The Routine in Panyebar: Kent and Ann

Above is the town of Panyebar. Below you see the two story building. Our "house" is the little one at the corner of that building facing us.

You never know what you might find outside your door when you walk out in the morning… the other day, it was a big pile of corn cobs; yesterday, a cow’s jawbone with teeth intact; everyday, plastic bags that have blown into the little dirt yard. Regardless of what arrives, it is usually a surprise.

But Panyebar is small enough that there aren’t usually too many surprises. We have settled into a routine that works pretty well so far. A shower followed by a cup of coffee while we sit in the sun…a nice start, esp. since the coffee is what we call “local-grown, plancha-roasted, stone-ground by hand, Guatemalan best” which we found at a local house where an ancient woman prepares the coffee as needed. This, as opposed to what everyone drinks (a couple of tablespoons of instant and a bunch of sugar in a couple quarts of water), wakes us up!

Routine includes school for me, where I now remember why teaching was so hard! My plans of using science to teach English have pretty much disappeared, as the level of kids’ English is at the learning-colors level. So, in addition to the actual preparation of 3 classes of science materials, I translate words into Spanish, even simple words like “pour,” “container,” “magnet,” etc. You get the drift! And we all have to suffer through my massacre of the Spanish language. I tell the kids that we are all learning together and they correct me as needed, which is often! I do give them English names as well as Spanish names for materials, so we’re working on it, but I realized that English is a foreign language for them and it is not like kids in the States learning English as a second language.

The other day we dissected a cow’s eye in one class, explored magnetism in another and 2 days ago (Monday the 9^th) I started chemistry with the youngest class of 7^th graders. The latter was a disaster. If I were teaching at home, I would call it the “class from Hell!” You know, kids aren’t trained yet in how to behave in class, they can’t sit still (especially since the class is from 5:35 pm – 6:15 pm), and of the 27 students, 75% are boys, immature ones at that. You can imagine… One of those classes that makes you feel like a failure. So yesterday I shut down the materials introduction and we took notes instead. Makes a teacher’s heart cry. One more shot at it today and perhaps I will choose not to do hands-on with them. As a visiting teacher who is not 100% conversant in either language or culture, it might just not be worth it and the kids just might not be ready. (UPDATE: kids

moved easily if noisily into groups and we are proceeding apace! Yes!

Kent has quickly endeared himself to many, including the family we are living with, the local carpenters and

contractors, and the school staff. He fixed the broken shower water-heater and fixed other water leaks at home. At the Colegio, he has fixed broken lights (one class had no working lights, so when the fog rolled in around 5, it was hard to see your hand in front of your face, let alone try to write!), is replacing broken windows and fixed the school bell which now rings out through the entire town.

The bano is now making serious progress. As one who had to use the “provisional bathroom” (read “pit toilet surrounded by cardboard blown apart by the wind”) in a moment of desperate need, I can hardly wait!

Wading through various misunderstandings and miscommunications has been challenging, but Kent’s Spanish

ability is up to it and already he has gained the trust of the local contractors.

For me, I would wish for a little more freedom. A teacher’s day is a scheduled day and I have to be at the

Colegio. But last weekend, we accepted the invitation from the dad of 2 of my students and we hiked to the spring that is the source of all of Panyebar’s water. This was, may I say, a killer hike.

The kids never complained and were spirited fun the entire 9 hours. Crossing into the nature reserve called Panan, the forest, now only a shadow of what it used to be, still had the power to amaze. Flowers, trees, bromeliads, even freshwater crabs at the spring made the hike memorable. Those and the aching knees and quads!

We made it home in time to eat dinner with the family where we are staying, as is the routine every night before

going to bed.As long as the neighbors aren’t playing their music super loud, or the wind isn’t trying to blow the corrugated roof off, or the dogs aren’t having extensive conversations, it is a blissful drop into sleep.

The girl above in the black is the daughter in the family we are staying with. The two playing are friends and the three below are the brother and sisters of the kids we walked into the forest reserve with.