Off the Grid

Marie and I are leaving on Saturday for our December holiday.

We’re planning to hit up Zambia, Malawi, and Tanzania. Neither of us will bring computers, and although we’re hoping we can check our email and such at the hostels where we will stay, we’re not making any promises!

So, best wishes for the holiday season. Happy New Year’s, if I don’t get anything posted on here until 2014. Have a great December! Sago ge ni !gâise Hôasoreb ûha.

No More Learners, No More Books!

 The children have left!!

an end-of-year class party

School went out for our learners on Friday. It was sad to sit on my stoop and watch all of my kids slowly straggle out from the hostel… but at the same time, it’s also a huge relief to have a bit of a break from them! I’m sure it will get lonely soon.

Now, teachers stick around for the end of year stuff – marking exams, inputting grades to the computer system, sending out end-of-year reports.

My grade 8 maths class wrote their exam two weeks ago, so all of my marking is done. Because it’s the end of the year, our exams all come from the region. It’s difficult preparing kids for an exam that you have no control over! When I calculated all of my final grades, it was pretty depressing, actually. I have a 39% pass rate for my grade 8 maths – also known as a 61% failure rate. That’s pretty depressing.

When I had calculated all of this, I went to my principal to apologize for my lack of results. Honestly, I was about to cry. But she looked at me with a huge smile and said something along the lines of: “39%! That’s excellent. Well, not really, we aim for 50%. But our school is usually close to 25% in maths, so 39% is good.”

It’s weird to think that now I will teach many of the same learners next year in grade 8 maths. Because if they fail maths (which means they don’t attain at least a 40% for the year), they fail the whole grade. Still, I’m pretty proud of what we accomplished this year! My kids’ English has improved a lot and we can communicate pretty easily now. We learned to work together as a class and they really did a lot of work towards the end. I’m hoping that next year, I can use everything I’ve learned to my advantage to have the best possible maths class for 2014!

One year, down.

It’s officially the end of my first full school year here at St. Therese JSS! I can’t believe I/we made it!

Here’s some hilights from the last month or so.

The kids write exams for the last month or so of school. That means no real classes, but lots of time spent “invigilating” – either supervising learners studying or writing exams. It also means the learners are bored pretty much all of the time.

We had a few days where the learners really did a ton of work cleaning up the school and hostel for the end of the term. It’s great what an active role they play in keeping up the physical side of the school – they cleaned classrooms, washed windows, raked the sand (I know, I don’t get it either), watered the trees and plants, picked up rubbish, cut down invasive shrubs and burned the old branches. I definitely enjoyed watching their fires!

Teachers have been busy with marking exams, but the atmosphere is a lot more relaxed when we’re not actually planning and giving lessons. I’ve tried to spend a lot of time preparing for next year – I have my plan for the year finished and my worksheets for the first term finished and sent in for copying. (If we want a lot of copies, we have to send to town for them.) I’m hoping to do a lot more learner-centered work next year. This won’t really go with the traditional style of teaching here, but I really think it will help to get the kids more invested. If anybody has ideas about this, I’d love to hear them!

Most of our local churches had their confirmation, baptism, etc. services within the last month or so. I didn’t get to see all of them, but I saw the two confirmation services where a bunch of my kids took part. It was really cool to see these services here – they are considered really important within the church cultures and it was cool to see my kids taking them so seriously.

I’ve been getting more khoekhoegowab (local click language) tutoring from one of my learners. He taught me 4 days a week for the last month or so. He’s focusing more on reading and writing than speaking and listening, which means I’m still not great at conversations… but last week he gave me a test and I wrote two full letters and a police report in khoekhoegowab! This language is insanely difficult, and it’s taking me forever to grasp just a tiny bit of it. But still, I’m pretty proud that I can say anything at this point! Tita ge nesi kaise #nisa a.

A penny saved...

Is a penny that you weren't willing to share with your friends.

The concept of "saving" is something that really does not translate well between American and Namibian cultures. It's something I don't totally understand about Namibians, something they don't understand about me, and honestly, a point of contention between traditional Namibian cultures and the current capitalistic world.

Saving, to me, is an idea that has been drilled into my head since I was tiny. One-fifth of my allowance, starting from when my entire allowance consisted of 5 pennies, had to be put into my separate "savings" piggy bank, which I was keeping as a college fund. My mom always encouraged us to save our money, "just in case." What if you want contacts when you are older? What if you want a car? What about a prom dress? It's not that my parents were being unreasonable… it's that they were trying to instill in my brother and me a sense of personal responsibility.

This habit—saving what I have in case I need it later—actually goes contrary to the common culture here in Namibia.

Here, all people—starting from a young age, just like my brother and me—are trained to share. "In Africa, we share" is probably the phrase I've heard the most often since arriving in Namibia. What does that mean? Here, we are taught to share what we have. Because in a month, you might also be out of work. What will you do then? So, if there is extra food, you don't keep it as leftovers—you share it with your neighbors, friends, or a stray dog. If there is extra money, you don't save it for a rainy day—you give it to your aunt so that she can also provide for her household. It is not at all embarrassing here to go to a friend and ask for money for something, because you know they will do the same at some point. (And if not, then you are extraordinarily lucky and ought to be sharing what you have anyway.)

As an outsider, it's easy to look down at this kind of "sharing" because, honestly, it does inspire less personal responsibility than we are encouraged to have in the States. If you don't have to plan, to save for what you want, sometimes you are less inclined to think ahead about anything. Money, babies, whatever. There's less drive to get a good job to support yourself, because you know you will always be supported somehow. Not necessarily good.

BUT. Is it all bad? Definitely not. I've walked through towns in the US and stopped someone on the street before. Not to ask "ou me one rand" (the common call of children here when they beg all white people for money), but to ask for directions. And people look at me like I'm crazy. Why should I help you if you can't take care of yourself? Here in Namibia, anyone will help you. Need directions? No problem. Anyone will take you there or if they're busy, find a small boy to show you the way. Not enough money? No problem. You can take something from the shop on credit or "on account". Not enough time? No problem. There is never a lack of friends with free time who can come help you finish your projects in a hurry.

This ideal of sharing builds community. It makes people closer and more willing to help each other. And honestly, it's when people get more money—like the teachers or the police—that they become less willing to share. Does having money make us less generous people?

Development with a capital D

I've been reading "The Last Train to Zona Verde," a new Paul Theroux book about a former Peace Corps Volunteer traveling through southern/western Africa. It's a little condescending and his writing style is a bit weird sometimes, but he brings up some good points.

One of the ones which I found particularly salient has to do with foreign aid. Theroux discusses it in terms of monetary aid, but I think this issue can really be discussed more broadly – including aid in the form of money, personnel, advice, etc.

Africa as a whole is pretty much overwhelmed with foreign aid. Basically any organization of people with some kind of goodwill see that there is a lot of need in Africa, and think that their contributions can probably fix some of these things. It's a fair point, and I really think it's great that we have these people who want to contribute to those whoa re less fortunate.

But Theroux also brings up the counterargument, which is one we have heard from Peace Corps time and again (when it comes to money). If you give people everything, they don't learn how to do it themselves. Giving a man a fish, and such. You can imagine the argument. If we (and I mean "we" in the broadest sense – anyone from a somewhat more developed area who is trying to do something good) provide EVERYTHING in terms of aid, people and organizations here aren't self-sufficient. If we provide the expertise to set up businesses, governments, and other organizations. nobody knows how to go about it the next time around. If we give the money to build the schools and computer labs, there is less ownership, and the people truly value these things less.

Here's my question, though. To what extent does this argument reach? I can imagine an extension that goes, "If we provide the teachers for the schools, the locals don't learn how to teach, and the kids don't have local role models. They need these role models – teachers and otherwise – to see that they can really be successful in life." I think this argument has legitimacy, personally. However, it's also hard to say I don't have a legitimate role here. Peace Corps tries hard to make sure our efforts are "sustainable," which means I'm not just a teacher, but I should also be training the other teachers n skills so that they can continue on their own. I shouldn't be creating new programmes unless there is a local counterpart who will continue it when I leave.

The role of volunteers can definitely be debated. But I think that the question is more interesting when you dig down farther, because volunteers truly can make only a limited difference. What about foreign aid in the broader sense?

My village has gotten a TON of things from various investors and sponsors and … aid. I've thought about it broadly, but some of the local implications are still coming out. Here's an example: we are starting to plan the 50th anniversary celebration for my school, which will happen in about a year. In conjunction with this, we are discussing the future of the school. What is our vision, what do we need, etc? It's all really exciting. But when we discuss this "development" of the school, it usually comes down to money. Don't worry, they tell us. We can write grants and proposals and get the money from somewhere.

It's the same on a smaller scale. There isn't financial planning. When the kids go to sports competitions, the teachers end up contributing all of the money because these expenses aren't assumed by the institution. When the school runs out of paper, the principal has to buy it out of her paycheck. When the staff wants a microwave in the staff room, we all buy it. These are small things, but in my opinion, they are examples of how the school hasn't yet learned to PLAN. Income should be greater than expenses, but it hasn't happened yet.

Many of these things are cultural, sure. Namibia is a young country, development is still occurring, people are still getting used to the modern world of capitalism.

But still, you have to wonder. Would "development" happen faster or slower if we just left the village to itself? Is the aid a necessary component that is required to get things started, or are we simply delaying the process by which people and institutions will become self-sufficient?

"African Black Magic"

A few days ago, my kids started getting possessed by evil spirits.

I know this sounds absurd… I don’t technically believe in witches, witchcraft or “African Black Magic” as they have been calling it. That didn’t stop the last few days from freaking the hell out of me!

Sunday afternoon—my kids say something bad happens every Sunday at our hostel—two girls collapsed outside of the girls’ block (dormitory). The sisters started seeing people who they knew but could not name, screaming, writhing, kicking… Apparently they were possessed by a spell. Honestly, I wasn’t paying much attention because I thought it was a bunch of crap and would soon resolve itself.

After a few hours, the girls had indeed recovered and all was fine at the hostel again. But after dinner, a bunch of other kids “got it.” I was having our Sunday night family dinner with the volunteers of Tses, and when some of them went home they told me that there was something big going on at our eating hall. When I got there, there were about 10 learners lying on the floor of the hall, screaming and writhing, with a bunch of different elders and pastors there to help and pray for them.

I, with some of the other teachers and community members, was there from about 9 until after 3am – sitting with them in the hostel, holding down kids who were literally trying to get up and run away, restraining kids who were trying to claw at each other. Most of the children affected were girls, but there were also a few boys. Apparently this kind of thing is more common with girls and it is also more common around times of stress, like exam time. I know there are probably millions of psychological explanations for everything that happened – but in the end, it is children who are in a great deal of physical and emotional pain, and regardless of why you think it happens, it definitely, definitely sucks and is really hard to watch!!

As we were in the hall that night, there were obviously times of more and less panic. Sometimes the kids were quiet and we sat around drinking tea, and sometimes they were literally punching and kicking at us! We had some help from a few other learners, as well as company from those who were unwilling to go sleep in the blocks that night.

All of the affected learners slept eventually, so I assumed it was all over. But Monday morning at school, more kids started going wild! More learners were affected during class and many of the same ones from Sunday were still having issues. The story goes that there were a few “main” learners who were being witched by a jealous lady who worked at the hostel, and those few were the ones who suffered the most and for the longest time.

Monday afternoon, the kids were a mess. They were all scared of the hostel/blocks/kitchen/food/matrons, and a few were still “possessed.” We tried to send these ones home to their families ASAP but some of them stay far away so we sent them to other families in Tses, just to separate them (so they couldn’t build off of each other anymore). It was so strange to go around carrying some of my learners who were unconscious, when they are normally very strong individuals; holding some when they thought they were being choked, etc. A different way of seeing them, I guess. When I wasn’t busy there, I was going around to all of the different groups of kids around the hostel, trying to comfort them as much as I could. Which wasn’t much, but at least some of my normal visitors came over to visit my house (as well as another group of the boys who I normally think are very independent but were clearly terrified).

Monday evening, we had what must be called an exorcism. We had leaders from all the different churches in our hostel’s eating hall along with community members, all of the hostel matrons, most of the teachers and all of the kids from the hostel. There were all of the “affected” kids (including a few new ones) in the back, writhing; and all of the learners in the front, praying and being prayed for. After what seemed like hours of prayers, the pastors prayed for every child individually (it took forever!) and sent them back into the blocks. They were obviously terrified to go alone, but I think it helped some of them to overcome that fear. At this point, the pastors “got out the demons” from the affected children. The pastors prayed, touched the children, yelled at them, spit holy water in their mouths and faces. Eventually, they got every child to say that they believe in God and Jesus as our savior. (I’m really glad I understand Afrikaans, since the entire night was not conducted in English!)

Almost the whole time, there were weird things going on. Girls rolling around in the back, clawing at each other, kicking. A bunch of them truly seemed like they were possessed by something strange. One boy wasn’t allowed to sit with the others (he had been possessed but was now feeling better) so he sat in back with me. He seemed fine, just weak and scared, and kept leaning on me or holding my hand or something. It was really cute but also really sad to see him this way, because he’s normally a really rambunctious kid!

By today, most of the weird stuff seems to have settled down. There were a few odd cases throughout the week, and our school is now really empty because most of the hostel learners have left for their families for the week. Last night, we had another church service to try to keep the kids on the right track.

Coming from my culture at home, this stuff all seems weird. And I know that probably most people reading this will agree that it is all a load of crap! But guys.. honestly, I don’t know what to say about all of this. Do I believe in witches? Not really. Being possessed? Not really. But obviously, something was psychologically and physically affecting my kids, for a long period of time… and no matter what you think it was, it was really sad and really hard for the kids. Everyone at my school is exhausted because nobody has been sleeping (even though I wasn’t personally too scared, I had about 10 kids sleep in my house for a few nights because they were afraid of the blocks… and getting woken up in the middle of the night because they were scared). Whatever is going on—even if it is some kind of mass hysteria (or “exam-phobia” as the regional education director just called it), it doesn’t matter much to me. The effect is not good either way!

The One-Year Mark

Well, Peace Corps Namibia Group 36 has officially been at site for over a year! I thought we’d never make it.

I can say that it’s been an adventure. I’ve done many new things (eaten donkey, gone to a wedding, led a youth group…taught a class) but in many ways, it’s not so different from home. I’ve built up my family and friends, and I definitely feel like I belong to my community here.

I had a crazy moment last week, though: Thursday night was our annual academic achievement awards ceremony. It was the first event I was here for last year, too. In this evening, we award learners with certificates for outstanding academic achievements, improvements, and other things (sports, behaviour, commitment). I remember last year being horribly bored watching the ceremony, and also feeling bad for not being able to help control the kids from the audience (where I was standing to take photos).

Our pastor giving the Keynote Address

This year was different. The 3 hour ceremony honestly felt like nothing. I felt like a proud parent, smiling all the time and mouthing directions and taking billions of photos of my kids. (Sorry Mom for rolling my eyes when you “played the piano” with me in my performances and stuff…)

Some of our top academic achievers

More importantly, I feel more successful as a teacher now. To start with, I was actually able to help keep the kids in the audience under control when they needed to be. But further – and this is my crowning victory of the last month or so – I have discovered that I am one of the teachers now.

The only awards I, personally, handed out - to the "Sportsmen" and "sportswomen" who are good leaders, athletes, and teammates.

I helped choose the new prefects, I helped choose learners for the awards, I helped make the awards. And my input was taken on different issues. I have been trying pretty hard to follow Peace Corp’s policy on only intervening when your help is asked for, but I felt like there was a glaring problem with our Awards Ceremony programme. You see, in the 49 years of my school’s history, only Head Boys have given a speech at it.

But we have a Head Boy and a Head Girl. And let me just tell you, the Head Girl this year is way more competent, and a much better speaker, than the Head Boy. So for the first time since I’ve been working here, I straight-up argued with my colleagues for hours until they let me add a Head Girl speech to the agenda.

Our new Head Girl for the 2014 school year giving her speech!

I know one speech won’t change gender relations; it’s not even a drop in the bucket. But at least we’re trying, right? There is so much male superiority happening in this place, and that extends to the learners. Hopefully if we can continue to make changes, even small changes like this one, to the way we interact at school, we will be able to help some of these girls grow up to be self-confident and capable individuals!

Our Role

As Peace Corps Volunteers, we have three specific goals set forth by the Peace Corps. These are, vaguely:

to improve Namibians’ understanding of Americans,

to improve Americans’ understanding of Namibians,

to assist with development in Namibia in whatever way we can.

As a teaching volunteer, I have another set of goals. These include things like improving learners’ marks, improving teachers’ capacities for teaching effectively, improving management at the school and improving English and critical thinking skills among both learners and teachers. There are more, but you get the idea.

So, teaching volunteers are placed at schools where there is perceived to be a need. Schools where learners consistently underperform. The thought is that at these schools, learners probably are not getting the support they deserve from teaching staff, and teaching staff are probably not doing their jobs as far as showing up to school every day, teaching effectively, communicating ideas in English. It’s our job as volunteers to come in and do whatever we can to improve the situation, set a good example as a teacher, etc.

But what do I do when these common problems are not the problems faced by my school? It’s something that I’ve been struggling with, and I would absolutely love advice from anyone reading this!!!

Many other volunteers complain regularly about teachers who miss weeks of school at a time, or teachers who sit and do nothing rather than teaching at the front of the classroom. Teachers who don’t speak English well and therefore are not well equipped to help the learners pass their exams. Here’s the thing though—my community doesn’t suffer from these problems. My teachers, in fact, are a pretty amazing set of individuals. They care a TON about the learners, they come to school every day, they TEACH in school every day, and their English is actually very good.

Yet, I had a 15% pass rate on my recent end-of-term exams, among my grade 8 and 9 learners. These learners attend school every day, and most of them have at least 2 hours of mandatory study time every day. We taught every day during the term and reviewed before the exam. The struggle at our school right now is: why and how is teaching occurring, but learning is not happening?

Now, I know I’m a teaching volunteer, so my primary position is in the classroom. But if the reason I was sent here was to improve the pass rate of my learners, we need to figure this out. From talking to teachers, learners, community leaders, and church leaders, the best I can figure out: it’s a cultural problem, not a school problem. The culture in my region is not a culture that values education highly. The Nama people were herders, suffered under the German genocide in the early 20^th century, and after that faced apartheid. Most of the adults haven’t completed formal education past grade 5 or grade 8, and many of them honestly don’t see the need, since they subsistence farm for a living. Many kids don’t have frequent parental supervision, and parents definitely aren’t checking if they have finished their homework or if they are passing their classes. Many of them aren’t even checking if their children have eaten 3 meals in a day.

We recently hosted a “parent meeting” – we have one at the beginning of every term in order to try to keep a supportive school environment. 14 parents attended, and I have about 210 learners. This is the kind of support we are commonly receiving from the community.

My philosophy so far has been that probably I can make more of a difference by working with the community rather than spending all of my time in the classroom. Working with the young people here to stay busy and motivated (and be good role models for the kids and good future parents), working with parents, working with the community leaders. But I don’t know. How do you work within this kind of community and expect to make any kind of difference?

August in photos

Mom came to visit, I saw some places in the north. Enjoy!

Etosha national park:

Real family and host family meet up in Okahandja:

Steph's village outside of Rundu:

Grandpa, this one’s for you.

I don’t know much about farming, but I am always a little interested in it because of the family farm! Not that my kids believe me when I say there are farms in America, but still.

Namibia’s currently facing a huge, horrible drought. Last year, there was pretty much no rain in my village and everywhere in the country experienced significantly less rainfall than normal.

Over our August holiday, I got the chance to see some of the north of Namibia, where things are generally greener and farming is a much bigger deal. They can also actually raise cattle because there’s enough water and food. But all I heard from anyone in the north was how dry it is right now, and how worried everyone is about having enough food and livestock to make it through the year. If the rainy season is not good this year, it will be a big problem. Luckily, at least in towns and in some villages, the government is providing drought relief in the form of supplementary food—but it isn’t enough for most families, and we don’t know how long it will continue.

When I was coming home, I got a lift with a farmer from the middle part of the country. He had a few more details for me. He said that last year he had about 150 head of cattle. Cattle are better to raise if you can afford it, because they are harder to steal and big enough that jackals cannot pick them off of the herd in the night. Well, this farmer had about 10mm of rain in 2012 instead of the ~200 he needs to keep his cattle on his land. He sold a bunch, so he is down to 76 with an additional 36 calves. He is waiting for the calves to make 200kg so he can sell them too, because there just isn’t enough food and water.

The problem with this was that farmers all over Namibia had to sell livestock early this year, so prices were horrible and most of them lost money. Now they are trying to make it up in a poor economy (not that I know much about economics, but the dollar keeps gaining on the Nam dollar) and in a climate that is not helping them out!

In a country where farming, and subsistence farming at that, is a primary source of livelihood for much of the population, things like droughts hit really hard. And since everybody here has accepted climate change and knows it will continue to worsen, you have to wonder how they will manage to stay afloat?

sorry it's been so long since the last posts, guys! More to come soon about my recent holiday travels and our school here =)

Is she a Nama lady??

Guys, I’ve made it.

I’ve made it hard.

Someone asked last night if I was Nama.

But I digress - the occasion was actually the point of this blog post.

There was a Nama wedding celebration last night. It was for the brother of a friend of mine, and Jenita, Lily and I were invited to attend the celebration.

It was awesome – we got to get dressed up in Nama clothes!

The actual wedding was in Windhoek last week, but this was the traditional Nama wedding/celebration. When we got to the house where the wedding was being held, we were invited inside to sit with the elders. It was a huge honour and we are still not sure why they allowed us!

After a few minutes, the actual ceremony began. Some of the elders began to dance outside of the traditional hut, and the groom escorted the bride out of the hut where they must stay (per tradition). Her head and face were covered with a towel, so he had to lead her. They danced the traditional dance with the elders for awhile (which is really impressive given that she couldn’t see anything!!)

After the dance, we all went back inside the living room, where the bride and groom were seated at a table. An elder led a short prayer and ceremony, and the groom’s sister uncovered the bride’s head.

Each elder was given an opportunity to speak. We couldn’t understand any of the blessings since they were in the Nama click language, but we are told they were very beautiful, inspirational and wise. The groom, when it was finally his turn to speak and thank everybody, was really sweet and switched to English for a minute. He informed us that the elders had been blessing the new couple and passing on their knowledge as 2 they could. He also thanked us for attending and for trying to follow their culture (wearing traditional dress, etc.).

When the ceremony had concluded, the ladies from the family served the food they had prepared ahead of time. Then the younger generation (kids and the young twenty-somethings, us included) escaped outside to dance for awhile. Eventually, the elders and the new couple prayed again and all the extras slowly left.

It was such a great honour and experience to be able to witness such a wedding! Even my friend Elden said he had learned from the ceremony, because these traditions are not often followed anymore. A great learning experience all around!

A Hard ‘Nuff Life

(I recently discovered that I don’t have the Annie soundtrack on my computer, it’s a problem.)

Being a kid is hard. But the weird thing is, I remember when I was growing up, I used to always wish I was a few years younger. Really, no matter what age I was, I would always feel like I’d had so many fewer worries 2 years ago.

The thing is, I’m not sure it’s the same here. Yes, kids have fewer worries than adults. Probably. And yes, in general there are people around to care for them. Probably.

But then you have kids who take on the responsibility of finding food for their families, because their parents don’t provide. And hundreds of learners staying in the hostel with 2 adults around to supervise them. Let’s be honest, they’re basically fending for themselves at that point.

Some of my girls who were here for the “out weekend” –they live too far away to go home just for the weekend, so they were stuck at the hostel. They came over to my house to hang out, listen to music, do some sewing and make a cake (I felt like they deserved something nice and felt badly that they couldn’t go home!)

I get frustrated with my kids a lot. They don’t do their homework, they’re not up to grade level in school, the can (really frequently) be really rude, disrespectful, demanding and obnoxious. But I guess I’ve been starting to wonder if I can really blame them. Most of them don’t have parents to direct their behavior, and half of those who do have parents who are alcoholics, abusive, or in some other way not really able to be there for the kid. Which means the kids (at our school, we have learners who are only 12 or 13, but there are also hostels at primary schools) are responsible for doing their laundry, mending clothes, keeping themselves clean, finding snacks when they need them, finding rides for themselves to get to/from school from breaks, etc. The kids who aren’t at the hostel usually have it even worse – some of them have adults at home, but even those usually don’t eat 3 meals a day, have functional clothes and shoes.

 A bunch of our learners received blankets from a local organization called OYO. These are the kids we deemed most “vulnerable”—which in this case, meant the kids who are staying in Tses for the winter and don’t have a blanket on their bed.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that, at least for most of our kids here in Tses, being a kid isn’t what I think it is. It’s not carefree or easy. And yes, there are probably parts of America where the same is true. But let’s be honest, not where I grew up. And I’ve gotta say, I’m just so thankful.

Hardloop, hardloop lekker!

“run, run nicely!”

Well, I started writing this post about a month ago and lost track of it. But I’m gonna give it a shot:

Pretty much any time I see a new person, or a kid, while I’m running, I’ll get pelted by cries of “hardloop, hardloop, hardloop!” run, run, run.

But my favourite is when those kids yell at me, but then decide to tag along. I kind of felt like the pied piper today—I was running out of the village and at the edge of the houses, there were a bunch of kids playing in a field. They saw me from a ways away, and ran across the field to watch me.

It was really impressive, I had 2 kids—a 10 year old and a 12 year old—come with me for probably 5 miles! I’m not gonna claim that I’m in shape right now, but we were probably going somewhere in the vicinity of 8:15 miles. (yes, I’m staying in Namibia, and yes, we use metric here, and no, I still have no idea how to measure my mileage in kilometers.) Dang African kids. Anyway, I was surprised. I tried to talk them into coming to St. Therese when they get to secondary school so they can run with me, but I’m not sure if it’ll work.

Even though I usually only have time to run twice a week here, I’m still really REALLY glad it’s part of my life. And that it’s acceptable (although weird) in my village. I’ve found that not only it is, obviously, a way for me to stay healthy and relieve stress, but it also helps me to get out and see people (and for them to see me). Yay running!

Acceptance

At home, things were different.

When somebody did something stupid or got himself fired from a job, I sometimes associated that action with the person. I might not ask them for help on another project because I know they have flaked out before, or interact with them differently because I feel I have some new insight into their person.

But I find that the way I interact with people has changed.

There was a security guard at my school. He was, quite honestly, a pretty bad security guard. He slept on the job, left the gate unlocked while he was sleeping, and sometimes just missed work for no reason at all. He got fired a few weeks ago. A year ago, if I had seen him after these events, I might have thought to myself “he deserved that” and “why should I bother with this person when he can’t even keep his job?”

But I saw this particular man this morning, when I was out for a run. Not only did I stop to greet him, but the first thing I said was “we miss you over by the school.” And I surprised myself, because when I thought about it, this was true. He’s a great guy who, regardless of his work ethic, really cared about the kids. I invited him to visit me at home sometime this week so that we can try to work out a sports program for our learners. Because even if this man isn’t a great security guard, he’s loves soccer and is interested in helping out. And if I have a reasonably good person who is eager to help out, well, I’m certainly not going to turn that away.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, when it comes down to it, you just have to be grateful for the people in your life. Whatever they are willing to do, and wherever and whenever they happen to be motivated to help out others, well, I’m learning to be grateful for those small things.

AAAAAnd we’re back!

Today marked the first day my 2^nd full trimester as a Namibian teacher! Today was just the teachers, so we spent a few hours in a staff meeting discussing plans for the new term as well as results from the first term. Our most impressive result: a 2% pass rate from our grade 9 learners. WHADDUP NAM EDUCATION?!

Ok but really. This, plus the results from a big regional education conference that happened during break, led to a conversation this morning about what is going on in our school. First off, we are approximately the last choice in secondary schools due to our results.. the good schools accept only the top tier of learners, and so on until we are left with those who have not been successful in the past. We talked about home life, parent support, and teacher support as major influences on learners, as well.

We also discussed the lack of educational alternatives for learners who are just not cut out for “normal” schools. 99% of our learners qualify as needing extra classes, but we simply don’t have the teacher-power to provide them with the extra classes, in small groups, that would be required. Many of our learners have undiagnosed (or even diagnosed, but what can you do about them?) learning disabilities or other problems that may even be preventing them from ever being successful in a standard classroom setting. One of the things we are wondering is: is there a way to get a vocational or “special” school in Karas? Our region currently lacks any of these options for learner support. Why should the learners from our region be prevented from having these resources?

Anyway, at the end of the day we decided it comes down to the teachers doing the best they can given what we have. So, back to the grind – at least we are once again a full teaching staff and can try to help each other make it through the term!