Letting myself down

So when I first started out my journey as an island teacher, I had so many expectations for myself and for my students.  While I was student teaching and the summer before I left, I had grand dreams of what I would be able to accomplish.  I dreamed I would be an amazing teacher, a teacher who made a significant change in the lives of my students.  I pictured myself as doing it all, going to the moon, and then some.  I planned out large, elaborate, projects that would require logic, perseverance, cross cultural connections, and just plain awesomeness.  For example, I pictured my students making children's books.  They would have to write the story line, incorporate many different literary techniques, and finally become masters of their own learning.  I even bought those white, blank, hard cover books, with so many great ideas waiting to be written.  Maybe it was the first year big dreams, or my expectations didn't meet reality, or maybe I just didn't have a clue.

And during the year, while I was teaching, watching, observing, making lesson plans, and completing my WorldTeach TEFL course load, I realized that my dreams were way too unrealistic.  I felt like my students were at this point (imagine my left hand at the level of my shoulders) and I dreamed they would be here (now imagine the other hand at the level of my forehead/top of my head).  At first I was angry.  Why weren't my students up to this level?  Why didn't they know the basics?  Why did I think that they would be able to accomplish such great, Noble Prize things?  Why did I let myself think like that?

That was the one point I didn't understand.  Was I too unrealistic?  I received a harsh reality check, rather fast, and then I felt that I let myself down.  I felt that I wasn't being a good teacher.  I was letting myself down and therefore letting my students down because I assumed that they would all be up to the level of my imagination and ridiculous expectations.  I was failing and falling super fast.  And then I had a mental makeover.

I realized that my students can make momental changes, I just needed to start at a different point.  I needed to start back at the basics and build, and with this new building, they would be amazing.  Once I changed my way of thinking, I saw my students accomplish things that were truly incredible and inspiring.  I was amazed.  At the end of the year, I got my students reading!!  I feel so proud of my students, because I pushed myself to think differently and be a better teacher.  While I still have much improvement, regrets, and unfinished business, when I left, I felt I made a difference.  If I could do it all over again, I would have had the attitude change from the very beginning.  And then I truly could have been a better asset to my students.

So the moral of the story - expectations can be very devastating.  If I didn't have them, I guess I never would have let myself down.

Really standing out there.

Now I know that its a good thing when someone says to stand out in the crowd.  You want that individualism and the "Oh, this is me, here me roar! RRRAAAWWWWRRRR" And honestly, thats a great thing.  I love being me and I wouldn't want to change me for anyone in the world  (to be honest though, that would be one very interesting exchange program - here lets swap beings, shall we?)  You can't be someone else, because they are already taken, so be unique, be yourself, and embrace it.

But has it ever happened when you stand out too much?  It the point where it is sheer uncomfortable?  Ever been so much of an individual when everyone knows exactly what you are doing, how you are doing, (but not really sure why you are doing it), but nonetheless, EVERYONE KNOWS!!!  Now I feel that this is a bit excessive when it comes to standing out in the crowd - but be forewarned - this has happened to me, and it is based on appearance.

Now if you are a regular reader on this blog, you have seen pictures.  The pictures of Utrik are beautiful.  The island itself (minus the lack of upkeep from its habitants) is a very beautiful, yet small, island.  And the people are truly beautiful.  Their skin is gorgeous, and I'm going out on a limb and saying its from all the coconut oil they smear on, and I have honestly never seen eyes that dark (dark brown, borderline black - so dark, I honestly couldn't find the pupil).  And so naturally their skin is dark, very dark.  So dark that they surpass the black people I have met.  In fact, when I was teaching colors, many of the students would point to me, and say white, while pointing at themselves and say black.

So let me paint the picture.  I'm on this island, and everyone (I mean everyone) is the same color (and now that I think about it, probably all related in one way or another), and then you throw in this very tall white girl with blonde hair.  Now that is what I call standing out (and probably not in the best way).

Now because I look so incredibly different, everyone knows what I am doing, when I am doing it, and they probably have no idea why I am doing it (for example, when I go running at the airport)  (but they did probably understand why I was doing laundry - that is honestly just common sense right there.)  And I have to feel you, it feels very awkward.

Back home in the States, I don't think there is this problem.  Yes, we have majority and minority populations, but the majority isn't so huge, and the minority population isn't incredibly small.  The majority isn't the dominant thing I see.  And the minority's numbers are below the .5% percent mark.    And (back home) when I walk down the street, I see many different shapes, sizes, colors, ethnicities, you name it, its there - mingling, mixing, integrating - everyone, everything.  And if a see a person (could be anyone, white, black, brown, purple, green, blue, rainbow whatever), there isn't a fraction of a doubt on guessing if the person is American or not.  Unless the person has a sign on their forehead, I am going to assume/guess that this person is American.  Actually, most of the time, it isn't even a conscious thought.

But here in the Marshall Islands, I have that huge sign on my forehead.  Everyone can tell in an instant that I am a foreigner like with a snap of their fingers.  It feels as if I could never fit in no matter how hard I would like to try.  I would have that foreigner stamp, just because of the color of my skin, or my height, or my hair color, or even my eye color.  In fact, the Marshallese have a word for this being a foreigner concept - its called ribelle.  And no many times, when I was talking around on island, I wouldn't have a name - it would just be "ribelle".  I got so fed up with this, that I would actually respond, "My name is Beth, not ribelle"  and eventually it caught on, and people would use my name when they were talking to me.  Not so much when they were talking about me (and not behind my back, rather to my face, but I couldn't really understand what they were saying - but that is an interesting feeling no doubt.)

So in conclusion, I have to say that was the first time really standing out there (almost in a not belonging sort of way), and will probably not be my last (seeing as though I am teaching in Thailand).

Really listening to music

So on the second half of my year on Utrik, I decided to start an exercise regiment.  And by exercise regiment, I mean running at the air port.  I would dawn on my sneakers, socks, running shorts, and a rather large, unattractive guam dress, grab my water bottle and ipod, and start running.  I have found that it is best to run in the evening, because its not so hot.  (just to be clear, it is ALWAYS hot, but not as hot when the sun starts to go down, and plus, the sky looks amazing!!)

See, I told ya so!!

So while I am running, I would listen to music that would have a great beat.  Examples include Backstreet Boys, Insync, Ashley Tisdale, etc...  So usually when a song has a good running beat, the lyrics are a piece of shit.  This will be important later on in this post.
So after many laps of running, sweating, walking, running, sweating, drinking water, running, walking sweating even more, I head home to take a shower, cause lets face it, I smell.  Okay, so that it is the end of that story.  (Although I did stop running for about a month, because the island had no food, and I realized that the amount of calories I was consuming was way under than what I was losing.  It was dangerous, so I quit running for a little bit.  But then the food ship came, as well as edible calories, so the exercise started back up again.


So to go back to the music, every Saturday, I would do laundry.  For several hours, I would sit there and scrub and scrub.  And I would watch the muscles in my right arm get significantly stronger than the ones in my left arm.  Lets just say that flexing looked awkward.  

So as the year went on, I decided that listening to music would be a good idea while I was scrubbing my never ending pile of unclean clothes.  So thinking that this would be a good idea, I decided to listen to the music that helped me so much when I was exercising.  Have you ever really listened to the lyrics of pop songs from the 90s?  Well, I know I haven't, until that day.  Holy cow - I was filling my ears with lyrical trash every since I was in the 4th grade and I had no idea whatsoever!!  Man, that ruined my whole childhood right there!  So disgusted with my taste of music as an elementary school student who had no choice of radio stations while on the bus.  And this moment also ruined country music me as well.  So let's just say that when I got home, I had a huge music make over.

Haha, my laundry all done!!!  So beautiful!

Unconnected, and it feels so good.

Have you ever been unconnected from the world?  So remote that you can literally focus on what is in front of you without any distractions or updates from the real world?  I was literally wire-less and had no hope of being connected - and I honestly have to say that it felt very good.  But then again, when I got back to the reality I was familiar with, I had no idea of anything.

So Utrik did have internet, we just couldn't use it.  The building was right across from the school, and it had the computer, the internet, but again, we couldn't use it.  Why?  Because we needed to have the opening ceremony.  Now to have the opening ceremony, many of the important people needed to actually be on Utrik for this to happen.  Now what consists of the important people?  The important people for the important opening ceremony are - the mayor, the head of the Department of Health (because she is from Utrik), and other important people from government head offices.  So lets recap - in order to use the internet, we need to have the important opening ceremony, and inorder to have the opening ceremony, we need to have the important people of Utrik actually come to Utrik (they live on Majuro) and then have the ceremony.  So to put this in perspective, the internet was actually ready to go around October or November.  The opening ceremony happened in May.  So it just sat there, collecting dust- for months.

So while this seems really bad, it actually was a good thing.  How many times do you check your phone?  Do you ever feel incomplete if your phone is not in your pocket?  Do you need to be connected all the time?  (Random side note to illustrate this point - when I came back from the Marshall Islands, I worked at the summer camp where I worked for the past 5 summers as their maintenance staff.  One night, some of us went out to dinner.  The whole time we were at this restaurant, everyone with a smart phone (since I'm so behind, I don't have one) was on it.  There was no conversation, no talking, everyone was connected, and the human connection was not there.  It was tragic to see that the human connection cannot occur, but I digress)

So I have to say, it felt very nice to be unconnected to literally be wire-less.  There was this huge weight that was lifted off and I could finally breathe.  And because of this, I had the rare opportunity to communicate with my family and friends the old fashion way - writing letters.

Haha, what fun!  And because of the irregularity of the planes, I had no idea when to actually write the letters.  Once I wrote a 12 page letter to my parents, sealed the envelope and everything, thinking that the plane was coming the next day.  Alas, I was wrong, and I had that envelope sitting on my desk for 3 months.  I felt that I couldn't write a new letter to them because what would happen if the new letter reached them before the old one.  The time sequence would be all wrong!  Chaos and unintended ignorance would enter their lives, and ruin their lives FOREVER!!  (okay, not really, I was just lazy because I knew the plane was down and not going to be fixed for months, and I didn't feel like writing. I know, I'm a poor excuse as a human being.  I fail.)  One time, the plane was down for about 3 months, and I already started a letter to my friend, Holly.  So I turned her letter into a diary.  Her letter, originally about 6 pages, turned into 30 pages.  And six of those pages were me talking/writing about open faced sandwiches (remember, this was the time of no food and I was dreaming about all the possibilities of combinations of open faced sandwiches.  I know, I know, I'm pathetic.)  So to my dear friend Holly, I'm so sorry.  You received a novel of a letter, full of random shit.

And because I had to write letters, many of my friends actually had to write letters back to me.  Some of my friends were very good pen pals, like my friend Holly, and my very good friend Susan.  Twice, Susan made me cookies.  I was unable to eat the first batch, because a mouse at the post office wanted to have them first.  And the second batch, I ate some, shared with my family, and then someone went into my room and ate them.  It like the universe was trying to send me a message, you shall not enjoy Susan's very delicious, enno, extremely yummy cookies.  YOU SHALL NOT!!  Oh, and my parents started writing their letters in bullet points.  And one time, my mother wrote me a letter while at a cardio heart conference nurse thing.  I'm glad you chose me over that!  And to my friends who wrote me, I honestly read and reread the letters so many times.

And because of this pen pal system, I found out who really wanted to connect with me.  I have to say that it really hurts when I write letter after letter to some of my friends, and I don't get a response back.  And I would like to thank my friends who took the time to actually write to me.  And I would like to thank all the people who mailed me care packages - Ginka and Aunt Kris, my parents, Susan, Aunt Kathy and Uncle Reggie, and to all those people who I can't remember.

The only down side to this mode of communication is receiving world news.  Our field directors would more or less update us (Sometimes we actually got news, and other times we got celebrity news.  Apparently both are very important).  And this mode of communication is very slow, and add the fact that the plane was broken down about 80% of the time, I really never knew anything.  For example, the Penn State Sandusky thing happened around November.  I didn't find out about it until February.  That was when I was able to read all the newspapers my parents sent me.

So more or less, it was a great experience, re-establishing the human connection, and to truly be wire-less.

What I really came for...

So while this light, carefree, and funny, I was actually there to do some serious business.  For those of you who don't know, I am a teacher.  I am actually a certified teacher in the state of Pennsylvania, and now I have the CELTA (Certification from Cambridge for English Language Teaching to Adults).  And while in the Marshall Islands, I was a teacher.  That was my main objective and goal.  I did not go there to only just eat coconuts and fish and live in such an isolated place- I came to be a teacher.  And for some people, that seemed like a hard concept.

I take my job very seriously, and I am glad that I do.  There were some individuals who did not put in the effort and hard work, and quite frankly it showed.  There were many days when I would stay after, way late, working on tomorrow's lessons, and trying to get everything prepared.  And some of my teacher friends from back home would think that my job was a joke.  That I wasn't a real teacher.

Well, to prove you wrong - I was (and still am) a real teacher.  I love teaching English as a foreign language, and seeing as though English is now the linga-franca of the world, it is also a very important subject.  I had to follow/try to achieve the standards (the rather vague and not really achievable standards, but nevertheless, the standards).  I still implemented classroom management techniques (some better than others, but in the end, they were still torn to pieces) and I still did everything that a regular U.S. teacher did.

So stop giving me beef (unless you are a vegetarian, than stop giving me tofu)!

And here are my students...

There were times when I loved my students.  I was so proud of their achievements as well as mine.  There were some days when I genuinely looked forward to going to school everyday.  Or I would really enjoy school once I got there.  There were times when my students' smiles and eager to learn eyes would give me such encouragement and the will power and drive to keep teaching.  It was these moments where my heart would melt (and it still does) and would make me feel like a worth-while human being.

And then there were other times when I would want to stab my eyes out, rip my heart into a million pieces, place my brain in a blender and shred it into a billion pieces.  There were days when I wanted a better job.  There were days when I would wish that my students would disappear (and it didn't matter in what way, as long as they were gone.)  There were days when their eager to learn eyes would stab a thousand daggers in any direction where goodness prevailed, and would destroy anything that represented happiness with a blink.  Oh man, there were some days I hated those kids.

But then the good always out-weighted the bad, and at the end of the experience, I will always miss my students.  They were always have a special place in my heart - even if they wanted to stab it out.

And here are my students. (Note the gang signs)

1st grade.  Haha - I got those kids reading!!

4th grade

3rd grade (Dashwood - the kid in the green, doesn't look to happy)

My beloved 2nd graders

Kindergarten

Max and his 8th graders

I am part of a involuntary blood donation to mosquitoes. I feel that they appreciate the service. You're welcome...

So Utrik had lots of mosquitoes.  Many many many many mosquitoes.  So much so that I felt that I have become immune to the itchiness.  The red itch bumps no long had any control (on a side note, now that I'm in Thailand, I have lost the power but I digress.)  Yes, I GOT THE POWER!!  But sometimes too much power comes with a price.  The ultimate downfall to absolute power is the forces that try to undermine you.  I wish I had the power of hindsight in the present, it would have cleared the way and given me the knowledge that I would need to know.

1.  I now think that 100% DEET will do absolutely nothing to me.  Seeing as though I would rub that stuff all over me twice a day.  You really glisten when you rub that stuff all over you.  And if you have some on your finger tips and eat a pancake, haha, what a great sensation.  Or I guess I should say, lack of sensation.  My tongue would go numb, my lips would go numb and sometimes they would stay numb for hours.  Try teaching that way.  Such fun!

2.  Mosquito nets become the ultimate sleeping fashion accessory.  And mosquito nets actually block the breeze and make your bed about 20 degrees hotter.  Holy cow, not fun.  Try sleeping in 80 degree weather, but now it feels like 100 degrees and you are literally swimming in sweat.  So not comfortable.

The old mosquito net.

The new and improved and "had-to-crawl-in-like-a-ninja" mosquito net.

And now mosquito nets remind me of wedding bride's veils.  So if I ever get married, no veil.  I've slept under a mosquito net, and honestly, I never want to be under one ever again.

3.  Still not quite sure about the Dengue Fever.  I had it.  I felt like shit for a week,  but then I was fine (Okay, I talked with the doctor and he was saying that the strain here on island was a weaker strain, and even he had no idea why everyone was freaking out about it).  My mom sent me some Tylenol (Thanks mom!!!).  Other people on the capital island left.  Why would you leave?  

On a fun side note, Max taught his eight graders about the signs and symptoms of Dengue Fever and what to do once you have it (honestly wait it out and take Tylenol).  But his lesson didn't go long enough, so he switched over to a writing contest about world peace.  But his students slightly mixed up the two.

How do you think we can get world peace?

- World peace can be achieved by taking Tylenol every 6 hours.

Apparently, Aspirin will lead to the opposite!

The 8th graders reading a chapter book!!!!