May 31st, Friday
Today
was so great! We woke up for breakfast: seriously my favorite part of the day
because of the yummy rice and bananas, loaded up the bus, and went off to
school. When we arrived to the school Liz and I had promised Patrick, a teacher
we met yesterday, that we would come visit him and his Standard 5B class this
morning. So, we stopped by there and he was so excited to see us. I have never
met someone who shakes your hand more than him but it’s so great; he is
wonderful. He had his class all stand up and greet us and then sing us a song.
While we were in there Liz and I heard voices from the window behind us and it
was our little Standard 3 babies calling our names to make sure we weren’t
forgetting about them (I can’t get over how wonderful my name sounds coming
from their mouths). When we got to our class they were both relieved and
excited for our arrival. Ellen even said that the kids came running in the
classroom stressed about the fact that we were in the Standard 5B class but we assured
her that we were only being visitors, haha. We handed out everyone’s name tag
before class and I must say that these names are difficult but after you look
at them a couple of times they aren’t any more difficult than some of the
combinations made up these days.
Liz
and I decided to incorporate a little bit of science and math today so we
started out our lesson by drawing a stick figure on the chalkboard. We then
wrote different body parts, such as arms, legs, hands, eyes, mouth, feet, etc.
on sticky notes. Before we started the activity we taught the class the Head, shoulders, knees, and toes song
but little did we know that they already knew it in Chichewa! The students were
so excited to learn it in English and then taught us in Chichewa, it was adorable.
We had some students come up to the board and put the sticky notes on the right
body part; they were so wonderful at it. We do have one student with Down
syndrome named Chisomo and she is such an angel. She could light up the darkest
room with that smile of hers. She raised her hand to participate and her sticky
said, “nose”, Liz and I assisted her but she was perfectly fine all on her own.
The class usually gives one clap for a student who does something right but the
roar of claps Chisomo got after she participated was life-changing for me.
Chisomo is not looked at through her disability and that is just how these
people are; they are so accepting and loving towards every single person,
disability or not. A boy named Kelvin, who is definitely the brightest in the
class (also is one who has stolen my heart), sits next to Chisomo everyday and
helps her as much as he can. The other students make sure she feels included in
everything and are always there to guide her if she gets stuck. These children
are such beautiful human beings. After they finished the activity on the board
we gave them paper and crayons to draw themselves and label the body parts we
had gone over in class. The drawings they turned in were absolutely heart warming
and I cannot wait to put up pictures of some of them to share with you all.
After
break ended we went into a little math lesson. Liz and I bought pipe cleaners
and beads to incorporate a counting math lesson. We put 10 beads on each pipe
cleaner and did all different kinds of math problems. The kids all answered the
problems using the beads on their pipe cleaners, which they loved. After the
activity ended we had the kids turn the pipe cleaners with the beads into
bracelets and they absolutely loved it. The children here are so thankful for
everything we give them. Even when I give them a piece of notebook paper and 1
crayon they say “Zi Como” a million times, which means thank you. Even when I say thank you to them, they say it right
back to us; we’re being thanked for being thankful. Pretty wonderful if you ask
me. After the last break only ½ of the class retuned and Liz and I were so
confused. Ellen told us that in the Muslin faith there is a prayer time that
happens in the middle of the day. I loved how open they were with sharing with
us about the different practices and how even the individuals who weren’t
Muslim accepted those who were.
After
school ended we walked 2 ½ miles to a Malika Catholic church. The walk went
through a couple of villages and by the time we got to the church the amount of
children we collected were dozens. When we arrived we heard all of this
beautiful African music and had multiple people coming up to us with hugs,
kisses, and the warmest of welcomes. We all sat down and all of the kids were sitting
at our feet, right up against us, and in our laps as the group performed. The
dancing was absolutely phenomenal! The people were so cheerful; I actually
started to wonder if I would ever see anyone non-cheerful and I truly don’t
think I will. After the dancing performance was over the kids all clung to us
like white on rice. One little girl grabbed my hand on the way back to the
school where we were to be picked up and did not let go. The only exception of
letting go of my hand was that when our hands got sweaty from being locked for
too long she would let go and wipe them off for us, it was so funny. She had
the most innocent little face I have ever seen. She seemed pretty young and I
don’t think she knew much English but that didn’t stop us from getting to know
one another. I loved the way her small hand fit right into mine, not just
because I have small hands like a child too, but also because it was honestly
the perfect fit into my unfinished puzzle. I found out that she loves to giggle
and laugh like any other child. It’s funny that even though all of our words
differ between our two languages, a smile and laugh will always mean the same.
As we were walking I heard my name in that sweet and innocent voice that I love
so much and I saw one of my students from our Standard 3B class. She came
running up to me, shouting my name, and was so excited to be there in that
moment. She was running around me and being such a cheerful child. After we got
to the school I had to say my goodbyes to the children I had met over our walk
but they made it such a happy goodbye because I know that we’ll cross paths
again.
After
we got back to Annie’s we all cleaned up a bit from our 5-mile walk. Apparently
in Malawi it is very common for the electricity to go out, like all the time. It went out this morning
for about 3 ½ hours and happened again tonight around 7:00pm. The sun sets here
at 5:30pm on the dot so when the electricity went out it was pitch black
outside but what a blessing it turned out to be. I was up in Amy’s room with
her and Leigh when it happened and we heard a scream from outside and quickly
went to check it out. Marissa was out there with Emily and told us to hurry
over to them as soon as we could. When we got to them I knew exactly what they
were so excited about: those stars. I have never seen anything more beautiful
in my entire life. My eyes were in shock by the sight I was seeing. I have
never seen so many stars and especially stars that were shining as bright as
these. Marissa is an astronomy enthusiast and was explaining all of the
consolations to us. It was crazy to me that these were stars that I had never
seen before because they were on the southern hemisphere; things like that just
blow my mind. I literally felt like I was trapped inside the brightest blanket
of stars. We were able to enjoy them for about 45 minutes before the lights
came back on.
I see bedtime in the near future;
say 10 minutes from now, because tomorrow will be an early start to a long day!
We are going to be leaving around 8am to travel over to Mt. Mulanje, which is
the highest mountain in Africa. And guess what? We’re hiking it! It is going to
be such a fun and exciting day but a long one with that. I have been having
such wonderful experiences here so far and I cannot believe it’ll be over in just
two weeks.
Until then,
Xoxo
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