Week 9

Week 9
This week we were back to the daily grind of language. We did have one session with our associate Peace Corps director, but other than that it was all language! On April fools day we played some jokes on our teachers and our director (who’s worked with Americans many times before) joined in. First thing we did was to hide the bell that calls us to class, then we all switched classes. It wasn’t that funny because none of the teachers even realized and just went on with the lesson, but they were all looking for the bell and we started class 15 minutes late. Our director got a few people really good. He told one girl that she had a visitor waiting for her out front, so she went out front all excited and there was no one there. Then he called 3 girls into his office after our first language session because they switched classes, so we were all feeling bad for them for being the only ones getting caught, but it was just a joke. Lastly (of what I heard), he came up to one volunteer and told her that she had a large package sent from home and that she needed to call Francesca and give her more money to receive it. That one was mean! You can’t joke about packages! They’re too important! All in all, not much was done, but the morning was really fun.
I got a dress made and picked it up this week and gave them some fabric to make me a skirt with pockets. I love pockets. My dress is pretty and I’ll try to put a picture of it up so you can see it, its green, yellow and black. The fabric for my skirt is brown and green.
Thursday, I went to the orphanage in town for my practical activity teaching about the importance of hand washing and the important times to do so. It went pretty well and the kids definitely needed the talk. They knew they were supposed to wash their hands before eating, but didn’t know the other times or the reason why they should wash their hands. So I feel good about doing that and it was good practice speaking in Kinyarwanda and getting a feel for doing health activities in Kinyarwanda. It was definitely necessary for me to have a translator though. There were a few questions that I did not understand or didn’t know the right words to answer. We made them a poster with all the important times to wash hands on it so they would have a reminder. We had a language exam Saturday morning. I didn’t do amazing. We have to reach mid to high intermediate to be sworn in as volunteers; I will be swearing in! We lost power Saturday and by Sunday the water was out as well. The water turned on Monday afternoon and the power in the evening. So two days without power and one without water. It was awesome. They have huge tanks to catch rainwater here, so we still had access to water, but we didn’t have running water in the sinks, toilets or showers. We have been so spoiled here with our electricity and running water. I am super spoiled at site too, but there are a few who do not have electricity and whose water source is a ways away from their house. This is definitely not what I was expecting to have for PC. I thought I would be in a mud hut with no power and have to walk with a bucket of water on my head. I am really happy that I get to live so luxuriously, don’t get me wrong, its just not at all what I had been picturing these past few years when I was thinking of going into the PC. This will definitely make it a lot easier on me.
We had our LCF party Saturday night after the test at the Chinese restaurant in town. We each made a card for an LCF and had them read it aloud to the group. We have one teacher whom we have taught some American phrases to, such as; that’s what she said, chillax, you are terrible (which he pronounces tellible), who was soooo funny when he was reading his card aloud because they put in a lot of his sayings in there and he thought it was so funny and would do a spin after he read each one. It was a fun night and a good way to say thank you to all of our teachers (they wont be coming with us to swearing in in Kigali). Sunday was spent trying to entertain ourselves because the power was out and there was a huge wind and rain storm, so we couldn’t go outside and do anything. We tried to watch 27 dresses (9 of us in one room), but both computers died before we were able to finish it and everyone else's computers were already dead. So, Meredith, Anna and I played Phase 10 and a big group of us played catch phrase in the dark in the conference room (the sun went down while we were playing, but none of us had our flashlights with us so we just kept playing in the dark until dinner). After dinner, since it was so dark and we were all bored, we sat around a single candle and told ghost stories. I remembered one someone told me while we were in Kenya about a bride getting trapped in a secret door in the basement of a house while playing hide and go seek and dying there only to be found years later, so I told that one. One of the guys here from Chicago had some really good ones that his crazy grandfather told him and EVERYONE who grew up or had lived in Ohio at some point had some good ones. So I decided never to move to Ohio (sorry Em).