So yesterday I went to school, and I think that the course of the day accurately describes my life in Peace Corps. First of all I should say that I waited a while to call the principal the day before to remind her that I was coming, and she didn't answer, so they didn't probably know I was coming. When I got there the principal wasn't there and neither was another teacher. Since there are only 6 that means that a third were gone... So I found the one who was in charge and told her that I was there to observe lessons. Unfortunately I forgot to say "health" lessons, so she invited me in and I ended up sitting in on a 30 minute math lesson. So to stop myself from shouting out all the answers to the elementary school math problems I started doing random math problems in my notebook, and pretty much did that the whole time. Eventually the teacher left without saying anything to me, and I figured out that she had gone to make a snack for the whole school, and that she wasn't coming back until snack time was over. Since I was supposed to be observing her lesson, I decided that this would be a good time to leave, so I did. I went and found another teacher who said that he had a lesson prepared. Lo and behold, he did! It was a health lesson and everything! Even more exciting, he is 20 years old and just started working there a month ago, so he had missed most of our presentations, but still did a good-ish job at his health lesson.
So that was a nice surprise, and then I hung out for snack and recess, and after recess went to the next teacher's class. That teacher had good activities (charades!) but he was trying to hard and his lesson went on for a really long time. We like lessons that last no more than 15 minutes, because at some point the kids lose focus, as does the teacher. Anyway, so that was alright, but I wasn't terribly impressed so I left and went to the last class, which happened to be kindergarten. Apparently they get out 30 minutes earlier than the other kids, which I didn't know until the teacher told me that she only had 6 minutes to do the health lesson. I said that's fine, because we like short lessons. She proceeded to make my day...
So she started with a song that I did with them when I did lessons there a couple weeks ago called Pin Pon. It involves dancing around and silly movements, and when a group of 5 year-olds does it it's adorable. It was made better because that class has one girl in it who seems to be both brilliant and adorable who remembered that the version that I use is different than the one that they're used to, and she made the teacher fix it whenever she got it wrong. The teacher then proceeded to ask all the right questions to get the kids to think about what they need to do daily hygiene-wise. Then, as if I wasn't already pumped enough, she went back to whatever the lesson had been before I came in, which it turned out, was the 5-year-olds doing a choreographed dance to music from a CD. And they sang along in calm and pretty little 5 year-old voices, and one of them harmonized on accident. And I left the room smiling, and my day was good...
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Monday, July 26, 2010
26 July 2010
This month has been strange because we have spent so much time away from our sites for work-related events. We had the 4th of July party plus the two days before it, and then we just finished a week long series of classes at the office that is called reconnect. There were two days of health related training and then three days of Spanish classes. The end result of this week is that I know how to say a lot of things in Spanish that sound perfectly harmless, but can be taken to mean something completely different. Also that I feel like I haven't worked with my schools for a month...
Today will be my first day back, and I think it should be okay, but it has potential to be frustrating. I'm going to a school that had already been in our program for two years, but with a volunteer who was doing a lot more teaching the kids than I do. According to the principal, they know nothing about most of the program, so I have to start with them as if they have never had a volunteer before. So today I'm giving them a presentation about "What is Healthy Schools." Ideally it goes the same way it always does, but we'll see.
I recently took a trip to the city of Huehuetenango which is in the department of Huehuetenango (the capital cities often have the same names as the department, in case that seems weird). I visited some Mayan ruins which were beautiful and later went to a fair and rode a ferris wheel. I would like to mention that the ferris wheels here are run at about 10 times the speed of the ones in the US, so it's a little different than you might expect. I posted some pictures of the ruins on facebook if you're interested. I had a strange realization moment while I was in the ruins. It was my dad's birthday, and I remembered while I was there, so I called him from the top of one of them. When I started to describe to him where I was, I realized how different my life is right now than it has been in the past. Ruins are pretty common here, so I hadn't been thinking about the fact that nothing like that exists in the US. Makes me realize how my perceptions of normal have changed already...
This month has been strange because we have spent so much time away from our sites for work-related events. We had the 4th of July party plus the two days before it, and then we just finished a week long series of classes at the office that is called reconnect. There were two days of health related training and then three days of Spanish classes. The end result of this week is that I know how to say a lot of things in Spanish that sound perfectly harmless, but can be taken to mean something completely different. Also that I feel like I haven't worked with my schools for a month...
Today will be my first day back, and I think it should be okay, but it has potential to be frustrating. I'm going to a school that had already been in our program for two years, but with a volunteer who was doing a lot more teaching the kids than I do. According to the principal, they know nothing about most of the program, so I have to start with them as if they have never had a volunteer before. So today I'm giving them a presentation about "What is Healthy Schools." Ideally it goes the same way it always does, but we'll see.
I recently took a trip to the city of Huehuetenango which is in the department of Huehuetenango (the capital cities often have the same names as the department, in case that seems weird). I visited some Mayan ruins which were beautiful and later went to a fair and rode a ferris wheel. I would like to mention that the ferris wheels here are run at about 10 times the speed of the ones in the US, so it's a little different than you might expect. I posted some pictures of the ruins on facebook if you're interested. I had a strange realization moment while I was in the ruins. It was my dad's birthday, and I remembered while I was there, so I called him from the top of one of them. When I started to describe to him where I was, I realized how different my life is right now than it has been in the past. Ruins are pretty common here, so I hadn't been thinking about the fact that nothing like that exists in the US. Makes me realize how my perceptions of normal have changed already...
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Recent events
July 6, 2010
So it's been a while again, eventually I'm going to have to stop saying that... Things have been going really well here, with my life and with my work. I have Guatemalan friends who I enjoy hanging out with, and this may blow your mind, but one of them invited me to a LAN party (google it if you're confused) at his house to play counter strike... It hasn't happened yet, but I'm excited about the prospect. Work has been going great. We updated our presentation that we do to explain to the teachers about our project, and today we gave it to our biggest school (over 1000 kids!) and it was really fun. We taught them a few songs and made them dance and generally had a goofy and fun time. They participated a lot more than I was expecting, so it went over really well with them. I'm starting to feel like the teachers and directors know who I am, and that they are comfortable with me, which is a wonderful feeling. Of course we hadn't had school for two weeks, so this might be just a false high after two really successful day back, but still, I'm very optimistic.
I haven't mentioned this before, but sometimes I strike up conversations with random people on the street, and it usually turns out to be a really positive thing. Old men especially, because they like to sit for hours on the corners chatting with each other. I just walk over and introduce myself and we talk about life and my project and their perceptions of Americans and my perceptions of Guatemala and it's all great. I don't know if other volunteers do this or not, but they really should. It's a lot harder for the girls, I know, because they really can't approach random men on the street without breaking some social norms, but even chatting with the market women or women working in stores has been good for me. Everyone is curious who the giant gringo is, so they generally enjoy finding out...
Last week we had a few days of activities leading up to the 4th of July party, and they were really fun. We had a basketball tournament that you guys who haven't seen me play basketball might think I would have been helpful in, but I really wasn't. I watched all the World Cup games at the office in a lounge with a bunch of other volunteers, which is much more fun than watching them by myself, and all the games were fantastic and dramatic. On Saturday there were some soccer games, and I discovered that I should never be asked to play midfield, because that requires an awful lot more running than my body prefers to do. In the afternoon we had a BBQ with almost all the Guatemalan volunteers (there were probably over 150 of us there, we have over 200 in country), and in the evening we hung out in Antigua. I'm not sure why we celebrated the 4th of July on the 3rd, but my guess is because it was a Saturday, which is more convenient.
My birthday is coming up this weekend, and so far I have very little control over what is happening. My closest Guatemalan friend has the same birthday as I do, so he invited me to lunch with his family. Then my host family told me they are going to make dinner for me, so I guess I just have the morning free... I am in charge of making my own cake, because most Guatemalans don't know how to bake, so they were planning on buying me a cake, but store-bought cakes here are not great, so I'm going to use some of the brown sugar that I have received from the states to make my favorite cake, Irish Potato Cake with caramel frosting.
Thanks to everyone for reading, and for caring enough to follow what's going on with me. I have found that I really value the wonderful connections I have made over the course of my life, and I think about you all often. Thank you for being part of my life.
So it's been a while again, eventually I'm going to have to stop saying that... Things have been going really well here, with my life and with my work. I have Guatemalan friends who I enjoy hanging out with, and this may blow your mind, but one of them invited me to a LAN party (google it if you're confused) at his house to play counter strike... It hasn't happened yet, but I'm excited about the prospect. Work has been going great. We updated our presentation that we do to explain to the teachers about our project, and today we gave it to our biggest school (over 1000 kids!) and it was really fun. We taught them a few songs and made them dance and generally had a goofy and fun time. They participated a lot more than I was expecting, so it went over really well with them. I'm starting to feel like the teachers and directors know who I am, and that they are comfortable with me, which is a wonderful feeling. Of course we hadn't had school for two weeks, so this might be just a false high after two really successful day back, but still, I'm very optimistic.
I haven't mentioned this before, but sometimes I strike up conversations with random people on the street, and it usually turns out to be a really positive thing. Old men especially, because they like to sit for hours on the corners chatting with each other. I just walk over and introduce myself and we talk about life and my project and their perceptions of Americans and my perceptions of Guatemala and it's all great. I don't know if other volunteers do this or not, but they really should. It's a lot harder for the girls, I know, because they really can't approach random men on the street without breaking some social norms, but even chatting with the market women or women working in stores has been good for me. Everyone is curious who the giant gringo is, so they generally enjoy finding out...
Last week we had a few days of activities leading up to the 4th of July party, and they were really fun. We had a basketball tournament that you guys who haven't seen me play basketball might think I would have been helpful in, but I really wasn't. I watched all the World Cup games at the office in a lounge with a bunch of other volunteers, which is much more fun than watching them by myself, and all the games were fantastic and dramatic. On Saturday there were some soccer games, and I discovered that I should never be asked to play midfield, because that requires an awful lot more running than my body prefers to do. In the afternoon we had a BBQ with almost all the Guatemalan volunteers (there were probably over 150 of us there, we have over 200 in country), and in the evening we hung out in Antigua. I'm not sure why we celebrated the 4th of July on the 3rd, but my guess is because it was a Saturday, which is more convenient.
My birthday is coming up this weekend, and so far I have very little control over what is happening. My closest Guatemalan friend has the same birthday as I do, so he invited me to lunch with his family. Then my host family told me they are going to make dinner for me, so I guess I just have the morning free... I am in charge of making my own cake, because most Guatemalans don't know how to bake, so they were planning on buying me a cake, but store-bought cakes here are not great, so I'm going to use some of the brown sugar that I have received from the states to make my favorite cake, Irish Potato Cake with caramel frosting.
Thanks to everyone for reading, and for caring enough to follow what's going on with me. I have found that I really value the wonderful connections I have made over the course of my life, and I think about you all often. Thank you for being part of my life.
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