The Blanket Wrap

I’ve been teaching and working at the local schools in rural Lesotho for six weeks now, walking up to seven miles a day while rotating between the schools.  Teaching has been going very well, but at first it was overwhelming.  The first class I taught had over 120 students in it, the principal wanted grades 4 through 7 to attend the first class.

I had not prepared for that many students and had to improvise my lesson.  I talked to the principal after class and we agreed that I would just teach life skills to 6^th and 7^th grades, still close to 50 students, but much more manageable.  The kids are very receptive and ask a lot of questions.

The younger students have trouble with English, but luckily at the two primary schools at least one teacher attends my class and is able to translate (while at the same time learning how to teach life skills themselves).  At the secondary school the teachers are much less involved, but the students are more advanced and have been really great.

Life skills cover topics such as HIV/AIDS, self-empowerment, gender, reproductive health, etc.  I often sound like a cliché after school special, overly simplifying everything so that the students can understand.  One of my classes was on self-esteem, for the next week kids in my village would come up to me and say “I love myself!”  I’m not sure if they understood, but it was nice to hear. Read more

My village has a kind of rhythm and sound that has begun to sound and feel like home.  It is made up of cowbells, distant women singing, children shouting and crying, dogs barking, sheep bleating, metal pots clanking and sometimes an unusual birdsong.

It might be because my village is on a steep hillside facing a mountain, but all the noises echo off the mountains and blur into a type of music.  It’s always changing and make the village feel alive.  At dusk when everything is settling down it seems beautiful and peaceful.  About half an hour after dark all the noises stop except for some insects. Read more