I have officially been in Mozambique for 6 months! It really does not seem like that long. The first trimester is already over! How did my students fare? Not so well. After some extra credit, and a small ‘chalk it up to the teacher who doesn’t speak Portuguese well’ curve, between 60-85% of the students have passing grades in each of my classes. Everyone said the first trimester would be rough, and it definitely was. But I definitely learned a lot and have many things I plan on changing next trimester.

Hmm I feel like a lot of stuff has been happening here lately, so for lack of a better way to organize, I’m going to bullet point:

- Becky and I got a dog. His name is Rama. He may look cute, but don’t be fooled. I am not a dog person. But then we had the kitchen robbery incident and a creepy person looking in our window, so we decided it’d be a good idea to scare people off. So our colleague had a 6 month old puppy he was looking to get rid of, we just had to get a car over there to pick him up. So our friend graciously agrees to take us in the car he’s borrowing from his boss. We pick up the dog and Becky’s in the backseat trying to keep it calm (She is more of a comforter than I am!). About 5 mins into the trip, we hear “&@*# (that’s censored for you, mom!), it’s peeing all over me!” Pee can be cleaned up, so not that big of a deal, our friend tells us. 5 mins later… “$@*&” I look back. All over Becky, the seat, my backpack…intestinal throw up. I don’t know what he ate that morning but oooh my goodness it was the grossest thing I have ever seen slash smelled. I of course, burst out laughing, the completely wrong reaction to this situation. I was just thinking to myself, this couldn’t possibly be going any worse. When we finally arrive home, I find out yes it can, the dog also pooped in the car. Needless to say, Becky and I felt horrible and I don’t think the smell will ever completely come out of the car. Since our horribly first day, Rama has ran away multiple times, chased chickens and made small children cry. This dog is making our old dog Max look good!
- Got evacuated for a cyclone. Peace Corps told us there was a cyclone that was going to hit our coast, so we had to travel about 4 hours south to Xai-Xai to get out of the path. We got this text Friday afternoon, but it was already close to dark, so they said we should leave Saturday morning. So Saturday morning, skeptical of the sunny day we were having, we pack up, make arrangements for Rama, and get a ride heading south. About 30 mins into our trip, we get another text, saying ‘never mind, not going to hit, you don’t have to leave.’ At this point, I was all mentally prepared for a fun excursion, so we decided to just go to Xai-Xai and make it a beach day. So Becky and I spent a few hours at the beach, met up with some other volunteers who were also spending their cyclone evacuation at the beach, and got invited to stay the night at their house. All in all it was a fun weekend, got to see other PCV’s houses and city, and returned the next day. I felt really bad for the people who had left at 2 in the morning to avoid the slight rain and breeze that was definitely not a cyclone.
- My favorite brown-nosing student. So I spent a day a few weeks ago doing a brainstorming session with my students about things I can do better as a teacher and they can do better as students to improve things. This came right after a particularly bad test. So we’re talking about what I can do better (very little discussion here, I think they’re all scared of me), but one kid is like ‘Speak better Portuguese.’ And I’m like ‘OK, good, are you guys having trouble understanding my Portuguese? I am going to study hard to try to improve it.’ And then my favorite suck up pipes up and says ‘No, teacher, we understand you just fine.’ Riiiight. Any more suggestions for what the teacher can do? Same kid: ‘Give more homework!’ Now the other kids start throwing him dirty looks. We’re now onto what students can do to improve things. This kid is now on a roll. ‘Study more!’ ‘Don’t be disruptive in the classroom’ ‘Respect the teacher!’ Every time, he’s like straining reaching his hand in the air and he jumps up and yells the next thing before anyone else can talk. My favorite of his suggestions: ‘Have good hygiene and tuck in your shirt. Then we will learn better.’