papeles nuevas: estudiante, profesora y tia

It's funny how fast life can change. A month ago I was struggling to stay afloat while the feelings of isolation, uncertainty, loneliness, and uneasiness swelled into a 20-foot wave lurking over me. Now, I have a schedule. I have a home. I have more friends. I am a teacher. I'm an aunt and I'm crazy about my peanut of a nephew. It's taken a month to get settled, but I now have the right frame of mind and confidence to make the next 9 months the best they can possibly be, both personally and professionally.

On February 2, 2011 I became a teacher. I spent the entire previous day planning exactly what I was going to say, how long each component would take and what I hoped my students would take away from the lesson. Christine was a great help on the details and suggested a couple fun activities to make the class more interactive. I was anxious before the class, but as soon as my watch read 10:30 I immediately felt comfortable. The students' timeliness was a lot better; those that were late were not so late they disrupted the flow of the class. To break the ice I had my students discuss common English idioms; Wednesday's included: Achilles' heel and needle in a haystack. Then we used a verb wheel to get in English mode; students had to verbally construct three sentences: one using simple present, one in simple past and one using the past participle. It was a great way to get them thinking more creatively and create a more open environment. I introduced narrative paragraph writing: the structure, the flow, the transitions, etc. I then had students work in pairs to piece together a jigsaw of a narrative paragraph. After more practice on the details of the structure, each student selected a noun card from my Apples To Apples stack. This card represented their topic, their setting or one of their characters. To finish class we did a progressive narrative paragraph. I started with the first sentence: "Last year I went on an exciting trip to the Amazon jungle." Each student added one sentence to the paragraph. By the end of the paragraph I was in love with my guide and begging him to leave his wife for me. Needless to say, the students had a lot of fun with this one!

I taught another class last Friday. This group is very small (only 6 students!) and they are all very bright and committed to their major. They are the most advanced group I have, they're taking Written Communication III. I introduced essay writing to them. We looked at the structure, the necessary components, different types of transitions and the characteristics of each paragraph. We stressed the thesis statement and the introduction, mostly. Then we analyzed a traditional 5-paragraph essay on the influence of Latin Music in the US. They were all so focused and flew through the lesson with no problems; I was really impressed.

I found out a few days after teaching this lesson that I've already started to have an impact on my students. A colleague told me she ran in to one of my students, a very bright girl from Venezuela, who told her my entire lesson with great enthusiasm. I was so glad for a few things: 1). that she learned something and remembered it well enough to re-tell it! 2). that she was excited about it and 3). that my colleague told me. This was such a confidence booster. I can tell in the classroom that my students like me, but to hear that even just one student had that much passion for one of my lessons was so fulfilling.

Yesterday I taught opinion and expository paragraph writing; tomorrow I will teach comparison/contrast essay writing. Good thing I was an English major with a writing concentration!

I went to the beach for the first time last weekend. Even though Panama City is built on the Pacific coast, there are no beaches within the city limits. Christine and I took an oversold, small bus a couple hours to Santa Clara beach. We rented a little cabin for shelter from the hot summer sun. There was a group of about 20 "racataca" Panamanians (that's what Christine's local friend called them...search racataca on Urbandictionary to see the interesting meaning). They were completely plastered, loud, invading our shelter (that we paid for) and very scantily clad. By 1:00 the beach was scattered with empty Balboa and Atlas cans and they were sprawled out in beer comas. As annoying as it was in the moment, it was a really interesting cultural experience. We took the bus back and returned to the apartment in time for the 4th quarter of the Superbowl. Glad the Pack won.

Tengo una clase de español! Noris came by last Friday for my first Spanish lesson. She's a retired journalist and has promised to teach me about indigenous Panamanian cultures and more about the city. She gave me a placement test and an interview to check my Spanish level. I have my second class with her tomorrow so hopefully I'll have a better understanding of how it will function and help me with my Spanish. I've spoken with a couple of you about how this isn't your traditional abroad experience. My daily life is in English: I teach English classes in English, I live with an English-speaking roommate, I'm here to promote the use and instruction of English. So I'm not getting the Spanish-immersion experience that you normally would through study abroad. I am hopeful that my class with Noris will form a Spanish world for me.

On a somber note, my mentor teacher Alba has been admitted to the hospital. She's currently undergoing treatment and her immune system has been weakened. I'm going to visit her tomorrow. Please keep her in your thoughts/prayers and send positive vibes her way.

Next week is Access summer camp. I'll be teaching US holidays and US culture and helping with basketball to 160 kids the first session and around 130 the second session! I will be inaccessible from Sunday evening - Friday evening but will definitely create a post about the camp when I'm back in the city. I'll also get to meet the US Ambassador to Panama on Wednesday when she will give a presentation to the campers.

Have a wonderful weekend and week next week. Y feliz día de san valentín!

Cuídate.

love

he has a full head of black hair. he knows how to make an entrance. he has tiny feet and tiny hands. he nestles in the nook of my sister's arms. he is hundreds of miles away from me. he has know idea who i am (yet). he is perfect.

i love you Quinten Thomas. happy birthday.

espérame, espérame...

Week 3 consisted of waiting, waiting and a little more waiting. I got a full dose of "it'll happen when it happens" while making the transition to the Latina apartment. I was initially told I would move last Tuesday; I packed up, just in case, but fully aware that was unlikely. Tuesday came and went, as did Wednesday and Thursday. I did, however, make a little progress on Thursday: the company delivered the furniture for my room. They brought a bed, bedside table, AC unit, and a TV (not sure why the TV). Unfortunately, they didn't bring a mattress, only a bed frame, so the move would have to be postponed yet again. Finally, on Friday I made plans to move at 11. I didn't end up actually moving until around 4. The mattress was delivered at 6. But finally I'm here. My suitcases are empty, my drawers are full, my closet is lined with shoes and my bedside table is stacked with books and scattered with photos of all of you.

It's difficult to sleep through the night here; we live on Via Porras, a heavily trafficked street day and night. Panamanian drivers aren't quite as crazy as those in India, but for the most part they don't follow traffic laws and are not shy with their horns. The privately-owned buses, colloquially known as Diablos Rojos, rumble by with lights flashing and music playing trying to attract passengers, while simultaneously interrupting my slumber. The buses are only $0.25, but are known for pickpockets, and because they are privately-owned and compete for passengers, are also quite dangerous.

My job is starting to pick up a little but I won't be all that busy until Access school-year program starts in April. I'm teaching my first lesson on Friday to the Written Communication 3 class. They have been working on descriptive paragraphs and I am going to introduce essay writing. I'm also helping in Grammar, Written Communication 2 and Speech. I hope to create an interactive, creative environment for these students to explore English-speaking countries (not just the U.S.) and increase their own English skills.

Access Summer Camp is going to happen! This will be my first shot to really start fulfilling one of my Fulbright goals: connecting with young people via English language, US culture and sports. The camp is 2 short weeks away, and I'm counting down the days to departure! It will be in Cermeño, Capria which is about an hour from the city. There are 2 camp sessions, each 2.5 days long. I will be presenting on US culture--I haven't yet decided on a specific topic, so if you have any ideas appropriate for 10th and 11th grade ESL students please post comments! They will hear other presentations on health and fitness, entrepreneurship, conversation and literature, and safety and values. It wouldn't be summer camp without some extracurriculars, so they'll also have the opportunity to (attempt to) beat me in basketball, watch movies and play games. I can't wait to start making a difference in the lives of young students.

Until the Access school-year program gets started, I'm planning on filling in my time around classes by helping at CELI (Center for English Language Immersion) which is Christine's huge project. They have had to jump through some hoops recently and the center's opening has been postponed, but once it's up and running I'm confident she'll have plenty for me to do. I'm also starting Spanish lessons this week. I'll be working with Noris, a retired journalist who has promised to teach me everything Panama.

Hopefully you can sense the difference in attitude between this post and the previous post. Having a home is a huge sense of relief. I'm meeting more people, getting adjusted to the way of life, and finally starting the work that brought me here: English language instruction and cultural exchange.

Cuídate.

The search for el hogar panameño

Home: a pile of bricks and a sense of well-being, a physical structure and an emotional state. I've been on the up and down swing of finding my home, in the two senses of the word, here in Panama. Let's start with the easier, physical sense. I've been searching for the last 12 days to figure out where I'm going to unpack and get settled. I spent the first 4 nights at Hotel Toscanna Inn in the El Cangrejo district; a lot of hotels and casinos are in the area. It was a fine place to be for a while, but I was very much isolated. A week ago, I moved to a beautiful building, an apartment-hotel. It's a fully furnished, 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom, full kitchen apartment, but is rented on a nightly basis. There's also a pool which I've been taking full advantage of since I won't have that amenity the rest of my time here. The building is also in a great neighborhood. It's very safe, there are a few other very nice, high-rise apartment buildings, and it's just off of Via Argentina: a main drag of local restaurants. Like I said, it's been nice, but it's certainly not home. I've looked at a few different apartments and was completely flabbergasted by the rent. $1,000 for an apartment in a safe neighborhood was not at all what I was expecting when I came here.

So, being the frugal person that I am, I looked for ways to save as much money as possible. I've decided to move in with Christine, the English Language Fellow. She lives in a university-owned apartment in a safe place, near to Parque Omar (a gorgeous golf course turned public park that's extremely safe and always bustling with people), down the street from a grocery store, across from a laundromat, across from arguably the best ceviche restaurant in the city, and just a 20 minute walk from Multi-Plaza: the city's high-end shopping center with stores ranging from Columbia to Tiffany & Co. and a great movie theater. Living with her will be great in many ways: those of you that know me well, know I'm very much a people-person and don't care to be alone too often. Christine and I will also get to cost-share on a lot of things (such as taxis to/from the university, utilities, groceries, etc.) and we'll each have someone to just hang out with.

If, for some reason, we decide it's not working out, I'll move to my friend Urbano's place in April. Urbano and my dad share a mutual friend in Miami and he has been very welcoming to me since I arrived. He is moving to Costa Rica in April and has offered to rent me his place for 400/month all-inclusive. His building is very safe and is on the main road I take to get to the university.

Now, the more challenging issue: the feeling of home. These first 12 days have been some of the most difficult days for me. I was prepared for some uncertainty, uneasiness, culture shock, but I realized, almost-immediately, that I couldn't have prepared myself for these feelings. Everything from the housing situation, to getting oriented to the city, to my schedule (or seemingly lack thereof, so far) at the university has caused me a great sense of uncertainty and the overwhelming, suffocating feeling of being unsettled. I'm sure, for many of you, this is not what you were expecting to hear from me and that you're a little caught off guard, but I'm trying to use this as an outlet to be 100% honest about everything, including the difficult stuff. I'm trying to keep everything in perspective and cherish the moments and day-by-day it's getting easier, but it's not without its challenges.

That is the perfect transition to my first day of observation at the university. This Wednesday, I observed two English language classes: Speech and Written Communication. The first class, Speech, started at 8am and because I was unsure of how traffic would be, I arrived 40 minutes early. I sat with the teacher, Telly (who, as a side note, lived in the Quad Cities for a while and went to Kansas University...weird!). 8.05 rolled by, then 8.15, 8.25. Finally, at 8.40 two of the 8 students in the class came in. One, didn't even attempt an excuse, the other said, "I was hungry, I was upstairs in the cafeteria." Now, I was expecting a bit of tardiness. A lot of Latin America practices the "It'll happen when it happens" mentality. Of course a 15, maybe even 20-minute window is acceptable given the traffic and the lack of timeliness in most students, but to be 40 minutes late, to a university class?? This is going to be a real struggle for me, especially once I invest my time to plan and instruct lessons.

Those of you that made it this far in the post, are in for the good stuff (save the best for last, right?). Despite the emotional roller coaster of the last 12 days I have had some pretty good experiences.

The touristy stuff:

1. The causeway is a peninsula on the west side of the city built by the Americans with scraps from the canal. It juts out into the Pacific with the city on one side and large ships exiting/entering the canal on the other. It has a nice biking/walking path and is lined with restaurants, gelato shops, bars and touristy shops.

2. The Panama Canal. This doesn't really need any explanation. It was definitely a site to see! While I was there, a "Panamax" cargo ship from Singapore was passing through. Panamax is the largest ship size that can pass through the canal; on either side there's just 2-feet of leeway between the ship and the canal.

3. Partido de fútbol: Panamá vs. El Salvador. Todd and Stephanie, two really great Americans I met through Christine, invited me to the semi-final of the Central American Cup series (copa centroamericana) this Tuesday night. Despite the inefficiency of getting in to the game (we missed most of the first half because of very tight security), we had great seats for only $6, had a couple Balboas (local Panama beer) for $1 each and got to experience the hype of a goal. As soon as the ball hit the net and Panama took a 2-0 lead in the second half, everyone threw their beer in the air, yelled, cheered, harassed security, some lit a signal fire, others banged drums; it was an incredible experience. Todd, Stephanie and I agreed that all we cared about was seeing a goal, I'm so glad we did.

Other positives:

1. Alba is my mentor-teacher. She's a very sweet woman in her 60s, wears the same perfume as my grandma Susie :) , and attended Illinois College in Jacksonville, IL where my aunt, uncle and cousins live (another strange coincidence). I haven't spent a ton of time with Alba, but I know from our first meeting that she's going to be a great person to work with and has already had a calming presence in my life here.

2. Luz is my other long-term mentor. She's in charge of Panama's branch of Access. Access is one of the US Government's largest programs run worldwide. Low-income, academically-dedicated students in 10th and 11th grades are given the opportunity to learn English. The program is run in a number of cities around the country (I think I'll get to visit some of them!) and has a branch in Panama City. Currently, Panamanian students in public schools are on summer vacation. If funding comes through, there will be a summer camp in February for the 800+ students in the Access program. If not, they will begin their regular Access program (3 days/week for 3 hours/day) in early April. I will be helping Luz with logistical planning, assisting in the summer camp (fingers crossed we get funding!), hopefully traveling to some of the other sites, and giving presentations to the students. This week, Christine, the main Access teacher trainer, brought all the Access teachers together at Latina for 3 days of workshops. I was fortunate enough to meet all of them. The passion for their profession and for their students just seeps out of them. They are such an inspiration.

Other random things:

1. I went to the US Embassy for a security briefing.

2. Urbano introduced me to a great local restaurant/hang out called Los Cedros. They serve local cuisine, as well as Lebanese food, and have hookah available. It's a very relaxed, cool place to hang out and I've already been there 4 times in 12 short days.

3. My Spanish is getting me by. Once I get settled in my place and used to a routine I'm going to take lessons a couple times a week to help me adjust to the Panamanian dialect and work on my general fluency.

I was told it's -15 in CR today. Here, the sun is shining and the pool is calling my name so I'm going to work on my tan. Please feel free to leave comments; I'd love to hear from all of you.

Cuídate.

PS Sorry the post was later than I promised. I'll work on my timeliness. However, I am in the land of "it'll happen when it happens," so I can't guarantee anything :)

Estoy en Panama!

Wouldn't be air travel without a bit of a kink in what seemed to be a solid schedule. I woke up to a voicemail at 1 am the morning I flew out notifying me my flight out of Cedar Rapids was cancelled. So, logically, I rolled over with a disgruntled "ugh" and got a few more uneasy hours of shut-eye. They were able to re-route me through Chicago then on to Dallas and finally in Panama City. While I shivered on the jet bridge in Chicago and Dallas, I was overwhelmed by the humid ocean air upon arrival in Panama City. A driver from U Latina picked me up and brought me to Toscana Inn (my home for this week). As soon as I started speaking with the driver I realized, "Holy crap I haven't spoken any Spanish since the first week in May and this accent is crazy difficult to understand." I was feeling a bit nervous about my language abilities but as today went on and I got to talking more and more I fell right back in to the swing of things.

Today was such a rush of emotions. When I woke up at 7am I forgot where I was and was slightly panicked with a sense of loneliness and isolation. Luckily I had the contact information for Christine, the English Language Fellow who is in the process of starting a Bi-National Center here in Panama City. She and I made a plan to meet later in the afternoon so I decided to do a bit of exploring around lunchtime. I went to a local place near the hotel and, of course, ordered a local specialty: ceviche de corvina. It was loaded with onion and celery and not quite what I was expecting but delicious nonetheless. I overheard an American guy order at the adjacent table and immediately started to chat with him. Andreas was there just for the day so we shared a car and went to Casco Viejo (the old colonial area of the city) and walked around in the pouring rain. Despite the overcast rainy weather, I could see the canal from afar with a huge ship passing through; can't wait to check it out up close! It was great to hang out with someone for the afternoon even just for a few hours. I felt much less anxious/nervous about being here after that.

I don't know how to put in to words my appreciation for Christine. She's an incredible woman who has done so many amazing things around the world and she's such an inspiration. She helped me get a cell phone and took me to the mall and showed me her place and just listened and answered questions and offered advice. I did an emotional 180 between 7am and 9pm today and most of that positive change was due to her support.

So, that's all I've got for now. Check back in later in the week to see my first impressions of the university and my apartment.

Cuídate.

PS For those of you stuck in the craptastic winter weather, it was in the upper 80s here today ;)

Peace out, Estados Unidos

And so begins my next great adventure!

In 5 short days I will be flying to Panama City, Panama to begin my Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship. I'll begin my 10-month stint at Universidad Latina a few days after arrival. Those are really the only details I know as of right now. So, if you're interested in seeing photos and updates, I'll have them here for the next 10 months. 

Cuídase amigos. Nos vemos en un año.

PS Enjoy the single-digit temps while I'm in the tropics :)