As you may have guessed, we're just now beginning to really throw ourselves into our work here. Classes are in full swing and giving far too much homework, and I went to Ana al-Misri for the first time yesterday (Saturday), and tomorrow is our first day at our various St. Andrew's centers. So things are just now starting to get busy. I'll try to update pretty regularly, but don't be alarmed if I don't post every day or something. Also, thanks for all the well-wishes, I'm feeling much better now.
The first day at Ana al-Misri was... draining. The kids sorta run wild over this center, especially on weekends when there are fewer staff there to corral them into activities. Many of them are very new to the center, and one of the policies there is to let kids sort of roam free as they adjust to living in one place and having a schedule, etc. And, while I think it's a great policy, it certainly didn't help us yesterday as half of us were shuffled off into the art classroom after a failed attempt at introductions. We just knew that we were going to be in the art room - what we didn't know was that there was no planned activity and, at first, none of the staff there to help us.
Note: none of these kids speak fusha (modern standard Arabic, which we learn in school) and none of us speak amiya (colloquial Arabic, which is spoken on the streets), so these kids could hardly understand us and we really couldn't understand them at all and, I'll be honest, that first half an hour was disheartening. After realizing that we really couldn't communicate with them and really didn't know what we were doing, the kids just kind of did their own thing. We knew they wouldn't open up or warm up to us immediately, but I was hoping that curiosity would lead to a few more interactions.
But that was just the first half an hour. Eventually we were joined by some staff members, and one girl wanted the picture I was coloring which led to the discovery that I could write in Arabic, which they were very excited about. While we eventually had to leave the art room because the paint situation got out of control, by that point we felt much better. The rest of my time there was mostly spent trailing around after a small girl who couldn't speak in any language and had the biggest, cutest smile - when I have better internet, I'll upload the picture of me carrying her around while she's wearing my aviators.
So, in short, it was an exciting and draining few hours. We go back tomorrow morning, and supposedly there will be more staff and actually planned activities and everything will be much more structured.
Anyway, tomorrow I'll also try to post about the awesome lecture we attended yesterday, but right now I need to go sleep and save up my energy for a super eventful day tomorrow.
The first day at Ana al-Misri was... draining. The kids sorta run wild over this center, especially on weekends when there are fewer staff there to corral them into activities. Many of them are very new to the center, and one of the policies there is to let kids sort of roam free as they adjust to living in one place and having a schedule, etc. And, while I think it's a great policy, it certainly didn't help us yesterday as half of us were shuffled off into the art classroom after a failed attempt at introductions. We just knew that we were going to be in the art room - what we didn't know was that there was no planned activity and, at first, none of the staff there to help us.
Note: none of these kids speak fusha (modern standard Arabic, which we learn in school) and none of us speak amiya (colloquial Arabic, which is spoken on the streets), so these kids could hardly understand us and we really couldn't understand them at all and, I'll be honest, that first half an hour was disheartening. After realizing that we really couldn't communicate with them and really didn't know what we were doing, the kids just kind of did their own thing. We knew they wouldn't open up or warm up to us immediately, but I was hoping that curiosity would lead to a few more interactions.
But that was just the first half an hour. Eventually we were joined by some staff members, and one girl wanted the picture I was coloring which led to the discovery that I could write in Arabic, which they were very excited about. While we eventually had to leave the art room because the paint situation got out of control, by that point we felt much better. The rest of my time there was mostly spent trailing around after a small girl who couldn't speak in any language and had the biggest, cutest smile - when I have better internet, I'll upload the picture of me carrying her around while she's wearing my aviators.
So, in short, it was an exciting and draining few hours. We go back tomorrow morning, and supposedly there will be more staff and actually planned activities and everything will be much more structured.
Anyway, tomorrow I'll also try to post about the awesome lecture we attended yesterday, but right now I need to go sleep and save up my energy for a super eventful day tomorrow.
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