Year 2 - Week 25: Fake Plastic Holidays

Riding on full stomachs and rum and cokes, the three of us managed to stay up until 3:30 in the morning. We probably could have willed ourselves to stay up until the sun rose over the islands, but it wasn't worth it. The other two guys had travel days albeit short ones.

Most of my plans on Sunday revolved around the computer. Given that the Vil girls have internet at their house -- and it's free -- I thought it best to take advantage of it. My computer hasn't received any Windows updates since I revived it in January. When the time came, there were twenty-four updates necessary. While I was at it, I updated my anti-virus. And just for kicks, I started looking at prices and itineraries for flights home. I know, it's still six months away. Don't judge me.

The sun never really made it out on this Sunday. Combined with the facts that we're almost in the dead of winter and there was an off-shore breeze, it was not just dark but fuckin cold. Good thing I didn't have to go anywhere in town today. Otherwise, I may have been judged rather harshly for wearing sweatpants and a sweatshirt. From the time I went up until the time I went to bed, this was my gear.

In the afternoon, the sweats were a luxury. In the evening, they were an absolute necessity. I sat outside with my computer catching up with people from home. One of my buddies from home, who is now a Volunteer in Cameroon, happened to be online. He's heading down to South Africa for World Cup as well, but we will be on opposite sides of the country. During a conversation with another person, I managed to score a General Admission ticket to the U2 show in Oakland sometime next spring. I've been to four U2 shows and never had floor tickets. I'll rearrange my life to get to this one. And while I was outside, my family called. They were wrapping up a glorious trip to Hawaii while I was wrapped up in cold-weather clothing. For an uneventful day, that's a lot of things to happen.

Since I got a whole four hours of sleep last night, I was banking on a good night of sleep. Those plans, however, we're scratched -- literally. Simba, the Vil girls' dog, scratched at the door every half hour, either wanting to go out or come in. Every time he scratched, I vowed I wouldn't open the door, but every time, he just kept scratching at the door. So I got up every time.

This wasn't the best way to start a travel day, but from there, things actually went almost perfectly. I cleaned up the house and headed into town to buy some things for Machanga. I was hoping to buy some meat and cheese to store in our neighbor's refrigerator, but most of the stores were closed for one reason or another. Still, I managed to buy Rice Krispies (yup) and some avocados. I paid double for those suckers, but I don't care. I feel like I'm stealing from someone getting these avocados. Then, there was a new chapa running from Vilanculos. I know I vowed off of these chapas, but I figured what the hell.

How nice was this chapa? The seats were split up two on one side, one on the other like those terrible regional jets that American Airlines flies from San Diego to San Jose. There was no fold-down middle seat, as there usually is, so I had a ton of space to myself. And apparently, the car still had its shocks because it drove remarkably smoothly. It was such a quiet ride that I was asleep for almost all of it.

Things only got better from there. I got in a canoe right away and then got a ride on an ox cart from the river to villa. With the avocados, I was hoping the town would have meat. The butcher had killed a cow right before I arrived. He didn't even have the meat in the freezer: he just went outside and cut me off half a kilo. That's what I call fresh meat.

Up until dinner, the rest of the afternoon was pretty calm. I ate a little something before preparing for dinner. Except for the tortillas (we ran out of flour), the food was delicious. At some point, one of my best friends from home unexpectedly called, so we spent a little time catching up. Other than that, our night was spent watching a couple episodes of "Chappelle's Show" and by 9:00 I was down for the count.

Whatever nap I got in the chapa did not help me catch up on sleep because I was out cold all night until 6:30 or 7 in the morning. It was a good night's sleep. Refreshed, and already with an idea for a lesson plan, I wanted to wake up my head with a couple Kakuros. Today was one of those days where the light bulb went on and everything made sense. I finished two of them in just under an hour.

I went out for a bread run mid-morning -- or rather, I tried to go on a bread run mid-morning, until I got roped into doing some tech work. One of the teachers was trying to print a document from his laptop, but it just wasn't going. I transferred everything from his laptop to another computer and everythnig worked fine. He just laughed at how quickly I worked: "You dance on the computer." Yea, I have 19 years of experience. It goes a long way. Work complete, I was able to make my bread run.

While I sat around the house, fleshing out my lesson plan, the physics teacher came over and requested to use my time slot for teaching. I initially wasn't thrilled about this, knowing that I'd have to reschedule my lesson for another time. But eventually, again, the light bulb came on: I can combine my classes not have to reschedule anything. It really doesn't matter to me if I'm teaching to 60 or 120 people at once. This is a victory.

Class went well. My work for the day was done in 45 minutes. The fact that I even had work today was kind of shocking. Today was Children's Day, whatever that means. Most holidays here are legitimate holidays. I'm fine celebrating Women's Day because women run this country. I'm fine celebrating Independence Day and Worker's Day. But Children's Day? Children's Day? What have children done to earn a holiday? This is just another excuse for the parents -- specifically the fathers -- of said children to get drunk. In spite of this "holiday", most of my students were around. They've come to realize that you are not a child if you are between the ages of 18 and 25, as most of my students are.

The hours after class were marked only by shivering. By 3:00, most people had started drinking, but we just weren't up for it. We're going big this weekend and next week, so it's probably better for us to take this one off. We got invited out, and we probably would have had a beer or two, but as usual, our colleagues couldn't get their shit together, so we just left. We made our run to the market, specifically looking for dinner food. By the time we got back to the house at 5:30, it was nearly dark. Only a small sliver of orange sky remained in the west.

Richie was not a good mood tonight and Sozinho through him into an utter rage when Sozinho tried to tell him how to fry fish. It's not difficult to fry anything: put in oil, then take out of oil. And as I've heard from Richie many times, he does not like being told how to do something. He ate his fish and shut himself off to the world. It's for the better: he probably would have gone on a killing spree had he not locked himself in his room.


By the time I was awake, Richie was back to his regular jovial self, in spite of the fact that he had seven classes on Wednesday. I, on the other hand, was only scheduled for two classes, but I knew better than that. Now that we are in the dead of winter, it is nearly impossible to teach classes on Wednesday. For one, the classrooms get too dark by the time I have to teach the last period. More critically, so many of my students have to go across the river before sunset. When you add on the 30-45 minutes it takes to get to the river, that pretty much reduces my ability to teach the at 4:45. So my new game plan is this: I'm only planning for one period on Wednesdays, which effectively means I'm only teaching one class on Thursdays also

Of course, on this day, one of my students came over to tell me that I could knock out my class early. The teacher who was supposed to use that hour wasn't around. I'm always happy to get my class done earlier. Teaching at 2:00 is a lot better than waiting all the way until 4:00. And my students are just as eager to finish classes early. If they are good at anything, it's letting me know when I can teach at an earlier hour.

Today, however, they were particularly good at another thing: participating. This year, and especially this last month or so, I've been moving away from grammar and going toward vocabulary development. I'm trying to get them to stretch their minds out, to get beyond "How are you? I am fine". I realize that this is difficult, but there are enough cognates that they should be able to pull out some vocabulary. The letters group was on their game today.

One of my questions was about different types of government. One student, by himself, pulled out the word "autocracy", which is the kind of thing he should be able to do, considering that the word in Portuguese is "autocracia". I asked him to give an explanation, and he gave one...in Portuguese. I paid close attention to the words he used, and all of them were words he should have known. I told him to think about his definition in English and I'd come back to him. A couple minutes later, he had a sufficient definition. He's going to do just fine on the National Exam in November.

That class actually left me feeling pretty good about myself. I rode that momentum into planning a computer class. There is a group of teachers here who have had computers now for about a year, so they already know most of the very basics. They know how to write, open, and save documents. They all know how to play music. But there are some very practical things that sometime require a little extra push. My job is to give that push. The lesson will be about how to format an exam. So on big paper, I wrote out a mock exam for them to type out. It will be their job, with my help, to reproduce this document.

We got cooking on the early end because we were cooking beans. Just as the beans finished cooking, around 7:00, I got called into the director's office to help print a document. The printers here have never been great, but they usually get the job done one way or the other. It seems, however, that they no longer want to print. There are plenty of things I'm good at when it comes to computers, but I'm completely in the dark with printers. There's not a lot I can do repair a printer.

Eventually, I gave up on the printers and came back home to eat. The beans, usually good anyway, were made especially delicious with the addition of some cheese and and avocado. Then again, you could put cheese and avocado on a pile of dirt and rocks, and it would probably be just as delicious. While we ate, we watched "Fearless". I'm not usually one for kung fu movies, but this was pretty cool. I did some reading and turned the lights out around 10:00. It sucks having to roll out of bed to turn out the lights. This is the price we have to pay, I guess.

Following a good night of sleep, I was mentally prepared to work Thursday morning. I gathered my teaching materials and went over to the teachers' room to set up my things. On the way, I ran into a couple of teachers who would be on the receiving end of the class. I told them yesterday the class would be at 8 n the morning. They didn't look ready to learn at 7:55, but by five minutes after eight, I had five teachers in the room. Everyone in there except for one teacher had a fair amount of experience, so I didn't need to baby them through the basics.

The task for them was simple, but it required them to know a lot of things: how to center a document, use caps lock, and numbering. What was new for them was how to maximize their space on a page. Since the 12th Grade National Exams are multiple choice, many teachers have moved to this format for their own exams. When I see their exams, I notice that they almost always use a new line for each option, even though more than one option can fit in a line. Along with the tab key -- a new phenomenon for everyone -- the formatted an exam with one answer per line, two answers per line, and four answers per line. There was one benefit of having a total newcomer: I could compare his work with theirs. Even though they've only had their computers for less than a year, their basic knowledge was evident. Now it's about how to manipulate the program to make it do what they want.

I didn't have much to do following class. My lesson -- the one that went so well yesterday -- was already planned. All I had to do for the rest of the morning was prep for lunch. We made our now regular move toward cheese omelets. We have determined that the Velveeta omelet is the superior form of egg. Until someone can prove to me otherwise, cheese omelets rule the day.

Given that my lesson went so well yesterday, I had high expectations for this class. What I received was nothing short of painful. I've dealt with dental procedures that were more comfortable. Whatever participation I had yesterday wasn't there today. In terms of being in the classroom, there are few things more frustrating than asking for participation -- and knowing they have the vocabulary to do it -- and not getting it. I'm happy to play the waiting game. I'll ask the same question over and over until I get the answers.

That class certainly made me want to hit the bottle. Good thing Richie and a colleague were in the mood to do the same. We started out with a couple little bottles of wine. By the end of the afternoon, we had shifted locations to the town. We stayed out fairly late -- just past 9:00 -- knocking off a case of beer over the couple of hours. Just another Thursday night in Machanga. We got home and with the power of 24-hour energy, we cooked up some dinner before crashing.

Things were very quiet on Friday morning. As we've come to expect, the bell was run at 7:00 to start school, then at 7:45 to mark the end of first period. But outside of that, there wasn't a lot of noise, in both the literal and figurative sense. There weren't many people taking, many students walking around, many teachers going to class. Things were just sort of not happening. It made sense: a whole group of teachers were not at school.

Now, why would twenty-some teachers randomly disappear on a regular Friday? The "Chama de Unidade", of course. The Chama de Unidade is an Olympic torch-like flame that is being brought from the north of the country to Maputo. I don't know why this flame is being busted out now, but apparently it's a big deal for people. Everyone was up early preparing to cook, preparing not to go to school.

For me, this is just another fake holiday, another reason to cancel class because it just happened to occur on a Friday, another reason for the men to get hammered while the women do the cooking. School wasn't even officially cancelled. The bell just stopped ringing about 9:00. By then, nobody was at school. Everybody had just given up.

That's fine by me. I had some things to do in the afternoon, mostly packing for our trip. We're going to be gone for a good while, so I wanted to make sure I had everything. This would not be a good trip to forget a passport or a bankcard. I know that I put everything in my bag, but I still probably checked fifteen times to make sure they hadn't wandered away.

Around 4:00, a couple colleagues wanted to go out to a town called Chinhuque, about 12 kilometers away. I really didn't want to go, but whatever, I didn't have anything else to do. I guess that's what made the afternoon so strange. He drove us out to the villa, and then we had to wait for him for an hour. It's an hour I would have spent just sitting on the patio, but instead I was sitting in a car. Instead of me wasting my time, someone else was wasting my time, and that kinda put me in a bad mood.

Then it took us almost an hour for us to cover the twelve kilometers, whcih is just absurd. Fed up, I just closed my eyes and slept for the second half of the ride. The place where they took us was what could only be described as a "business hotel". You could pay 350 Meticais to spend the night, or 150 Meticais to get some business done. Great. Skeezy. The only upside for the whole afternoon was that we didn't have to pay for beer. Our colleagues bought them for us. Small victory there.

By the time we got back, I was at a level of pissed off I haven't reached in a long time. I rarely get angry. It just doesn't happen much anymore. I feel like there's no a lot to be angry about. But the confluence of having my time being wasted, being hungry, being tired, being drunk, and coming home to an empty house with the lights on pushed me over the edge. I wanted no part of any activity or any person. Richie, recognizing that I was about to go on a killing spree, left the house quickly for the villa. I made my spaghetti, ate as quickly as possibly, and went to bed. It was 8:30. I hoped a night of sleep would do me good.

I woke up feeling refresh, alive, without a bit of anger in me. Part of it was probably the good night's sleep. Most of it, I think, was knowing that I was leaving Machanga for a good long time. We were on the road to South Africa for our World Cup game. The travel day was an average one. We got an absolutely horrible ride to Inhassoro, but after a short wait, we got a Land Cruiser to take us all the way from Inhassoro to Vilanculos.

The rest of the day was very routine, at least for Vilanculos. We caught up with colleagues, got drunk, ate pizza -- all the important things. And as has come to be the trend, three of us stayed up late into the evening, discussing all topics. It's three of us guys. Aside from Richie, they are the only guys in the area. And they have good sports knowledge, so that makes for fun evenings.

I'll be away from my computer this week, on the road to USA vs. England. I'll be back in a couple weeks.