Thursday, July 22, 2010

C'est comme "yo momma"?

So sometimes you are sitting in your French/Fulfulde class and you've been teaching all week and your host family has forgotten to feed you and you are trying to learn how to count and you are very, very unhappy...and then the trainee you are sitting next to turns to you and says "C'est comme 'yo momma'?"...and you start to laugh and things suddenly do not seem as bad.

I think a lot about universals here -- things that are funny both here and in the U.S., things that are offensive...for example, when I was riding in a bush taxi during site visit, a man was attempting to pass a sachet (basically a plastic baggie filled with some kind of liquid -- ice water, milk, juice, whiskey) of eau glace to someone in the row behind him, and it burst open on top of the head of the man sitting next to him. The man was soaked, and all 20-something of us in the van burst out laughing. Apparently, in a similar way that people getting water poured on their heads is funny everywhere, people making fun of your mom is also very offensive in both the U.S. in Cameroon. Our teacher was explaining to us that showing someone your palm (the high five symbol in the U.S.) is really offensive up north, and has something to do with insulting your mother. In other words, trying to high five someone in the Extreme North is pretty much the same thing as telling them a yo momma joke...except they will not think it is funny.

Just finished my second week of teaching -- am exhausted and looking forward to the weekend. I am learning a lot and working very hard...sometimes I even feel like I am effective. Mostly it is really hit or miss whether an activity will work (kids will be able to understand it and will be interested), or whether it will just fall flat on its face. Cameroonian kids are excellent at copying things off the board...but that seems to be about all they have learned how to do in school. Critical thinking skills? What a ridiculous thing to teach a child. Most of what I do is try to figure out strategies to bridge the gap between what I write on the board and what I want them to be able to understand, think about, and tell me. The education system here is entirely exam-based, and I am trying to find a way to reconcile teaching successfully in Cameroon (i.e. getting kids to pass their exams, graduate, etc.) with my own philosophy of language learning -- that it should be practical, useful, interesting, and fun...and that kids should maybe know how to use the language in real life after school.

It is a lot to think about...and in general I am still trying to take things one day at a time. Another thing I try to remind myself is that you never know what kind of impact your teaching will have on kids til way later down the line -- I have been doing my best to try to make English fun and interesting, and to show kids that I think they are smart, capable, and often very funny...I don't think there are a lot of teachers here who do the same, and I feel good about being able to bring at the very least some optimism and enthusiasm into the classroom, even if I still feel that my qualifications to teach English are a bit lacking.

Anyways, all is well here...well, I guess a bunch of us have typhoid (Peace Corps took a vanload of people to the hospital yesterday), but I am fine! Hope you all are too...Much love!

Monday, July 12, 2010

Adaptation!

So it has been way too long since I have written. My bad. Sometimes when you try to go to the internet cafe in Cameroon, there is no electricity. And then you spend a solid week on a bus/train/bush taxi/moto traveling to the extreme north and back. And then you come back and the Peace Corps training house has wireless internet, but now all your classes are at the lycee (high school), and to get to the Peace Corps house from the lycee you have to walk by the bar, and somehow an absurdly long time goes by without updating your blog.

I got back about a week and a half ago from my site visit to the Extreme North, which was long and intense and excellent. I also had the opportunity to take every form of transportation available in Cameroon: buses (from the travel agency Super Amigo, no less) with rows built for three people and holding five (periodically during this part of the voyage, one of the community hosts we were traveling with would stand up, pat our shoulders, and shout "Adaptation!"), trains (the couchettes aren't bad, unless you are trapped in one with a crying baby for 15 hours), bush taxis (vans built for 12 and containing about 20, plus at least one chicken and maybe a goat), motos, etc. The Extreme North is truly wonderful, my village is small and friendly, my house is adorable. I will write more about all these things later. Suffice it to say that I cannot wait to move to site, and that travel in the US will never seem difficult or uncomfortable ever again.

Also, as of this morning I am officially a teacher...As in I taught a real class with real students (about 30 of them...which is probably the smallest I will ever have; approximately sophomores/juniors in high school). For two straight hours. The kids were pretty rowdy but it turns out I'm pretty good at laying down the law, and I managed to keep things under control, most kids at least reading/writing/speaking/paying attention most of the time, and I think a couple of them might even have a vague idea of how to form the present perfect, which they didn't when they woke up. Overall, I am left with the impression that I could eventually be very good at this. And I suspect that often it might even be really fun.

Okay, off to more cross-culture sessions, then Fulfulde. Yes, I am learning Fulfulde...from French. It makes me feel like my brain is going to explode, but also like maybe this is exactly what I have been wanting to do since I was about 13. So yes -- life is still always exhausting, usually surprising, and most of the time a whole lot of fun. Please keep writing to me -- I miss you all and want to know all about your lives. Much love!