January 20th to January 26th 2024
I was very excited on Sunday, because my plan was to watch the Buffalo Bills play the Chiefs. I hadn’t been able to watch many of their other games because of the time difference, but this game was their biggest game of the season so I couldn’t miss it. I went to bed super early and set my alarm for 2am so that I could watch my team…
What started off as excitement, slowly turned into disappointment. The Bills lost to the Chiefs… again. I really think that all Buffalo sports teams are cursed and will never win. I was not happy and since the game ended at 5:45am here, I had about 30 minutes before I had to go teach for the entire day. If they had won, I could have justified waking up so early to watch it, but since they lost, I was super tired and sad and then had to go teach and be energetic which was not a good combo. Anyway, life goes on, and teaching was okay that day. Plus, I will continue to be optimistic. Maybe next year they will finally win.
The rest of the week was good. Once I got a full night’s rest, I had more fun with teaching and could be more energetic. This week I planned out a pretty creative lesson plan, where I had my students play battleship to help them with speaking and learning English. I put “should I,” “are you,” “does your” questions at the top, and then answers in a grid below. If their battleship was there, they would answer the question positively and if it was not, they would answer the question negatively. The lesson worked moderately well. None of them had ever played Battleship before or knew what a battleship was, so it took a little bit of explaining. By the end of the class most students had figured out how to play and were practicing asking questions in English. The students were also very enthusiastic and wanted to participate even if they did not fully comprehend what to do, so I would say it was a success. I think if I use it again for one of my lessons, they’ll get it. I had fun teaching them and they had fun trying to learn a new game and practicing English so that’s what’s important.
This week I also started going to the gym with my friend Mbola. The first time we went, we were there for over 2 hours and did every single chest exercise possible. Since I haven’t lifted since I have been here, I was ridiculously sore the next few days. Even though I was sore, I was really glad that I went. While the gym did not have the same machines that U.S. gyms have, it felt nice to do something that I do in the U.S. Lifting weights is the same no matter where you are, and I liked being able to go with a friend and push each other to be better.
Mbola is the president of Operation Smile Club which he invited me to. Operation Smile is a global nonprofit that helps perform mouth surgeries for children in countries that do not have access to proper health and dental care. Mbola and the club here in Madagascar are trying to help spread awareness and raise money to hopefully bring more dentists to Madagascar. When I went to the meeting, there were over 30 people there. I was impressed by the number of people willing to donate their time to help the community.
Overall, it was a good week. Just like most weeks I miss home sometimes, and some days are better than others. But I do enjoy the way of life here, even though things are a little more chaotic and different here compared to back home.