Hello All!
Once again, I apologize for me lack of postings. Not only is it still due to the completely overwhelming feeling of trying to compress this experience into a mere page or two of blogging, but it’s been pretty hectic since I have finally started school! I say “finally” because, as I have learned, school in Sierra Leone never actually starts when it’s supposed to. We were scheduled to start on Monday, September 10th. I had heard from other PVC’s who have already been here for a year that school would not actually start on September 10th because, well, that’s just the way it works. I was still hopeful and optimistic that it would indeed start on time this year (still in me American mindset). When September 10th finally came around I was just as excited as I was nervous to meet me students and to start teaching. Walking about the 25 minute walk up to the school, I was telling everyone, with a huge, cheesy smile on my face, rearing to go in my teacher’s clothes, “first day of school!” I got up to me campus and see me principal’s son, Zinab, who is one of me students, and jokingly yell at her for not being in her uniform because assembly is about to start. She laughed at me and gave me, what would be first of many, “oh poor American miss Brooke” look and said, “Miss Brooke, school isn’t starting until the 17th now. They just announced it on the radio.” So I had gotten to see first-hand that schools in Sierra Leone do in fact never start on time. It’s just a given fact.
Then, as some of you may know, I missed my first official two weeks of school because I had to go to Freetown because I had a weird, painful, swollen spot on me left shin. The doctors, which I saw many, never really did figure out what exactly it was, but it’s all better and healed now! As much as it sucked to be away and miss the first two weeks, I received quite the greeting from me village upon me return and could feel the Bandajuma love. It was great. Except the part when I walked into me house to find out my mother cat had eaten her three kittens. Yes, I said eaten. I know what you are thinking: Brooke, or Musu, how could you leave your cats unfed for two weeks!? Well, in me defense, I thought I was going to be gone for two days (which is all I had also packed for so that was interesting) but I also left the window open for them to get in and out of to go hunt. When I told people about it in my village, they just shrugged and said, “yeah, So? They were hungry.” No biggie.
I returned on Sunday and started teaching on Monday (our school is a Muslim school and goes from Sunday to Thursday). It was a tad bit overwhelming, especially since I was two weeks behind. As well as all 360 eyes on my as Mr. Rogers, my principal, gave an embarrassingly long and unnecessary introduction, calling me “nothing short of the Iron Lady of the school” and also a “specialist in the field of communications” as well as telling them what the repercussions would be if they were to disobey me. Love that man.
All in all, school has been going really well. I have all forms (JSS1, JSS2, JSS3) for two periods of grammar each and once period of “reading” in the library each a week. I put reading in quotations because i’m not exactly sure that Principal Rogers even knows what “reading class” means. Miss Corrigan, the Peace Corps I replaced, did an awesome job getting the library at our school up and running, but even still there’s about 200 books, none the same, and half of the being too hard for even the teachers to read – and I’m supposed to teach them “how to read quick without error.” Direct quote from my principal when I asked what he wanted me to do for “reading class.” It also seats about 40 students, which is fine for me JSS3 class of about 30, and me two JSS2 classes of about 30 each, but trying to fit me two classes of JSS1 with 60 students in each, is kind of difficult.
The first week I got back, I did ice breakers and such for each of me classes, for me students to get to know me and for me to get to know them. I made a box with a slit on the top and had them write a question they wanted to ask me. I would say three-fourths of the students in every class asked my what my mother and father’s names were. Let’s just say “Michael Mik-MAY-Hawn” will be well known when he comes to visit in December. The next week was all revision (what they call review) for the exams the next week. Since I had already missed two weeks I had to try to cram an entire lesson in one week to have something to test them on. Luckily, I had my lesson plans from summer school, which I was able to use with JSS1 (the articles a, an, and the. If anyone knows a way to teach the difference between using a and the, would LOVE advice) and JSS3, subject-verb agreement. With JSS2, it was a review of the parts of speech.
On Monday of that week I started having students from my JSS3 class asking me for help with their debate arguments because we were having a debate competition that Thursday, which I had no idea about. The debate was ‘secret ballot system vs. open ballot system’ since the presidential election is on November 17th. On Tuesday I learned from me principal that I was entirely in charge of the debate competitions that are to be held EVERY Thursday. So I had to organize the order and set up, get judges, organize the hall where it was to take place, and make sure all of the students had their debates ready to go. I have never done, nor witnessed a debate before. This is just an example of how the job has increased me adaptability, as well as me creativity. Being at a school, where there is not a generator, only chalkboards and desks, and the only tools the students have are notebooks and pens, has forced me to pull creativity out of places I had no idea existed.
As frustrating and overwhelming as it can be there are also so many things that I love about this job and keep me constantly entertained.
Example 1: The first Friday I’m back at site, we had our CTA meeting with the parents of the students. After my principal makes my give a speech (I have done more impromptu speeches here than I have ever done in me life –and I was a public relations major) which my principal had to translate to Mende after I finished, the entire meeting was then held in Mende. Since I only know the basic greetings, I’ll admit, I spaced out a little. Halfway through I looked around and noticed that not one, but two women were breast-feeding…while the meeting was going on.
Example 2: This is where the title for my blog comes from. After school one day, me students who live on the school grounds wanted to show me a village about 2 miles away. The walk was beautiful. Full of rolling hills, going through the jungle and cassava farms. On the walk, I hear me students talking about Americans in Mende. I asked them what they were saying to which Musa, one of my faves who won the debate competition says, “we were just saying that all Americans are perfect, Miss Brooke.” I immediately replied with a snort (which probably changed their minds right then) and said “No. Not at all. No one’s perfect, Musa.” Then another turned and said “but Miss Brooke, you’re perfect (guess the snort hadn’t scared them off too much).” I wanted so bad to agree, but I decided to LIE and tell them that even Miss Brooke, The Great, was not perfect. Later on in the walk I said something and they laughed and one of the said “see Miss Brooke, this is why we like American’s. You all are so funny. I then thought to myself, I need to hang out with me students more, they do wonders for me self confidence!
Example 3: It’s quite obvious that I am the only woman teacher at a school with 10 teachers. I think at least twenty times a day my students reply “yes sir”, “thank you sir”, or “no sir” and every single time they quickly grow a mortified look on their face like I’m going to flog them and then quickly shout “Ma!”
Example 4: My principal, having 3 daughters himself, is very pro female education. He encourages the girls to do their best and to do better than the boys, which is very rare for girls in this country. One day, where I had class in the morning and then no class until the end of the day, I decided to walk into town to take my phone to the charge station. It’s a good 20-25 minute walk one way so I was gone for around an hour. I’m walking up to the school when I see some of my students walking around the buildings, even though I know class should be going on. I keep walking and see a whole swarm of them in the brush on the side of one of the buildings with cutlasses brushing. I went and asked one of my teachers what was going on and he said that the boys are brushing and just the girls have class for the rest of the day. I asked why we were doing that and he replied “because the girls need to learn.”
Those are just a few of probably a hundred crazy experiences here thus far. Every day I am completely thrown for a loop and never ceased to be amazed. As tired, frustrated, stressed, annoyed, underappreciated, and overwhelmed as I feel, sometimes all of those in one day, at the end of the day, when it comes down to it, I love this experience, this country, and these people. If I’m ever having a bad day it always helps me to put things into perspective. It varies due to the day’s events, but usually my thought process when putting things into perspective goes like this:
- My best friend in the village is a 70 year-old man. I pee in a cement triangle in the ground. I’m living in West Africa.
OR
- I just had a lizard crawling on my arm, during my bucket bath, while ducks are walking on the tin roof, annnnd I’m living in West Africa.
OR
- I just had my 15 year old neighbor cut my hair on my veranda using medical scissors and have no idea what it looks like because I have no mirror and I’m living in West Africa.
OR
- My student had a baby bird in class today and I have a cold where nose is a faucet and there is no toilet paper around so I’ve been blowing my nose into random leaves and old student papers.
Putting things into perspective never ceases to amaze me and always makes me laugh.
Hope everythings going great in America and I love you all!! :)
