Snakes: absolutely not
So I last posted my update I think midweek last week, not countin my short story. So I’ll run through all that’s happened since then. It was a mad busy couple days. First of all at some point an ant bit the hell out of my foot. It’s a huge red circle on my ring toe (left foot…everything bad to my feet has been the left) and it actually is swelling up the left side of my foot below the toes. It’s crazy. I am justified in hating the ant species.
Our first mail call was last week. About half of the people here in Mandurriao got letters or packages from home, I did not which was a bit of a bummer but I really want to give a shout-out to the people that have taken the time to send me e-mails, facebook messages, or skyped me in the past week or two. You guys are awesome, thank you so much. Mary, Lindsey, Rebecca, Ryan, Heather, Jeremy, Allison and of course Amy, Mallori, Mom and Dad =). And a special shout out to Ebben in PC Burkina Faso. I got to chat with him the other day on our mutually sketch internet connections, was awesome to hear from him. He’s doin great things in BF!
Thursday I co-taught for the first time. My counterpart and I were sposed to meet at 930 before our first lesson at 1000. Unfortunately she didn’t get there until 1000 so yeah we didn’t get a chance to prepare much at all. This happens a lot in the PI. So we winged it. Never good for teachers. The 1000 lesson was pretty bad in my estimation. I knew which part I was doin but not really how we were gonna transition into it and what she’d be doin durin my part and vice versa. It wasn’t very smoothe. Fortunately Carlos (my Technical and Cultural Facilitator…basically my technical trainer) wasn’t observin that one so I got a chance to talk with my CP (counterpart) between the 1000 and 1100 lessons and kinda iron things out. The 2nd part went well, I even modified my part to use my visual aid as kind of a participation activity…it being a poster of different types of formal and informal letters. The students had to arrange them and what not. I had lunch with some of the other PCT’s and CP’s and Dexi, Kelsey’s CP, gave me some delicious squash to mix in with my rice. It was gooooooood.
Friday we had a pizza party durin TCF class for Sharon (our LCF…language teacher) and Jaron, another PCT. We all gorged ourselves on pizza hut pizza, rocky road ice cream, cake, and coke. So American. So good. That night we went to Smallville, which is where the bars and restaurants and night life is around here, and rented out a videoke room. Videoke is Karaoke + music videos. It took two vans to get all of us down there. At one point we had to stop and pick up Ryan at SM City (a mall). I commented to the van in general that it’d be pretty easy to find the tall white guy in a crowd of Filipinos. I was right…except I found the wrong tall white guy. I ran into Jaron there on the way to dinner w/ his host fam. What are the odds? Wrong tall white guy. Anyway we fetched Ryan and hit up Smallville. No one really wanted to sing at first, but eventually Red Horse did its duty and we all abandoned our assorted inhibitions. Oh, by the way, take it from someone who has never (friends will attest) been one to sing in public, do karaoke, or otherwise be involved with microphones; you sound way different on a microphone than what you think you sound like. Wow. This was my song selections more or less, mind you the farther down the list we go the more I was joined by friends and the less control I had over the picking of course…
-Sex and Candy (I scored a 100 despite an awful throat…foreboding my current illness. That’s right, 100 on my first try. But let’s be real, we all knew I was gonna ace that one right?)
-I will Survive (foolish, I know)
-Johnny B. Goode (duet, was awesome but impossible)
-I want it that way (a crowd favorite, but not really my jam to say the least)
-Some N’sync song that I didn’t really know, it was like their ballad. Not proud of that one either
-And for the finale the terrific trio of Jason, Ryan and Andrew concluded with Total Eclipse. Oh yeah, scored 100 there too.
I remember a conversation with Sean the next day that went something like this:
Me “Dude you sang Reflection from Mulan last night. Definitely lost some man cards there)
Sean “So? You sang Total Eclipse of the Heart!”
Me “Yeah but we got a 100. At least we sound good while makin asses out of ourselves”
This may or may not be us singing "Total Eclipse" haha
Saturday I woke up early and went with Sean and Carlos to go watch the Mandurriao National High School’s Hampang (which is basically a day of sport). They go to this big field w/ track, a pool, bball courts, tennis courts, etc etc. All the sports. The grade levels (freshmen, sophs, juniors, and seniors) all compete against each other in all the sports and competitions. I promised my host sister Sapphire I’d go watch her play chess…and she wan the ‘Ship for the Junior class happy to say. It was interestin to watch and see. I got some pics too I’ll put up at some point when my connection’s good…
Sunday I woke up with a splitting ear-to-ear headache. I basically just ate and laid in bed. Played some Plants vs Zombies on my computer…epic game. Serious. You harvest sun, put plants into the ground, and they fight the Zombies trying to get into your house. Basically a tower defense game. So funny. Plants and Zombies, what a combination. Try it out for free somewhere, it's crazy common on the internet! I got real familiar with my medical kit from Peace Corps. It’s dead useful when sick. I also had some Dayquil in my toiletries bag…lucked out there. I watched Liverpool against Manchester United. Great game, Dimitar Berbatov had one of the best goals I’ve ever seen. Too bad the wrong team won =/. At least the Gators took the 6th straight from the Vols. I wonder how far we’ll drop in the polls for winnin another game by double digit margins?
Plants vs. Zombies
Finally, today began our PACA week. PACA stands for Participatory Analysis through Community Action…or somethin like that. I dunno, it’s kinda interesting but not overly useful but PC makes us do it. Some aspects look like they’ll help a lot but other seem redundant. Basically a current PCV comes and helps us out with it and shares their experience. My cluster’s PCV is Jason. He’s a cool guy and I think the most important thing I learned is that when a Filipino is harassing you to buy something or whatever just pretend to be a French tourist and babble away in French. Sounds awesome. He said literally evertime he’s in Manila he’s a French tourist.
No teaching this week but next week we go to Bacolod!! It’s a city on Negros Occidental and it’s where our supervisor’s conference is. We meet our next host family, find out where we’re gonna be livin for the next 2 yrs at permanent site, get some time on a resort, meet our future CP, and travel to our next host fam’s house/dwelling/shack/whatever for an overnight trip. Cannot wait!
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