6-3-16

6-3-16

TGIF :) first full week of school is under our belt. It has been the most amazing week ever. Today was sort of a "fun Friday" in the schools. The classrooms actually had more coverage than we thought they were going to be because the student teachers did not attend the conference so there were more teachers than we had originally thought. We broke up into groups of two instead of threes so we could tackle more classes. We learned that school would be letting out at 11am because there was a girls netball game at 1pm. We later learned the game wasn't until 3pm. The wonderful world of school in Malawi :)
Our goal for the classes today was for them to copy the rules for our games in their books. For standards 4 and above, we had them copy it in English. The younger standards copied the rules in Chichewa. Once they had finished copying, we headed to the yard to play. Today for the first time I had a chance to work the standard 7 children. Once they finished copying a few students opted out of playing to stay in the classroom talking with me. The students inside with me started to show off their skills by reading the rules in Chichewa to me. They then proceeded to tell me it was my turn to read the rules in Chichewa. They went word for word through the whole sheet pronouncing the words and laughing at my attempt. By the end of it, I was surrounded by 10-15 standard 7 students, many of which were laying over my back to see the words. :)

The girls then told me they were going to teach me to play netball, which is the girls equivalent of basketball. We picture it as like being like water polo but on land. They (sort of) patiently taught me the rules of the game, but still laughing and yelled at me when I passed the ball to the wrong team. At one point, the student who deemed and called herself my best friend, came over end tied up the other side of my long skirt so it was knee length so i could run better. The same student found me after the game and untied my skirt. While I was playing netball, the other members of our group were engaged with the children in other games and songs. It was awesome to look around and see all the students happily playing with each other and 6 balls. :)

Innocent then lead us in another drumming lesson. He taught us three more beats. The father beat, that is slow and allowed for others to speak. Then there was the mother beat that was quicker because the women never stops talking. The final beat the children and it was the quickest because children are always into things. :)

After school we headed to watch what we thought was going to be a netball match, but ended up us hanging out by the field with other children from the demonstration school.
Once the bus picked us up we headed to visit Sammy's Mosque. Sammy is this wonderfully amazing man they for years has been taking care of the students traveling here with our group. We don't pay him for his services, but he looks out for us downtown, makes sure we know where we are going, knows everyone in town and is able to find anything we need. There we were met by a teacher there who taught us about the muslin culture and religion. It was amazing how wonderful and accepting both of these men are towards us and how they just wanted to share with us and proudly show us around their Mosque. I wish everyone could have this wonderful experience to open their eyes and mind.

The day then ended by a nice group dinner with friends swapping stories. :)