Ok, what to tell you. A couple of general things:
- we have another volunteer! Her name is Becky and she is great and musical and I knew we would get along just fine because her movie case has Casablanca and 500 Days of Summer in it
- Saturday is going to be one of the hardest days of my time down here because that is when Kelley, my roommate and balance to my insanity, is going home permanently. It's for health reasons which really sucks because a) her health needs help and b) it's not even like I can complain about her leaving. What am I going to say, "No, don't get better?" Please pray for her and for all of us because we are going to miss her terribly
- I'm teaching 2 IT classes now! I've only had each class once so far, so I can't say how it's going since all they did was go to a website to look up definitions. I'm going to take a look at what the semester plans are though because if you ask me, teaching our 1st Formers how to type is much more important than knowing what a BIOS is and what it does. I'm pretty sure my dad might be the only person reading this who knows what that is
- Deacon Juan left for the States to be ordained! So he will come back in a couple weeks as a priest!
I think the weekdays were pretty standard. Oh! Except it really was so cold! It rained every day last week except Friday, and I was shivering all of those rainy days. Horrible. You couldn't get warm or dry and all you want is a comforter but you can't have one because who brings a comforter to Belize knowing that in about 2 seconds it's going to be sweltering? In other news, the past couple days have in fact been warm and pleasant.
Now for the weekend run through since that seems to be the only time I do anything interesting.
Friday:
I love Fridays partially because they're always different. Since I don't have classes then, I just never know what's going to pop up. This past Friday was one of those unusual ones because Becky and I were running a Campus Ministry workshop for a couple of the other Campus Ministers and religion teachers from the country. Sounds like an intense trip for them except that their principals were already coming to our campus for a luncheon with all the Catholic school principals in Belize and the Bishop. No big deal. But our workshop went well and it was really good networking with the other Catholic schools in the country. Poor Becky though, she got a real big dose of TIB when our lunch got pushed an hour and a half (because we were invited to eat with the luncheon) and therefore our workshop got totally and spontaneously rescheduled within itself. Personally, I was completely expecting that to happen so I wasn't stressed so much as I was hungry, but this was a whole new experience for Becky. Belize certainly doesn't break them in gently. So the day was good, oh yeah! I spent the afternoon handing out report cards to parents which actually was kind of exciting because I got to meet them. And a lot of them spoke English! I am ashamed though because I practiced a whole introduction of myself in Spanish and I only used part of it once because I chickened out and didn't want any parents thinking their daughter's homeroom teacher was an idiot. But alas, there are always more report cards. After I was done, Kelley and I hung out with our three 3rd Form hooligans that we love so much. Two of them decided they wanted to see what they looked like with our glasses on. The other just called them nerds.
Love this one! Daniel in Becky's glasses, Rolman in mine
That night we had our family Christmas party where we all exchanged Secret Santa gifts. Brynne loved the earrings I got her, and Joey got me food and a book! A bag of Reese's cups, a bag of cheesy spicy chip things for when I can't have sweets, and one of the books from Anne the lay apostle (look it up!). It's a classic Melissa gift. So yeah, that was Friday.
Saturday:
A little less eventful, I spent Saturday sleeping in, cleaning my room, and doing schoolwork which involved reading a book for Kelley's reading class I'm taking over. It was so wonderful! A quiet house, beautiful weather, and a good book. And I was technically working! That night we all went over to Sunil, our dean's house to hang out with him and his wife but mostly to play Dance Revolution 2014 with their daughter. They are one of my favorite families, so we always love being with them. And that was Saturday!
Sunday:
If you don't know by now how much I love Sunday mornings in our little Benque home, then you must not be reading my blog. I stinkin love them. This was also one of the best days I've had in a long time, just because it was so good! The morning was just like any other as far as breakfast and coffee and girl time goes, but then there's always sometime between breakfast and going to Mass where it's just me and Kelley (and now Becky) downstairs and that's when the crazy for the day starts to come out. This past Sunday, our insanity manifested itself by dancing on our couch-bed yelling about who knows what and barraging Joe with heavy doses of our ridiculous as he walked by our house to go pray.
Having fun. It's a thing.
Mass was a whole other event because there were primary school kids literally everywhere. People were standing outside the Church for Mass. Apparently they can get extra credit if they go to Mass and have a priest, sister, or their teacher sign their little card. Whatever works, right?
Sunday afternoon, we went to Melchor one last time with Kelley, and it was the best time yet. Kelley had brought Catchphrase in her bag, so we played a couple rounds at the park with 2 of the students while we waited for the rest of the students to meet us. Then Kelley wanted to get a couple things in the market to bring home, so us 5 white people and now 4 students went across the street to the market where we picked up 2 more students. After souvenir shopping, we obviously had to get ice cream because it's just not a trip to Melchor without getting ice cream cones.
Edna, Kelley, and Samuel with their ice cream cones
After ice cream, we went back to the park to play some super competitive Catchphrase aka the only kind to play, and you will never find a better, more entertaining way to play that game than with 6 kids who have English as a second language. Some of them couldn't get over the fact that the game wasn't charades and that they were supposed to use their words. And of course, us teachers were excited that we were secretly getting them to work on their English while having fun. Score! We played best 2 out of 3 and my team won of course and then we had about 20-30 minutes before we needed to head back to the border, so we just hung out and took pictures with Ms. Kelley. So now I will post a very small fraction of all of them that were taken.
The girls! Patricia, Carmen, myself, Kelley, Becky, and Edna
Our boys minus Jack who already had to leave: Moises, Rolman, Joe, and Samuel
Quintessential of their relationship: Kelley with high school Kelley
What can I say, I just love this girl. We're also pretty cute
The downstairs crew
These two.
I don't think there could be a picture that captures our relationship better than this one
The whole group for our Melchor Day!
The river, Melchor side, walking back towards the border
Sunday night Kelley and I were invited to one of our student's house to hang out and meet his family. It was our Primo (cousin en ingles. See my Placencia post for the back story). In typical Belizean fashion, his mom fed us the best chicken I've had here (breaded and baked!) and some darn good rice and beans as well as 2 desserts. Whenever you have someone to your house, you feed them an unbelievable amount of food, so we were practically rolling out of there.
We blend right in, yes? Primo with his mom and some of his siblings
Ok I hope you've been sufficiently satiated with the words and pictures from the past week of my life.
St. Maximilian Kolbe, pray for us.
Totus Tuus, Maria.
No comments:
Post a Comment