Randomness

A lot of different things have been going on but nothing all at the same time. It is hard to categorize and sort out everything into different blog posts so I figured I would cheat and throw everything into one! Where to start is the question. 

Well, we had our site visits in this region with our Field Director from WorldTeach. He came and saw where we were living as well as talked with our Principals, Inspector, and observed our classes. They went fairly well and I think we all learned a little bit from them. We still have not yet received our first paychecks in this region which kind of stinks but things are slow here. Hopefully by next week they will be cut for us. 

My application for the grant money from the Embassy has been successfully submitted. I called Wednesday to check to see if they had received all of my paperwork and they confirmed they had. They will meet to discuss the applications in 2 weeks time. From there they are then brought to the Ambassador to be looked over and have suggestions made. We were told that we will find out mid April whether or not we will be approved. That is perfect timing because then we go on holiday and come back ready to get down and dirty; literally.

With that being said, our first term is coming to an end. We only have a couple weeks left and we will be finishing up term 1 out of 3. It is crazy how fast things have gone. I am a little nervous for the close of this term because our classes have changed again. When my director visited he informed the school that I was overloaded on classes; which I was definitely overwhelmed teaching all that I was teaching; especially Grade 5 English. We were having a big discussion that led no where on how we are supposed to change up our classes. I am still not sure. I am now teaching Grade 7 English, Math, Science, PE for grades 5-7 and B.I.S. for grades 5-7. B.I.S. stands for Basic Information Science. It is kind of like library science and teaching the kids about computers and things like that. Unfortunately, we don’t have computers so that won’t be an easy topic to teach. My school is just trying to keep me on my toes by changing up my classes every couple of weeks haha.

WIth the close of term 1 my mom and Krista come to visit! In between Term 1 and Term 2 we have about a month off to travel and relax. We have a conference in Windhoek at the end of April for a few days in order to talk about how our time is going and then we are released to do whatever we want to do. Mom and Krista are flying into Windhoek on the 29th and are staying for about 2 weeks. We haven’t really hammered down what we are doing yet but have our first 2 nights booked in a nice lodge in Windhoek. Mom is being a champ and doing all the research with Krista seeing as my internet is limited. I know that Etosha and Epupa Falls as well as where I live are on the list but beyond that I am not too sure what we are doing. Mom has gotten all of her shots and I believe Krista has also. ONE STEP CLOSER! It is hard to imagine that after 3 months I will be seeing my mom in about 1 months time. Man, how time flies... in a good way!

I have been so blessed by all the generous donations people have been handing to my parents! The project is close to being fully funded and will allow me to buy all of my students mattresses. It has been really encouraging to see children donating money from their piggy banks and report cards in order to buy these children mattresses to sleep on. I am currently working on trying to figure out how we are going to get the mattresses from Opuwo to Otwani but I am sure, like everything else, it will work out the best way possible.

Those are most of my updates for now. I am starting to get into a better routine of writing and answering emails. If anyone wants to email me they can send it to awillo1.ca@gmail.com. I only get to check it about 1 time a week but I dedicate a lot of my time on Friday afternoons to answer them. You guys are all 5 hours behind me (East Coast people) so you might even have an answer by the time you check your emails Friday morning. Love and Missing home but loving my new home here!