Start of Quarter Four

Sorry for being so hit and miss on the blog this semester. I think part of it is how busy we have been and how much we have been working. Some weeks it feels like we didn't get a day off. Anyways things have been going well here, we are finally into fourth quarter which is very exciting. We are 11 days away from spring break and our safari in Tanzania which is going to be amazing!! We can't wait to be out in the wilderness seeing some incredible beasts!! For those of you that don't know three other teachers plus one of their boys friends are going on the safari as well as my cousin Nate who has gone to Italy and Norway with me. My uncle Alan, my mom and dad which will be the first out of country experience for them other than Canada!! Leah and I are very excited to see family!

Leah and I went out to the orphange this last weekend and did a game day with them which turned out really well and was a lot of fun. We are trying to organize a miral project for the orphange school, but we realized that every weekend in April will be a no movement weekend do to elections happening. We are still unsure if we will be able to continue on with school or not. There has been speculation that all schools might close so teachers can help count votes for elections. If that happens I'm not sure what will happen for us. The last time we stayed in session when other schools didn't there was a newspaper article published that pretty much forced us to close school. We shall see. We had recently just finished having longer days and working Saturdays to make up for those days off.

My new excitment is getting a ultimate pick up game going every wednesday after school with a bunch of different people. It is great to play without any kids there. I give teachers that are parents a lot of credit. I am so worn out when I get home the hardest thing would be having kids to take care of and push through it. I hope when we are back home and teaching that I am not as tired as I am here. I really think the intensity of the sun drains me more than normal.

Just today Leah and I were going to run after school, but it was so hot I couldn't even stand walking around the track at school. So we went home to our a/c!! lol well I have to get ready for tomorrow but we hope everyone is doing well and enjoying spring, even if you are still getting snow!

It's been a while!!

Wow… I cannot tell you how often Matt or I have started to update our blog in the past 2 months… only to get distracted by something else on our to-do list! Needless to say we have a lot to write about! When we first got back we worked for about a week and a half before our school was shut down because of a government directive. There is an upcoming election in April and the public schools were used as registration places, therefore they felt the need to close ALL schools. Because of our week and a half off school we are now working longer days and Saturdays- not to fun! But Matt and I were able to complete a lot of wedding planning during our time off and it was a blessing to relax.

Matt and I ventured off to a mini golf course…. We were very surprised to see a mini golf course here….but you could definitely tell it was in nigeria. It was complete with a hodge podge of putters, woods, and irons. We were the only ones golfing there, and we had to skip the 7^th hole because a women was sleeping on the green. She woke up as we passed, but just rolled over and went right back to sleep….oh Nigeria.

We spent a lot of our time off visiting with our fellow teachers as well. It can be hard for us to find things to do hear outside the house, so we often work on puzzles, swim, play cards, and cook. Another teaching couple here which we are friends with are members of a golf course. They will sometimes take us for burgers because they are really cheap and good! They took us there to play tennis once, and I was unable to play because I was wearing a pink shirt, apparently they only let you play if you are wearing a white shirt and certain shoes?? I was not a fan, but Matt got to play.

While we were waiting outside the courts for a tournament to finish a man gave us tickets to a Valentine’s Dinner….$200 tickets free!! Valentine’s day is a big deal here! We went out with our colleagues, and this dinner was located at a park in a beautiful big tent. I cannot even describe how beautiful this building was. This meal was supposedly 14 courses!!! The first few were finger foods, and then it was a large buffet of Nigerian food…not my favorite. But it was a really fun/funny night out. There were dancers, comedians, and singers. And at one point they had a raffle drawing, the mc was calling up doctor’s wives that he knew to draw the raffle numbers. There were some pretty big (rich) wigs there. And when it came to the door prize the mc asked Matt if I could come draw the prize! Sometimes the fact that we are white and stick out make us a little popular. Later on in the night there was a singer who pulled me out on the dance floor to dance with him as he sang as well….talk about awkward! I was relieved when he told Matt to come and join me as well. Needless to say it was a night to remember.

Matt worked very hard to organize a run/walk for the school. After much planning the date was decided, but then we had off school so it became a very rushed effort. Matt was able to organize the students in 4 days into teams and they worked to fund raise for money. It was such a success! There were so many students, parents, and teachers that came to help! We came away with over $3000 dollars in donations.

Matt also organized a sports day for the kids where the students ran some track races and then competed in six team like challenges. It was a pretty crazy day. The parents at some stations decided to join the competition (Tug-A-War) with their first grade sons and daughters and were being dragged across the field. It was unbelievable.

We are getting excited about spring break! Everything is coming together and it is exciting! It is really hard being in Africa and not beign able to go out and see the things that Africa is so popular for. Maybe we see the a lot of what Africa really is but we don’t get to see some of the really cool things Africa has. One thing that Nigeria does have is some really cool art work. Over winter break we brought home some samples of that and last night we met another wood carver and might try to get another table carved. Their wood working here is incredible especially because it is all by hand without any power tools. Leah and I used to check out the art at a market and I would just stop and watch these guys carve. It becomes a family business where the trait gets passed done generation to generation.

Leah and I have been doing a lot of swimming lately we recently decided to try and swim a mile in our pool at home which we calculated to be 80 and half laps!! Talk about boring, but we did it. We then decided to try and do the same thing at our school pool where it was only 33 laps that we had to complete. That was more enjoyable. I have been teaching swimming currently and that is fun and interesting. It is a little nerve-wracking when kids are screwing around and I am the only person there. I have one grade that is really tough and the kids really don’t listen at all. I had one kids who is always screwing off with other students and is a ELL student so plays it up like he doesn’t understand what he is doing, but him mom came in to watch him and sure enough I am trying to work with other kids and he is screwing around with another students and falls into the water. I told him to go sit out. Later his mom comes up to me during class and says that she is a teacher and that it is not good for him to sit out and miss the lesson, but I don’t think she understands the safety concerns for her son or other students. Maybe I’m being to critical and paranoid, but I really don’t want or need someone being hurt on my watch and if a kids can’t wait their turn I’d rather sit them out and be safe than ignore their behavior and have one of them get hurt. Always interesting on the P.E. front.

I (Leah now) also decided to have my students tie-dye as we were learning about solutions. Many of the students had never even heard of tie-die before! So I looked up on the internet a recipe that used vinegar and kool-aid. The students all brought in tshirts and they looks really neat right after we tie-died. I took the shirts home to dry In the dryer because the directions said to set the color to put them in the dryer until they were hot. Because of the vinegar, it caused out whole house to smell! I couldn’t even walk into our kitchen which is attached to the laundry room without my eyes watering and my nose burning. I didn’t want to give the student the shirts like that, so I decided to wash some of them… without soap even so that the color would wash out! But unfortunately the die didn’t stick and all the shirts turned a wonderful pink color..I felt awful!!! The students were such great sports though…they wrote pink is the new fashion in sharpies on their shirts and we are going to have a pink day at school tomorrow.

We hope you are all doing well! We are definitely homesick!! – But we are learning and growing so much here that it is a wonderful experience. We will hopefully write again soon :)

Leah's Packed and ready to go

Leah and Jecy