I've been at site for a few months now and it's going super well. I'm very impressed with my community. Some women in my village give after-school lessons to the elementary school kids. The women worked with a non-profit from the Netherlands to have the building for the lessons built and text books and desks and chairs donated. We just got a big shipment of new books, and the lessons have really taken off. The women have mostly been working with the kids' reading and writing skills. Since it's all in Dutch, I'm not much of a help, which is frustrating. So, I'm going to start a little Math Club and tutor them in math 4 days a week. I'm super pumped about this (I'm such a nerd). A lot of kids in the interior end up failing several grades, and if we can work with the kids in my village to prevent that, it'd be great.
One of the kids' favorite things I own is my 8 lb weight. I've been teaching them different exercises and it's pretty cute. A bunch of 10 year-old boys will show up at my house, looking longingly at the weight, and finally I'll ask them if they want to play with it and they get super excited. The photo is my favorite little 3 year-old neighbor, Oviente. He pretty much has full access to my house, since he's too adorable to get annoyed with. He gets a lot of treats out of me too. Every time he comes into my house, he goes straight for the weight, picks it up over his head, and invariably says "a hebi!" which means 'it's heavy!' It's like clock-work. I really like this photo because he looks like a little tiny weight-lifter in his little muscle tee.
My Mom is coming to visit in a few days and I'm super excited. I'm really excited to see her, since it's been 9 months (I can't believe that!). I'm also really excited to show her Suriname. Everything is normalizing here for me. A lot of things that were originally scary or just strange to me seem really normal. I'm curious to see things through another person's perspective, a fresh perspective of Suriname. She'll be here for just about 2 weeks. We're going to visit another volunteer, Christine, at her site for a few days to start with. Then we're going to go out to my site for about 4 or 5 days, then spend a few days in the city. Then, we're going to Tobago for a week! Woooo! A week of sitting on the beach and swimming and relaxing. I'm so excited!
