the reason I can still feign sanity

Nicky
Tuesday, 3 August, 2010

I know half of my entries are about Nicky, or she at least plays a prominent part in them, so here’s another!

Every time Nicky and I spend some time alone for some reason, I love her even more when we reconnect. We have barely spoken outside of school for over a week. In the classroom, I’ve been sensing a lot of frustrations, maybe with me, maybe just continuing to come to terms with my departure, maybe a combination of a lot of things. But last Friday was the only time we hung out after school, and she barely talked to me. I could barely get a smile from her with a chocolate cake we made together!

Over the weekend, I ran into her briefly and it was clear she wanted nothing to do with me, so I didn’t push it. And then I had some alone time at a hostel nearby. It was great to be alone, but of course I found myself wondering what Nicky was up to.

Yesterday I really expected her to visit after school since we hadn’t hung out in over a week at that point. She didn’t come. I was worried about her. I know she’s trying to deal with the fact that I’m leaving. I am too! And I think she’s trying to do it alone. Which saddens me. I’m still here and I want to be here for her and help her be ok with the change that’s coming.

So I wrote her a letter. She isn’t good at listening to the hard topics we have to discuss and she’s not good at talking about them either. I’ve pushed a couple times when I felt like she was in a place where she was ok to do that. But I wanted her to know how much she means to me and that I’m just making sure she’s ok. I gave her the letter at break today. Just handed it to her quietly.

I taught her class just after break, and I could feel the difference in her in the whole class. She wasn’t holding back feelings anymore. She was herself again. Which helped me to be myself again. When I was handing her the worksheet she had to finish, I asked, “Did you read it?” Ghii. “Are you ok?” Ghii. And class continued normally. I was content with that simple answer, just knowing, for now now, she’s fine.

And then she came over after school. And she is herself again. She’s more than fine. She’s happy. Smile. Sharing cheesy popcorn. Sharing her ndongo – groundnuts – peanuts. A promise that Thidjukwe will bring me more tomorrow. Easy jokes. A combination of Thimbukushu and English.

Thidjukwe. I have to thank that girl for her new friendship with Nicky. They were in different classes last year. I never saw them together until this term when they’re nearly inseparable. When I walked Nicky home, Thidjukwe’s name again came up and I asked, “She’s a good friend to you isn’t she?” Ghii. “Where’s she going to school next year?” Max. Hmmm…we’ll have to figure that one out. I’ll feel better knowing they’re together somewhere. Anywhere.

My favorite time of day
Wednesday, 4 August, 2010

My favorite time of day is not when I wake up. It always comes earlier than I want it to. Long before my alarm is set to go off. All I think about is how tired I still am and how nice my bed is.

My favorite time of day is not when I first get to school. The weather is nice at that hour, but I prefer my mornings alone, several hours alone at least.

My favorite time of day is especially not when I first get to school on Monday, Wednesday or Friday. Then I know I have at least 30 minutes to sit through where the principal, or another management member followed by the principal because he can’t keep his mouth shut, will talk about all the problems the teachers create. It’s taken a lot of effort to keep my outer armor on and not let it get to me – especially since it can’t possibly be directed at me when I teach every single class I’m supposed to, and extras.

But today was especially frustrating. That 30 minutes turned into another 30 minutes. Where each teacher had to individually give the problems in our classrooms. Late coming of learners. Dodging of learners. Learners making noise. Behavior. I was asked specifically what the solution should be to change the disorganization at our school that is created by the teachers. “Teach your freaking classes.” I was near tears – frustrated tears of having my teaching time being stolen and also what it was stolen for. This was not helping. I spoke up again later – we all have 2 choices: we can do what we want to or what we’re supposed to do, when those things aren’t the same. And then, if we choose to do what we’re supposed to do, we have another 2 choices: we can hate it and be miserable, or we can make the best of it. Maybe it we change our attitudes, things will begin to change. And the other thing I want to say is this: there are a lot of things I will never understand about this place – the village and the Hambukushu people. But I can accept a lot of those things I don’t understand as just being the way they are. But one thing I cannot accept is that it seems to be ok to show up to work and then dodge your classes. That is completely unacceptable and I refuse to be fine with that.

That 60 minutes was followed by another hour with the learners at a surprise assembly. Each class captain had to tell the problems in their classes and what their class teachers were doing about them. Useless.

I got to spend 30 minutes of my scheduled 160 minutes in a classroom before break.

After break was a parents meeting. I skipped it since I can’t hear anything anyone says. I taught. And then ate lunch. And went back for study. For the first time in my time here, I had every single learner come back for study. I’d sacrificed 40 minutes of my time with 6B to discuss as a class what some of the behavior problems were and what the consequences should be. We made lists. They’re going on the wall tomorrow morning. One of the consequences was to bring your parents if you’re absent to school or study to tell me personally why, instead of the learner telling me. No one wants to do that. Everyone was there. And the latest anyone came was a whole 1 minute late. Another problem, identified by the learners, was late coming. Consequence? You come 5 minutes late, you stay 5 minutes late. You come 35 minutes late, you stay 35 minutes late. I hope I don’t have to enforce these very often. I’ll collapse. But their attitudes had changed too. We were a happy group again.

My favorite time of day is not at school.

My favorite time of day is not at study.

My favorite time of day is not at home.

Nicky came over after school. We went for a walk. I told her when I was in grade 7, I would go for walks with my mom. She looked at me funny like, why was your mom going for walks? And why did you go with her? Because I just like to be with her.

My favorite time of day is dusk, when I’m walking Nicky home. Our conversation is always easiest then – I invited her over for mahangu porridge at lunch tomorrow and she talked about bringing cabbage to eat with it. I suggested we cook the piece of chicken in my freezer that Ziggy stole from my neighbors. We both cracked up. I apologized for forgetting to return her watch (from me) today after she forgot it at my house yesterday. And then gave her the bad news that the battery died last night! We both cracked up again.

But it’s not only the company and conversation that makes that my favorite time of day.

We walk east, away from the setting sun. Our shadows are long. She always tries to make hers taller than mine. There aren’t many people out walking, everyone is huddled around their cooking fire – it’s family time. There’s a fire at each home we walk by and kids call out “Madam” or “Miss Lori” or just “Lori” hoping for a wave, a smile or a greeting. Some come and play tag with me as I pass their home, some come and shake my hand. It’s a ritual every evening.

Then I walk back alone, always with a smile on my face. Not because I said goodbye to my best friend and I’m finally alone. But because I know I’ll see her again in 12 hours. I spend the 10 minute walk home telling myself, or someone who isn’t there, how great Nicky is and how great my day was. Maybe it wasn’t all great, but it ended great, so that’s what sticks with me in that moment. I walk toward the sunset. The sun is usually gone by now, a deep blue sky with the first stars and planets overhead, slowly changing to a light orange and deep red making a silhouette of all the trees.

My favorite time of day is not the time between getting home alone and getting into bed.

My favorite time of day is not when I got to bed.

It’s that walk. With my best friend.

See you peghundha
Thursday, 5 August, 2010

There’s nothing like time apart to remind yourself how great something is. Or someone. Like Nicky.

She just gets me.

Kaitlin reminded me early this week, when I was witnessing Nicky struggling with coming to terms with my departure and not knowing if I was still here for her, that Nicky is extraordinary. I think she used the word smart. In the classroom, sure, she does fine. But she doesn’t stand out. Not in math anyway. Her English is ahead of a lot of her peers after spending the last 6 months around me almost daily. But even her English grades aren’t anything to write home about.

But her understanding of people, her ability to have a healthy, fulfilling relationship when she’s never known what that is before, her ability to read people and just get them, is unbelievable. People have told me that I can do that – read people in an instant. Maybe it’s judging, maybe it’s something else. I think it’s something else. It’s just KNOWING. And Nicky can do it too. I have a hard time reading people in this culture – so utterly different from what I’m used to, even after 19 months, so I depend on Nicky to fill in the holes. I ask about a particular person, and she can tell me in one word with a simple gesture. I guess I can read her, but I still struggle with others.

She came over after study and I was angry and frustrated (not with her coming over), a common theme unfortunately. I do my best to hide those feelings and reasons from her, but she knows. Just like I know when she’s feeling them. I asked what she wanted to do, as I shuffled my Set cards mindlessly. We haven’t played much in a while. She silently and quickly pointed at the deck of cards in my hands. We sat outside and found our rhythm of playing, keeping Matthew and Popay far enough from the cards to not get their drool on them, and then their pee. We moved inside to get away from the kids and the pee. And continued our game. It takes no effort anymore.

Our new thing to say to each other when we part at the gravel road leading away from the hospital, marking the halfwayish mark between our homes is, “See you peghundha.” She said it yesterday and I loved it. It means see you tomorrow. Or even see you yesterday – tomorrow and yesterday are the same thing in Thimbukushu, causing much confusion when kids try to tell me what happened tomorrow or what will happen yesterday.

On our walk toward Nicky’s home, we talked about her birthday. It’s next Wednesday. She asked me, on my suggestion that she buy fat cakes for her class (with my money), to buy her sweets to share with her class. She then told me her birthday is tomorrow. Mbudhi. Lies. Ok, it’s tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow… 6 tomorrows still.

Of course, once I turned around to walk back home, I started thinking about how many tomorrows will we get to hang out? How many peghundhas are left for us together? How many more times can I tell her, “See you peghundha” until I’ve used them all up?