Just in case you were wondering, the kittens that were in the shed, have now left the building. Last week, in the morning, I heard a horrible "screaming" kitten sound, so I came out of the kitchen and saw the mother cat carrying a kitten by the scruff of its neck out the top of the shed, down across our pit and shower area, and up again to the top of the cement block fence. The whole time the kitten was screeching, and the poor mother looked like she was putting all her strength into this manuvere, and had to repeat it three more times, I'm guessing. Because when I checked the shed again, they were gone. I think that maybe she decided that they were getting too big, and soon she would not be able to move them out of the shed herself.
Even though those kittens are gone there are some "teenager" cats around here, that are sort of pets to our host family. They scamper through holes in the cement fence seperating our compound from a tangle of a garden, dart between shadows at night, trying to get closer to the food bowl, and one night one of them (this one is all white, except its tail, which is a great contrast because its black) was playing with this gigantic beatle on the ground. They are so funny to watch because they look (like all cats I'm sure) very schizophrenic jumping around, and avoiding the shadows and immaginary things all around the compound.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Busy, Busy
Well, I was looking forward to the "thanksgiving" break this past weekend, but it kinda of ended up being a whirlwind of activity as usual, when you have so many people around, and you want to hang out with all of them, and you are trying to fit in work with some relaxing time. I had classes Thursday up till the afternoon at the college, and jammed back home on my bike, to grab my bag, then caught a gelley to Fajara. I walked in the PC office and was immediately (literally like 5 feet in the door) thrown into practice for the 40th anniversary celebration. We were supposed to say a few snippets about where we are posted and what we are working on. After that we caught a ride to a peace corps staff house and had a great time, eating roasted pumpkin seeds, watching and trying no to get in the way of people who made the tremendous effort of making about 24 from scratch pumpkin pies. Amazing. Andy enjoyed barbecuing a ton of chicken with the people out back. It was a general good time. After all the food was finished, we took it over to the Embassy house and had a really great dinner. It was very surreal, after we stuffed ourselves, we hung out on the grass area out back of the house and watched the sun set against a picturesque view of palm trees and the beach. And even though I thought I might be in danger of sinking because of my full belly, we took a dip in the pool. After they kicked us out of there, we went to a house near the tourist area that we were fortunate enough to be staying. We enjoyed a nice warm shower, toilets that flush and you can sit on, nice people and a comfortable bed. But even though we enjoyed all this, there was always a strange feeling that I just wanted to go home to Brikama. Maybe because we are so comfortable there, and we don't really need those amenities anymore. After a great weekend of eating, hanging out on the beach, and sitting through meetings, we headed back home on Sunday. We were really glad to be back, and it was just a few days that we were gone!
So, I am trying to slow down a bit with work, the end of the college term is very near, this week we are reviewing in the classes, and then next week is their final test. The following week after that I have to turn in grades,..(groannn.....) Which means a lot of work figuring out grades for about 350 students by hand. The nursery school is coming along, I am working right now on getting a resource binder together for them, so we can start to build up the resources the teachers have available to them. I came to the peace corps office to print out examples of themed units and other helpful information to add to the binder. Hopefully, I will get the other teachers to contribute their own ideas to the binder, and soon we will have many binders. Thats the goal right?
I have been really trying to make a concerted effort to help out host brothers and sisters with school type work, because we are learning every time they come for homework help, that instead of the Venn diagram assignment they have to do, they really should just be learning how to read! So, instead of doing a lot of the things I was doing for myself, like drawing, and reading, I have been nonstop teaching it seems. Take yesterday, I had three, two-hours classes, drawn out between the hours of 9am and 6:30pm at the college, right when I got home, and sat out on the porch and two of the smaller children came, so I took out my homemade flashcards and bottle caps for counters, and started doing work with them. After they were done with that, one of my host sisters came over with her SES book, where it was talking about the importance of the River Gambia, and I said, "you read it, and any word that you can figure out, I will help you", turns out that was every single word. She can't read. So, I insisted that the next day we would start work on learning how to read, but for that moment, I read it to her, and we summarized it, talked about what it said, and I asked her some questions about what it had talked about. Well, if that wasn't enough teaching for one day, when I though I was done for the day, and we had eaten dinner and taken a shower, I once again came out onto the porch, only to end up doing place value homework with our host brother till about 10:45. The funny thing was that he came to Andy for help, and Andy didn't really know how to help him, so I took over, and I really think that he was getting the hang of it by the end of the exercise. I felt very accomplished last night, and the great thing is, that as much work as that was, I would do it all day because I really am finding out being here in the Gambia how much I really enjoy my chosen career. And because it's Thanksgiving time, I want to say how much I am thankful for the chance to be able to teach here and broaden my horizons by teaching older students, when I thought I would never like to go above grade 1! I'm also thankful that I get to work within such interesting cultural surrounding, and with so many people. Anyhow, enough of that!~ I think that Andy gave a more detailed account (of course!) about our weekend break, so be sure to click on that link on the right hand side of my blog.
Well, I think thats all my brain can handle right now, I am here in Fajara, doing work, and taking this chance on the computer to update you guys. Of course like every trip here, I have to hit up the grocery store and lumber down to the car park with my arms full to run and catch a gelley back home. Ok, well, call me, write me, email me!
So, I am trying to slow down a bit with work, the end of the college term is very near, this week we are reviewing in the classes, and then next week is their final test. The following week after that I have to turn in grades,..(groannn.....) Which means a lot of work figuring out grades for about 350 students by hand. The nursery school is coming along, I am working right now on getting a resource binder together for them, so we can start to build up the resources the teachers have available to them. I came to the peace corps office to print out examples of themed units and other helpful information to add to the binder. Hopefully, I will get the other teachers to contribute their own ideas to the binder, and soon we will have many binders. Thats the goal right?
I have been really trying to make a concerted effort to help out host brothers and sisters with school type work, because we are learning every time they come for homework help, that instead of the Venn diagram assignment they have to do, they really should just be learning how to read! So, instead of doing a lot of the things I was doing for myself, like drawing, and reading, I have been nonstop teaching it seems. Take yesterday, I had three, two-hours classes, drawn out between the hours of 9am and 6:30pm at the college, right when I got home, and sat out on the porch and two of the smaller children came, so I took out my homemade flashcards and bottle caps for counters, and started doing work with them. After they were done with that, one of my host sisters came over with her SES book, where it was talking about the importance of the River Gambia, and I said, "you read it, and any word that you can figure out, I will help you", turns out that was every single word. She can't read. So, I insisted that the next day we would start work on learning how to read, but for that moment, I read it to her, and we summarized it, talked about what it said, and I asked her some questions about what it had talked about. Well, if that wasn't enough teaching for one day, when I though I was done for the day, and we had eaten dinner and taken a shower, I once again came out onto the porch, only to end up doing place value homework with our host brother till about 10:45. The funny thing was that he came to Andy for help, and Andy didn't really know how to help him, so I took over, and I really think that he was getting the hang of it by the end of the exercise. I felt very accomplished last night, and the great thing is, that as much work as that was, I would do it all day because I really am finding out being here in the Gambia how much I really enjoy my chosen career. And because it's Thanksgiving time, I want to say how much I am thankful for the chance to be able to teach here and broaden my horizons by teaching older students, when I thought I would never like to go above grade 1! I'm also thankful that I get to work within such interesting cultural surrounding, and with so many people. Anyhow, enough of that!~ I think that Andy gave a more detailed account (of course!) about our weekend break, so be sure to click on that link on the right hand side of my blog.
Well, I think thats all my brain can handle right now, I am here in Fajara, doing work, and taking this chance on the computer to update you guys. Of course like every trip here, I have to hit up the grocery store and lumber down to the car park with my arms full to run and catch a gelley back home. Ok, well, call me, write me, email me!
Thursday, November 15, 2007
On the wings of wind
Last week the winds came. The compound grounds are windswept, and everything has begun to build up its layer of fine dust from the dry season. With the wind came an unexpected treat. Baby kittens hiding in the shed with their mother. In the morning we got up and were moving about in the kitchen, and I noticed that the shed door (its really an outdoor cooking area in the back of the house) was ajar. Thinking the wind had blown it open, Andy went to go close it, and discovered three kittens. I didnt see them at that moment, but when I came home from class and saw the door was once again open, I took the opportunity to peek in. And there they were. They were huddled in the corner on a tiny scrap of rag that happened to be there, between two old kerosine lamps. I got the camera and snapped a few pictures. Then I took a rag that was outside the shed and tossed it to the floor, the kittens instantly hissed at the disturbance. And though they are completely adorable with big round blue eyes, I cant feed them. That would mean that they would probably learn to trust people, and that would not be a good thing for them around here!
Last friday we had a great dinner with some area PCVś. I had been saving my two pesto packets I had brought from American for when we could share it. So we had pesto pasta with tomatoes, I toasted some bread and we had garlic bread, and I even made sweet iced tea! It was delicious, but now, there is no more pesto :(
Just wanted to give a shout out to Cheryl and Tim! Yeah your married! Hope it was everything and more, and you are enjoying Jamaica mon!
Michael asked me about a fire in a market here, but I haven´t heard anything, but then again there areńt a lot of sources where you would get that information except for word of mouth probably.
Next weekend is Thanksgiving ( I realyl can believe that, because it just doesnt have the same kind of leading up to it all around you as you do in America), we are having an all volunteer meeting and a dinner in Fajara. I am looking forward to it, because it will be a much needed break from work. Not that I don like it, ( I really like having such purposeful work )its just been so busy. sometimes I dont know how I am going to get all that I want to do at the nursery school done in even two years!
Dharma (a nearby PCV) and I went the other day to have dresses made at the tailors for the meeting and dinner next week. I always have such a mixture of excitement and nervousness of how the thing will turn out that I am getting made. I always feel like I have this new exciting thing, even when I just drop off the cloth. I hope it works out well, because I used some cloth that I really liked and would hate for the dress to not be good.
A recent phenomenon I have discovered is that in the market there is a corner of the roadside that has just piles upon piles of second hand clothing for sale. Now the clothing is sometimes clearly from places like Goodwill, because it has tags still on it from there. Sometimes you can get great finds, that are totally ill fitted to the Gambia, like, a bright yellow fantastic lambs wool turtleneck sweater for 3 dalasi! Too bad I was sweating like crazy, or I could have imagined myself buying this sweater! I got a super comfy New Kids on the Block European Tour shirt, that is great to wear to bed because it is at that stage where it is perfectly soft. It makes me curious to see all these clothing items here in the Gambia, because I think of what journey it has probably made. From the manufacturer in asia somewhere no doubt, shipped to America, in the store, then someone buys it where it for one season, gives it to goodwill, someone buys it there, wears it for a while, then gives it to somewhere and it gets shipped, most likely to europe, and then down to the Gambia, to sit on the ground right next to the charcoal area of the market, and be sold for sometimes would be equivalent to 10 cents.
So, I have started my jump roping regiments. And of course it is such a interesting thing to the fam. Some of the younger girls, especially Jaleka like to join me, and are endlessly frustrated when they cant speed rope like I can, at first try. The first night I did it, she ran to the house to get into some spandex type capris. It was great. I wish I would have brought more than one of these ropes to share, because it is great with the weights, and the rubber rope has good weight to it, and will last a while. Anything I can do to build up female confidence! Well, I think thats about it for now, keep in touch. And if anyone has talked to my long lost sister, tell her to write me! Later.
Last friday we had a great dinner with some area PCVś. I had been saving my two pesto packets I had brought from American for when we could share it. So we had pesto pasta with tomatoes, I toasted some bread and we had garlic bread, and I even made sweet iced tea! It was delicious, but now, there is no more pesto :(
Just wanted to give a shout out to Cheryl and Tim! Yeah your married! Hope it was everything and more, and you are enjoying Jamaica mon!
Michael asked me about a fire in a market here, but I haven´t heard anything, but then again there areńt a lot of sources where you would get that information except for word of mouth probably.
Next weekend is Thanksgiving ( I realyl can believe that, because it just doesnt have the same kind of leading up to it all around you as you do in America), we are having an all volunteer meeting and a dinner in Fajara. I am looking forward to it, because it will be a much needed break from work. Not that I don like it, ( I really like having such purposeful work )its just been so busy. sometimes I dont know how I am going to get all that I want to do at the nursery school done in even two years!
Dharma (a nearby PCV) and I went the other day to have dresses made at the tailors for the meeting and dinner next week. I always have such a mixture of excitement and nervousness of how the thing will turn out that I am getting made. I always feel like I have this new exciting thing, even when I just drop off the cloth. I hope it works out well, because I used some cloth that I really liked and would hate for the dress to not be good.
A recent phenomenon I have discovered is that in the market there is a corner of the roadside that has just piles upon piles of second hand clothing for sale. Now the clothing is sometimes clearly from places like Goodwill, because it has tags still on it from there. Sometimes you can get great finds, that are totally ill fitted to the Gambia, like, a bright yellow fantastic lambs wool turtleneck sweater for 3 dalasi! Too bad I was sweating like crazy, or I could have imagined myself buying this sweater! I got a super comfy New Kids on the Block European Tour shirt, that is great to wear to bed because it is at that stage where it is perfectly soft. It makes me curious to see all these clothing items here in the Gambia, because I think of what journey it has probably made. From the manufacturer in asia somewhere no doubt, shipped to America, in the store, then someone buys it where it for one season, gives it to goodwill, someone buys it there, wears it for a while, then gives it to somewhere and it gets shipped, most likely to europe, and then down to the Gambia, to sit on the ground right next to the charcoal area of the market, and be sold for sometimes would be equivalent to 10 cents.
So, I have started my jump roping regiments. And of course it is such a interesting thing to the fam. Some of the younger girls, especially Jaleka like to join me, and are endlessly frustrated when they cant speed rope like I can, at first try. The first night I did it, she ran to the house to get into some spandex type capris. It was great. I wish I would have brought more than one of these ropes to share, because it is great with the weights, and the rubber rope has good weight to it, and will last a while. Anything I can do to build up female confidence! Well, I think thats about it for now, keep in touch. And if anyone has talked to my long lost sister, tell her to write me! Later.
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
a few quick words
Just wanted to say hello, haven't had much time lately on the computer, but I try to kick Andy off his at work at often as I can. Today was another day at the nursery school, we are slowly making progress there, its just diffcult because I can't be there every second of the week. I have started giving the teachers I'm working with now, "teacher assignments" where I give them one particular aspect to work on for that day on a notecard, like today it was using positive praise, which is not something they even think of here as something that should happen in the classroom to encourage the students in behavior and in academics. I explain it a little, we talk about it beforehand, and then they put the brightly colored notecard on their desk in front of them, so that they have it there as a reminder of what they should be working on all day. At the end of the day, they write how they thought the day went concentrating on the particular assignment on the back of the card, and we discuss what I observed, they can ask me specific questions, etc. It is a good way of focusing on one issue at a time, and that way we can see progress and keep track of what we are working on, instead of just piling on all these things that we need to work on at once.
So, the weather here is very hot during the day lately, as I'm sure you already got. Its the kind of heat where I walk with an umbrella to shield myself from the sun like when I'm going to the market, and even though it is about 5 when I usually go, I immediately have sweat dripping from the crook of my elbow that is bent from holding the umbrella above my head. But despite the heat during the day, the nights aren't too bad, like last night I was wearing a tank top, and sitting outside chatting with the family, and I was a bit chilly! When I took my bucket bath before going to bed, I had goosebumps! Crazy.
And some more random topics:
The oranges you can buy here are not the color orange, they are a good solid green, and light yellowish inside they are called "lemuno". They are pretty tasty, but I don't know if I would be saying that if I had one when I first got off the plane, if you know what I mean. But the other day I saw an amazing sight,... a orange colored orange! When I went to buy one, the lady mistakenly thought I wanted one of the green ones (the lemuno), but I said no, and pointed to the orange colored one, and she said, "oh, tubab lemuno" If you don't know already tubab is the word for white person/outsider, that is constantly berating us where ever we go. It made me laugh that she called it a tubab lemuno. But it was soo completely delicious, and juicy and orange.... even inside! It was expensive, (for the cost of one of the tubab oranges you can get 4-5 green ones. Anyhow (Guess you had to be there!.... so come on, get here!)
Another story about tubab. When I was at the nursery school observing a new class, the children were turning around and looking at me in the back of the classroom. They kept calling out "tubab" For some reason in this school they call the teacher Auntie, (so Auntie Mary, Auntie Fatou, etc.) So when the teacher tried to correct them, and said, "no her name is Auntie,... what?" The children said without hesitation, "Auntie Tubab".... hehe. One track minds I tell ya!
Well, thats it for now, gotta do some computer work for the college. Hope to hear from you soon. :)
So, the weather here is very hot during the day lately, as I'm sure you already got. Its the kind of heat where I walk with an umbrella to shield myself from the sun like when I'm going to the market, and even though it is about 5 when I usually go, I immediately have sweat dripping from the crook of my elbow that is bent from holding the umbrella above my head. But despite the heat during the day, the nights aren't too bad, like last night I was wearing a tank top, and sitting outside chatting with the family, and I was a bit chilly! When I took my bucket bath before going to bed, I had goosebumps! Crazy.
And some more random topics:
The oranges you can buy here are not the color orange, they are a good solid green, and light yellowish inside they are called "lemuno". They are pretty tasty, but I don't know if I would be saying that if I had one when I first got off the plane, if you know what I mean. But the other day I saw an amazing sight,... a orange colored orange! When I went to buy one, the lady mistakenly thought I wanted one of the green ones (the lemuno), but I said no, and pointed to the orange colored one, and she said, "oh, tubab lemuno" If you don't know already tubab is the word for white person/outsider, that is constantly berating us where ever we go. It made me laugh that she called it a tubab lemuno. But it was soo completely delicious, and juicy and orange.... even inside! It was expensive, (for the cost of one of the tubab oranges you can get 4-5 green ones. Anyhow (Guess you had to be there!.... so come on, get here!)
Another story about tubab. When I was at the nursery school observing a new class, the children were turning around and looking at me in the back of the classroom. They kept calling out "tubab" For some reason in this school they call the teacher Auntie, (so Auntie Mary, Auntie Fatou, etc.) So when the teacher tried to correct them, and said, "no her name is Auntie,... what?" The children said without hesitation, "Auntie Tubab".... hehe. One track minds I tell ya!
Well, thats it for now, gotta do some computer work for the college. Hope to hear from you soon. :)
Friday, November 2, 2007
November! November!?
Wow, its already November! Halloween flew by with barely a nod from us, I was so busy with work, that I almost completely forgot. The college work has been keeping me busy, and I am still trying to keep up with the nursery school, so that gives me a full schedule now. Grading, planning, prepping, observing, etc. Wheeww. I will be glad for a little break come Thanksgiving time. There will be a dinner for Peace Corps in the city, I think we might go. I am here at the PC office today, got up this morning and rode over, to spend all day on the computer for work stuff. I am beat, and still have to go to the grocery store here, and then off course chase after a van and hope that I get one back home! Tomorrow will be nice to have a little time to relax. Lately I haven't been able to write in my journal or draw but I hope to tomorrow. I went with the nursery school to the "zoo" (really just a few animals in cages) the other day. I thought I was just taggin along, but right before we left, I got somehow squeezed into leading a class! But it went ok. Thursdays classes at the college ( I have two on that day, four hours) went pretty well, but I have yet to look at the students papers for that day, so who knows. I always get the most random questions from them! Andy, myself, and one of our host brothers rode our bikes to the beach last Saturday, it was sooo hot! But the beach was beautiful, deserted, and then we went to another section and saw the fisherman pulling in their large boats. They chanted as they all heaved and hoed the boats in. There was a woman with a child in a small blue plastic tub at the edge of the ocean giving him a bath,.. it would have been such a cute picture, but I couldn't get my camera out fast enough! After we rode home (its about an hours ride each way) we got showered and went to a friends going away party. It was being thrown by a Gambian, and there were drummers there and a leader dancing around and with a whistle. She had amazing energy and was just jumping around and dancing, it was crazy, she had sweat dripping off her because it was so hot. Speaking of being hot the last volunteer in our house left a thermometer in our kitchen window, and we just assumed that it was broken because it stayed on 80 degrees the whole wet season, and then all of the sudden the other day I look over and it was at 100 degrees. We think what had happened was, like many other things, it got stuck with the extreme humidity during the wet season. Random things began to work a bit better now that its dry, like our salt shaker, matches, etc. Well, I better head off, and start my decent back towards Brikama. Hope all is well! Write me :)
Lydia
Lydia
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