What an interesting week in Danli. We started working this week, and if you have ever taught, you know how nuts the start of school is and getting ready for it all. Both Jd and I have been working all day, each day, to prepare for our students. Jd will be teaching english for the first eight weeks because these kids need to get to where they are supposed to be. Apparently the teacher from last year was not very good. I will have second grade in English in the morning, and first grade in English in the afternoon. There are 31 second graders and 40 first graders. The kids arrive at 8 a.m. on Monday...ready or not.
It has been a hard week as far as fighting my American ways has gone. Every part of me wants to just work by myself, do my thing, and be done, because that is the American way. We don't need help, and if we do, it's a serious thing. So this week, working with my partner at school, I have had to push aside all guilt because she is helping me and realize that other cultures offer and accept help as easily as Americans open credit cards. It's just part of life. It has also been hard to fight pride. The pride of thinking, I know how they could do this better, I know how it could be smoother, ect. I do know that putting things in a Database would make registering for school a little easier than writing everything down by hand, but I am not here to change them or Americanize them. I am here to love them like Jesus would. I don't remember any of His sermons being about easier school registry or how they need to be putting things in Excel. There are many things here, however, that for lack of funds, are just not accessible, and this school needs. We do not have a copy machine, so, imagine that every time you need a copy of something, you have to write the whole thing down, or go to the copy store and pay for a copy. Imagine writing down 71 names of children, who, unlike Americans, have four or five names. Example, if I grew up in Honduras, my name my entire like would be Cynthia Kacy Elizabeth Rankin Neinast. That makes no sense to me, but a lot of things don't make sense here. I am learning that I need to just get over my pride and realize that it's different, yes, but it is not bad. It is nice to hang your clothes out to dry, and not have nine hundred activities to go to each day. It is nice to be able to walk a lot of places, and it is even fun to see cows in the street on the way to school. And I never fail to get a laugh out of how people speak English. Two weeks ago, the Honduran soccer team beat the US, and we were told the next day at church by a kid that we were ´beat in your own home´ and ´we are your fathers´, i.e. who´s your daddy. I still laugh about it.
The hardest part of the day for me is the morning. I get up, work out, and go to school. But in that instant between the alarm going off and getting up, after having dreams of friends and family, I realize that I am a thousand miles away and I won´t see them for a while. But it is in that time, that I remember that Jesus came to earth and was far away from His home too, so, even when Jd doesn't get it, I know I can lean into Jesus and He can say 'I totally know how that feels'. Being here is overwhelming at times, fun at other times, lonely, enjoyable, purposeful. I pray He shows us what that purpose is, because I fight this lie that all I am doing is teaching school and I could do that in Texas and be a lot more comfortable. Lead us, Savior, we know You called us here, and we are eager to see what else you have for us.
miss you, love you.
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