The Daily Grind

I had a conversation with my mom last night and she suggested that I describe my day to day life to you. I had never really thought to do this because it is so normal to me now. I forgot that it may be interesting to someone who has no idea what my life is like here.

First of all, I live in a house on school grounds that consists of two bedrooms, a kitchen area, and a living room area. I live in one room and my housemate Indila lives in the other. Hunter has taken over the living room for his own. So really the only shared space is the kitchen. It is the only house on the grounds where the teachers live. The other teachers live in what we call shacks (they are rooms made of tin).

In the morning I get up at 7:00 and get ready for the day. I dress in professional teaching clothes just as if I was teaching in the U.S. All of the teachers dress really well. On Mondays we wear black and white. No one really knows why. I guess someone decided it was a good idea. On Tuesday and Wednesdays we wear whatever professional clothes we would like. On Thursdays we wear sports attire to support our netball and soccer teams that play on Thursdays. On Fridays we are allowed to wear jeans. I know what you’re thinking, you wear jeans in Africa?! Yes, I do. I have gotten used to the blazing hot weather for the most part and I am able to wear pants here.

My day consists of about 4 classes a day. Each class is 40 minutes long. I have my English 8A and 8B every day and other than that I have a rotation of my computer classes for grades 8-10. In my spare time I plan or help others out with things on the computer. We “knock off” at about 3:30 most days. Classes end at 1:50 (except for Mondays when there is an extra class until 2:30). In the extra hours of the day the learners are expected to stay in their classes and study for the remainder of the day. This is why it always strikes me when learners don’t bring their homework. You mean to tell me you had study time the day before from 2-3:30 and you couldn’t manage to fit my English homework in there?

Each class has 9 teachers and subjects. (Geography, Entrepreneurship, Life Science, Agriculture, English, Oshikwanyama, Mathematics, Art and Physical Science) and now with me here, they have BIS (basic information science) otherwise known as ICT or computers. The classes stay in their rooms throughout the whole day (unless they have computers and then they come to the lab…or as they like to call it the “computer stadium”). Each teacher has their schedule and rotates into the classrooms during the different periods. This school has grade 1-10 so there are a lot of classrooms. Each grade has either 2 or 3 sections with about 30 students in each one.

At the end of the day we all return to the teacher housing and relax and do whatever chores we need to do before we have to cook our meals. Sometimes this consists of hand washing laundry. We have small wash basins that we use. We go to the tap and fill the basin and then add a washing soap. Each basin can wash about 4 articles of clothing until you have to change out the water and repeat the process. Each article of clothing needs to be hand washed 3 times before you can wring it out and hang it up to dry on the clothesline. Once is with soap and the other two is with regular water to rinse it out. I’m not very good at hand washing but I’m getting better at it and my clothes stay clean so that’s something to be proud of.

If we are not washing or cooking dinner, we are normally socializing and playing cards or watching something on one of the few laptops here. Also, Mr. Imms has a flat screen T.V. in his room so he is a popular man during soccer matches. It’s all about Manchester United for a lot of the teachers here. So yeah, I’ve kind of become a soccer fan. Or at least I can tolerate watching it now as a social thing. Because my name is Chelsea and there is a soccer team named Chelsea, I get a lot of jokes thrown at me about it.

As for cooking, my housemate and I usually make chicken and soup with either macaroni or spaghetti. Last night I was really craving the traditional Mahangu porridge that they make here. It is very plain and you eat it on the floor with your hands. Normally you have one plate of it and everyone sits around together and eats from it. You take a small ball into your hands and roll it kind of like dough and dip it into either milk or soup and it is delicious. It also makes eating a social thing instead of something you have to do. Of course we all know we have to eat. But it’s nice to spend time with people. A lot of times in the U.S. eating is rushed and a solo thing.

If we are not doing any of these things, then we are in the village playing pool and relaxing listening to music from the jukeboxes. I have become obsessed with the music they have here. They have so much rhythm! They have either house music or quito (sp?) music. Each one has a unique style and beat. No matter which it is, it’s incredibly fun to dance to.

On the weekends most teachers go home to their families. The mothers and children live here during the week and then see their husbands on the weekends. Vice versa with the men who are married here. Because we live in the bush it’s very hard for anyone to see anyone else other than the villagers and teachers during the week. If you stay here on the weekends, there isn’t much to do. This is why I travel a lot to go see other people and stay other places for a few days. The only thing about leaving is that even this is hard. Hitchhiking is not easy. Sometimes you get a ride the moment you reach the hike point on the road and other times you are waiting in the blazing hot African sun for 2 hours before someone stops. In either direction, Eenhana is a half hour away and Ondangwa is an hour away.

Speaking of the hot sun, right now it is either really hot or really raining. We are in the rainy season right now which means that at any moment during the day the rain comes and pours buckets. Sometimes, there isn’t much of a warning. It’s not like I have the weather channel for my village so it’s a guessing game each day. Last year the surrounding areas flooded and roads were inaccessible for a large amount of time

I think this pretty much covers a lot of what I do on a day to day basis and gives you more of an idea of where I am and what I do. Always feel free to comment on the blog and ask any questions, I’d be happy to answer them.

Also, tomorrow is Namibian Independence day and we are all getting together to eat goat, drink and be merry. We all pooled together our money to buy a goat to slaughter it and share! Because, “in Africa we share” remember that phrase, because it is quite popular here. Literally, anything you have, you share with others. Kind of nice.

Peace and Love,

Chels

I may be a dreamer but i'm not the only one

What does it mean to make a difference and change the world? I think that it starts with following your passion. You can do much more good in the world if you are passionate about what you are doing. I don’t care what it is you are passionate about. It could be anything. Follow your dreams and don’t shy away from something that seems too far out of reach. Wouldn’t it seem too far out of reach for me to travel to Africa for a year to teach? I’m writing to you now from Africa where I am currently volunteer teaching. Think about it, if I can be in Africa and fulfill my dreams, why can’t you? You need to follow your passion and see where it takes you.

I think I was meant to be here and have this experience. I followed my gut feeling about where I was supposed to be and what I needed to be doing. I could have taken the easy route and applied for grad schools and stayed home trying to get a job. For the time being, that is not what I’m meant to be doing. I’m not saying that doing all of this is easy or even pleasant all of the time…this following your passion stuff.  It’s challenging and exhausting. However, wouldn’t you much rather be doing something that you know you want to do than be stuck doing something you hate? We only have one life to live (yes that is a soap opera name) and we should try and live it so that in the end we have no regrets. I can say with confidence that I have no regrets thus far and I do not plan on having any for as long as I live.

Make a bucket list. Tick things off the list when you can. Make a plan; set a goal.

Now that I have that thought out of the way I can fill you in on the past week. I had a much better week teaching my learners. I’ve been planning my lessons like crazy to make sure that there isn’t a moment for my learners to be talking or disrupting. They are busy little bees in Ms. Chelsea’s class now! I think that being bored contributes to a lot of talking in class.

This weekend I went to Ondangwa with my housemate Indila to her restaurant and bar that she owns. It was cool to see how she runs her business here in Africa. We brought Hunter along with us and he hung out with some of the young boys that Indila looks after. She has so many responsibilities at only 25 years old. She runs a business, looks after some young boys that stay at the house, looks after her cousin and her cousin’s baby, and looks after the girls that she employed to work at the bar. She pays for everything herself and still gives them a salary. She also teaches at the school with me. Talk about being able to multi-task!

When we were all coming back from the weekend I had Hunter in my lap in the car. The driver drove so fast through the village to drop us off that when he stopped the car, Hunter threw up on his back seat. I think that’s a little bit of karma. Stop driving so fast and maybe my dog won’t vomit in your vehicle J

Yesterday we had a staff meeting called. Staff meetings here are announced mid-day when someone decides there should be one. So around 12 when I was passing by the office I saw the notice on the chalkboard that we need to report for a meeting at 2:30 when the last class ends. I rushed out of my last class to get a chair to bring to the staff lounge and sat for the meeting. Business went on as usual as one of the teachers was explaining that parents were coming in and complaining about students being kept late after school. The students are staying late and playing and then blaming it on sports. They say that they are being kept by the teachers. Really they don’t want to go home and do chores and look after the animals so they lie to their parents.

Another issue as my colleague so kindly blamed me for was that learners keep coming to my house and visiting me. He turned to me in the middle of the meeting and called me out specifically. I then informed him that I have a housemate (and pointed to her) and asked why he was not addressing her as well. He then kept saying do you understand me and Chelsea they shouldn’t be over there because that’s teacher’s housing. I then told him that I never asked the learners to come over and I agree that they shouldn’t be there. I also informed him that he should not be attacking me specifically.

After school I went over to him and explained that it is unprofessional to address someone in such a manner during a staff meeting. He should have come to me privately and discussed it with me first. A staff meeting is not a time to point fingers and bring things like that up. He said he understands and that he was sorry. I think that it’s important to stand up for yourself. I do not feel bad for what I said. Life goes on.

Peace and Love,

Chels

Breaking Point

This week teaching was very interesting. I’m getting to a breaking point in some of my classes. The students get out of hand sometimes and I get very frustrated. I ended up walking out 5 minutes early from one of my English classes because they would not listen when I said they needed to quiet down. They were much better the next class. I am no longer interested in raising my voice in any of the classes. I calmly talked to the class saying that talking over me is disrespectful and rude. If they did not quiet down I would leave. Some students continued to talk so I said okay I’m done for the day I hope we can have a better day tomorrow. Today in my 8C computer class I went into their class before computer period started and informed them that they would not have the privilege of having computer class today because last class I had to kick one of the students out for not listening after time number 3 of telling him not to play on the computer and to practice his typing like I asked. I said to him “I’m done asking go back to class”. A lot of the students then mocked me as they were leaving the lab saying “I’m done, I’m done” and laughing at what I said. Today when I went in I explained that this was unacceptable and disrespectful to me as their teacher. They need to readjust their attitudes and come back next class.

After having a stressful teaching week I travelled to Oshakati to meet up with a number of the other volunteers. One of our friends travelled all the way from Rundu to come see us. Rundu is about a 7 hour drive from us. It was nice to see everyone again and hang out with Americans. We stayed at a guest hotel and the next night at the guest lodge in Oshakati. We planned on staying with one of the volunteers at her school. However, upon arriving we found out that she was talking to some of her colleagues and they asked her if she was scared to stay for the weekend on a “home” weekend at the hostel school. Apparently a lot of the learners taunt the locals and throw things at them. The locals then break into the school and try to kill the learners or whoever is in the hostel on a home weekend. Recently a local broke in and stabbed someone with a screwdriver. Not a safe place.

Can I just say as well that I cannot believe it is already March? I’ve been here since the end of December but it feels like I’ve been here for about 3 weeks and not over 2 months. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. I am enjoying the time I have here and even though I’m having a rough couple of weeks I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything. Being a first year teacher and teaching in Africa is a huge obstacle to tackle and I am learning a lot from this.

Peace and Love,

Chels