I am thankful for my turkey

  Today was both the end of model school and Thanksgiving. A very emotional day in good and bad ways. Model school ended with a bang. My secondary students and I got serious with a dictation using “their, they’re and there” and then I dismantled any discipline I’d taught and we drew our thanksgiving turkeys on the board. It was a fun exercise for everyone because it is important to recognize what we are thankful for. And we had some great turkeys. The students were sad to see the abasitajeri (trainees) go and many of us got notes telling us how much they loved us. I am sad for model school to end but that is a great sign. I’m feeling ready to go to site, plan my curriculum and begin teaching. 

I’ve been hanging with some neighbors and female students recently. We have internet and food dates. They want me to invite my friends Tressa and Russell. Or as they’re known in Rwanda, Kayitesi and Brussell.

The US ambassador of Rwanda is visiting us today and bringing a turkey. It will be the first time we meet him. Scott and others have planned a huge thanksgiving feast for us and our center is decorated with hand turkeys. The Rwandans are beginning to realize that Americans will use the smallest excuse to have a huge shin dig. Dance party to come…

Thinking of everyone that I love on this special, misty Rwandan day.

PICTURES en fin

1. Bob and I on a hike. Picture by Nicole Gaunt.
2. Stephan, Elyse and I at their house. My neighbors.
3. A bunch of us "monkeying around" in Nyungwe.
4. Stephan 

Students in my S3b class

View from the walk to my host mom's house.

View from the center

Blogtown

I just told the neighborhood kids that I am unable to dance football. Whoops. Teaching has been so fantastic this week. I’m still riding a wave of elation from this morning. Walking through town this afternoon, I heard of chorus of “teacher!” and “penny!” Even the adult student whose cellphone I confiscated in class stopped on his moto taxi to tell me, “teacher, I am driving!” On Tuesday, I tried my first environmental education class. It went so well that I carried it over to Wednesday’s lesson. I need to work on being an educator, not an advocate but a part from that, the students were incredibly responsive and excited about the lesson. I began with, “class, I have a question. What is the environment.” I was inundated with answers so I was able to easily segway into our first think/write/pair/share. I asked them if the environment is important and why? My answers ranged from scientific arguments to “because it shows the Power of the Creator.” Nice. Next, I introduced a challenging text about the Ogiek people of Kenya. We explored issues of habitat loss, deforestation and relocation. I introduced so many new vocabulary words that the students commended me for being such a smart teacher. Aww. Wednesday was “no chalkboard” day but this wasn’t too large of an obstacle since I planned a vocab review and a nature walk. I can be such a hippie. Anyway, I tried a new technique during the vocabulary review component that increased comprehension and student participation. When I asked students, “what is ___?” I would have at least two students answer and then call on a quiet student to ask them what the other student had said. There was a lot of acting, synonyms and spelling dictation. After that, we went outside of the classroom (mind-blowing for these kids) and walked around the school. I asked about what they saw, observed, noticed, etc. and we talked about what environmental problems Rwanda has. This was the critical thinking component of the lesson and it was very beneficial for those that understood. Rwanda is very clean in terms of trash but when I asked them where their trash goes, they had clearly never thought about that before. Erosion is a big problem here because of the hills and inadequate amount of terracing and the students were able to introduce this topic during the walk. Tomorrow, I am visiting two of my female students at their houses. We will see how that goes. I have to be careful about accepting too many invitations. Tuesday was Lindsay’s birthday and we had guacamole, beans and rice for lunch. It was about as close to chipotle as you can get (she’s also from Denver). Thanksgiving preparations are in the works. Rwanda pictures on facebook if you have facebook. We should find out our site placements within a few weeks…!!!!!! Wednesday night ended with a bang. It was like Christmas but better. I got 9 letters in the mail, including pictures of my cousins and ginger candy! Thank you everyone! I can go to bed and expect the presence of all my wonderful friends and family back home in my malaria dreams. Letter writing is an expensive hobby in Rwanda but it sure pays off. Closing thoughts are from my mom: “Every time you move you get to reinvent yourself, start over and get better.” I sure am. Love.

Amanda in the Landa...

Thousand Hills

Today is hump day! Half way through training! An event to celebrate for sure. I celebrated the day by teaching the past simple to 60 6th graders and then learning how to cook Rwandan-style with my host Mama. Mama Kaliza is a wonderful teacher, patient with slow diction and hundreds of new words every day.

As I bent over the little metal firefood-stove and stirred our mélange of freshly deconstructed chicken, tomatoes, onions and thyme, chickens pecked at my feet and smoke clouded the mud and concrete kitchen. I thought, “I’m in (expletive) Africa.” In my comfortable compound and daily shuffles between Kinyarwanda school and English school, I forget about the beauty and toils our Rwandan friends live every day. As calming and fun as cooking was today, I cannot imagine spending two hours cooking every single meal every day. Yet this is what I hope to do at site.

Though Agathe and her children are very friendly and welcoming, the cooking lesson was very uncomfortable at times. To begin, I nearly started hyperventilating when Pascale was sharpening the knife and I thought I was about to witness my first slaughter. Luckily, Agathe brought me inside for some amata meza. Milk. When it came time to eat the cassava paste and sauce, we washed our hands at the table and my family began to show me how to roll the paste into small spoons to scoop the sauce. This went reasonably well but I had more sauce dripping down my arms than everyone else. I became really uncomfortable when I tried to pick a small chicken leg but they insisted I take the largest chunk of chicken meat. I eat meat two times a day every day but this family eats meat maybe once a week. And they insisted on sharing so much with me. So much, in fact, that I couldn’t finish my portion of meat and sauce and the children sat flabbergasted as my food went to waste. I was so embarrassed. And felt awful. Every day I try to live as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Rwanda I still buy sweets, eat well and complain about what is lacking. The guilt and embarrassment I felt at Mama Kaliza’s house is something I will continue to experience through my whole two-year stay so I will need to channel and transform that negative energy towards the positive things I will be doing. Of course, Mama Kaliza had no hard feelings towards me and was sad to see me leave after our 4 hour visit. I told her my mom may visit this summer and if so, we will visit her and she was TICKLED. Arashimye. Happy.

Thank you for reading. Love to you.

Amanda

Alternative Halloween

Nicole compared our service last Saturday to her alternative spring breaks spent in New Orleans. So it stuck. As we filled our rice sacks with dirt to bring to the classroom, we chimed "trick or treat!" Umuganda, or national community service, was the best way to start our Halloween. Community members including prisoners and the military all joined us to put in the dirt floor for a new school in Nyanza. As our safety and security coordinator Gloriose told us, most Rwandans have a role in their community and are expected to contribute in a highly decentralized system. Wearing anything from playboy t-shirts to classy Eurostyle shoes to cross-country ski boots, most of the town was out there. They were impressed by our hardwork us amazungu could do and the men in particular were stumped as to how to treat the American women. They would force a shovel in our hands but as we willingly shoveled dirt into bag after bag, they would quickly remove the shovel from our possession so as to maintain their masculine appearance. Mandy and Chris carried dirt in baskets on their head but I was not so lucky.

Following Umuganda were several speeches, singing and dancing. Rwandans have a propensity for giving looooong speeches. They also like American women and the mayor essentially auctioned us off at the end of the speeches. Luckily I was wearing my fake engagement ring. I have quite the fictious boyfriend!

I spent the middle part of Halloween with Mama Kaliza, my resource mom. She is a teacher and could spent hours patiently teaching me the months, days, hours, parts of the body and color. She is kind enough to constantly tell me "umuhanga"! You are clever! Her children are just as wonderful and patient with me. After an explanation of Halloween, I left to prepare my costume; however, it is very difficult to describe Halloween as a celebratory, fun day in a country with such a violent history. Just today, we had the most unsettling language class about calling for help. We learned graphic, gruesome verbs that the teachers were very casual about teaching.

Anyway, the costumes we came up with were out of this world, some of the best I've ever seen. I hope to post pictures soon. We had a talent show, which included skits about Day Man, Ethiopean dancing, jokes, singing, gymnastics... oh we are a talented bunch. I told my classic Halloween joke (why can't ghosts have sex?), did my headstand-to-handstand and participated in the Ehtiopean dancing. Crazy dance party afterwards. Oh good times but it didn't feel like we were in America. Which was important.