Thursday after school, we cleared out the 3 rooms that will get floors and put all the “furniture” in a room behind the school. I was very impressed by the boys. They would crawl under the tables and hoist it up on their backs and 3 of them would carry the tables to the room hunched over. A bunch of the girls, and a few boys, walked down to the lake in order to fill up vases (max 2 gallons) and empty liter bottles of coke and bring them up one by one to fill two huge barrels. The girls simply hiked up their “corte” (traditional skirts) and walked into the water to fill the vases. They wrapped their shawls around their hands to make a sort of cushion to put on their heads and carried the vases, on their heads, without using hands, all the way back up the hill, through the corn to empty them into the barrels. There were girls as young as 7 doing this without spilling. Of course, they played a bit in the water, but they did this work without complaining.

I talked with Roselda, the kindergarten teacher and she told me that they use lake water for everything: laundry, bathing, even drinking. The lake is relatively clear, but that doesn´t mean it´s clean enough to drink. I guess if it´s all that´s available, they have no choice.

I can hardly get mad or frustrated with these kids anymore. These kids have no time to study after school. Sometimes they don´t even have time to go to school. It´s simply not a priority here because the kids need to work in order to help their family survive with the little they have. Even when they´re at school, I can only imagine what else they´re thinking about. Yet, somehow, they can still act like kids during recess. They play soccer and tag. The only thing that´s different as far as I can tell, is that they simply don´t fight. I haven´t seen a fight yet. Of course they joke around, but no one´s been hit or kicked.

They continually amaze me and remind me how lucky I am. I had nearly perfect conditions for learning-good genetics, decent enough school system, parents that make enough money to survive without drinking lake water. I don´t know how they do it but somehow they have great responsibilities and also find some (though not much) time to be a kid.

These past few nights have been absolutely beautiful. Amazingly it hasn´t rained for a few days and at night the sky is perfectly clear. When I go on the roof of the house, I can see the black outline of San Pedro against the only slightly lighter sky. The moon is just to the left of the peak. Across the lake, I can see groups of city lights on the hills. There are a million stars in the clear sky. On Thursday, I sat on the roof for about an hour and felt the cool wind blowing while listening to the dogs barking and the murmur of voices. The only other thing I could wish for is a way to capture the moment.

I realized I have just 2 weeks of classes left and there´s still a ton of stuff I want to teach the kids but I realize it would take months in order for them to get a decent grip on the English language. Unfortunately, I don´t have that kind of time. I´ll just have to make due with what I´ve got and maybe I can leave some stuff for the teachers to continue with. Tomorrow, Diane comes to Santiago so I´ll get to see her. It´ll be nice to see a familiar face.

Theresa

go to July 6