true love

first, let me point out that there is a D.A.R.E. manual sitting next to the computer. awesome. this is going to be a long post. beware.

2-16-09
7:51 am

i love it here. we have yet to really get into a schedule or routine, so things are pretty chaotic, but the campus is gorgeous and the kids are really fun.

we spent our first night at a hotel by the airport. of course, i somehow missed the fact that the rooms had air conditioning, so i basically lost half my body weight in sweat that first night. i also got lost in the dark maze of the grounds. good times.

here on campus, i've got my own bedroom/bathroom and our guest house has a full kitchen and living area. these houses (there are 3, each can accomodate 6-8) are fairly new and very nice. plus, our house is named "simba" and you're greeted by a sign with a lion on it as you approach the house. it goes without saying that i mentally burst out in "i just can't wait to be king" everytime i walk in. we have a porch with adirondaks (no idea how to spell that) out front, overlooking the surrounding hills and part of campus. so far the only difficulty of the living situation is the showers. the water pressure is terrible. and by terrible i mean non-existant. yesterday i stood in the shower for over 10 minutes and didn't even get enough water out to wash my feet. i finally had to tiptoe across my room with my feet covered in soap and use my bottled water to get the suds off. you know how showerheads have all those little holes in them? the water comes out of ONE of those holes. i am on the verge of shaving my head and don't really plan on showering much. thank god you can't smell me from the states.

yesterday we got to eat lunch and dinner with the kids and got a tour by a few of the students. (as for the food, i have yet to decide whether i'll gain weight as they eat strictly carbs or whether i'll lose weight because i can't quite stomach rice laced with shards of cow bones.)

the students here are ages 10-19 and have each been hand-picked by peace house. because peace house is relatively new, there are currently 2 "forms" (which are like tanzanian grade levels)-form 1 and form 2. as the students age, peace house will add new forms. there will be about 100 students per form.

the kids are so grateful to be here and are anxious to learn everything from commerce to english to biology. the classes are taught in english, so they study hard to improve their language skills, as classes are easier for those who have better english. there are signs on classroom doors reminding them, "english first." peace house sends a team of staff (teachers, cooks, drivers... everyone is involved) out on "verification" (which i will get to do later in my trip!) for each student. the team visits the place the student is living and basically makes sure all their information is correct and then tells them in person that they've been accepted. all of the students are either orphans, "at-risk," or "vulnerable" and cannot afford to pay for schooling. many students come to peace house with nothing more than the clothes on their back. one girl was shown her twin-sized bed in her dorm and asked, "how many people am i sharing it with?"

peace house runs an exceptionally tight and efficient ship. the students each take 11 subjects and have mandatory study hours each day. they study 2 hours every weekday and 4 hours on sundays. they are each assigned a classroom to study in. there are not teachers supervising individual rooms, but because they're so happy to be there, the students actually utilize their study time. yesterday we walked past them and they all were quietly reading their books. i can't imagine a bunch of teenagers doing that in the states. pretty sure half of them would just leave.

the tanzanian schooling system is based strictly on memorization and standardized testing. the schools don't really accept or encourage critical thinking and analytical skills. peace house is starting to teach their students to go beyond the memorization and you can tell how much it's impacting their education. they asked us questions like, "how do you elect a president in the united states? (and as a follow up- "in tanzania, you must be a citizen to be elected president"... obviously asking about obama) what is the best way to succeed in school? how come america has street children if they're so wealthy?" peace house is also an extraordinary school because they just got a grant for a science lab, complete with microscopes. there are secondary school science teachers in tanzania who have never even seen a microscope in real life. they teach off of pictures of microscopes.

another cool thing about peace house is they're trying to become more self sustainable. some future plans include an irrigated farm plot, bunny hatches (to raise and then sell as food), chicken coops for eggs, sheep to "mow" campus, and they just planted lime, papaya, mango and banana trees. plus, part of campus is running off of solar power. the showers are heated by solar power, but the campus as a whole can only run off the solar energy for about 2 hours, so it's used as a back up.

the power here goes out frequently, but usually only for a couple hours. yesterday, however, it was out all day. i didn't even miss it until the sun started going down. we ate dinner as it was beginning to get dark and by the end of the meal it was basically pitch black. the kids were supposed to have 2 hours of study time after dinner, but because it was so dark, it was impossible to do so. one boy looked at me and said, "we are all so sad there is no power because we want to be reading."

the head mistress met with the students after dinner and told them to wait in their dorms until 9:00 and if there was still no power, to go to sleep. however, if the lights went back on by 9:00, they should go to the classrooms to study. well, at about 7:45 the lights went back on. all of a sudden, a stampede of students comes SPRINTING across campus, books in hand, to go study. it was incredible.

as a sidenote, the headmistress is unbelievable. she clearly loves the kids and her job. she got to go come to minneapolis last year and see the mall of america and ride an escalator for the first time. she truly wants the very best for each and every student and is so proud of the kids. last night when she arrived at dinner, the kids went silent within seconds and ran out to meet her and listen to her. another man had been trying to get the kids to quiet down for about 10 minutes with no success. also, her husband works for world vision here in town! we're probably going to be having dinner with her family sometime this week (all the teachers and their families live on campus) and i'm hoping to see what world vision is like over in this part of the world.

well, that's my exceptionally long post for now. hope everything in the states is going marvelously.




this is real. this is me. i'm exactly where i'm supposed to be. --demi lovato