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!