Today was much better in terms of the teaching experience - I'd at least had time to prepare for the classes. I know I'm going to love this. As tough as the experience is, I can laugh - and I / we do constantly.
To get to New Hope today we had to pick our way through the stickiest mud, worse than the first, due to a huge downpour just prior to our arrival. Foul! When we at New Hope we washed our feet in a huge urn of rainwater. Later I discovered the little ones drinking from this and splashing each other.
The little monkeys were on fire today, literally jumping on me, crawling all over me, but there were some lovely cuddles. A most confronting case is however a little girl who apparently has HIV. She is so unbelievably out of control, sometimes violent, hitting other children and Donna, another volunteer. But most confronting of all was a tiny little baby, maybe 9 months old. He was badly deformed with legs finishing in stumps around the knees and a club arm. OMG, he's going to have a very, very difficult life, but so is his truly beautiful eight or so year-old sister who’s obviously been tasked with looking after him while their parents work. I’ve since learned that they are part of a family of five or so who basically have to raise themselves during the week while their parents live elsewhere, working – purely for food, no money – during the week. The family is completely dependant on handouts from New Hope; food, clothes, everything.
My older classes learned a multitude of adjectives to replace their standard, wrote learned "I'm fine thank you". At the beginning of each class I'm welcomed with "Hello Teacher, How are you today?” I reply "I'm wonderful / fantastic / sensational thank you, how are you". We had great fun playing with the options and it was gorgeous listening to them practice "sensational" / "fantastic", etc. I can't wait to see the results after two months. I'm going to give them the most colorful vocabulary! Feel free to send suggestions please!
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