exchange

Nov 30, 2010

Today in class I realized that it’s not just me who is learning a new way of life, culture, and group of people.  I found several copies of the same poem, which obviously meant I would be reading it with my students.  A piece of treasure.  A Frost poem about a traveler choosing the road less traveled.  Some students got it right off the bat, but a majority were lost. 

As I was trying to explain the imagery of this poem I started to explain a yellow woods.  Of course my students have no idea what color changing leaves look like, or what it looks like to have hundreds of leaves covering a path.  So I drew some pictures, you know, the evolution of a tree loosing it’s leaves.  They were amazed.  Then one students said “dead tree.”  And I said, “that’s the magic, it’s still alive! It’s just like hibernating.”  My students looked at me as if I was from another planet.  Then I asked if they knew the word “hibernate” and as is to be expected no one did.  What was I thinking? I’m on a tropical jungle island.  So, I wrote the word “polar bear” on the board then explained I was a polar bear then I crawled under a desk in an attempt to demonstrate hibernation.  They were impressed. 

Then questions such as “can you eat snow?”  “where does snow come from?” “how do the bears not starve?” “where does the snow go when summer comes?”  “how do you wash your clothes if water freezes in winter (cause here all clothes washing happens outside in buckets of water from whatever water source is closest)?” “how do you get water into your house (I said we wash our clothes in the house and to answer this I drew a map of city with a system of pipes underneath)?” “does the water freeze in your house (I then explained heaters and water heating systems)?” I also explained we don’t take showers out of buckets, but we have a faucet, which again I drew, that dumps water on us.  Things I took for granted as I’ve been adapting to this new place and culture.  Washing clothes outside, tabo showers, not having seasons…all of these things I’ve been adjusting to. I’m beginning to know life here and I know life back in the states, but my students only know this life.  While I knew this, it never really hit me until today. 

So, on Friday if we have a week of good classes then I’m going to bring in my lap top, cracked screen and all, and all 60 students in each class will huddle around to attempt to hear the commentary, which may be impossible considering I don’t have speakers, of a planet earth episode talking about polar bears and hibernation.  I’m excited. 

December 3, 2010

Wow! I can’t believe it’s December.  I was intending on writing some other things, but my mind just got a bit overwhelmed with this whole December thing.  I always say time boggles my mind, but it really does.  A year ago, probably from the day you are reading this, I was in surgery during my last week of college classes before finals.  Since that time a lot has happened.  I graduated college, I moved home, I went to my grandpa’s funeral, I went to the Israel, Palestine and Jordan with a seminary group of students and met some pretty incredible people, I went to Indonesia alone and pretty recklessly (haha it actually makes me laugh as I think about getting off the airplane at midnight having no idea where I was going to stay or where it was I was supposed to be teaching in the second largest city in Indonesia) to get my TEFL certification where I again met some incredible people, I got a job at Grasshopper-the store I wanted to work at since I discovered it sometime in middle school-and met more amazing people, I got an internship working with political refugees and learned more than I could have imagined about the world and myself through the relationships I formed with people I met through that experience, oh yeah, I went to NYC for the first time to visit my family for Easter…again a good time with some amazing people, I visited some of the best friends a person could imagine back in CA to welcome Caleb into the world and say goodbye for the next couple years, I redeveloped some friendships that had been with, you’re right, some more amazing people, I had time to be and learn how to live in the moment taking in every breath and every smile and every tear, I said goodbye to my family and friends and moved to the Philippines to be a teacher for two years, I’ve started to learn a new language and culture and through it met some incredible people, I’ve been taken in by more than one family not as a stranger but as just another member of the family, oh yeah, I spent a few weeks in MA with some inspiring individuals who are going to change the world as I learned about permaculture and am now certified to design you some rejuvenating landscapes (!), and it’s all been amazing.  Full of ups and downs as all life is, but truly a beautiful year.

I can’t believe it’s been a year. 

And I can’t believe that I’ll be in one place doing the same thing for the next two years. I’m used to going and moving and changing, but now I’m here.  The crazy thing is time is flying by. I only have two more weeks of school till Christmas break and then it’s January and then I only have three months till summer. It’s insane.  It makes me wonder if life just continues to move faster than light as I get older and older.  If that’s the case I can’t even imagine how fast it will get considering I’m only 22. 

I met a woman the other day. she couldn’t really speak anymore and she couldn’t move very well. She mostly laid in her bed looking out her window at the rice fields.  She is going to be 101 February.  Her room is decorated of pictures of her family.  And you could tell when she managed to roll over and look at the pictures she was happy.  She has a beautiful family, and she has lived a good life that has brought them life. I can’t imagine living for so long.   How much the world must change.  But, maybe not as much for someone from a small island like this compared to someone from a more populated city with access to information about the world and its’ happenings.  Either way, it challenges my mind in ways I can’t express.  It makes you wonder about the point of life, and the purpose of your life, and what the future could possibly include.  It’s a humbling sort of feeling or thought.

So, what I wanted to write about:

I introduced one of my classes to BBC’s Planet Earth today.  I have never seen a group of 50 teenagers so in awe of a cracked computer screen.  Just watching their eyes as they saw things they had never even imagined was a surreal experience.  The questions and discussions that came out of this viewing gave me an overwhelming sense of happiness.  You could tell their minds were turning and they were trying to imagine other possibilities that might exist in the world.  If these things are real, what else could there be? 

I’m also trying to introduce them to racial, ethnic and religious diversity.  My entire island is Christian.  Literally.  At least that’s what I’ve been told by multiple people.  Today I returned a test I had given about a story we had read.  The story was about a Native American girl who was going to be taken to white school against her desire.  The question asked why the students though some people think they are more superior than other people, and I asked them if they agree that the white people were better than the Native Americans.  I think I have a few future human rights lawyers, but I was heart broken to also read several students say that the white people are better and have more knowledge than the Native Americans.  The reasons? They are rich and white and have better clothes and more education. 

Here students have “vacant periods” which just means they don’t have class. There’s a group of third year students that always hang out with me during this time.  Today I introduced them to Cool Runnings.    I’m hoping that the more I familiarize them with people that are “different” their concepts of right and wrong, good and bad, and dark and light will change.  On a happy note, I had a handful of students discuss “ubuntu” (all people are people through other people) on their exams.  I literally cried.