The Start of the 2nd Year

We are now two weeks into the school year in Lesotho with new classes, new students, and a new outlook.  I’m teaching the grade 12 (Form E) and the grade 10 (Form C) math classes.  Both of these are the classes that take huge external exams at the end of the year that determines for Form C’s if they will pass from secondary school to high school and for the Form E’s if they will graduate from high school with high enough marks to go to university.  The tests are crazy long and cover every topic learned in every subject for the last 2 to 3 years.  At Qholaqhoe our pass rate on external exams for math was around 15% and very few of those that passed got higher than a near pass in the 50 and 60%’s.  So hopefully we have nowhere to go but up!

Qholaqhoe High School afternoon assembly.

A year ago when I first started teaching it was so difficult and I didn't think I could do it.  This year my mindset is totally different and I actually enjoy going to school!  It’s crazy to think about how things were last year versus now and it gives credit to the necessity of being here for two years and also how much I have grown individually as a teacher.  I’ve been successful so far at getting to school at 7 am everyday (first period isn’t until 8) to spend extra time with my Form E’s working on math or just encouraging them to work on anything.  We follow an I’m here you’re here policy because I don’t like getting up early and they are required to get there at 7 or face potential beating.  So far teaching the externals has been great there interest in learning is better and generally less disruptive in class.  There are still many things that frustrate me with laziness and maintenance of my school but I want to focus on the things I love about this place because I know a year from now I’m going to miss many things about Qholaqhoe. 

Right now I’m only teaching 2 classes and have extra time to work on other things including the library, math and science club, and a few other small projects in the community and with the district math and science teachers association. 

Library project:

In addition to teaching I am focusing in the short term on working on the school library.  Every day I work with the school leaning lady to reorganize and catalog the books and train her to be the school librarian.  This is a challenge as her English isn't very good and neither is my Sesotho, but we are doing our best!  We also just last week submitted a grant application to Peace Corps to construct a library building at my school.  Just getting to the point of submitting the project application and plan was a small victory!  If approved I will have to raise $5800 from sources at home to compliment the $3300 the school has raised.   A lot more on this to come if we are approved!

Form C students posing for a picture in the library.  The space is small and there is no furniture but we are working to make the organization of the books simpler and easier to follow.

Reorganizing the books by reading level instead of fiction types hopefully will help students to find books and training a librarian will help to keep them in an orderly fashion. 

After school I have been starting to focus on training for a half marathon in Cape Town at the end of March.  How can you not enjoy running when you finish to views like this!

Holidays and a Visit from My Sister

This blog post is long overdue!  Over Christmas I was visited by my sister which was one of the best experiences of Peace Corps.  We kicked off her visit by meeting her at the airport and driving the next day to Kruger National Park.  Driving!  Wow what an experience after not driving for so long and on the left side!  But it was so freeing to have a car after our normal lives of packed four to the backseat in overfull taxis. 

 

Our car we were very sad to return after putting it through the paces driving through parks and into waterfalls.

The day we visited Kruger was agreed to be one of the most incredible days any of us had experienced!  We saw the Big 5 (Lion, Elephant, Buffalo, Rhino, and Leopard) in less than 5 hours!  Everywhere we looked there was wildlife.  Caitlin recorded the times and locations of the animals we saw and could hardly keep up with what we were seeing. 

 

Rhino directly outside of our window

 

Elephants and also a hippo in the same pool

 

Lion!

 

Giraffes!

The most incredible sitting came late in the day when we were driving away from other cars on a less traveled road.  We spotted a bull elephant right by the side of the road.  We watched it for a couple of minutes and it started to walk out in front of the car and we backed up, it then stopped right in the middle of the road and stared straight at us and I reversed fast!  We all screamed before the elephant continued on across the road, all of this on video on Caitlin’s camera.

 

Emily and I at Kruger Park

The rest of trip was also not without highlights including: White water tubing, Jumping off a 18 story gorge, driving on crazy roads, craft shopping in Swaziland, trying to sneak up on Zebras, and returning to Lesotho and straight to a Christmas party.

 

Caitlin, myself, and Emily after the Big Swing jump!

For how amazing the trip was the highlight for me was returning to village with my sister.   She got to experience all the aspects of Peace Corps life including:

•           Traveling on public transport and waiting on the side of the road for a lift with big bags
•           Movie nights by candle light
•           Climbing Qholaqhoe Mountain
•           Seeing my school and meeting my Basotho friends
•           Washing clothes by hand
•           Bathing in a bucket
•           Hiking and visiting the orphan support group
•           Making tortilla chips from scratch
•           Greeting people in Sesotho
•           And, taking pictures with all of my Ntate’s most prized possessions; goats, donkeys, and corn!

 

Emily with Ntate Tankiso and his donkeys!

 

At the Likoting support group.

 Homemade chips and salsa!

It was incredible having my sister visit and a time I will forever cherish.  She did everything with ease and I think I complained more about bad transport and annoyances than she did.  It couldn’t have been better and I still miss not having her here.  More visitors are welcome!!!