Mondays:
Monday mornings should be relaxing: I am at the Manna house until about 1pm, generally throwing together my lesson plans for the day. At 1:30 I teach a literacy class in El Farito in Cedro Galan to 4 very bright girls ages 10, 11, 12, and 14. Generally we start with logic puzzle, then do some journal writing, then reading (currently a version of don Quijote designed for 10-14-year-olds). Lastly, we play Scrabble if we have time (and I am sorely abused if there is no time! The girls LOVE the game, and are very good at it!). The class lasts from 1:30-3pm, from which I walk about a kilometer to pick up my young students for English class. Altogether, we walk 2.5 kilometers to the Chiquilistagua library where we have our class. That class has anywhere from 5-13 students, ages 5-12. The picture of the three boys in the blog entry below shows three of them - Lester, Maycol, and Gerald. The class goes from 4:30-5:30pm. If it is light outside, the children are able to play on the playground afterward, if not, I drive them home in the Nissan Patrol. From there, my evening is full of picking up and dropping off students from our various evening English classes - Intermediate English in Chiquilistagua at 6pm, and Beginner English in El Farito at 6:30pm. Monday nights are a time for "family dinner" - one Manna member cooks for everyone, and we all eat together around 7pm. Immediately afterward, we have our Monday night meetings, where we talk about all our programs, keeping one anther up to date on progress and difficulties in the program so we can rejoice together or give advice and ideas on how to improve them. After this meeting we generally break into other meetings and work on lesson plans for the next day and for the week.
At the end of every month we have parties for the literacy and math kids, sometimes at our house, sometimes at the cinema, sometimes in educational locations like museums or historical locations. And sometimes we rent a blowup water slide like in this picture with Dayana and Damaris, two of my students.
Tuesday:
On Tuesdays we have to be up and out of the house by 9am. Tuesdays are a day to visit La Chureca, the city dump. We are there from 9:30am until about 11am, as we are not allowed to stay much more than that due to health concerns. The government declares that workers are only allowed to stay in Chureca for 4 hours or less because of the hazardous environment. This makes my heart ache, as I know many of the families I know and love have no choice but to stay in that environment. In any case, the Child Sponsorship team splits up into two groups of two, and covers the two "neighborhoods" of Chureca. This way at least one set of us is able to see each family once a week. Smaller groups also allow for more intimate talking and getting to know the real needs of the community and the families, rather than only a quick overview of the child's health. At 11pm we leave, retrieve our mail from the post office, and head back home for a quick lunch. Then I go on to comedor, a program designed to feed the children of Cedro Galan on Tuesdays and Thursdays in El Farito. The children start by singing a prayer of thanks, then lining up to get their food. We assist the very young ones with getting their food, and talk with all the children while they eat. Afterward, I wash dishes while some children can earn "Farito dollars" by drying the dishes. With these "dollars" they can buy different things from the "Farito store" - pencils, notebooks, marbles, soccer balls, headbands, action figures, etc. This helps the children learn the importance of working. The Farito dollars are a hit, though I think there might be a black market for them... In any case, after Comedor we are about to start a "homework help" session where we can get to know some of the kids in the community who do not attend our classes, and be better equiped to assess the needs of the community. At 3pm there is a drama class, which though I did not attend it last year, I will be helping to lead this year.(our classes all start next week). At 4pm I generally start my run to Chiquilistagua for the Women's Health class. Class begins in the ranchón at 4:30, starting with yoga and moving to an upbeat exercise class doing kickboxing, marching, and general working out moves to the sounds of upbeat pop music - both in English and in Spanish. One must be over the age of 14 to join the class - and we get a variety of women. It shocked me the first time I saw a woman in a full sweatsuit - trying to lose weight by sweating more. Fascenating. Class ends at about 5:45pm, and we rush home to shower, eat dinner, and head out to Advanced English class at Farito. This is a group of about 20 people who come from all over to have a class taught predominately in English. We work on reading, writing, and communication. The class is always lots of fun, and we learn just as much Spanish as they learn English, it seems, because lots of the words they don't understand in English, we (or maybe just me) don't understand in Spanish. So we both learn together. The class is done by 8:30pm on a regular day, but we generally hang around afterwards, just talking and having fun together. From there it is on to our house, where we do prep work or play until we go to bed.
Wednesday
Wednesdays are much like Mondays, except that in the morning the Child Sponsorship team heads to Chureca for the weekly Health talk held by MINSA, the Ministerio de Salud or Ministry of Health. We are in charge of taking attendance (women must attend at least 3 of the 4 charlas each month in order to recieve the milk for that month) and listening to the suggestions given by MINSA so that we can encourage them in the households on our weekly visits. My favorite part of this time is playing with the children who are too young to be in school. They are always dressed in their best and freshly bathed, and always looking for fun. My arms are rather sore when I leave, after much throwing and whirling and twirling and jumping.
When we get home between 10:30 and 11am we excercise or prepare for our classes and/or shower. Showering is pretty important after spending time in the dump :-) Then I have literacy at 1:30, Children's English at 4, driving and helping from 5-7, then back home for prep work or other administrative tasks or meetings.Thursday
Exactly the same as Tuesday, except the drama class is creative arts, and I am not involved in it.
Friday
Mornings we are able to sleep in or do whatever, because Fridays are our prep days. I plan my lessons for the next week and grade the papers of the past week. At 3pm I have women's soccer practice, which is tons of fun. My roommate Christina and I train about 15-30 women and girls to play soccer in a non-competative practice. We have fun playing games and doing interesting drills and scrimages. It has been one of the more rewarding programs, and keeps me in practice so I don't entirely lose my skills!
So that was my general work week. Weekends are used for rest, travel, and playing (sometimes catch up work). All in all, my weeks are wonderfully varied and lots of fun. Thank you again to all who help support me in my work!
