Tuesday 5-13-14

Tuesday 5-13-14

                Hooray! Both kids are better. I didn’t have to stay home to take care of a sick kid, I didn’t even have to bring a sick kid with me to school and keep them separate from the rest of the kids. I just got to send them off in the morning and then meet them there an hour later and start teaching. It was so very nice.

                I was getting ready to start Std1 in the morning and a few of the kids pointed out that a baby bird hopped into the room out of the rain. I went to catch it so that it wouldn’t get trampled. The kids all watched eagerly. When I finally caught it they looked on in awe as this animal sat on my finger not moving away. I reminded them of the lesson that Teacher Asa taught them of being nice to animals. They just couldn’t believe that I was able to have the bird sit on my finger, and what is more that I was brave enough to do so. I went from one classroom to the next so all could see and get that very important lesson reminded to them. It hit the closest with the Std.3 class. I do believe that they were the ones that were throwing the other baby bird from a few weeks ago, so I am glad it hit with them. I even pulled Jove out of class for a moment so he would be able to see. If I had brought the bird into chekechea, they would have all gone nuts. I then went and let it go under one of the wooden benches outside. The mama bird was just above waiting for me to walk away, and when lunch got out, the baby bird was no longer there. I hope that the flying lesson from mama stuck.

                We found out that one of my favorite kids here, Samweli Stan was going to be transferred to Mugugu School. This is the local school and it is like educational death. Mamaliz hates the thought of this because he is a very bright student and he tries very hard. His mama carries water for the school in order to take care of part of his tuition. All his baba (dad) had to cover was 20,000 tSH (aprox 15 usd) a month. He is the local tailor and it works out to making one uniform a month for the school, or two outfits. As it stands for the last month he has been working on two dresses and two shirts for Ayla and Jove. If he would just finish those he would have two months worth. But I will not allow Samweli to go to educational death, so we will be his mama and baba when it comes to his education. He tries too hard for him to lose it all now.

                In std.1 Mamaliz scolded the children for not listening to me the day before. We did much of the same, but my favorite part is Pimping out the sentence. This is also Ayla’s favorite part of English when we do it. One of us will write a very boring sentence on the board and have the kids make it exciting. We are very much trying to get them using their adjectives. So, “The cat sat.” will turn into “The big fat cat sat by the river eating a piece of dog meat in the mud.” These are so much fun because the things they come up with are just hilarious.

                On to standard 3. These kids are good kids and so there was no scolding. They goofed off a little the day before but in general very good. We did set up a library book checkout system once again for these kids. Word recognition is rough with most of the kids in the school and so the more they read the better, and what better way to read more than get a book to bring home for a week. The rest of the kids would most likely lose the book (as would many of the adults), so for now it is only std3 kids. They were very happy when we brought them into our little school library to pick something out. It isn’t much but our library is better than anything else around here. It could still use more books however.

                I gave the kids a hug and kiss and had them go off to lunch. Mamaliz and I went home for lunch as we always do. The power was out when we got home so no computer, hamna shida. We just sat and talked instead. It was nice. After we got back to the school the kids told me they even at the Kande today. I was so happy. It is a bean and field corn glop, and they have never eaten it yet. They were so proud of themselves I told them if they were good the rest of the school day I would get them a big bomb (lollipop) from the duka.

                In std.2 I asked Freddy if he had done his homework I gave him. 100 times “I will not make fart noises during class”. He said no he didn’t have a pencil at home. Mamaliz walked in at this point and took over. As it turns out the only excuse the kids may give for not doing homework is if they are dead. Yes, this is actually her rule, and at St. Mary’s Teacher Liz’s rule is the law because she is the QUEEN. I love it. So she finally after about five minutes of him trying to make excuses, got him to say that he did not do it because he was lazy and wanted to play. His new homework is 100 times “I will not make noise in class” and 100 times “I will do my homework”. He was told to have his mama buy him a pencil because she has a job. Hopefully he does it, because if not, he is suspended for three days. I like Freddy. He is a fun kid, he just has a hard time in the class. When Jove’s class got out he came into std.2 with us. When he did, we were doing the flash cards. Jove decided to jump right in the line to do the flash cards too. He wanted to be one of the big kids. So when it came to his turn, Mamaliz and I made sure it was an easier addition or subtraction card, and he was doing a good job. I was very proud of him.

                After school got out, the clouds were threatening rain and so I had the kids come back with me and we hurried as fast as I could to the house to get the laundry inside. I wanted dry sheets and clothes. I made it just in time thanks to the kids help bringing everything inside. As I grabbed the last few things the rain started coming down.

                As it sprinkled outside, I started having a craving for a half cake. Asa made a comment about missing them and I just couldn’t get it out of my head. Half cake is kind of like a slightly sweet fried biscuit pound cake thing. They are very very cheap and I wanted one. So I walked in the rain to the duka to buy some half cake and get the kids their suckers. When I got there the lady did not have any change. My stuff cost 1,100 tSH and I had a 1,000 note and a 5,000 note. I showed her and in the end I had to put back one of the half cake because she did not have 3900 in her box to give me as change. Somewhere in this country is all the change and it would be nice if whomever has it would share. Either way when I got back the kids were very grateful because I had told them I wouldn’t go out in the rain to get them.

                Mamaliz cooked tonight and made a very tasty mung bean soup with eggplant and greens and all kinds of tasty stuff in there. Food the week right after a Morogoro trip is always nice because we still have the veggies.

                We worked on our word recognition cards as I had the kids in the tote bath (heated by boiled water of course). My computer won’t allow me to print and so I had to email the file to Mamaliz’s computer where it changed the dimensions of the excel file, so I adjusted which was difficult because I know nothing of Macs. I finally got it and we printed, then scanned so I could get them double sided. The new wazungu (white people), Hannah and Chris, neighbors came over to visit and have some chai. We all sat around talking and getting the papers into the laminating sheets. Chris is a new doctor, still working on getting to the point of actually being able to practice and this is part of his learning. Hannah is a nurse that works in the bone marrow transplant area, so she will have some difficulties getting used to the lack of machines and technology this way. We made sure to let her know that if she doesn’t like the hospital she is welcome to come to the school and help teach. They seem like very nice people and near my age. It will be nice to have someone to talk to occasionally.