Couple of random things

Fine and you? If all goes well, I'll be back next week (or even as soon as tomorrow) with another post, something kinda new and exciting (at least, I hope it excites everyone).

But for now... a couple of random thoughts and anecdotes.

- I think my official favorite misuse of English that I hear all the time is when someone walks up to me and greets me by saying, "Fine and you?"

- A sad, frustrating, revealing story that I've been meaning to tell for a while: At the end of 2nd quarter
back in June, all the teachers compiled the students' grades from semester exams. We average them out, sort them, rank them, and hand write individual reports for each student in the school, with comments from each teacher for each student. This took many hours. This culminated in a day over winter break when parents (or guardians) were told to come and collect reports. Teachers were all on hand to give comments.

Roughly 30% of the students had someone show up. Bummer, right? But wait... turns out, we only give them their kid's report if they're up to date on school fees... which most are not. So the day went something like this. We sit around for a while. Someone shows up asking for a student's report. I find it and take it out. I hold it in my hand for 5 minutes as conversation ensues, in Sesotho. I am told by a teacher that we are not giving the form, please put it back. I put it back. In the end, I think we gave out less than 50 reports (there are over 300 students). That's how few students have both a) someone looking out for them and b) enough money for school fees.

Now, students and parents who are behind on school fees are unable to find out the child's performance, and how they are doing compared to their classmates. I see this as a waste of valuable information that is both wanted by the students and useful as a motivational tool (and motivation is in short supply already). So, I've taken it upon myself to discreetly tell my students about their ranks, and load up the conversation with as much personalized motivation as I can. I hope it's helping.

- On Monday, a group of boys shoved a donkey into their classroom, in the middle of history class. Their parents or guardians were called to the school today, and both parties were spoken to firmly. The boys were subsequently beat with sticks.

- I learned recently that Basotho use the word "crocodile" to mean "prostitute." Here is why. The Lesotho soccer team is called the Crocodiles. And apparently, they are bad, and are beaten by everyone. When you are beaten, the term that is used is the same as saying "you were eaten by" that team. But, there is a lot of redundancy in Sesotho, and apparently "being eaten" is also a term form being... well... there might be kids reading this... let's say for being cuddled. So it's like, the crocodiles were cuddled by everyone they played. So crocodiles are prostitutes.

- Over winter break I spent some time at my friend Rory's village, building keyhole gardens to feed local orphans. Another friend, Shanthi, posted something about it here, with a good photo, and apparently is going to upload more photos soon. It was a great experience. Usually, spending time with other volunteers is more about taking a step back from everything and blowing off steam. But it was wonderful to spend my time with them actually doing productive work.

I had one more thing I wanted to write about, but now I have forgotten it. Darn. Maybe I'll remember by next time. Everyone in America, I love and miss you!

One Day in the Life of Eric Pierce(ovich)

Today was in some ways a fairly typical work day, and in other ways pretty weird. Though, the weirdness is, in itself, pretty typical. So yeah, it was a fairly typical work day. I will recount today's events...

I hit snooze about 3 times and finally got out of bed at about 6:50am. I hurriedly dressed and ate, managing to barely get out on time.

(It was cold this morning, but in recent days the temperature has risen quite a bit from as midday has approached, so I left my house without a coat. Turns out today was an exception, so I was pretty cold all day. When students and teachers asked me throughout the day if I was surviving without a coat, I lied, saying "No, I did not miscalculate, I meant to be dressed like this in this weather." I feel strangely compelled to maintain my "Makhooa don't get cold like Africans" appearance).

Monday is supposed to be my most hectic day - I teach 6 periods. I spent some time lesson planning before heading to Form A Maths, where I began teaching about symmetry. Behavior was the worst it's been this semester. I nearly left the class in anger, but held it together because we are already in such horrible shape (I am guessing I'll finish 60% of the syllabus this year).  With 30 minutes left in class, my vice principal knocked on the door to say "Please stop teaching, we're having a staff meeting, it is beginning right away." To much applause, I dropped my lesson and went to the staff room... where I sat for 25 minutes waiting for the meeting to begin. Needless to say, not a great start to the day. Questions of "If the students don't want to learn, and the administration doesn't want me to teach... then why am I even here?" raced through my mind.

We had our meeting. It was a little bit productive.

[A brief background to understand the rest of today: We are hosting a big cultural festival at school on Friday, where our school will compete against 5 other schools in traditional games, dances, and other events. To create time for practice, we have decided to cancel 2 hours of class every day for the last 3 weeks running. Roughly 70% of the students are involved in 0 of the activities, so they spend this time wandering the schoolyard or playing soccer. Such use of time does not lend well to teachers finishing their syllabi.]

Following that meeting, classes were cancelled for the rest of the day to prepare for Friday (for a total of 2 hours of classes today).

With no teaching to do, I went to another meeting with a few teachers and some members of the community. These folks are trying to find ways to help local orphans (awesome), and I was invited to pitch an idea I've been developing. I am hoping to build a playground at school, which will be open to all local children outside of school hours, and will be covered in HIV/Healthy Living information. I am hoping to fund this project with a PEPFAR grant (US government money for HIV/AIDS projects). With my coworker and friend Nthabiseng translating for me, we pitched the idea, and were given a hearty ovation in response, ululations included (traditonal throat howling sound, used when something is really exciting)! People are enthusiastic about helping, which is great.

Following this meeting, I played a little frisbee (thanks everyone back home!) and wandered around the throngs of idle students. Two students handed me bottles of motoho - traditional sour porridge made from sorghum, which (to the shock and awe of my fellow PCVs) I absolutely love. I have a standing offer to them that if they bring me motoho, I will buy them lisweets (candy). I cashed in on this today. I was thrilled to skip Monday lunch - Undercooked White Rice with Gross Sauce - and chug some motoho instead.

In the afternoon, I watched 5 girls practice liketoana, which is a lot like jacks. I'm told we are gearing up to dominate in liketoana. After some time, a Form A student approached me for help with science. This was a rare treat - if only all students had the courage to admit when they need help, Lesotho would be a different place (Note, I'm not sure where the blame goes here. I might also have said, "If only teachers didn't strike such fear in the hearts of students that they are all terrified to seek the help they need and deserve." But I digress.). As students realized I was explaining concepts that they, too, were struggling with, a crowd formed. In the end I think some genuine learning took place.

The schoolday came to an end. I headed home, picking up some veggies along the way. At one shop, I got a chance to snag another Form A student, Zyphiwe (favorite name in my class, really fun to scream in a high pitched voice). I forced her to listen to me as I used the shop's fridge and freezer to explain the concept of melting point. I knew she didn't want to be learning after school, so I apologized - she laughed. But also on the way home, I encountered a particularly troublesome student doing some very loud imitations of me ("Do you think it is funny that you are failing! No one will pay your school fees next year if you fail!" Somehow she thinks this is hilarious, despite it applying to her perfectly). I told her she must now write "I will not make fun of teachers" 100 times before I let her back in my class. A sour end to the day.

So with all said and done, I can sum up today much like I would sum up most days in my American life - some really good things happened, and some really not good things happened ("...but either way, things happened" - thank you DP). And at the end, much like in my American life, I took some time to relax and reflect on it all over some hot, delicious, home-cooked dinner.