Madame Fransistah

Hello Hello!

SO I have finished my second week of teaching in Tunayili! It has been fun, though is incredibley challenging at times. Getting to know the kids has been a lot of fun. Last week, we had two sports days, in which we went to Gushie, the next town up, by the main road for football and races, we lost all but one race, but had a great time there and are really beginning to feel like part of the school. Our schedule has changed, we teach 3rd and 4th grade english and physical education from 8:15 to 10:15 and then 5th and 6th grade english from 10:30 to 12, it is exhausting, but we really enjoy it.

We have also been getting to know the other teachers better, which has been very nice. One of them, Asana, is very quite. She cooks us dinner every night and is not a very good cook. She seems to think that making everything taste like fish is the way to cook, we have started snacking and preparing some of our own food. One of our favorite things to eat is canned hummus! We can buy breakfast in the community also most days. For 10-20 peswas, about 10 cents, we can get rice balls with groundnut (peanut) soup or fried doughy things called maha, both are delicious!

Three 5th grade girls, Zainab, Bantu, and Karima, have started coming over every day and insisted on doing any washing we have. This all started when they saw me washing our clothes in the wash bin last week. They came over and showed me how to do it properly, but whenever I try to help, Zainab, the most vocal, looks at me like I am crazy and says, "Madame stop!" After they finish they ask us for toffe, which means they want orange tic tacs.

There is a Peace Corps Volunteer, Shawn, in Dipali, the furthest village from the road, who we have been getting to know. She is very nice. Last weekend, she invited us over to watch a naming ceremony for a newborn baby. We didn't get to see much, but met a lot of her community and then went to her house for tortillas with steamed vegetables and apple pie, it was incredible! It has been nice getting to know her, she is very friendly and as she has been here over a year, has answers to a lot of the random questions we have.

Allright, time for me to sign off for now!
Lots of LOVE!