So, I’ve been in Mokolo for a little over two months, and I’m almost starting to feel settled. Mostly, that means that I’ve finally accepted the fact that for the next two years I will have no idea what is going on, and I’ve gotten much better at just rolling with it.
We just finished the end of our first sequence, so lately I’ve been spending a lot of time in the teacher’s lounge frantically filling in grade cards by hand. I’m “class master” of my 5eme 3 monsters, which means I have to calculate their average grades/ranks etc. I noticed that who ever taught “TM” had not filled in their grades, so I asked one of the teachers “What is TM?” and they responded “Travail Manuel” (Aka, manual labor class)
Me: “oh, who teaches manual labor?”
other teacher: “the class master of each class teaches manual labor.”
me: “But, I’m the class master of 5eme 3.”
other teacher: “So, you are the one who is supposed to teach manual labor.”
me: “mmmm… pretty sure I don’t. I’ll talk to Principal Vandi.”
So, I talked to the principal and tried to convince him that I don’t teach manual labor. He then proceeded to give me an inspirational speech about how it isn’t about the labor, it is about working on a project together that benefits the community and in that way we help foster civic engagement, blah, blah, blah. And after that speech, I couldn’t really say no. So, I made my 5eme 3 pull up some weeds and water our Citron orchard.
That is also worth mentioning: In the past few weeks we have planted over 1,000 citron trees to help stop deforestation and to “inspire the students. They will plant them in 6eme and then when the graduate they will see how big and strong their trees have grown! It will symbolize their own educational development…”
I’m glad my french is in a place where I can almost understand the riddles that Principal Vandi spits at me. He and I get along pretty well. The other day he referred to himself as the old man and me as the walking stick and together we will climb the mountain. That made me feel pretty good.
My 5eme 3 monsters have also graffitied “HANE” in huge letters across the back of the classroom. I think it means they like me. And, they’re honestly not bad kids, it’s just the class prefect is 10 and he can’t keep order because most of the other kids are 12-16 ish. Also, I still have an issue with extra kids sneaking in. I have 109 officially registered students in 5eme 3 and grades for 134, so clearly, something is amiss. The final issue with 5eme 3 is the fact that one of our class delegates (who helps the prefect out with their duties) was recently stripped of his title for getting into a fist fight (in my class, of course). Evidently one of the other students said “Daada ma!” to him or whatever the fulfulde phrase for “your mama” is. And I just find that hilarious that the phrase “your mama” is universally insulting to middle schoolers.
My 1ere class is still going well. We always manage to have good discussions and I feel like their writing has gotten a lot better already. English club has started, and that’s also been a lot of fun. My favorite officer is the vice president who is a chubby little terminal girl named Charlotte who wants to be a PE teacher after she graduates.
So, if it sounds like I am living at school, that would not be entirely inaccurate. Fortunately, I feel like I’m making friends at the school. Everyone in the English department is pretty cool (save for Ruth from Nigeria, who I am unconvinced actually speaks English because I can not understand ANYTHING she says). Our main computer science teacher, Paul, (who has his masters! What is he doing at a school with three working computers? Kicking ass, that’s what! He did his defense on using technology for lycee administration and incorporating technology in all subjects, etc. etc. etc.) Anyway, Paul has made an electronic report card computer program and he’s hooking up everyone’s laptops/the school computers to the same network so that way next sequence we can start doing stuff digitally. Super super awesome.
In other news my neighbors are still doing well, and they’re having fun shouting a new phrase in Fulfulde at me everyday. The other day one of my neighbor’s chickens somehow got into my compound, and Sawalda and Amadou, two of my favorite neighborhood kids and I spent about 45 minutes chasing it around. Then we got to walk around and ask who had lost their chicken. It was actually a really fun way to spend a saturday morning just chatting with my neighbors and carrying around a chicken. Life here is sometimes very bizarre and very exciting.
It is also really annoying and terrible and horrible other times. But on those awful days, something redeeming always happens that makes it all seem worth it.
So, for now, life is good. I hope all is well on the home front.
Love,
Emily
