My First Day of School

On Tuesday Kim took me to meet with Noelina, the director of the Meeting Point organization, whom I’ve been in indirect touch with since last spring. We went up to the new learning school building to meetwith her. She was incredibly warm and welcomed me, explaining that Meeting Point is called that because it is where happiness, joy, sadness, all these things and many more come together. She also said she had begun to fear that I was never going to come because she hadn’t hear anything of my arrival—this has been a long time in the planning. So it was terrific to finally meet her and see the place that I first heard about back in February! We discussed the bag of art supplies that I had brought and a tentative schedule to test out some of the many different programs that Meeting Point Kampala (MPK) operates. My starting date was set for Thursday.

Today I woke up early—really! And was all ready to go to the school around 8:30. I met with the new head school teacher briefly (she just began on Monday, nearly like me, but she is from Kampala and a skilled teacher I think, so therefore, not at all like me!)and several regarding a schedule, and settled on a temporary schedule for the next week or so that would include three days a week at the learning center getting acquianted with each of the four class levels—nursery, P-1, P-2, and P-3—as well as a couple days doing fieldwork where I will join trained counselors who venture out into the community to make homevisits to those who are HIV+ and check on their health and progress. There is also a vocational that trains older children—sewing for the girls, shoe and brick-making for the boys. In fact, I was impressed to learn that the older children sew the green uniform smock dresses and shirts and shorts for the younger school children. So that the vocational school is yet another possible option for teaching some English reading and writing.

Then the head school teacher, whom the children call Madame, took me to each classroom starting with the Nursery class. We walked into the room, and the teacher welcomed us, and upon Madame’s greeting and allowing me to introducing myself as Laura from the USA, they chanted in unison something along the lines of “Welcome to our school, we are the nursery class, we are happy to have you here,” and then did a multi-clap rhythm of sorts that made for quite a finish. It was just so darn cute—I wish I could come up with a better description, but that’s all that really comes to mind, maybe that and earnest. The nursery children are so young, about 5 or 6 mainly and all seem to have some variation on all bald or nearly bald heads (in the case of the girls mainly who have just the roots of short black hair), beautiful big eyes that seem so full when they look at you, and bright smiles that are even brighter against their dark smooth brown skin. They just smiled and waved at me so genuinely as I stood at the front of the classroom in front of their rows of school benches, ten deep in two columns. There over 40 children in that class, but that is one of the smaller ones. P-1 has 66 children, and the teacher seems understandably swamped. I was introduced to all the classes and sat in on some of the teaching and observed some of their workbook writing.

I also met the other volunteers: the Chevy Chase couple Lew and Judy who have been at MPK since July and whom I had met on Tuesday, and then also two Danish girls, Pia and Mede (I’m sure I just destroyed that spelling!) who have been at MPK since August. I was very pleased to get some knowledgeable advice from people who’ve had some time to really get a sense of the school and hadn’t even really thought about the possibility of other volunteers, so that has been a nice surprise! The five of us left for a lunch break and walked down to the market down the street for a rolex—no, not a fancy fake watch, but rather fried egg with tomato, onion, and cabbage rolled up in a flat, wide pancake. I could definitely have that for breakfast any day. Although it was really quite filling! We took our sandwiches to a café up the street and sat outside. Between the coke and the rollup I was stuffed. I couldn’t even finish the rollup, I promised you: Me! I couldn’t finish the last bite, very troublesome! The whole meal set me back 1100 shillings—approximately 65 cents maybe. Just ridiculous. While it is nice to have such a cheap meal, one can’t help but feel strange in knowing that for most people there, that would not be a small amount of money. It’s just staggering to consider. So much like in London, except for opposite reasons, you must distance yourself from the cost of things to maintain your sanity.
After lunch, I shadowed Judy and Lew has they took a couple of the children out of classrooms for some more individualized attention. Judy has begun trying to plot the current abilities of all the children—a daunting task. They come from so many different backgrounds, languages, and educational situations, and even though the teaching staff is dedicated, with such large classes and the childrens’ varied learning levels, many children struggle greatly with English and are lagging behind. The 7 and 8-year-olds from P-1 that read with Lew and Judy could not identify colors, calling a red shirt blue, and the like. I’m hoping this is where art projects may be able to help, at least going over the colors with the younger children. There is so much to be done, and even after my first day (which felt like it could have been a week!), I feel both intimidated by all the help that is needed and idealistically hopeful that these eager and obediant children can certainly succeed with ongoing instruction.

These children have been through so much, and yet you would have almost no idea watching them wreak joyous havoc on their barren dirt playground or accept their allotment of rice and beans scooped out of large green buckets (that would no doubt make any American schoolkid turn up their nose, or adult for that matter. I’m no better as I didn’t venture it today, but actually, you know me, I’ll probably like it!) Lew told of two little girls in particular on our walk to lunch. One was of a little girl, Rose, whose parents had taken her and returned to Rwanda, but became sick and passed away, but not before the father begged the grandmother to return the little girl to MPK where he knew she would be looked after. She now lives in the foster home, as does a sweet little girl named Evelyn who is HIV+ and whose parents died of AIDS. She was able to transfer to a private school, but because she is on ARVs to treat the virus, she falls asleep and so she could not keep up in her new school. But inspite of these sad tales, how can one not feel somehow optimistic with three uplifting experiences at the end of the day. First, I talked to Evelyn about drawing animals and people the next day and her eager smile nearly made you forget that she was not just another carefree child. Joseph, the P-3 level teacher, explaining, “You remember yesterday, but you hope that tomorrow will be better,” in reference to the children’s learning struggles. And finally, and I am not making this up, an end-of-day assembly where the children are encouraged to keep learning, be smart, studious, clean, quiet, and respectful, and then following a group prayer, march out of the schoolyard chanting, “We are marching in the light of God, we are marching in the light of God!” over and over. It was like I was in a Save the Children commercial come to life, but so genuine and um, real life! Just mind-boggling. (Al, you would have just been bawling after the first verse!)

But then I did get to go out for some beers with Kim, David, and some of their friends—and I had a chance to talk with RachieP (thanks for calling!), so the long, good day ended on a high note. So there we go, another mouthful from me, but there just seems so much to tell. The other volunteers are gone tomorrow, so I’m going to try to take some students on my own to read or draw and color. Wish me luck!