teaching the teacher

After rafting I had a couple of weeks left to really spend time at the primary school and with the kids at the children's center. It was by far the best part of my month's time in Uganda. Like I mentioned in a previous post, I taught math and english in P4 classes, which is equivalent to third grade in the states. My favorite time was working with the kids in math as the teacher really let me take over the class at times, allowing me to give the lesson and work with kids who needed extra help. With English it was a little more frustrating as that teacher didn't have me teach a whole lot, but had me grade a whole lot, something i cannot stand to do. but, i was there to serve as they needed, so i did it with a stubbornly annoyed heart. Each day I also got to eat lunch with the students, which was a lot of fun. I mostly ate with the girls as they were the ones who would always save me a spot to sit with them while the boys just tried to eat as fast as they could to get the most football time they could in the short 30 minute lunch break. It was during these lunches that I got to know the students a little better and they in turn got to know me. It was a little painful at first since they were pretty shy with a white teacher sitting to eat lunch with them and so they would talk in luganda the whole time, but after a few days the luganda changed to english and we were able to have somewhat of a normal conversation. they loved to ask questions about the states and what it was like in my home in california with my family. i found after a bit that they didn't really understand my answers because i was telling them things that we have or things we do that they had no idea about. even explaining where i live, on the beach, they had no concept of, having never seen a picture of a beach let alone going to one. Needless to say, the talks were interesting with me more giving vocabulary lessons of things in my answers than really answering their questions. but it was a lot of fun.

The few times i hung out with the boys at lunch i would attempt to play football with them, but the field was so chaotic for me that i soon gave up. In a square shaped field about the size of one half of a professional soccer field, they had 4 games going all at the same time, without any markers for boundaries. That meant that they whole field was the space for each game with four balls going in all different directions and 8 teams running to get them. Half the time i didn't know who was on my team or what ball we were even playing with, it was pretty comical.

After working at the primary school each day I would go to the baby house, which was a home on the secondary school site that housed 4 toddlers and 2 infants. I fell in love with these kids and found that after a long, somewhat frustrating day at times, i could go over there and get lost in playing tag and hide and seek and hugs. There was one little girl named Mercy who captured my heart. She was the only girl out of all the children in the home and she was such a strong, stubborn little girl, standing up to the boys and trying to get them to do what she wanted. We had a lot of fun running around and going for walks on the property. The children are watched by two women, Hope and Blessed, who are both amazing women that give their lives to care for these kids. Always smiling, they raise these kids with discipline and love and I was amazed as I watched them each day. I tried to give them breaks when I would come, holding the infants and taking the toddlers for little walks or bike rides on their plastic bodas, for which they would seem grateful but willing to take the kids back at anytime with smiles on their faces. Being at the babyhouse was so fun, but made me realize i am not ready to dedicate my life to a little person any time soon.

After going to the baby house I would go home and have dinner with Monique, and then go to a family group for devotional or homework tutoring help. The kids always seemed a little stand-offish and wary of me at first, but soon became comfortable as we worked through their homework together. I loved going to visit Monique's family group, the Jonathan family, as they really invited me in. we would eat dinner together, play a lot of football together, and share stories with one another. It's funny, with the language differences sarcasm goes out the window as the Ugandans really don't understand it, but there were a couple of kids in the jonathan family who understood the joking around and would give it right back, which was awesome. On my last day with them they were so interested in knowing the process of getting back, as in getting on the plane, sitting there for so much time, how big the airplane is, etc... they had so many questions and were so intrigued by the whole thing i felt bad going on the plane without them being able to see more of the world than their small village in the bush of Uganda. Again, just a reminder of how lucky i am in the life God has given me.