December 2nd

Today was not the most exciting day, but it was a pretty good one
nonetheless. For starters, today is over a week since the last time I
cried over being homesick. I still miss people but it’s not quite so
bad now. God’s helped me keep pretty focused on being here in
Africa and on my task here as opposed to spending so much time
dwelling on all the things I’m missing stateside and all the people I
miss there. I spent some time reading this book I borrowed from
Mrs. Emmett called Vanished by Alton Gansky. It was a pretty cool
mix of science fiction and Christian literature. I had just about
finished when Foday came by. He was just copying some notes and
so I finished reading it. Karen came home shortly after and so she
could stay in the house with Foday so I could finally get to the
market like I had planned to before I sat down to read a little bit of
Vanished, obviously I got a little carried away. When I get a good
book I struggle to put it down. I had to go down to the market to
try and find a piece of fabric for Karen. One of the Pastors Karen
and Tom know is getting married on the 11th of December and all
the hospital staff have to wear the same color scheme, really
supposed to be the same fabric but the fabric they chose is this
really waxed fabric that would just be so hot. So Karen wants some
other fabric to make the majority of the outfits from so it’s not as
hot. I got roped into having to wear it because I’m with them.
Otherwise I would have been allowed to wear whatever I chose.
Anyway, I failed on my quest for a blue fabric to match the color in
the material given to us. After lunch Karen and I went to the school
for the CTA meeting. It was not very exciting; it was in Krio so I
didn’t understand a good part of it. By time they went through all
the previous meetings minutes and all the stuff they had for this
time it had been about three and a half hours. One thing I was not
happy with was their idea for trying to get the kids to come back
school January 3rd when the school opens up for the second term.
There has been a big problem with the students not returning to
school for two or more weeks after school starts again. Anyway,
they said that if the kids aren’t there on the first day of school they
will receive a MONTH suspension followed by a week of hard labor
(meaning another week out) for a total of five weeks where they
don’t get to come to school. Tell me that doesn’t sound counter-
productive to the aim of getting the students educated. I don’t
know about their method of discipline here… I tried to talk to the
principal about it, and told him that there must be some other
way but he just told me that I don’t understand their discipline
system and that this will work. I hope so, I’m concerned that a
bunch of students won’t show and I’ll be teaching a small group
for a while. Tom and Karen both say that would be ok since it will
be the serious ones that really want to learn, but I am just not so
sure about that. Next Monday exams start, so soon I have to
write my exams for the students to take. The exams go two
weeks, Monday to Friday with a work day each Wednesday.
That makes tomorrow my last teaching day for an entire month.
After the meeting I went for a walk with Foday for a little while.
Post-dinner wasn’t very exciting, I read some and then Foday
came by for night class but Karen wasn’t back yet to teach so I
talked to him for a bit, then I sat with him and Saidu for about
an hour after the class was over. Anyway, I had a pretty good
day today, missing you all, have a great day.

Blessings from Kamakwie,
Ryan Brooks