So today was pretty much a normal day- woke up, went to Spanish- the usual. Sascha wasn't feeling the best, so she didn't come with me to volunteering. I was a little nervous and rightfully so because I do not speak much Spanish and it was extremely difficult. As I have said before... the kids don't speak much English... I was in a little bit of a pickle. I started out by reviewing clothing that we had learned the day before, though they were having difficulty understanding what I was talking about. I had them draw on the board items of clothing that I told them to draw, though they didn't seem to remember how to pronounce and of the items of clothing from the day before. After they finished drawing, I had them draw a person with clothes on and then write sentences of what they were wearing. It took the rest of class thankfully, but it was a little frustrating- there were about 20 kids and a lot of them can't really sit still. Finally class was over and I had the older kids, and they understand more English than the younger kids. The pictures were still up from the first class and so I had the kids write the words on board the correlated with the articles of clothes, and then they added a few more that weren't already on the board. Next we went on vacation- I would read them a scenario and they were write 3 sentences about what they would wear on each trip. They were really understanding what I was saying, until I told them they were going to a wedding- they had no idea what that was at all. I tried to explain in broken Spanish- thankfully I had learned the word for married in Spanish class that day so I thought they understood what I was saying. When I was reading their sentences though, they all said "I am wedding..." instead of "I am wearing..." I then realized that they had no idea what I was talking about and thought that a wedding was a verb not a noun. I was then trying to explain it, and then all of a sudden they got it. It took way longer than it should have, but I was really happy when they understood it.
After I got back from volunteering, I went home and got ready to go out for Amanda's birthday. A bunch of us met up to go to a bar that Carlos (the trip leader) was going to take us all to. It was a cute extremely small bar, and our group just kept growing eventually taking over the whole bar. It was fun and a great way to meet the new people- I tried to meet all of the new people- including all of the new Minnesotans. I don't know any of them personally, but I have mutual friends with a bunch of them. We then went to another bar to meet up with more people and then went dancing for a little bit before calling it a night and going back to the house.
Wednesday:
Today was my last day of Spanish, which was kinda strange. I am glad that I will have
more time to do stuff in the morning, but I was enjoying learning Spanish. I went from knowing almost nothing, to being able to speak a little. After Spanish, I met with Sascha to plan class for the day. We decided to teach them animals, and work a little bit on expressions as well. I had learned expressions in Spanish class, and thought it would be nice for the kids to answer more than "i'm fine thanks," when we ask how they are. After that we had them draw animals on the board, and then write the name in English. We will work more on animals with them Thursday, as we ran out of time today. For the older kids, did about the same except we added a few more animals for them. The rest of the day was relatively uneventful. I am trying to figure out what to do this weekend, so hopefully I will find something tomorrow. After that I had dinner and then watched Ted Talks for a while. I finished my book today which was awesome- I need to find more time to read, because that was the first book I had read for leisure since last winter break. For anyone that is interested in development that is working well, I would recommend the Blue Sweater by Jacqueline Novogratz to you.Thursday:
It feels so strange not having to be somewhere at 10 am. Most mornings, Sascha takes her host family's dogs on a walk, and so today I went with her to climb to the cross. The hike was only about 10 minutes up stairs and the view was breath taking. It was amazing to be able to see most of the city from the cross. After that, I just went back and relaxed before lunch. It was extremely strange staying home most of the
morning, and I dont think that I will be doing that tomorrow. I need to get out- it's boring staying in the house all morning. After lunch I headed to Maximo to figure out exactly what Sascha and I would be doing in class. We then headed to Alotonango for class. We went over animals again with the first class and then had them write what their favorite animal was. After that we tried playing a game where the kids would mimic an animal noise, but everyone was too shy to actually play. Before that class started, one of the kids Daniel, gave both Sascha and I some fruit called chico to try- it was extremely tasty. In the second class we went over the animals and then started teaching them question words. After class, we went to go buy some of that fruit that Daniel had given us earlier. When I got back to Antigua, to meet up with some people to try to figure out the weekend. We decided to go to Lake Atilan for the weekend and the market as well. I'm excited for the weekend- it should be fun. After-wards I went back home for dinner and then a bunch of us decided to watch the movie The Number 23.Friday:
So I slept in today, which was extremely nice, seeing as I haven't woken up past 8 all week- and today I woke up at 8. I then went to go explore Antigua a little, and did some shopping. I went to this market not too far from Maximo, that i was told was cheaper. I then figured out that I got ripped off quite a bit, but o well... I won't shop there again. After that I went to plan for the class, and then headed back for lunch. On the bus to Alogonango today, Isabelle, Saleh, and Baptiste were on it as well, probably because we were going pretty late. In the first class we had the kids write sentences describing the pictures we gave them. It was to help them work on clothes and colors. In the second class we worked on verbs and grammar. For the past few days there have been some booths selling food and toys appearing outside the school, we found out that there is a festival in town coming up, but both Sascha and I will have already left Guatemala by then. But as we were leaving the school today, we noticed a churro stand set up that wasn't there earlier. We got some and I think that we were their first sale, and they were so tasty. After that I just headed back to the house for dinner, and then went out for a bit.
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