Bringing it to a final farewell

Alright, so with this blog update I’m hoping to finally be caught up updating everyone.  And it’d better be worth the 2hrs I’ve spend sitting at the internet café, haha.

I’ve filled you in on GLOW and weddings galore. That brings us up to the last trimester of school which was a breakneck 8 weeks long.  8 weeks to teach is basically nothing. I was able to get 2 short units in for my Biology classes, the Urinary System and Non-Flowering plants. I’m not sure how much the got out of either, but it was good to finish up there…I at least finished further along than last year which is good for the students.  With my English Literature students, we attempted, key word attempted, to read the first couple chapters of a book called Nervous Conditions, which is about an African girl and her story about her battle for education.  Well, we read, but I don’t think we understood much at all. Instead, we developed some serious critical reading skills. They did exercises every week where they had to answer questions about things in the text, got really good at identifying and looking up unknown words in their dictionaries AND they got really good at telling me “Teacher, we have no idea what this book is saying but we’re really happy to practice speaking.” Okay…so I guess that’s a win?  But yes, third trimester was super fast and now…well, it’s over and basically has been for the past 2 weeks.  We started exams super early, actually the week my replacement came to visit site, not very ideal for her, and now it’s just correction and deliberation.  But really, that’s all that’s been happening in the last trimester at school.  I’ve been grading, filling out report cards, giving “second chance” exams and marking those.  Next week all the teachers will finish up, my S4’s will have a “celebration feast” which I’m invited to (I don’t really know what it entails) and then we’ll have a teacher celebration the day after on November 9th.

And then, then (here’s the kicker), the next day I move out of my village. That’s right friends, family and all readers…it’s been 2 years. I move out of my village in one week, I will no longer be a Peace Corps Volunteer in 1.5 weeks and I leave Rwanda in 2 weeks.  Things just got real.

But let’s take a break from that real quick and let me fill you in on some awesome news: my site is getting a new volunteer in December! Hoo-ray, this is very very exciting because I know that Muremera is one of those places that will thrive with another volunteer in place.  Anyways, her name is Julia and she came to visit the second week of October.  I kind of wish we hadn’t started exams that week, would’ve given her a chance to watch teaching/maybe teach herself BUT all in all I think we had a solid 4 days during her site visit.  Julia is an awesome girl and reminds me a lot of myself when I first visited Muremera.  Loved the scenery and view, was really freaked out about living with no electricity.  However, I think, given time, she will adjust (like I have) and do really well at Muremera and teaching at Munanira.  She seems like a very focused individual with many ideas.  So, I’m hoping that she will be able to implement some secondary projects that never came to fruition in my time since I focused mainly on getting the village used to having a foreigner there.  So, shout out to Julia, my replacement volunteer, I think you’re going to do great!!

And now back to the reality of leaving. It’s hard to believe I’m leaving. I’m pretty sure I’m in denial. Who wouldn’t be in denial? This place has become home and I’m leaving in a very short time.  It’s very surreal and strange and I’m pretty sure I haven’t fully accepted that I’m moving out, leaving and (eventually) going home to the USA.  Weird.  Enough moody thoughts, I’ll leave you with some fun photos from this past weekend when we had the baby naming ceremony for Euphron and Aloysie’s new baby, enjoy:

The happy new family

My best friends: Euphron and Twaza

And we continue…

So, last time I left off we had finished up with the month long of weddings and now I do believe I’m backtracking to fill you in on GLOW camp.

A little background first. GLOW is a Peace Corps program to empower girls around the world. It stands for Girls Leading Our World. (There is a boys version, but no, we do not call it BLOW). Peace Corps Rwanda has been doing GLOW camps for the past 3 years. Last year, I did not participate due to various factors. My region (Muhanga) also did not participate at a whole, but we decided this year, we were going to put together a GLOW camp!  And, lo, we did.  With the power combined of Pamela and Gelsey (and the rest of our administration team; Jamie, Daniel, Michael and Meredith) we held the 1st regional Muhanga GLOW camp from August 27-31st at Mpanda Vocational Training Center (Jamie’s site). In total we had 30 teenage Rwandan girls from 6 different schools, including 5 from GS Munanira!  We had a really fun week teaching the girls all sorts of important things having to do with life skills: HIV/AIDS awareness, goal setting, teamwork, etc.  But we also decided our camp was going to be as “camp-like” as possible, so they learned what it’s like to go to an American camp…well, as American as we could make it!  So, when they weren’t in sessions learning something, there was recreational time, a ropes course, movie night, dance night and all girls were organized into “teams” with cheers.  At the end of the week, there were many tears as the girls headed back to their homes, leaving their new found friends and experiencing something that they will likely remember for the rest of their lives.  At the end of the week, all us PCVs were…exhausted but happy I think. We pulled off GLOW camp with no major snafu’s and the girls clearly had a good time.  And in the end, that’s what counted, the girls having a blast.  And, just to give you an idea of GLOW camp, here’s a summary in photos:

Me and fellow PCV Susie with some of our Rwandan co-facilitators

Checking campers in!

Playing Basketball (Knock-out actually)

Happy PCVs! Kay, myself, Jamie and Nate

Learning good hygiene: hand washing!

Rec time: Volleyball

Rec time: Painting

Rec time: Yoga

Affirmation Wall time

Team Cheer: Go team Oprah-Obama!

Ropes Course: Team building

Ropes Course: Trust Sit

Kay teaching a session

Me and a bunch of the girls

Me and my girls from GS Munanira!! (so proud of them for smiling!)

Last day with their shirts

Loading them up onto the bus to go home

Group Shot with special guests Steve (our CD) and the US Embassy’s DCM (2nd in Command)

And that was GLOW…stay tuned for the next update!