In the past two days, I’ve been so excited to be working in Zone Z and get things going.  Elena is a dream to work with—she’s energetic and seems to know everyone.  It couldn’t be better.

On Monday (yesterday), I headed up there with Elena.  At first, I was under the assumption that we would be doing more participant interviews, like we had a few days ago, but when she showed up at the house she asked if I had a marker… then I realized I would be teaching.

I was excited to see the “local,” the space where we could use to teach in Zone Z.  It’s a community space used for meetings and such.  I’m more and more sold on the idea that at least once a week, we need to bring education to the actual Zone.  It makes such a difference in their parents’ financial situation, plus it feels good to actually have a physical presence there every week.  Zone D begins to feel very far away and this “local” provides us with a space close to them.

I showed up to a decent sized classroom space—with 30 kids packed inside.  I had no real lesson plan prepared, seeing as I thought we were doing interviews, but it didn’t matter. I hopped out of the moto-taxi and was greeted by an insane amount of hugs and besitos. There were so many greetings that I completely forgot to pay the moto-taxi right away. He of course waited patiently for his money until Elena pulled me back from all the kids.

The class itself was a bit tough. Some kids knew their colors, numbers and alphabet; others had never heard “Hello” before. Plus, the ages ranged from 5-13.  As you can imagine, it was a challenge and I was exhausted by the end of the hour and a half class.

…But I came home so excited. Before Elena dropped me off, we coordinated another time for the next day (Tuesday).  This time, I knew I would have help as Alejandra  (aka Sandy) would be available to come, as well as our very recently arrived volunteer, Leslie.

I really can’t express how much fun I had today and how good it felt to get going. I can’t believe this is my life. Alejandra and Leslie were such amazing volunteers today and went with the flow. And I know they had fun.

We divided the classes by age groups, which naturally divided them by language levels, for the most part.  First, Leslie taught an English class to 5-8 year olds, with a bit of my help. Meanwhile, Elena and Alejandra were playing soccer with the 9-13 year olds.  After an hour, we switched.  It worked beautifully.  The younger kids enjoyed soccer, but a few of the girls were hanging out near the goal post and I could tell weren’t really interested in soccer.  I pulled out the jump ropes (donated by Sandy’s relatives, thanks!) and they loved it. Immediately they lit up.

One thing I did realize is that the 5 year olds are still behind the others in terms of how much they can handle.  Volunteers willing, we’ll divide further into three classes. 

Again, I am so happy to be doing this.  We’re not “pulling teeth” with these kids to get them interested in being in a classroom.  The entire Zone, including the director, is behind Light and Leadership as well.  I think my happiest memory of today was hearing the announcement over the community loudspeaker that English classes would be held at 3:00—so.... send your kids! And they did.