I'm still here!

So it’s been quite a long past few months. I think it best to just pick up here, halfway through month 19 (seven more to go).

Things at school are absolutely different from last year. Teaching English has been much more fun than I ever imagined. I think part of my problem last year was teaching something that I wasn’t so sure about – study skills is not a class really taught in the States. English is different – for one, I love love love grammar already, and two, I have some really great books to reference, (as well as the occasional google search), and a syllabus that takes me along an organized schedule. The other English teachers have been fun to work with too; to share ideas, resources. My teaching style is much different from theirs which has provided me more time for creating supplementary exercises and to move faster than the rest of them. I don’t know if this is a good or bad thing yet, but it has made it nice to share some of my ideas with the other teachers. They seem grateful for the extra help.

I teach two classrooms of Form I students (freshmen) English, and one classroom Religion/Ethics. I don’t know if these kids are just sweeter than our Form IIs that I taught last year, or maybe I am a little better at the whole classroom management thing, but I’m in love with them all. I’m really trying to push them into wanting to beat their own scores rather than beating each other. It is typical for schools in Tanzania to post the results of each student for every exam in a public place, complete with ranking them first to last. I know when I was in high school, that would have horrified me, so I’m doing things to avoid it. I don’t know if it’s working or not, but they seem to appreciate how silly and secretive I am about their grades.

As far as my teaching colleagues, I feel much more part of the team nowadays. I really enjoy sharing ideas with the other teachers. Though we’re still all getting used to each other, and we’re still figuring out how to work in a school in which we have to start everything from scratch, I feel a definite “team” mentality forming, which is wonderful.

Hmm.. we’re eating a lot of mamung’unya (a type of squash), karanga (fresh peanuts and similar nuts of a different variety), and different kind of maharagwe(beans). Also in season are lots of different kinds of green leafy vegetables, which are spinach like, but really not at all. One that’s really in season now is pumpkin leaves, which are delicious if prepared properly! (I say that because sometimes we try things out without really knowing how to properly cook them.) We just finished pear season, and I’m really missing them already! There aren’t many crunchy fruits like apples or pears here. Apples are actually quite expensive in Dodoma too because they are grown pretty far.

The cold season has also begun. Rains are now sporadic 5 minute sprinkles, and the mornings and evenings feel so cold! The cold season lasts until August. I’m going to have to pull out my “winter” clothes again! The very early mornings are especially freezing, which makes it really hard to get out of bed for a run.

Oh yeah, did I ever mention that Hannah and I run before school? Never in my life did I think I’d wake up at 5am in the dark to run before work, but we do it! Mon, Weds, and Fridays are usually our days for running a little less than 3 miles. We have to go at 5:15am, because we catch the bus now at around 6:50am. That means a half hour for running, 15 minutes for a luke warm bucket shower, and then the rest of the time for a cup of instant coffee, oatmeal with peanut butter (if I’m lucky), and a few minutes to properly wake myself up. If we have the time or aren’t feeling lazy on the weekends (that’s usually me, not Hannah), we’ll take a longer run around the big rock “mountain” that is a short walk from our house. There’s a beautiful trail around it that is just through trees and bush. We pass a few others who are also exercising, but a lot of the time we’re alone. It’s really beautiful, especially now while it’s still a green Dodoma.