Mood of Jubilation

Last week I had the great pleasure of attending the graduation party for my host mother, Winifred, who finished first in her class (the 'ace' in Liberia) with a degree in religious education from the Baptist Seminary in Monrovia. As with all life events here, this was a capital-O Occasion. My host father is the pastor of a large church in Kakata, and both he and his wife have touched a lot of lives. So the entire church turned out in Sunday best to show their support for such a huge accomplishment.

Liberian parties are usually full of people, they always have great food and an absolutely terrible rented/borrowed sound system, and they all have a program or agenda complete with an MC and the feedback squeal of an abused microphone. There are opening prayers, unrehearsed speeches, and frequent audience participation. This party was a magnitude above because my family works so hard here and because it doubled as the unofficial going-away party for their departure to a new life in America. I got to meet my host ma's mother, see the puppies all grown up, and give Delwin a hug goodbye. It was amazing, and I will miss them terribly, but I am so proud of and happy for them starting a new phase of their life. 

The MC called for a prayer to thank God for the "mood of jubilation" we were graced with, and today, on my six-month anniversary of arriving in Liberia, I am full of jubilation in one form or another.

Dry season is fully upon us, complete with bright sun, cool breezes, and the hazy, dusty sky of harmattan, when the winds blow off the desert to the north instead of the ocean to the south. 

On our adventure to the market, Heather and I were blessed by the produce gods with cucumbers, a tomato, a butter pear (avocado) AND a pineapple! When okra and bitterball are the standard fare, this is a trip to the produce section of Whole Foods by comparison. We had delicious sandwiches bursting with fresh veggies for lunch, and loved every bite. The market was insane today, in the run-up to Christmas, which is a huge deal here. The main market road was choked with wheelbarrows full of clothes and other gifts, and navigating the crowds reminded me a little bit of the mall, but with that dusty Liberian twist. 

Today, my last teaching day before the holiday vacation, was a scheduled quiz for all my classes, so mean of me! But I decided to give those students who showed up a nice Christmas gift, and made it an open-book quiz when I got to school. This also allowed me to put the questions on the board in all my classes at once, taking advantage of absent teachers, so I didn't have to stay until six, which was a side benefit. It was a really good decision, because today was the day for stump speeches and campaigning for student government. They go all-out with that here, registering a political party with the PTA, taking a stand on issues like teacher attendance and the lack of desks, and disrupting class to pass out candy and badges. There are also fabulous campaign crowns that any first-grader would be jealous of: a bright paper band with a square stapled up in front proclaiming "SUP for Rights" and "Ferguson wants justice for students." Because Heather and I were virtually the only teachers holding class today, most of the students were running around campus chanting slogans and playing music. Several of my tenth graders asked me if I supported SUP (Student Unity Party, wants to increase teacher regularity and administrative transperancy) or SDP (Student Democratic Party, wants to get more rights and justice for students, whatever that means). I told them I was very pleased to see my students exercising their political rights, and that I was sure that the best party for the school would win. I also got to wish everyone a merry Christmas ("Ms L, you will carry me with you for Christmas?") and a happy new year. 

It's strange to think that I'm almost done with my first semester of teaching here, that it's been half a year since staging in Philly, that I didn't know any of these people six months ago and now they are my family. I have plans to travel to Grand Cape Mount county for vacation (and maybe end up at Robertsport, one of the best surfing spots in the world), and to call home to talk to everyone. I am keeping you all in my heart this season, and I wish you all the jubilation you can handle. Merry merry!

Thank You For The Work

Today was a day of good work, as such things are measured on a Liberian scale.

Since we were gone to training for a week and came back to 2nd marking period exam week, neither Heather nor myself have had time to do a big restocking trip for far too long. So this morning we strapped on our backpacks, faced the nemesis hill right outside our front door, and headed to the market to fill our empty shelves. 

Wednesday morning in Kakata is a bustling, bizarre, beautiful thing. It hasn't rained in a week, so the streets are a dusty brown instead of a muddy red. The row of shoeshine boys who set up camp at the side of the coal tar greeted us cheerfully as we wended our way past them, fighting upstream against a tide of wheelbarrows and bundle-laden teens. The money-changer we stopped at to convert US dollars into Liberian dollars had a chess game set up and asked if we wanted to play. And everyone said good morning. Our usual shopkeepers missed us and gave us a gently chiding hard time for not stopping by to say hello. We ran into at least half a dozen of our students (most of whom sell in the market or do other work in the morning before going to school in the afternoon since they are self-supported and/or have families and children of their own). And we covered a lot of ground, walking around half of Kakata. All told, the adventure took about two hours. We returned with enough time to rinse off the sweat and stash our haul of rice, canned goods, oil, vegetables, and cleaning supplies before heading to campus for school. Pantry: stocked.

This week is the first week of 3rd marking period (a marking period is four weeks of instruction, one week of review, one week of exams repeated six times in a school year) and I made the executive decision that I would teach my tenth-graders actual algebra for this period after months of arithmetic review. So today I introduced the concept of translating English sentences into algebraic expressions. We kept things simple, making a list of words for addition and practicing math sentences using just that operation. I felt like an amazing teacher, too. I had students raising their hands to ask thoughtful questions and coming to the board to give (mostly correct) answers. They even took a mini-quiz and mostly managed to do their own work. 

Part of the reason class went so well is that more than half my students were absent, and twenty bodies are easier to manage than fifty-five. Many students and teachers have decided, apparently, to take their Christmas vacation two weeks early, and campus is like a ghost town after recess except for those dedicated/unlucky few who have Peace Corps teachers and decide to stay. After I finished teaching today, the empty schedule meant that I got some time to 'lecture small', or chat, with my kids and engage in a little Goal Two exchange, sharing American culture with Liberians. They had some great questions, like "do people in America have hard time like Liberians we do?" (I told David and Abraham about homeless people living on the streets, of which I've seen none here- "Don't their families help them, Ms. L? Why don't they get jobs?") and "is there special state for vampires to live in? (No, Martin. Vampires aren't real, we just have plenty stories about them) and "why  your father teach literature and you love to teach mathematics?" (Some people are strong at different things, Eva). I loved having the chance to talk and listen to my kids in an informal way. And they're so curious and open to asking anything- sometimes to a ridiculous or uncomfortable degree- which is refreshing. Students: taught.

Amos the carpenter came by yesterday to finish grouting the tile floor in our living room and reinstall the baseboards, and today when I got home from teaching my one class, I got out a bucket and a brush and, Cindarella-style, took to hands and knees to remove the spots of grout and cement marring our gorgeous new floor. (Tile: cleaned)

 I naturally tackled this task with the front door open and music playing loudly, which the neighborhood took as an invitation to drop by and thank me for the work and jealously ogle our beautiful floor. I had been worried that they would see us as selfish, wasting money on something so superfluous, but everyone's reaction has been overwhelming support and admiration of our investment in our home and the community. They all want to tell us "Thank you for the work," which I find strange since all I did was sit on the porch while three Liberians took less than a day to lay a floor, but since we supplied the materials and had the idea, we get the thanks. And the visitors. First was Ma Mary from up the hill who dropped in to appreciate us and ask if we had any extra cement dust she could have. Then Muistafa, a student, visited to say hello and caught me singing along (loudly) to "Hey, Jude," which probably made his day. And Peace, Ben and Fatu's dog, came by to spread out on the coolest surface in town. But my favorite visitor was Ben himself. I was just putting the bucket away and dancing on clean tile in my bare feet (para bailar la bamba, se necesita una poca de gracias) when his quiet voice interrupted from the porch, "what country is this music?" 

I told him the language was Spanish, and asked him if he liked it. 

"I hear this before, when I were refugee in 2003, it make me think on that time." 

"What place were you a refugee?"

"Oh, near to Freetown, in Sierra Leone. It a nice song..." and he smiled and went back to hooking the grass in his yard. Thank you for the work, Ben. 

Working Hard to Make a Living

It's the Saturday after exam week and there's no rest for the lazy.

My roommate is in town, leaving me on kitten/dish duty. Amos the carpenter is coming to put in a new floor that (hopefully) won't try to trip me to death every morning, so there's a huge mound of sand right in front of our porch steps waiting for his arrival at '8:00' or the Liberian equivalent. I need climbing gear to scale the pile of laundry-to-be-done in the corner of my room. If I don't use the bananas today they will aquire consciousness and possibly take over West Africa. I have 400 final exams and 200 make-up quizzes to grade. There is a rampaging horde of children at the well causing noise, spilling water, and taking forever to fill their buckets, holding up all my other chores. And yet.

And yet the mist over the hills is gorgeous, keeping the heat and bright sun of dry season at bay for a little while. My lap is full of purring baby cat curled up in a little ball of peace. A very kind blind man carried two pumpkins to us yesterday (word of our 'pumpkin business' conversation with Ben last month has spread all over town) so I get pumpkin soup for dinner today and tomorrow. The semi-sentient bananas are going to be delicious banana bread in a few hours. I have faith that at least half my students will pass my class this marking period. And I am here, alive in this moment, looking ahead (forward?) to a full day after a full week in a full month of the hardest and most amazing year of my life to date. Maybe I have a blessings list and not a to-do list. I can see how people love 6:30 in the morning.

An Awfully Big Adventure

Today as part of our training we watched a documentary called Girl Rising, which uses the stories of 8 girls and young women from countries like Peru, Haiti, Ethiopia, Nepal, and Afghanistan to illustrate the point that educating girls is the single most effective thing any country can do to combat poverty. The issue of gender equality wasn't my greatest passion back home, but my presence here as a woman teaching math and standing up for myself is a revolution on a micro scale. Our PCVL came to watch us teach a while ago and brought my attention to the fact that for a review activity with fifteen questions I had only three girls come to answer. I hadn't thought at all about the way I dealt with gender in the classroom here (too busy keeping my head above water for first marking period), but after his comment I made a deliberate attempt to call on girls more often, and to make sure that they felt like my classroom was a safe space. In the last month I have noticed a significant increase in the number of girls who raise their hands to answer questions in class and fight for a chance to come to the board. It feels like a tiny victory in an immeasurable war.

The issue of gender in education in Liberia (or the world) is part of a broader question I have been asking myself lately. When I stand in the front of my classroom, chalk on my hands and mud on my shoes and sweat running down my back, I sometimes see huge possibility and potential. Other times I see the 2/3 of my class who only occasionally cheat on their quizzes, usually come to class, and seem to value the results of education, if not the process. They work harder than any honors student in America, because they have to fight economic obstacles associated with being orphans/parents/self-supported adults, societal pressures stemming from a decade and a half of actual collapse, and the ingrained restrictions of gender roles. My last two classes of the afternoon have the added challenge of literally racing the sun in the sky to be able to see the chalkboard and their notebooks as dusk falls and their dim classrooms become even darker. Sometimes it feels like a losing battle (and an inappropriate goal) to teach them to graph a line or balance a chemical equation. How could that be relevant to the immediate screaming needs of their lives? What else could I possibly be doing, if not this? Is there a better use of my time here, or a better perspective I could find from which to approach our primary project?

One of my fellow volunteers (who has her students call her Miss Frizzle, btw), teaches math and science in a tiny school in a minuscule village. I love the way she looks at the world, and the humor and color she brings to her stories. We had an amazing conversation about our purpose here and what our role really is in development in Liberia. Her 12th grade physics class has less than a dozen students, and she has decided that in addition to helping them master the basics of force, waves, and matter, she is going to explicitly model teaching techniques and ask her students to put them into practice with each other when they take turns as class leaders since one of the only job opportunities for high school graduates is teaching. She described a Peace Corps volunteer in their school as Wendy reading to the Lost Boys, showing them new ideas bigger than themselves.

I think that is our purpose here. Our students are the (not-so-distant) future teachers of Liberia. We need to teach them now to value integrity, hard work, and gender equality. We can show them that progress is possible, you just have to want it. It's not this generation we'll have the biggest impact on, but the next one. We've spent the last week at our inservice training, discussing challenges and successes and sharing solutions with other LR-4's. I've been so consistently impressed by the creativity of my fellow pcvs and their resilience in the face of chaos (150 kids in one room, nonexistent resources, radically different cultural context for the process and purpose of teaching and learning), blown away by how they find incredible victories and dedicate huge swaths of their time and energy and heart to a job that is never done in a country that feels further away than the second star to the right and stranger than any rabbit hole ever could. Sometimes it feels like this Neverland is more real than the California dream I left almost six months ago. Will the lost boys (and girls) be better off for our fairy tales and dreams? No system is too big to be changed, and the quiet revolution of expecting them to participate in and take ownership of their own lives is one I have not yet surrendered. To teach in Liberia is an awfully big adventure.

Celebrate Good Times

On October 31st, as I was writing the date on the blackboard in my first class, I decided to share a little bit of American culture with my students. So I added a "Happy Halloween" below, and after the warm-up I shared some of the traditions surrounding halloween from back home (the dressing up in costumes and trick-or-treating and watching horror movie traditions, not the more religious roots of the day). They really loved when I went all along the front row of desks knocking on each one and saying "trick or treat," and for the next week I was greeted with "Trick or treat, Ms. L" when I saw my students in the hall. I also gave them a quiz that day (Happy Halloween!) and if they finished early I had them write me a letter on the back about what their favorite holiday was and why. I got a lot of random answers, but there were many students who liked New Years Day because they were grateful to God for letting them see another year. There's not much to argue about that sentiment here in Liberia, I feel.

Sharing celebrations with my students was a great way to kick off the holiday season here in the tropics halfway around the world from my family, where I don't have crisp, cool fall weather to set the mood. I decided I would find my own ways to make the holidays special this year. So far, I'm off to a great start.

One of the LR-3 Peace Corps Leaders went home for a couple weeks around the same time (and brought me back a new iPhone, thank you so much to everyone involved with that!) and was really excited about, and I quote, "all the pumpkin-flavored things" including bread and pie and spiced lattes. I decided to bring autumn to West Africa. I got some canned pumpkin and pumpkin pie spice in Monrovia and set up my coal pot dutch oven to churn out some tasty pumpkin bread. I borrowed metal muffin tins from our neighbor Fatu and used laughing cow 'cheese' to make a maple cream cheese frosting. In case you are wondering, the experiment was a success.

In exchange for the use of the muffin tins, I carried some of my victory baking to Fatu, Ben, Winifred, and the kids. Heather and I had a great time explaining the harvest season traditions of America to them, including leaves changing color, jack-o-lanterns, American Thanksgiving, corn mazes, and giant pumpkin growing contests. Ben is a farmer, and he was really interested in the differences between Liberian pumpkin (green and squash-shaped) and their round orange American cousins. They also really enjoyed the pumpkin muffins. 

I stopped by the Peace Corps office recently to pick up some mail, and I had a postcard (thank you Stan) and an amazing package (thank you Carrie) full of gorgeous paper/ephemera and a Smithsonian magazine. The paper became another pop-up 'card' that I hung on the bulletin board in my room.

The Smithsonian magazine actually had a really good article and photos of how giant pumpkins have gotten bigger in the last century because of the pumpkin-growing contests. Heather had a package as well, and her parents had sent seed packets, including pumpkin seeds with a jack-o-lantern on the front. We got so excited about this, and carried them over to show the neighbors all the things we'd told them about. Ben was fascinated with his glimpse into American agriculture practices, especially the photo of a tractor hauling a huge pumpkin out of a field. He reached out a finger to trace the giant tire and commented that it was "a fine fine machine." We handed the seed packets into his experienced hands to try out the American varietals of tomatoes, bell peppers, pumpkins, and squash in exchange for part of the produce. 

Thanksgiving is in two days, and the volunteers have been invited by the US ambassador to the Embassy Thanksgiving potluck in Monrovia. So I will get to eat real pumpkin pie, turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing with my fellow LR-4's. It's nice to have family around, even if it's a new and different kind of family than I've had before. I am thankful for so much in my life right now, and the great support system I've found for myself here is at the top of the list. 

Something to Be Gained

“Having been borne across the world, we are translated men. It is normally supposed that something always gets lost in translation; I cling, obstinately, to the notion that something can also be gained.” ― Salman Rushdie

In geometry, a translation is a physical shift that maintains the integrity of an object's form and features, but installs it in a new location, giving it new context and function. Standing in front of my 10th grade students, I am translated. The new context doesn't change who I am or what I do, but that person and those actions have a different impact. I have to listen, hear, and speak differently, both for the language limitations and because when I am in public I represent something much larger than myself, and I am always conscious of the weight my words and actions carry as a Peace Corps Volunteer, especially in Liberia. This isn't study abroad adventure. I find myself thinking differently, too. My fashion sense has re-adjusted to West African styles (some would argue that it never left), my sensibilities about correct public and private behavior have been altered, and there isn't any physical thing from home that I miss enough to impact my quality of life here. People are a different story, but that comes with the territory. I am still/again myself, but I have missed this version of me! When UN vehicles, Liberian English, and the collective community consciousness have become my new normal and I can't imagine myself in any other place, doing anything else, nothing feels lost in my geographic shift. I feel found in this translation. I fit differently here, not better or worse, but translated...

All My Days

This is my life here in Liberia:

I wake up at about seven am every day to our neighbor Fatu leaving to sell her doughnuts. I wish there was an easy way to save and embed sound here, because there is no way to accurately describe the prayer-call/hawking/gibberish phrases that are apparently "yeeeeaaaahh, doughnuts! yeahhh eat a sweet doughnut here."

Until this last week, we didn't even have to draw water very often, just put buckets out on the porch to catch all the rain that pours from the edges of the zinc-tin roofing and drips holes in the concrete of the steps.

We cook breakfast sometimes, either oatmeal with brown sugar and powdered milk (the Wonderful Amazing Heather has suggested that condensed milk might be a better option), or fried egg sandwiches, which require a small trip up the hill to Bossa Community Road. The road is lined with houses and small 'shops': tables out on peoples' patios with candles, soap, bread, eggs, biscuits, plantain chips, and other bits and pieces, as well as coal for the coal pot. On the way to the shop we always go to, I have to pass our neighbors, one of whom had a monkey as a pet for a few weeks, and also has a litter of kittens Heather has been eyeing with desire. I also have to run a gauntlet of small children who all chorus "My friend, my friend!" and require individual greetings and handshakes to be placated. It is common practice to greet everyone you meet or pass by, so it takes a while to wind my way up the path through groups of houses and yards to the road, and along the road to the shop. The Ma who runs the shop has an adorable 18-month-old daughter named Esther, who is not scared of us like most Liberian babies are (apparently white skin is terrifying, and they scream at us all the time). She comes out from behind the house to greet us waving her whole arm and beaming, and she is learning to shake hands.

After breakfast we read or do lesson planning on the porch. Heather and I have started a book club of sorts, and are currently reading The Stand, after Pride and Prejudice. I am not sure what will come next, maybe some science fiction? Some of the volunteers have put together a pretty great kindle library with enough books to keep even voracious readers occupied for a while.

For me, lesson planning is not that big of a challenge. I teach 10th grade 'Algebra' at Lango Lippaye High School, but most of my students are not that confident with whole number operations, so I've started them on a modified pre-algebra curriculum that may take us to expressions and equations by the end of the year. It's a lot like what Harvest Middle School 7th graders do, actually. I teach seven sections of 10th grade, which is between 385 and 420 students, depending on attendance. Algebra class meets twice a week for 45 minutes, so I really don't get as much class time with my students as I would like, and since there are so many of them (true confessions) I don't know most of their names. Exam week for the first marking period starts Monday, and it is shaping up to be just as inefficient and frustrating as everything else has been on campus. But despite the ups and downs of working within an educational system still being rebuilt after the war, I love my job. My students work so hard (most of them) and it is so gratifying to see them actually understand things, or thank me for explaining concepts in a way they can grasp. More experienced volunteers say that I should wait until I grade my first exams, because understanding in the classroom doesn't always translate to performance on the test, so I may be changing my tune. Even if I do, this still feels like a perfect fit for me.

We teach high school, which runs in the afternoon from 1-6pm, since elementary school uses the campus in the morning. So at around 12:15 Heather and I get dressed to teach, in our lappa fabric skirts, and head to campus. Sometimes, when we get there early, we hang out in the teachers lounge and listed to the junior high French teachers complain about their students.

School is pretty much constant semi-organized chaos, with elementary students leaving and high school students clamoring to be let in early so that they can claim their chairs before the rush of students starts. They are supposed to line up outside of the school gates for devotion and announcements at 12:30, but if it is raining devotion is canceled, and it usually doesn't start or finish on time, so students all rush the gate and push through the line of 12th graders whose job it is to check their uniforms for skirt length and waistband width (below the knees and 4 inches respectively) for girls, presence of belt and lack of sagging for guys, and correct shoe and sock color. I try to start teaching at 1:00, but most of my students are not in class at that time, and when they do come in, they come in and fight over desks, like a never-ending game of musical chairs with no winner or prize except a place to sit in class.

students coming in the front gate late for first period

10th grade meets in an unfinished building in the middle of campus, a county education project slated to be completed in 2012 (Liberian time), complete with no light, leaky roofs, and empty gaping window holes. It has been six weeks, so I don't really notice the dirt floor and precariously mounted chalk board anymore.

my section 10D copying their practice test review questions from the board

I am very lucky in that I feel like most days are teaching victories. I am definitely grateful for the teaching experience I had at home before I came here, and our training was also really good, if very fast.  And I really love hearing people call me Miss L as I walk through the market.

When we finish teaching we sometimes go into the market to buy supplies or peruse the wheelbarrows of secondhand shoes and clothes. I found (miracle of miracles) a Blackhawks jersey for sale on Wednesday, for 330 LD, which is less than $5. So exciting! Then we head home, and I usually cook something delicious for dinner (pumpkin soup, ground pea soup, spaghetti, stir-fry, or sometimes an experiment!) and we grade papers, eat, and watch the sun go down over our quiet neighborhood while lightning bugs zip and frogs croak. I really feel like I am finding my feet here and walking my path.