Year 1 - Week 41: To the Theatre

I woke up Sunday with terrible stomach pain. I don’t know if the copious amount of meat and cheese from dinner is last night did this, but I refuse to blame such a delicious combination. Whatever it was just did not agree with my system.

Adding to the physical pain, I still had a hundred exams to correct. There was no urgency to correct the exams last week, but now I could procrastinate no longer. These exams have to go back this week. Along with innumerable trips to the bathroom, correcting papers took up almost all of my morning and good portion of the afternoon.

Even though grading papers is a pain in the ass, at least it gave me something to do for the better part of the day. Once I finished grading papers, I had nothing to do for the rest of the afternoon.

All I had to look forward to was a phone call from my parents. After talking with my brother and grandfather toward the end of last week, talking to my parents was the end of a full weekend of catching up with family.

By the end of the night – and four Pepto-Bismols later – my stomach was feeling better for the most part. After dinner, we watched some “30 Rock” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” before going to bed.

I was fully recovered by Monday morning and whatever I had passed on to Richie. All is well that ends well, right? Unfortunately, the probelm that is correcting exams was still in front of me. There was only one more class to deal with, and this was by far my best class. Still, I will give my students the chance to improve their grade on their final.

There was little preparing to do for classes today. This is my last full day of lecture, which is obviously exciting. My twelfth graders got a full two hours of lecture and my eleventh graders reviewed for their final exam. By the end of next week – and 200 more exams later – I will be done with formal teaching for the year.

My night was shockingly productive. I wrote more than half of my students’ final exam. As if that wasn’t enough, getting in two episodes of “Dexter” made our night complete. And once the lights went out, my aunt (a “Dexter” fan, herself) and I talked for a bit.

Our English theatre students were back to work Tuesday morning. After a couple days off, it was time to practice in front of people. For the first time, they performed the play in front of a crowd, and they more or less got everything right. There were a few lines that were flubbed, but the timing was near perfect. We recapped after they finished and I spent the rest of the morning before lunch relaxing.

Classes were alright today. My twelfth graders got their final exam review and the eleventh graders had the opportunity to ask me whatever they wanted about the exam. Shockingly, I got a fair amount of questions. This might be the first time students have asked me questions about the exam, so I was happy to address their doubts. During the break between classes, the students performed the play again in front of a different group of students. The timing was better than the first time, but some lines were seriously screwed up. There’s some time yet to get it down perfectly.

The rest of the night was pretty relaxed. Sadly, it was not a “Dexter” night, so we watched “30 Rock” and “Curb” after dinner.

With the practice runs behind them, the students went back to practicing in front of just us. We set up shop in the gym and they ran through the play a couple times. They have started to realize when they are making mistakes, so we no longer have to point out their errors.

My weekly market run was pushed up a day to this morning. We are heading out of town on Friday, so it doesn’t make a whole lot sense to make a full market run on Thursday.

Luck continued to be with me in terms of being able to put my classes together. The other teacher who should be teaching each of the groups I see on Wednesday has already given his final exam, which means I am good to combine from here on out (even though “here on out” is just one more week). The class went okay. This was their review day and as is typical with these groups, there were no questions. It’s strange though: in one group they don’t have questions because they get it, but the other group doesn’t ask questions because I think they don’t know where to start asking.

Having classes end by 2:00 meant my afternoon was free. I would love to nap but I’ve come to the tragic realization that if I nap during the afternoon, there is no way I will be able to sleep at night. This is the downfall of having a 9 PM lights out. I read some “Economist” and studied some GRE vocab before the power came on. From here, the night was all good: turkey sandwiches and “Dexter”

Thursday was an all around boring day. With school wrapping up and a holiday on Friday, I am down to one more hour of teaching before final exams. So what the hell am I supposed to do? For almost the entire morning, and a good portion of the afternoon, Richie and I sat on our porch in silence, trying to find ways to speed up the clock.

The one class that I had today went well. This is by far my best class and sadly, this is the last time that I will see this group of kids. I will miss working with them. A lot.

And once I was done with them, it was back to the regularly scheduled boredom. Napping was again out of the question. I have a bad feeling that this is going to be a preview of my next four months. This could be bad.

We actually had something to do in the evening. Besides dinner, we had to get our house cleaned up. Richie was busy with something for the most of the night, so I ended up prepping, cooking, and cleaning. And on top of all of that, we had to get the rest of the house cleaned up before heading out. With our cleaning finished, we had a bit of time left for “30 Rock”.

Originally, we thought that we would be heading out to Chimoio at 6 AM on Friday. That, however, would have made no sense. We are not supposed to arrive to Chimoio before 1 o’clock, so the pushed back 8:00 departure was a blessing. The late leave time also allowed me to get a bit of work done. A teacher needed a document printed, so I asked the director to flip on the energy, and it was done. Even though I had to wait to use the computer, we were still gone on time.

The ride up to Chimoio was different than the rides we have taken in earlier months. As we get into the hot months before the rainy season, all of the greenery has turned into one big sepia picture. The only real signs of life on the EN1 were the troop of monkeys that walked right in front of our truck.

As it was with our departure, our arrival was perfectly timed. We got into Chimoio around half past 1. Had we left at 6, we would have been there insanely early. A lot of our students haven’t been to Chimoio before, so they are really exciting. After getting everyone checked in to the hotel, we walked the town for a bit. The stage that the students are going to be performing on is fuckin’ huge – way bigger than anything we were anticipating. It won’t change our play though.

Walking through the city exhausted all of us. As we made our way back to the hostel, we bought our students sodas. This weekend is really all about them, and if it costs us an entire four dollars for twelve sodas, it’s worth it many times over.

We got back to the hostel before dinner, and with time to spare for the kids to wash up. And I got to wash up too, with a spectacularly hot running-water shower. Today was the first time in two months that I’ve seen running hot water. Needless to say, I soaked in every glorious moment of it.

After dinner, our kids had the opportunity to practice the play on a small stage. With 12 hours to go, we expected it to be tight, but they butchered it. Missed lines, missed cues, scenes out of order. And the second time they did it was worse. As our Mozambican counterpart said, “I just don’t know.” We’ll see how it goes down tomorrow.

Everyone was up early on Saturday, but for different reasons. Of course the kids were up before sun break, but I actually made it to the 5:45 alarm. Apparently, miracles do happen. The kids needed to be out by 6:30, and I was in charge of this. Getting anything done on time is tough here, but I was on a mission. Mission failed…but not by much. By 6:40, everyone was out of the hostel.

As it turned out, they got to the theatre early. Beautiful. Another Volunteer and I rode to the theatre with the judges and the props and the show was off and running. School names were drawn and Machanga pulled tenth out of eleven schools. I don’t know how it will play out. All I do know is that it’s going to be hours until my kids get to perform, hours for them – and me – to get nervous.

I felt like a parent the entire day. I went to the bathroom no less than eight times over the course of the day. Hard to believe, but I think I was more nervous than they were. Every time I talked to my students, they said they were good to go.

They went on stage second after lunch, which turned out to be not a bad time. The play will be fresh in the jury’s mind come judging time. I gave them a little pep talk a small dance to make them laugh and calm them down – those who have seen me dance know that it will make you laugh.

I stood at the side of the stage helping the students with their props and their cues. And they fuckin nailed it. They missed one line and three words over the entire eighteen minutes. It was good enough, in my totally biased opinion, to win. But when the judgment came down, we didn’t win. Or place. Or show.

The disappointment in my kids was palpable. It probably was in me too. But when the results were called, it was time to be a parent again. The performance they put on was the best run-through they had ever done. And unlike last year, this was truly their play. Their writing, their ideas, their practices. They have a lot to be proud of, and I made sure to tell them that.

I don’t know how much it meant coming from me, but when it comes from someone outside, I’m sure it meant more. Another Volunteer told them that they had come a long way from last year. I know that means a lot to them. And it means a lot to me too, because it means I must be doing something right in the classroom with them.

As we walked back, we passed a little bar and, as we did yesterday, we offered to buy sodas for our kids. Once they had Coca-Colas in their hands, all was forgotten. They were happy to be drinking cold sodas.

The dance party that followed dinner also helped ease the pain. I mean, how can you think about not winning when there is a dance party?! It was also good for us Volunteers too. While the kids danced, a good group of us had our own little celebration, not only because of the successful weekend but because we know our time with our Moz 12 buddies is slowly slipping away.