Shear Force, IDP's and Mentors

Thursday June 28, 2007

I cannot believe that I have been in Gulu for just over a week. It feels like so much longer! The last two days have been really great. Awere SS (secondary school) has been having testing all week, so our coordinator Amy had set up a couple other opportunities for us in the past few days, in order to keep us busy, and not just sitting around. And I have definitely been busy.

Shear Force

Tuesday I spent the whole day, from 9 am until 4pm going over the test which we gave to one of the classes. It was a 50 question test, and it was actually really, really difficult (and my Seniors at UMAHS thought they had it bad). It covered a very wide base of physics concepts, some very basic and others which would be covered in a University physics course in the States.
African time is definitely very different because we worked very slow, and literally spent THE WHOLE DAY just choosing the correct answers on the test, in order to make a marking guide (answer sheet). At one point I was ready to jump out of my skin. But, it was also good because Sheargold (I found out that I was misspelling his name) and I have been able to connect a lot and spend a lot of time talking. He had asked me if I could help him set up an email account, so of course I told him I could definitely go to the internet café with him. I told him that he needed to think about what his email address should be, and so I wrote out my whole name, and showed him what my email address is at gmail. He then wrote out his name, which I then found out was Sheargold, not Shagold. We talked about it, and he said, “No, it is not Shagold, but Sheargold. Like shear force, in physics.” Jokingly I then added, “So your email address should be shearforce@ gmail.com He thought that was hilarious, and we both laughed.

IDP Camps

On Wednesday I spent the morning at school actually not doing much of anything. Everyday my teacher has said that he will be at the school at 9am, but he shows up sometime between 10am and 10:15am. But T.I.A. (This Is Africa). That’s what we say to one another when we come across something which is culturally very different, but typically we use it in reference to time. So enough about that, I left the school in the afternoon, and went to Awer IDP Camp (pronounced Away Camp). We went with Walter, who is the Bracelet Program manager for the Awer Camp. It was definitely an experience I won’t soon forget. Just a ton of grass huts in the middle of nowhere really. It is really just like a small town. As we drove out to the camp, Walter told us a lot about the camps, and the history of the camps. Apparently the road we drove out on (which was probably in the worst condition of all the roads I've been on) use to be very very unsafe, and many people were abducted or killed while traveling on that road. It became very easy to understand how the LRA can easily hide only 1,2, 3 or so meters from the road, and no one would know they were there. Once we got into the camp we were asked to sign in at two different locations. At one of the locations, the Director of the camp gave us this whole speech in Lwo. Walter then translated it into English for us. The director told us that we needed to go home, and tell people about what we saw. That maybe since we have seen with our own eyes, people will believe, b/c they do not believe the newspapers. And it truly was a very powerful experience, and a great place to see with my own eyes. We walked through the camp, and so many children followed us through the camp. It was like we were the pied pipers. We didn’t even ask for it, they just followed us, and we very quickly turned into a parade. The kids would just come up to you and grab your hand, and walk beside you. It was crazy. We then had time to sit inside the hut where the bracelet makers worked, and we watched them make some bracelets, and then they showed us how they are made. I sat with a woman named Filder. She was really great, and her son Emmy was totally cute. They make about 8-10 a day, but they can only make 40 a week. From there, the bracelets go through quality control, and the makers are only paid for the ones that pass quality control. Visiting the camp was an experience I will never forget. Did I mention that I won’t forget my visit to Awer Camp?

Mentors

Today (Thursday) I began my day at school, starting to mark papers. There are so many papers to mark, and honestly I’ve only done about a ¼ of one out of three classes. But anyway, I left school after a few hours, and went over to the IC offices to meet up with a mentor. Then I had the opportunity to shadow an Invisible Children Education Program Mentor. Every child which receives a scholarship for school through IC, also is assigned a mentor who guides them through issues like school, health, affects from the war, growing up, and life in general. They sort of act like a Guidance Counselor b/c schools here do not have counselors (yeah LC!). It was great b/c we visited many houses and our mentor Stella was so great. I actually went to a house of one of my students, and even though she was not there, it was wonderful to meet her parents. They were so proud to be able to invite “the American teacher who teaches our daughter” into their home (read grass hut).

Basically I have had a couple of very amazing days, despite not being in the classroom yet. It will be very weird b/c we will only have 3 weeks in the classroom, while other teachers would’ve had the chance to have 4 weeks in the classroom. I am hoping that I will still have a great experience, as things are still going very well. Oh yeah, and today Komakech Sheargold (my Ugandan teacher) invited me to go visit his village in just over a week. I cannot wait to go. It shall be really great!

Wanen lachen. (See you later)