Introducing...El Colegio de la Compania de Maria "La Ensenanza"

No, I did not photoshop any of these pictures. The school where I am teaching is really as beautiful as it looks. The first two pictures are of the main entrance where teachers (who don't live at the convent) and students enter and exit. The wooden door opens to a small foyer. There is another door at the end of the foyer manned (womaned?) daily by a woman and a security guard. Parents drop off their children at the front door. If parents arrive a few minutes early to pick up their children, they may hang out in the waiting room which is through the wooden door and to the left, but they may not through the guarded door without permission. No unwanted person gets in or out of the school. It's really quite awesome. The next few outside pictures are of the campus, which is enormous. The campus of the school and convent is a city block, and there are approximately 1,000 girls from preschool-high school who attend the school.

All of the classes I teach are on the third floor. Since I have gotten no real exercise since I got here, I am pretending that walking up to the third floor 3-4 times a day is going to keep me in shape. I also keep intending to do sit-ups in my bedroom, but I can't seem to remember to do them at night. I am obviously not going to do them in the morning because all of the teachers have to be at a meeting every morning at 6:30 a.m. (Hopefully Debbie V. doesn't read this and get any ideas.) Since I live at the convent, I leave at 6:29 every morning and I haven't yet been late to a meeting. (Please, no gasps of shock from anyone about my being on time every day. Since I am not driving to work, I don't have to deal with bad drivers who insist on keeping me from getting to work on time. Yes, I am aware that I am blaming other people for my being perpetually late to things in the US. For some reason, it seems easier to get to things on time here. Maybe it's because so many things are so close together.) Classes then begin at 6:45. On many mornings the students take exams from 6:45-7:30ish. Rather than using class time to take tests, the year is set up with pre-scheduled exams for each of the subjects a certain number of times a quarter. It's a concept I'd never heard of, but I think I like it. I need to find out a little more about it. When exams are not being administered, students have homeroom time from 6:45-7:20. First period begins at 7:20 (and 7:30ish on exam days). Just like LP, there are eight periods a day (those 8 periods don't include the exam/homeroom time). There are two 30-minute breaks during the day, and classes are dismissed at 2:45. The day works well and the girls seem to like it. I like that there are only two periods after lunch. Since lunch is from 12:45-1:15, there is only time for 7th and 8th period after lunch.









The first picture in this next group is of a cute little open room not too far from the entrance to the convent. There is a statue of Mary and Jesus and a boat made out of styrofoam (yes, the boat is painted styrofoam) that used to have a net coming from it and cute little Nemo fish. The school's theme for the year is Cast Your Nets and the boat is just one way they have illustrated their theme. The next picture is the salon de las columnas (I think I got that right) and it has Auxilia admiring the backdrop for the English Show. On the right-hand side of the picture, there is a gray door (mostly hidden by a column) that is the entrance to the convent. The other pictures are of some of the school's long corridors.







Moving outside, the first picture is of the seniors' wall. Every year the seniors are given part of an outside wall to paint so their legacy will never die. Since last week was the bicentennial of Colombia, the girls chose to paint about it. As with many (most? all?) of my pictures, they do not do the wall justice. The other pictures just show some of the play and eating areas.







The last pictures are of the cutest preschool I have ever seen. There is a special small door from the playground to the preschool (not the only door to the preschool, of course) with a little playhouse inside. There is then a long sidewalk with numbers in English and Spanish and fun play-stations along the left-hand side of the path. All along the wall of the play-stations are the letters of the alphabet, each with a painting that illustrates the letter. At the end of the path is a large playground area with equipment and painted game-boards on the ground. If I were a little kid, I would want to live there. If things don't work out in the convent, I might just be living there :P.

School Begins...

Last Tuesday was Colombia's Bicentennial so there was no school. Woohoo! School began Tuesday, July 13 and as of today I have taught nine days. As excited as I was about teaching geometry, it didn't happen because the day before school began one of the English teachers said she had to be gone for 15 days. I am, therefore, covering her classes while she is gone. The girls are friendly, cute, and very talkative. I am sure I will love them, but right now I am working on setting ground rules for the classes. I told the girls on Friday that the only way I can teach them English is if we are on the same team. I wrote some rules on the board that they have mostly followed, but we'll see how the rest of this week goes. At some point I'll have some pictures of the students, but I think it's a little early to be snapping pictures and putting them on my blog. The girls have learned a great deal of English up to this point, but most of them are terrified to speak it. I think my job here (once I am not subbing for someone else) is to help the girls gain confidence in speaking. It seems I will be working with all the students from 6th-12th grade one-two times a week.

The students are currently preparing for the English Show. It is a musical written by a couple 11th grade girls, and it is very good. It's a combination of High School Musical, Mean Girls, and Glee. The show is July 30, and some of the girls are still working on memorizing their lines. Since their lines are all in English and they speak Spanish, I figure it's understandable that they don't know every line. Once they know their lines, we will definitely be working on pronunciation. When they speak their lines, they speak rapidly to attempt to sound American, but I have a difficult time understanding them. I keep telling them to slow down, but I think maybe working on their diction will help more. The girls from 7th-12th (6th-11th here) are involved, with each grade doing a dance (although only a few girls from each grade are dancing) and all of the main characters singing. I will be taking many pictures on performance day.




One Friday of the first week of school, Alexandra (one of the English teachers) had her birthday. A group of us went out with her after school to celebrate. The pictures show the celebrants who happen to also be fellow teachers. Alexandra is the one in the center of the picture of three without me. Jenny is to the left of her and Virna is to the right. The picture of the three people with me in it has Kelly and Virna, as well. I have written about Kelly and Virna before. They are the two English teachers who have really worked hard to make me feel welcome. I am just getting to know Alexandra, but she seems extremely sweet and kind. The third picture is of Kelly alone. (She is interested in meeting an American man, so I told her I would put her picture on my blog. Please let me know if you are interested in meeting Kelly.) We ate a restaurant with many names - Papa Loca/Hot - America's Favorite Pizza/El Torito/and another name I can't remember. The girls called it Papa Loca, so I figure that is the most important part of the name. Since it was called Papa Loca, I decided to get a potato. I ordered the same thing as Kelly because she said it was good, and it was. Here was the problem: The potato itself was huge and it was filled massive amounts of butter and cheese. Ooops! I ate much of the potato, but not much of the cheese. Although it was yummy going down, I had a huge stomachache all night.







I know I've posted some pictures of the convent, but I took some pictures of the chapel that is connected to the convent a couple of days ago that hint at how beautiful the chapel really is. The chapel is shaped like a cross, and at the intersection of the two parts, the are amazing stained-glass windows depicting the life of St. Jeanne. Hopefully that is somewhat clear from the pictures. The middle and high schoolers had mass in there the day after independence day and it was beautiful.

Speaking of independence day, it was a great day. After watching the Colombian Military Parade during the morning for almost three hours, Ana Elisa asked me if I wanted to join her at a desfile at 3:00. I didn't know what a desfile was, but I figured it would be nice to leave the house and escape from watching the military parade. Looking back, I am so mad at myself for forgetting to take my camera with me, but I didn't really understand where I was going. I should know to always take my camera when I leave the convent. As I now know, a desfile is a parade. We watched a wonderful 30-45 minute parade with dancing groups, schools, scout troops, etc. It was sweet and simple and I have no pictures of it. After the parade Ana Elisa and I decided we wanted some ice cream (yes, I know ice cream doesn't really work for me, but I figured I'd get a fruit sorbet). We went to one of her favorite places called Crepes and Waffles. I decided to order a Nutella and banana crepe, my favorite, and Ana Elisa ordered a forest berries crepe with vanilla ice cream. Mine was delicious, but Ana Elisa hated hers because it was warm. I guess she had never had a crepe before and it was too much for her that everything was warm. She didn't understand how ice cream could be warm. For the next three days she talked about her disappointment with the warm ice cream. It was actually funny to hear her obsess about ice cream. On day four, Gustavo brought cold ice cream. She has been fine ever since.




I need to take some pictures of the curbs here because many of them are really high. People have been telling me they have to be high because when it rains there are arroyos. My understanding of the word arroyo was clearly incorrect. I didn't see what the big deal was...until yesterday. I had seen a clip on the news of an arroyo knocking down an abandoned house and it was pretty scary, but I hadn't experienced one first-hand. Yesterday I was at Virna and Jose's house eating lunch when an arroyo came rushing down their street. I took these pictures just outside Virna's front door. As with most pictures, they don't really show how powerfully the water was rushing down the street. It was a sight to behold, and now I understand why people talk a great deal about the arroyos.

A last little story. Please stop reading if you are offended by politically incorrect comments by 84-year-old Colombian nuns. One day I was sitting in the kitchen working on something for school and Juana Maria walked in. She looked at me and said to Ana Rosa, "Trabajando como una negra." I don't speak a lot of Spanish, but I am pretty sure I understood completely. I burst out laughing and so did Ana Rosa. It was hilarious, but wrong. I am sure I should have chastised her for her racist remark, but all I could do was laugh.

Back to Cartegena

Before I wrote about my second trip to Cartagena, I had to include a picture Tina Herman "enhanced" of Sr. Cecilia, Sr. Elivira, and me relaxing on the lounge chairs.








While Srs. Cecilia and Elvira were here, we went to Cartagena. Although I had been the week before, I was not at all upset to be going again. I felt like I had only touched the surface of the city, so I was excited to go back. As when I went with the Barranquilla nuns, we first stopped at Crespo to enjoy the Carribean Sea. Because I had a meeting at school the next day, I couldn't spend the night, but Srs. Cecilia, Elvira, and Anita reserved rooms at the retreat house. The first pictures are from Sr. Cecilia's room. Pretty nice, especially considering the retreat house is less than $45 a night and it includes all meals. From what I can gather, the public can also stay there. If anyone wants to visit me, we can take a journey to Cartagena and stay at Crespo for cheap.


















After we enjoyed the ocean, including watching fisherman pull in their fishing nets in which there were almost no fish, we headed to the old city. Our first stop was the castle. When I went to Cartagena the week before, we only stopped outside the castle. This time we went into the castle and on a tour. I loved it. The design and location of the castle are amazing. There are tunnels, towers, elevators (hand-drawn), cannons, hidden gun holes, etc. There were several times I felt like I was on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride (minus the boat, of course). We went through a couple tunnels and one of them is quite narrow and decends over 450 feet. We could not go to the end because the rains had flooded it, but we got very close. Sr. Cecilia kept asking the guide if she could hear Sister's voice. It was extremely funny. Sr. Elvira somehow got next to a nice young man who helped her through the tunnel.















After the castle, we walked to the old city to experience walking along the walls of the city. That was the thing I wanted to do the most. It was great. The walls are incredibly thick, as hopefully the pictures show, and they helped keep the city safe for years from many invaders. The walls surround the entire old city, and there are small and short openings periodically which allow cars to enter.








For most people, my final Cartagena adventure would not really be an adventure. Since the sisters were spending the night in Cartagena and had to return to Barranquilla, I had to take both a van and a taxi to get back to the convent. Sr. Anita was so nice to insist that the van driver who was taking me (and 14 other people) to Barranquilla take care of me. She told him to make sure I got in a taxi once we got to Barranquilla. I must admit I was a bit afraid, but it ended up being extremely easy. I asked the driver how much it cost to take me to the convent ("Quanto?") and showed him the address I had written on a piece of paper. Within 5 minutes I was in the convent. I think the reason I was so afraid is because many people are convinced I will be kidnapped and killed in Colombia. I got neither kidnapped nor killed during my first solo taxi ride, so I think I might do it again.
















When I got home, I headed straight to dinner. Although Srs. Cecilia and Elvira were in Cartagena, Srs. Basiliana and Gilbert from the Congo were here. They had been in Medellin at the big Company of Mary meeting and decided to stop by Barranquilla for a couple days. After dinner, they said they were going to do a raffle. The raffle actually ended up being a song and dance followed by a interpretive dance in which they gave Sr. Ana Elisa a beautiful painting of a mother and child. I guess their singing and dancing reminded the Barranquilla sisters how much they love to dance and next thing I knew, it was a dance party. Sr. Auxilia (I spelled her name wrong before) danced first with Gilbert, followed by Sr. Olga, and then to the side Sr. Ana Elisa was dancing. It was a wonderful sight to see. I, of course, enjoyed the show.