planning for the unexpected

“You can’t promote peace by fighting a war.”
Thursday, 12 August, 2010

I read a couple articles in the NYTimes in the last couple days about the tax debate. There were some big figures thrown around. One that struck me was that if the tax cuts that were started under President Bush are extended for the next 10 years, they will add US$3.8 trillion to the national debt. Can you comprehend 3 800 000 000 000 of anything? Grains of sand? Hairs? Cells? Ants? Cockroaches? Rats? Dollars? Because I can’t. That’s an unfathomable amount of money.

You can go where you want with that tid bit of information. I didn’t go anywhere good with it.

I did find myself so frustrated with those articles that I even braved talking about them with some teachers in the afternoon study period. I mentioned the ridiculous amounts of money, but then the conversation turned toward war. That’s what people hear about here in terms of the US government. War in Iraq. War in Afghanistan. So I talked about the US foreign policy of fighting in these countries compared to Greg Mortenson’s personal policy of building schools there. I said that he has done more to promote peace in the part of the world than the US government and military has done or could ever hope to do. Mr. Shangara blew my mind with his next sentence, “You can’t promote peace by fighting a war. How will this one be happy when this other one is crying?”

Right?? Right?!!? It’s that simple isn’t it? I try to use that theory in my discipline. I’m not going to show my anger and frustration in the hopes that it will make kids get along better. I have to stay calm to get them to calm down and talk nicely to each other. And it takes forever for that message to sink in!

I just didn’t really expect to hear those words or ideas come out of his mouth, so it impressed me and made me smile.

This morning I walked into the staff room hoping to hear feedback about the circuit (district) based marking program. I’d heard there was no food provided, but teachers were kept from 7am until after dark. I’m not looking forward to this. Most other teachers aren’t either, but it took them longer than me to express my disgust at it. But I finally found something to smile about that was brought about from this unpleasantness…

Mr. Kutenda: We South Africans boycott.
Ms Ndunda: We Zambians don’t stand for hunger.
Ms. Mughongora: We Angolians plant bombs.
Ms. Siyanga: We Malawians just do what we’re told.

They’re all Namibians. But no one wants to go to the circuit to mark another schools’ papers, we all just want to mark our own WHEN we want to mark them. And no one will come up with an actual excuse or reason that is legitimate enough to get us all out of it. Just these silly stories.

Plans
Friday, 13 August, 2010

Sometimes things go according to plans. Whose plans? I don’t know. Never mine.

This morning I thought it was Thursday. I wasn’t even convinced it was Friday when Kaitlin told me it was. I walked into the staff room 15 minutes late because I didn’t think we had a staff briefing. Because I thought it was Thursday. I asked what day it was. Everyone there told me Friday, so I finally believed them. But most Thursdays I wake up thinking it’s Friday, so when I woke up thinking it was Friday, I reminded myself that no, Thursday comes first and today is Thursday.

After our normal briefing, we had a normal assembly. The learners started a song, “Oh Lord you are my God, you’re leading me everywhere I go…” The principal interrupted them. “I want to hear the boys singing, start over!” They sang again, finished the song just repeating itself. He jumped in again, “But you have to say the words right: My Lord, you are my God, YOU leading me everywhere I go, not YOU ARE leading me everywhere I go.” I walked out.

The whole school was scheduled to write English exams today – grades 5-7 only 1 exam, grades 8-10, 3 exams. Ms. Mughongora was getting her question papers ready for the lower grades, but there were no papers to be found for grade 7. Mr. Sihope was getting his set for the higher grades, and no papers for grade 9 paper 3. He drove to the circuit office to collect those missing question papers. But they weren’t there either!! So grade 7 didn’t write and the higher grades all ended up being behind by a few hours because everything was delayed and then they just take a long time to write.

Unexpected Goodness
Saturday, 21 August, 2010

You know how things usually don’t go according to your plan? And when you live in Africa, and are an outsider, and particularly a young white female outsider, things almost never, no I take that back, they NEVER go according to your plan. I have no control over anything, so it’s all left up to someone elses’ plan. Always.

Sometimes things work out in a good way and sometimes they work out in a bad way.

A recent example of things working out in a bad way first.

Our inspector (superintendent) required that all grade 7 and grade 10 teachers didn’t mark their own exams. Instead, all of the subject teachers got together at the circuit to mark each others’. I went Thursday to start marking. There are 10 teachers teaching grade 7 math. I waited and waited and waited, I was early of course (also out of my control). Finally 2 teachers showed up who I recognized from a math workshop in term 1. I’ll call them Mr. “Sousa” and Mr. “Cheesa” because their names were something like that and I don’t know their real names. Probably better that way. They’re both old. And stuck in their ways and not about to listen to a young white 20 something female.

We decided to start marking and let other people join as they showed up (they didn’t show up). I marked Mr. Cheesa’s 58 question papers, Mr. Sousa marked my 48 question papers and Mr. Cheesa marked Mr. Sousa’s 23 question papers. That was my arranging. They had both wanted to put a pile from one school on the table and we’d all be marking for that school until it finished. I didn’t like that idea because we’d all mark a little differently, even though there’s a memo telling us HOW to mark each question, we’d still do it differently. But I didn’t shut up this time and actually got my way. It got me more work, but it’s impossible to win everything.

We finished marking paper 1. My learners did the best by far. Mr. Cheesa’s learners were miserable, I would have been embarrassed if I were him, but he didn’t see mine, so he had no idea. Sure I had those who failed miserably, but less than 10 of them. He had less than 10 who didn’t fail miserably. His excuse for each one I’d ask him about who I couldn’t find anything right with was, “Oh, she’s just that way.” No, you’re just that way, sir.

The three of us were in another place of the TRC (teacher resource center) than the other 4 groups marking, so when food was served, we missed out, making us cranky when we found out with still another hour to go for lunch and being refused food when I went to the kitchen. My crankiness turned into me finding out who was in charge – someone I know relatively well, or at least well enough to go and complain.

Sir, there are only 3 of the grade 7 math teachers here. WHAAAAT??? Why didn’t you tell us earlier (I’ve never figured out why that is, without fail, the first question when a complaint is issued)??? Well, I didn’t really know who was in charge or that no one was going to show up, so I’m telling you now. He came to talk to the three of us, took a record that we were there, and after me asking maybe 15 times if we still had to be there to mark each others question papers when everyone else will be marking their own and doing any kind of statistics would be useless since 66% of the data wouldn’t be present, could we just leave? Please? Oh and they didn’t feed us. Fine, just finish marking and then go.

I refused to let those fools touch my paper 2 question paper. I looked through their marking and moderating and found TOO MANY mistakes. “Write all the factors of 10.” The memo told us the answer should be “1, 2, 5, 10.” Yes, true. However, I teach my kids to think about in term of multiplication, so their answers looked like “10x1 and 2x5” if it was right. A lot of them got that question marked wrong even though they had the right answer. We had agreed to throw out 3 questions because there were mistakes on the exam that either made the question unanswerable or just confusing for kids whose first language isn’t English and who already struggle with math. But Mr. Sousa forgot to throw out one of those questions almost everytime! So I had to go back and remark everything, recount the marks and almost every single learner got MORE marks, as many as 8 one time. So I wanted them to stay away from paper 2!

We stayed for lunch, meat that I couldn’t eat anyway, and then left. I walked home and refused to go back on Friday. I sort of had permission not to? Maybe?

I finished marking everything today and I’m really happy with how a lot of kids did. The difference between my exams and Mr. Cheesa’s was incredible. The difference from the exams I marked a year ago and those I’m marking this year is incredible! Last year a lot more exams looked like Mr. Cheesa’s – you couldn’t even pretend there was a salvageable mark. Now, at least half the time for almost everyone, they’re at least thinking in the right direction. If nothing else, this miserable circuit marking debacle made me realize I’m doing a really good job!

But then there’s the other side of the unexpected and lack on control – when things work out, or at least produce laughs and good memories.

Today Nicky sent an sms around 7:30 telling me she’d come at 11 and we’d look for a chicken to buy so I can learn to kill them (sorry Mom, but if I’m going to keep eating chicken, which I want to do, I have to be able to kill it myself, I’ll leave yours alone though).

Well, she didn’t come until 1. I was playing Set, sitting on a jerry can in my kitchen, using my counter as my table. She took her shoes off and without pausing walked straight over to me and started whispering in my ear with her lollipop smelling breath. “There are visitors.” Who? “Two people are here, Lengi and someone you don’t like.” Why? “They followed me here because they want to get music from your computer.” I had to stifle laughter. I walked outside and found Lengi and someone I don’t like. They wanted to put a USB in my computer. I’ve learned through enough trials and errors that even when someone tells me their USB is virus free, it isn’t. “I don’t put USBs in my computer because they always have viruses.” Yes, but ours isn’t. “Yes it is, they all do.” Oh, ok.

Well at least that ended quickly.

Nicky hadn’t eaten lunch and I’d only snacked because I never knew when she was coming and if we’d make fat cakes, make porridge or find that elusive chicken. So we decided to make fat cakes.

Well, we’ve had 2 good fat cake making sessions, and 1 great one! Today’s was beyond disastrous. They stuck to the pot, they didn’t rise, we added more flour, we added more water, we added more yeast, we let the dough sit in the sun. Nothing seemed to make it better. We finally gave up with more than have the dough still left to do something with, ate the fat cake wannabes, left the dough in the sun and went to the river.

We found more kids there than last weekend. Last weekend it was only Nicky, Kayoka, Kunyima and me. It was great. Kids come alive there! It’s their domain! But the crowd was a bit much today for some reason, even though it’s a lot less than what it’ll be when the school opens again in 2 weeks.

Kayoka had a great boat! It was literally half a tree trunk. It looked like it had just fallen that way and no one had done anything to make it better. His paddle was similar. Two people would get on it, it’d flip, and finally Kayoka got caught in the extra fast rapids because there’s still a lot of water and he had to bail before being swept into crocodile territory.

Nicky, Mukoya, Ndara and I were the last ones to leave. Nicky and myself back to my house to try to figure out how to salvage that dough.

Before doing anything though, we had to clean up the previous disaster. Making fat cakes is a messy job – we cook outside because of it. But the fire turns my pot black and the black comes off on my hands is almost impossible to get off even with loads of soap. But then I once tried using Dr. Bronner’s and it made a protective layer over the blackness! It took off some of it, but didn’t leave my pot the orange (?) color it once was. At least I think it started as orange. Maybe red. Who knows? But it dissolved the blackness instead of just making it stick to my hands. It’s pretty magical. So after Nicky washed the other dishes with normal soap, I brought out my Dr. Bronner’s and started washing the pot. She gave me a funny look, not understanding why I would use a different kind of soap, and one she’d never seen before, to wash one thing. I explained. She was impressed. Then I took some Dr. Bronner’s and started washing my bathroom sink, which had a pretty gross layer of nastiness on it. She followed, intrigued. “That won’t come off,” she told time. Watch and be amazed. And amazed, she was! I told her it’s magical! Then I got the container and even showed her how it says Magic Soap on it!! She took some more soap and a cloth and thoroughly washed the rest of the bathroom sink. I told her you can use the soap for anything – wash clothes, wash your body, wash dishes, brush your teeth, but I hear it tastes bad. She requested some to use as toothpaste. I obliged and am eagerly awaiting feedback tomorrow when she comes. She’s very impressed with the soap.

Anyway, back to the dough. “Can we make it into bread?” Tjani. I don’t know. Let’s try. Let’s add more flour. Done. OK, how about some spices? Garlic powder? Smell it. “Ghiii.” Italian seasoning? Smell it. “Ghiii.” We made it a seemingly good bread consistency, added oil to small cans I use to make muffins and Nicky scooped dough into the tins. We baked them, not having any idea what to expect. There’d been no recipe, no measuring or anything, had changed goals midway through and we’ve never made bread together.

We peeked. They smelled good!

We took one out. It tasted good!

We took them all out. And they were delicious! Nicky cooked up some cabbage and we had bread and cabbage for dinner.

From a disastrous fat cake endeavor, we got some delicious rolls that will never be replicated because we have no idea what we used!

One thing I do love is the unexpectedness of everything, especially when things work out nicely.