Homestay Week 7: Last week of Language, Prep for Model School

I reached a level of boredom on Sunday that I didn’t think was possible. I began my usual Saturday routine a bit early, getting to internet café just after 8:00 AM. With my emails pre-written and the internet moving at an early 21st Century speed, I was done early. Too early. I made my way home, but no one had returned, so I went for a stroll into another bairro to bother some people. Luckily, the people who I went to bother were just as bored as I was, yet we couldn’t really find the motivation to do anything of substance. So I returned home again, this time to find that one of my sisters had returned from church. I ironed my clothes just before eating lunch. My family has stopped watching me iron my clothes, which I think means I’m doing a decent job.

I returned to the bairro in the afternoon, once again bored, once again looking to bother people. They put on a movie, which kept us mildly entertained. I didn’t really want to return home, but I knew I had to. I had a feeling that it just wasn’t going to be a good evening.

A good conversation when I got home changed my outlook on the evening. And following dinner, minha mae broke out sweet rice – what a treat! The evening turned out surprisingly well, much better than I had expected. And it was made even better by conversations with my parents and my brother.

I knew that Monday was going to be a somewhat interesting day, for a couple reasons. First, we started preparing curriculum for our fist step of practice teaching. And second, our program directors were in town to talk about site placement. It was exciting to learn about the possible site placements, although it seems that that there aren’t enough potential job placements for male volunteers. I let them know that I was interesting in doing teacher training and not just secondary school teaching. Hopefully, they will be able to fill my request, but I won’t be angry if they can’t.

The afternoon was somewhat slow. As I walked home, a ran into minha mae on the road. Just as it began to rain, she saw a friend, and told me to run home. As I walked in the door, the rain starting coming hard. It would be rainy on and off for the remainder of the evening. When it was quiet, it rained; when there was thunder and lightning, no rain came. Strange place this sometimes is. I prepared a color wheel for my teaching segment for tomorrow, knocked out the rest of my homework, ate dinner, and – exhausted – went to bed.

The morning’s weather left off where last night began – grey. It wasn’t raining but it was clear that rain was on the way. The ground was still wet from last night’s rain. Namaacha is finally turning into the mud pit that we had expected weeks ago. But at the same time, this place is starting to turn shades of green. After an uneventful language class, the English teachers convened to begin “micro-teaching”. Working in groups of three, we designed lesson plans for very basic subjects such as the human body or food. All of these small lessons were taught in front of some of the language teachers and and the other English teachers, which was a little strange. My group taught colors and clothing. This brought back memories of my first weeks teaching English last year with my students. I remembered how long it took to learn thirteen colors, how they struggled with pronunciation, but how they eventually got it. The afternoon was much of the same, but as I had delivered my lesson in the morning, I was stuck sitting for the entirety of the afternoon.

By mid afternoon, the rain began albeit lightly. It was just enough to tease and dampen us, but this place will take any rain it can get. Upon getting home, minha mae was very pleased with how green her garden was. Soon enough, she will have enough food growing here that she won’t have to buy vegetables in the market. In a country that relies so heavily on agriculture, I don’t think it is too much of an overstatement to say that the economic fortune of people here depends largely on weather. Just within a household alone, if a person doesn’t have to spend money on basics like onions or tomatoes, it is money that can be saved.

The evening passed without consequence or event, with the exception of a phone call from a friend in the states. I cleaned up my room, which was in dire need of a good cleaning, ate dinner, and read about the election that has already happened. It is very strange to read articles about election issues and candidates after the fact. But much like a rerun on television, if I haven’t seen it, it’s new to me. So I will continue to enjoy these mid-October magazines well into December.

Wednesday was a big day, not just for Namaacha, but for all of Mozambique. Today, municipal elections were held across the country. It was pretty amazing to see people line up for hours, just for the opportunity to take part in the democratic process. Minha mae was proud to show off her ink-covered fingertip, evidence that she had voted.

We started our language class late, a gift from our language teacher. Today, we learned the future conjunctive. I know: sounds impossible. But it was surprisingly easy for me, especially since I can still barely conjugate some verbs in present tense. After classes, almost all of the language teachers went to Maputo so they could vote. We were left with our Volunteer of the week to help us develop lesson plans for Model School. No, model school is not about teaching Volunteers how to walk down a catwalk – it is an opportunity to practice teaching in front of real Mozambican secondary school students.

Following lunch at home, I met up with my teaching partner to develop lesson plans for the first couple days of the week. Planning went by quite quickly. We both noted that planning with another teacher is much more difficult than planning alone. While it’s nice to have the opportunity to bounce ideas off one another, we also have to make sure that we are getting across a consistent message. For the majority of the teachers here, this will be the first attempt at lesson planning and teaching; it will also be an opportunity to see what works, what doesn’t and learn from mistakes. Even with a year of teaching English as a Second Language under my belt, I’m sure that I will take a lot away from Model School.

I had low expectations for Thursday. The day started early and did not start off well. I woke up at 2:30, courtesy of a pack of barking dogs. I was absolutely freezing when I woke up, so I put on sweatpants and a sweatshirt, which were barely sufficient in keeping me warm. I had trouble sleeping the remainder of the night, as I was awakened almost hourly by mefloquine-induced dreams. I mumbled my way through breakfast and certainly didn’t understand much of what minha mae had to say. Thankfully, we didn’t do a whole lot in language class. The majority of our time was spent playing “Vinte Perguntas” – Twenty Questions – which I actually thought was a good way to use language. After language classes, all of the Trainees met up for a session on working with Mozambican colleagues. We mostly discussed very possible situations in the workplace, which was fairly beneficial.

I returned home for lunch knowing that the plans for the afternoon were loose at best. We were told that we might meet at a certain house at some hour to continue lesson planning. I figured we wouldn’t have the session, but I received a text message saying otherwise. I made my up to the house, but before I got there, I was stopped by two other Trainees who said it was cancelled. Shocking. I didn’t want to return home, so I went to a hotel with three other Trainees for a soda and snack. This is where the afternoon got interesting.

As we waited on our food, the owner of the hotel – a white local Mozambican –introduced himself to us. For about twenty minutes, we listened to a small lecture and asked questions regarding Mozambican history and problems in Namaacha. It was probably the best-spent twenty minutes I’ve had here. Following this, we went to a barraca where a lot of other Trainees were hanging out, either playing cards, lesson planning, or just being social.

I returned home around 6:00 and the afternoon became more interesting. One way or another, I got into a conversation about HIV/AIDS with minha mae. I don’t even know how it started, but it was the first time I found myself in this situation. One thing about being here in Mozambique is that almost everybody has been affected by HIV/AIDS in one way or another. As we talked, minha mae disclosed that she lost her brother, at 33 years old, to AIDS. It was physically apparent that it was difficult for her to discuss. And it was difficult to be on the listening side of the conversation too. It is something that I’m going to have to get used to: this certainly won’t be the last time that I have a discussion like this.

Friday was nothing out of the norm. We had Hub Day, which was nice, although we saw all of the health and science people yesterday, so it wasn’t like a usual Hub Day. After a very causal (and final) language class, most of the morning was dominated by health issues, especially for the teachers. First, we all got a lecture on emergencies and benefits. Then toward the end of the morning, we were split into education and health groups. As the education group learned about the national health system, the health group learned about the national education system.

Our afternoon schedule was loose again, which as yesterday set up for trouble. I stuck around at the school for lunch with a couple other people before heading for a scheduled 2:30 meeting. We had the feeling that the session wasn’t going to last more than 20 or 30 minutes and we probably weren’t going to get a lot done. We received two or three pieces of information and we were done in less than half an hour. The rest of the afternoon was spent at the barraca, celebrating the end of the week, talking, and playing cards.

I was awakened Saturday by a phone call from minha mae. She had gone into Maputo yesterday and stayed the night. She probably thought that I had classes today, which had been the norm, but our only obligation today was to continue lesson-planning on our own. With my lesson plan for Monday already done, most of the morning was committed to housework – cleaning up my room and doing laundry. Once again, I was spared from washing by the empregada, who is recovering from malaria. I didn’t ask her for help and, considering her health status, didn’t expect it.

I spent a little time after lunch with a 10th grade boy who has moved into the house this week. I think he goes to school somewhere but is just spending his vacation here. We hadn’t talked much over the course of the week, but we finally found something to talk about – music. He was blown away by the iPod touch and enjoyed the music I played. I’m going to burn him a CD sometime next week.

Following a brief rest, I walked toward the Mozambique-Swaziland fronteira for a game of soccer. With six Mozambicanos and four Americanos, we played Mozambicanos vs. Americanos (plus 1 Mozambican). We played miserably. We couldn’t pass and certainly couldn’t dribble. The Mozambicans passed well. They dribbled with ease. They made fools of us Americans time and time again. They played the beautiful game beautifully in a 10-5 loss to the Americans. They just seemed to forget that you need to score in order to win. Victorious, I returned home, showered and ate dinner.

Seven weeks are in the books. Next week is probably going to be the most exciting we have until we officially become Volunteers. We begin Model School on Monday. I can’t wait to be back in a classroom. On Wednesday, we celebrate Thanksgiving and we find out to where we will be moving. It should be a fast week. And the weeks that come should pass quickly also.