So many little cheaters in my classes!! I gave my first test this Thursday and Friday. The whole thing was just stressful! We don’t have the resources to print off tests to hand out, so I wrote my test on big paper and just posted it on the blackboard for everyone to copy. I made everyone put all their stuff at the front of the room and clearly explained that cheating would not be tolerated. Ok? ‘Sim, teacha!’ Ummm….no. I marked at least 20 people’s tests for cheating. And I only marked the superly obviously cheating tests. Staring at their neighbors page while I’m looking straight at them for like 5 seconds, cheat sheet falls out when they’re handing in the test, etc. When I stood at the front of the room, like a third of the class is just staring at me, waiting for me to look a different direction. My favorite was when I stood in the back of the room, and people would turn around to see where I was. I gave so many death stares my eyes hurt. Not only do you have the classroom of students to worry about, then there are always the sneaky little buggers from other classes who look in from outside and just stand there copying down the test. Not the ideal set up! So many times the past two days when I just wanted to start laughing, because they think they’re sooo sneaky, but they are soooo obvious!
So I get to grade 400 tests this weekend! I started yesterday and it’s pretty depressing. I’m hoping most of the people that did really bad just didn’t come to class and it wasn’t that they didn’t learn anything. A rock is a gas, soda is a solid and sand is a liquid?? Really? What is chemistry? The study of living things. No, that is the other white girl’s biology class. Like 3o people wrote that for the definition of chemistry! I really think they just can’t keep Becky and me straight. I’m trying to tell myself that the few people who did well on the test did well because they came and paid attention to my fascinating chemistry lessons. Ughh..
Also, someone broke into our outdoor kitchen last night. The door was locked, so they didn't break in, I think they climbed in where there's an opening where the ceiling meets the roof. They took the following: our crappy plastic shelving that keeps on falling over, a hammer, a bucket, a can of tuna, and some chicken stock. What?? I kind of feel like they deserve that stuff because that must have been quite the feat to climb up that and get all the stuff out. But chicken stock? Hmm...
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Happy Valentine’s Day! Valentine’s Day is alive and well here, in Mozambique. It’s called ‘Dia de Namorados’ and everyone is really concerned that I can’t be with my fake namorado today. (He’s so far away, you need someone here, too!) Becky and I are celebrating tonight with a Beer Pong party because we found ping pong balls randomly in a store. Our friend Molly is visiting, and we are going to teach our other Mozambican friend the wonders of this American tradition.
School is going pretty well, all things considered. We just have 18 classes a week, which is nice, in 6 different classes. The kids get excited about the tiniest experiments (ie, paper inside a cup doesn’t get wet when you plunge it into a bucket of water because air takes up space and is matter!), so that’s really fun to see. I don’t know if they’re learning much or able to understand me, but we’ll see next week because we have our first test already! That will be interesting. Considering we still haven’t ever taken attendance or have an official list of who is in what class.
School is going pretty well, all things considered. We just have 18 classes a week, which is nice, in 6 different classes. The kids get excited about the tiniest experiments (ie, paper inside a cup doesn’t get wet when you plunge it into a bucket of water because air takes up space and is matter!), so that’s really fun to see. I don’t know if they’re learning much or able to understand me, but we’ll see next week because we have our first test already! That will be interesting. Considering we still haven’t ever taken attendance or have an official list of who is in what class.
Friday, February 6, 2009
I know a lot of people were concerned that I was just having way too much fun over here and doing nothing, but rest assured, all that has changed. School has started. Classes officially began on Monday. I spent the weekend before writing up my ‘apresentacao’ to introduce myself to the class and writing my overly strict rules for the classroom and being reeeally nervous about Monday. Becky and I showed up like an hour early for our afternoon classes. We get there, and all the teachers are just lounging around and students are just hanging out. I was told, ‘Maybe we’ll start Wednesday.’ There was a holiday, Hero’s Day, on Tuesday, so I guess no one felt like teaching on Monday. So! I got nervous all over again on Tuesday night, showed up Wednesday, and finally did introductions. I don’t want to be dramatic, but I kept having those moments where the voice in your head is like ‘I can’t believe this is happening right now, stop talking to yourself and focus on what you’re supposed to be doing!’ Since it was the first week, only about half the students showed up, which is a scary thought, because even with half a classroom, it was hard to get them to pay attention. I had a couple students correct my Portuguese (I need to get a tutor soooon to look over my lesson plans, that’s going to get old fast). During my second day of lessons, I shut the door because it was loud outside, and when I tried to open it at the end of class, it was locked. That’s right, some students locked the door from the outside and we couldn’t get out. This, the class found to be hilarious. After a few minutes of yelling, someone came and unlocked it and let us out. All in all, I am mentally exhausted from my 3 day week. I am really proud of myself for getting through my first few days without anything really horrible happening. I did not have an emotional breakdown in class, hit any students or faint. For me, this is a success. Next week: substances and mixtures; it’s going to be awesome.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Not a whole lot happening lately. Work technically started. It’s been a lot of waiting around for someone to tell us what to do. Supposedly all of the classes are going to get put together, teachers are going to have schedules, and we’re going to do trimester long planning all next week! Tal vez…
Becky and I went to visit Molly in Quissico last weekend. She’s just less than 2 hours south of us. She lives on the most beautiful lagoons I’ve ever seen. Actually I don’t think I’ve seen too many lagoons, so that’s not difficult, but it was amazing. Turquoise water that looks like glass surrounded by palm trees. We spent a good couple hours just floating. I’m getting all my traveling out of my system. Gearing up for classes to start where I’ll actually have to work! Xi!
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Ok, so I don’t feel like I’ve been doing that great of a job really talking about what life is like here. To improve on this, I think I’m going to start with a few topics that have been very important in my life lately: Food and Chapas.
FOOD:
So much better since leaving our host families! Becky and I do most of our shopping in our local market, where there are a bunch of stands where people are selling what they grow in their machambas. Most people here have a field where they grow a few things. At the market, you have your basics- there’s always tomatoes, onions, rice, cassava leaves, beans, oil and bread. Depending on what’s in season, there’s also fruit. Mango season is on its way out (SO SAD), but there have been more pineapples lately, and I’m told nectarines are coming. And there’s always bananas. So good. So if we want any variety of vegetables or spices or anything, we go to Maxixe, which is about a 10 minute chapa ride away. They have a huge outdoor market where you can buy pepper, cucumber, sometimes lettuce, cabbage, oranges, papaya, and lots of other stuff. We also planted a little machamba in our yard. The cucumber, zucchini, green beans, and cantaloupe have all sprouted. If my zucchini grows, I am going to buy an oven purely for the purpose of baking chocolate zucchini bread!
Becky and I have been having so much fun cooking. We were given this great cookbook entitled ‘You Can Make It in Mozambique!’ We made a lot of really good stuff lately. Highlights include: spicy curry cabbage over rice, homemade tortillas with spicy beans and rice, and split pea veggie mush with cous cous (a rare find in the South African store!) Everything is spicy, because they have this amazing piri-piri pepper that we use in all of our cooking. Can be dangerously spicy, you have to be careful how much you add.
We went to go visit friends in Inhassoro last weekend, and it was the best food weekend ever. Sara had found dried seaweed, so we made sushi (which inspired me to buy some seaweed, which cost the equivalent of what I’m supposed to spend on food for 4 days). We also made fruit crepes, quesadillas (cheese is so hard to come by here!), and sweet potato gnoki with tomato mango sauce. Ha, oh yeah, and one night when we went to the beach for dinner, I had my first seafood with the head on where I wasn’t grossed out at all! It was a huge ‘pedro’ fish and some fried squid that was really good! I think that’s about it on food. Really good and we have too much time on our hands to cook since school hasn’t started yet. I’m sure it’ll be rice and beans every night when things pick up!
CHAPAS:
Oooooh, public transportation in Mozambique. Always an experience. So I am just going to describe yesterdays chapa adventure coming back from Inhasorro. Just for reference, the trip there took 6 hours, and was relatively uneventful. We are at the chapa stop at 8 am, ready to leave. Chapas are the main form of public transportation here; they look like really large vans. There are 4 rows of ‘seats’ plus the front. They fit 4 people in each row where 3 would comfortably fit. The whole chapa could comfortably fit 18 people, but chapa drivers don’t like to leave unless there’s at least like 23 people shoved in there. So we’re at the chapa stop. And there’s maybe 10 people waiting around, so it’s obvious we’re not leaving for a while until more people show up. About an hour later, there are about 18 people, so we start to load up in the first chapa. I manage to get one of the prized front row seats, where your knees are not like squished up against your chest, so I’m feeling pretty good about this chapa ride. Then we all wait in the chapa for another 30 mins, while they try to cram more people in. And it’s like 100 degrees out. After the seats are filled, then people start standing, hunched over, wherever there’s a little space. So then the driver starts the chapa, and it won’t start. There’s a lot of smoke and it sounds like the engine might start, but not quite. No one seems concerned. The driver yells for some guys to help push. So 3 guys are pushing, we get out on the road, and then it starts (woo!). We’re putting along for a couple hundred feet, and it dies again. At this point, I’m like this chapa is not going to make it to our transfer spot. So Becky and I get off, despite the motorist insisting that nothing is wrong. We go back to the stop, get in another chapa, with a more unfortunate seat, and an hour later, we are on the road again! About 30 mins into the trip, we pass our first chapa, which is still on the side of the road, and most of the passengers on that chapa pile into this one. I’m sitting next to a guy who’s wearing a trucker hat that says “Sex is a misdemeanor. Da more I miss, de meaner I get.” He was a really nice guy! So this chapa was functioning a lot better, but stopped like every 5 mins to let people off, or pick more people up, or sometimes the driver just wanted to talk to some friends along the side of the road. We made it to our transfer, waited for a new chapa to take us home for another 2 hours, and then were on the road again. We made so many unnecessary stops! Any time anyone needs to pee, they make the announcement, and we have to pull over, while they go in the bush. I am terrified of the moment I have to ‘fazer xi-xi’ while on a chapa. It’s way easier for guys to do that, plus if the white girl needed to go pee, I’m sure everyone would be watching and talking about it. I’m sure in 2 years, it’ll happen. On the second leg of the trip, I was seated next to a couple chickens and like 3 babies that kept getting passed around, depending where there was a tiny bit of space. We got home finally at 7 pm, almost 11 hours later. So that’s that chapa trip. Every time, different adventure. I have a friend who swears she was bitten on her heal by a goat that was shoved under a seat.
FOOD:
So much better since leaving our host families! Becky and I do most of our shopping in our local market, where there are a bunch of stands where people are selling what they grow in their machambas. Most people here have a field where they grow a few things. At the market, you have your basics- there’s always tomatoes, onions, rice, cassava leaves, beans, oil and bread. Depending on what’s in season, there’s also fruit. Mango season is on its way out (SO SAD), but there have been more pineapples lately, and I’m told nectarines are coming. And there’s always bananas. So good. So if we want any variety of vegetables or spices or anything, we go to Maxixe, which is about a 10 minute chapa ride away. They have a huge outdoor market where you can buy pepper, cucumber, sometimes lettuce, cabbage, oranges, papaya, and lots of other stuff. We also planted a little machamba in our yard. The cucumber, zucchini, green beans, and cantaloupe have all sprouted. If my zucchini grows, I am going to buy an oven purely for the purpose of baking chocolate zucchini bread!
Becky and I have been having so much fun cooking. We were given this great cookbook entitled ‘You Can Make It in Mozambique!’ We made a lot of really good stuff lately. Highlights include: spicy curry cabbage over rice, homemade tortillas with spicy beans and rice, and split pea veggie mush with cous cous (a rare find in the South African store!) Everything is spicy, because they have this amazing piri-piri pepper that we use in all of our cooking. Can be dangerously spicy, you have to be careful how much you add.
We went to go visit friends in Inhassoro last weekend, and it was the best food weekend ever. Sara had found dried seaweed, so we made sushi (which inspired me to buy some seaweed, which cost the equivalent of what I’m supposed to spend on food for 4 days). We also made fruit crepes, quesadillas (cheese is so hard to come by here!), and sweet potato gnoki with tomato mango sauce. Ha, oh yeah, and one night when we went to the beach for dinner, I had my first seafood with the head on where I wasn’t grossed out at all! It was a huge ‘pedro’ fish and some fried squid that was really good! I think that’s about it on food. Really good and we have too much time on our hands to cook since school hasn’t started yet. I’m sure it’ll be rice and beans every night when things pick up!
CHAPAS:
Oooooh, public transportation in Mozambique. Always an experience. So I am just going to describe yesterdays chapa adventure coming back from Inhasorro. Just for reference, the trip there took 6 hours, and was relatively uneventful. We are at the chapa stop at 8 am, ready to leave. Chapas are the main form of public transportation here; they look like really large vans. There are 4 rows of ‘seats’ plus the front. They fit 4 people in each row where 3 would comfortably fit. The whole chapa could comfortably fit 18 people, but chapa drivers don’t like to leave unless there’s at least like 23 people shoved in there. So we’re at the chapa stop. And there’s maybe 10 people waiting around, so it’s obvious we’re not leaving for a while until more people show up. About an hour later, there are about 18 people, so we start to load up in the first chapa. I manage to get one of the prized front row seats, where your knees are not like squished up against your chest, so I’m feeling pretty good about this chapa ride. Then we all wait in the chapa for another 30 mins, while they try to cram more people in. And it’s like 100 degrees out. After the seats are filled, then people start standing, hunched over, wherever there’s a little space. So then the driver starts the chapa, and it won’t start. There’s a lot of smoke and it sounds like the engine might start, but not quite. No one seems concerned. The driver yells for some guys to help push. So 3 guys are pushing, we get out on the road, and then it starts (woo!). We’re putting along for a couple hundred feet, and it dies again. At this point, I’m like this chapa is not going to make it to our transfer spot. So Becky and I get off, despite the motorist insisting that nothing is wrong. We go back to the stop, get in another chapa, with a more unfortunate seat, and an hour later, we are on the road again! About 30 mins into the trip, we pass our first chapa, which is still on the side of the road, and most of the passengers on that chapa pile into this one. I’m sitting next to a guy who’s wearing a trucker hat that says “Sex is a misdemeanor. Da more I miss, de meaner I get.” He was a really nice guy! So this chapa was functioning a lot better, but stopped like every 5 mins to let people off, or pick more people up, or sometimes the driver just wanted to talk to some friends along the side of the road. We made it to our transfer, waited for a new chapa to take us home for another 2 hours, and then were on the road again. We made so many unnecessary stops! Any time anyone needs to pee, they make the announcement, and we have to pull over, while they go in the bush. I am terrified of the moment I have to ‘fazer xi-xi’ while on a chapa. It’s way easier for guys to do that, plus if the white girl needed to go pee, I’m sure everyone would be watching and talking about it. I’m sure in 2 years, it’ll happen. On the second leg of the trip, I was seated next to a couple chickens and like 3 babies that kept getting passed around, depending where there was a tiny bit of space. We got home finally at 7 pm, almost 11 hours later. So that’s that chapa trip. Every time, different adventure. I have a friend who swears she was bitten on her heal by a goat that was shoved under a seat.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
I found a place with real coffee and wireless internet! Kind of crazy! I'm doing great at my site, but it's been raining a lot lately. Usually when it rains it rains hard all day, so it makes it difficult to do stuff. We did make a garden the other day and attempted to plant a bunch of vegetables. After we finished, the neighbor boy came by and was telling us we did it all wrong, and proceeded to rake through the garden and put leaves on top. I don't know anything about gardening, could be right. We'll see! I planted some flowers around the house too. I hope stuff grows! Otherwise I've just been reading a lot. I read "Water for Elephants," which was really good, on the Elizabeth White (Is it a 5 star system?), I'd give it a 4 stars. Then I just finished "When a Crocodile Eats the Sun," which was a sort of depressing memoir of Zimbabwe, which gets 3 stars. I have my new address! Send stuff to:
Irma Stephanie Goettl
C.P. 31
Maxixe
Inhmambane
Mozambique
If you write me a letter, I promise you'll get one back! Hope everyone had a great New Year! Oh yeah! We went to two New Years parties and oh man, Mozambicans love to dance! And really enthusiastically. I think we're going to be known as the white girls who don't like to dance. I tried at one party to dance, and this guy says in English, "Oooh, you dance so well!" (lies) "It pleases me so much that you try to dance!" It was hilarious. You will all be so impressed with my dance skills when I get back.
Irma Stephanie Goettl
C.P. 31
Maxixe
Inhmambane
Mozambique
If you write me a letter, I promise you'll get one back! Hope everyone had a great New Year! Oh yeah! We went to two New Years parties and oh man, Mozambicans love to dance! And really enthusiastically. I think we're going to be known as the white girls who don't like to dance. I tried at one party to dance, and this guy says in English, "Oooh, you dance so well!" (lies) "It pleases me so much that you try to dance!" It was hilarious. You will all be so impressed with my dance skills when I get back.
Blog 12/21
Happy first day of winter everyone! It’s another 100 degree day here in Mozambique. I’m trying to imagine what it’d be like to be cold right now, and I just can’t picture it. I’m dripping sweat all the time here, so gross.
So Becky and I moved into our new house! It is great! I’ll try to describe it. So you walk into the main living room area, it’s a pretty good sized room. When we got here, there was a dining room table and 4 chairs and a gas tank and a stove. And two boxes of science fiction books, generously gifted by a previous volunteer, so I’m pretty much set on reading material for the next few years. Then on both sides of the living room are doors to bed rooms. There were already beds and mattresses when we got here, which was awesome. In my room I’ve crafted a nail and rope clothesline/closet and turned my moving boxes into bedside tables covered with some beautiful capulanas. Maybe someday when I’m feeling especially handy I’ll try to make some bookshelves or something. So then outside of the house, there’s a little reed hut thing that will eventually be our kitchen once we get a table made for it. A little ways away from the house is a cement casa de banho with (get this) a working shower and flushing toilet! So that’s our house! I love it. We’ve been making lots of trips into town to buy stuff the last few days, but I think we’re pretty set now.
We visited the school a few times this week and met some of the other teachers. They all seem pretty nice. It’s exhausting trying to not screw up the Portuguese too bad and always speak really formally when I’m meeting new people. Becky and I were introduced to everyone at a teacher’s meeting, and the only question someone asked was if we were single. Awkward. So I made the announcement: “Ja temos homens” and everyone started hooting and hollering. Ha, should be a fun group to work with! We’re headed to Tofo beach for Christmas with a couple other volunteers. Merry Christmas!!!
Happy first day of winter everyone! It’s another 100 degree day here in Mozambique. I’m trying to imagine what it’d be like to be cold right now, and I just can’t picture it. I’m dripping sweat all the time here, so gross.
So Becky and I moved into our new house! It is great! I’ll try to describe it. So you walk into the main living room area, it’s a pretty good sized room. When we got here, there was a dining room table and 4 chairs and a gas tank and a stove. And two boxes of science fiction books, generously gifted by a previous volunteer, so I’m pretty much set on reading material for the next few years. Then on both sides of the living room are doors to bed rooms. There were already beds and mattresses when we got here, which was awesome. In my room I’ve crafted a nail and rope clothesline/closet and turned my moving boxes into bedside tables covered with some beautiful capulanas. Maybe someday when I’m feeling especially handy I’ll try to make some bookshelves or something. So then outside of the house, there’s a little reed hut thing that will eventually be our kitchen once we get a table made for it. A little ways away from the house is a cement casa de banho with (get this) a working shower and flushing toilet! So that’s our house! I love it. We’ve been making lots of trips into town to buy stuff the last few days, but I think we’re pretty set now.
We visited the school a few times this week and met some of the other teachers. They all seem pretty nice. It’s exhausting trying to not screw up the Portuguese too bad and always speak really formally when I’m meeting new people. Becky and I were introduced to everyone at a teacher’s meeting, and the only question someone asked was if we were single. Awkward. So I made the announcement: “Ja temos homens” and everyone started hooting and hollering. Ha, should be a fun group to work with! We’re headed to Tofo beach for Christmas with a couple other volunteers. Merry Christmas!!!
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