Letters from Hannah

Dear Mom and Dad (etc.),

(Ed. note: we have become disconnected in the numbering system. Two #9 letters will get us back together.)

Well, goodbye community health and hello TEFL! I am now a teacher. How the hell did this happen? I'm not sure myself -- I think Mike and I are part of some elaborate plot. Or maybe this is just Africa, and I'm a Peace Corps volunteer here to serve my community, and what my community needs is an English teacher.

There are 21 classes of English (3 each grade, 7 grades) and right now, 2 English profs. M. Djipala is supposed to be here as well but he is trying to get posted somewhere else (teachers, like nurses, doctors, police, prison guards, gendarmes, immigration officers -- all govt employees -- are assigned to towns, like us PCVs. The length of stay varies.) Mike and I have taken 2 classes each, because we feel guilty, are bored, think it will be a good way to meet profs and students and talk about health/environmental education, and we have nothing better to do. We definitely don't want the profs resenting us for sitting on our butts while they teach 11 classes -- that's 33 hours a week in the classroom. We each have 6 hours and quite frankly that's plenty! My kids, thank god, are good and haven't thrown paper at me (yet) but the responsibility of having to teach them and having them learn is overwhelming at least 3 or 4 times a day. It's turning out to be not as easy as "Hey, I speak English, therefore I can teach it!" Ha! How many of you know what the past perfect tense is? Past perfect continuous? Present perfect continuous? Yeah, I thought so. Now take a dark room full of old termite ridden desks and fill it with 13-20 year olds (note: I am teaching 8th and 9th grade). My materials? A blackboard and some chalk.

It's great. I'll get the hang of it eventually and my smart students will keep me going even when the others write sentences like "writesn't he a lot of letters?" I mean, why isn't it writesn't? I have no books and neither do the kids. I pick up grammar from M. Tchitombi by observing classes and borrowing books. He's older, very nice, and Gabonese. M. Amininou (all the i's are like ee) is from Togo and young. There are a lot of Togolese and Beninoise profs, mostly in math and science. There's one Malian (math) and a couple Senegalais. I'd say 40% of the profs are foreigners, and there are about 35 teachers in all.

I've been wanting to describe what a day is like but my routine has been so perturbed it hasn't seemed right. But who cares. I wake up, crawl out of the green army issue mosquito net, and slide my feet into my flip flops. If Chikwang is inside I let her out and turn out the outside light, which keeps people away during the night. I go to my spare bedroom where I hang clothes and laundry and my towel, and I get my towel and go into my bathroom, which is across the hall, squeezing by the toilet. I look for the Spider, who's 4 inches across and lives in the bathroom on the ceiling. We get along but don't like each other. He usually stays put as I hang my rust-spotted towel on the rusty nail in the door (ah, humidity!) and take a shower. The water is hard (soft?) so the soap doesn't lather well. I dry off and change into work clothes (pants or skirt and nicer shirt) or shorts (my one pair, that I never wore at home, but here are so comfy). Now that I've hung a rod from the ceiling to hang my clothes, they aren't so moldy. I go into the kitchen and open the window and make cocoa (water and Nesquick and powdered milk) and plug in the radio. BBC starts at 8:00 but RFI has news in English at 7:30. Sometimes I have oatmeal. I open the 2 living room windows which look south over my septic tank down the hill to the Spanish prof's new plank house, which is well built with a concrete floor and aluminum (tin?) roof.

So then I'm up and either I bum around reading or picking up or preparing lessons or to do lists, or I run off to class or the hospital. I teach, or see babies and mamas, and come home after maybe running errands -- buying peanut butter, canned tomatoes, sugar, sardines for Chikwang, etc. Sometimes I check the marché for spinach (not real spinach) or bananas or wierd fun stuff. I come home and bum around some more until 3 or 4, because everyone has siesta. Hospital and school starts up again at 3:30, but I am usually at home doing nothing or lesson plans. At 4:00 the light gets nice and at 5:30-6:00 the sky is bright blue and pink with clouds and it's beautiful. The coconut palms stand out and the wind picks up and walking around is really pleasant. If I'm out I try to get home by 6:30 because walking through the Carrefour is sketchy after dark. It's not unsafe. I know all the shopkeepers and bar and restaurant guys -- but it's a pickup zone, and therefore not anywhere I want to be. I put up the mosquito screens in the living room and kitchen and feed Chikwang (rescuing her from the neighbors down the hill if she's run off) and listen to more BBC and make dinner. Then book or letter or sewing a shoulder bag or planning a lesson. At 9:00 or 10:00 I take off the screens and bolt the windows and lock the door, then sweep the biting red ants off the bed (20 minutes of someone sticking you with an itchy pin when they bite) and get in under the mosquito net. I lie awake listening to the mosquitoes whine above me, and wonder if I'll fall asleep before the ants come. This is usually the point where I think of things I must do or forgot to do or creative lessons or health strategies. By morning I usually forget.

My goal right now is to get everyone in Ndendé to say Good morning ma'am. Right now conversations go like this: Gud mawning sir! or more often Gud mawning misses! (Mrs.) I'm thinking about trying to teach them when I go around each class to announce the girls' scholarships in a couple weels. I'll say good morning, and they'll say Gud mawning sir/mrs./teacher, and then I'll write ma'am on the board and explain. I never thought I would ever be encouraging people to call me ma'am. I guess what keeps me from feeling old (ha!) is the fact that most of the 10th graders are already older than me.

We got our bikes a couple weeks ago but Mike and I are embarrassed to wheel them across town to get the tires inflated. They're brand new Trek bikes, not super fancy but way more solide than the bikes you'll see here. I have to fix the brakes and derailleur before I can actually ride it, but once we get going it should be fun. I doubt I'll use it much around town but maybe for village trips and Lebamba -- we'll see. (We did a test ride today: nothing draws more looks than our bikes. We even went towards Congo on the dirt road, but I had to ride home through the Carrefour -- yipes. Maybe they'll get used to it? I think I'll stick to walking.)

Oh! -- it's the 2nd and it is raining. Mike and I were in the marché trying to kill time when it started, not too hard -- we went to a bar a block away to have Cokes outside in a gazebo. It picked up, then stopped, and then just as we were getting ready to go it really started. We waited it out for 1/2 an hour inside the bar, watching the palms sway through the doorway. It was like watching The Weather Channel when a hurricane hits. Wind, gray skies, palm trees -- it wasn't violent but it was a lot of water. At 5:30 I started home and it let up a little but I was still soaked when I got home. Now it's raining again -- it just pours! I don't know where the dog is but she's probably hiding out somewhere safe.

Today UNHCR came from Tchibanga to distribute food to the Congolese refugees. The ones with legit papers got (per family member) a small baggie of salt, a kilo of dried beans, a liter of soybean oil, a bar of soap, and 20 lbs of rice. They also gave out some rakes, machetes, watering cans, and axes. Kara was there -- they moved on to Mouila when they were done. My Congolese friends said it wasn't really enough -- they come once a month (usually) but they want more. People get yelled at for not having the right papers, and HCR is encouraging them to go back. Some have left but most say their towns are still unsafe so they're staying. They speak Punu, it's all the same ethnic group, but there are differences -- the women who sell at the marché are almost all Congolese and they seem more willing to work than the Gabonese. The women dress nicer too -- good African prints, because Gabon has been too Frenchified. Today was nice -- I was busy, and while doing mostly nothing (I bagged some beans) at the distribution I chatted with 5 or 6 people. I'm starting to fit in! People know me! I'm figuring out some of the politics, and who has cars, and the other day I even gave weaning advice to a student and told her how to express milk so her family can feed the baby while she's at school. I met the school nurses and they seem nice, and teaching is rolling along. Near Halloween my favorite facilitator is coming to visit -- no haunted missionary village due to that, plus I have to teach. I say hi to tons of people in the street and I'm getting better at remembering their names. When I hear about how great a volunteer Kamba was I think well, at least they'll remember that I spoke Bambara. I think I have a good start and things are rolling along nicely and I may yet live up to my expectations and have a good time doing it, too.

Oct. 24 -- Tuesday my 5-e class was out of control but in the evening I brought plantains over to the neighbors and we had mushrooms with them. Wild mushrooms, yum! They've come now the rains are here, but they won't last long, so I'm buying them everyday at the marché. I put diesel around the corners of the house to keep the ants out but it's giving me a headache. If I sweep everyday that shold keep them out. Other volunteers don't have a problem with them in their beds, so I'm not sure if my house/location is just special or if I'm doing something wrong. OK, it's pouring now and I can't hear my radio even with the volume all the way up. The rain on the roof is loud! But sounds more like wind in the trees to me.

Matt, the PCVL came by and said not only did LBV not get my bank info but they don't have my rental agreement either. I am not impressed. It's no big deal, Virginie has her copy so I can fill out the new one and send it off so she can get paid. I talked to Simon, the chef des refugees, who wants me to find money for fishing equipment so he can feed his family. It doesn't really qualify for a Small Project Assistance grant because it only involves him and his two friends -- they're looking for a handout, only (of course) they don't see it that way. It'll be difficult to enlarge the project -- doing so would basically be the Fish Culture program which closed last year. His wife wants a sewing machine, and a women's sewing coop would be perfect for a grant, except that the tailors who are already here don't have enough clients. OK -- the rain drowns out my walkman and those little speakers which are plenty loud most of the time (when I'm alone). Crazy. It's sitting right in front of me.

Well, today (27th) I made beef tail soup with wild mushrooms and mashed taro with the neighbors. It needed tomato and carrot and more onion and spices but it wasn't bad for only having 2 of the 3 food groups (starch/oil, meat/protein, vegetable/fruits). They gave me a lot to eat at home, and I ended up giving Chikwang a decent amount. She only ever eats rice and sardines so she was pretty psyched. I got mail, the first in 6 weeks, from Kevin and Sarah yesterday. Jenny's boyfriend Mohammed came through and gave it to us. Hopefully, the post will stay open and the rest of our stuff will get here soon.

Guyette, my 19 year old neighbor, came over and said "my friend just gave me her wedding invitation, and I don't have a gift. What am I gonna do?" I said I didn't know, thinking this must be one of those times where if I was Gabonese I would understand immediately. "Do you have any wrapping paper?" No. I sure don't. She sat there for a long time. "What do you usually give as presents?" I asked. "Oh, whatever, a cup, like this -- she picked up a plastic 30 cent cup I had bought -- "but you wrap it up nice. Maybe I could just buy a box of cookies." Ah, I thought. The problem is money. I owed her 2 weeks pay for my laundry but since I am broke I needed to borrow $$ from Mike first. I told her I could pay her tomorrow and she sat, silent. That probably wasn't the right answer, I thought. Well, screw it, I don't understand, it's not my fault. Maybe I was supposed to provide the present. Sorry! All I have to give away are pens. People keep asking if I can get Chacos and Tevas and walkmen and stereos and cars and radios and watches sent from the US. Yes. I am Santa Claus. No problem. All the neighbors and all the students ask will you take me to America? Yeah, sure, let's go. We'll hop in the bush taxi to LBV and go to the airport and I'll buy your ticket and well go to America. Then when we're there I'll pay your rent and food and find you a job where you just sit all day not having ever to speak English and you'll get paid gobs of money. Sound good? Don't worry about the visa, we can bribe the INS. It's like the boys/men in the street -- hey cherie, you're pretty, let's go get a drink, can I come over? Do they really expect me to turn around and say, "ok, yeah, you there, let's go"? The disparity between the "tactlessness" of these situations (it's not tactless to them!) and the unspoken complications of Guyette (and others) is astounding. It's all just code and I'm not cracking it. I don't speak your language! You see, it's not about your French level here. There's a whole different way of communicating.

I love you,

Hannah