Rohit, Luzia, and the Orphans

Leaving the school this afternoon, I had possibly the best moment a teacher can have. Rohit, a boy in the grade 5 math class I've just recently started teaching, saw me coming, pulled away from the group of friends he was with, and whipped out his notebook to ask about the homework I'd given him. What's fantastic about this is that 2 weeks ago, Rohit would spend his time in math class energetically distracting, entertaining or hitting his classmates as they tried to work, but not doing a scrap of work himself. I was told by his previous teachers that never once had he completed any homework (though I have trouble placing much blame on him for this given that his parents can't afford the textbook from which most homework questions are given...as a side note, the textbook costs 210 Rs or about $3). Basically, he's so far behind the rest of the class that none of the explanations make sense to him and he would stare at questions without any hint of understanding about what he should be doing with them. He has trouble with the simple multiplication his classmates can all do easily by now and I think had essentially written off math as too far out of his range of abilities to even attempt. Today, after school, I only had to get about 6 words out before he remembered what I'd shown in class him about turning fractions into decimals, and he snatched his noteback back grinning and nodding with excited understanding. I've started writing separate homework questions for him since he has no book to get them from and today as I was giving them to him he said "melai dherai dinu!" (Give me lots!). It's unbelievably cool to see him so eager to do problems now that he's realized he actually can. Each day when I sit down with him and start showing him new, more difficult problems, he gets a concerned look on his face and asks for problems just like the old ones that he already knows how to do. But then I show him how he can work out the answers for himself and he enthusiastically starts to go through them.

Another volunteer has arrived in Kirtipur now. We found out she was coming about an hour before she showed up at the house and managed to move the prayer room up to the attic and arrange a bed for her just in time. She's from Switzerland and is here for 2 more months at this point. It's been highly entertaining watching her confused reactions to all the questions in Nepali that get thrown at her every day (and very reminiscent of some of my own feelings in the early days), but I've been enjoying my new role as translator. Especially when she first arrived, she had endless questions for me about "how does this work?" and "why do they do things this way?". I'm happy to answer them and feel much the same as I did the first time I ever had a summer student at work...it's the feeling of sudden realization of just how much I'd learned in a very short time since my own days of mass confusion. Being able to answer questions that had all at one point in time run through my own head can be pretty gratifying. It also made me think just how different my experience would have been if I'd had an interpretor and guide helping me every step of the way. I've decided I'm quite glad I didn't. Luzia, though, seems to have not expected Nepal to be as extremely different from home as it is and is finding the transition somewhat rough. She's expressed a lot of relief to have another foreigner here for support. I think she'll settle in just fine though once the initial shock wears off.

I managed to catch up with all the other long-term volunteers, many of whom I hadn't seen since our first two weeks together, yesterday at a fundraising event we had for Aishworya orphanage. The range of project situations is vast. For example, it's hard to hear about Jim's village orphanage where the children are forced to work at all times either on their school work, around the house or in the fields with not a moment for play and are regularly beaten for even the most minor of slip-ups. Jim finds it very wearing being there, but I think he knows his presence is a good thing. He remains determined to get through to the woman who runs it even though he's had no luck so far. On the other hand, there's the Aishworya Children's Home in Kathmandu where 2 volunteers are helping the one woman take care of 40 children in one of the happiest environments I've ever seen. Apparently, the children never fight with each other and when I went to visit on a Saturday, they were fully enjoying their day off school with a massive dance party in the main room. I'll try to get a couple pictures of it up when I can find a bit faster internet connection.

Namaste!