Some Days Are Just Legendary

Happy February to all! Another month of my service has passed and already the weeks are flying by! I thought I might be a little short on content this week but actually I got a phone call about twenty minutes ago that will change the lives of several people.... and therefore will change the content of this blog (just killed a mosquito with my bare hands). However, since it happened at the end of the week, you have to wait until the end of the blog to get there! (I know some of you will scroll down, nothing I can do about that but fair warning, curiosity killed the cat)

Mouse vs Cindy and Viper round 2 round 3 round 4 and round 5

As you all know, I love mice... oops sorry I guess I just channeled an insane person that doesn't mind the sound of rodents gnawing through things in the middle of the night and shit laced floors. After Megan left last weekend I did a fairly thorough sweep of my house to make sure there was nothing desirable to a rodent. This did not work.

Monday night I heard it. I slipped out of bed and found it hiding in its usual spot under the stove. I flipped on the light and decided I'd have a much better shot of capture or murder if I got Viper Sweet Face Chicken Killer on the case.

I opened the door and stood at the ready as I poked at it to come out from under the stove. Viper saw it, I saw it. We both went in different directions.... not as smart as I thought she was, that dog. Anyway I followed it over behind my “kitchen” shelves as Viper investigated under the stove. I found it, hiding out in a caddy that I stock pile extra food in, but just for a second my attention is diverted! Viper has knocked over my water container and I have to leap to pick it up and rescue whatever water I can from the spill. The mouse uses this as its escape! Rats!

Viper sees it and starts chasing it around the walls of my house, shoving her nose and paws into the smallest corners of my home as her butt stands high in the air with me waiting patiently behind her not sure what I'm rooting for because if she kills this thing and gets mouse blood all over my house I'm not sure I can handle it.

The mouse got away never to be seen again that night.

Every night this week I was awake in the middle of then night chasing this mouse around or at least trying to get it to stop making noise.

Last night somewhere around 3 am I heard it and it sounded amplified, why? You ask. Because it was in, on, or around my dresser. I decided to let Viper just sleep in my house which I normally don't do because my house is so small that its not fair to either of us, but these were dire circumstances. My logic was either she would kill it, or she would scare it enough to shut it up.

The problem with having a dog in your house is it sounds like having a GIANT dog size rat in your house. All night anytime she scratched herself or walked around clicking her little nails on my concrete floor or snored, it woke me up. I woke up again at 5:30 to the sound of her most definitely eating something. My first thought was, maybe she got into the dog biscuits. Second thought: What if she's eating the mouse. Third thought- If I turn this light on and there is mouse blood all over the place I will be beside myself and will either need to move or light myself on fire. Fourth thought- it sounds like she's crunching something. Fifth thought- Just suck it up and turn on the light, assess the situation and take it from there.

The light comes on. She's found a mango that I dropped on the floor earlier that night.

Today I ran on about 2 hours of sleep, I'm pretty sure to onlookers it was as if someone let a lunatic out of the insane asylum and told them to go teach some kids, hey have fun!

Mail call

I got very lucky this week with a huge shipment! Monday I received lots of goodies from my mom and a few friends from home. Needless to say, I had a stomach ache the first half of the week because giving me American food is like giving a 2 year old 60 cupcakes and just leaving the room. I'm an embarrassment.

I also got another one today! People are awesome.

Creative Art

This is a legit subject in our timetable now and the responsibility has pretty much fallen on me to come up with activities. I'm a fairly creative person, but not in the right ways for an art class so I spend a lot of time looking up arts and crafts on the internet trying to use the few materials we have. A lot of days I have them just draw things, but this week we've branched out!

Friday last week we colored some sand that we stole from the school (shhh!) and then on Monday we did sand art pictures! It was an overwhelming success and I've already hung them up in the classroom which makes the kids really proud of themselves.

I also stumbled on another do-able project this week which has made me kind of a maniac but I think the outcome will be exciting. I had all the kids trace their hands and cut them out and color them. Then we shaped them into lilies and attached them to straws. We just finished the project today and we have about 40 lily hands which I'm hoping to form into 3 bouquets for each of us teachers to keep on our desks. What will be in the vase with the flowers you ask? Good question! Leftover colored sand!

I'm pretty sure I enjoy this class more than all of the kids put together.

Tid bits- stories that are too short to have their on title but worth mentioning.

-I went to buy spaghetti noodles at the store this week. I bought two packs and as I was interacting with the cashier I looked over and realized the bag boy was frantically shoving loose spaghetti back into the open package. I asked if I could just have a new one. They gave me a new one, but I was slightly alarmed that I had to ask. Whatever, it was funny.

-One of my students stopped my class this week to let me know my hair was messed up and they would like me to stop and fix it. Cool. Fashion consultants.

-Dust and dust storms suck. Rain is awesome and I miss it.

-Things that apparently only last a year- mop, broom, waterguard (crap that tastes like pool water used for filtering water), and propane

-This week for the first time ever I used the same piece of chalk without breaking it! What a triumph!

The story of all stories

Several months ago I met a man who is originally from Kenya but is now living in the U.S. He was visiting our unit with his mother who lives in Nairobi. They mentioned how impressed they were that people had donated enough money to buy land for the school and said he wanted to help.

I haven't communicated with him a terrible amount recently mostly because we just came off of break blah blah blah.

ANYWAY! Tonight he called me and told me we will start building next week, to which I said, “we can't build anything until we pay for the physical planner and we don't have enough money for that.” He responded with

“We're paying for that, we're paying for all of it. We want you to have 3 classrooms and an office built by the end of March and we'd like to have the school built before you leave in December.”

PAUSE FOR GENERAL SHOCK AND WATERY EYES

After checking to make sure I heard him correctly about 6 times he confirmed that he, with the help of his friends and co-workers would really like to see this school built.

AMAZING

I was also able to talk to his boss who said he and his wife were willing to contribute whatever they could and they were happy to see some good happening in the world.

It's been about 2 hours since I hung up the phone with him now and I am still completely overwhelmed and in general awe.

There is a very good chance that we will be participating in sports at the end of the term under the title Sega School for the Deaf instead of Unit.

To everyone who has been involved in this project in anyway I am truly grateful and just thrilled that progress has been and is being made. Change is happening.

I hope we can have a class pet now. I hope it can be a giraffe.

Thanks for reading!