First Day of School!

Lundi...

School started today! Lucky me, I had to be up at 6 and at the school at 6:45. Good thing I had the bells to help wake me up. Colin and I made it there on time and ready to find out our schedules. But to our surprise the headmaster had yet to arrive and he wouldn’t for another hour. So we spent our time sitting there listening to the other professors rearranging the schedule board so that everyone had a favourable class listing. It took about 2 hours, and all of it was spent sitting there on our part. But we did come away with an accurate idea of when we were teaching and to whom. I have the 5em class (roughly our 4^th/5^th graders) and Colin has the grade above mine (in the American system). My French is somewhat more advanced than his, so we decided that it would be best if I took the less developed English speakers.

School also didn’t exactly start today either. It was supposed to, but no one showed up the previous week to clean the schoolyard or building, so the students spent the day doing that while Colin and I ventured off into Kara. We ended up taking a taxi moto in thinking that it would be best if we didn’t rely on the monks for our every need. Besides, all we wanted to do was check the sports scores and send out a few emails. It was hardly anything worth disrupting another schedule for. And Johanas, one of my favorite monks here (I will do bios and a brief description of all in time), was very happy to hear that we were going out on our own. This was more because he wanted us to be able to experience it and he knew it would be a learning experience for us. It was the whole "Give a man a fish, or teach a man to fish" mentality, of which I would prefer to learn how to fish!

However, another monk who had some alterior motives and did not think that we were ready to undertake a task such as this escorted us to the spot where we picked up the moto and then asked us to buy him some phone credits. (this was all after he turned down a cheap car ride with some local workers in our name). We agreed and were off.

Once in Kara, we spent a good long while gazing at the football scores, blogging, and sending out emails. We also decided that we needed to eat since we were missing lunch. So we trucked it a mile or two to the café where we had eaten on the day of our little tour. There was a supermarche located next door and the food was pretty good. We got lost and wound up near the Palais du Congres before regaining our bearings and making it to the restaurant.

We ate and bought our supplies, toiletries mostly, and found our zman (moto driver) to take us back to Agbang. We also stopped to pick up the phone credits before heading out of the city.

We made it back in time for dinner and after a bit of confusion between Colin and myself decided that we would indeed give the monk the telephone credits. I also made a point, politely, to say that we were friends and appreciated all he had done for us, but not to expect us to be buying him things in the future. Friendship should not come at the cost of material goods, and we do not have enough money to support his needs along with ours, regardless of what anyone thinks. After a moment of awkwardness, he said ok and we talked for a little while before I left to go and prepare my teaching lesson for the next day.

*There is some background info that I have chosen to leave out regarding some of the monks and “office politics” at the monastery. It is also important to remember that there is a group chemistry and mentality for every living community and this is a very natural and commonplace occurance. Colin and I have made a point that we are new to this place, and anything that may be present between any of the monks is not something that we want to get into. We have a clean slate with everyone and plan to keep it that way. With that said, it isn't difficult to see when one is being taken advantage or in a sticky situation. Now that Colin and I are more observant to this, it is easier to stay clear of any potential problems.