CCT Week 2

This whole week we have been going to CCT for technical training. We learned how to teach more effectively and had to teach two micro-lessons. Some people were really unsure of what to do and spending almost two hours making lesson plans. It is hard because we are teaching to English speakers who have a college degree, yet our lessons are directed towards 14 year old ESL students. Also, we have to reduce our lesson down to 10 minutes instead of a 40 minute lesson or 80 minute lesson. I think my microteaching lessons went pretty well and I did learn a few things from current volunteers. Any suggestions for classroom activities, or learning games or songs would be greatly appreciated! There have been a few volunteers who have come back to talk to us and demonstrate. Two out of three of them talk in “Simple English”, that I think is very condescending. I understand that we need to speak slower and articulate and pronunciate clearly, but it seemed to deter from the lesson. Also, we are supposed to only speak in English to our students. One volunteer tries to use very basic Swahili, but she mispronounces the word. All of the trainees are trying to stifle their giggles, so I can’t imagine how her actual students feel. So I have learned: no Swahili at all in the classroom (I will have someone translate if needed), I will speak slowly but not too slowly, and I will try to engage the students as much as possible.

Getting to and from CCT has also been an experience this week. We were told on Monday that we would be taking a daladala for the first time. Instead, we were surprised when our Peace Corps van showed up at 7:30am. We arrived on time. For some reason, our LCF (Launguage and Cross-Cultural Facilitor) didn’t think we needed to leave earlier. We have to take 2 daladalas on the way to CCT. We arrived 45 minutes late on Tuesday and then an hour late on Wednesday. So now they are going to send the van for us every day! On the way home it is about 2 miles to the daladala stand at the traffic circle, which we have been walking every day. Then the main road daladala takes us maybe 5 miles. Then we can either walk the next 2 miles or take another daladala. So it can take us a little over an hour to get home or about 2 hours depending on the daladala schedule and if we decide to walk or not. I like walking for the exercise but I don’t like walking IN the road. I have almost been hit quite a few times. There is really no sidewalk or anything. So motorcycles, bicycles, and sometimes cars are driving on the side of the road where people are walking. Also, we get stared at a lot and little kids yell “muzungu, muzungu, muzungu”, or “good morning, teacher”, which can get a little bit annoying.

Two days ago we met another muzungu on the road, but she doesn’t speak English. She was actually from Brasil and her husband is going to be the next president of Kenya. Dr. Sammy talked to us for about 20 minutes. He has been to 53 different countries and knows 40 languages. He was the youngest person in parliament in Kenya. They have a “cappuchino” kid. They live in Brasil half the year and then in Boston the other half. They are missionaries, which is why they are in Tanzania now.

I have 2 local “friends” now. One guy, William, works on the daladala and Theresa is a friend of my mom. My siblings took me over to “grandfather” (actually they were saying “to get flowers”) at William’s house and it was very awkward. The next day he saw me though. Then Theresa saw me walking down Mazimbu Road and yelled “Alllyyyy”. It was so nice to get called by my name finally! Also, our LCF, PJ is really cool too. He is 26 and we just found out that his host family left to go to a funeral so he has been very lonely for the last 3 days. He texted all of us last night and my family thought it was the funniest thing that my teacher was texting me.

My baby sister Catherine has started to like me now. She loves to play with my hair. My other siblings still think I’m pretty weird. I think they are mostly shy. I told my first attempted joke the other day. I told Patrick, the 9 year old, that I was going to pull his other tooth out tomorrow. He put his hand over his mouth and his eyes got huge. All the adults thought it was hilarious. He lost one front tooth the day before I arrived and the other front tooth is lose. Emmanuel, the 13 year old, loves to dance, so I played some American music for him yesterday. I found out that the other mama is actually my mama’s sister and my dad is putting her two girls through school so they can support their mom later in life. My dad speaks English to me a good deal, but really only to have deeper conversations. Last night I was telling him about the great room and how that is basically my dad’s house and the real house is my mom’s house. He thought it was so funny that my parents are still married but have their own spaces.

We are at our school now doing language training. After we are done, we all might hang out or I’ll hang out with my family. Tomorrow, I’ll probably end up going to church with my family and then we are going to pick up dresses that were made for me and my mama. We are going to be twins!