Not a good start.
When we got up in the morning, there was no breakfast. Well, there was dry cornflakes, but no milk,
no bread and no water. Apparently we had
eaten our bread allowance as afternoon snacks!
Luckily I had some rations. Everyone blamed everyone else. I was very unhappy. Surely it was not that hard to organize the
food! Apparently we were supposed to
use our initiative and organize it ourselves. This must mean Elaine and I as we
are the only Indians in a place full of chiefs.
Then we found that our classroom had been invaded by red
ants. Elaine and I started sweeping
vigorously. But the more we swept, the
more ants there were. Finally I went
downstairs to have a look – they were climbing up from a nest in the ground
next to one of the supports. They seemed to have come with the rain! Luckily
the village chief (a real one for a change) who lived next door, gave us a rag
soaked in turpentine, which he wrapped around the post. And poured more turps into the ant
nest.
Tracy had prepared sheets of paper with alphabet characters and words for the children to trace over. They would draw the words, rather than write them, moving the paper around and using a ruler for all the straight lines.
I had made paper airplanes the previous day with some of the
boys, which were a huge success. Today
the little boy in shiny red pyjamas, which he wore most days, wanted one of my
sleek jet-streamed airplanes, but unfortunately I didn’t know what he
wanted. We both got pretty
frustrated! It was so difficult to
communicate. The children managed
better than I did by waving a finger at me, and saying ‘t-CHER No!’ or giving me a big smile and ‘t-CHER yes’
when I got it right!
I continue to be amazed at how keen they are to learn. Even the Cool Marble Gang sit quietly in class and write laboriously in their exercise books, in between kicking the kid in front, or quickly borrowing an eraser when no-one was looking. We had very little furniture and chairs had to double as desks.
Little Miss Toughie wore a woolen Christmas
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