The children have it bad. It is even infecting me. With only three weeks left to go, we're all dreaming of summer. Even as I take time to reflect, I am caught up in the changes that are swirling around us. The migration beings. This morning I received a letter indicating that this week would be the last week for a student. Today is Thursday. This week is practically over. I see tears forming just behind the eyes as I talk to her and try to determine excatly what the travel dates are.
This is the ritual. Late arrivals, early departures and all of it unexpected and sudden. Beyond control. Having just read "Third Culture Kids," I am aware that this is the culture we're talking about: a culture of constant change and inevitablity. It adds a completely new dimension to the experience of a school year. I have witnessed the skipping of social steps in order to form quicker, more intense friendships. No one has time for small talk. They've been through it all before.
This year I have taught the touchy-feelingest, footsie-playingest group of boys I think I will ever know. It has been difficult for me to balance the constant disruption of all their back patting, foot rubbing, shoulder poking behavior with what I recognize as their unabashed craving to be comforted. I've always noticed with admiration the way African men will grab each other by the arm or hold hands while walking with a close friend, but these are eleven year old boys that think nothing of giving each other shoulder rubs while watching the high school choir during an assembly. They walk arm in arm on the way to lunch as if they might not make it were they to attempt the journey alone.
Some of them have known each other for a few years, some met just this past August. They have found a way to support each other and to really live here and now. It has made some of our class events take on an even greater sense of importance. We are marking moments of time that will be forever remembered as, "When I lived in Kinshasa, I remember we..." It's like teaching school and summer camp all rolled into one. Only these kids don't have next summer's reunion to look forward to. When they say goodbye, it will most likely be forever.
I am closing this year with a real sense of accomplishment. It comes from our community service project, which had initially caused me so much grief because we could not provide a sustainable gift. I have received something more from this experience than I expected and I suspect it is what will sustain me to keep pursuing these kinds of experiences.
The project began with the students writing very funny skits- spoofs of traditional fairy tales with an environmental theme. The dinner theater was a great success. The plays went well, the kids served spaghetti and everyone enjoyed the cookies they baked for dessert. We raised a respectable amount of money.
I finally connected with the right people and we decided to spend half of the money on trees to help stop erosion at a local orphanage. The other half of the money would go towards clean water packets to be donated to children at Stand Proud (www.standproud.org)- an amazing organization that provides surgeries and braces for kids with missing or malformed limbs.
What has stunned me about my students is that, in just this last week, they have translated one of the plays into French and are going to perform it during the donation ceremony. Of course, we’ve yet to see how it will turn out, but it is their sheer confidence that dazzles me. Rewrite our play into another language? Perform it before 200+ people and be filmed while doing so? Give up our free time to practice and our Saturday to perform? Yeah, no problem. We can do it. We can do anything. And I believe them. This whole event seemed to get bigger than we wanted or anticipated. The company that has asked to film the event for use in advertising and promoting the PUR water packets is another exceptional organization (http://www.psi.org) working in Congo to provide health products to low income families at cost.
Working with the people at these two places and exposing my students to their capabilities of making real change has given me one small breath of hope and inspiration. Maybe I am doing something useful after all.
