, tomatoes, and onions, and no easy means to cook anything. The first powerless night I made a nice little “salad” by chopping up some veggies and tossing them with oil, vinegar, salt, Italian seasoning, and, I kid you not, folks…. Beef stock. I was seriously ready to eat my arm and found some of this on my shelf, so figured, why not add some protein? Disgusting in retrospect. But I ate it. The following day, between my tests to see if the power was back on every, oh, ten minutes or so, I was desperately planning what I could eat. At one point, I was convinced I could make it on some tomatoes and a few Jenny crackers (have I described these yet? They are delicious), but when I saw that my tomatoes were no good, I realized it was time to swallow my pride and ask for help getting my charcoal burner going. Another teacher helped me, and I was happily able to make some curried potatoes. Probably the most rewarding meal I’ve had in a while.

*Wednesday: Real ice cream. Not soft serve. Not gas station fudge pops. Ice cream. The other Tete girls and I go to this café about every time we are in the city, and every time we have asked if they have ice cream and been told no. It’s on the menu, but that doesn’t always matter at Mozambican restaurants. Well, they had it last week. It even came with a little cookie spoon. Audrey and I almost cried, it was so good. We may not have the beach or the parties of the other provinces, but let me tell you, sitting in an air conditioned café eating ice cream was about as awesome as I think a Peace Corps volunteer’s Wednesday afternoon can get. And of course, what would ice cream be (or any dairy for that matter these days) without the next morning stomach ache to follow? But so worth it.

*Thursday: Witnessing a full jug (and these are African water jugs… 20 L) of wine being spilled of a chapa. Enough said.

*Friday: Having the same conversation at least 5 times with the same person… 5 times in English and 5 times in Portuguese. There’s this hot-shot Mozambican (I have no idea what he does) that sometimes stops in my village and likes to buy people things. Last time he was there, I walked away with a soda and can of tuna to go. This time, he bought me a Fanta, and then offered to drive me up to Manje with some other professors “just to have something to do.” Since my day was pretty empty (shockingly), I agreed. Big mistake. There I was, this hot shot on one side, and my counterpart figure (a fairly arrogant English teacher) on the other side, riding up to Manje. Along the way, he was telling me how my Portuguese is like a tractor, and when I am not sure of what to say, I just need to say “no futuro” (in the future) or “normalmente” (normally), and people will understand what I mean. Apparently some Belgians that worked with Doctors without Borders did this and everyone understood them. Now, I don’t know about you, but this makes absolutely no sense to me in either language. Perhaps I heard it wrong? Well, no need to worry, he told me that story about every 10 minutes, and by the end of the ride, I have no doubt that that is in fact the story in its entirety. I was about ready to scream. In case I wasn’t understanding, he also explained it to me in English about 10 more times. But, I got a new capulana, more tuna, some candles, green peppers, charcoal, and matches out of the ride… so worth the headache!

*Saturday: My first teacher meeting. Of course, the meeting started over an hour late (was I expecting anything different?) and then proceeded for at least 5 more hours. Not exaggerating. My director introduced me to everyone, and then started to tell a little anecdote about my first night here. How nice, right? Well, the story was about how I was confused as to which was my latrine and which was my shower house, so I had to run around with my flashlight looking in each one. Cute story, Director, thanks for telling all my future colleagues about that.

I also can’t talk about Saturday without mentioning the fact that I was accompanied on my evening jog by 5 barefooted criancas. For the whole time. Hilarious.

Oh, and it was also mentioned at the meeting what each teacher will be teaching. I am only teaching 5 classes of 8^th grade biology (10 hours a week), but also co-heading sports at my school. I tried to convey that I would like to teach more, but my principal told me I already have up to 25 hours with the FIFTEEN hours of sports I’ll be doing a week (!?), so I’ll apparently be pretty busy. Who knows. I’m a little bummed I’m not actually teaching more, but I have been thinking about it quite a bit (what else is there to do in Kaunda?), and I think that it will be pretty nice. I will hopefully still keep busy with all the extracurriculars, and that’s really where I’ll be able to build relationships and have an effect. Seeing as few of these students even complete high school (my school only goes up to 10^th grade), what they learn from me outside of the classroom will probably be more important than my biology lessons. Sour grapes, maybe, but I think it will be a fun year.

*Sunday: Realization that my mother’s teachings followed me to Africa (as if I didn’t already know this). I spent the day deep cleaning my house thinking how necessary it was to have a clean house for the start of the school year. Thanks, Sherry. My house actually looks pretty cute, now! I hopefully can post some pictures. It’s amazing what an extension cord can do. I was able to move my table into the center of the main room and put my little stove on the floor so there is actually room to sit at my table. I also hung some awesome pictures up (thanks, family!) and hung a capulana on the wall. It actually looks like I live there! So much more fun to come home to.

*Monday: My “first day of school.” This was really just the opening ceremony, which was extremely long and hot. I got to plant a tree for being the “newest” professor,” which was pretty cool. I also realized that I lucked out in terms of colleagues- there are lots of women professors, some of whom are also single (but most have kids). They are all pretty cool and one even asked if she could run with me in the morning! We’ll see if that really happens, but it was nice to think someone wants to hang out with me.

*Tuesday: My “first day of school” x 2. This was actually a pretty emotional day for me. For those of you that know me, you probably are aware of my fairly… obsessive compulsive tendencies. Well, Mozambique is not the place for these tendencies. I arrived way too early, again, and was told that the schedule still wasn’t ready. I was still supposed to be there, though, but no one seemed too concerned about telling me what I should be doing. I was getting very frustrated, especially seeing as I had no idea when my first lesson would actually be and I wanted to be prepared for it. All the teachers were telling me different things, but eventually someone helped me get started on working on lesson planning in the absence of classes. Apparently this week is “mostly for planning.” Might have been nice to tell me this earlier…

*Wednesday: My “first day of school” x 3. “We are giving lessons today!” everyone kept saying. Again, I’m just wandering around feeling like an idiot. “Don’t you have first day lessons to give, Professora?” Well, sure, but I have no one to give the lessons to… the schedule still is not done! It turns out that because I don’t have a class that I am the equivalent of “homeroom teacher” to, I still am off the hook for teaching. Please just say that from the start! My Type A personality cannot handle this! But, again, it all worked out because I could spend the morning working on lesson planning, and have another free afternoon. Which is where I sit right now. Tomorrow, the schedule may or may not be done, but even if it is, I’m just supposed to give a “Presentation of Professor” lesson… at least that’s what I think right now. We’ll see come tomorrow! Friday, I will head out of Kaunda and back into civilization. I think I’ll be ready!

Well, thank you for reading this incredibly long post. I certainly hope I get to post it! I hope things are going well back home. I can’t believe I am almost done with my 4^th month here! It’s amazing how time can still feel like it’s flying when every day just seems to crawl by.

The song of the post is “Run Around” by Blues Traveler. Maybe I can make this symbolic by saying that sometimes I feel like my school is “giving me the run around,” but I really was just listening to this while I was lesson planning the other night, and it just put me in a good, productive mood.

So, that’s it! Hopefully positive stories of teaching to come soon!

Pictures! In random order, sorry.

 My bedroom- cluttered, of course. It's actually clean right now, though. Hopefully soon a bed frame will be added.

 Bath house.

 Closet

 Christmas cookies.

 These are the criancas. And where they sit. And watch me.

 My house!

 Kitchen

 Lasagna

 Mexican food

 Mountain behind my house.

 Puppies

 School

 Wall of encouragement

2011!!!!

Happy New Year!
I hope 2011 found you all well. Down here in Kaunda, 2011 got off to a pretty good start. School finally starts one week from today, and I am pretty ready! Much to my surprise, though, the days have been filling up pretty well. Many of the teachers are moving back into town after their holiday trips, so it is nice to have some people around. I find a group of people to talk to every day, and I know my Portuguese is improving drastically as a result. I’ve also explored my village a little more. There is a mountain that I am pretty sure I can get to, and I’ve gotten close a couple times. It started to get a little sketchy, though, in the sense that I was starting to picture myself getting bitten by a black mamba snake and dying alone under the African sun, so I decided to wait until someone visits me to try to do the whole trek!

My house is starting to feel a little more like home. I made some little decorations and am anxiously awaiting the arrival of some pictures and other décor from my parents via Janet and Luc, 2 volunteers that were back in the States for the holidays and graciously offered to bring some things back for me. I’ve been asking around about getting some furniture, too, and I’m pretty sure once school starts and the town is back in “full swing,” I’ll be able to get some. I just want a table to sit at! Dinner time is my least favorite time of day. It’s dark outside, so I usually just stand in the middle of my living room/kitchen and eat as quickly as possible.

I should also mention that not once, but twice, have I had to shoo goats out of my house while I am writing this.

I’m still figuring out the social norms for women in my community. All the women teachers stop by my house to converse with me, and comment on how I am always sitting alone. This is totally not true and fairly irritating. I leave my house multiple times during the day, but none of the women are ever out to see me! Every day this week I have sat for a few hours with other teachers. Unfortunately, though, they are all men! I’ve seen other women with them a couple times, so I know it’s acceptable, but usually I am the only girl. It’s a bummer because if I want to be social, hanging with the men seems to be my only option unless I want to invite myself over to some woman’s house and help her cook. Perhaps when I get to know more women I will do that, but for now, the men it is. I try to be careful though; I only drink sodas and make sure to never have it be just me and one guy. The group dynamic seems pretty safe. Yesterday, a group of them walked me around to see where all the teachers live, too, so that was nice. I just want to find some female friends! I am just in a weird place because although I am a woman, I don’t quite have the same responsibilities that the women here have; I don’t have a whole family to cook for, I don’t have children to watch, I don’t have gallons of water to carry every day, Hopefully with more time, I’ll find my niche.

My counterpart figure returned from holiday yesterday. He greeted me with the traditional “Wow, you’ve gotten so fat” that most Mozambicans like to give me, and then today came over to comment on how dirty my house is (it’s not.) Ah, great to have him back. Luckily, without him around I have found lots of other “friends” to talk to! I have a feeling I’ll be hanging around with the younger teachers more as opposed to him. He’s nice enough, just very intimidating and doesn’t seem to respect me that much. Time will tell.

Well, I wish I had some more interesting stories to tell. Next week I will find out exactly what and when I’ll be teaching- I’m anxious to know! As of now, my most exciting moments consist of things like realizing I had packed a second box of dental floss. Similarly, though, my most upsetting moments are things like realizing that a goat had pooed in my bath house. Although I’m anxious for more excitement, I wouldn’t trade the dullness for worse low points, that’s for sure!

Tomorrow I will head to the City for the day, which is hopefully how I’ll get this post up! I have quite a few errands to run and will meet up with Audrey and Helen and also Janet and Luc to get my American goodies! Can’t wait. I do enjoy my relaxing time at site, but four consecutive days of having absolutely nothing on my agenda is about the max I can take. So, tomorrow’s trip is needed! After that, I’ll come back to just a week more of empty days before things really start to take off. Can’t wait to share more details of that!!!

I miss you all. The song for this post is another Rolling Stones pic- “She’s a Rainbow.” Great song, plus there are rainbows here almost every day! Puts me in a good mood.