Second wind

My postmate and I were tired. For the last three hours, we had been walking around the village with two of the girls from our soccer team searching (slightly in vain) for any amount of money that would ease the pain of the cost of transporting fourteen girls to and from our soccer tournament in Parakou that weekend. 

I looked over at Dave. He was slumped in the wooden chair in the room where we sat with my counterpart trying to determine our next course of action. I knew he was hungry and I knew he was dreading having to bike back to his house in the dark.

I was ready to call it. Dave and I had the money between us. It would just be a little harder to eat for the rest of the month. I explained this all to my counterpart in French in front of the two girls, who seemed significantly less tired than me and Dave.

When I got to the part of the story of how Dave and I were planning on paying for the difference between the two of us, the two girls perked up. When I had finished, they starting listing to my counterpart the people who were left in the village that we hadn’t visited yet.

“Madam,” they said to me. “If you’re not tired, we’re not tired.”

I smiled at their resolve to not let me and Dave just solve this problem ourselves: by throwing own our money at it. I was suddenly not tired anymore.

The new normal

When my English club stood up to close this week’s meeting by singing “Hello, Goodbye,” I thought about how we would look to an outsider:

Me, in front of 19 middle school-aged Beninese students, wearing pants in traditional fabric, plus my bright yellow dry-fit shirt from last year’s half marathon. My postmate’s dog is at my feet. He has just spent the better part of the meeting doing laps around the classroom with his tongue hanging out and scaring every student he approached. My postmate was in the back, dirty from that day’s bike rides and had just finished a conversation with a French teacher about how we elect presidents in the US.

I thought about my role in this ragtag group signing the Beatles and wondered when exactly this had become normal to me.

Hold tough

In my second year at my school, the most controversial thing I’ve proposed since starting continues to be my girls club. What other teacher and students say, though, doesn’t stop me. What I fear is that it will stop the girls.

I’ve started to dread 4 p.m. on Wednesdays, an hour after we start our meetings. All of the 5eme students show up around that time for their PE class, the teacher of which tends to be especially not understanding about the point of a girls club. During weeks when we’re having discussions, it means that I have to chase some students away from eavesdropping. During weeks when the girls play soccer, it means fielding constant demands from boys to let them play, a gathering of hecklers on the sidelines and the occasional degrading comment from the professor himself.

This week, the girls were in the second half of their scrimmage when the PE teacher called for the 5eme students to assemble under the cashew trees. He told them to line up and start running the perimeter of the field where the girls were playing. The game was soon interrupted by 86 5eme students walking two-by-two through the middle of the game to the other side of the field.

I was pissed at this interruption, but didn’t feel like starting an argument. All the girls got out of the way, except one.

Esther, who was goaltending on the far side planting herself in the middle of the goal and forced the two lines to fork around all four feet of her.

When another student caught me laughing at the situation, I’m pretty sure he thought I was laughing at the absurdness of Esther’s actions. I wasn’t.

I was laughing with joy to watch her stand her ground.

An excerpt from a student’s paragraph about what he did on holiday:

On holiday, I stayed in Mayamon. I studied my copybook and went to the fields. I saw the headmaster. One day, I went to school and saw a crocodile. He was eating the headmaster. Yes, I enjoyed my holidays.

I have this student, part 2

His name is Florentin. He’s in my 5eme class this year, but he was also in my 5eme class last year. He is reasonably smart, but with about two months left of school, he just stopped coming to all his classes. I don’t even remember if he took his exams at the end of the year. But regardless, here we are, doing the same song and dance that he and I did last year.

This year, though, he’s been named one of the leaders of the class. I was surprised, but hoped that the responsibilities that come with the role would keep him coming to class this time. They have, but the thing is, he’s beginning to care more about his responsibilities of being the leader than his responsibilities of being a student.

Instead of taking notes, he writes down the names of all the students who are chatting. Instead of listening to my lectures, he’s asking his friends which students are absent that day. With 15 minutes left of class, he asks to go take down the flag.

All these things are things that he legitimately has to do now. But, how do I convince him that there are other responsibilities while he’s at school that are more important than his newly-found ones? How do I convince him that watching all his classmates is not as important as the notebook sitting in front of him?

Another story about an interaction that makes me remember why I like being a teacher

I was teaching my 6eme class this morning. These are the youngest and tend to be the most shy students at the school.

Each class has two students (usually a girl and a boy) who are supposed to be the leaders of the class. (the prefects, if you will) These students are in charge of lining the class up for the flag ceremony, taking attendance and doing anything (within reason) that a teacher asks them to do.

I had 10 minutes left in this particular class period when I realized I hadn’t signed the attendance sheet yet for that day. In ordinary Beninese teacher fashion, I whispered to one of the students in charge (the girl) to go get the attendance book from the director’s office. 

I continued to walk through the class to make sure the other students were still working. When I made a pass back by her seat, I noticed she wasn’t back yet. I looked over to the director’s office and saw she was still standing outside in an apparent effort to conjure the bravery to step into the room.

I knew there were important people in the building at the moment. (the director, the vice principal, the president of the PTA) And I knew that she needed to learn how to not be scared to talk to people in authority.

But I also remembered how I used to feel at her age when I was afraid to make phone calls and talk to waiters at restaurants and bring a book with me everyone so I wouldn’t have to answer questions.

So, I retrieved the attendance book myself that day.

I have this student:

Florent is young and adorable and still a little naïve. He’s also smart (He had the second-highest grade in my class last year) and catches on fast to concepts and likes being at school. (Once, he refused to go home when he was sick until he was sick all over my classroom.)

He’s rarely in trouble. He’s usually in a good mood and doesn’t really get into fights with the other students.

He and I get along well. I appreciate that he studies for my class, and he seems to appreciate that I’m not like his other teachers.

And there’s something about him. Like he’s not quite yet chosen to believe that as a Beninese man, he’s entitled to everything before everyone else.

And I’m afraid I saw that being literally beaten out of him today at school.

First words

I grew up a reader. My mom would read to me every night before I went to sleep. Every summer, I participated in the summer reading program at my local library. Each week, I would go the library, load up on books and then sit on our steps, unable to make it all the way up to my room, and read. I learned at an early age how books can change who you are, what you do and what you think. 

I live now in a country where very few books exist. (The largest collection of books I’ve seen is the library at our Parakou workstation.) In my seven months in village, I have seen one child reading for pleasure.

My students don’t even have textbooks. We have 27 English books at my middle school, but until 2 weeks ago, they were locked in a closet to which I did not have a key.

Last Friday, I got the books out for the first time during my 6eme class. I had a lesson planned about vocabulary at the market and didn’t feel the need to take the time to draw tomatoes, onions and mangoes on the board. 

I don’t know how many, but I have a suspicion that for quite a few, this was the first book they had ever seen, let alone be able to touch and read. 

Within 5 minutes of passing out the books, I knew I was not going to be able to finish my lesson. My students had become absorbed by the pictures and words, and nothing I could do would pull them back out.

I looked at my phone. We had 20 minutes left. I sat down at my desk and faded into the background. There was no need to interfere.