East Side gets a visit
East Side visits
Russ and I rode our bikes out to visit James and Christy's site and Loni's site on the East Side of our town. We had not been out that way since the villagers were in the process of building their houses in the dry season. The bike ride was fairly easy and quite pleasant in the early morning as it was cool and breezy. We got to Loni's site (45 minute bike ride) and rested a bit then continued onto to James and Christy's site (30 minute bike ride from Loni's site) where they were painting a wall to make their house a bit more lively.
We helped out with painting, talked, and had chai. Chai is literally tea but for most Tanzanians it's breakfast usually taken around 10 am and consists of tea and fried finger foods. We toured their gardens and soon-to-be-finished water tank. We noticed that they've done a great job with their gardens and they just need a roof on their water tank for it to be completed.
Before we left to go back to Loni's site, we visited a friend of James and Christy's, an older man who builds a board for a local game. They had one made for themselves so we ordered one for ourselves. When we get it, in a month or so, I'll take pictures and tell how it's played.
We rode back to Loni's site around 2 pm or so and it was quite hot. We stopped at her house and had peaches and avocado a very rare treat in our town. Angus brought some back for us when he went to Iringa for a conference and we thought it would be nice to share it with other volunteers. Hopefully there will be avocados in our town soon, but I've never seen a peach at our market. We then made our way home in the early afternoon and relaxed the rest of the day.
Gardening
The longer rainy season has begun and that means it rains once every three days, which has been happening for the last week. That's just long enough between rains that I don't have to water our garden. I now understand the meaning of a "pumpkin patch" and "watermelon patch" as our pumpkins, squash, and watermelon plants are taking over our entire garden! I thinned (trimmed) the pumpkin leaves, which we ate (tasty!), but I still need to thin out more leaves otherwise because it's so damp under the patch of leaves fungus will start to grow. We transferred many plants, especially tomato, from our compost to our garden. Compost is a great source of seedlings we realized. All of the tomato and papaya plants which were transferred into our garden are doing great. Just the other day I noticed that our tomato plants are flowering and we already have some large okra ready to pick and eat from our okra plants. We've been eating cucumber and beans as those plants have already started producing.
Teaching
The amount of students in my classes keep increasing. In two of my three classes the number of students is approaching 40 in each class. This makes it a bit difficult to do "fun things" but I'm learning all of their names, to their great surprise, and I am animated in class, which they find amusing. Teaching is going well and I enjoy seeing the light bulb go off in my students' heads. One day, I gave them some homework problems on the board then noticed that a few students finished quite quickly. To keep them busy, I put a more difficult problem, from a past national exam, on the board for a challenge. I had one way of doing it but when I saw the way one student did it, I was so proud I let him explain to the class his solution. Unlike last year, my students this year love to "play teacher" and explain solutions on the board in front of their classmates. No shame here, which is great because it takes the spotlight off me and then I'm not the one lecturing all the time. They are taking their first maths exam at the moment so I get to go home and grade them soon. I typed up two different exams for the same subject to minimize cheating. We'll see how they do.
Russ and I rode our bikes out to visit James and Christy's site and Loni's site on the East Side of our town. We had not been out that way since the villagers were in the process of building their houses in the dry season. The bike ride was fairly easy and quite pleasant in the early morning as it was cool and breezy. We got to Loni's site (45 minute bike ride) and rested a bit then continued onto to James and Christy's site (30 minute bike ride from Loni's site) where they were painting a wall to make their house a bit more lively.
We helped out with painting, talked, and had chai. Chai is literally tea but for most Tanzanians it's breakfast usually taken around 10 am and consists of tea and fried finger foods. We toured their gardens and soon-to-be-finished water tank. We noticed that they've done a great job with their gardens and they just need a roof on their water tank for it to be completed.
Before we left to go back to Loni's site, we visited a friend of James and Christy's, an older man who builds a board for a local game. They had one made for themselves so we ordered one for ourselves. When we get it, in a month or so, I'll take pictures and tell how it's played.
We rode back to Loni's site around 2 pm or so and it was quite hot. We stopped at her house and had peaches and avocado a very rare treat in our town. Angus brought some back for us when he went to Iringa for a conference and we thought it would be nice to share it with other volunteers. Hopefully there will be avocados in our town soon, but I've never seen a peach at our market. We then made our way home in the early afternoon and relaxed the rest of the day.
Gardening
The longer rainy season has begun and that means it rains once every three days, which has been happening for the last week. That's just long enough between rains that I don't have to water our garden. I now understand the meaning of a "pumpkin patch" and "watermelon patch" as our pumpkins, squash, and watermelon plants are taking over our entire garden! I thinned (trimmed) the pumpkin leaves, which we ate (tasty!), but I still need to thin out more leaves otherwise because it's so damp under the patch of leaves fungus will start to grow. We transferred many plants, especially tomato, from our compost to our garden. Compost is a great source of seedlings we realized. All of the tomato and papaya plants which were transferred into our garden are doing great. Just the other day I noticed that our tomato plants are flowering and we already have some large okra ready to pick and eat from our okra plants. We've been eating cucumber and beans as those plants have already started producing.
Teaching
The amount of students in my classes keep increasing. In two of my three classes the number of students is approaching 40 in each class. This makes it a bit difficult to do "fun things" but I'm learning all of their names, to their great surprise, and I am animated in class, which they find amusing. Teaching is going well and I enjoy seeing the light bulb go off in my students' heads. One day, I gave them some homework problems on the board then noticed that a few students finished quite quickly. To keep them busy, I put a more difficult problem, from a past national exam, on the board for a challenge. I had one way of doing it but when I saw the way one student did it, I was so proud I let him explain to the class his solution. Unlike last year, my students this year love to "play teacher" and explain solutions on the board in front of their classmates. No shame here, which is great because it takes the spotlight off me and then I'm not the one lecturing all the time. They are taking their first maths exam at the moment so I get to go home and grade them soon. I typed up two different exams for the same subject to minimize cheating. We'll see how they do.
posted by lisa at
10:08
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