I found out yesterday that one of the best students at Shepherds Junior, Leah, may be taken out of the school by her mother. Another volunteer, Andrea, who's there now, spoke with both Leah and her teacher Nancy. Nancy said that Leah's mother sometimes is unable to have any food in the house (not like in America, I mean zero), and that she must move Leah to a free school so that she can feed her children.
I believe I said in my last post something naive along the lines of "thank god they're all well taken care of, or I wouldn't be able to leave". I may have been deluding myself. I think I just can't comprehend the day-to-day struggles these people face. Leah looks happy, and is incredibly smart and mature. Of all the children, I probably thought she was the best taken care of.
Don't worry, I've obviously already offered to help figure out how to keep her at Shepherds, but you just never know.
I continued to receive gifts this week from the school. Teacher Angel (a teaching assistant who probably makes less than $1 per day) sent me home some material that's tied around one's waist as a traditional conga (skirt). I just don't even know how to show gratitude that matches their generosity.
Other than that, this week we painted the nurse's station at Nkoranga Hospital with our best buddy here, Diane. (Mom, you would love this woman. Her dog's her best friend, she's a Harley-driving nurse. We love her.) The conditions at the hospital are, as you might imagine, deplorable. They actually use glass IVs, the kind you see in like Civil War movies. We walked past the TB isolation ward, and the patient was sitting outside on the lawn rather than in his room. We also stopped by the torture chamber, I mean, maternity ward, where a red bucket labeled "Placenta" sat at the foot of the bed with god-knows-what muck inside. We walked past a baby lying in a bed with her eyes fixed and dilated facing the ceiling. God knows what's even wrong with most of them. Diagnostic tools are limited, and treatments even moreso. They don't feed the patients there - they're families bring them food, or they don't eat.
We've spent most of this week actually, to my great pleasure, with tons of free time just wandering the streets of Arusha and exploring. We've not had nearly enough time to roam freely to date, so this has been fascinating. We took Sanjay's photo in front of Happy Sausage, Ltd, and near the House of Lubricants, and got a few cool gifts. Actually, we thought about getting one more item we saw - the Saddam Hussein wall calendar that was being sold on the street and read "Execution has turned Saddam into a Martyr!" Sanjay insisted it was a bad idea, though. I said I'd carry it in my luggage . . .
Last night, since I've had absolutely enough of Chef Japhet's eggplant, boiled potato, bean, carrot and tomato surprise, we actually found Kraft singles at Shop-Rite (the local western supermarket where plums and grapes cost over $10 USD per pound) and white bread and made the BEST grilled cheese sandwich I've ever had. Honestly, I didn't know food could taste so good. We gave one to the watchman, Thompson, too, as well as Saidi's son (Saidi's the owner of the bar across the street from our compound) - I think they were duly impressed with my white-girl cooking skills.
After I went to sleep, Sanjay sought retribution against his 50-something Australian roomate, Pat. Pat had the audacity to move Sanjay's dainties and toiletries from the top shelf to the bottom in the bathroom in order, I think, to mark his alpha-male territory and, since he's a crotchety old man (not really), to avoid bending over every day.
In retaliation, Sanjay froze his socks and manties in a loaf pan, and presented them to him with an announcement to all of the volunteers over breakfast this morning. I think Pat was actually delighted for the attention.
We're super psyched to be leaving tomorrow for Cairo, and we'll be going out tonight with all of the volunteers to Pepe's for pizza, then to gamble and dance the night away. Hopefully, we'll be home in time for curfew . . . we'll catch up with you in Egypt!!!
Showing posts with label Tanzania. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tanzania. Show all posts
Friday, February 9, 2007
Sunday, January 28, 2007
HomeSICK
It's finally catching up with me. I think I'm dying - not really, don't panic. Besides, just yesterday one of the CCS volunteers in the Moshi program fell off the top bunk and was safely med-evac-ed home, so I'm certain if my current fever and sore throat escalate, I'll be safe and sound in my own bed (wait, do I even have my own bed? I guess I mean Zoe's bed.) with Millie in no time.
The other most exciting stories:
At St. Lucia's, we played with the orphans, and visited the lone adult patient currently residing in the facility. She, I believe, was the saddest case of all, as she's laid on a mattress on the floor without speaking a single word for two years. As they described her situation, it was the first and only time I've been nearly moved to tears. Her husband abandoned her there and has since moved on, with her children (and likely her infection as well), to another wife. I have never been in the presence of someone so completely alone.
As we left, they shared some general information about the AIDS pandemic in Africa. The figure they shared was that in the small ward of Arusha they serve (called, I believe Mt. Meru or Moivaro), it is estimated that 32% of the adults are infected, and the number is rising despite their best efforts. (Of course, they said, the statistics are collected by multiple agencies without any clear central accountability or method, so there's really no telling.) While the Clinton Fund is currently providing free drugs to combat the disease, that funding is limited to two years, and they're not certain how they'll replace it. They said that the key reasons for the continued spread of the disease are shame, silence, and an unwillingness to even be diagnosed, a tradition of wife inheritance, especially among the Masai, which passes even the wives whose husbands have died of AIDS on to the husband's brothers, the continued practice of traditional medicine among practitioners who do not sterilize their instruments and equipment between patients (and, in many cases, who don't treat the disease but rather the "curse"), and religious rituals, like mass circumcision, which are practiced by using the same, uncleansed instrument on all participants.
On Friday afternoon, we also painted my school, Shepherds Junior. Nearly 20 volunteers went, plus Zungu, a local artist who works next door to our dormitory. On Friday morning, I asked him if he'd donate his time to help us that afternoon, and he agreed without hesitation. He's SO nice., and made our job SO much easier, since he helped us open the paint, mix it, you know, the stuff I'd have had no idea how to do. Instead of paint stirrers, he used sticks, instead of sandpaper, he used stones. He thinned all the paint, and walked with me to the local hardware store when we needed to procure additional supplies. Even the taxi driver who brought us there picked up a paint brush to help. It was awesome, and it turned out incredibly. On the outside, it's bright blue with bright red trim, and the three classrooms are light green, light blue and gold. I must admit, I was very proud to have organized the effort. I can't wait to see the kids faces when they return to find their formerly gray stucco classrooms newly brightened and glossy with a fresh coat of paint.
Zungu's even coming back with me this week while I paint so that he can add a mural to the front of the building. I can't wait! Even though he doesn't have much, he's SO generous with his time - he also teaches art, for free, to local children in his spare time. We learned that when our team of painters took him out to dinner at Big Bite after we were done renovating. The food was awesome (think Amber India in Mountain View awesome), and it was totally interesting to talk to him, too. He actually used to be a porter on Kiliminjaro before he became an artist, and he only completed primary school but speaks nearly impeccable English. Based on his Kili experience, he said that he had no doubt that Sanjay would make it to the top . . . but he wasn't so sure about me.
After our Big Bite feast, I immediately went to bed as we had to get up to leave for a 6am safari departure.
The next morning, we left in an I-just-know-this-thing-is-about-to-break-down-and-strand-us-in-BFE minivan. Beth and Tegan packed a TON of snacks (thank goodness) so we ate crackers, peanut butter and nutella the whole way. Jean also provided us with some seriously coveted M&Ms. As we drove, we shared our favorite Africa songs by passing around everyone's iPod. We listened to today's:
Songs of the Day
We continued our drive, and they opened the roof of the minivan for us to peer out at the multitude of cheetahs, waterbucks, elands, gazelles, impalas, zebras, lions, elephants, flamingos and birds of all shapes and sizes (the coolest one was the Sacred Ibis). Once we'd made about 1/2 of our trip around the massive crater floor, our vehicle, as suspected just gave out. We were stuck for about an hour, but eventually, after significant consternation and talk with our travel companion Jean about how she, as a Boulder park ranger, would have the skills and supplies to save us, the vehicle cooled down. Of course, the drivers were feverishly running back and forth to the nearest mud puddles to fetch the water with which to cool the engine.
After we continued, we stopped for a quick boxed lunch of a grated cheddar-like substance & butter on white bread sandwich with a bluish-colored hard-boiled egg and a green, flavorless orange. We drank black currant juice from boxes. Luckily, they included some sort of African Doritoes and hid two tiny candy bars at the bottom, which we each quickly gobbled up.
After lunch (which was at about 3:30), we started to drive from the crater and, because a rain shower was moving our direction, we started to get super cold. Tegan and Alex had to pee so bad, and I started to feel feverish, irritable and my throat was killing me. We drove with wind gusts of about 2-degrees and speeds of 1,000 mph for over an hour while I slowly felt sicker and sicker. I put on my bright pink raincoat to warm up, but to no avail. Finally, we reached the exit gate, and several of us literally raced to the bathroom.
The rest of the drive was extremely protracted as well, because they couldn't push the gas too hard for fear of us overheating again. It may have seemed even longer for Diane, Jean and Sanjay, as Beth, Tegan, Alex and I sang the entire way home without any accompaniment except for the iPods in our ears. They hated every single Jewel, Beach Boys, Billy Joel and Simon and Garfunkel song we massacred, but I actually think they liked our rousing rendition of today's final
Song of the Day:
As we drove into Arusha town, we begged to skip dinner, but our super-nice guide Naaz (a 22-year-old who's married to a former CCS volunteer) wouldn't allow it. He stopped and insisted, because of the vehicle problems, that he buy us each a dinner of fried chicken and chips (i.e., fries) at Steers, a local fast-food joint. The chicken had feathers all over, so I avoided it. The fries were good, though, and as I left the man cleaning our table said, "She likes fat, but not chicken." No shit, Sherlock.
Anyway, eventually, we got home. I've never been so grateful for a hard mattress on a bottom bunk in a room with water that runs only part of the time and is generally frigid, and supremely unreliable electricity that barely allows Sanjay to charge his camera. But last night I was grateful.
Actually, if I've learned anything at all here, it's really that we can subsist on so much less than we have . . .
I finally woke up, with a low temperature and a terribly sore throat at 2pm today. I didn't want to move, but I also didn't want to eat rice and beans for the 92nd time, so I left the dorm with Sanj and Diane. We walked through town, and, after I clumsily fell into a foot-deep hole on the sidewalk but completely avoided injury, we dined in style at Pepe's.
Pizza and Sprite has never tasted so good.
PS: Thanks for all the photos (especially you, Millie). In my current germ-ravaged state, I'm growing a little homesick, so every little bit helps . . . I'm hoping to recover by Saturday in time for our Kili climb. Sanjay is sick too ;(
PPS: Chooch, you are the cutest birthday boy ever!
The other most exciting stories:
- A black kite (a large hawk/eagle/vulture-like African bird) swooped down while we were having lunch on safari yesterday and tried to steal Sanjay's sandwich. Luckily, Sanjay kept his sandwich, but he does have two large claw scratches on his arm from the scuffle. Of course, since then, rumor has spread among the volunteers about the incident. I believe the last I heard was that a pterodactyl bit him, that he overheated on safari and had to be med-evac-ed to Nairobi. Actually, that's a conglomeration of three exaggerated rumors - the black kite, the volunteer falling from her bunk and the overheating of our vehicle while we were on safari. (Yep, we were stuck for almost an hour, not really certain if we would ever actually leave Ngorongoro Crater while our guides poured water that exploded into steam on our 1,000,000-degree engine. More on that later . . .
- Someone tried to mug Connie on the daladala (a small bus form of public transportation that generally holds about 30+ people with asphyxiating BO in a vehicle the size of a minivan). While two other volunteers exited the daladala (which Diane calls the dollydolly), a man held Connie by the arms and tried to rip off her hip-sack. Luckily, Nadia (a totally nice volunteer from the UK who works with Connie on her placement at Patandi School, a school for special needs students), hit the guy and Connie escaped without any losses other than her false sense of security. Connie's in her 60s, so I assume they thought she'd be an easy target. Little did they know who they were dealing with! She's one tough cookie.
At St. Lucia's, we played with the orphans, and visited the lone adult patient currently residing in the facility. She, I believe, was the saddest case of all, as she's laid on a mattress on the floor without speaking a single word for two years. As they described her situation, it was the first and only time I've been nearly moved to tears. Her husband abandoned her there and has since moved on, with her children (and likely her infection as well), to another wife. I have never been in the presence of someone so completely alone.
As we left, they shared some general information about the AIDS pandemic in Africa. The figure they shared was that in the small ward of Arusha they serve (called, I believe Mt. Meru or Moivaro), it is estimated that 32% of the adults are infected, and the number is rising despite their best efforts. (Of course, they said, the statistics are collected by multiple agencies without any clear central accountability or method, so there's really no telling.) While the Clinton Fund is currently providing free drugs to combat the disease, that funding is limited to two years, and they're not certain how they'll replace it. They said that the key reasons for the continued spread of the disease are shame, silence, and an unwillingness to even be diagnosed, a tradition of wife inheritance, especially among the Masai, which passes even the wives whose husbands have died of AIDS on to the husband's brothers, the continued practice of traditional medicine among practitioners who do not sterilize their instruments and equipment between patients (and, in many cases, who don't treat the disease but rather the "curse"), and religious rituals, like mass circumcision, which are practiced by using the same, uncleansed instrument on all participants.
On Friday afternoon, we also painted my school, Shepherds Junior. Nearly 20 volunteers went, plus Zungu, a local artist who works next door to our dormitory. On Friday morning, I asked him if he'd donate his time to help us that afternoon, and he agreed without hesitation. He's SO nice., and made our job SO much easier, since he helped us open the paint, mix it, you know, the stuff I'd have had no idea how to do. Instead of paint stirrers, he used sticks, instead of sandpaper, he used stones. He thinned all the paint, and walked with me to the local hardware store when we needed to procure additional supplies. Even the taxi driver who brought us there picked up a paint brush to help. It was awesome, and it turned out incredibly. On the outside, it's bright blue with bright red trim, and the three classrooms are light green, light blue and gold. I must admit, I was very proud to have organized the effort. I can't wait to see the kids faces when they return to find their formerly gray stucco classrooms newly brightened and glossy with a fresh coat of paint.
Zungu's even coming back with me this week while I paint so that he can add a mural to the front of the building. I can't wait! Even though he doesn't have much, he's SO generous with his time - he also teaches art, for free, to local children in his spare time. We learned that when our team of painters took him out to dinner at Big Bite after we were done renovating. The food was awesome (think Amber India in Mountain View awesome), and it was totally interesting to talk to him, too. He actually used to be a porter on Kiliminjaro before he became an artist, and he only completed primary school but speaks nearly impeccable English. Based on his Kili experience, he said that he had no doubt that Sanjay would make it to the top . . . but he wasn't so sure about me.
After our Big Bite feast, I immediately went to bed as we had to get up to leave for a 6am safari departure.
The next morning, we left in an I-just-know-this-thing-is-about-to-break-down-and-strand-us-in-BFE minivan. Beth and Tegan packed a TON of snacks (thank goodness) so we ate crackers, peanut butter and nutella the whole way. Jean also provided us with some seriously coveted M&Ms. As we drove, we shared our favorite Africa songs by passing around everyone's iPod. We listened to today's:
Songs of the Day
- Africa, by Toto - I know, I know, this was yesterday's song, too, but I probably listened to it 5 times yesterday, so I haven't managed to escape its grasp yet.
- Circle of Life, by Sir Elton John and from Disney's The Lion King. Actually, this song nearly makes me cry when I hear it and am driving through the edge of the Serengeti. How lucky can one girl be?
- Baba Yetu, which is the Swahili Our Father. I don't know who sings this, but Alex, a 19-year-old good Catholic boy from Canada, brought it and it is incredibly beautiful.
- Weeping, by Josh Groban with the South African group Ladysmith Black Mombazo. It's a song about apartheid.
We continued our drive, and they opened the roof of the minivan for us to peer out at the multitude of cheetahs, waterbucks, elands, gazelles, impalas, zebras, lions, elephants, flamingos and birds of all shapes and sizes (the coolest one was the Sacred Ibis). Once we'd made about 1/2 of our trip around the massive crater floor, our vehicle, as suspected just gave out. We were stuck for about an hour, but eventually, after significant consternation and talk with our travel companion Jean about how she, as a Boulder park ranger, would have the skills and supplies to save us, the vehicle cooled down. Of course, the drivers were feverishly running back and forth to the nearest mud puddles to fetch the water with which to cool the engine.
After we continued, we stopped for a quick boxed lunch of a grated cheddar-like substance & butter on white bread sandwich with a bluish-colored hard-boiled egg and a green, flavorless orange. We drank black currant juice from boxes. Luckily, they included some sort of African Doritoes and hid two tiny candy bars at the bottom, which we each quickly gobbled up.
After lunch (which was at about 3:30), we started to drive from the crater and, because a rain shower was moving our direction, we started to get super cold. Tegan and Alex had to pee so bad, and I started to feel feverish, irritable and my throat was killing me. We drove with wind gusts of about 2-degrees and speeds of 1,000 mph for over an hour while I slowly felt sicker and sicker. I put on my bright pink raincoat to warm up, but to no avail. Finally, we reached the exit gate, and several of us literally raced to the bathroom.
The rest of the drive was extremely protracted as well, because they couldn't push the gas too hard for fear of us overheating again. It may have seemed even longer for Diane, Jean and Sanjay, as Beth, Tegan, Alex and I sang the entire way home without any accompaniment except for the iPods in our ears. They hated every single Jewel, Beach Boys, Billy Joel and Simon and Garfunkel song we massacred, but I actually think they liked our rousing rendition of today's final
Song of the Day:
- I Touch Myself, by the Divinyls, which seemed to be very well-received.
As we drove into Arusha town, we begged to skip dinner, but our super-nice guide Naaz (a 22-year-old who's married to a former CCS volunteer) wouldn't allow it. He stopped and insisted, because of the vehicle problems, that he buy us each a dinner of fried chicken and chips (i.e., fries) at Steers, a local fast-food joint. The chicken had feathers all over, so I avoided it. The fries were good, though, and as I left the man cleaning our table said, "She likes fat, but not chicken." No shit, Sherlock.
Anyway, eventually, we got home. I've never been so grateful for a hard mattress on a bottom bunk in a room with water that runs only part of the time and is generally frigid, and supremely unreliable electricity that barely allows Sanjay to charge his camera. But last night I was grateful.
Actually, if I've learned anything at all here, it's really that we can subsist on so much less than we have . . .
I finally woke up, with a low temperature and a terribly sore throat at 2pm today. I didn't want to move, but I also didn't want to eat rice and beans for the 92nd time, so I left the dorm with Sanj and Diane. We walked through town, and, after I clumsily fell into a foot-deep hole on the sidewalk but completely avoided injury, we dined in style at Pepe's.
Pizza and Sprite has never tasted so good.
PS: Thanks for all the photos (especially you, Millie). In my current germ-ravaged state, I'm growing a little homesick, so every little bit helps . . . I'm hoping to recover by Saturday in time for our Kili climb. Sanjay is sick too ;(
PPS: Chooch, you are the cutest birthday boy ever!
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Wetting the Bed
My roommate Diane used to be my friend. Yesterday, she wet my bed.
Actually, here's how it went down. Diane was sick and whiny and she took the whole day off yesterday while the rest of us went on a field trip past Kiliminjaro to Moshi. (Kili is f*%ing huge - I must admit I'm getting a little, okay a lot, terrified now. I've heard some serious horror stories and no matter how much Al Gore says the snow is melting up there, it still looks seriously white.)
Anyway, I mistakenly assumed that Diane's "day of rest" had allowed her to recover in full. And, when I went to bed on my bottom bunk, I playfully bounced her bed up and down - just enough to aggravate her. After my pestering, she sought retribution and dumped an entire liter of water on me in my jammies and on my already miserably uncomfortable mosquito-net suffocating bed.
I was soaked, and my bed still has not recovered. I'm quite certain my Swahili-only speaking maid is concerned about my incontinence problem. While these escapades went on, Connie, our "prim but mischievous" moo (we greet elders here with ShikaMOO, so we call the old girls, of which I'm now honorary because I'm not one of the coeds, MOOs for short) found a gecko on the wall and screamed like a six-year-old on a sugar-high for our neighbor "Sanchez" to save us from our insect invasion. (She can't remember and/or pronounce Sanjay's name, but I think it's appropriate that she's given him a Mexican nickname since he wants to name his first child Nacho.)
Sanjay ran over and threw the gecko toward Connie, who ran screaming from the room. He did, eventually, remove it. Finally, with the water spilt and the gecko exterminated, we were able to sleep soundly - except I was upside down trying to avoid the wet spot, and Diane whimpers in her sleep. I still like her, though ;)
To catch you up a little bit, we've been going to our placements most days, except for our field trip yesterday. The babies in my class are adorable - although my throat hurts from singing to them for hours a day -loudly - to get them to pay attention. I'm trying to teach them (along with their full-time teachers, Happy and Angel - how appropriate) letter A and number 0. So far, so good. I really adore them - My favorite is Mary. Everyone says she's mine, because she's the child with the lightest skin and she's also chubby like me. Today, she put my glasses on and she looked incredibly cute. She's 2 1/2. Of course, I have about a million favorites. Leah's another - she's older, maybe 10, in Class 3. I taught their math class the other day, and we held a little addition competition which she won. I cut her out a star from construction paper which said "I'm a Math Superstar". She was SO proud, she showed everyone and even put it on every day for the rest of the week. She's such a good girl.
I've also continued working on a fundraising plan for them, which has taken every free moment I have - and then some, which is, in part, why my postings have been so infrequent. But I really think it could help them to begin to raise the funds to continue to grow this school, so I'm committed to seeing it through. I'll be sure to share the plan once it's finished . . .
Tomorrow, we also plan to paint the three new classrooms that they just built in the back yard of the headmistress, Lucy. I can't wait to see the children's faces on Monday after they see what we have done.
Other than that, we went on a field trip yesterday, as I said, to Moshi, which is just past Mt. Kiliminjaro. We hiked down to an incredibly beautiful waterfall, saw a traditional home from the Chaga tribe, which was very interesting and looked like a tropical hut of some kind. (The Chaga people are originally from the Kiliminjaro area and, unlike the Masai, most no longer live traditionally but have substantially modernized.) We also saw some tunnels in which the Chaga hid from the Masai when the tribes battled over cattle (which they still do, sometimes). Then, we stopped for lunch at an outdoor buffet (yes, you read that correctly, a BUFFET) - where raw beef hung, nearly whole and definitely recognizable, next to the totally unpalatable beans, rice, okra, grilled chicken, noodles and beef mash that we ingested.
Later that day, I (I know this will be a surprise . . . ) suffered my first bout with diarrhea. Lucky, stupid me. Anyway, we made up for it by stopping at a supermarket on the way home where we bought Pringles and candy bars. I think I ate my weight in junk food - but, for those of you concerned about my weight loss, I did get up and jog this morning.
Not too much more to tell - we did play a rousing game of Celebrity (during which I was forced to charade "Pussy Galore") last night with Jean, a totally buff park ranger from Boulder - she couldn't stop giggling. I just love unstoppable laughter.
So, I'll end with that. I miss you all sooooooooo much, but we're doing just fine.
I hope your day ends, as mine did yesterday as a consequence of Jean's silliness and Diane's raindrops, with total joy and a bellyache from laughing too hard.
Songs of the Day:
PPS - Zoe, I was thinking maybe Holland Elementary could be a "sister school" for Shepherds Junior, and you could be penpals with the children here and send them books, toys and school supplies that your school collects for them. Maybe you should ask your principal or teacher???
You'd just love them, and they could really use anything!!!! Pencils and paper are scarce (they actually ran out of pencils today, and couldn't find any to give one of the students), and some of the babies have never held a crayon!!! They LOVE stickers, even just little stars. Give it some thought, and let me know what you think! Ashlee - is there any sort of project the students in your program could do with the students or teachers here remotely???
PPPS - I know, we need pictures!!!!!! But the upload speed is simply overwhelming . . . Samahani, Pole, I'm so sorry - we're working out the glitches, I promise! You just have to see my babies!
Actually, here's how it went down. Diane was sick and whiny and she took the whole day off yesterday while the rest of us went on a field trip past Kiliminjaro to Moshi. (Kili is f*%ing huge - I must admit I'm getting a little, okay a lot, terrified now. I've heard some serious horror stories and no matter how much Al Gore says the snow is melting up there, it still looks seriously white.)
Anyway, I mistakenly assumed that Diane's "day of rest" had allowed her to recover in full. And, when I went to bed on my bottom bunk, I playfully bounced her bed up and down - just enough to aggravate her. After my pestering, she sought retribution and dumped an entire liter of water on me in my jammies and on my already miserably uncomfortable mosquito-net suffocating bed.
I was soaked, and my bed still has not recovered. I'm quite certain my Swahili-only speaking maid is concerned about my incontinence problem. While these escapades went on, Connie, our "prim but mischievous" moo (we greet elders here with ShikaMOO, so we call the old girls, of which I'm now honorary because I'm not one of the coeds, MOOs for short) found a gecko on the wall and screamed like a six-year-old on a sugar-high for our neighbor "Sanchez" to save us from our insect invasion. (She can't remember and/or pronounce Sanjay's name, but I think it's appropriate that she's given him a Mexican nickname since he wants to name his first child Nacho.)
Sanjay ran over and threw the gecko toward Connie, who ran screaming from the room. He did, eventually, remove it. Finally, with the water spilt and the gecko exterminated, we were able to sleep soundly - except I was upside down trying to avoid the wet spot, and Diane whimpers in her sleep. I still like her, though ;)
To catch you up a little bit, we've been going to our placements most days, except for our field trip yesterday. The babies in my class are adorable - although my throat hurts from singing to them for hours a day -loudly - to get them to pay attention. I'm trying to teach them (along with their full-time teachers, Happy and Angel - how appropriate) letter A and number 0. So far, so good. I really adore them - My favorite is Mary. Everyone says she's mine, because she's the child with the lightest skin and she's also chubby like me. Today, she put my glasses on and she looked incredibly cute. She's 2 1/2. Of course, I have about a million favorites. Leah's another - she's older, maybe 10, in Class 3. I taught their math class the other day, and we held a little addition competition which she won. I cut her out a star from construction paper which said "I'm a Math Superstar". She was SO proud, she showed everyone and even put it on every day for the rest of the week. She's such a good girl.
I've also continued working on a fundraising plan for them, which has taken every free moment I have - and then some, which is, in part, why my postings have been so infrequent. But I really think it could help them to begin to raise the funds to continue to grow this school, so I'm committed to seeing it through. I'll be sure to share the plan once it's finished . . .
Tomorrow, we also plan to paint the three new classrooms that they just built in the back yard of the headmistress, Lucy. I can't wait to see the children's faces on Monday after they see what we have done.
Other than that, we went on a field trip yesterday, as I said, to Moshi, which is just past Mt. Kiliminjaro. We hiked down to an incredibly beautiful waterfall, saw a traditional home from the Chaga tribe, which was very interesting and looked like a tropical hut of some kind. (The Chaga people are originally from the Kiliminjaro area and, unlike the Masai, most no longer live traditionally but have substantially modernized.) We also saw some tunnels in which the Chaga hid from the Masai when the tribes battled over cattle (which they still do, sometimes). Then, we stopped for lunch at an outdoor buffet (yes, you read that correctly, a BUFFET) - where raw beef hung, nearly whole and definitely recognizable, next to the totally unpalatable beans, rice, okra, grilled chicken, noodles and beef mash that we ingested.
Later that day, I (I know this will be a surprise . . . ) suffered my first bout with diarrhea. Lucky, stupid me. Anyway, we made up for it by stopping at a supermarket on the way home where we bought Pringles and candy bars. I think I ate my weight in junk food - but, for those of you concerned about my weight loss, I did get up and jog this morning.
Not too much more to tell - we did play a rousing game of Celebrity (during which I was forced to charade "Pussy Galore") last night with Jean, a totally buff park ranger from Boulder - she couldn't stop giggling. I just love unstoppable laughter.
So, I'll end with that. I miss you all sooooooooo much, but we're doing just fine.
I hope your day ends, as mine did yesterday as a consequence of Jean's silliness and Diane's raindrops, with total joy and a bellyache from laughing too hard.
Songs of the Day:
- Africa, by Toto - which I haven't heard since I've been here but I CANNOT get out of my head;
- Faith, by George Michael, which I sing incessantly to a little girl named Faith in my class, who's also 2; and
- You are My Sunshine, which I heard my babies sing for the first time today during morning assembly (They sing for about 30 minutes every morning, all 110 of them together - it's really quite a beautiful way to start every day, to the sound of children singing. They must know a million songs.)
PPS - Zoe, I was thinking maybe Holland Elementary could be a "sister school" for Shepherds Junior, and you could be penpals with the children here and send them books, toys and school supplies that your school collects for them. Maybe you should ask your principal or teacher???
You'd just love them, and they could really use anything!!!! Pencils and paper are scarce (they actually ran out of pencils today, and couldn't find any to give one of the students), and some of the babies have never held a crayon!!! They LOVE stickers, even just little stars. Give it some thought, and let me know what you think! Ashlee - is there any sort of project the students in your program could do with the students or teachers here remotely???
PPPS - I know, we need pictures!!!!!! But the upload speed is simply overwhelming . . . Samahani, Pole, I'm so sorry - we're working out the glitches, I promise! You just have to see my babies!
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Upendo Nursery
Here's a little bit about my placement:
I am a teacher at the Upendo Nursery, a small 2-classroom building walking distance from the dorm I am staying at. It has 14 kids right now between the ages of 3 and 6 but should have closer to thirty kids by next week. The kids here are adorable! They are these tiny little munchkins who run up and hold my hand as soon as I am in sight of the playground outside the school. They go to this school because they can't afford to go to the more expensive schools in town - they only pay $1 a month so that they can get porridge at lunchtime. (If they can't afford that, the family that runs the nursery pays for it with their own money.) The family is a preacher, his wife and their son Daniel who is the children's primary teacher. He is great with the kids, sometimes I wonder if he really needs our help but he says he does.
The work itself is pretty kickback - I teach them the alphabet, sing songs, and play with them. I guess I didn't know what to expect but working with them is pretty easy, I get to the school in the morning around 8:30, start lessons at 9:00, teach until about 10:15, and then let them play in the yard while we (Hilary, my fellow volunteer from Santa Cruz) go have Chai with Daniel. The children have their porridge served around 11:00 and then we walk them home shortly thereafter. I know I am having a great time with the kids but then I feel like I am not doing enough or not being utilized enough. I'm trying to do additional things like conduct Engligh lessons for some of the adults and helping Stacey with her work stuff. I still feel like I am constantly doing things and am exhausted, but I don't know how much of that effort is truly beneficial to anyone.
I actually got yelled at yesterday by one of the staff at dinnertime because almost all of the volunteers did not attend a scheduled 30 minute presentation about the Tanzanian education system. In front of everyone she said how disappointed she was and then she called out my name and said that as the leader, this was on me. (I didn't attend the presentation either because we had a 2-hour window before the presentation and Stacey and I needed to go into town to buy with our own money the paint and supplies we needed to paint Stacey's school.) Needless to say, I was upset; this seems to be the main issue I have with this volunteer program - it is way too structured and you have no real free time to do any personal items, much less any real work. I understand that you have to structure a full day of activities for the 18 and 19 year olds among us but for us adults, just give us the latitude to be effective.
Anyways, I have to run back to the ranch for another meeting but I really can blog for hours straight, there is so much to say (I think Stacey is writing about our trip to the Masai village right now so stay tuned for that - it's great stuff.) We hope you are all doing well and I can't believe how sad Millie looks - I think we'll have to bring her back an elephant tusk as a bone for her to chew on.
(I just found out today that the Colts and the Bears would be playing in the Super Bowl - how awesome is that! And a special thank you goes out to Win-Champion who is tivo'ing 24, my favorite TV show for me.)
I am a teacher at the Upendo Nursery, a small 2-classroom building walking distance from the dorm I am staying at. It has 14 kids right now between the ages of 3 and 6 but should have closer to thirty kids by next week. The kids here are adorable! They are these tiny little munchkins who run up and hold my hand as soon as I am in sight of the playground outside the school. They go to this school because they can't afford to go to the more expensive schools in town - they only pay $1 a month so that they can get porridge at lunchtime. (If they can't afford that, the family that runs the nursery pays for it with their own money.) The family is a preacher, his wife and their son Daniel who is the children's primary teacher. He is great with the kids, sometimes I wonder if he really needs our help but he says he does.
The work itself is pretty kickback - I teach them the alphabet, sing songs, and play with them. I guess I didn't know what to expect but working with them is pretty easy, I get to the school in the morning around 8:30, start lessons at 9:00, teach until about 10:15, and then let them play in the yard while we (Hilary, my fellow volunteer from Santa Cruz) go have Chai with Daniel. The children have their porridge served around 11:00 and then we walk them home shortly thereafter. I know I am having a great time with the kids but then I feel like I am not doing enough or not being utilized enough. I'm trying to do additional things like conduct Engligh lessons for some of the adults and helping Stacey with her work stuff. I still feel like I am constantly doing things and am exhausted, but I don't know how much of that effort is truly beneficial to anyone.
I actually got yelled at yesterday by one of the staff at dinnertime because almost all of the volunteers did not attend a scheduled 30 minute presentation about the Tanzanian education system. In front of everyone she said how disappointed she was and then she called out my name and said that as the leader, this was on me. (I didn't attend the presentation either because we had a 2-hour window before the presentation and Stacey and I needed to go into town to buy with our own money the paint and supplies we needed to paint Stacey's school.) Needless to say, I was upset; this seems to be the main issue I have with this volunteer program - it is way too structured and you have no real free time to do any personal items, much less any real work. I understand that you have to structure a full day of activities for the 18 and 19 year olds among us but for us adults, just give us the latitude to be effective.
Anyways, I have to run back to the ranch for another meeting but I really can blog for hours straight, there is so much to say (I think Stacey is writing about our trip to the Masai village right now so stay tuned for that - it's great stuff.) We hope you are all doing well and I can't believe how sad Millie looks - I think we'll have to bring her back an elephant tusk as a bone for her to chew on.
(I just found out today that the Colts and the Bears would be playing in the Super Bowl - how awesome is that! And a special thank you goes out to Win-Champion who is tivo'ing 24, my favorite TV show for me.)
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Mzungu Mwalimu
Mzungu = ForeignerMwalimu = Teacher
I am both now. I'd apologize again for the lapse in communication but it really is totally unavoidable. You cannot possibly imagine the situation in which I currently write. It's actually amazing that there's a computer at all. Near our "compound" is Tengeru Village. The internet facilities are here. I cannot possibly describe to you the conditions outside the doors. It reminds me somewhat of a ghost town from the southwest - dusty and crumbling with chickens wandering the narrow loose gravel alleyways aimlessly. There's a key difference, however. The place is entirely kinetic - tailors sew on their porches, tiny children play independently, and many people wander the dirt paths that cross back and forth in no seeming organizational scheme. As they pass one another, they greet one another without fail - Shikamoo ( I respect you), Hujambo (Hello) and Habari (How are you?) must pass the lips of each individual one thousand times. Completely unlike the fast, ignoring Americans who pass one another at strip malls.
As energetic as the village is today, it is even moreso on market days - Wednesdays and Saturdays, when you can't even move for all the people. There are second-hand clothes and shoes stacked four feet high (which we've been told are mostly stolen from packages bound to Africa from well-meaning European and American donors), and a farmers market is crowded with individuals selling their bananas, mangos, dried fish - whatever they have - to make a pittance to feed their families. It's incredible. Hopefully, I'll be able to post pictures at some point, but everyone's advised us never to take pictures in the market because either a) our camera will be stolen or b) anyone in the general direction of our photo will expect to be paid a commission.
The small internet shop in which I reside is set in the midst of this place. It's almost incomprehensible to imagine that we're even in the same century as the internet was invented given our surroundings, but here I sit in the midst of total irony. That said, we are talking about a dial-up connection slower than the pony express, but there is something. I am sitting next to two small local boys whose father is giggling while watching them play a game in which President Bush and Condoleeza Rice are armed and defending themselves from potential assassins in the oval office. Small World.
Anyway, I came to the village to write to you about my volunteer experience so far. It's probably good that I've waited 4 days in to write this, because I've had the opportunity to see and feel a little more. Hopefully, I can find the words to describe it.
I am a teacher a Shepherds Junior Academy, a local primary school that has 6 classes; Baby Class (ages 2-3), Nursery Class (ages 3-4), Pre-Unit (Kindergarten), and Classes 1-3, which seem to generically correspond to our grade structure. I am in the Baby Class. These children are perhaps the cutest I have ever seen, snotty noses and all. Of course, I understand nary a word they are saying as, at this age, they speak almost exclusively Swahili. My favorite is probably Eliza, a little girl who sits near the back of the class and constantly says one of the few words I know to describe her perception of my degree of comprehension of the Swahili language - kidogo or "just a little." Of course, there's also Damares, Prisca, Melania, the two Charities, Collins, Faith and Jordan. All of them have the brightest eyes I've ever seen. They sing incessantly. My personal favorite:
Be happy, be happy before you die. (Come On!)
Be happy, be happy before you die. (Come On!)
My friend is ___________. She's a girl.
Shake-a your body before you die. (Come On!)
(In hearing from some of my fellow volunteers at local HIV orphanages and hospitals, death is much nearer to them than it ever is for American children. Just today, three of our volunteers attended a funeral service for an 8-year-old girl from St. Lucias who died not from her HIV infection, but from chicken pox that spiked a fever and, from the perspective of one of the volunteers, killed her from dehydration as they have no facilities to deliver IV fluids and have no time or resources to ensure the children drink a sufficient amount of clean water.)
As for my new favorite song, they clap along and they shake their little hips and dance durin
g the last line if we've called their names. And we try to sing it for as many of the children as we can before 2-year-old booties can no longer sit still (and whose names we know - the teachers don't even know some of the children's names!) Of course, once they can no longer sit still, the teachers tell them to sit quietly and they pass out one stuffed animal to each child to play with independently. You should see these toys. The eyes are all gone and the stuffing hangs out on every single one. But they may have no toys at home, so they love them, and rock them like tiny babies. Zoe, when I get home, we are cleaning out your closet and mailing them here.
There's a schedule on the wall that says what we're supposed to be doing when, but it seems to be completely irrelevant, at least this week, as it's the first week of school and our head teacher - Teacher Happy - is not feeling well at all. In fact, on my first day, she was not present and on our second day, she slept all day on the floor in the back of the room trying to recuperate. As she did, her assistant teacher (Teacher Angel) and I attempted to keep 33 2-year-olds entertained, quiet and sitting in their seats. It was a nearly impossible feat. The classroom is so small that you can't even get to the children for fear of stepping on another one. It's truly incredible.
Actually, though, I suppose I'm kind of surprised by how little I'm surprised. In truth, the school seems just like an American school with FAR fewer resources. It's not what we've got, but I do believe the children are learning and are cared for by their teachers. (This, in fact, may be the greatest lesson I take home: it's not so much that they have too little, though that's true - but it's become clear that we have far, far too much. And we've lost sight of the important stuff for all the material bullshit. For them, families, neighbors, friends and relationships are still clearly the most important.)
They have no crayons, balls, jump ropes, desks, toys, teaching aids, computers, text books, a/v equipment, etc. Even pencils and paper are terribly scarce. A teacher from another classroom came to our room today searching, in vain, for a pencil. I brought crayons in for the children to color an apple (a sound for apple!), and one little boy cried because he didn't know how to color - it seemed that many of them had never held a crayon before. I'd love to see an American teacher attempt to teach in this environment. This morning, for instance, I hand wrote out the letter a, instructions, the date, and 10 dotted a's to trace in 33 notebooks; in a separate 33 notebooks, I wrote the date and instructions and drew an apple for each child to color. Photocopying is simply too expensive. They work hard - an the teachers make only about 70-80,000 shillings (or about $60-65) per month for their efforts.
In addition to my work with the children, I've been working with the former-poultry-business-owner-turned-headmaster Lucy to develop a capital plan to raise funds to expand her school and start an associated orphanage. I believe this is actually where I may do the most lasting good. Lucy is a good woman who started this school. From everything I've seen and heard, she's done an incredible job given her limited resources.
You can bet that I'll be asking each of you to contribute to her fundraising efforts - I'll let you know more after my plan is complete . . .
Sanjay is at Upendo Nursery, a school for 2-6 year olds. He seems to like it, and I'm sure he'll post later with some details. Right now, he's teaching English to the school's staff.
Both of us are enjoying ourselves, but there definitely seems to be something critical missing. I was interviewed today for a PBS special about voluntourism. They asked whether I felt like I was doing "good." I really don't know. Here's how I feel: It feels good to have babies run to me, hold my hands and kiss me. It feels good to hug them and play with them. But, in all honesty, I feel like I'm getting more out of the experience than they are. I SO want that to be different, and I'm hoping that my fundraising plan is a step in the right direction, but I just don't know . . . some of the volunteers and I are also planning to paint some of her classrooms, so at least I'll leave some mark behind, I suppose.
This weekend, we're headed into Arusha for dinner and tomorrow we'll be camping in a Masai village. We'll be sure to catch you up upon our return. You can continue to expect our updates to be somewhat sporadic . . .
PS: I haven't had time to proof, but wanted to get you an update, so sorry for any necessary edits!
PPS: I'll also get some pictures as soon as I can - you've got to see these babies!!!!
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