World Literacy Day and New Friends

World Literacy Day and New Friends
The first Monday that I worked was World Literacy Day, and since a major mission of the HO is to increase literacy by making literature in mother tongues more widely available, we did a few special activities.  I made a powerpoint of a story called “Tom Tom,” about an old man who sells bananas, and we read them with class two.  I got a lot of good pictures for the HO, most of which I will not share here because they are of children who didn’t ask to have their pictures distributed.  We did run into a snag when the laptop died and the solar charger malfunctioned, but it was overall an interesting day.  Memorization and repetition figure highly into the instruction methods here, but there really are not a lot of resources like paper and writing utensils to do very much else.

I am also making some new friends here.  Caren is 28 and the most youthful and energetic teacher.  I was amazed when she said she has two sons at home.  We go on walks together and actually talk about more than the obvious how-are-africa-and-america-different topics.  She definitely took me under her wing and has offered to take me to visit Obama’s grandma in January!  She (Obama GMA) lives about 40 miles away from here.

Caren

Cathy and Mary are very maternal and call me “good daughter.”  It is hilarious showing them some of the tech stuff because it is just like watching any other grandma get all wide-eyed and panicky in front of a computer

Cathy and I on WLD

Willis is the middle-school science teacher who has decided I will be his wife.  He told his mother about me.  He is a really funny and jovial guy.

Willis

Humphreys is serious and I don’t quite get him yet.  He is really nice, though, and always bustling around working at school.

Humphreys

Wilburforce drives me to school, so we get the chattiest time of anyone (about an hour a day together on a motorcycle).  He is very nice but he’s suspect because he asked if I would like to marry a married man and have a polygamous family.  Maybe I’m reading into it, but about ½ the guys I have met here propose, so….

Me and Miriam, and ECD teacher

I am also approached and talked to by a lot of people when I run errands or just go for a walk.  I understand I am an oddity, but it can be a hassle.  Everyone is really nice but I just can’t trust everyone who comes up and talks to me.  Some people are truly nice and curious and want to make the outsider feel welcome (let’s be real, it’s obvious I am an outsider).  Some want to convert me to Evangelism (it is big here).  Some want to marry me.  So it is pretty nice to have a group of people to work with that I really enjoy and trust.