June 19, 2012: Touring the schools in Lower Virginia, Liberia

June18/ Touring the schools
About Liberia, West Africa, my experience: There is no way to show what the 14 year Civil War did to this country. There is no way to explain the poverty, the filth, the utter devastation left on the people and yet explain the almost tangible hope they seem to have. That being said, here is my attempt: For one, there is no trash service. Trash lines the road, floods from the house and, due to the rainy season, literally moves across the street in rivers of iron- colored goo. The smell while driving is of pure petrol and putrid air and cycles in and out through our windows as we drive over the giant pot holes and through the seas of people walking to and fro with bundles on their heads. The smell of people permeates the markets and lines the food with an almost tastable BO. It is like everything is crowded into one space, lining the streets with raw food and dirty umbrellas, people and their merchandise and at the same time, there is nothing really worth much, nothing Yet, there is something that is so alive and wonderful about the whole scenario. Commerce is alive, the people are beautiful and the hope for a better future lives in their minds, I feels as if there is so much to do and it all needs to be done now. When I think about what is meant for me in my life, having a cause like this, wherein I know I can make a difference even though small, is important. The ladies I am working with are amazing people. I know they feel the same way.

There is also no electricity so everything is run on gas generators. The houses are made of concrete and of course, have no AC. They have no light and no windows, just open areas about the size of an ipad to let the air run through. Mostly though, it means that the bathroom stench (which is not even in a bathroom but is totally just pooped out behind the house.The water that runs down the street is just filled with junk, both biological and refuse. I cant imagine that they are healthy and I completely see the lack of care for their community as why they will struggle for a long time. Even today, the contact person for the libraries, Glorious, threw her Fanta can on the beach as we were walking! After a week of working on understanding the importance of the wetlands and how the environment affects how we engage with our world, the damn can hit the beach. I had to school her and well, carry the can back.

We are staying at a fancy hotel, one of the better ones for Liberia, yet there are cockroaches and everything works, almost. That seems to be a trend here in Liberia: Make everything look good but then when you get down to it, it is broken, flawed and a mess, but a fairly good looking mess. The Cape Hotel is like that. The pictures, even on the internet, make it sound so enticing, but when you get here, it is well, sort of okay.
We spent the first day visiting the schools. I am always reminded that our students who fane poverty are guaranteed the right to go to school. They all get free lunch, and they all are provided electricity, and supplies. It is such a farce to say that our children are in extreme poverty. Poverty yes, extreme, no.

So, the schools: We saw 6 schools (the 7th will occur later in the trip) wherein the teachers will spend 2 weeks at a workshop learning about service learning, KWLA, and other best practices, lesson planning and assessment, particularly ongoing assessment, they are very good at assessing with TESTS (capital TEST). We, Kristy, JooYoung and I have met many times with Kathy to work through our plans. Even now, before we have actually started I know there will be revisions to our ideas and curriculums. Simple things such as while Liberians speak English, they are difficult to understand being that they drop the final sounds and of course have an accent. That being said, they sound as if they speak so fast! So, if that is true for them, it most certainly is true of our American accent, it will be problematic. My Texas drawl and fast speech will be hard for them. But, we will struggle together and learn a lot. I love language! And so far, these people as well!

Their schools are all similar concrete buildings with tin roofs, humid, no electricity, large classes in a room the size of my living room and one teacher, one blackboard and chalk. There is a well close by where kids or others pump the water when needed. There are no bathrooms, although there is a room that has a toliet basin where they go and then wash it out with a bucket. God forbid if you have the classroom with an adjoining wall. The chalkboard is a black board that doesnt really erase and a box of very humid, crumbly chalk for the year. The desks are made of wood, most are rickety and scary for someone my size to sit on. A couple of the schools have benches. It is all very "Little House on the Prairie" without any of the charm. There are no posters, no tablet paper, little supplies and nothing to make a teacher's job easy. I do so hope our strategies, planned with little supplies needed, will be usable for them!

When we arrived at Brefo, one of the schools, there were teachers there (one walking with a cane in hand in case punishment was needed?) and children. "Gather the little children" kept running through my head as plentiful kiddies were around and within minutes I was surrounded, showing them my cell phone camera and laughing at my dog videos along side. That would be my learning today: Children gather to listen and learn, no matter where in the world they are. They long for affection, time,value and literacy. They will gather in His name to be enlightened. Today, I sat among angels in dirty clothes with runny noses and little in their tummies and yet, felt hopeful. There is work for me here. I can feel it.

Because there are so few books, Kathy and Anne have been creating libraries in the schools. These libraries are basically classrooms (although one library is housed in one of the teacher's homes, with cinder blocks and about 400 books on wooden planks. The planks bow low because the weather is so humid. It is dark, sticky and the books are dusty as most dont get checked out. Books are such a commodity that everyone is scared to let them go. We saw libraries with padlocks, shelves at the ceiling and screened window holes (there are NO glass windows, of course). Later, Anne told me that in Liberia, in general, there are few books and that many books' pages were used for making cones to sell peanuts (an easy crop here). That just shows merge lack of understanding for the importance of books and more importantly, literacy and education. It will take a psychosocial shift in consciousness to make them change! But, I KNOW we can do it.

The librarian is a woman hired for the about $25 a month to run the library. She (at all 6) is herself most likely a struggling reader and has been told to keep the books safe, which for most means that they are padlocked and only allowed to be taken out by a student for an hour or 2 and a teacher the same. The teachers have very limited access and in some cases, no books to teach with and the libraries, funded and established by Kathy, Anne and others, have not been used well. Glorious, the education point person in Liberia, is in charge of making sure the libraries get utilized. She is in a state of literacy growth herself and, I believe, struggles to understand her roles and responsibilities, but has passion and will learn over time, like all of us. There are shifts happening everywhere in Liberia! Kathy and Anne have done amazing things getting these libraries here, amazing. Now, the hard work of training teachers and holding them accountable for using the books, of not being scared to lose them, of recognizing the importance of text, while living half a world away begins. I'm glad I get to be a part of that! It will be a profound psychological and social shift! Kathy was on it like white on rice as we toured. In time, like the ladies before me, I know it WILL happen. Faith is something I can already tell is important when working here.

After we returned from our tour, walking in mud and grime, we met for dinner, and regrouped to begin tomorrow with the conference. These ladies are hilarious! We drank wine, laughed and I decided I adore everyone one of them. Boy, this is going to be hard work, fun, but hard work! I'm already glad to know them.