Phase 3 and Easter Break

I’m sitting here in my living room with some candles lit listening to Dylan’s “John Brown.” The weather is getting cooler and feels very much like autumn in Ellensburg, with sunny, warm days and crisp, cool evenings that turn into chilly nights. It has been a distinct departure from the clear mornings with afternoon storms sweeping through. Mike and I are both hoping this weather is typical of the winter months, as it will make the long nights much more bearable.

I just finished packing for our two and a half weeks away from site (read: Phil will be within communication range for 2.5 weeks!!!). We have Phase 3 training in Maseru for a week and a half, then head off to Durban for 4 or 5 days over the Easter holidays. It will be strange to be in an urban environment by the beach again. It is apparently a lot like being along the beach in Orange County. Also, they have a Subway. And hopefully olives. And maybe I’ll finally get some of this South African wine that I’ve been hoping for. We’ll see.

It is definitely time for a break from school. After I had 7 students get 0s on a fractions exam (that is 10% of my students), I think it is time to clear my head and get rejuvenated. Each day is two steps forward and one step back. On Wednesday students seem to understand and can do problems in class, and on Thursday they look at you like they had been comatose since Monday and you were diving right into the middle of material. It is terribly frustrating and disheartening some days. Other days I sit down with a kid to explain something and they have an ‘AHA!’ moment and things are good. Dad, I don’t know how the hell you’ve done this for 25 years. Kudos.

And to give you a taste of some of the teaching difficulties I have faced:

1. The curriculum has me teaching about sources of energy for power plants and one of them was tidal estuaries. Not one of my students has been to the ocean. Trying to explain the tide (“Well, remember when I told you that gravity was the attraction of two masses? The moon is a big mass and the ocean is a big mass, and as the moon spins around the Earth it pulls all the water after it.” Blank stares all around with some robitic “Yes, Sir”s) to that group of students ended in confusion.

2. I also tried to give bubbles getting bigger as they rise in water due to the decline in pressure with depth. See difficulty 1 for obvious reason why this was ineffective.

3. I tried to explain power plants. They don’t have electricity.

4. During the sensing organs unit I was supposed to explain X-Ray machines. Nobody had had an X-Ray taken.

5. During the sensing organs unit I was supposed to explain how if some of our senses are bad we can use different machines or tools to aid them. Nobody had ever seen a hearing aid. Not even spectacles.

6. Also, they don’t speak English.

All this to say that things are going slowly and there is a lot of work to do. I think I am going to spend a lot of time during breaks designing labs and different teaching aids. I have no access to a hardware store or Radioshack, so it is going to take some serious creativity and a few trips to town. We’ll see what happens. Maybe we can really spend some time on science fair projects so that they’re worth keeping around.

Oh, and some guys at NGC have spent some time working on sizing a power system for the school (Tad especially deserves some credit) and have done some really cool analyses involving weather patterns and showed how transmissivity of different levels of cloud cover will affect available solar power. I got really excited about showing it to my students, but then realized that explaining transmissivity probably should take the back seat to learning how to add fractions. Maybe next year… But, thanks guys for all that work! I’m really excited about helping put together a grant proposal to get a basic power system put in the school in the short term, and hopefully get some money in the future to expand the system to provide power for a computer lab. Part of the upcoming training is about these types of secondary projects, so we should get some help in grant writing. And having all this great technical data will look great in the proposal, so thanks again.

I’ll finish with a Moment of Zen.

Phil is in Form A Maths at 8:00 am. Phil answers a question, “No, 37/5ths is not equal to 1/2. Where did you even get that number?” Phil looks left out the door because he hears some rustling outside. A cow walks by pulling a chain. It is followed by a large bull, also pulling a chain. Another cow walks by. Students are still looking at the board trying to find equivalent fractions to 1/2. Phil shakes his head a little in hopes of finding some clarity. Nope. He turns back to face the class and try for the 8th time to explain equivalent fractions. “Mashoba, seriously, where did you get 37/5ths?.....”

Keepin' On Keepin' On

I'll be within cell phone reception until Sunday, March 22 at 10 am West Coast. Call me.

So, I’m nearly done with my 9th week of school and the days are beginning to get shorter. Dusk is heavy by 6:30, which brings about a whole new set of challenges. What do you do for the two or three hours of consciousness before it is time to go to sleep? Tonight I read a little bit more of A Fortunate Life (thanks Ted) before beginning to worry about my eyesight, then decided to get out my laptop and take a look at some pictures.

I found some good ones in a folder labeled “Leaving Home For College.” I’m not that good at labeling things apparently, because the folder has pictures that go well into freshman year, including cutting Adam’s first mullet, but the picture that stopped me is one that was taken on 10th Ave in Ellensburg, WA.

It was taken just down the street from my house, probably in front of what used to be the Hall’s house, looking towards the University. In front of our house is the trusty Taurus (my sisters “learned to drive” in that car, which involved various iterations of body panels and paint matching). The sun is just peaking through the tall trees that line the street and it looks quiet. It reminds me of many summer mornings I had heading out the front door to get in my truck and head to work somewhere around Kittitas County on a construction site, the sprinklers already going at 6:30 am to try and get the grass a quick drink before the heat really kicked in. It was so quiet and peaceful. But then, on the left side of the photo, is the Weinegar’s old truck. The grey beast with loose fan belts and unbalanced wheels that stressed the ball joints into an audible rhythm of speed-sensitive periodicity. It was a slow, screeching, thrumming hellion of a vehicle. But the rest of the picture is nice.

Just a nostalgic moment from my high school years.

Anyway, almost nine weeks of school done and gone. Oops, students still aren’t fluent in English and a few still aren’t really sure what a fraction is.

The former will take a while, but I thought that after 2 ½ weeks of fractions, students should at least know what they are. So, after a terribly frustrating class, I decided to have a mini fraction cram session after school. There was one girl in particular that I really wanted to make a little head way with. A chocolate bar seemed like an appropriate teaching tool, as it would hold her attention and is already segmented and easy to break into fractions. After a few minutes of putting pieces together and breaking them apart to try to show equivalent fractions and adding fractions, etc., she seemed to start to get it. At the very least she replied, “Yes, Sir” to my ever useless question, “Do you understand.” I think she was over me talking to her. So I kept going, trying to pound it in to the point that kids rolled their eyes because they knew it so well.

After the chocolate bar example had run its course, I told the 12 students in the room they could each have a piece. More than a dozen hands all darted in towards the chocolate and just as quickly vanished, leaving only 2 of the 18 pieces remaining. I stared for a second. “Ok you turds, which one of you took 2 pieces?” “Sir?” “Sir?” “Sir?” “Which one of you little thieves took two pieces?” “I did, Sir.” A little fist showed up in front of my face and the fingers uncurled exposing a melty chunk of chocolate. The girl dropped the now deformed piece of chocolate in front of me. I grimaced. There were still 3 pieces missing. I snagged an untouched piece, gave the other untouched piece to the Form E boy who had been helping me tutor and stood up. I knew the 3 missing pieces were already securely stored somewhere on other students’ persons, and I was not particularly interested in having a I-know-you-know-what-I’m-saying inquisition with students that rarely get sweets, and many of whom have never had the pleasure of dark chocolate. Besides, I had another half bar stashed away at home.

I’m not sure what else people want to hear about. I got Planet Earth in the mail from my parents and it’s working wonderfully on my laptop. When the projector arrives (I’m not really sure when or how) then I am going to plan some viewings. Students are often asked to come to school on Saturday mornings, so I might show it then. Mike and I talked about getting some popcorn and some trinkie (the bottle says it makes 60 servings from 4 fl oz, I’m not sure how they can store it in plastic, as it sounds like something that melts glass, regardless, it’s cheap) and having a movie day when they come to school. So, we’re pretty excited about that. I have also started to compile a digital library. When I do research on the internet in town, I try to save the web pages so that I will be able to show them to students later with the projector. Wikipedia pages work great, and I’m excited to show the Science and Math Club the page on Electromagnetic Radiation because their book sucks and I’ve done a little work in that area. Atmospheric transmissivity might be beyond them, but hopefully wavelength will be at their level. Anyway, that is briefly what is going on with me.

The 29th of March I will be heading to Maseru for training for a week and a half before going to Durban for some McDonald’s and a quick vacation over Easter. During my time in Maseru I’ll have constant cell phone reception and frequent access to the internet. So charge up your Skype accounts and buy some phone cards, because I’m expecting to hear from all of you.

Again, thanks for keeping up with me everybody. Somebody rearrange Mike Gomez’s dolls for me when you get the chance.

Blessings.

Getting in a Rhythm

As is typically the case with new experiences like this, you eventually get into a rhythm and new, exciting stories become a little less frequent. But, some things still happen.

Firstly, there was a debate last week at school. The debate was part of the Form E (senior) English class. I don’t have them in class, but I know a few of them from diversity camp that I took them to two weeks ago. They were visibly and somewhat melodramatically nervous, as humans only are before public appearances in the high school arena.

“Alexander, let me see your hands.” Alexander showed me his palms, which I wiped with one finger as if I was sporting white gloves at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance (spelling? Ugh, French). He watched his hands with curiosity. “Wow. You really are nervous. You know, the WHOLE SCHOOL is in there, right Alexander?” If the probability of his eyeballs actually popping out of his hadn’t been so remote, I would have been worried. His head snapped back and he looked at me with a et tu Brute? (Ugh, Latin, is that quotation Latin? Ugh, no Wikipedia) surprise. Then I smiled and laughed, and he relaxed a little.

The topic of the debate was, “Pregnant students should be expelled from school.” The entire school was there. All 200 of them stuffed into one classroom. The moderator and his bellman (the dude who rang the bell when a debater went over her time allotment) were seated at the front of the classroom with their backs to the blackboard. To their left were two desks for the judges, and immediately in front of them were the debaters. Chairs for the debaters were arranged in a horseshoe pattern with five seats on either half of the horseshoe. On the right of the moderator were the teachers in attendance and stuffed in the corner behind the door was yours truly. I arrived late.

The moderator, a Form D student named Moeletsi, began to introduce the students who were in the debate. I’m not sure how to describe the reaction of the audience as the individual debaters were announced and walked in to take their seats, but as best as I could tell it was somewhat akin to the entrance of a boxer into the arena for a Vegas title bout. There was a lot of energy, to say the least. Entrances of the female students were less engaging than the entrances of the male students, who postured and strutted more, but it was pretty exciting. I had no clue what was happening. That happens a lot.

Then the debate started. The first girl got up and stood at the desk that was in front of the moderator and facing the crowd. She looked up at the crowd, then looked at her note page on the desk, stuck her right leg out to the side, put her right shoulder forward a bit and, at a volume usually reserved for lovers, proceeded with her arguments in support of the motion.

The following five debaters had similar body language, but some of their voices wobbled more or less than others. I couldn’t hear most of what was being said because of the quiet voices and my position behind the speakers and in the corner, but the audience seemed to get the idea of what was going on and let out jeers, cheers and yelps at various times. I rarely saw the correlation.

After the first three advocates on either side, there was a break time. Any student was given the chance to come up and speak their views on the topic or tell a joke, story or sing. I thought this was the coolest part of the whole afternoon because the result was unrehearsed (although it would be hard to make an argument that any of the debaters rehearsed their points beforehand), untheasarusized, and generally crowd-acclaimed performances. I understood very little of what was being said as the English wasn’t particularly good and was sometimes said into the speaker’s hand, which often covers students’ mouths when addressing anybody of authority or in a public forum, but, I had a smile on my face the whole time and the student body was eating up every second of it.

The debate eventually continued, the last debaters gave their pre-scripted arguments without regard to rebuttal, and the judges found that the expellers had argued better than the educate-the-pregnant-girlers had been. Despite my sadness at anybody feeling any vindication for holding that position, I had been thoroughly amused and impressed for a solid hour. It was a fun afternoon.

Secondly, one night after Mike and I had enjoyed a dinner of pasta with a delightful red sauce with fresh tomatoes, onions and carrots out of the garden, we decided to have a night cap of warm sprite from the shopong. I locked up the house, and we started off on the five minute walk to the shop. At the end of our pleasant walk we rounded the cyclone fence only to stumble upon the Machinese (I’m not really sure about the spelling here, but it is phonetic) shop owner kneeling over the carcass of some bird in a pool of its own blood, plucking away. The Ntate that was overseeing the taxodermic efforts turned and said hello. He was the same Ntate who had given me the fat off the knee joint of a cured goat knee last week. Nice guy.

The Machinese owner, Tia, looked up and smiled. Mike laughed a disbelieving, loud, echoing laugh. We thought it was a chicken at first. Then we realized it was the carcass of some large-wingspanned bird. We tried to ask what kind of bird it was. “Twenty Rand,” the shop owner said with a broad smile. The Ntate informed us that he had purchased the bird from someone who had killed it.

Mike and I looked at each other quizzically. To us it looked like one of the large white birds that nest in a tree in the village that is probably 25 meters tall. It might have been a stork. We had no clue how anybody would have gotten close enough to one of these birds to kill it. And, with that in mind, we don’t know why they would sell it for as little as $2 American. Or why Tia would buy it. For that much you can get a bag of frozen chicken from the shop down the road. And you don’t have to clean frozen chicken. And chicken tastes good.

Mike laughed again. Loudly. We went inside only to find out there was no Sprite left. We left the shop. Mike laughed again, loudly, and we went and got a beer at a shop 20 minutes away.

Thirdly is Makai. Makai is the smallest student in the school. She is maybe 4’ 10” and 75 pounds. She makes me laugh everyday. Her desk is in the front of the class, and I quite often find her absent mindedly making very strange faces at me. Sometimes she puts a ruler in her mouth and flops it up and down like a spring board. When I find her in such strange pose I mimic her or tilt my head and give the, “WWWHHHHHAAAATTTT??!!” look. You know the one.

She inevitably looks up at me, realizes that I have witnessed whatever she has done and pulls the turtle. Sometimes that involves her pulling the peek-a-boo invisibility pose behind her hands. I can still see her. When her English gets a little better we’ll attack that metaphysical reality. Other times it involves her hiding behind/under her desk. She is so little that she could almost climb in her desk. It makes me laugh everyday. She is my favorite this week and makes me laugh every time I see her. Makai the turtle.

In other news, last weekend Mike and I got a little generator. We can now charge the battery that we bought a month ago and has been dead for the following three weeks. However, we may have bought a trickle charger on accident, or the capacity of our battery is much larger than we thought, because I charged the battery for 10 hours today and it is still not full. Part of the problem is that we are at an elevation of over 6000 feet and I don’t think the throttle was calibrated for that altitude so it’s running a little underpowered. I’m going to have to pick up a crescent wrench in town this weekend in order to get that 67cc hellion tuned a charging things in 8hrs flat. It will at least power a couple computers and a projector, so kids had better be ready to have their minds blown by Planet Earth when everything gets hooked up. I can’t tell you all how excited I am to show that to these kids. They’ll finally be curious enough to want to try to speak English. Glory awaits.

Okay, this is getting quite long, so I’m going to stop now. Sorry my new posts are so infrequent, but internet is a luxury I only get every couple weeks. And thanks everybody for keeping up with me. Packages and letters have been fantastic. I love you all and think of you often.

Cheers.