I’m writing this on the 28th of February, though I don’t think I’ll be able to post it until much later since I’ve hardly been able to get on the Internet lately at all.
And just now, so recent that I had to stop writing this blog in order to move my computer away from the window, was the first thunderstorm I’ve experienced here, and wow was it magnificent. I had to go outside just so I could stand in the awesome wind and feel the fear of God. But then it got really dusty and I heard thunder, so I ran inside to see if I could jar my slated windows free of their rusty confines in order to close them. Anyway, it was fantastic – I love God’s nature so much! (Especially when it leans in the opposite direction of the 90° ish kind of weather.)
So that’s good news, though I’m not sure rainy season has really started, because it’s supposed to start by the earliest in April. If it’s not time yet, everyone’s fooled… well at least the snakes, because they’re out already and they’re not supposed to come out until the rainy season’s started. I’ve already seen what I think were two vipers, and another two dead snakes on the road. Along with this surprise of realizing there were snakes here, I found out all three kinds are deadly poisonous! This, of course, was after my first encounter with a snake, in which I happened to be about three feet away from.
Another interesting tidbit about me is that I came down with malaria about a month ago. At first I had no idea that what I had was that bad, it kept getting just a little bit worse it seemed, but there’s no getting around the fact that I really felt awful during the days preceding my blood test. When I told Richard (my boyfriend) he told me to tell Belen right away, but I didn’t think anything was bad enough yet. Finally one day after the symptoms had seemed to get a little bit worse, he again asked me to tell her and I had a really strong feeling that I probably should. She said that I definitely should get a blood test because malaria just isn’t something you play around with. That night I found out I had it, and started treatment right away though I didn’t feel any better at all the next day, instead I seemed to feel worse. The next day, though, I felt like someone had siphoned a bag of sand from my bones overnight, and suddenly walking wasn’t so hard. So the only way I knew how bad I felt was in comparison to after my medicine kicked in.
One thing I didn’t understand right away was that what I had was the same malaria that could turn into cerebral malaria – the same kind I talked about in my previous blog – and I didn’t really find this out until last week. Bad communication led me to believe that I had a lesser kind that wasn’t as big a deal as the one that Michaela and Joshua and Belen all got. But that’s not true because if I hadn’t treated it, it could have easily turned into cerebral malaria. Apparently it was malaria month because all four of us got it within four weeks. Unfortunately Michaela had it again just this week, and scared us all by being bedridden for 4 days without eating. It seems their malaria medicine isn’t working so well, but I think mine is fine, except that I had been a few hours off of my daily one a few times and only when I take it absolutely on-the-dot is it 99% effective. Anyway, I’m better now, and Michaela seems to being doing much better once again.
So the big story for this blog is as follows:
I was put directly into a teaching position when the new year started for grades 3-5 because the English teacher quit and they didn’t know until the first day back at school. Apparently she didn’t tell them, though she told me, and I wasn’t aware of the sincerity of the situation. I was wondering all Christmas break if they were going to ask me to teach so I could at least prepare something, but they never did so I assumed they had someone. When I found out they didn’t have a teacher, I had extremely mixed feelings. At first I was thrilled to be doing something so involved finally, thinking, “Surely this is why God has led me here!” But it didn’t take long to be not so thrilled. Either the indirect nature of their culture or the awkward situation as a whole led them to refuse to tell me outright that I was the teacher. This whole time I was thinking that no one would come at this time of the year that would be good enough for the Seventh-day Adventist system, since it is known as one of the best school systems here in Nigeria. I underestimated the amount of unemployment apparently, because within 3 or 4 weeks there was another teacher. I had no idea anything would happen that fast and I was trying to mentally prepare myself for teaching these kids English without having taken any teaching classes, owning a curriculum, or even having a teacher’s textbook to use. Most of all, I was worried about discipline because the system they use is the method of the stick, and I couldn’t get around the feeling of not wanting to beat kids. But these 4 weeks of thinking I was the teacher for these kids for the rest of the year forced me to come up with either a new discipline system or a better reason for not hitting these kids than “because I can’t.” I tried a new system and after a few days I could tell it wasn’t going to work, but I thought that a lot of things need more time than a few days… so I waited a week and lost my patience with that idea. I can honestly say without a doubt that that was the most stressful week of my life. When you have 30-40 kids in one classroom that don’t fully understand your English, can’t hear you because your voice is dying from yelling too much, and are taking advantage of the fact that you don’t carry a stick around, you will truly know the meaning of stress. I was immediately pushed to make a better decision on why I disliked beating kids so much. I now know why I obtained such a strong moral feeling against “beating” because I naturally value human life to a great degree, and grew up in a society that is very against child abuse. Maybe I forgot to mention something that I assume everyone realizes, and that is that the beatings they go through here are so much more severe than any I’ve seen before. So if they were to take one of the teachers here and put them in an American classroom, after a few days they’d be arrested. I looked at their punishment with sadness and disgust in my days before teaching, but then the teacher they had wasn’t as bad on them as the others I had to deal with later either. Then I really saw the true nature of things, and how the kids would mock me for not beating them, laugh at the beatings of other kids, and master lying to avoid punishment at a severe degree. One time the class of 40 was being so bad that I asked them if they wanted to be beaten. Minus four or five, all of them said yes enthusiastically and started flocking to me, “waiting” for their punishment. I just stared, dumbstruck at what to do, thinking to myself, “These kids are sick in the head”, so I made them kneel for the rest of the class (another form of punishment) even if they didn’t do anything bad. Another teacher walked by, saw that I was having issues, and went to get a large stick to beat them for me. As he beat each of them, some would move and get hit on the head, and one girl started bleeding from right next to her eye. They were all crying loudly, and so when he left I asked them, “Didn’t you want to be beat?” And their reply? Laughter. Instantly, their reply went from loud and dramatic wailing to laughter, all of them faking their distress, except the few that didn’t want to be beat and the ones who were bleeding. After this point, I realized the true nature of the way things worked as far as discipline and struggled with my methods a little bit longer, than came to the conclusion that I had to deal with a discipline they understood. I can still remember the first time I hit a little boy, and how it felt. I felt like my hand was detached from my body afterwards, like someone else had done it and not me. Unfortunately I had to do it more, but the class was shocked enough that I did anything at all, that they were quiet for a few more days on their own without me doing anything. In the rest of the time, I had to hit less than a dozen kids to keep them to a somewhat manageable degree, and since the new teacher came I haven’t hardly hit more than two or three.
Now, with the new teacher keeping peace, there are quite a few moments during my school day when I can actually hear myself, and it’s a relief. Instead of teaching, I am now an assistant again, just grading the stacks of paper for all but 20 minutes of my 5 hours, and occasionally getting the chance to teach them something again. I definitely appreciate teaching more now that they respect, or at least pretend to respect me. But it still has its issues especially because they still cannot understand my English very well, and they fail to tell me when they have questions, turning in their papers without doing anything on it at all. Anytime I can, I’ll work with some students one-on-one if I see an opportunity to fix something really important or that I know how to handle. These are the most rewarding moments, along with knowing they finally understand me after laughing at some of my jokes. I like making them even if they don’t, because then I have a chance to laugh anyway.
I realize more than ever that all of my most stressful times have been times I’ve pushed myself away from God, and all of my most joyous times have been when I’ve realized this and gone running back to him. This trip has included so many of each of those moments, to the extreme, and I still passionately dislike the heat, and ardently miss my boyfriend, family and friends. So if anyone asks me how my trip has been, however am I supposed to respond?
I guess don’t have anything else to say other than, “God has led me through it.”
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