Monday, August 02, 2004
FRIDAY, JULY 30
The Peace Corps promised that we would have periods of frustration. Well ... they were right.
It’s Tanzania. That student instructor from the U.Dar who was here last Friday? He hasn’t been seen or heard from since. So I gave my test on the chemical equilibrium work we had been covering, and scrambled to move on to a new topic on the conservation of energy and the first law of thermodynamics.
But the test was depressing. First, many students were simply not there – an absentee rate as high as 70% in Section C. The absentees will get zeros anyway – I am becoming a hardass about stuff like that - but that is not an encouraging sign. Although scores were generally pathetic there was a full range, even two A’s. But there were tons of zeros – and worse. I’d warned every class that there would be a question about chemical formulas again, and if anybody still said that a chemical formula tells you a ratio by mass they would not get a zero on that question, they would LOSE ten points.
At least 20% of the students got the -10 points anyway! I have no solution for that. That is not a language problem, it is not a lack of understanding. It can only be a willful decision to have nothing to do with this required course of chemistry.
I guess I will have to bring in the Academic Master on the attendance issue. I hate to – that simply means the absentees will get whipped some more. I talked to a couple of my students about it, looking for ideas, but even they say that Tanzanian students have to be whipped or they will not come to class. But damn, I don’t want to be party to that! Hearing the crack of the whip every day and seeing the kids wince really bothers me. So does the look on the face of the teachers doing the whipping.
After not hearing as promised from the Acting Director of Kuleana about how they might help the Skills for Life TZ! project, I dropped in for a status report early this week. Edith promised to get in touch with me by Thursday. Didn’t happen of course. So today (Friday) I dropped in again. The new date for a discussion is tomorrow at 11:00. We’ll see.
Of course, I haven’t heard any more from the Rotary Club either. Or from my two instructors after I text messaged them advising them to wait another month before they come back from Arusha.
And my new crop of corn was growing nicely in its corral... Until yesterday, when my negligent neighbor’s goats destroyed it. I chased them out on their first pass, but wasn’t there for their second pass and they really must have enjoyed themselves.
So long as I am cataloging frustrations, I’ve been without running water for a week because the flex line to my toilet sprung a bevy of leaks. I bought a replacement line, but it didn’t seem to fit. So I bought a replacement fitting with valve and float, but it was no better. I’ve been after the school maintenance guy to look at it, but he was waiting for a contractor that they couldn’t find. He finally came over today and said it couldn’t be fixed. Swell.
So by necessity I fixed the fitting myself by wrapping the threads with unraveled twine the way I’d seen a Tanzanian plumber work when I first came here. Back then I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just use the teflon tape he had in his kit. Now I know. But after all that I couldn’t get the float mechanism to shut off the water after the bowl filled. So I doubled the washers in the valve to stop all the water flow to the toilet. At least now I have water for my shower and sinks, and can always use buckets to flush the toilet.
** **** **
SATURDAY, July 31, 2004
That Kuleana appointment with Edith for 11:00am? Sure. I got a text message about 9:00 from Edith saying that she was sick and couldn’t come to the office today. She had suggested the time, but I should have expected that the chances of her coming to the office on a weekend were pretty slim. The new date is now Monday afternoon.
Today has not alleviated my sense of frustration. The goats returned to make sure they hadn’t overlooked anything interesting in my corn patch. I took a couple of the newly re-mangled stumps with healthy clods of dirt attached and threw them into my neighbors house... again. That resulted in a bilingual shouting match in which neither of us understood the other, but it felt good to release some energy anyway.
This is also the season when Tanzanians hack away at every tree in sight with machetes (pangas, in Kiswahili), cutting most down and just mangling the rest. I don’t understand it – something about it being the best time of year to cut down trees. They pile up the wood in stacks to use the branches for firewood and the trunks for burning to make charcoal. Anyway, some other neighbors engaged in this sport dragged hefty sections of trees through the middle of my garden. So much for the onions, the remaining peppers and half the tomato plants that were just beginning to produce.
So I ended the day by walking up to the overlook. The incredible view and the silence and the absence of anyone likely to speak Kiswahili does wonders for my state of mind. It is always a good place to look for wildlife, too. No monkeys tonight, but I did see a big brown bat flitting and swooping for the first time. And one of the large owls up there sat silhouetted on top of a monumental rock for quite a while, surveying the neighborhood. I tried to answer its Hooo Hoooo with my own, but it didn’t seem interested in my efforts at all.
I stayed longer than usual as the red faded from the sky and walked home in the light of a magnificent cream-yellow full moon.
The Peace Corps promised that we would have periods of frustration. Well ... they were right.
It’s Tanzania. That student instructor from the U.Dar who was here last Friday? He hasn’t been seen or heard from since. So I gave my test on the chemical equilibrium work we had been covering, and scrambled to move on to a new topic on the conservation of energy and the first law of thermodynamics.
But the test was depressing. First, many students were simply not there – an absentee rate as high as 70% in Section C. The absentees will get zeros anyway – I am becoming a hardass about stuff like that - but that is not an encouraging sign. Although scores were generally pathetic there was a full range, even two A’s. But there were tons of zeros – and worse. I’d warned every class that there would be a question about chemical formulas again, and if anybody still said that a chemical formula tells you a ratio by mass they would not get a zero on that question, they would LOSE ten points.
At least 20% of the students got the -10 points anyway! I have no solution for that. That is not a language problem, it is not a lack of understanding. It can only be a willful decision to have nothing to do with this required course of chemistry.
I guess I will have to bring in the Academic Master on the attendance issue. I hate to – that simply means the absentees will get whipped some more. I talked to a couple of my students about it, looking for ideas, but even they say that Tanzanian students have to be whipped or they will not come to class. But damn, I don’t want to be party to that! Hearing the crack of the whip every day and seeing the kids wince really bothers me. So does the look on the face of the teachers doing the whipping.
After not hearing as promised from the Acting Director of Kuleana about how they might help the Skills for Life TZ! project, I dropped in for a status report early this week. Edith promised to get in touch with me by Thursday. Didn’t happen of course. So today (Friday) I dropped in again. The new date for a discussion is tomorrow at 11:00. We’ll see.
Of course, I haven’t heard any more from the Rotary Club either. Or from my two instructors after I text messaged them advising them to wait another month before they come back from Arusha.
And my new crop of corn was growing nicely in its corral... Until yesterday, when my negligent neighbor’s goats destroyed it. I chased them out on their first pass, but wasn’t there for their second pass and they really must have enjoyed themselves.
So long as I am cataloging frustrations, I’ve been without running water for a week because the flex line to my toilet sprung a bevy of leaks. I bought a replacement line, but it didn’t seem to fit. So I bought a replacement fitting with valve and float, but it was no better. I’ve been after the school maintenance guy to look at it, but he was waiting for a contractor that they couldn’t find. He finally came over today and said it couldn’t be fixed. Swell.
So by necessity I fixed the fitting myself by wrapping the threads with unraveled twine the way I’d seen a Tanzanian plumber work when I first came here. Back then I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just use the teflon tape he had in his kit. Now I know. But after all that I couldn’t get the float mechanism to shut off the water after the bowl filled. So I doubled the washers in the valve to stop all the water flow to the toilet. At least now I have water for my shower and sinks, and can always use buckets to flush the toilet.
** **** **
SATURDAY, July 31, 2004
That Kuleana appointment with Edith for 11:00am? Sure. I got a text message about 9:00 from Edith saying that she was sick and couldn’t come to the office today. She had suggested the time, but I should have expected that the chances of her coming to the office on a weekend were pretty slim. The new date is now Monday afternoon.
Today has not alleviated my sense of frustration. The goats returned to make sure they hadn’t overlooked anything interesting in my corn patch. I took a couple of the newly re-mangled stumps with healthy clods of dirt attached and threw them into my neighbors house... again. That resulted in a bilingual shouting match in which neither of us understood the other, but it felt good to release some energy anyway.
This is also the season when Tanzanians hack away at every tree in sight with machetes (pangas, in Kiswahili), cutting most down and just mangling the rest. I don’t understand it – something about it being the best time of year to cut down trees. They pile up the wood in stacks to use the branches for firewood and the trunks for burning to make charcoal. Anyway, some other neighbors engaged in this sport dragged hefty sections of trees through the middle of my garden. So much for the onions, the remaining peppers and half the tomato plants that were just beginning to produce.
So I ended the day by walking up to the overlook. The incredible view and the silence and the absence of anyone likely to speak Kiswahili does wonders for my state of mind. It is always a good place to look for wildlife, too. No monkeys tonight, but I did see a big brown bat flitting and swooping for the first time. And one of the large owls up there sat silhouetted on top of a monumental rock for quite a while, surveying the neighborhood. I tried to answer its Hooo Hoooo with my own, but it didn’t seem interested in my efforts at all.
I stayed longer than usual as the red faded from the sky and walked home in the light of a magnificent cream-yellow full moon.
