Today SUCKED. Firstly, there are now two teachers in the same class - Miss Jones and Mr Koroma - which is just stupid. Miss Jones slept the whole time and left midday to attend a funeral. We had to stop for 20 minutes because the rain was so torrential that no one could hear (tin roof) and because it was too dark to see anything (no lights). Mr Koroma seems like an ass. Besides hitting every other boy over the head with his cane in assembly (and that HURTS because most have shaved heads), he was absolutely no help to me during my lesson, and ranted about Jesus throughout his. I wrote his lesson down verbatim:
Class Five - you are nearly ready to go to Class Six because our God is a good God!!! CLAP FOR JESUS!!!
HOME ECONOMICS
SOIL [don't know what that's got to do with Home Ec]
What is soil?
Examples of plants that grow in soil: rice, potato, cassava CLAP FOR JESUS!!! [class claps and cheers for Jesus], bananas...
Qualities of soil.
Clay soil: Clay soil is poor for agriculture and swells when wet. It is made up of fine soil particles CLAP FOR JESUS BECAUSE JESUS IS ALIVE AND THAT IS WHY WE ARE ALIVE!!! and holds a lot of water.
Loamy soil: Is very fertile and good for agricultural purposes. It is a good combination of sand and water particles. THE BIBLE SAYS WE ARE THE CLAY, JESUS IS THE POTTER. WITHOUT JESUS THERE IS NO LIFE. CLAP FOR JESUS EVERYONE!!! IF YOU'RE IN MY CLASS AND YOU DON'T BELIEVE IN JESUS THEN YOU DON'T LIKE ME [stares pointedly at me - and he is correct, I don't like him]. THEY GROW US OUT OF THE GARDEN BECAUSE OF ADAM AND EVE! AND GOD SAID "GO OUT OF THE GARDEN" AND THEN JESUS CAME AND BEGGED FOR US TO COME BACK IN. It is also useful for growing cassava, bananas, acra, granules, and oil palm. What is the difference between palm oil and palm wine? Palm wine is drunk AND THEN JESUS SAID "STOP, DON'T DRINK IT!!!"
Gravelly soil: Gravelly soil is poorly drained, has no airspace and is difficult to cultivate. THE PEOPLE OF SOMALIA HAVE A GOD CALLED DEGOL . [?] THEY TAKE DEGOL TO THE TEMPLE AND WHEN THEY CAME TO THE TEMPLE THE NEXT DAY HE WAS DEAD. CLAP FOR JESUS!!! IF YOU THINK EDUCATION IS YOUR GOD, IT IS POWERLESS. IF YOU THINK MONEY IS YOUR GOD, IT IS POWERLESS. TAKE MICHAEL JACKSON. HE WAS A VERY RICH MAN, BUT WHERE IS HE NOW?
"DEAD!" the class cries.
My turn
Things went from bad to worse. It was my turn now, to teach punctuation, verbs, and adverbs. Miss Jones usually translates for me, and keeps the kids quiet(ish) but she had headed to the funeral. Mr Koroma sat on his skinny ass looking sour and did absolutely nothing. I tried to explain what a sentence was, and what punctuation was. No dice. I tried to list the different types of punctuation and no one had a fraking clue. I tried explaining capital letters and drew totally blank stares until I figured out that they call them 'Big letters' and 'Small letters' here. I tried handing out word cards and getting them to create a sentence with correct punctuation. They could not understand what I was asking them to do. Finally they clued on, but they were hopeless at it. All the sentences came back as three or four words with no punctuation at the end. Eventually I just explained that every sentence needs to end with a full stop - forget about question marks and exclamation marks.
Verbs and adverbs? Ha.
This is a waste of everybody's time.
Mr Koroma forcing a smile:
