The
past couple of weeks have been fraught with the legendary Peace Corps “downs”.
I knew I was headed into a funk when most of my thoughts turned immediately to
the negative if something or someone would upset me by yelling some atrocious
word because it’s the only one they know in English. I found myself dreading
the moment between songs when there would be nothing but the sounds outside of
my headphones. I knew that someone would most likely say something to me or
about me and that act would ruin my 8 minute walk to my school.
Pedestrians or the inevitable slackers
on the side of the street in tea houses aren’t my only problem this month.
Every time I go into Addis (which is more frequent than I assumed it would be)
for a PAC meeting it seems as if I am splitting my work life in two. I am
excited to get on the plane and have at least four days to work with my fellow
PAC members and get things done. I come home (happy to even be home) and upon
my return my teachers ask me where I have been because I have not been at
school. By the way, they already know that I was in Addis doing work for Peace
Corps. Either they forget or just have fun making me feel like I am never at my
own school. The other possibility is that it’s just culture for them to ask me
where I have been and I am taking it wrongly because I am already frustrated.
For the purposes of my sanity, I normally choose the latter.
April 15 is a particularly
frustrating tale. But I will get to that in a minute. When I returned from
Addis I was, for the millionth time, dealing with G.I. issues. For one of the
days I was actually bed ridden during a barbeque at my own house. So, needless
to say, I did not go to work that week but I did keep in contact with my
principal and my counterpart. They knew that I was ill and things at school
went on without me (as they should because I am not a permanent fixture). Every Friday in my absence was English
Communication Day led by my counterpart, Berhana. Other projects were put on
hold though. English Club for Students is not solid enough to be led by another
teacher, my English Club for Teachers is pretty much dead in the water due to
lack of attendance, and the Teacher Mentor Program can’t be done without me
seeing as I’m the mentor.
After my week of unspeakable
bathroom atrocities, I headed back into school eager to get things back on
track after my long absence. Becca and I were ready to continue painting our
World Map and I had some fun things planned for the eighth graders for English
Club. As I walked into my office I noticed that it had been used as what
appears to be a paper shredding room that had no trash can. Pieces of paper
were everywhere so I asked my Vice Director what happened and he immediately
began tidying up. After protesting a bit Becca and I began to help. Once I sat
down at my desk I realized something else. The power strip was missing. Not a
problem. This can be easily handled by going into the office next door and
asking for it back. Nope. The power strip had a shortage. No more power strip,
therefore, no more computer work for the time being.
We then proceeded to the world
map to paint. The next day we came back to paint again and found that some of
the students decided to dip there cute little (not in kindergarten or first
grade) fingers all over the map. Setback? I think so. This exercise continued
for the next three days until Becca and I decided that we could not continue work
on the map until the Summer when the students will not be there. You may be
asking yourself if we exhausted all available forms of influence in order to
get the students to stop defacing the map. Yes we did. We begged the teachers
to speak with their students about the importance of the map and all the hard
work we had been putting into the map. Not too long ago I talked about the map
during the morning announcements. Apparently, as in the U.S., some students
just don’t have respect for the works of others. I am hoping that by
discontinuing our work the students will have learned a lesson. I may be hoping
for too much.
During our frustrations with the
map we had a number of teachers approach us and we pleaded again to have them
speak with their students. The reply of the teachers only added to our current
climate of toxic negative thinking. The teachers complained that it was the
students. “They are all stupid” they claimed. Now this is for lack of a better
word. Remember people, most of my teachers have very little skills in English
so when they use the word stupid I take that for a whole host of different
words. For example, they could mean “disrespectful”, “arrogant”, selfish”, or
really just “unable to learn”. Either way they don’t literally mean that their
students are stupid. Becca and I assured
the teachers that t is their job to teach the students not only to not touch
the map but also to not keep calling us “ferengi”. Yes, I am still being called
“foreigner” by the students I have been teaching for eight months. The teachers
respond by explaining that when they were children it was very exciting to see
a foreigner but that kids do not do this today. After we just explained that
the kids call us ferengi he responded by saying that that doesn’t happen
anymore. So I reiterated. “Every day students, children, even young men call me
ferengi or baby.” He acted shocked and asked me if this is true what I was
saying. Part of me wanted to shake him and say “Yes, you moron. I just said
that didn’t I?” But it is a tribute to my time here that I did not do that but
recognized that him asking me that is a part of his culture. What he really
means is that he is genuinely shocked and is expressing that shock by asking me
a question.
After
a heated discussion we all came to the conclusion that this kind of behavior in
the students would only stop if enough people were to teach children that it is
wrong to call someone a name because of their skin color or where they come
from (sound familiar?) and that it would take some time. Well, I will never see
that change in our time in Ethiopia so here’s hoping! My week back was turning
out to be somewhat of a disaster. We had to stop the World Map Project, my
English Club which was moved to Wednesdays was cancelled because no one told me
that the students would be occupied and I had to move the club meeting times
back to Mondays, and English Communication Day was another lackluster occasion.
Most of the teachers do not participate in English Communication Day nor do the
students because they are too afraid to speak and be wrong. That problem is for
another blog though because I have an idea for a solution but I would need some
help and right now help is what I do not have.
Which brings us to April 15
which happens to be today (well I am writing this on April 15 but most likely
won’t post till another day.) After my USAID visit, which happened on Tuesday
but for obvious reasons I will not discuss in this blog, it was decided that
better communication was needed between me and my administration. Well, duh.
More than I would like to admit there have been scheduling conflicts and
miscommunications that have abruptly dismantled any plans or programs I had
made at the school. I would say communication is the biggest issue I deal with
on a daily basis. I have learned to go with the Ethiopian flow but sometimes my
American culture (yeah, we have a culture) just creeps up and wants to tell
everyone that their excuses are unacceptable. Today wasn’t that day. Nor, will
any day be that day. I revere my relationships with my teachers and staff and I
refuse to tarnish them because I have lost my temper. That doesn’t mean that I
don’t play out scenarios in my head.
After discussing new methods of
communication we decided on a weekly report wherein I state what my functions
were and what problems or successes I encountered. Along with this report I
expressed what I would like my plans to be for the next week. I wanted to start
the Teacher Mentor Program (TMP) again
with a new teacher, reschedule English Club for Students on Monday, create
a presentation for the teachers about
CPD (for information check out my other posts), and start work on Earth Week.
My plans faltered again because 5-8th grade were going to be in mid
semester exams. That was okay because the teachers I wanted for the TMP were
going to be 1-4 teachers. “Not possible” was the answer I got. All teachers would be busy. I didn’t
press because I would have probably smoked at the ears. Well, at least there
was English Club for Students (CPD presentation can be done at home). Or so I
thought. I went into work this afternoon, preparing for English Club only to
find out at 2:30pm that no one was coming back to school for the afternoon. My
Vice Director, when confronted by this fact, merely shrugged and said that
there was no school. “But what about English Club?” I demanded. “Oh! What about tomorrow?” he asked. “Is
there school in the afternoon?” I had no right to hope. And of course he said
that there wasn’t so no hope for English Club. Don’t ask me about how this
logic works out because it doesn’t.
This is pretty typical for
numerous volunteers here in Ethiopia. We are told after days or weeks of
preparation that on the scheduled day of events that “it is not possible”. Most
of us have come to expect it and therefore are not bothered when these
disappointments rear their ugly heads. Sometimes though, it cuts through and
leaves us wondering about the impact our work has or whether or not our schools
even want us here. Two years of your life is a lot to sacrifice for
uncertainties but I guess that’s part of the experience. I haven’t given up and
I hope it doesn’t come across that I don’t love or appreciate my life here. I
do. I learn something every day but not all of it is good. I learn some things
about myself that I may not be proud of but I hope to keep the persistence and
optimism I think I have acquired during my life so I can change for the better.
