Faith Gilbertson Superstar
Okay,
Here it goes. The very first day, September 1, Wednesday, the children enter my classroom, one by one, and the parents do not leave. The children see other children crying, so they start to cry and then everybody is crying and they do not stop. So, I get instructions from the main office that the parents need to leave. So, we proceed to take the children outside and then the parents leave but really don't leave. They go outside the fence, the kids see their parents, start to cry more and then, finally, when the parents leave and we get them back upstairs, they go to the room and then the crying turns into vomiting. Three of them. Two boys and a girl. They cried so hard they made themselves puke. I have one child Hassan who I refer to affectionately as "the scratcher" because when I took him away from his parents he proceeded to hit me, pull my lip down violently with his little hands and scratch my face, neck and arm. I have a war wound on my left cheek right in front of my ear. I neosporined my war wounds and showered right when I got home. He is not even 3. He will be three in October.
[That’s right, folks: Faith’s 24-student “kindergarten” class has three and even two year olds in it....
And here’s something a bit more recent:]
Lee and I have survived the second week okay. No puking but a lot of peeing in their chairs. When Dina my assistant asked one of my boys, Mina, if he wet himself (we could not tell for sure because sometimes they spill their water bottles over and it looked like he might have done that, but in the end he HAD wet himself), he said, no, it was another little boy and that little boy had already left. Well, I told Lee that on the way home and I thought LEE was going to pee, because we were laughing so hard. We were envisioning that another little boy got into his pants and peed on them and then left. This Mina kid is quite funny. He is a chunky little boy who speaks to me only in Arabic and throws me and my assistant kisses. He likes to be near me all the time and he does not interact with the other children as much as he should. But he is getting better.
"The Scratcher,” Hassan, has turned out to be a great little boy. We almost had 3 days tear free except he fell off the toy horse during garden time and hit his lip on the ground. We had some blood and tears but no permanent injury. His mother sits in the car and waits everyday. He is her first born. Sweet woman and Hassan is going to turn out to be one of my favorites.
Also, I have another student, Tamer, that I thought was going to be a big problem, but he in fact is turning out to be a great kid. A little rambunctious but I put him once in time out and the threat of going there again scares him. He is so beautiful to look at it just melts your heart. He has this gorgeous milky white skin, black curly hair, brown eyes and long eyelashes. And he is smart, extremely fast, and speaks english quite well.
[One other charming story: one of Faith’s students, Mina I think, blows her kisses all the time and recently told her that he would “wait for her.” This is, if you didn’t know it, a very marriage-centered culture!
In conclusion, for the time-being, on the teaching front, we both are hanging in there and learning more and more each day about how to survive teaching in Egypt, in this school, and with these kids. We have no doubt that things will get better, and are looking forward to whatever comes next.]
Here it goes. The very first day, September 1, Wednesday, the children enter my classroom, one by one, and the parents do not leave. The children see other children crying, so they start to cry and then everybody is crying and they do not stop. So, I get instructions from the main office that the parents need to leave. So, we proceed to take the children outside and then the parents leave but really don't leave. They go outside the fence, the kids see their parents, start to cry more and then, finally, when the parents leave and we get them back upstairs, they go to the room and then the crying turns into vomiting. Three of them. Two boys and a girl. They cried so hard they made themselves puke. I have one child Hassan who I refer to affectionately as "the scratcher" because when I took him away from his parents he proceeded to hit me, pull my lip down violently with his little hands and scratch my face, neck and arm. I have a war wound on my left cheek right in front of my ear. I neosporined my war wounds and showered right when I got home. He is not even 3. He will be three in October.
[That’s right, folks: Faith’s 24-student “kindergarten” class has three and even two year olds in it....
And here’s something a bit more recent:]
Lee and I have survived the second week okay. No puking but a lot of peeing in their chairs. When Dina my assistant asked one of my boys, Mina, if he wet himself (we could not tell for sure because sometimes they spill their water bottles over and it looked like he might have done that, but in the end he HAD wet himself), he said, no, it was another little boy and that little boy had already left. Well, I told Lee that on the way home and I thought LEE was going to pee, because we were laughing so hard. We were envisioning that another little boy got into his pants and peed on them and then left. This Mina kid is quite funny. He is a chunky little boy who speaks to me only in Arabic and throws me and my assistant kisses. He likes to be near me all the time and he does not interact with the other children as much as he should. But he is getting better.
"The Scratcher,” Hassan, has turned out to be a great little boy. We almost had 3 days tear free except he fell off the toy horse during garden time and hit his lip on the ground. We had some blood and tears but no permanent injury. His mother sits in the car and waits everyday. He is her first born. Sweet woman and Hassan is going to turn out to be one of my favorites.
Also, I have another student, Tamer, that I thought was going to be a big problem, but he in fact is turning out to be a great kid. A little rambunctious but I put him once in time out and the threat of going there again scares him. He is so beautiful to look at it just melts your heart. He has this gorgeous milky white skin, black curly hair, brown eyes and long eyelashes. And he is smart, extremely fast, and speaks english quite well.
[One other charming story: one of Faith’s students, Mina I think, blows her kisses all the time and recently told her that he would “wait for her.” This is, if you didn’t know it, a very marriage-centered culture!
In conclusion, for the time-being, on the teaching front, we both are hanging in there and learning more and more each day about how to survive teaching in Egypt, in this school, and with these kids. We have no doubt that things will get better, and are looking forward to whatever comes next.]
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