17 months in...

Here are some thoughts and moments from year two (so far).  Send me email updates of your lives please.   I’d love to hear it!

The sticker chart…  So I still don’t use the stick in the classroom, which is shocking to many.  I often wonder if I do a disservice to the kids being their teacher.  Will they fall too far behind because I don’t “demand” the same level of discipline as other teachers?  I try to make it clear to my students how much I am there for them and how important I think it is that they succeed.  I may not use the stick, but that in no way means I am not serious.  Over time, I think they are really starting to believe me and I am seeing their effort and performance increasing.   As added incentive I have started a sticker chart!  Each week I review exercise books for completion and neatness and put a sticker (a sticker is equivalent to crack-cocaine in my classroom, by the way) near anyone’s name who’s done it all.  Whether or not you got a perfect score is not important.  In the world of class rankings and grades based on test scores, kids are surprised to see a sticker next to a lower performing kid’s name and a blank next to the kid who got a 95%.  Is this social justice?  Probably not exactly…  but I like it. 

Holding yet another sick baby…   So another baby arrived at the dispensary the other day.  His mother had died from AIDS the day before.  He is fourteen months old and tiny, and has thin, long limbs and a distended belly from malnutrition.  Sick from AIDS, malaria, typhoid, and probably pneumonia.  It’s these moments where I realize how very little I know about the world and how I understand even less.  I am slapped in the face with the realities of poverty and structural injustice, but I just can’t wrap my head around it.  Maybe that’s the point. I don’t know. 

Holding a baby who is getting better…  So happy to say, lots of examples!  Here's one: being here for a long time, I have watched Esther grow healthier and healthier since she arrived when she was about 2 months old and tiny.  She is standing in her crib, playful, and loves to try to talk in her raspy, grunting, hilarious noises.  Cheesy as it may be, she is joy and hope in human form. 

Books…  Our library is growing thanks to the help of so many of you and so many other donors to the Village of Hope!  I try to encourage the kids to choose books with words that they can read, but I can’t (and don’t really want) to harness the interest in and awe that Maria De Mattias students have in books!  In pictures, cartoons, bits of information, recognizing a word.  Just the other day, I witnessed a student experience a pop-up book for the first time and his excitement when I told him we have more than one. Another student fount a science text book from the U.S. and told me, very seriously, that this was an excellent book and he was coming back to read more of it.  

Drinking tea…  I read a description of tea in the book Little Bee, the story of a Nigerian refugee in England that drinking tea is like drinking fog.  For her that wasn’t necessarily a positive thing, but for me it tastes like home.

Drinking coffee?  Yes that’s right.  Not only do I eat peanut butter, but I also drink coffee now.  Mostly instant AfriCafe, from which I make very weak cups.  But the other day I had my first Starbucks from a pack of instant that my mom brought.  Let me just tell you… I was buzzzzzing. 

Visiting villages!  One of the coolest things I get to experience here is visiting some surrounding villages.  Some teachers have invited me to go to their homes, meet their families, and experience a bit of village living.  One of the coolest parts about it is hearing the teachers' life stories.  I feel so honored that someone would welcome me into their life in this way.  Also, I love busting out some Kigogo (the language of the local tribe) greetings, and then hearing the shock/laughs in response. 

“She’s different…”  Sometimes when friends introduce me to others, they tell them “She’s not like the other white people.  She speaks Swahili.  She visits people.  She cooks,” and things of that nature.  I guess two years really are necessary!

“She’s leaving in December…”  Yes, we are coming up on May, but I feel like everyone is talking about me leaving!  The head teacher, choir members, friends and even my students have started the guilt trip already.  I know it is really just a compliment, and don’t get me wrong,  I look forward to going home, but I also am going to be so sad to leave here.  I just wish other people weren’t looking so far ahead! 

Cooking...  I was just thinking the other day about how many things I have learned here in the kitchen.  Nothing here comes from a box and I can make lots of traditional foods like chapatti, chapatti mayai, beans, dengu, ugali, and more types of greens than I ever thought possible.  Who knew you could eat so many types of leaves!  Also, I can make bread without an oven, using a big pot and a little pot and sand and rocks.  It may be true that I’ve never been camping, but I think I could hang. 

Laundry…  I am not going to lie.  There were about two minutes one day where I thought, “wow.  Doing laundry by hand is such a cool experience.”  Then I immediately got over it and missed the washing machine again.  Even if I have to walk a mile to a laundry mat, carrying everything, I don’t think I’ll ever complain about doing laundry again.  If I do, please slap me. 

Sharing all this with my family…  In February I had the greatest experience ever sharing all this with my mom, Maura and Marie Simpson when they came to visit me!  It was so much fun and so interesting to introduce them to a lot of the aspects of my life here and share in their reactions, discussions and everything else.  We had a blast, and everyone here was so excited to meet them.  And I think people like me more after meeting my family.  That really shows you come from good people.  Of course I had a homesickness resurgence after they left, but I only let it last about a week.  And really, time is flying.  I will be home before you and I know it. 

Ten Months In

So it's been a while and here I am, ten months into my two years in Tanzania.  Can you believe it?  I think there were times when we all thought it might not happen, but here we are.  I am feeling a lot more at comfortable here these days, or maybe comfortable with discomfort?  I have some real friends.  I can communicate with people.  I feel effective in some aspects of life.  When really awkward or uncomfortable things happen, I don't freak out so much and I know what to do.

Every once in a while I stop and realize that I have some of what was missing beofre... FUN!  A good example of this feeling happened the other day when I was reading The Three Little Pigs to a class of kindergarteners.  I had the ability to go between Swahili and English to get the point across and ask the kids some questions.  I was even able to manage the class (somewhat).  Without even thinking my "big bad wolf" voice came out (who can stop herself, when reading The Three Little Pigs???)  Immediately the kids and I burst out laughing and could hardly continue.  As we were all laughing together, I thought "ya... this is fun."

The picture at the top here is from Nairobi, where Laura, Liz and I kissed some giraffes and had a great time.  I am hoping to write a retrospective on my travels soon.  Miss you all and love you!!!!

Visitors!!!!

Week one of my two weeks off from school was jam-packed with visitors and fun.

Sunday, Cat and Beth, JVs at Gonzaga primary school in Dar came to town.  After a run around "The Rock" we ate dinner and prepped for a night on the town.  We learned that Club 84, the dance club by our house, has LADIES' NIGHT on Sundays!  After some Konyagi and Bongo Flavor, we made it home at about 4 a.m.   Who knew?

The next day, we slept in and then went for a tour of the Village of Hope where I work.  It was pretty low-key there because the kids were napping.  We did go into the dispensary to visit the babies, though which was a lot of fun.  Alice, a British volunteer working in Mwanza came through Dodoma on Monday night on her way home.  Roland came to town and we had a great feast of a dinner including guacamole and velveta cheese!

Tuesday, our first set of guests headed for the bus station and Laura and I began our prep for the next set.

Wednesday, Mary Ahlbach, her nephew Adam, niece Mairead, and friend, Sr. Gaudentia came to Dodoma!  Their main purpose for coming to Tanzania was to visit the Orphan Center near Bukoba that Mary has been working with since 2005.  Generously, they changed their departure city to Dar to be able to pass through Dodoma and see me!  This switch included about 20 hours of bus travel... VERY GENEROUS.  It was so great to see a face from home and make some new friends.  In town for two days, three nights, we made the most of it.  Day one we went downtown, did a little shopping, toured the market, and at lunch at one of my favorite spots.  Then we walked over to the Cathedral where we met a priest who wanted to give us a tour of St. Gaspar's hotel and Radio Mwangaza, promising that it would be thirty minutes.  At this point, I know what that means, but it was pretty cool.  We went home eventually and had a lovely dinner at our house in Area D (thanks Cristina).

The next day we all headed to daily mass at 6:30 a.m. Afterwards, we had a great chai with the Jesuits and sorted out a bunch of the great gifts our guests hauled with them across the world!!  (A volleyball net!?! And LOTS of stuff for me! So heavy!  They are saints.)  We then went to pick up the bus tickets (slight scare there when some were sold out... luckily we have some friends that were able to help us out.) We moved on to St. Peter Claver where Roland gave us a great tour.  It was really nice for me, too.  I'd seen hardly any of the school until this point!  It is a pretty huge place, and a lot of it is still under construction.  Like Mary said, it will be very cool to see that place in about 10-20 years.

We moved on to the Village of Hope and had a great time walking around the beautiful site and again, getting some love from the babies.  Then Fr. Vincent met with us to give us a history of the Village, which is turning 10 years old this year!  He is so humble and truly inspiring to listen to.  I could see the wheels turning in Sr. Gaudentia and Mary's heads, getting ideas for there orphan center outside Bukoba.  We closed up the tour with a quick visit to the church and the new bakery, which is part of the plan to make the Village self-sustaining.  

This being Mary's sixth visit to Tanzania, I thought it was about time she got on a daladala, so we took one part of the way home.  We took a taxi for leg two of the journey, not because they couldn't handle it, but because we were pressed for time.  We wanted to do our hike of "The Rock" before sunset.  We made it about half way up and saw some stellar views of Dodoma.

Mary then treated me, my roomies, and Fr. Sossy to one of our favorite dinners... the swanky pizza place by our house!  It was great, fun, and delicious.  Then it was time to pack up and get to bed, as taxis were set to pick us up for the bus stand at 6:15 a.m.

Though the visit was a little hectic, it was so great to have visitors!  I had some wonderful talks with each visitor and really appreciate each one's advice and perspectives on life here.  It is so refreshing to see things through someone else's eyes.  Also with Adam being a second grade teacher and Mary having taught primary before, they had really good tips and advice for me.

Having visitors also helped me take some ownership of my life here by sharing it with others.  Introducing my friends around town and speaking Swahili really helped me see how far I have come in this experience.  These six months (almost 7 now!) have been really hard, but with encouraging words and perspectives from my visitors, I am thinking it will only get better.  I can't thank them enough.

The Dodoma Meat Tour

So my friend Erick, bus driver from Maria De Mattias, is also a butcher.  For a few weeks now he's been asking me to visit his shop and I've given him the excuse that I am too scared.  I ran out of excuses and found myself on a tour of meat processing in Dodoma.  I talked to Mom the morning of and she told me "channel your grandfather."  I did my best.  It was nuts, but it was actually a lot of fun, and something I will never forget.  Here's the summary:

We started at mchinjoni (the slaughterhouse) at 8:00 a.m. Thank god Laura and I were together for this.  After a brief tour of the facilities (luckily you can't go inside without a uniform... but the goat processing is visible from windows from the outside) we went across the street where there is a market for the less desirable parts of the cow.  "We're walking on hooves..."  Laura murmured to me as we kept smiles on our faces and greeted the people there.  At the market, the feet and heads of the cows are broken down (image: man hacking at cow head with a machete on a tarp) and made into soup.  The horns are apparently sent to Dar where they are processed and made into things like buttons and earrings.  Laura and I enjoyed some cow foot soup (Erick ate the foot, we just couldn't do it... but we ate the broth) sitting across from an inspector from the slaughterhouse.  He was in his uniform that was not exactly clean, which only added to the experience.  After that we enjoyed some chai and chapatti with some of the other workers.  Not really sure why, but the words "goats sound like children when they cry" came out of my mouth at one point.  My comment was met with a simple "yep."

After the slaughterhouse we moved on to see Erick's butcher shop in town where they package the meat to be shipped to Dar.  They had done all the butchering the day before, so they were just cleaning up.  After that, we saw a vocational training slaughterhouse that was not currently functioning, so we got to go inside and walk around.  It was very modern and pretty cool to see.  It was clean at the time, but it was easy to imagine it working!

We took a break then and went to Erick's house.  His nephew is one of my students, so it was fun to surprise him! We looked at photo albums and relaxed a bit.  Then, we headed out for lunch with Erick's brother to a place Laura and I hadn't been yet.  We ate delicious mshikaki (meat kabobs) and chips with a couple of beers.  Two beers (they are big here) at one in the afternoon will get you... We had some good laughs, saying that next time we'll have the beers first and actually go into the slaughterhouse.

Then we moved on to check out Erick's brother's house in a place called Nzuguni outside of town.  A lot of Maria De Mattias kids live there so I heard a lot of "TEACHER!" shout outs.  There is also a small meat market out there where they roast goat on Saturdays.  Naturally, we stopped by.  It was a good thing we had the beers, because then we were served roasted goat intestines.  They serve this with the stomach bile that they mix with salt.  It's green.  I ate it.  'Nuff said.

With a roasted goat meat goodie bag, we headed home.  Exhausted with the smell of meat permeating our skin, we gladly gave the goodie bag to Cristina and Sean for dinner.

Six Months In

So, I suck at updating this blog!!!  I’m so sorry.  As in all things, I am trying to be better.  Since March though??? Yikes.  Anyways… Dearest Molly Nora Callaghan emailed me asking these questions about my experience now that I have been here for SIX MONTHS!!!!!  I can’t believe it.  It feels like 6 days and 6 years.  I’m one-quarter of the way home kids…

I decided that the answers to these well-formed and thought provoking questions (thanks Moll) might be interesting to a wider audience, so here you go!

How’s life in Africa?

Life in Africa is at once difficult, beautiful, painful, fun, new, old, and just nuts… in varying ratios.  I definitely have good days and bad days, more dramatically than I’ve experienced before.  Some days I feel overwhelmed and that even at this point I have not progressed and things have not gotten any better for me here… then I remember that I did not feel that way yesterday. 

Also, when thinking about returning home, I used to only feel excitement and longing.  I definitely still look forward to going home, but I am starting to feel like I will miss it here when I go.  Bittersweet. 

What’s been your favorite part?

Too hard… but here are some fun things.  Kilimanjaro half marathon, retreat in Tanga and swimming in the Indian Ocean, shopping for beautiful vitenge and khanga, silly conversations with kids, learning to cook chapatti in the village and laughing the whole time, getting the words AND dance moves down for a choir song…

A really great experience I will never forget is having kids in the library at school for the first time.  Until a couple weeks ago the room and the books in it were off limits to the kids.  Now each class has one forty-minute library period per week.  I gave some brief instruction on being quiet in the library and returning books properly, but then just let the kids at it.  It was so cool to see how excited and engrossed in the books they were.  Most of them have never had a storybook before.  I have lots of ideas for creating a library program that includes reading comprehension, fluency, etc, but my main goal is to keep that excitement level up and get kids to love reading.

Least favorite?

Also too hard… but probably feeling lonely.  You get used to having lots of friends and family around always planning the next fun event, and then bam… you’re living in stark contrast to your previous life.  It’s getting easier, but keep the updates coming!

Navigating the use of corporal punishment in school has also been really really hard on many levels. 

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve eaten?

Cow stomach in banana soup.  The banana soup part was delicious, but I’m really not that brave when it comes to eating meat.  There is usually a process where I try to identify 1) what animal, 2) what body part, and 3) meat, fat, cartilage, or bone.  A boneless skinless chicken breast chicken breast is sounding pretty good about now.

I often try to sit next to Cristina and dish some to her… she will not only eat, but like nearly any type of meat.  A true champ.

What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen?

Two images come to mind with this question.  The first is women carrying things on their heads.  It is truly incredible, and it’s usually with a baby on their back too.  I’ve seen three tables stacked on one another, GIANT bushels of reeds, a four year old child in a basin carrying the gospel (at a celebration at church), giant suitcases, and more. 

Another one is accidents on the road here.  I’ve seen a person lying immobile in the road.  One person gathers branches that serve as what we would use flares for at home: warning the other cars to slow and go around.  Almost immediately a large crowd of people gathers around the person.  I’ve never seen an ambulance at one of these… I have come to realize how far we keep ourselves from our mortality at home.  Here, death is really part of life. 

Where your favorite place you’ve travelled?

Of course I would love Moshi, right?  The views of Kilimanjaro are stellar.  I think I need to get to the top of that at some point.

Also, Morogoro is incredibly beautiful.  We had a retreat there just before Easter.  See pictures on Flickr.

Do you drink coffee now?

Not yet.  I do, however, eat lots of peanut butter.  So strange.  I’m still having some cognitive dissonance around it. 

Do you have a favorite kid?

Of course.  I have a few, and often it depends on the day.   There is a kindergartener named Smart who I think looks like Taj Mowry (The Smart Guy…), which of course I’m obsessed with.  There is a first grader named Benson who is so sweet and tries so hard, but is also just a clown.  A couple pre-one girls, Rehema and Sabrah who seriously crack me up with their facial expressions (on purpose).  Also one of the littlest ones, Kevi Mdogo, (Little Kevin… there are two and the other one is tall) who is so little that the baby fat in his cheeks bounces up and down when he marches. 

There is also a group of older girls that I hang out with at lunch sometimes… they are hilarious.  Tausi, Zena, and Edina. Zena must be about 5’11 and Tausi is maybe 5’0.  Of course they are besties.  They have taught me a lot about language and culture here, and laughing the whole time. 

How are the roomies?

The roomies are good.  Sean’s family just visited us here in Dodoma.  They have all just set off for Zanzibar together.  It was so cool to see them all share in Sean’s experience here together.  Also, it was great to have an “outsider’s” eyes on things that I hadn’t even realized I’ve started to get used to.  They also brought some really great gifts, including PRETZEL M&Ms!!!!

Laura’s siblings are arriving in a few weeks at the beginning of July.  They will be here in Dodoma and then set off for a siblings safari!!!  Even I will have some visitors with Ms. Ahlbach coming at the end of June!

Cristina and I have so far have had very different experiences in our first year.  She mainly started in a very blissful honeymoon period, that is unfortunately starting to wane.  As for me, most of you know that I have struggled quite a bit here, but things are starting to look up.  It’s kind of nice now that we are meeting in the middle.  I’m glad we are sharing this experience together. 

Are you excited/nervous/both to have new ones in December?

Yes.  Both.  Roxanne and Jamie will make us a power-house of all females.  At first I was really nervous about it, but on reflection, I think it could be really fun.  Growing up in a family of three girls should probably have prepared me for this, right? 

I am really excited to get to know them, nervous to be a second-year for them, and sad to say goodbye to Laura and Sean.  But then again, it’s not for six months, so why worry!

As always, thanks for reading and thanks for the love.  The internet is going too slow to upload pictures, but check some out on Flickr (hannahbrosnan1).  Missing you all terribly.  Try not to forget about me!!!!!!

A Day in the Life (Part One)

-Wake up!!! (Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays 5:00 a.m., other days about 5:45)

-Boil water for shower/breakfast.

-Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays (if it’s not raining) I run with Laura, about 3 miles in the dark.  Other people are out running at this time, too, though so it is pretty safe.

-6:00-6:45- Shower, eat, get ready for school.

*A note on the bucket shower:  I say this only because it confused me...  This may have been very clear to everyone else.  I thought a bucket shower entailed some sort of rigging system where there is a hole or many holes in the bottom of a bucket that you hoist over your head.  Wrong.  It’s a bucket with water in it.  You use some small container to pour the water over yourself.  Duh?  I think my imagination got the best of me. 

-6:45-7:00 Walk to the bus.  We walk by a primary school on the way, and the kids love to practice their English “good morning’s” on us.

-7:30 arrive at school, wander about, greet kids and teachers.

-7:50 “Parade”  This is kind of an assembly where the kids stand in lines and respond to commands such as “attention!” “at ease,” “about turn,” etc.  This is usually followed by the national anthem (I almost have it down), maybe a song in English, and morning prayer.  Then the kids march off to class (singing “marching, marching, marching like a soldier…” they love it?).  At first I found this very odd, but now it is one of my favorite parts of the day!

-8:00-12:20- Classes.  This is the time when I rotate between the four “English Medium” classes.  Lately I’ve started to go to only two classes per day to try to develop some continuity in the classroom and have time to do something a little more meaningful.  Every day is different and I’m still not quite sure what I should be doing, but I’m trying.

Typical classroom activities include singing songs (If you’re happy and you know it, 5 little monkeys- Molly they LOVE this one!!! Thanks!, twinkle twinkle, etc), writing the alphabet and numbers etc.  I also do a lot of grading, which mostly involves checking if things are written correctly, e.g. is that capital letter Q acceptable?  I’m pretty much a hard ass.  The first grade kids do a lot of copying from the blackboard.  For a lot of them, I’m pretty sure school is just a drawing activity.  I’m trying to figure out ways to get them to actually understand what they are doing.  Suggestions in all areas here are MORE than welcome! 

Honestly, school is really, really hard for me.  I’m going to go into more depth in another post to try to explain it. 

This is getting long so I will continue with the PM hours another day!  And by they way, to tell time here, subtract 6 hours… For example, 12:00 p.m.  is really 6:00 (or saa sita in Swahili).  7:00 a.m. is 1:00 (saa moja asubuhi... the first hour of daylight).  It definitely makes sense if you think about it because the days here are pretty much always the same length, but needless to say it is a little confusing to ask someone the time. 

xoxoHB

I Wore Tights?

It was a little chilly; I was wearing a longer dress; I decided to wear tights. No big deal, right?  Wrong. I noticed we were getting a little more attention than we usually do on our walk to the bus stop in the morning.  Cristina and I were both looking at each other trying to see what might be drawing the stares.  We racked our brains, but thought nothing of my tights. 

I didn’t find out until I got to school and talked to my friend Nanja that my wearing black tights happened to be confusing and HILARIOUS. Why are her legs black?  What is that?  Are those socks?  She is very dark today.  Half African?  Children, adults, and everyone in between gave me a second look that day.

I’m not sure if I’ll wear tights again, but if I do, at least I will be in on the joke.