Wednesday 2/23/11
All day, hot sun, beat,
But reveled in Mash, much fun,
Home, sunburned, tired.
Thursday 2/24/11
Wow, busy, busy,
Not much time to breath, relax,
But we must go on.
Maybe some of you didn't know this about me, but prior to joining Peace Corps I tried to write a Haiku a day for an entire year. I got to day 250...then I petered off, too many other things began to happen. Anyway, most of 'Ku's were directed towards Chelsea gushing love, compassion, understanding (I am a romantic, whatever) and so forth, but sometimes I wrote them as a journal. My attention span couldn't handle writing an entire daily entry, but a 3-line poem, sure, no problem. Recently, as of February 14th, I picked up this habit again. And I've written them everyday since. These two above wrap up my last two days.
I am sitting at my computer around 9pm or 2100 hours Guyana time after a 12 hour work day. Chelsea is out training some of the new trainees at the remote training site and I am listening to music, rambling on our blog. One thing I've taken away from development work is that when it rains it pours. Many projects culminate at once and then it's time to start a new project and continue the cycle, all the while sustaining previous projects that need to be revisited until it becomes a gigantic juggling act. Granted, not everyday is like this. There are some days where not much happens and projects progress at their own pace without much direction from me.
But today was not one of those days.
The day opened with me putting together the winner's display of the Regional Author's Fair I helped organize. My Guyanese counterpart and I had kids from all over the Region submit poetry and short stories around the theme of the Mashramani Season (Republic Day), “Showcasing our culture, sustaining our pride”. We ended up with about 37 entries which I count as an amazing success because this was the first of it's kind in the Region. The idea behind it was to promote literacy through the nurturing of creativity in creative writing. My hopes were to get students to research their own heritage and culture then write a fictional account using the knowledge they gleaned. It was really great reading through the students' accounts and learning so much more about Mash then I ever thought possible. (I will get into Mashramani later).
After I completed the posters, I had to rush over to the nearby high school and facilitate a professional development session with the entire staff (40 + teachers). We went over a few comprehension strategies (For my teaching buddies: GIST and Reciprocal Teaching) and I was able to demonstrate model lessons for each strategy, then explain how they can incorporate it into their daily lesson plans. Overall I think it was successful and actually pretty fun. (Literacy coach here I come!)
Then, I had to rush back over to office to see how my counterpart was coming along with the borders on the posters. She finished them up and then I carried them over to the National Library, Linden Branch. I had to get permission from Georgetown to use the library's space, even though the Linden head Librarian was all about it; she had my back from the start of this project about 2 months ago. The display looked really good. It is right near the entrance so whoever enters the library sees them. We are working on getting letters to the winners and the schools throughout the region to check out the display (and maybe introduce some new kids to the aweseomeness that is the biblioteca, perhaps as an unexpected side effect? This is something else development work has taught me: see the benefit/success in ALL that you do). And then we need to plan and host some sort of awards ceremony, but I think I will do this next week, from a distance, since I will working with the new Trainees next week. But I ramble.
After we set up the library I came home for a quick bite to eat then then I had to head over to the main road to facilitate another session around 530 pm (I got home from the library at 445 pm). This session was completely different from the session earlier this afternoon. I was working with a PTA of a nearby Nursery School on a “Father's Only” workshop. In November, Chelsea and I did a similar workshop for this same nursery school, however, that first time, there were only 19 women and 1 man. This time, though, the school invited only the father's of the children. It was a great concept. The Regional Education Officer (REdO) and myself think it's one of the first in the region based around educational goals. I did my session on Communicating Effectively with your child/children (yeah crazy, right? My dad, bro, and mom can attest to that!) I went first and then we had two other facilitators give their presentations. It was a really good event. And even without planning it, all three of our presentations really melded together well. As an added bonus, we had the Media there. I don't own a TV, but I think I may be on the local news within the next few days (this would be the second time, the first was when I was the time-keeper for the regional/interregional debate.)
It was a very busy day, so maybe that second Haiku makes sense, right?
Yesterday was a good day too. I was able to Spend Mashramani in Town. But that can be a whole other entry (here is at teaser: Chelsea in a BRIGHT YELLOW jumpsuit with a hat of a man exercising on her head walking all over the City. And then picture me with beers, camera, and bright lime, green shirt. Yeah. think on that....). For now though, I will relax and will post some pictures soon. And maybe a few more Haiku's...
Much love,
T
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