And I thought I wanted to be a teacher?

Now, before I left for Peace Corps, I was contemplating becoming a Spanish teacher. You know, because I like kids, like Spanish, I’d get the summers off, etc. Well, in my 6 months as a PCV in El Salvador, I think I have ruled that career option out from the possibilities...and here’s why:

As I told you in my last blog, I gave an HIV workshop to the kids 13 years old and up at the school in my community. The first day of the workshop went fine. We had a small group of good kids that participated and listened. Great. Day two was the biggest disaster of my life. After part one, I guess word got around about the gringa teaching about HIV and it was way awesome, because on day two, all the slackers who didn’t show up for part one of the workshop because they were too cool for school decided to come. Initially, I was pumped that more kids seemed to be showing interest, but the additional kids that showed up on day two were the class clowns and slackers, and they proceeded to make the 1.5 hours I spent with them a living hell. The ring leader wore a bandana over his face and didn’t shut up the entire time, making jokes, horsing around, etc. One kid played music from his cell phone the entire time I was talking, and continued to do so even though I asked him to put it away several times. I caught another boy trying to cut the hair of the girl sitting in front of him (I confiscated the scissors). Also, for the entire session, the kids outside of the room that were not allowed to participate because they were too young decided it would be funny to beat on the door. Kids banging on a metal door=MORE than enough to give you a headache.

The nurse who was “helping” me added to the chaos that was the workshop, in that she didn’t try to keep any of the kids in check and goofed off with them the whole time. Also, she didn’t review the activities we were going to do with them, even though I went over them once with her and gave her copies to take home and study over the weekend, so she messed things up constantly, which was confusing for the kids.

Moral of the story: don’t be a teacher in El Salvador? The schools here are chaos (not just in my community) and I don’t know how anyone can deal with hundreds of kids running around screaming for 4 hours every day.

On a more positive note: Right before part two of the HIV workshop, I gave my first trash management charla (lesson) to the kindergarten/first grade class. THEY WERE GEMS! I can’t believe the 6 year old students are better behaved than the 15 year olds. They were SO excited that I was there teaching them about trash, and they participated when I asked them questions, and all of them had questions for me at the end! And they can’t wait to do the community clean up next week (kids excited about picking up trash, imagine that!). I have given my trash charla to all the grades at the school now, and it has gone pretty well (I think they learned something new about trash and our environment) but I am procrastinating big time on heading into that 5th/6th grade classroom of hellions and talking about trash management. I’m thinking I’ll finish and give them the lesson on Tuesday, you know, give me the weekend to mentally/emotionally prepare myself. UGH.

So that’s where I’m at this week. My limpieza (community trash clean up) that was scheduled for today fell through, but the mayor has agreed to send a truck out to our community this coming Wednesday, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed he keeps his word because I’m not letting anything push this project back any further.

So, after a week of trash management charlas and HIV workshops, I’m heading to the capital for much needed 2x1 beers! There is not enough Pilsener in San Salvador….

If you need me, I’ll be drunk, poolside at the Sheraton!

xoxo