Back again! I just finished my third week and time is FLYING by! I think with each passing day here I’m realizing more and more that teaching and coaching is what I really want to do. Which is a REALLY exciting realization actually! I just need to try and fit in an education minor before I graduate...6 courses in 4 terms left at Dartmouth? Crazier things have happened. It's just so much fun trying to think of creative ways to present ideas and ways to engage the kids with activities that they will find fun, that they will understand, and that they will get something out of. I just find it so cool how each kid thinks differently and how each one interprets the simplest thing like painting their dreams with watercolors in such a unique way. And the kids are absolute SPONGES of information…. It's depressing that I can't even remember a new Spanish word 30 seconds after I learn it and I’ll tell the kids a word once and they’ll remember it a week later. It's REALLY amazing actually. On the note of learning actually Kay, Zoey and I are actually starting our Spanish classes tomorrow!
Today, February 2nd, may be renowned as Groundhog Day to most gringos up there in the Estados Unidos but down here it marked the first day of school for 87% of Granada’s kids….the rest start either tomorrow or….at another undisclosed date. The start of school here signified a couple noteworthy things in my mind:
1. the streets are now swarming with kids dressed in their navy and white school uniforms
2. we had a POOR turnout for both of our practices today which was slightly demoralizing.
3. an unprecedented number of haircuts
4. TEARS in my household because Pedro did NOT want to have his first day of school…probably because it means he no longer has time to hand wash himself and the clothes he is wearing at the time before school every morning.
When I asked the kids why they didn’t come today most said that they forgot, which is understandable I just hope that our turnout next week will be better so that we can continue to have worthwhile practices. In the coming weeks I think I might be going around with Chepe to a number of schools to talk to principals, hand out flyers, and try to spread the word about Futbol Sin Fronteras. So hopefully we will be able to see the fruits of our labors with an increased turnout at each session!
The past 2 weeks have kind of been these 2 intermediary weeks before we start February’s Poetry unit so 2 weeks ago we carried on from camp and made teamwork the general theme. Last week we tried to get the kids fired up to go back to school and made Education/Back to School the theme! During noche de ninas with the pequenas we read a book that we picked out of the library that was all about friendship, morals, respect, etc. which was actually very educational. Not gonna lie. With the grandes we picked out a number of articles from the newspaper on Education in Nicaragua and split them into small groups that each read an article, answered questions, and presented it to the group as a whole so that they could continue to practice their public speaking skills that they had worked on the week before.
On literacy night or noche de idiomas where we usually try and get the girls writing and possibly analyzing things from the night before we did a time capsule sort of exercise where each girl filled out a worksheet with specific goals they have for the coming school year, helping around the house, how to better themselves, and what their dreams are for the future. We tried to get the girls thinking very specifically about their goals and make sure that each one addressed either a subject they had trouble with in school, or a specific chore that they would help with around the house, etc. Then we put all of the letters into envelopes and sealed them in a box that we plan on opening a month or 2 later so that each girl can evaluate her goal and the progress she’s made on it and, if she hasn’t achieved her goal, hopefully think about why she hasn’t and what she can do to then accomplish her respective goal.
On noche de manualidades, (I legit had to write this one on the board outside the office 4 times before I could make it fit) or crafts night, we decorated our time capsule box from the night before with individual handprints that the kids made and decorated and then glued to the box. The event quickly progressed to a t-shirt decorating party where I got a handful (literally) of handprints all over my t-shirt and I’ve since sworn not to wash it because it looks AWESOME.
On Noche de Peliculas we finished watching the second half of UP and discussed with the youth leaders what the plan for Saturday and Tuesday’s practices would be. Basically all of our planning sessions are in Spanish because the main focus of SWB this year is to get the Nicaraguans more involved so that they are learning how to run the program more themselves (although as I understand it there will probably always need to be long term US volunteers down here to keep things running smoothly) and have more ownership of the program in general. All in all, very cool.
AND THEN! Probably my highlight of the week was our first Girls for Change meeting at Café Latino! I think it was a huge success! Basically we’re working on implementing this program called Girls for Change or Chicas para Cambio as we’ve dubbed it and are trying to be the first international site to do it. We have a group of the older girls who have committed to coming to a meeting one time a week to try and think of a social issue that they want to learn about and try to address and change. Zoey went to the training in San Francisco this past year so she’s the one really spearheading the curriculum and is sort of teaching all of us about it along the way, but they way she was explaining the projects is that they try to differentiate between social change and service. So in this tree example she gave: there is a tree with lots of dead leaves. Service would be going everyday and picking up these leaves. Change, on the other hand, would be going and finding out why there are dead leaves, i.e. what the root cause is behind it and figure out how to stop it/ prevent more leaves from dying. Her other example was in a soup kitchen. Service is going to the soup kitchen and serving homeless people food. Social change is going and interviewing these homeless people and figuring out why they are homeless, why they come to the soup kitchen and trying to figure out ways to combat further homelessness. So right now we’re trying to think of social issues to make the girls aware of and that they can hopefully do something to change. There are a lot of problems here like domestic abuse, and alcoholism that would probably be very hard to address and difficult to approach so we are considering potentially looking into smoke inhalation because it’s a pretty serious problem in third world countries and, for example, many people work all day cooking and preparing food in these spaces that are completely unventilated and are just destroying their lungs. I also know in big urban cities, in developing countries especially, there are huge problems with pollution and trash (trash is a HUGE problem here, it literally lies everywhere) so maybe we could do that as well. But needless to say I think it’s a really cool idea and has awesome potential with the girls if executed well…
As for the meeting, we had our group of 4 girls show up along with Zoey, Kay, Kim from Hotel con Corazon, and me. We talked about female role models in our lives (Hi Mom!) past experiences that we’ve had on teams, why we’re excited about this team, and other insightful questions that were REALLY interesting to think about and discuss… Its nice being in such an intimate group of women and it’s an environment where I think most of us feel comfortable sharing ideas and personal experiences so I think it should be a really eye opening experience for all of us. SO. More updates about GFC to follow in the coming weeks!
Tonight Zoey, Kay, Suyen, Cindy and I met to discuss the syllabus for February’s POETRY UNIT! As there is a huge Poetry festival that comes to Grenada every year we are hoping to get the girls ready for and excited about the upcoming festivities….and while I don’t want to give away too many surprises, the coming month just might include: the SHOW de SUYEN, hanging mobiles, AMOR (HELLOOOOOOO VALENTINES DAY!), poetry recitations, name poems….the list goes on.
AND FINALLY, because I think I’ve accomplished the equivalent of overstaying my welcome on the blog, this past weekend was Ariana’s first communion…a VERY exciting day in the life of my family! We woke up MUY TEMPRANO Sunday morning and Ariana put on what some might call a wedding dress and walked to the IGLESIA. The church was FILLED with girls and boys who, after manyyyyy weeks of preparation were finally ready for their first communion. The congregation sang lots of catchy songs and each elaborately dressed boy and girl got up for his/her first communion. I got to dar la paz to those around me, listen to the amusing priest that led the service, and take in the whole experience which was followed by a party at our house. After tying balloons till my fingers bled the night before in preparation for the party I got to experience my first AND SECOND Nicaraguan piñata! You can picture the scene by imagining a room FILLED with yellow and white balloons….hung from the walls, surrounding the doorways, scattered on the floor, etc. an array of white plastic chairs set up around the perimeter of the room, a MASSIVE speaker system BLASTING reggeton and other Latin music, and a piñata hung on a pulley system in the middle of the room. Forget being spun around in a circle while blindfolded…..this piñata operated a little differently. Frankly, it was OUT.OF HAND. After each kid had a black bandanna tied around his/her eyes, Tito (mi padre) started using the pulley system to vigorously crank the paper mache up and down so that it was near impossible to hit….to give you an idea even the kids that weren’t blindfolded couldn’t hit the thing…..but instead of hopelessly swinging at the flailing piñata, the kids just start doing this blindfolded dance in the middle of the room and swing every so often when their dance moves run out….it is SALVAJE. And I think the highlight of the afternoon may have been when Kay stepped up to the plate and ended up injuring a small child when she confused the piñata with Jose Luis and literally hit him as hard as I think she could have with the little wooden stick. I’m actually surprised he doesn’t have a broken rib right now but I kicked around with him today and there was no visible damage so I think we’re in the clear!
Welp. I think that’s about it.
HASTA LUEGO,
Risa
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