Becoming Miss Bowers

Decisions, Decisions Part II or "Becoming Aunt Bowers"

2012-01-29T16:10:00.000Z

So: Guess what?

I know what I'm doing with my life until December.

I'll tell you first--then I'll tell you the story. Perhaps that makes it less suspenseful, but I'm not writing a John Grisham novel or anything, so who cares about the suspense?

I was officially offered the position of "Interim Dorm Parent" for one of the Dakar Academy dorms for the Fall semester of the 2012-13 school year, and I have officially accepted. So, translation: I will be the dorm parent for one of DA's dorms while the current dorm parents go on home assignment (furlough) for six months.

So, Miss Bowers will become Aunt Danielle--single mom to twelve to fifteen girls.

Call me crazy...but I'm EXTREMELY thrilled about this.

So, here's the story.

First of all, this was not my idea--I didn't have a divine revelation or anything that led me to approach the dorm parents and administration about this. In fact, when I first heard about it, I thought it was a joke.

One day in early November, Ron, the dorm dad, came into the staff lounge during fourth period and asked me if I had decided what I was doing next year. I said that no, I hadn't--I was still waiting for divine inspiration, or even just ordinary inspiration. Ron said *very jokingly* (or at least that was how my brain interpreted it: "Well, you could come back to DA for a semester and take our dorm while we're on home assignment..." Laughter. Ha, ha, Ron. Very funny. Me? A dorm mom. Silly. I brushed it off and told him I'd probably need a husband for that--so if he could find me a husband in the next six months or so, I would consider it. Laughter. Ha, ha, Danielle. Very funny. (He proceeded to tell me that if I did get married in the next six months then I probably couldn't be dorm mom because they wouldn't want newlyweds being dorm parents. Good thing there isn't someone in my life, eh?)

Even though I thought he was joking--I really believed he was--I kept thinking about it. It would be so cool! I would fall asleep considering it and day dreaming about it; but I then would mentally slap myself, saying "Nahhhhh, that's crazy. He was kidding--they really wouldn't take a single woman in her twenties to be a dorm mom. That's ridiculous." I was so interested, and so...fearful at the same time, I was too afraid to ask Ron and Chris about it after that conversation. I was so sure he was kidding that I was scared to ask him only to find out that he really was kidding. This is how my mind works. I even wrote them an email several times to ask them--and then deleted it--to ask them about it. Eventually, I tamped down the interest, sure that it was just a funny side comment, and that they couldn't possible think of me. Ridiculous.

About three weeks later, our director, Joe, asked to meet with me to discuss my future plans. I thought that he just wanted to see how I was doing, and to see if I had anything lined up for next year. He's a very caring boss, and so I went into this meeting expecting him to encourage me in my job search, pray for me, and send me on my way.

Well, he did indeed ask me about my job search, my plans. He did encourage me, and pray for me--but he also sort of offered me a job--The Job. It was more of a "We would like to consider you to be the interim dorm parent for next year, so may we consider you, along with other candidates?" than a direct job offer. But, it was a big deal, nonetheless. Despite my conversation with Ron, and the way it stayed with me for weeks afterwards--I had myself so convinced it was just a joke that I did not see it coming.

After praying for about two weeks, I told Joe that I was willing to be considered for the position (yay!) and over Christmas break they officially offered it to me. I spent a few more days praying about it (we went camping right after I got the email, so being cut off from internet and TV really helped me to have the quiet to think about all of this), and I simply sensed a peace that it was the right decision to make.

So, that's the story. Perhaps it's not terribly thrilling (the story) but I think it's rather exciting, overall. I'm...overwhelmed in many ways, because this is not small feat by any stretch of the imagination. It will be hard work: physically and emotionally and spiritually. It will be an ENORMOUS responsibility--I've been dorm relief for almost four years, but I always know that if anything major comes up, the dorm parents will assume control. Also, it will be challenging because I will be doing it alone without the shared responsibility of a husband to help handle the workload (but, of course, we all know that I'm not allowed to get married in the next six months anyway. Good thing that's not a problem for me). (Fortunately, I won't be "alone" because DA has a spectacular dorm staff, and I know that if anything big and scary does come up that I'll have three wise and experienced couples, plus the wise and experienced dorm administrators, to turn to for help.) I love the girls I'll be taking care of (I've taught many of them, and I've interacted with them as dorm relief for many years now). I got to be there when the dorm parents told their girls that I was going to fill in for them next semester, and it was incredible--I was warmly welcomed with cheers and hugs. I'm surprised I didn't cry! (Again, I was so worried they wouldn't be happy about it, that I really, really did not want to be there when their dorm parents made the announcement--but I'm so glad I was!)

I feel so encouraged and uplifted by this job offer (even if I hadn't accepted it) because I've been feeling pretty lousy about myself for a while now (as evidenced by my extreme aversion to accept that Ron might actually be serious)--and I have some self-esteem issues and some spiritual issues I really do need to work on--but I think getting this position has been helpful for me to see that I've been believing a lot of lies about myself. Sure, I have things to work on both emotionally and spiritually...but don't we all? I've been believing lies that I'm worthless and pretty much a sorry excuse for a human being...and while I don't want you to think that I accepted this position to be a giant band-aide for whatever self-worth issues I have, it's helping me to see that I am more valuable than the sticker price I have been placing on myself. I have a long way to go, but I'm feeling more content about myself, and finding some healing and peace in other areas of my life that are unconnected to working in the dorm.

So, that's my story. I still really don't know what comes next--I don't know where I'll be exactly one year from today. I'll be somewhere in America, but that's about all I can say with confidence. But, I also know that God's got a plan. I've been in Christian circles almost my entire life, and honestly, I've heard it all. There's really no Christian thing you can say to me that I haven't heard. I tend to be a pretty cynical person, and I shy away from what I perceive as mindless platitudes. Every year at Graduations, people roll out the Jeremiah 29:11 "I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord..." verse...and I get tired of hearing it, I admit.

But, here's the crazy thing...it's true. I didn't ask for this job. I didn't seek it. I didn't expect it. I was looking elsewhere for my future...and God had a plan all along. He actually had (and has) a PLAN. Like...he had something...set up...prepared...for ME. Not some generic, general thing out there somewhere like "Move to America. Get job at temp agency. Get apartment. Possibly get a cat. Make sure apartment takes pets" (which is basically what the plan was in my head) but He had something specific and real and wonderful planned for me.

How could I doubt him? How could I be afraid of being directionless? How can I still be afraid of being directionless? I don't know what January 2013 will hold for me...but I believe and trust with all my heart it will be something fantastic, possibly unexpected, and wholly of God.

Please remind me of this when I start worrying and whining in August that I don't know what I'm doing with my life...just remind me (as un-cheesily as possible) that God probably has a great idea, and that I need to wait on his timing to reveal it to me. This doesn't mean don't be proactive about it--it just means "be patient" and wait for Him to reveal what's going to happen.

Because, guess what? My God--the master of the universe--has a specific, unique, wonderful, incredible and exceptional plan for ME. Not just for other people--but for me.

How cool is that?

A few of the girls I will be serving next semester!

P.S. No, I will not be changing the name of my blog to "Becoming Aunt Bowers"...although it's certainly tempting.

On Reading, Nooks, Book Reviews, and 2011 Part III

2012-01-05T18:09:00.000Z

Continuing my short series on reading in 2011: The "Good" Reviews

Best Series: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

I know, I know—so predicable. I’m not saying these are the best books I read all year, but they are great YA books. Definitely a bit gory (I don’t recommend them to my seventh graders) but gripping and engrossing. I consumed these books when I read them (I need to read them again, at a slower pace, before the movie comes out), and felt empty and bereft when I was done. The Hunger Games also provides that deliciously edgy dystopian view of the future. Call me a pessimist, but I just love a good dystopian.

Best Sci-Fi/Fantasy: The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

Okay, obviously I have a big appetite for fantasy and sci-fi, based on these reviews. I’m not ashamed to admit it—I can’t get enough of the stuff. I like all genres of books, and I like to pretend I don’t have a favorite…but I do. It’s sci-fi/fantasy (I know, I know—lumping them into one genre is something no true Sci-Fi or Fantasy fan would do, but I have the same regard for them). The Name of the Wind was recommended to me by my friend Jamie via a comment on my blog post about Literary Pet Peeves. Her literary pet peeve was weird names in fantasy novels, and she mentioned the main character’s name in Name of the Wind as an example (Kvothe pronounced “Quothe”)—but said she made allowances for it because the novel was so good.

I purchased the book, but didn’t read it for several months after purchase. When I couldn’t find anything that looked enticing on the library website, I opened up Name of the Wind and couldn’t put it down for three days. It’s another “Boy discovers magical powers and goes to a wizarding school to become a wizard” plot…but it’s so much more. It’s not a children’s book, like Harry Potter, it’s in a completely different world and basically completely different circumstances. Of course there’s an evil antagonist, and of course the protagonist must overcome heartache and hardship to defeat him, but that’s where the similarities stop. (I also read the 2^nd book, and it is less enthralling than the 1^st, but the series as a whole possesses a lot of potential) I’ve enjoyed it far more than Martin’s series, and I do recommend Rothfuss’s wholeheartedly.

Best Romance: Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson

Major Pettigrew was recommended by my friend who’s a librarian in the Baltimore County Public Library (and who has to read many books as a part of her job). Usually, I don’t like romance novels because they’re sappy and sentimental and wishy-washy, and yes, I don’t really like reading about romantic relationships when I haven’t any romantic relationship of my own to fall back on. However, every once in a while, a book happens along that is a romance, but it’s well-disguised with another story—and doesn’t leave the reader (namely, myself) feeling sorry for myself.

Major Pettigrew is about a sixty-something English widower who falls in love with the Pakistani widow who runs the convenience store in his village (in contemporary times). He is of the stiff-upper-lip stock of English gentlemen who still believe in good manners and good tea; she is an independent woman who is struggling to know her place in her own culture as a childless-widow. I actually did not know the book would be a romance till they fell in love—that sounds funny, but the book has another plot that covers up the romance subplot effectively. It’s a sweet story of falling in love, of standing up for what one believes in, and of overcoming cultural barriers. Read it with a cup of fine tea.

Runner-Up: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Annie Barrows

Another romance veiled in within a good story. One of my coworkers loaned it to me, and I read it during our staff retreat. I didn’t see this romance coming, either. Partly because I imagined the man in the romance to be an old man, and the woman to be young—apparently they were the appropriate ages. However, The Guernsey Literary focuses on the isle of Guernsey during the German occupation in WWII. It’s in an epistolary style—which I ordinarily do not prefer (although of course, I’m a huge fan of the epistles of the New Testament…) However, it’s done smoothly. The author did an excellent job of capturing the voice of the various letter writers, and that is why it worked so well. I was caught off guard by the romance (and to be honest, found it probably the most unnecessary part of the novel)—however, it doesn’t ruin it, and I really, really liked the book.

Best Non-Fiction: The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls

I don’t read a lot of non-fiction [lowers head in shame]. I just love stories, and have always been enticed and fascinated by fiction that I let most of non-fiction go to the wayside. However, I usually enjoy the non-fiction books I read, giving lie to the idea that non-fiction is somehow boring and not as exciting as fiction. But, truth is stranger than fiction, and I often forget that.

The Glass Castle illustrates the above maxim. What a strange (and engrossing) story it is. The main character is the daughter of two highly eccentric (and criminal) parents who drag their children all over the country. The story tells the tale of her family and her parents’ antics, from childhood to escape in adulthood. It’s fascinatingly absurd—my friend Alicia loaned it to me just before our trip to Italy, and I had a hard time putting it down to go see the sites of Rome. Okay, who am I kidding? It was always in my bag—but you know what I mean.

Runners-Up: Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy O. Frost and Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Stephen D. Levitt

I do love books about interesting phenomena or strange illnesses or curious happenings. Stuff is about people who hoard—it’s fascinating and disgusting. Freakonomics explores the correlations between seemingly unrelated events—like Roe vs. Wade and a decline in crime rates in the United States.

Best Book: The Help by Kathryn Stockett

My friend Beth brought this book with her when she came to visit Dakar in May. At first, I was skeptical and too-cool-to-read-this-popular book. Yes, I’m one of those people who resist reading popular books, watching popular movies, or listening to popular music simply because it’s popular. Being a snob, I was sure that The Help couldn’t be as good as everyone was saying. Also, I don’t really like southern fiction. I really didn’t want to read The Help. However, it was summer, it was a book, and Beth said it was good. I trust Beth, so I decided to try it.

I’m glad I did. Despite all the hype, it’s an excellent book. I plan to reread it (I just watched the movie, which in turn made me want to reread the book—the sign of a well-adapted movie is if it encourages you to re-read the book). If you don’t know, The Help is the story of a young white woman in Jackson, Mississippi who convinces several black maids to tell their true stories of working in white households. It’s the kind of novel that opens your eyes, makes you think, encourages you to face the truth, offers you redemption, uplifts you, and encourages you—all at once. I was challenged to consider my own perceptions of race, challenged to consider this presentation of life in 1960s, challenged to think about how to be a part of healing the wounds created by racism and prejudice for centuries upon centuries by my ancestors. I often struggle with books about racism because they make me feel guilty for being white, even though I hope I’m not racist, nor am I the one who committed those atrocities. The Help offered a fair perspective on racism in the 60s—reading it, I was appropriately challenged, but also not manipulated into hating myself and my whiteness simply because I was white and not a minority.

The story is well told and the characters well realized. I read a review that compared it with To Kill a Mockingbird—I’m not sure if I’m ready to put it on that pedestal, but I think it is certainly a book that belongs on the same shelf as TKM.

I think I said this in a previous blog post, but I hope you read it in spite of the hoopla surrounding it.

Oh, and since I can’t wait till 2013 for my 2012 book review—if you’re a P.G. Wodehouse, Jasper Fforde or Oscar Wilde fan, check out To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis for a time travel romp through Victorian times, to say nothing of cats, boats, country houses, and dogs.

What books do you recommend for 2012? What do you hope to read? What did you read last year (or ever) that changed you, moved you, challenged you—or simply made you laugh? Throughout this post, I've mentioned the friends who have recommended the books that I've loved--because I think it's really important to recommend books to one another, to talk about what we've read, and to keep the book love flowing. I'm so glad those friends mentioned or loaned those books. Maybe I would have stumbled upon them eventually, but perhaps not.

I have this funny fear of recommending books to my friends and students--in part because I don't want them to dislike me because they didn't like the book I recommended--that's how devoted I am to my reading. Not liking a book that I recommended is not liking a part of me. Yes, of course I need to see a counselor about that, but that's beside the point. I'm giving them a part of myself when I endorse a book, and it matters that they don't like it. On the flip side, I feel terrible when I don't like a book someone recommended. Books are my friends, and I always want my friends to get along with one another. This is my "shout out" of thanks to Beth, Alicia, Tanner, Will, Donna, Mom, Dad, Deb, Jamie, the Sittes, all the middle school girls who loved Twilight enough to make me decide to read it, and the good customers at Amazon who care enough to write reviews about the books I'm interested in reading...Maybe you didn't realize it--but thanks for your suggestions, recommendations, conversations, cryptic commentary (obviously that refers to Will and Tanner), and book loans that made me read the plethora of books I read this year.

This is just to say: do recommend books--to me, you your friends, to your children, your students, your pastor, your husband, your coworkers. It's okay if they don't like it--but maybe, maybe they do like it, and they discover a whole new world in the process. I often find kindred spirits through books--because if I know that so-and-so loved the same book I loved, well, then, he or she can't be so bad, can she? (I was raised on Anne of Green Gables, so of course I think this way).

This concludes my exhaustive (or exhausting) review of books read in 2011. May it inspire you to discover new books, new friends and new worlds.

Happy Reading! (And Happy New Year!)

On Reading, Nooks, Book Reviews and 2011 Part II

2012-01-05T17:59:00.000Z

And so, without much further ado (goodness knows I’m good at the “ado”):

The "Bad" and the "Ugly" Book Reviews

Worst Book: P.S. I Love You by Cecelia Ahern

Believe it or not, the Worst Book I read this year does not go to the Twilight saga (because I actually think those books had some merit…very little, but just enough).

I really enjoyed the movie P.S. I Love You, so of course I wanted to read the book. Don’t. It was awful—nothing like the movie at all except for the premise: a young widow’s dead husband leaves her notes and instructions through the year following his death. Everything else was completely different. I’ve read books that I’ve really liked that are quite different than the film, so it wasn’t that. It was just a poorly written book. The potential was there--and the screenwriters took that potential and produced a fairly decent film, but unfortunately Ahern herself did not tap into that potential.

Runner-up Worst Book: Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella

Okay, so I have had a secret love for “chick-lit” genre books ever since reading Bridget Jones’s Diary, in which I laughed till I cried several times while reading. Unfortunately, most chick-lit novels are poor knock offs of Bridget Jones’s, and therefore don’t quite add up, like buying a pair of Adibas sandals in Sandaga market for 1500 cfa instead of coughing up the 15,000 cfa at City Sport for Adidas sandals. Confessions gets runner-up, and not first place because I “read” it as an audiobook (really, it’s just as terrible as P.S. and, the movie is also much better than the book). It made me want to throw my iPod across the bushtaxi in frustration (because it was the only time I was desperate enough to actually listen to it), but I didn’t since that would have destroyed my iPod.

Worst Series: Percy Jackson and the Olympians by Rick Riordan (Spoiler Alert)

I read these books too quickly (there was a rush on them at the DA library), and it’s possible I got sick of them because of that. Before I criticize them, I will say: these books have done a good job of raising an awareness of Greek mythology, something that, as an English teacher, I do appreciate. Kids just don’t know their Greek myths anymore, and it’s a challenge to understand literature without understanding the underlying allusions.

That said, this series was a poorly disguised attempt to capture the dissipating fever surrounding Harry Potter. I know that books about wizarding schools have been around since before Harry Potter (Ursula K. Le Guinn’s A Wizard of Earthsea had a darker take on schools of wizardery and witchcraft long, long before J.K. Rowling started penning her tale in a café somewhere in Edinburgh), so it’s not like Rowling had an exclusive right to the concept, but too soon, Riordan, too soon. The series featured a young male protagonist who learns about his magical (mythical-magical, potato-pah-tah-toe) powers in middle school, is shipped off to a training camp (camp-school, tomato-toe-mah-toe), learns that there is an evil overlord villain who is setting out to take over the mythical world (and the entire universe, of course) and said young male protagonist must defeat him in order to save the world. I wanted to like them, I did (I have always loved Greek mythology, and the thought of a children’s series based on Greek myths: woo-hoo!)—but there were just too many parallels to Harry Potter—even down to the mythical overlord’s corporeal body being reconstructed bit by bit till the end of the series till he assumes full human shape…um, Voldemort, anyone?

I know some of my readers really did like the Percy Jackson series…I apologize. In the immortal words of Shawn Spenser: “Agree to disagree.”

Silliest Series: Portuguese Irregular Verbs by Alexander McCall Smith

Readers of the The Number One Ladies Detective Agency may be the only ones who pick up these slim volumes (on the strength of their love for Alexander McCall Smith and Mma Ramotswe) as they are extremely, extremely silly. They feature a German academic who is the world’s leading expert on Portuguese irregular verbs, and all of the antics this academic gets himself into. I love silly books—P.G. Wodehouse and I are bosom friends, of course, but these books may be a little too silly. I liked them, but they were pointless. I brought them home over summer break for my parents to read, simply because one of the books is called The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs (my parents being dachshund owners, of course) and they did not really appreciate them. My dad said on his Goodreads review: “strange! pointless!” and recommended them for “no one.” They are the kind of book that I wouldn’t recommend without a lot of disclaimer—“Don’t blame me if you don’t like them…they’re pointlessly silly…it’s not The Number One Ladies…”

Most Ambivalent (Series): Song of Fire and Ice by George R. Martin

Have you ever started a book or a series and not known what to do with it? I don’t recommend these books, but at the same time I’m still reading them. I’m half-way through the third book (with two more published books to go in the series, and who knows how many unpublished) and I think I’m going to keep reading it but I’m not one hundred percent sure.

I don’t really like the books. I guess I want to find out who wins. I don’t know who I want to win. I’m not sure if I like any of the characters (besides the children who may or may not die). He kills off main characters at a whim, adds unlikeable characters to replace the semi-likeable main characters, and focuses far, far, far too much on sex. Well, sex-scenes can be skipped (and are), but they’re still there. And the books are depressing (mostly because he keeps killing off the good guys, and no one is winning the war, and Winter is Coming…)

I just hate not finishing books, and now that I’ve read almost 2500 pages of Martin’s series (most of the time with excuse of hoping it will get better…and skipping the Daenyrs parts—I hate her) I kind of want to finish what I’ve started. So, even though I’ll probably regret it, I’m probably going to finish the series. Unless he really does kill Jon Snow. Then I’m quitting.

Most Embarrassing: Five Hundred Kingdoms by Mercedes Lackey

Do you ever just want to read fluff? Like…pure fluff? This summer my head hurt from thinking…I was exhausted…I was weak. So, I read a few novels in Mercedes Lackey’s Five Hundred Kingdom series, and then felt embarrassed to admit to anyone, especially my students because they were just…poorly written novels. This particular series of Lackey was a retelling of fairy tales from around Europe, and I’ve always enjoyed reworked fairy tales. But, really, the books were thinly veiled excuses for poorly written romance novels. I’m not really a romance novel person, but I read them anyway. These books were cotton candy…I don’t even like cotton candy, and I feel sick after eating it. That’s how the Five Hundred Kingdoms book felt…bleh. (I just don’t get cotton candy…do you?)

What's the worst book or series you read this year? Or the most embarrassing? Or the silliest? Do you have a secret love for a genre that no one would suspect (like an English teacher who reads Chick Lit...or a Trucker who loves Jane Austen...)?

Coming Up: Part III--The "Good" Reviews

On Reading, Nooks, Book Reviews and 2011 Part I

2012-01-05T17:47:00.000Z

I love to read.

Yes, of course I love to read. It’s in my blood—you should see my parents’ house—bookshelf after bookshelf after bookshelf fill the rooms.

In my family, we take books with us everywhere, we always talk about books, we always are reading several books at once. Reading is my escape from reality, it is my comfort when I’m feeling sad, it is my entertainment. (Okay, yeah, I watch TV sometimes, but my first choice is usually a book, when I’m by myself). When I finish reading a book, I feel listless and directionless until I find the next book.

This year I have read more books than I usually do. This is in part because I have a bit more free time (5th year teacher and all that), in part because I just got tired sacrificing reading-for-pleasure time (especially as an English teacher who should constantly try to encourage her students to read for fun), and in part because I purchased a Nook last summer. It changed my life. Perhaps this is a somewhat melodramatic statement…but not really. (A Nook, by the way, is Barnes and Noble’s version of a Kindle [an ebook reader]). I bought my Nook with some reluctance. I didn’t want to become one of those people who read books on ebook readers.

Well, I’ve become one of those readers.

Here’s the reason why: I live in Africa. Africa is a wondrous place indeed, but it does lack for reading material. I am blessed to teach at a school with a great library…but since it’s the same library from my school days, I’ve read many of the books in the library already. Not the entire library, but most of the decent books (I refuse to read Christian Romance Novels, and that eliminates a lot of books in the DA library…).

When I learned that public libraries in the States had begun offering ebooks for download on the library websites, I decided to give up my reservations about ebooks and buy a Nook (Kindle books were not available at the time on the library websites). I didn’t buy a Nook to buy books, but to check out library books. (Yes, I am trying to defend my purchase since I still feel like I’ve betrayed the Real Book People who refuse to buy into the ebook craze…stay strong, my former brothers and sisters…but don’t move to Africa.)

As a result, I’ve had a lot more reading material at my fingertips, and I’ve read on my Nook voraciously (no more voraciously than usual—just with a wider selection than normal). It’s been delightful and, well, since I’m one of those people now, I highly recommend it, particularly if you live overseas (and have a library membership to a public library in the States). The majority of the books I’ve read have been free (borrowed for a 2 week period); I’ve only purchased a few (and, oddly enough, I’ve only read a few of the ones I’ve purchased, as I get distracted by the library books that have a more urgent reading deadline).

Don’t worry—I still prefer reading “real” books. It’s so much easier to read a book that doesn’t need to be recharged or cleaned or kept in a dust-free-case. It’s much less worry to worry about on bushtaxis, and if someone steps on it, it’s not the end of the world. A “real” book can be fixed with tape and cardboard and will never need its software updated. However, my Nook has been the temporary fix to my craving for new reading material here in Africa; the balm after a long, frustrating day of teaching or the companion on long lazy vacation days.

I decided to go through the mental exercise of thinking back over what I've read this year--the good, the bad, and the ugly. I'll start with the bad and the ugly in my next post--then move on to the good.

What do you love about reading? What are your thoughts on Nooks, Kindles and other eReaders? For those of you who are Real Book People...can you ever forgive me??????

Coming Up: Part II--The "Bad and the Ugly" Book Reviews...because sometimes it feels good to gripe!

What's Hair Got to Do With It?

2011-12-07T17:51:00.001Z

On October 1^st, I chopped off my hair in a “pixie cut.” It wasn’t the first time I've chopped my hair off super-short, but it was the first time I’d chopped it off after having relatively long hair.

Short-hair just after The Haircut

I did not regret it at the time. I was glad to be done with long hair. I was tired of shedding, tired of always waiting for it to dry, tired of the color—I had accidentally dyed it black in April, and it seemed like it would never, ever grow out or wash out (the dye wasn’t good, hence the black instead of the brown on the box).

Blue-Black Hair? Oh, Marilla! (At least it didn't turn green...)

Now I regret that drastic measure. Oh, folly! Lately I’ve been wishing and longing to have my hair back. I keep looking enviously at people’s long hair (which is ironic, since before cutting my hair, I looked enviously at people’s short hair). I keep thinking about how it was finally long enough to actually do something with. I think, in part, it’s because my super-short hair cut has grown out just enough that I am at a crossroads: do I cut it again, or do I begin the long process of growing it out? (I just googled “Haircut advice for growing out short hair,” which prompted this piece). It’s such a pain to grow out—it took three and half years for the length I had before I cut it (after growing it out from a pixie).

Do I want to do that again? Go through the growing pains of awkward hair for several years till I get it to a point where it’s not in the growing out stage again?

I’ve realized this about myself through my process of dying and cutting my hair: it’s a symptom of something deeper. Whenever I feel discontented about something else about myself, I want to change something physically about myself.

Right now, I’m feeling listless and lost, and unsure of the future. I can’t do anything about that at the moment, so instead I stress about my hair. And, to be honest, I’ve been feeling pretty down about other aspects of my physical appearance…the extra pounds I’ve put on in the past year or two have been stressing me out, and so what do I do? I stress about my hair—because I can’t drop 20 pounds over night, but I can dye my hair or cut it somehow. I've know this about myself for a while now, but I still get that feeling of discontentment, and try to “solve” it by changing something, rather than actually dealing with the problem, or, accepting that the it has a long-term solution, rather than a short term fix.

My dramatic haircut in October made me feel temporarily better—I was, admittedly, feeling pretty depressed about a lot of different things, and that haircut was a fix, for a time, for some of the burdens. Odd, isn’t it? Maybe it was the extra attention I received from the haircut? Maybe it was just the striking change in the mirror? But, it didn’t solve the problem at all, because here I am, two months later worrying into the mirror once again, regretting my spontaneous decision to chop the locks that I had patiently grown for years and years, still feeling dreadfully uncertain about the future, and somewhat unhappy.

"Growing my hair” is representative of the long term patience that I need for some of life's struggles. For example, as a teacher, there’s no “instant fix” for the problems I may have in my classroom. I may wish that I could fix that student with the behavior or academic problem, but I can’t do it right away: it takes time and effort and prayer. I’m always dismayed at the beginning of the year with my AP Lit class, because that’s the group that I tend to connect with the most—because through the intensity of AP Lit, and after two years of teaching that particular group of kids, we know each other really well by the end of their senior year. Of course we don’t have that tight camaraderie at the beginning of the year—but I wish I could speed it up and get there right away, even though the journey to the camaraderie is so much more satisfying.

Or, the weight example: I’m frustrated about the extra pounds, but, in order get rid of them, I’m going to have to work at it—I’m going to have devote time to really exercising, not just the once or twice a week I remember to go for a jog. I’m going to have to really watch what I eat and really pay attention to my eating habits (I don’t eat a lot, but I do eat inconsistently, which of course interrupts metabolism). It’s much easier to dye my hair a different color than to commit to a time-consuming exercise plan and weight-loss goal.

And, as to the future: well, there’s no easy fix for knowing what to do with your life. I have placed my future into God’s hands. I really do believe that He’s going to provide for me in ways I can’t imagine. I believe he has a job for me picked out next year, I believe he knows that I need to make enough to pay rent, eat, and substantially reduce my college debt so I can go to grad school with a clearer conscience. I believe he knows the deep desire of my heart is that sooner than later I could meet someone…

But trusting in all of that? Not being anxious about all of that? Not worrying about that?

Well, it’s so much easier to do something spontaneous and exciting like chopping my hair off, rather than waiting patiently.

2007 Prayer Card Photo

I don’t know if I’m going to grow my hair out—one way or the other, I’m probably the only one who cares; it’s mostly just vanity on my part (well, my dad probably cares because he doesn’t like short hair…)—but I do hope I have the courage to trust in Christ no matter what. I don’t know if hair-growing is a step of faith, but it’s certainly a reminder to me that the best things come after patience, endurance, hard work, and prayer. A quick fix is only that—fleeting, ephemeral. The long term solutions, however painful or challenging, are the ones that will ultimately bring the most joy and contentedness.

Six Musings on a Tuesday

2011-12-06T13:47:00.002Z

Today, I have a variety of things to talk about—none of them are terribly important. But, in my quest for self-importance, like so many other bloggers out there, I will bend your ear, if you read this, for a few moments and pretend that what I say is interesting or funny or informative.

(Self-importance with a liberal dose of self-deprecation…the perfect recipe for a blogger, eh?)

1. The Wall

I’m writing because I’m avoiding everything that I need to do. Every once in a while I hit The Wall. The wall of absolutely not wanting to do any work. It’s horrible. I know I need to do work. I have a MOUNTAIN of marking. I have to get exams ready. School’s out in a little over a week and half…so why can't I do it? I just can’t seem to find the motivation. I know I need to do it, but I’m just…putting it off. It's freaky, because I don't even feel stressed that I need to the work.

It’s the worst feeling. What usually happens is that The Wall precedes a great flurry of work and productivity. The Wall lasts a couple of days, but then I’m good for weeks and weeks. This Wall, however, has been in my way for longer than usual. I’m trying to find ways to scale it, but it’s proving rather high, slippery smooth, and with nasty barbs at the top. I just can’t stand it…but I can’t bring myself over it. I know that The Wall is my defense mechanism for feeling overwhelmed…that deep down inside I’m actually freaking out, so my subconscious creates this wall of indifference that’s masking my sheer terror over what lies just beyond The Wall.

One of the ways this wall of indifference manifests itself is in this very action—I write on my blog, or I email friends saying things like: “I’m just so unmotivated right now.” I fill my time with busy little tasks that are not needed at the moment (just like Samuel Johnson’s Mr. Sober in The Idler). Another way it manifests itself is that I suddenly get the urge to bake...Because there’s nothing like waiting an hour or two for bread dough to rise to put off grading papers...

The Wall is different than procrastination. I know procrastination very well. Procrastination isn’t indifference…it’s just…knowing that what needs to be done will get done, eventually. Tomorrow.

This Wall is something else, something darker and more dangerous than procrastination.

Don’t worry—it will pass. It always does. Suddenly, I’ll get a major burst of high stress and anxiety and adrenaline, and work like a crazy lady fueled solely by caffeine and get everything done.

2. A Current Use of Slang That I Despise

There’s a word in American slang I just can’t stand at the moment: “Bestie(s)" (as in, to refer to one's best friend(s)). Does anyone else abhor this term? It’s the most ridiculous expression. I just…HATE IT. Whenever anyone uses it, I want to smack them. I don’t know why it produces such a visceral reaction, but it does. I want to tear out their hair in frustration. Their hair—not mine. It’s just sounds so…ignorant. It looks like they’re trying to write “Beasties” and they misspelled it. I always get this mental picture of someone hanging out with dreadful looking monsters. And, it just sounds idiotic. I’m sorry if you use this expression. I like you—but I don’t have to like your word choice.

What current expression or slang do you hate? (Or, are you normal, and don’t get worked up over random turns-of-phrase, knowing that they will eventually pass on, as all other foolish, ignorant and dumb slang words have passed on…?)

3. 3. But I Do Like the Words "Slang" and "Brook"

On different note…isn’t “slang” one of the greatest sounding words in our English language? Say it with me: “Slang.” “Slang.” “Slang.” It’s definitely the cat’s meow.

The other day, I used the verb “to brook” in a sentence, and I have decided that we need to bring that verb back into the language. It’s the kind of word that you read in books, but rarely use out loud.

I will brook no use of the word “Besties!”

I will brook no late assignment excuses!

Try it—I think you’re going to love it.

4. Sanguine
I was re-reading Austen's Persuasion the other day, and she uses this word several times in a chapter, enough to catch my attention. Do you know what this word means?

What does it sound like it means? Anytime I hear or read this word, I feel like it means something sad or gloomy, but it actually means "hopeful" or "optimistic" or "cheerful." I find this strange and jarring. Words should usually mean the way they sound. There are a few exceptions--like the word "pulchritude"--it's just so fun to say, that it doesn't matter that it doesn't "sound" like it means "beautiful."

Sounds have emotive associations (which is what makes poetry so delicious), and it's hard for me to reconcile "sanguine" with "hopeful."

Sigh. These are the burdens English teachers must bear.

5. Climate Control and Aromatherapy
I love my students. I love, love, love them. Really, I do.

But they drive me crazy sometimes!

For example: in Senegal it is hot until about December. (November sometimes gets cool, but in recent years, it's warm till December.) I have air-conditioning in my room--Praise the Lord--and I use it. I like it not just for the temperature benefits, but it acts as sound-proofing, and drowns out the loud noises from around campus (we have a wood-working shop; the planer is extremely deafening, and cuts through the entire campus when it's running).

In November, I kept the AC on, even though temperatures were not as high. As the temperatures dropped, more and more students whined about the cold. I always told them the same thing: bring a sweater (and: suck it up; and: cry me a river...). I did turn the fans down to the lowest setting, but I wanted to keep the AC on as long as possible for the sound-proofing effect.

I turned the AC off last week. The first day I turned it off a student who was wearing a jacket asked me if he could turn the fans up, because "it was hot in here."

REALLY? Really? Really?

It's possible my response to him was less than gracious. I may have said something loudly, with a bit of a shriek to my voice: I CANNOT ADJUST THE CLIMATE TO SUIT EVERY STUDENT WHO WALKS INTO MY CLASSROOM! TAKE OFF YOUR JACKET FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!

And then, today, another student--a student who always complained about being cold...asked to turn on the fan above her seat.

REALLY? Really? Really?

I was a bit gentler in my reaction, I promise, although in my head I was screaming the same as the above.

Another thing that drives me crazy but also makes me laugh are the comments about the smells of my classroom. My AC emits a particular smell--it's a moldy smell combined with BO. So, to counteract that, I almost always burn a candle. When the students come into class, they always Oooooo and Ahhhhhh over the scented candle. They describe its myriad of scents--"Miss Bowers: how can a candle smell like so many things at once? It's a cinnamon, with strawberry and a hint of pineapple..." one student cooed the other day (apparently she's a future wine critic).

Inevitably, as soon as my candle runs out, or I forget to light it, the same students who coo over the smells scrunch up their noses and whine about the smell: "Ewwwwww...it smells horrible in here."

I'm sorry. I forgot that my secondary job as your teacher was to be your aromatherapist. Pardon me while I light some incense and cinnamon-strawberry-pineapple candles. Then, we can all work on our Chi together and maybe do some yoga...

4. 6. Miss Bowers’s Latest Tongue-Tangle

Yesterday in AP Lit, we were compiling “cultural characteristics of Victorian society,” having just finished the bulk of our readings from the Victorian period.

We were discussing the sexual taboos of the Victorian period—basically, that any mention of sex is taboo.

I said something like: “The Victorians did not brook any mention of sex. It was not tolerated. That didn’t mean they didn’t have societal problems because of sex, they just didn’t talk about 'the bedroom.' They just chose to sweep the problems under the covers.”

The covers?

“Ah, Freudian slip!” I declared. “I meant the rug! The rug! Pun not intended!”

But, as usual, it was too late. My tongue-tangle was met by raucous laughter (by those who caught it…), and I fought to keep from blushing, which is very hard when your skin is as pale as someone who has fair skin and doesn’t spend very much time in the sun.

The Amazing-Tree-Climbing-Lizard-Hunting-Dachshund

2011-11-28T20:05:00.002Z

On Friday night, I cried myself to sleep. I haven't done that in a long time, but I did. My parents' little dog, Chester, died on Friday. He wasn't really my dog, but my parents had him for three years, and in those three short years, I came to love him.

Even though he chased away all of our cats.

It surprised me how much it hurts to lose this little life. It surprises me that I'm writing a blog post about it, because I'm not that sentimental. I think I'm a bit sensitive right now, because there's been several people deaths in connection to DA, including a parent of one my students--so, sure, I'm probably reacting in part to all of that--but mostly, I'm just sad to lose Chester.

I really loved Chester. And I'll miss him. He was one of a kind--but of course, every dog is, I think. He was kind and gentle to little children (they could, and would pull his tail and ears, and he'd take it patiently), but ferocious when he needed to be. Sometimes a little too ferocious, as he loved to bark at everything. Chester thought he was a big dog, a trait of most dachshunds, I'm told. Before my parents had him fixed, he would escape the fence when the neighborhood dogs were in heat, and run with this pack of wild dogs in our neighborhood! We'd have to track him down; sometimes he'd be gone for days and days. He had random dislikes of certain people--he strangely always disliked our guard, who's basically the Malian Dr. Doolittle, but he loved our maid, Ami and would bark delightedly each morning she came to the house. He loved to chase lizards, and could occupy himself for hours and hours hunting them outside. He loved to sleep, and found the most interesting and undignified positions to sleep in. He also loved to lick people--but I wasn't a fan of that. He was a good lap dog, and would sit contentedly snuggled up to you, if you let him up on the couch. Every morning, especially in cool season, he would sit on my mom or dad's lap as they did their devotions, content to be as close to them as possible.

As I lay there crying on Friday night, I thought: so this is why people wonder if dogs go to heaven? I'm sure once we get there, we won't be looking around for our pets--but it'd be nice if they were there.

Some of us are going to have a lot of pets in heaven, if that's the case. I know I'll have about twenty cats--perhaps Chester is chasing them up in heaven now. Except, in heaven the kitten and dachshund will love each other there, just like the lion and the lamb, right?

So, here's to Chester--you were a great little pet, a good little friend, and we'll really miss you.

Here's how I'll always remember him: The Amazing-Tree-Climbing-Lizard-Hunting-Dachshund.

The One with the Field Trip

2011-11-10T15:59:00.000Z

It's Senegalese Awareness Week here at Dakar Academy. What's Senegalese Awareness Week? Well, it's a week where we focus on Senegal...and try to raise awareness for it.

The school week is jam-packed with activities; it's particularly packed because Monday was a holiday, Tabaski, which is the biggest Muslim holiday celebrated. As a result, they crammed five days of activities into four days.

The biggest activity was Field Trip Wednesday. That's not the official name, but that's the name I'm giving it, since the entire school went on a field trip, except for a few party poopers who shall not be named, and shall be ever shunned for their party-pooperness. I should state for the record that I did not want to go on the field trip and tried to get out of it, but they needed me as a chaperone. So, I'm sort of a honorary party pooper...but I did go. K-1st grade went to the Zoo, 2nd & 3rd grade went to The Monument, and 4th-12th grade (about 180 kids) went to the neighborhood of Yoff, which is like a village in the city. There is mostly one people group, a fishing people group, living in that quartier. They have lived there much longer than the city itself has been on the peninsula. The reason we went to Yoff is because some DA people have connections and friends in that neighborhood, and they felt that it would be a good location to show the kids another side of Senegal.

Here is the tale of the One With the Field Trip. A photo-diary account.

The field trip commenced after a half day of school. We all met on the blue-top, and then loaded ourselves into Ndiange Ndiayes, the transportation of choice--well, if your choice is to ride like the locals. It is Senegalese Awareness Week, after all. (Actually, DA uses Ndiange Ndiayes for most of our large transportation needs--they are relatively inexpensive, as we don't have our own school bus).

Riding on a Ndiage Ndiaye is always chaotically fun:

We arrived in Yoff--imagine, six white buses filled with toubabs ("foreigner" or "white person). We caused quite a stir, of course.

Then we went on parade through Yoff. People stood at the side of the roads and waved to us. I'm not kidding. I just wish we had brought a float or candy or something.

This is the sacred tree in Yoff. Although the Senegalese are predominately Muslim, there is a lot of animism mixed into their Islamic beliefs. This tree had a wall all around it, and has been preserved over the centuries. It was interesting to note how the elevation has changed, as we looked down on this tree from the road--the city has built up around it, literally several meters higher.

It was a gorgeous day. After our parade through the neighborhood, we headed to the beach to get into pirogues (pronounced "peer-rogue" with the emphasis on the "peer" not "per-rogue"), which are akin to large canoes. I don't really know boating or nautical terms, so I am just guessing at the akin to a canoe thing.

We had to fill about 22 pirogues to the island. The waiting was...long.

Here is the island we were headed to. It's called "Yoff Island"--at least by the toubabs.

Of course, we attracted quite a crowd. Our students had fun playing with the children who joined our group.

As I said, the waiting was long. Stephen apparently just couldn't make it anymore.

The people who made it to the island:

A boatload of students headed across the small channel between the mainland and the island.

On the island at last! Let the exploring begin!

Ian found a way to accessorize with mollusk shells...

A view of the mainland from the island.

The kids were paired up with their "best bud"--a high school student and an elementary student. Andy carried his around the island.

The incredibly beautiful ocean:

On the right side of the island, there was a "field" of rocks with many tide pools filled with fascinating creatures, including little black black snails that at first sight looked like sheep droppings. I sat by one of the tide pools for a long time, and occasionally one of the snails would attach itself to my feet.

This rock kind of reminds me of those weird ball things in Galaxy Quest.

Teachers Emily and Alicia enjoying the sun and the tide pool.

Somehow, David and Elizabeth caught bird. They proceeded to attack people with it.

It bit Emily's head.

Then came the starving time. We left school around 11:30, before eating lunch. It didn't occur to me to bring a snack, since we were informed we would be fed on the island. It didn't occur to me that the food wouldn't already be on the island, waiting for us to eat it. It wasn't. It had to be brought over, after we arrived. It was scheduled to arrive at 1:30.

Well, if you've lived in West Africa any length of time, you know that most things are late. That's okay--we are used to lateness.

We waited.

We waited.

Then, at 2:00, everyone was called together on the beach--we were told the food was coming.

We waited.

We waited.

The only real vegetation on the island were cacti. We were starving, and so there was only one thing to do: eat the Prickly Pears. I found a particularily red one, sliced off the top with a mollusk shell, and then used it to scoop out the fruit.

I could survive on a deserted island, should the need arise.

Delicious!

Okay, not really. It wasn't really sweet. It sort of tasted like...nothingness.

How do you like my outfit? Perfect for climbing into pirogues, climbing over rocks, and wading in tide pools. I wanted to be culturally appropriate for walking around a very Senegalese neighborhood--which meant wearing a panya (African wrap-around skirt) and a long dress over my skirt. At least my head scarf came in handy as shade!

Alicia also sampled the delicacies.

FINALLY the food came around 2:45...only an hour and fifteen minutes late. What's the rush? C'est Senegalaisement...

This is not enough for eight people. Fortunately, seconds (and thirds) were available.

Alicia ate with her hands for the first time.

Getting off the island meant getting back on the pirogues in our groups. They let the first groups go, then they started going in reverse order. So, in a strange twist of fate, I was in the second to last boat. I wish I could say that I wasn't grumpy and tired and thirsty by the time I got off the island. I can't.

The boat I was in was sort of a maverick. When it got to the island, it came in too fast, skidded up onto the rocks beside the tiny little "landing strip" of the beach, and nearly impaled one of the sixth grade girls! Then, it tipped over--half in, half out of the water. This is was the vessel we were supposed ride in?

As we crossed the channel, the pilot cut back and forth, following the currents, giving us an extremely exciting, dipping sort of ride. When we arrived at the opposite beach, the boat stopped parallel to the shore, just past the breaker line. The two guys manning the boat just got out, and walked away (they had been helping everyone else in and out of the boat) and the eight of us were left to our own devices, parallel parked to the shore. Not exactly curbside service...

The last bus to leave (as the kids got back on the shore, they filled the buses and left) was mostly middle schoolers--what troopers! We finally left, and got back to school around 5:15--two hours after our estimated return, tired, thirsty, sandy and sunburned.

Oh Africa! Oh Senegal!

E V I T C E P S R E P

2011-10-25T14:15:00.000Z

Do you ever wish that you could somehow download your point of view into someone’s head? Not in a creepy “possessed” kind of way, or even a “Freaky Friday” sort of phenomena, but just to be able to give, briefly, an understanding of your perspective to others?

Being a teacher has taught me a lot about the importance of perspective. It’s taught me that what I think is easy might not actually be easy, or what won’t take much time actually does take too much time. I’ve had to learn to listen to my students’ point of views—well, I try to listen to my students’ points of view. Sometimes, there are moments when I believe that I am right because as a teacher I have experience as a student, a teacher, and a human being.

AP Lit is a tough class, not just because I teach it. Before students sign up for AP Lit, I give them a long, long, long speech about how challenging and time-consuming AP Lit is going to be. I caution them before taking it. I implore them to consider their schedules. I exhort them to think of their social lives and the amount of free time they desire for their senior year. Why do I do this? Because I am telling the truth—holding no punches—AP Lit is a time-consuming and challenging class.

And yet, every year, despite the speeches and the warnings and the admonitions, students still are taken aback by the work load.

This is an area of perspective—perhaps they’ve never had a class with as heavy a work load, so when I tell them that it’s a lot of work, it’s hard to believe, since English 11 was challenging enough. When they complain in AP Lit, I get to say “I told you so” with various levels of kindness. If they are complaining in a joking manner—I say “I told you so” in a joking manner. If they are complaining while crying, I pat their shoulders awkwardly and gently tell them “I did tell you so, I’m sorry that you didn’t believe me.” If they are disrespectful and hurtful in their whining, well, then I bring out the Wrath of Miss Bowers. You don’t want to go there.

Currently, in AP Lit we are studying the novel Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. The past 4 years, Great Expectations has been probably the most difficult text I have taught, not because the story in and of itself is hard or that the themes and meanings of the text are elusive, but because it’s a hefty, wordy 490 page novel. When I read Dickens for fun (and I do read Dickens for fun) it takes me several months, because I find it necessary to read only a few chapters at a time. Considering that his novels were published in series over a span of several years, even reading it in a few months is speedy.

There is no way to make Great Expectations easy. I have learned this lesson in the past few weeks.

In the past, I have taught Great Expectations in much the same way I teach the other novels and plays we study: read a portion (20-30 pages) and complete a reading journal assignment (a reading journal is a detailed and analytical assignment over the text—nothing like “dear diary”). There are daily discussions, which means daily assignments. With the combination of the extreme verbosity of Dickens and the required detail of the reading journal assignment, Great Expectations has been the probably the least-liked text that we read. Some years, depending on the personality of the group, they still like it; last year’s group did not like Great Expectations at all. I took it a bit personally, actually. It made me sad—even a little depressed—that I had created a group of 16 people who didn’t like Charles Dickens. I wanted to remedy the situation this year.

I thought and I thought and I thought and I thought all summer long and all of first quarter: how can I make this a better experience? No matter what, it’s going to be hard, because Dickens is Dickens—but how can I make a bit easier? My solution was to assign large chunks of reading (each part of the novel) each week with five reflections for each part. So, they do have to read a lot in one week—about 160 pages. And, they do have to do some kind of assessment to prove that they’ve done the reading, but what they don’t have to do is intense and detailed analytical journals on each 20-40 page segment that could take hours and hours and hours and keep students up to extremely early hours of the morning every night. Reflecting on way of the reading a novel, this resembles the way college literature classes approaches novel-reading (except, in college, the entire 490 pages would be due in one week, not just one part of it: Perspective).

Ah, perspective. My good friend. He’s been absent from AP Lit these past few weeks.

Here’s what happened: because I’ve gone a bit easier on AP Lit first quarter, when I introduced the Great Expectations reading and reflection assignment suddenly—suddenly—the students began to panic.

Perspective: they didn’t know that I was going easier on them first quarter than in other years, so as a result, first quarter was probably hard for them.

Perspective: they did not know what it was like to study Great Expectations the old way, so even though I knew (and even though I explained it to them carefully), the assignment was HUGE and overwhelming and overpowering.

Human nature is a funny thing, because this has really hurt my feelings. I know that they don’t know that it really is a much easier go of it than in years past—how could they?—but I still feel hurt by their complaining more so than I normally do because I found a solution to make their lives easier, whether they know it or not. I understand that they are juggling writing a paper on The Great Gatsby, and I understand that they have other things in their lives (they are busier than I ever was in high school, and I thought I was busy—ahh! Perspective!), but at the same time I still feel hurt because they are do not perceive the grace I’m giving them.

In the same way, overall, there is no way to help my students realize that I am actually preparing them for college until they get to college. It is so gratifying to receive confirmation that my strict policies on MLA formatting, my nit-picking about not slouching, my emphasis on the avoidance of banned words, and my teaching students the skill of close reading a text are all things that help them succeed in college. Perspective. It’s hard to sit through the complaining now—I want the instant gratification. I want them to realize that I’m not making this stuff out—that a college professor really will throw you out of her class for laying your head down on your desk, even if you’re paying attention!.

All of this makes me wonder about the perspectives that I don’t get, and maybe should. One of the most famous quotes from Harper Lee’s To Kill all Mockingbird is probably “…you never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them.”

Whose shoes do I need to walk around in? When have I complained about something my bosses have done—not realizing or choosing to try to understand the reasons behind it? When have I been frustrated with a person’s behavior without seeking the root cause of their behavior? When have I been hurt by a friend’s words or actions without taking the time to consider that they may not have meant it the way it came out? When have I misconstrued a situation because I didn’t try to evaluate from a different perspective than my own? Even in this circumstance that I wrote about right now: from the students’ perspective, I know, this is really, really tough. It’s harder than what they’ve had to do, even though I know it could be harder and that it has been in the past.

Here is my request for the technological people out there—for the future Steve Jobses (Jobses? How do you write the plural of Steve Jobs?) of the universe. Please design some kind of holographic thingy-maggigger—the Holographic Perspectivator, if you will--that would allow us to temporarily download a sense of our point of views, that we could share with others (in a non-invasive manner—only if they were willing, of course) to help them understand our perspective. And, I would be willing to go through the same process to understand their perspective. Together, we could then talk about it and maybe find a compromise.

Anyone up for it? I’ll let you have all the patents. I’d just like a little credit. Thanks.

Until then, I guess we’re stuck with words.

They’ve served us well for several millennia. I guess we can continue using them until the Holographic-Perspectivator is created.

Supposedly Teaching, Part VI

2011-09-29T12:51:00.000Z

It's time for another installment of "Supposedly Teaching." It's been a good week for supposedly teaching, because I've been five steps behind everything, creating the perfect recipe for classroom chaos.

In English 11, I presented their first quarter independent reading project. It's a fake Facebook profile page for a character in one of their independent reading books. One of the parts is the "Info" section, which has a subcategory "Basic Information" (just like Facebook, right?"). So, I want them to write a "pithy and clever" statement about the character under "About Me". As an example, I told them what I have written on my own Facebook profile (I happen to think it's pithy and clever. Please don't burst my bubble). My "About Me" says: "I'm a loquacious introvert." ("Loquacious" means extremely talkative.)

Of course, my English 11 students didn't know the meaning of "loquacious" because it's not a vocab word yet (heaven forbid they actually know what a "big" word means before they get it as a vocab word...) so I was about to explain the meaning to them after they didn't laugh at my clever and pithy "about me" statement, effectively busting my bubble (which is why I ask you not to burst my bubble, because it's been burst enough this week), when one student didn't raise her hand and said "Miss Bowers, what's loquacious?"

"It means extremely talkative," I said. "If you haven't picked up on the fact, I talk a lot. But, I'm also an introvert. I'm not really sure how that works, but I am."

"Oh!" said the uncalled-on student. "I thought that was, like, a name for a black girl."

You know what she means...Ketisha...Precious...Tramecia...Rihanna...Desiree...Loquacious...Shameeka...

My "black" name is Loquacious.

She doesn't really have a filter. This is the same student who said, when I asked for examples of similes:

"You look like a baby doll."

"Okay," I said. "You look like a baby doll. That's a simile."

"No!" she said, "You look like a baby doll, today, Miss Bowers."

Oh. I'm not really sure if I was being complimented or insulted.

(It runs in the family. Her brother is the one who sent me a post card all the way from India with a wrinkled, wizened old woman on the front with the message: "I chose the old lady to remind you to get married soon.")

AP Lit is second period, and most of the students in my class have Speech and Drama first period. Right now, their speech topics are demonstration speeches, and the kids come up with some rather creative demonstration topics. Often, the demonstrations--or at least the props--overflow into AP Lit.

Dakar Academy is a safe and trusting kind of place. As a result, we don't really have a strict knives policy. It's Africa and most of the kids are MKs, and MKs are comfortable with knives and often bring them to school. I know, I know--this sounds crazy, but it's so normal that I rarely even think about it. They aren't using them for violence, obviously, or we would have a stricter policy. They keep pocket knives for all the useful things a pocket knife can do (other than stabbing someone) and as long as no one stabs anyone, we'll continue to be lenient.

The pocket knives don't usually come out in class, however, and the knives are usually small and inconspicuous.

I wasn't really paying attention as the students settled themselves into class, but as I walked down the middle row of desks, I noticed that Kent was wearing a straw hat, and waving a machete about.

Pause.

Straw hat. Machete.

Unpause.

Because it was Kent, I knew it had to have something to do with zombies.

"Kent, why do you have a machete in AP Lit?"

"It was for a demonstration speech." Of course.

"What was the speech about?"

His brother Joel piped up: "It was a demonstration speech on how to ride a [motor] scooter."

Oh.

"And the machete?"

"I was riding on the back," said Kent. "There were zombies attacking us."

Of course.

And then, suddenly, the machete was in Taylor's hands, and Taylor was waving the machete around.

"Taylor, give me the machete." I said.

"No!" he cried.

"Give me the machete!" I said.

"No!"

"Don't give in!" said Kent and Joel. "Don't give in, Taylor. Be strong."

"Give me the machete, Taylor!"

He gave me the machete.

"I'm sorry. I'm weak. She's too powerful," moaned Taylor as the Twins berated him.

I put it on the back table to be picked up after class. Class moved on.

I've never said the sentence "Give me the machete" in AP Lit before. I'm going to miss saying things like "Give me the machete" in AP Lit. I'm not sure I'll ever teach in a place where "Give me the machete" doesn't mean crisis and fear.

This past weekend was our annual Staff Retreat. Because the students had worked hard all weekend...and the staff hadn't, I planned a fun day for my classes. We did Write-Arounds. (If you don't know what a write-around is, you don't know what fun is.) A Write-Around is a writing game. Everyone starts a story on a piece of paper, and then the paper gets passed from person to person. Each person adds several sentences to the story, and passes it on. The twist is that as you pass the story along, the only part of the story that the next person sees is what has just been written. As a result, you don't know what the story is really about--you have to rely on the clues that the previous person provided about the story. You can imagine that the story ends up being very nonsensical and extremely funny. They are not meant to be great pieces of literature. The problem is that sometimes they end up slightly inappropriate as well, because students do not know who the pronouns refer to, and often times end up placing themselves (and others) in awkward situations.

Before starting class on Monday, I decided to "sanitize" all my students, because there's currently a pink-eye epidemic going through the school (and in fact all of Senegal). I didn't want to catch pink-eye, and several students in each of my classes had pink-eye, so I offered hand-sanitizer to anyone who wanted it. I made the mistake of passing the bottle around, instead of squirting it into each student's hand. So, in AP Lit, Taylor and Philip went a bit overboard with the hand-sanitizer: they splashed it on their faces like after-shave, and rubbed it through their hair.

Pause.

Feel free to find this gross.

Unpause.

Eventually, I realized that my bottle of Germ-X was being depleted far too quickly, and that I need to reign in the sanitization (while it was being passed around, I was explaining the Write-Around instructions). I yanked it out of Taylor's hands, because he was going for round 2 of the Germ-X wash, and we went on with the Write-Arounds.

It takes about 30 minutes or so for the Write-Around to get to everyone, so there were only a few minutes left at the end of class to read them. I read a few, and a clear motif came through in the texts: Germ-X. Taylor had written something about Germ-X hand-sanitizer in each one. Silly boy.

I only read a few more each day because of needing to do actual schoolwork in class (imagine that). Today, I picked up the Write-Around on the top of the stack, planning to read 2 today before beginning our discussion.

Here is what I read today:

You can make up excuses for homework, parents can be convinced that no amount of studying could have made you pass that test; but there are no excuses for forgetting your brain at home.

Your brain needs some rest sometimes, so feed it some germ-x so that it may grow stronger.

This was an old proverb from the land of Germaphobia where germ-x was like a god. But other than this being the neighboring country, it really has nothing to do with the story.

Taylor let out a sigh of pleasure as he slowly descended into his bath of germ-x. Once completely submerged save his face, everything in life turned gold. His muscles relaxed, his heart slowed to a chill beat. Pure ecstasy.

"Nothing like a germ-x bath to sooth all your troubles away." Yes. Pure ecstasy. Suddenly, Taylor had the genius idea to warm up the germ-x, "after all, it is cold in here!" Taylor took out the matches and- -

AND THIS WAS THE NEXT ENTRY:

"No, stop!!" said Miss Bowers furiously...

ALL CHAOS BROKE LOSE IN MY CLASS. The students cried out in horror. Miss Bowers cried out in horror. As I sat on my stool, I writhed about in horror.

Taylor declared (unnecessarily): "What are you doing in my bathroom, Miss Bowers?"

Chaos continued to reign.

It really didn't matter that the write-around went on to say that the entire class was crying out to Taylor not to set the germ-x on fire. The damage was done. The damage was done.The damage was done.

I declared an end to reading any more Write-Arounds, picked up the broken pieces of my lesson plan, and resumed class.

I'll never be able to look at hand-sanitizer the same way again.

Vocabulary Comics

2011-09-20T17:37:00.000Z

My students have an "online school day" on Friday, and one of the activities that I'm using are vocabulary comics. I know this isn't an original idea, and I'm not touting it as if it is (don't worry). But, I created some funny vocabulary pictures using the Paint program, and they made me laugh today, so I thought I'd share them because I wanted to share them all day with someone--anyone!

Here you go...from the untalented "brush" of Miss Bowers...

Okay, the next one is Pirates of the Caribbean inspired, but despite all of that, my Captain Barbosa looks like one of the 3 Musketeers. Good thing I didn't attempt to draw Jack Sparrow.

Poor bride. Not only is her fiance a drunk, but she is also very ugly.

Now, please, don't jump down my throat for creating an implausible scenario on Jeopardy and for the Twilight reference.

Don't read into my politics from this picture. I'm almost as apolitical as Rob. Except my interests aren't really the same.

This is my favorite one of all. It's sort of an inside joke. My brother loves N'Ice Cream, the really good ice cream store in Dakar. And now that you understand the joke, you can laugh uproariously.

"Uproariously"...I bet I can come up with a fun vocabulary comic for that!

p.s. I know the pictures are too wide for the area, but, if I make the smaller, the text is too small. So, to the perfectionists in the crowd who can't abide things like crooked picture frames or partially erased whiteboards...get over it.

The Question

2011-08-21T17:26:00.000Z

The answer to the question--the question everyone is asking me these days--is "I don't know."

I just don't know.

Before The Question, there was another Question: the Is-this-going-to-be-your-last-year-at-DA? Question. I was asked this question for years, which actually is kind of draining, because it feels like you're not really being allowed to just...be here...but you're always being evaluated based on the remainder of your time here. I know that is not at all what people meant by asking me this Question--but it occasionally was tiring because I just needed to not wonder at that point in time whether or not it was my last year: I just needed to survive that grading period!

What is The Question? Oh, I should share that, too. The Question is the Do-You-Know-What-You'll-Be-Doing-Next-Year?Question. This is a perfectly reasonable question to ask. There's nothing wrong with asking me this question. In fact, it's polite to ask me this question, and a good conversation starter.

Except I manage to fail at starting the conversation when asked this question because I say: "I don't know." And then people press me for clarification...What do you mean you don't know? I mean...I don't know. But surely you know something...Well--I know I'll be in America, because I've got to learn how to live in America...but other than that...I don't know. Yes, but do you know where you'll live? Nope.

Conversation Killer.

As most people know (well, I think they know, but probably they don't , because I also realize the world doesn't revolve around me--surprise!), this is my last year at DA. It's been declared, officially so, and no matter what, this is not going to change. It's nice in many ways: This is the first year I've been absolutely certain that it's my last year--and that makes a difference in how approach things, because I want to do them as best as I can, since it'll be my last chance to do them.

But, even though I know that in 10 short months, I will move back to America (this much I do know), leave Senegal and Dakar Academy after 5 short years...I don't know where I'll be moving to in America, and what I'll be doing. I don't have a particular inclination towards anything. It's the weirdest and most disconcerting feeling, actually. I don't know if I want to teach...part of me suspects a break from teaching might be helpful to help me understand how much I love teaching. I don't know if I want to go back to school. If I did, I don't know what school I would want to go to, and I don't know what I would want to study. I don't know what kind of job I would get if I didn't teach, or what I would do if I didn't go back to school.

It's the most blank I've ever been about my future decisions. I used to be this person who planned out her life years in advance, and even when my plan didn't exactly work out, I still had an idea. But, a funny thing happened to me: I have done what I dreamed of doing--becoming an English teacher at an international/missionary school...and now I don't know if that's my dream still, or if it still counts now that I've fulfilled my dream while still under the age of 30--who am I kidding? Under the age of 25!

I'm really open to good (and silly) suggestions for next year. I've thought about being an astronaut, but then they closed down the space shuttle program (and I can't do math); I thought about joining the Peace Corps, but then remembered that they typically work outside the United States. I thought about working as a coffee shop barista (obviously the most likely profession out of this list--and I looooove coffee). I thought about being an au pair (yeah, that lasted about 12 seconds because then I remembered that I'm not a huge fan of children--no offense if you are a child or own children...I mean "have" children.)

So, in answer to your question: I don't know what I'll be doing, or where I'll be living. I'm spending a lot of time asking for divine inspiration. I think this is one where God's sort of waiting to see if I am willing to wait on His timing and His will, rather than charging off towards my own ideas. Maybe this blankness is God's way of nudging me towards completely relying on Him, and eventually, once I get it through my exceptionally thick skull, He'll carefully reveal His plan.And it'll be a swell plan--an amazing plan--a plan so much better than anything I could come up with.

If you should have any brilliant ideas about What I can be when I grow up, feel free to leave a comment. Remember: astronauts and nannies are definitely out. But as to everything else...the world is my oyster.

Summer Sundries

2011-06-21T13:21:00.000Z

What is a sundry?

It sounds like some kind of raisin.

I like raisins. I like to eat them on granola.

It's summer. My heart is happy happy happy. What have I been doing?

1. Reading.

So I decided that I would tackle the Twilight series this summer. Wait a moment before you mock me. Just a half-second. See, I work with adolescents, right? And Twilight is popular among adolescents, right? It's important to be aware of what they're reading. I actually believe what I just said, and I'm simultaneously mocking myself for what I just said. That, my friends, is an example of a paradox. The problem is, I can't get past the 2nd book. That's where I stopped the last time I tried reading the Twilight series, and they said (they being people who made it through the whole thing) that the 2nd book is the worst/hardest to read/slowest, etc.

Yuck. We'll see how this goes.

I also just read The Help which was incredible. I didn't really want it to end, which is a sign of a good book, isn't it? (Because I want New Moon to end. Die New Moon. Die.) But back to The Help. I was skeptical. I don't like Southern Fiction very much. I'm not terribly politically correct...I usually prefer reading novels of Dead White Men than Living White Southern Women. Don't tell my college professors...But, The Help was excellent. Oh, and just because everyone is talking about how good it is doesn't mean it isn't good--read it inspite of the hype. I hope you'll like it.

I'm also doing a reading of Dystopian classics--Slaughterhouse Five, A Clockwork Orange, Brave New World, and possibly 1984 and Fahrenheit 451. Why? Because I like depressing science fiction. I find it thought-provoking, challenging, and fun. That's right. Fun.

2. Watching TV (when the power's on).

I have to admit: I've been watching America's Next Top Model. Yep. And I like it.

Okay, everyone--everyone--needs mindless entertainment every once in a while. Again. Don't mention this to my college professors. Of course I watch it simply to mock it. Of course.

And I like the pretty pictures.

3. Running. Ish. Yes, I just made a suffix a word, and I don't care 'cause it's summer vacay, and I can do whatev' I want. I'm trying to run. And by run I do mean jog slowly. My goal: increase my mileage to more than it is now. Yeah, that's right. It's good to set good goals for yourself. In all honesty, I like running. I enjoy it, but I get shin splints, even with my new shiny really-expensive-for-a-missionary-teacher shoes (which leads me to conclude that I am the problem, and not the shoes, since my other pair seemed to give me shin splints, too) so I have to take it really easy. I don't think I'll ever run a marathon, or a half-marathon, but hopefully I can run five or six miles by the end of the summer without being in excruciating pain. Woot.

4. Packing/Moving. Sort of. I'm moving from the 3rd floor of my apartment building to the 1st. I'm not exactly being proactive about this, but in theory, I am. I took everything off of the pantry shelf today--proactive--and I thought about sorting through all my clothes--almost proactive--but then I didn't. I'm trying to move by June 30, since I want to go to Mali July 1st or 2nd. It'll get done. Eventually.

5. Writing.

I decided to take an online creative writing class--creative fiction writing, I should clarify. It's starts today (which is probably what's inspired this bout of silliness on the blog today.) I'm nervous, actually, because 1) I hate getting bad grades 2) what if they don't like me? and 3) Creative Writing is pretty personal and 4) I can never find endings to my stories. Seriously. I've written a lot of short stories...half way. Then I run out of steam/inspiration/care and I quit. So, I decided that paying money would inspire me to finish my stories. Then, I'll submit one to a famous magazine, like The New Yorker and they'll love it, and a famous Publishing House will ask me to write a novel, and I will, and it will become an instant best seller--the next great American novel (although hopefully not as depressing as all the rest), and I'll go on Oprah, or whatever the equivalent will be since she's off the air, and I'll make lots of money, pay off my college loans, meet a handsome/intelligent/Godly/hilarious man who doesn't love me for my money but for my many other wonderful and endearing (albeit occasionally annoying) attributes...

Wait, I am getting a bit carried away. I don't even have a single idea for a short story.

Guess I'd better think of that.

So that's my summer so far. I know you were dying to know. I'm off to audition for America's Next Top Novelist. Airing Summer 2012.

Now that would be a pretty awesome reality TV show.

p.s. I actually do know what a sundry is.

Graduation 2011

2011-06-03T14:06:00.000Z

Josh: The Savage Man

Part of "becoming Miss Bowers" has been learning how to say goodbye to my seniors. This is one of the hardest parts of being a teacher at a international school: every year, people leave...for good. It's not a hometown, and often when our seniors leave, it's forever. Oh, many of them come back to visit, and we're glad to see them--but some never do. So, graduation is often The Goodbye.

After the Commencement Ceremony, the new graduates line up against the back wall of the court to be congratualted--over the years this has come to be called "The Wailing Wall." Indeed, it is. I'm not a person who cries easily, but at graduation, as I say my goodbyes, I weep. I know that part of it is that every graduation brings back every difficult goodbye I've ever had in my life of many goodbyes--for the life of an MK is a life of perpetual farewells. Therefore, as I say goodbye to each senior, I'm reliving saying goodbye to everyone.

I'm not exaggerating when I say my heart breaks every year at graduation. I'm so proud of them, so happy for them...and so sad to see them go. Funny how the moments in which I pulled out my hair over their behavior, ranted about their comma splices and wished that sometimes, just once they would "Grow Up!" all are momentarily forgotten, and mostly I just love them--immaturity and comma splices and all.

So, as I write this, my heart is full of sorrow--but also joy over their accomplishments, over the privilege of being their teacher, over the times of laughter spent with them.

Here are some Graduation Faces of the Class of 2011:

Kaitlyn: baker of delicious sugar cookies.

Mary: the Wise and Mysterious One

David: The Witty Genius

Annieo: the Artist.

Tanner: The Creator of Outrageous Analogies.

Matt: the laid back guitarist.

Moeun: The Drummer.

Lee: the Sound Man.

Derrick: The Brazen Mathematician

Andrew: The Encourager (Please be sure to note Matt's face in the background.)

Graduates waiting to process.

This post is a "shout out" to the class of 2011: I love you. You know I do...but I just want to make sure that you know--you hold a dear place in my heart, and always will, no matter how many other graduating classes pass through my classroom door--I won't forget you...how could I?

End Times

2011-05-30T14:32:00.001Z

It's the end of the school year. Students are taking exams right now as I type this. I have been grading intensely, non-stop, for what feels like weeks. Oh, wait, that's right: it has been weeks since I've had a point when there hasn't always been a stack waiting for me to mark. I'm ready to be done...with the work. I'm not ready for the goodbyes, of course. School ends Thursday.

Here are some pictures of the end times. It's not over yet, but I thought I'd just document it a wee bit to give an idea of what the end of the year is like at DA. Graduation is a comin'--and this year, a 50th Anniversary.

Sign of the Times #1: AP Exams are over.

Tanner survived his AP Literature exam. The stickers all over him (including his tongue) are the college board bar code stickers each student gets. Oh, and don't worry: there's a far more flattering picture of Tanner below.

Sign of the Times #2: Classroom Management becomes a challenge.

This is my white board. After AP exams, I let my students basically sit where they wanted while watching movies...but it got a bit out of hand. If you can't read it, it says: "Also: Sit in your assigned seats. The Love of Lee has gotten out of hand."

Sign of the Times #3: The Seniors go on Sneak...sshhhh...it's the secret that everybody knows.

This is the merry-go-round. In the Flame Tree. Traditionally the seniors "re-arrange" the campus the night before Sneak. It's most of the time all in good fun.

They put the sand volleyball court on the blue-top (the "black-top" for you old timers).

Don't worry: there was supervision...

Then, before heading out to Saly, the seniors went "bumper carring" (which apparently can be verbed).

Sign of the Times #4: Alumni start coming back.

It's Da-vid. The boy who, for two years, said: "Hi Miss Bowers" and "Bye Miss Bowers" every time I walked past him. Every time. Did I mention it was every time? He's started the tradition up again. Oh, and I should mention that I also love David. Really, I do. I was so, so, so happy to see him again.

Sign of the Times #5: The last days of school (well, for the seniors!).

Annual class photo of the AP Literature class.

Annual class photo of English 12 class.

Sign of the Times #6: Some students study for exams...

These are my adorable little 7th graders who would not like being called adorable, or little. But they are so dear and I'm going to miss teaching them...unless I get to teach them next year (fingers crossed...!).

Sign of the Times #7: We get dressed up fancy and go to a Junior-Senior Banquet.

This is my baby sister, Susanna. She'll be a senior next year. Isn't she puuurrrrrdy?

This is Annieo, whom I've known since she was a wee little tot. And now, she's graduating. I shall miss her deeply.

A few more of my wonderful students.

The theme of JSB was "Masquerade"

This is Will. I'm going to miss Will. It's best I don't expound on it at the moment, because then I will get all weepy (which is an unofficial Sign of the Times, but there are no photos to document it.)

This is Tanner. I'm going to miss Tanner. See above remarks for why I am not expounding on this. This was a hard picture to procure, by the way. I had to practically arm wrestle him to take a picture with me.

Sign of the Times #8: We go to Senior Receptions. We eat a lot of food in honor of the seniors. Yum. Burp.

Cori and Kari at a senior reception. The first of 5 in that afternoon. Many cups of iced coffee were consumed.

The wonderful Yan. Another absolutely amazing person I'm going to miss dreadfully.

Mary, another student I've known since she was a tiny, tiny little thing. At the time, I didn't know I would be her teacher one day--our parents were missionaries in Mali at the same time. I'm so, so, so glad I got to teach Mary: she's lovely.

Sign of the Times #9: Students take exams.

Graduation is Thursday--the final Sign of the Times. Weeping and laughing and dancing and joy and gladness and sadness all bundled into one moment. Oh, the ache in my heart!

Henna

2011-05-30T09:35:00.000Z

Apparently, 8 years ago, my friends and I started a tradition of hennaing Cori's hair. I was still a student, Cori was our dorm assistant. Now, Cori's my roommate, and I keep her in line. Ha. Just kidding. We all know she still keeps me in line. Sort of. As much as anyone can. It's a tough job.

This is Cori, back in the good old days as dorm assistant.

So, 8 years ago, on the eve of graduation, we hennaed our hair, and we convinced Cori to henna a streak of her hair. Unbeknownst (what a word, "unbeknownst"!) to me, Cori continued the tradition, and when I came back to DA four years later, she was still putting henna in her hair at the end of the school year.

I decided to record the process--because it's quite a process--for posterity and all of that. I've done it several times to my own hair (the first time was when I was fourteen--I'd never dyed my hair before, and it turned my dark blond/light brown hair very close to the color of the gloves below!), but it's really better when you have short hair.

This is when I hennaed my hair in college, over Christmas Break in Mali. I remember when I got back to school, my friend Becky saw me from the back and started laughing hysterically. I have yet to forgive her.

What's henna? It's a green powder derived from a plant. It's green...but it turns skin, hair, and nails (and everything else) orange. In Africa, women use it to make designs on their hands and feet. You may have gotten a henna tatoo "down the ocean" (that's for all the Maryland folks), or perhaps in Saly (that's for all the Senegal folks). But, it's actually quite traditional to Africa, the Middle East, India--and probably other places that such sweeping geographical generalizations does not include. The great thing about henna is that it can dye hair. Careful: it's totally permanent--you have to grow out and cut out the henna once you've used it. (When used it on skin, it eventually scrubs off, but if you put it on your nails, they have to grow out).

If I hadn't been wearing gloves, my hands would be this color.

A before shot.

Step 1: Wet the henna. I didn't use enough water at first, and had to stop part way through and make it soupier.

My mom brought the henna from Mali--you can get it in any local market in West Africa. The henna is piled in a large benoir (basin) heaped up in a conical mountain--I don't know how they transport it back and forth from home--but there are always at least a dozen henna sellers when you walk through the market.

If you are thinking that this looks like green mud...you're right. This is going to go on Cori's head.

Step 2: Vasoline around the ears, forehead, and nape of the neck to protect the skin from turning orange.

I had to put her hair up in a little Pebbles ponytail. Why doesn't she wear her hair like this more often?

Step 3: Begin to slop the green goop on the hair. Be sure to coat every strand and to get the roots. It's tricky! The best way to do it is in little sections all over the head.

Please note: wear gloves! Otherwise, your hands will turn orange. Oh, and this picture probably isn't the best for a demonstration...I was a little too excited, and put a massive blob on her head, which actually threw me off, because it really is better to go section by section. I was doing it for the entertainment factor--Cori's family was there watching the process.

I decided to give Cori a mohawk. There's lots of sculpting one can do with hennaed hair!

In all seriousness now...

Step 4: Put a plastic bag on your head. The heat trapped inside the bag reacts with the henna. It would still work without it, I suppose, but it wouldn't be as fun. Also, Cori's going to sleep with the henna, and rinse it out in the morning, so she needs to protect her pillow.

Step 5: Leave the henna in for several hours. If you have lighter hair, don't leave it in too long; if your hair is dark, leave it in a long time if you want it to take well. Cori leaves hers in all night.

Step 6: Rinse out your hair. It's probably smart to wear gloves even for this part. Rinse it out into a basin or bucket, first, till most of the solid stuff is out of your hair.

Step 7: Look gorgeous.

I also told Cori to get a haircut. I'm bossy like that. The thing is, the Junior-Senior Banquet was coming up, and she needed a sleek hair cut to go with her red locks.

And that is how you henna your hair.

"When in Rome" Part VII: Venezia!

2011-05-19T11:04:00.000Z

About a month and a half ago, four adventurous friends went off on an journey to Italy, in pursuit of delicious pasta and fine espressos and in pursuit of a break from the humdrum dullness of everyday life in Dakar, Senegal. One of those friends was selected to tell the stories of their adventures, like the bards of old (except, without the rhyming--you really don't want her to rhyme. She's dreadful at the rhyming stuff). And then she got bogged down by the ordinary parts of life when they returned from their Italian adventure, and although she tried very hard to write about Italy in a prompt and timely fashion, everything else pressed in on her attention, until now, when she decided to use it as an excuse to procrastinate from marking the 34 research papers she needs to grade in the next week and half.

This is the continuation of their story.

On the seventh day of their journey the four women went to Venice.

The famous clock tower of St. Mark's square, a tiny peek of St. Mark's Basilica, and the Doge's Palace. If she is allowed to boast a little bit, Danielle is quite pleased with this shot, and thinks that perhaps Venice should use it as a postcard, and send the profits to Danielle to help pay off her college loans.

They arose early in the morning to catch their 9:30 train. Danielle got up earlier than the others to shower, and so she was ready to go by 7:30. Everyone else was still getting up slowly—they didn’t have to leave until 8:30 or so, so there really wasn’t a rush—Danielle just wanted a hot shower. At 7:45, the doorbell rang: it was Marcello, the little Italian man who owned the flat, coming to pick up the keys. Kari had been trying and trying to get in touch with Marcello to arrange the key drop off, but to no avail. She’d finally sent him an email telling him we were going to leave the flat at 8:30. So, he arrived at 7:45. The doorbell buzzing was the signal for everyone to wake up. After the doorbell chimed, there was a tremendous scuffle from Alicia and Kari’s bedroom, and a cry of “Shoot!” from Kari as she leaped up, and rushed into the bathroom. Danielle calmly spoke to Marcello on the intercom, and buzzed him up. She wasn’t really sure what to do with him when he came—would he sit in the living room and watch all of them scurry about to pack up the various last minute paraphernalia? Anticipating an awkward moment, Danielle let Marcello in. Marcello looked about in some confusion at the still unpacked apartment.

“When are you leaving?” He asked.

“Um…8:30…”

“Oh. Okay. I will come back.” And he left. And Danielle was relieved that she didn’t have to entertain him politely for forty-five minutes till everyone was ready to go.

At 8:30, they stood waiting for Marcello outside the building. It was raining—the first day of bad weather the whole trip, for which the four were very grateful. It had been beautiful in Rome for six days.

When Marcello walked around the corner, he opened his arms wide and said: “Rome is crying because you are leaving her.”

This man was a charmer in his day.

As they waved goodbye, and walked away from Marcello, Kari mused: “I really feel like he wanted me to give him a hug. But I wasn’t sure what to do.”

Finding the right train was not too difficult, but finding the reserved seats proved a nightmare. Apparently, the four no longer had reserved seats, because the train was a different type from the one originally planned on. It was rather trying to figure out where to sit, and they were juggling hand luggage, suitcases, and the carryout breakfast they’d purchased to eat on the train. People looked askance at them as they wandered in bewilderment up and down the aisle looking for seats 101-105 on a car that only went up to seat number 95.

Eventually, the four found unreserved seats in another car, and settled in for the three hour journey, in which they started taking notes for these very travel logs.

The train took them directly to the Venice train station, but their hotel was actually twenty minutes outside of Venice, on the mainland. The Venice train station is on solid ground, but as you may know, the rest of Venice is not. They peeked out the main doors of the train station, and there was Venice, in all of its rainy glory—for the rain in Rome had followed them to Venice. Despite the rain, it was still lovely in a Romantic poet sort of way. Danielle imagined Byron musing on the rainy skies over Venice, and found that odd, because Danielle does not even like Byron. After taking in the view, they waited for the train to take them to their hotel, which was in a small town outside of Venice. Alicia’s parents paid for the hotel as a part of Alicia’s birthday present (for which Alicia’s three friends feel immensely grateful). The hotel was nice in a hotel kind of way, and they rested for only a few minutes before heading out once more for Venice, despite the rain and their weary feet. They stopped in a little diner nearby for lunch (it was nearly 3:00 pm) for they were famished and fainting from lack of sustenance.

Cori and Kari on the train back to Venice.

And Alicia and Danielle on the train back to Venice.

Upon returning to Venice, they needed to make a rather difficult decision: which vaperetto tickets to buy. Perhaps you scorn. Perhaps you say: “Pssh Posh.” Perhaps you say: “What’s a vaperetto?” A vaperetto is the “bus” system in Venice—there are no actual automobiles in Venice: it's a bus boat. There is no other way to get around, other than walking or taking a Gondolier. You don’t hire a gondolier to get around for ordinary traffic—you take a vaperetto. And, because Venice is essentially a giant tourist trap, waiting to take all of your money, the vaperetto is remarkably, incredibly, exorbitantly expensive. After deciding to sell their future first-born children to the city of Venice in order to be able to pay for the 36 hour vaperetto pass, the four women lined up to purchase the pass from the vendor.

In this photograph, Danielle, Alicia, and Kari are looking at the vaperetto sign, and pondering: "How badly do we really want to ride the vaperetto? Is it possible to just walk, rather than selling our future first born children?"

The automatic machine did not work, and Danielle informed the man of this problem.

“I am better than machine.” He told her with a wink.

When Kari went, she asked him where they could catch the Number 1. He told her “You want #1, you come to me.”

Apparently, he has been working on his English.

It was still cold and rainy, and they huddled in the vaperetto shelter, waiting for it to arrive. Of course, by the way, they huddled in the wrong shelter for fifteen minutes before realizing that they were in the wrong shelter. Eventually, they found the correct one, and the correct vaperetto. The plan was to ride the vaperetto all the way up the Grand Canal to take in the view of Venice, first. Venice was crying—hopefully not because of their arrival—but, as stated, it was lovely in that dreary, poetic sort of way that inspires the Anne of Green Gables of the world to write poetry or re-enact “The Lady of Shalott.”

They took the vaperetto to nearly the end of the line, just past St. Mark’s Basilica, and then decided to walk around. Rick Steves told them that the most remarkable sight of Venice was Venice. Rick Steves, once again, was correct: Venice is indeed the most remarkable sight of Venice. As evening came on, and the rain drizzled down upon them, the lights of the small streets cast a comforting warm glow on the whole scene. Someone in the group suggested that they “follow the warm glow” as the guide for which streets to explore, and so they did—drifting down side streets and up alleyways, guided by the streets with the warmest glows. It was a perfect way to explore Venice, and their meanderings led them to St. Mark’s square—which was practically empty because of the rain, past tiny cafes closing up for the slow tourist night, to dead ends that emptied into side canals, up and over countless bridges and walkways, guided entirely by the glow.

Rain and pedestrians in Venice.

Views from the vaperetto ride down the Grand Canal.

A wet piazza.

Follow the Warm Glow!

For some reason, when Cori walked over a bridge, someone suggested that Cori needed a bridge song. So, every time Cori walked over a bridge, she “tooted” Pomp and Circumstance. Every single bridge that they crossed in Venice.

Every single bridge.

There are many bridges in Venice.

Once again, they attempted to find a place to eat that did not exist, or which existed in some parallel universe of the author of the guidebook, and they ended up walking and walking for miles and miles, as they had in Rome. At long last, they settled on a little place that looked welcoming, if not quite the example of the nightlife or youth culture one might want in Venice. They settled into their seats, foot-weary after a long cold day of walking in drizzling rain. The restaurant was mostly staffed by international waiters—there didn’t seem to be any Italian employees, although the restaurant served delicious Italian food. They spoke some English, but there were a few translation difficulties.

At the end of the meal, over dessert, the main waiter approached our table. This was just after he got excited about Danielle’s t-shirt—she was wearing a Dakar Academy shirt, and he probably thought it said “Dkaka”—he looked like he could be from Bangladesh (sometimes mail sent to Dakar ends up in Dkaka). He set his tray down, and crossed his arms, and then uncrossed them. He gestured to the group, but began to address Cori.

“You make take this as insult, or you may take this as compliment.” He began. We all looked at him with interest. “But, you look like…Dazed and Amazed.” He told Cori. Cori started.

“Me?” She asked, in confusion.

“Yes, Yes. All the others, they are looking wide awake, they are looking like alert. But, you, you are dazed and amazed. Dazed and Amazed.”

At this point, Kari and Danielle were struggling to hold in their bubbling laughter, and the waiter made his exit, fortunately. The four women spent the next couple of minute laughing so hard, but unable to laugh out loud, because they didn’t want to draw attention to themselves, or embarrass the waiter. The man must have realized that the four friends didn’t quite take his comment as he may have intended (how is one to take that comment?) and he avoided them ‘til they finally made eye contact long enough to ask for the check.

For the rest of the night, as they made their way back to the train station, and back to the hotel, they quoted the waiter to Cori: “You look like…dazed and amazed. Dazed and Amazed. Dazed and Amazed.”

They crawled into their beds, each one of them feeling dazed and amazed after another long day of tourism. As much as they had enjoyed Italy, Rome, Venice, Pasta, Espressos, and each others company, they were really ready to get home to the ordinary, humdrum dullness of everyday life. Vacation had begun to take its toll. Fortunately, they were going home very soon.

p.s. And, for the "haters" out there...the author is quite aware that the name of this post is "When in Rome" when in fact the story takes place in Venice. However, she would like to point out that it would throw off the flow of the series, and one never wants to throw off the flow.

The Digression of a Conversation

2011-05-18T16:16:00.000Z

The digression of a conversation in 7^th Grade English (more or less quoted quite accurately):

*It all started with talking about May birthdays, and how a lot of people are born in May*

Miss Bowers: Well, the only important birthday in May is Susanna’s.

7^th Grader #2: Who?

Miss Bowers: My sister. You know, red hair, freckles, in the 11^th grade?

7^th Grader #1: Miss Bowers, was Lizzy your sister?

Miss Bowers: Yes, she is my sister.

7^th Grader #2: I didn’t know you had a sister.

Miss Bowers: Well, Susanna is my sister.

7^th Grader #3: Susanna?

Miss Bowers: Yeah, Susanna—red hair, freckles, in the 11^th grade? [Yes, I repeated this again.]

7^th Grader #1: Wait, so there’s Lizzy, then Ben Bowers, then Susanna, right?

Miss Bowers: Right.

7^th Grader #1: Is Lizzy older or younger than you?

Miss Bowers: She’s younger by 5 years, then Ben is 7 years younger, then Susanna is 10 years younger.

Everyone: Whoa! Ten years!

7^th Grader #3: I didn’t even know you had any siblings.

Miss Bowers: Well, I do.

7^th Grader #4: Miss Bowers, how many siblings do you have?

Miss Bowers: 12.

Everyone: Whoa! 12?

Miss Bowers: Yep, I have eight older brothers.

7^th Grader #4: Wow! That’s a lot!

7^th Grader #5: I wish I had 8 older brothers!

Miss Bowers: No, I really don’t have 12 siblings.

Everyone: Oh. *Confusion*

7^th Grader #4: How old is Lizzy?

Miss Bowers: She’s 21.

7^th Grader #4: MISS BOWERS! You need to get married right now!

Miss Bowers: *amused* Why?

7^th Grader #4: Because you’re 25, right? You have to get married!

Miss Bowers: Really? How do you know that I’m not called to be a nun?

7^th Grader #6: Oh, no. You couldn’t be a nun!

Miss Bowers: *indignant* Excuse me! I would make a great nun.

7^th Grader #7: Oh, no, you wouldn’t.

7^th Grader #6: You’re too loud to be a nun.

7^th Grader #6: You should be a debater.

7^th Grader #7: Yeah, because then you could just scare them, and they would give in, and then you’d win.

Miss Bowers: Okay, okay. Let’s get started.

Dictionary Lament

2011-05-01T17:55:00.000Z

This afternoon, I was looking up some words on Merriam-Webster.com. I like words. If you haven’t figured this out about me…um...Surprise! In this particular case, I was actually looking them up for a purpose, but sometimes I even…read the dictionary…for fun.

I use Merriam-Webster definitions for my wicked-hard vocabulary lists, and in the past I was on the site often. I haven’t used it in a long time, and I went to it today, expecting an old friend; this afternoon, however, I was assaulted and shocked and horrified by the changes Merriam-Webster.com has made to its dictionary.

Ladies and Gentleman: The Merriam-Webster Dictionary has now become…INTERACTIVE.

Tell me, please, why do I need an interactive dictionary? Why do you need an interactive dictionary? Why do we need an interactive dictionary.

I was looking up the word “ebullient”—I know the meaning, but I was actually looking for some synonyms of the word.

When I look up a word, why does the dictionary want to know why I looked up the word?

Why do I care to read the comments of other people who have also looked up this word?

Why do I care if 135 people on Facebook have “liked” the word? Why have 135 people “liked” this word? What…need did they want fulfill by “liking” this word? What…hole in their lives did they patch up by “liking” this word? [Actually, the 135 “likes” were for another word, not poor, unused “ebullient.”]

Why do I need to know if the word I’m looking up is in the upper or lower 50% of word popularity that week?

Does the word have feelings? Should I look it up several more times over the next couple of days to help it to rise in popularity? (It’s currently in the lower 50% of word popularity.)

If it gets too unpopular, will it be voted off the island—I mean—Dictionary? Really: if it’s down in popularity…what does that mean, for the word? Seriously…think about it. What does it mean? What should we do with words that are so unpopular?

I think we should dump them from the language, because they obviously are not cool words. They should be deleted if they get below 90% unpopularity, because obviously, no one likes them. And if something exists in our culture and society that is unpopular and/or that no one “likes,” that’s obviously enough to get rid of it.

(Obviously, the word obviously is no danger of being deleted since I’ve just used it a gajillon times. But that was for effect, I promise.)

Please, before the word “ebullient” is deleted from our lexicon, go to Merriam-Webster.com and vote. You can vote as many times as you want. Maybe, "by our powers combined," we can make “ebullient” one of the top 10% popular words on the dictionary, and it can stay on the Island.

Supposedly Teaching, Part V

2011-04-19T15:55:00.000Z

This is my 50th post. (Woot!) It seemed appropriate that I share another "Supposedly Teaching" moment (or two)...

The school newspaper has a quote section this year. This is not a section for wise quotes, but for extraordinarily stupid quotes. I always know when I’ve said something…inordinately idiotic…when my students reach for their pens, and start writing furiously.

I tend say some rather spectacularly foolish things.

For a while, trying to use their journalistic integrity, I started crying: “Off the record! Off the record!” But then I just gave up, because at one point in the school year, I was saying this at least once a day.

Despite my own propensity to say remarkably stupid things of my own accord, Kent likes to misquote me. One day a few months ago, Taylor was being particularly ornery, and declared, after I expressed my exasperation over his behavior, “I can’t help it; I’m a middle child.”

I said in response: “Oh, dear, I struggle with middle children. Even my own.” Apparently this was funny—apparently it sounded like I had children of my own. I can see why this might be amusing. Not uproariously funny, but, you know, it might invoke a small chuckle.

Was it a quotable? I hardly think so. But, instead of writing down what I said, Kent wrote this down in his notebook: “Miss Bowers: ‘I have children.’”

This did not go well for Kent.

Later that day, it was chapel. We had the Wheaton football team working at DA over their spring break, and they were speaking that afternoon. I was sitting behind some of the junior boys. As the football players walked up to the front, Philip leaned back towards me.

“Miss Bowers—Bachelors!” he said enthusiastically. Yes, this was rather…intrusive, but since I am unmarried, it is obviously the business of my students to find me a man. Oh wait. That’s right: it is not.

“Uh, they’re a little young for me, Philip,” I responded wryly and dryly. Kent was sitting in front of me. He glanced back at me, with that predictably mischievous look on his face, picked up his notebook and wrote my “quote” down with exaggerated deliberateness: “Miss Bowers: ‘I want to marry a Wheaton football player.’”

This did not go well for Kent.

Yesterday, however, I didn’t need to be misquoted to sound inappropriate or stupid. I was talking about the AP Literature exam, and explained to my students—who are already feeling anxious about the exam—the following information about the test:

“The great thing about the AP Literature exam is that it is an open-butt exam.”

This did not go well for Miss Bowers.

"When in Rome" Part VI

2011-04-14T17:19:00.001Z

Day 6

Highlights

· Walking around an entire country: Of course it was the Vatican, but it’s still cool to be able to say so. It would have only taken about 45 minutes, but we meandered for over an hour.

A view of St. Peter's Basilica as we walked around the Vatican.

Cori and the Swiss Mercenary Guards who guard the Vatican. "According to Rick Steves," the uniforms may have been designed by Michelangelo.

St. Peter's Square.

View of the Church--St. Peter's Basilica.

· McDonaldi’s!: While walking to McDonald’s for lunch, Alicia thought up a prank for people back in Dakar. She said we should tell everyone that McDonald’s in Italian is pronounced McDonaldi’s and that no one says “McDonald’s” nor understands what you mean when you ask for McDonald’s. We would tell people that they would have to ask for McDonaldi’s if they came to Italy. We decided not to actually do the prank (it would have been all Alicia)—but she did exuberantly declare “McDonaldi’s” every time we saw a sign for the restaurant while we walked.

· Seeing nuns eating at McDonalds: When we got there, we found it hilarious that there was this group of about seven nuns eating at McDonalds. Cori kept taking paparazzi shots of them the entire time. Alicia went to the restroom and there was no toilet paper; she asked the nun standing in line for a Kleenex, which the sister graciously gave her. We thought that this McDonald’s was a perfect commercial—there were nuns, families, young people, old people, alpine climbers, and tourists all converged on this one neighborhood McDonalds.

· Running to make it to St. Peter’s Basilica on time: We somehow got the impression that we’d misread the closing times for St. Peter’s; we realized at 3:19 precisely that it closed at 4:00 (having previously believed it closed at 5:00), so we leap up from the couches just after coming home from our walk around the country and lunch to dash out again. (We hadn’t gone into St. Peter’s during our walk because we wanted to avoid the lines, and planned to come back later). So, we raced the half mile or so to St. Peter’s Square to stand in a line about two hundred meters long (by Vatican standards, that’s short). Fortunately, they didn’t close at 4:00, and we were able to get in.

The Vatican has a dress code--and they actually do check people and kick them out if they are not in dress code. Maybe we need a sign like this at DA...

· Seeing a purple lady: While standing in line: I observed an older woman who had dark purple hair. Then, I noticed her shoes—purple. Then I noticed her shirt—white with purple strips. Purple purse, purple coat, and purple hat. I like purple. I hope to one day have enough guts to color coordinate my accessories with my wild hair color.

· St. Peter’s Basilica: As usual, amazing and impressive and difficult to describe. Alicia and I took “awe” pictures to show our wonder. It’s a huge church. The funny thing was, the whole time I wandered around in that enormous monument to Peter and The Church, I kept thinking of this tiny little church in Manantali, (a small town in Mali)--a church that my family visited over spring break two years ago. The contrast between the two houses of worship struck me deeply—the harmonious voices of the choir singing in the Mass contrasting with the shrill Malian singers of my memory worshiping enthusiastically and unashamedly in their minuscule hut of a church, to the jubilant clanging of a grated pipe and clacking of cowrie shells on a calabash. I’m so grateful that I know the pleasure of worshiping in tiny African churches. (Sorry...my inner Miss Bowers has this tendency to soap-box...)

An entrance way into the Basilica.

Statues at the edge of the roof of the church--the shadows make them look like people looking down upon the crowds.

St. Peter's Basilica is bigger than any church you've ever been in. Unless you've been to the cathedral in Cote D'Ivoire--that one is supposed to be bigger.

The altar over St. Peter's tomb. It was made by Bellini.

The main dome of the Basilica, over the altar.

Awe and wonder.

· Africans: While waiting for Alicia and I to stop being awed, Cori met some Congolese who worked in St. Peter's—they were “modesty monitors” and their job was to check for dress code violations, and tell people not to lean against the pillars, which is what Cori was doing when they met her. They talked for a while—they invited us to a discotheque and we declined, playing the missionary card (and the “we really don’t like Discotheques” card, as well).

· Awkward moment at an Irish Pub: Kari wanted to go to an Irish pub she had read about for dinner that night, so we set out on our last night in Rome. We found the pub, and walked in to a stunned silence. The denizens of the pub turned and looked at us with utter…confusion and surprise as the four of us doe-eyed North American tourists entered their territory. It looked very authentically Irish (and the barman--woman--had a delightfully thick Irish accent), but it was only the bar part of a pub, and not the food part. We left to find better sustenance than Guinness, giggling for several blocks over the moment that we stood awkwardly in the doorway with the goggled-eyes of the bar’s patrons staring at us stupidly.

Day 7: Venice!

"When in Rome" Part V

2011-04-13T18:02:00.000Z

Day 5

Morning:

Kari headed out to see her brother (Jeff) and sister-in-law (Liza) again (remember, the whole Rome idea started with them). She went to the Coliseum and Forum for a second time (and was able to use Alicia’s information to guide them.)

Alicia, Cori and I went out for breakfast and H&M. It’s one of my favorite stores, and I really wanted to shop there.We found H&M, and a bunch of other stores. We bought things.

Yes, I heart H&M.

I went into Levi’s to look for jeans, and for some reason got suckered into getting my “Curve IQ” done. What is a “Curve IQ”? I’m not really sure. This skinny stick of a girl measured me, and frowned a lot, and then told me I had “Bold Curves.”

Um, thank you. I think. I’d rather not think about what that means, actually.

Afternoon:

We headed back to our area to meet up with Kari and Jeff and Liza to go to the Vatican. Alicia and I got lunch at Subway. Have you ever ordered the Italian BMT sandwich at Subway (I don’t remember what the BMT stands for)—I always get that at Subway at home (by home, I mean the USA, not Senegal. I'm a confused TCK, okay?). Well, in Italy, at Subway, it’s just a BMT. This answered the question I had been asking myself the whole trip: what do they call Italian Dressing in Italy? Dressing.

When we got back to the flat, we all changed into our new clothes. It’s nice to feel pretty, and not touristy. I regret wearing my black flats, though, and not my sensible sneakers for what was ahead of us.

Side Note: When we got back from Pompeii the night before, Kari told us about her day with Jeff and Liza. One thing she told us was that “Jeff is such a tourist: sneakers, backpack. He’s even wearing a fanny pack.” We have this long running joke about fanny packs, and had been discussing them the day before. Then she corrected herself: “Actually it’s not a fanny back. It’s a money belt—that Liza got for him that was recommended by Rick Steves.”

Oh, yes. Jeff was sporting Rick Steves fashion accessories. It does not get any better than that. I think Alicia wanted one.

Kari and her family got back from their morning of tourism, and we all headed out to the Vatican Museum.

Our main aim was to see the Sistine Chapel, of course, but to see the Sistine Chapel, you have to see everything else.

Everything else is an overwhelming amount of Famous Art.

We didn’t have to wait in line to get into the Vatican, which was a relief because Cori had been telling us about the long lines she waited in four years before. We just walked right in. I was disappointed, because we didn’t have to get our passports stamped (because the Vatican is a separate country from Italy—the smallest country in the world).

Star Trek Fans: Doesn't this look like a Borg Sphere? (You know you're a Trekkie when...you go to the Vatican and see Borg Spheres...)

We started walking down corridor after corridor filled with Famous Art. The popes of yesteryear lived opulently, and the Vatican Museum is the former palace of the popes. I don’t know how the current pope lives in terms of luxury, but in the past, the position of pope was more political than religious. Their living space reflects the power of Mother Church. The first corridor you encounter is a long hall of statues—hundreds of busts and full statues. We thought that the Sistine Chapel was the next exhibit, so we spent a lot of time in this corridor. Little did we know that there was a mile or more of walking to go. I’m not exaggerating: the full extent of the Vatican museum is over four miles long. We didn’t go into the Egyptian exhibit (I would have liked to see that, rather than the statues, but there was no way to know), but we saw most of the rest of the exhibits.

Hall of Statues. The tip of the Vatican iceberg.

After a while, it got overwhelming. It was crowded—it felt like being herded like cattle. Alicia at one point was being pushed along by man’s belly, which she found rather disconcerting. After every corridor, you thought you were surely almost to the Sistine Chapel—but you weren’t. We saw famous tapestries, famous frescos, famous sculptures, famous paintings—famous, famous stuff. Have you ever been a museum, and you know that what you’re looking at is probably really famous, and one day you’ll read about it, and feel like you’ve seen it before, but you didn’t know enough at the time to know if it was famous or not? That’s how the Vatican felt: famous, famous, famous till your eyes were crossing.

This is a ceiling. A ceiling! And not even the Sistine Chapel ceiling, either. Just a run-of-the-mill ceiling in the Vatican.

This is Famous. It changed Renaissance art forever and ever. Can you name this sculpture?

Finally, finally, finally, after walking for miles and after being overwhelmed, awed, and exhausted by marvelous art, we reached the Sistine Chapel.

It was worth it.

We don’t have any pictures of the Sistine Chapel, because you aren’t allowed to take pictures (even though other, naughty people did). The museum personnel who monitor the Sistine Chapel kept repeating in a piercing, nasal monotone that cut through the majesty and sacredness of the room with: “No photos, please. No photos, please. No talking, please. No talking, please.”

I can’t describe the Sistine Chapel to my satisfaction or yours. It’s incredible. It’s everything that they say that it is. It’s more than they say that it is. I wanted to lie down on the floor and gaze up at each and every intricate, detailed, phenomenal part of the fresco. I'm pretty sure the guards would have yelled at me, so I didn't.

Eventually, we had to go back into the real world. (In the process of re-entering reality, the six of us managed to get almost entirely separated from each other--Alicia stayed behind to listen to the audio tour on her iPod, and somehow ended up outside before the rest of us found our way out--but we all finally stumbled out of the entrance, blinking into the ordinary sunshine of an ordinary Saturday afternoon in Roma).

After miles of Famous Art, and after the Sistine Chapel, we were tired. Cori, Kari, and Liza decided that they have Art ADD. We all wished that the Sistine Chapel could be at the beginning of the tour, not the end—because by the time you get there, your mind is full-to-the-brim with incredible Art, and almost can’t handle one more piece—no matter how majestic the Sistine Chapel is.

Kari, Jeff and Liza headed out again to do more tourism, and we arranged to all meet at a restaurant called Ivo’s for dinner. Cori, Alicia and I went back to the flat, physically and mentally exhausted, and rested till we went out for dinner.

Evening:

As usual, it took us a while to figure out how to get where we were going. We eventually worked it out after extensive map-checking and cross-referencing with the internet and Rick Steves. We had to take a bus from Termini station to the restaurant, and half of Rome got on the bus with us, which, as you can imagine, was an extraordinarily uncomfortable and unpleasant experience.

We found the restaurant, and enjoyed a pleasant evening with Kari’s relatives, getting to know them a little better and telling them about our lives in Senegal. We ate outside, and since it’s a popular restaurant (and we’d gotten there unfashionably early) the people who arrived after us lined up against the wall and watched us eat.

Alicia was sitting on the end of the table, and got the brunt of the passersby and the envy of the waiting, hungry customers. At one point, a man walked past her, and sneezed on her shoulder. Then, a family began waiting for a table, and leaned against the wall across from our table. They had a cute little boy—probably about two years old, and he had a helium balloon. After a few minutes of waiting and squirming, the cute little boy walked up to Alicia and bopped her with the balloon, which she didn’t appreciate (I think she was as offended with the balloon bop as the sneeze).

In Rome, there are a lot of street vendors, just like in Africa. When you eat outside, the street vendors come to you. So, we were sitting there eating and minding our own business and the onlookers when one of the vendors approached us, selling roses. I’ve lived in Africa most of my life, so I just ignore people very well; however, Liza, Kari’s sister-in-law, wasn’t ready to ignore the guy, or let him off the hook for interrupting our dinner. She began to question him in English about his job, but he didn’t speak English. He just had a strange and almost creepy smile on his face. He held a large long stemmed rose in one hand, and, never taking his eyes off of Liza’s face, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a giant lighter, about the size of a small paperback novel, which he proceeded to light up for us. It also had a flashlight, which he shined on our table. We waved him and his giant lighter away. Instead of leaving, he put the lighter down on the table. Again, without taking his eyes off of Liza, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a handful of smaller lighters, which he waved under our noses. Laughing, we finally waved him away and resumed our dinner.

A strange phenomenon happened at the end of this dinner: Cori didn’t finish her dinner—again. Cori always finishes her dinner. We were not sure what Italy was doing to her appetite. She didn’t even take it home with her to finish later. This is so rare an occurrence that it was quite necessary to include it in the group journal.

Of course, we had to wait for the bus—again. We really had become resigned to waiting for buses—what else could we do? We were simply catching the same exact bus back to Termini, to take another bus home—and we even knew which bus to take from Termini. (Incidentally, I should add that we discovered the night before, coming home after Pompeii, that the bus we had to take from Termini went right past the bus stops we had lingered by on the first night--remember the Opera Singer and One One Six? So, either we weren’t asking the right question, or the bus drivers were lying to us have a little fun. They were probably in cahoots with the fake priest.) We waited, and we waited, and we waited—buses came and went, very few people got on and off, and the crowd at the bus stop grew larger and larger. After waiting over thirty minutes, our bus came at last, and far more people than should ever cram onto a bus crammed onto the bus.

We were so tightly packed that Alicia, Kari and I (Cori somehow got separated from us and was pushed towards the front of the bus) were standing in the back of the bus with no access to handholds, but it didn’t matter—when we tilted, everyone tilted, and everyone just held each other up. There was no space to fall—we were pressed up against each other and total strangers. In between Kari and I there was a very tall man—our heads came up to his lower chest. At one point, the bus turned violently (because Roman bus drivers care nothing for their shocks or their passengers), and the man accidentally lost his grip and brought his elbow down on Kari’s head. When he realized what he had done, he patted her on the head like she was a little girl and apologized in Italian and English.

Up next on Day 6: we decided that we would undertake a rare and nearly-impossible undertaking: we would walk around an entire country.

A Literary Pet Peeve (the real post)

2011-04-10T19:07:00.121Z

In recent months, I have developed a new pet peeve. I am the type of person who has many pet peeves. It's a problem that I am not working to correct in my life. Perhaps I should, but I just have far too many other important things to do in my life: for example, teaching the future leaders of the world and all of that. Of course, they are the ones who often provide me with all of my pet peeves--but this one has nothing to do with them.

My newest pet peeve is something I have observed in a few novels I have read in the past several months. Here is what I have observed about current trends in fantasy: if you are going to write a novel that is remotely fantastical in nature, you must include the device of dreams in your narrative to advance the plot.

I find this extremely irritating.

It all started with Percy Jackson. The library added the whole series to the collection, and I read through all five rather quickly. I'm a fast reader, and there was a lot of pressure to read the book--mostly from a little seventh grade boy that I almost had to put in detention over it. I read the whole series in about a month, and as I read, I grew more and more frustrated with Rick Riordan. In essence, I feel that the majority of the series is a rip off of Harry Potter. [At this point in time, I need to point out that I accidentally posted this entry--twice--at this place in my text--so if you got this unfinished, mea culpa. I'm still figuring out the keyboard on my new laptop!] But, in spite of the obvious Harry Potter similarities, Riordan used dreams incessantly; towards the end of the series (and all the books now run together) almost every other chapter is a dream. It was tedious (but in a way, it was only one tedious device in a long laundry list of other narrative devices that have been used well by other authors...).

After Percy Jackson, I started reading the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series by Tad Williams. This series is much better than Percy Jackson (my apologies to all Percy fans). I'm on the third book; I think the first book has been the best of the three (which is contrary to what a lot of fans say online, but are they English teachers? No, I don't think so. I'm going to play my literary snob card in this round.). Following so close on the heels of Percy Jackson, I noticed, however, that Williams also uses the dream device more than he should. Simon is always falling in and out of dreams, almost not surviving some violent dream, having dream messages from the bad guys, etc.

This got me thinking about other fantasy novels that I've read. I'm a huge fan of the genre--more than I care to admit--and I've read a lot of fantasy. Here are some examples of authors who were sucked into the dream trap:

The extremely long, and not terribly well written Wheel of Time series relies heavily on dreams, and Jordan even creates this whole world inside of dreams that the characters flit to and from in, communicating with each other, even moving physically from one side of the world to the next via dreams. Some might find it ingenious or creative. I just found it...annoying.

[AAGGG!! I just posted AGAIN without meaning too...I am having serious technological blond moments today. And other sorts of blond moments, too, today.]

Harry Potter also uses the dream device in her narrative. Admittedly, I think she does so better than Jordan or Riordan, but it's still there. I love Harry Potter (and with that, I just lost a thousand readers...), but even in Harry Potter, it grew old, stale, wearisome.

And then, this afternoon (and the incident that prompted this post), I realized that one of my favorite authors ever, Jasper Fforde (he's even up there with Jane Austen for me), uses the dream device, as well. Prolifically. I'm reading his Thursday Next series to be caught up on the 6th book that was just published, and, yes, he too fell into the dream trap. Oh, Jasper. Oh, where did you go wrong? In his--defense seems an odd word here since I'm the one doing the criticizing, but I'll use it--defense, Fforde does so many other incredible things with language and with story that I can forgive him. But still, the dream device is still unfortunately and unnecessarily prevalent.

[My family loves Jasper Fforde so much that we carted all of his books to Timbuktu on our vacation to take pictures of our family reading the books in Timbuktu for a photo contest called the "Thursday Nextreme" that he has on his website. We didn't win--some stupid twit who took his book to a Jasper Fforde convention won that year, which made us all nextremely disappointed, because as a family, we may like Jasper Fforde as much as we like Star Trek. My sister will probably disagree with that sentiment vehemently, but it's true, Ruthanne, it's true.)

Back to dreams. I just don't get it. I passionately informed my roommate that if I ever write a fantasy series, I will not fall into the trap of dreams. My characters will receive spooky messages from dark lords some other way than through their REM cycle, they will have remarkable moments of illumination in some other fashion than while counting sheep, and, most importantly they will certainly not have romantic interludes in their dream life (because that is just gross on several levels: literary, psychological, and spiritual). (Oh, and I should also add, for her sake, that my roommate probably doesn't care, but she gets to hear my rants whether or not she cares. It's one of the perks of being my roommate.)

Do you have any literary pet peeves? (And please, don't say: people who accidentally post three times before the end of the post. That would just be cruel...)

In other literary pet peeve news: apparently, the Oxford English Dictionary has decided this year to include "lol" in its once revered and honored lexicon.

English majors the world over are weeping.

"When in Rome" Part IV

2011-04-08T11:51:00.000Z

Day 4

I know that I had you on tenterhooks for Day 4. In case you were concerned, we narrowly missed being buried by volcanic ash by about 2000 years. Maybe I did lead you a bit astray… (Or, maybe you figured out we went to Pompeii?)

Yep, that's Mount Vesuvius. Rick Steves told us that the two peaks that we see here would have come up to a single point--that's how much of the volcano blew away. It helps to understand how a town 5 miles away could be covered in volcanic ash!

It's just that Day 4 wasn't nearly as eventful as Days 1-3, so I'm digging for material here...

On Day 4, we had a schism within our group—but not a theological one. Kari was going to spend the day with her brother and sister-in-law, and Alicia, Cori and I were going to Napoli and Pompeii for the day. We would be reunited at the end of the day.

Kari had her heart set on running in Rome, so she went with us to the train station to find a park we’d seen the day before, proudly sporting her new Brasilia jersey that she’d bought during the trip.

Props to her for running on vacation. (I mean, we’d clearly walked at least twenty-seven miles in the course of our travels, so she obviously didn’t need the exercise…)

Alicia, Cori and I went to McDonald’s for breakfast while we waited for our train. In Europe, almost all the McDonald’s are fancy—they all have espresso machines and you can get croissants and pain au chocolat and other nice pastries.

Yes, once again, I am defending our choice of McDonald’s. It's not that I have any great love for McDonald's. I'm just trying to shut down McDonald's Naysayers.

Just look how happy my fancy McDonald's coffee makes me. And how nice my scarf is. Oh, we weren't talking about my scarf?

After McDonald’s it was time to catch our train, so we found the right track, and our train and had no problems. It was about an hour and half ride. Naples is south of Rome; as we traveled, we got to see the more Mediterranean parts of Italy—sunny vineyards and olive groves and houses with terracotta tiled roofs and whitewashed walls. The trip was mostly pleasant—except for the person who sat behind me who kicked my chair in time to her music the entire time. For about an hour, I thought it was a child—until she answered her phone and revealed herself as an adult who should know better.

When we got off the train in Naples, Alicia informed us that Rick Steves informed her that Naples is the worst city in Italy for pickpockets, and she told us to “Trust no one!” Anyone could be a pickpocket, any thing could be a ploy, any commotion a distraction. Trust no one.

Alicia then proceeded to have drills with Cori and I, and attempted to pickpocket our bags, declaring herself head of security.

I passed the drill. Cori, I’m afraid, did not.

"Trust no one." (Not even Alicia)

As we waited in line to buy tickets to Pompeii, we had our second Rick Steves sighting (oh, I got my Rick Steves mixed up in the previous post—this was the British Rick Steves, not the one from Da Francesco’s). He was going to Pompeii, too, which excited us. And by us, I do mean Head of Security, Alicia.

And so, we rode the train to Pompeii—it was pretty crowded, and we had to stand most of the time, during which we watched everyone closely—men, women, children, youths, old ladies, old men—trust no one.

When we got to Pompeii, we had to use the restroom. I didn’t want to, being a bathroom snob, but nature was calling strongly. We found the train station bathroom, which was tended by this ancient Italian woman. As we stood in line, Cori suddenly started laughing and pointing at the wall. It was a dusty red metal sheet and written on the wall it said: “Leafs suck. A lot.”

Apparently, this was offensive to Alicia, who is from Toronto, and Cori was delighted since she’s from Edmonton.

I think it’s a Canada thing.

Then, we needed lunch. There are several sandwich stands along the road as you head towards the official ruins of Pompeii. We were hungry. We were caught in a what Rick Steves would call a tourist trap. He (the vendor, not Rick Steves) enticed us with freshly squeezed orange juice and sandwiches and by reducing the price significantly.

The sandwiches were good. The orange juice was disappointing because it was a little juice, lots of pulp, and seeds. When you have to chew your orange juice, it takes away from some of the magic.

I am looking askance at Alicia. Oh, check out the lemons behind Alicia's head. Lemons the size of grapefruit! Will such wonders ever cease?

A Cori Ibsen action shot.

After the tourist trap lunch, we headed to the sight of the Pompeii ruins. It’s a fascinating place—very well preserved. The volcano didn’t cover the city in lava, or anything (Vesuvius is 5 miles away from the city)—the volcanic ash and flying rocks caused the damage. Rick Steves also informed us that there were 20,000 people who lived in Pompeii, and that of the 20,000, only 2000 died—not the entire town (I was always under the impression that everyone was caught unaware, and died). The city is in good shape, and gives a clear picture of what life in ancient Roman times might have been like. If you ever go to Italy, I recommend Pompeii—it’s worth it.

One of the first things I noticed was a dog lying on the side of the road. I took a picture of it, because I thought it looked well preserved. Then there were many more “well preserved dogs” all around the entire site (we probably saw ten or more different dogs) so I took pictures of them, too, because I thought my joke was funny. It’s always important to find yourself funny, because that guarantees at least one person will laugh at you.

A well-preserved dog.

Ruins as you walk up the steep hill into the city. Apparently the water used to come right up to the city gates ("according to Rick Steves.")

A temple, I think.

I thought the stone work of this wall was beautiful.

Alicia tour guides, Cori listens.

Alicia took some time off from tour guiding to be a statue.

I don't really know.

McDonald's of Pompeii--this would have been the fast food stands of the city (and in fact, all over the Roman empire)--the holes were for clay pots that kept food cold or hot. Most people didn't have kitchens, so they ate "out" a lot. I think they could take bread to be baked in the bakery, or take meat somewhere to be cooked, as well.

This is the interior of one of the houses--someone wealthy lived here.

Alicia pretending to be like the tour guides we saw, who held up a flag or an umbrella to herd their tours. Except, apparently Cori's the only one in the group...

After Pompeii, we had a few hours before our train, so we decided to find a restaurant in Naples recommended by Rick Steves. It was pretty close to the train station, and we set off into Napoli (trusting no one, of course). I didn’t love Naples, or at least the part that we saw. It was crowded and grungy. A strange thing happened—all of the sudden, there was a deafening noise that sounded like gunfire (but we later identified as fireworks) going off in the middle of the city. Cori, Alicia and I all looked around in dismay and concern, but no one else reacted at all. It was rather peculiar.

A scary dark street in Naples.

As we walked down the road that we thought that the restaurant was on, we sensed that we were lost. It was getting dark, there were many, many people, and it was cold. We walked for several blocks, looking at each cross street, trying to find the right street. In Italy, they don’t have street signs like in North America—all the names of the streets are posted on marble plaques on the sides of the building. Sometimes they get covered by scaffolding, or laundry, or trees. This makes finding places…challenging. Finally, we thought we were lost, we were ready to turn around, and, there we were, just like that.

The pizzeria we had selected was called Da Michele. It felt authentic…but it was very touristic, actually. They had 2 options: Margarita, and Marinara. Nothing else.

The menu.

We ordered Margarita Pizzas, and settled down to wait, enjoying watching the waiters interact with the clientele. Alicia pulled out her Kindle to do some more reading on Naples, and the waiters were all impressed with her fancy technology. When we took out our cameras, one of them jumped in the picture with us.

Delicious brick oven baked pizza!

Now, I was feeling a bit miffed because there were pictures on the wall of Julia Roberts with the whole wait staff, and a picture of her eating the pizza, a lot like Alicia’s picture below. Here is why I felt miffed: my middle name is Marguerite, and I didn’t think it was right that Julia Roberts had her picture on the wall when surely she didn’t share her name with the national pizza of Italy. Cori started calling her Julia Marguerite Roberts.

It turns out that Da Michele is the same pizzeria from Eat, Pray, Love, a book I've never read and movie I’ve never seen—but Julia Roberts stars in the movie, and they filmed the scene on location. I guess that’s a good enough excuse to have her picture on the wall, but I’m still skeptical and a bit hurt.

We headed back to the train station (and saw a lot of Senegalese vendors along the way), had some gelato for dessert while we waited for our train, made our connection, dozed most of the way back to Rome, found the right bus eventually (I had taken a picture of the bus sign near our flat so that we could figure out our connection), and made our way home. Kari wasn’t home yet, and she had the keys, so we stopped at the gelato stand near our flat and Alicia had more gelato while we waited.

Eventually Kari came home, we headed back upstairs, and some of us went to bed. I, however, did not, because I had far too much caffeine, and this kept me up to past 3:00 AM. This did not make me happy at all (but at least I had a good book to read!).

I just can't resist "glass coke"--but it kept me up all night.

"When in Rome" Part III

2011-04-05T20:10:00.000Z

Day 3

On the third day, we decided to go and find coffee and pastries for breakfast instead of making our own, so we headed out to a local bakery around the corner from our flat. We realized how utterly ripped off we’d been at the coffee shop from the day before—but, live and learn. While eating, we planned our day. Somehow we always seemed to be planning our day the day of—again, much to Alicia’s dismay. I think it was partly because we were in break mode, and therefore not entirely willing to move at full speed. Lingering over caffe lattes was far too delightful . Eventually we decided that we would go to the Pantheon, one of the Roman Baths, one of the Catacombs, and hopefully the tombs of the Cappuchin monks—mostly because the name of cappuchinos comes from these monks (“According to Rick Steves”). So, we headed off on our adventures once more.

We had to figure out how to get to the Pantheon, which was easier said than done, since the transportation system in Rome isn’t exactly convenient. We learned that there are 2 metro lines only: A and B. They kind of criss-cross the city, but then there are all these Famous Things in-between that aren’t on the metro, requiring one to take a bus. And the buses are not easy to figure out. We finally worked out what bus to take, found the stop for the bus, and were on our way to the Pantheon. I kept saying how excited I was to go the Parthenon. Yeah. Wrong country and civilization, I know. It’s just that the words are just so similar.

The Parthenon—I mean, Pantheon—is another one of the BAM sights—like the Coliseum and the Trevi Fountain: it’s just right there in the middle of things. It’s a massive structure, like most ancient structures still standing in Rome, and it’s actually still whole and in use as a church now. It’s in the middle of this piazza that looks like any other piazza in Rome—sidewalk cafes, a fountain, tourists, pickpockets, etc—but there just happens to be an enormous structure on one end of it. Inside, it’s simply amazing—it has an enormous domed roof that’s open to the sky and all the elements. It was originally a temple to the gods (“pan” theon”), but as I said, now it’s a church. There are several important people buried there—the most famous being Raphael (“according to Rick Steves”).

Here it is: the Pantheon. It's big. I told you so. The people look so small next to it. The obelisk in the middle is an original Egyptian obelisk dedicated to Isis--and now to Jesus. Lots of things worked out that way in Ancient Rome.

I tried to capture the bigness with my "museum piece" (yeah, I'll never forgot, Jonatas...) of a camera, but I just don't think I could.

Here are the huge doors and the little people.

The dome.

I thought the marble floors were really beautiful--most of the old churches have them. It makes me think of George Herbert's poem, "The Church Floore." Do you like how I insert literary references into things that have nothing to do with literature? That's because I'm an English teacher, folks.

This is the altar. It's a little blurry, but Kari's wider-angle lens captured the sense of it well.

After the Pantheon, our next stop was one of the Roman Baths. So, we had to figure out how to get to the Baths. We checked the guide books, headed for the bus stop, and waited for Bus 81. Eight. One.

Which never came. We waited. We waited. We waited. We waited.

For an hour, we waited. Bus after bus after bus after bus came and went, but 81 never came.

I hate Bus 81.

Finally, we took another bus, that would take us to a metro stop, that would then take us to where we needed to go, but bus 81 would have taken us straight there. But it never came.

We made it to the Baths, and wandered around another enormous structure, but one that is not so well preserved as the Coliseum or the Pantheon. It was hard to really figure out what was what—where was Dana the lying tour guide when we needed her? I’m afraid to say we weren’t terribly…awed by the Baths, but oh well. Rick Steves failed us—but actually, we failed Rick Steves, because he said that the Baths weren’t that impressive, but we went anyway, and paid the price.

Ancient Romans would have showered here, somewhere. We're not sure where. But we liked the grass.

We left the Baths, and at this point we started to get hungry—it was about 1:00 or, so, logically, yes, it was lunch time. But, we didn’t eat, because we wanted to get to the Catacombs, which were supposed to be just around the corner, according to the map. Now, I guess if we had stopped and thought about it, we would have thought that the Catacombs were placed outside the city, and the Baths were public baths, so surely they would be in the city: so how could the Catacombs be just around the corner? We didn’t stop and think about it, but decided to walk.

We started walking up this cobblestone road. At first, it was okay. The air was crisp and clear, it wasn’t too cold, there was a nice breeze. We even took off our jackets and scarves. Then, the cars started coming extremely fast, and we suddenly noticed just how narrow the road was, and how we were actually walking on the road, and not a sidewalk or a shoulder. We walked and we walked and we walked, but there were no catacombs in sight yet. We found a gate that looked open to the public, walked in, and found ourselves in a park that took us to another very similar cobblestone road. So, we walked and we walked and walked some more, hoping to find a bus stop for the bus we should have taken (which, incidentally, was the 116).
We debated if we should go home, or keep going to the catacombs.

The start of our journey along the Appian Way of Doom.

We eventually found the bus stop that we needed, so we decided to carry on to the Catacombs. More like continue on to our death.

Here’s the thing about the bus stop: it was on the side of another treacherous cobblestone road—a road that cars whizzed down with no heed for the lives of pedestrians. To stand at the bus stop, we would be risking our very lives. We ended up standing on a little curb or stoop that was at the intersection of four roads, waiting for the bus to come—we then planned to rush to the little stop, and line up against the wall when we saw it coming. Kari went to look at the times for the bus, and a tour bus passed while she was looking and whipped some of the hair off her head as it passed—it was that close. We finally saw the bus, so we went and lined up against the wall in a row, and ended up waiting five minutes because it was actually stopped at a red light. It came, we got on, thankful for our lives, and the bus continued on at a breakneck speed rattling over the cobblestones with apparently no regard for its shocks or its passengers.

Here we are, scared for our lives. I am not exaggerating. I am actually scared for my life at the Bus Stop of Doom. Notice how the sign is turned sideways--normally they are perpendicular to the road, but this sign is parallel to the road.

Afterwards, we learned (“according to Rick Steves”) that we had been standing on the Appian way, the famous road that leads into the ancient city of Rome. I kept saying: “We’re going to meet our death on the Appian Way, and then, they’ll just bury us in the catacombs with all the other Christians.”

We got off the bus when we saw the sign for the Catacombs on the side of the wall, and we were relieved to find a little snack shop on by the road. We decided to stop and have some chips and crackers and something to drink, because we were famished at this time. It was a cute little shop, with nice ladies who spoke no English. Kari needed postage stamps, so Alicia went through an elaborate pantomime to indicate what they needed. They didn’t have stamps, but everyone enjoyed the charades, including the Italian ladies. Alicia is apparently really good at them, and this prompted her to try to get us to play charades sometime. I’ll let you know how that turns out…

We looked at our watches, and realized that it was past 3:30, and that the Catacombs probably closed at 5:00, and we still had to get to them. We wanted enough time to see them (not knowing if it was a tour, or a self-guided walk), so we started to head for them. Foolishly, we had thought that they were just around the corner.

The gate was just around the corner, but the actual Catacombs were not. There were 2 signs for 2 different Catacombs—900 meters or 1500 meters. We took the 900 meter option, since the gate was just in front of us. (Alicia almost died when a giant tour bus came careening out of the gate, by the way). At first, we thought we were trespassing, because all the signs posted said in big letters: “Private Property!” We found ourselves on a long, straight road through a grassy meadow that disappeared over the horizon. I was sure that by the time we reached the Catacombs, if indeed there were Catacombs, we would be dead, and they would bury us in the Catacombs with the other Christians. I know I already said that, but it still felt like we would probably die in the attempt to reach them.

So, we walked and we walked and we walked and we walked. 900 meters is less than a kilometer, but we’d already walked a great deal that day (and the day before), and we were tired. At last we reached them, rushed to buy tickets, and rushed over to make sure we were in line for the next tour.

I asked the man: “When’s the next tour.” He said (in an Indian accent, because apparently he was Indian, not Italian): “Tomorrow morning.” I half believed him, but then he said he was joking—which was good, because I think I would have slept on one of the benches at that point to wait for the next tour.

We were divided into language groups for the tour, and the English group was pretty small. Our tour guide was an Italian woman with a strong, strong accent. Everything ended on “uh”—Every-uh-thing-uh ended-uh on-uh uh-uh. She-uh took-uh us-uh down-uh a-uh long-uh stair-uh case-uh—many, many feet down, to the second level of the Catacombs (by the way, we were at the St. Sebastian’s catacombs, which, “according to Rick Steves” are the best). The Catacombs were an eery, fascinating place. She told us that there are actually 60 catacombs in Rome—and that the Catacomb system of burial was used by both pagans and Christians, contrary to popular belief. Of the 60, only 5 or 6 have been excavated. The catacombs that we were in had 4 levels. It was kind of an awkward tour, because it was such a small group, so anytime she would stop talking, we’d all look anywhere but at her, or the others in the group. Everyone would look up and bob their heads.

We emerged from the dark catacombs blinking in the afternoon sunshine, and made our way to the bus stop. It was about 5:00 when we go there. Once again, the bus stop was on the side of a treacherous road. I don’t know if it was another part of the Appian Way, or just another cobblestone road that the Romans built, but it was a narrow two lane road with quickly moving traffic. There was a bit of a shoulder, but not much.

And we waited and we waited and we waited and we waited. Again. For the bus. To come.

I was at this point rather furious with the Roman transportation system. I was thinking up evil things to write about it on my blog. I was composing eloquent letters to the transportation authorities to tell them exactly what I thought of their system. It was frustrating simply because of the lack of information—none of the bus stops had any kind of sign stating how often the buses came. The only information on the sign was of the hours the bus ran and the bus stops. I suppose we should be grateful they bothered to post the bus stops. It wasn’t a holiday, so surely the bus had to come?

We talked amongst ourselves how perhaps this was simply a joke that Rome played on its tourists—place “bus stops” near key tourist sights that actually aren’t bus stops. At this point, we’d waited half an hour in the growing cold, and still there was no bus. As we discussed this, out of no where, a priest appeared, and stood against the wall, waiting with us. We thought: “Surely, surely the bus must be coming, if this priest has shown up. First of all, he’s a priest, and second of all, he must know the bus schedule.” We still waited and waited, till finally we decided that the “priest” must be part of the joke—Rome would send a fake priest to the fake bus stops to fake out the tourists waiting for the fake bus, and laugh and laugh and laugh at our naiveté, and then probably use the footage of our waiting on candid camera reels for showing on Alitalia Airlines.

But, at long last, the bus did come, after waiting 40 minutes. The fake priest got on the bus, and so did we. Surely there should be some penalty for posing as a man of God in Rome of all places. He was probably headed to the Vatican on the fake 116.

So, filled with bitterness, once again hungry, and severely footsore, we eventually made our way back to the flat—and then decided to go out again for dinner.

I know, we’re crazy. But you only go to Rome once. Or, three times, if you’re Cori.

We got cleaned up, and set out for Da Francesco’s, a restaurant recommended by, you guessed it, Rick Steves. We actually found the restaurant without getting too turned around (by this point, we just expected to get turned around). It turned out to be a popular restaurant, and we had to wait. It was while we were waiting that we had our first Rick Steves sighting.

Yes, you heard me right. Alicia suddenly said: “See that guy over there? With the backpack? He looks like Rick Steves.” We all surreptitiously turned to look and see, and we saw a middle aged man with a dark jacket and back pack. So, Alicia pull out her Kindle and shows us a picture of Rick Steves—and the man did in fact resemble Rick. But, it wasn’t Rick, because he was English (I secretly wondered if it could be a “fake” accent to throw off the fans—and by fans, I mean Alicia). However, it was the first of many Rick Steves sightings for the rest of the trip.

We finally got into the restaurant after waiting an hour, and it was totally worth it. Thank you, Rick Steves. If you go to Rome, go to Da Francesco’s—it’s just a fun place. There were a lot of tourists, but there were enough “locals,” too, so you knew it was “authentic.” The food was great, the ambiance was great, and our waiter was a lot of fun. Cori and Kari had a little fight over who would “get” him, but Cori won because he was older. Oh, I should mention that each of us were supposed to find a “Mr. Rome” (not Marcello) during our trip. This waiter was the first of Cori’s many, many Mr. Rome’s. Cori and Kari had the highest count, Alicia had a few, and I had none. Apparently Italians don’t really go for the German-Irish look. Whatever. My barbaric ancestors totally took over Rome, so take that Roma.

I’m not bitter.

After Da Francesco’s, Alicia really wanted to go to the Piazza del Novono, (a famous piazza “recommended by Rick Steves”—his favorite piazza in Rome), so we went, even though it was after 10:00 pm at this point. For those of you who know me, I am usually in bed by 10:00 on weekend and school nights—it was pretty late for this pumpkin. We found the piazza, oohed and ahhed at the famous fountain in the middle (which was of 4 river gods, “according to Rick Steves”), walked around, and then we needed to find our bus to get home.

We found the bus stop with no troubles, and we knew it was going to be the right bus, and all we had to do was wait. At this point in our lives, we had reconciled ourselves to the fact that we were just going to have to wait for buses in Rome. We waited about 15 minutes, during which we got a bit punchy, especially Alicia who, after a brief conversation about Harry Potter started saying: “Butterbeer” in a high pitched voice over and over again (like a house elf, I imagine).

Maybe you just had to be there. But, next time you see her, just say: “Butterbeer” in a high pitched voice. She’ll find it funny.

Then, this Dutch couple (I’m going to say they were Dutch because they were tall, and weren’t Italian; yes, I’m stereotyping) walked up to us as we waited and said: “Waiting for the bus?” (Uh, no, we aren’t waiting for the bus. We just like to stand around on street corners at night in Rome under bus stop signs at 11:00 at night.) “Your bus isn’t going to come—it’s stuck at the corner.” So, we walked down to the corner, and there was our bus a little ways off (but not far at all), unable to turn because of cars that were blocking the street. For some reason, we didn’t go after the bus. We just watched it. We walked back to the stop, for some reason assuming that it would somehow make it. It didn’t. As we watched, it drove away, down the main street that was about fifty meters away. And then we watched another bus with the right number drive away about a minute later.

So, the plan, we decided, was to catch up with the bus further ahead at another stop. Do you see the flaw in the plan? We began walking very quickly forward, trying to find the next bus stop that the bus would probably stop at, trying to judge where it might come, since it couldn’t get up the street we were on. And we walked and we walked and we walked till finally we came to a large road that ran along the river that had a bus stop for our bus. Surely it would come?

We got there around 11:25, and we waited and we waited and we waited. Déjà vu? Oh, yes, indeed. We waited. We waited. We waited. It was cold. I was cranky. And tired. Finally, around 11:58, when we were just about to give up hope, and find a taxi, and man came out and waited at the bus stop with us. I could only think of the fake priest of earlier.

And it eventually came, a little after midnight. We weren’t sure if it was going to stop, so we stood as far out on the side of the road and waved our arms around. It did stop, we got on—rather, we collapsed onto the bus. We got home around 12:30, utterly exhausted—again—and collapsed into bed. (Except for Kari, who stayed up late every night after the rest of us got back and fell into our beds.)

Stay tuned for Day Four's adventures, and how we narrowly missed being buried alive in volcanic ash...

"When in Rome" Part II

2011-04-04T18:24:00.000Z

Day 2

The next day dawned bright and early and we did not get up bright and early. We got up around 9:00. We were looking forward to hot showers, breakfast, and hitting the tourist traps.

Did I mention Hot Showers?

Well, well, well.

When we got up, there was no hot water. Only cold. And when I say cold, I mean mountain stream cold. I mean snow melting cold. Bracing.

Kari and I were brave, and took the cold showers. I cried out in pain during mine. Except, I’m the kind of person who laughs when they’re in pain, so I laughed throughout the entire painful episode. Cori was a wimp, and just washed her head in the sink, and we all know Alicia had already had 2 showers and all the hot water.

We tried not to hold it against her. Much.

We needed to get started on whatever it was that we were going to do that day, so we set off for Termini station, the main train station in Rome. We took the metro to Termini, and planned to get a Roma Pass (museum passes that also covered transportation) there.

Termini station isn’t exactly the most clearly marked train station. We wandered around the station for a least 2 hours, if not more. We had to get the Roma Pass, and train tickets for Venice, and possibly Naples, but we still spent more time than necessary in the station. Rick Steves told us we could get Roma Passes at the tourist information booth—which meant that we had to find the tourist information booth. Fortunately, Rick Steves could tell us where that was, too. What he couldn’t tell us was how to find the ticket office to buy train tickets, but we eventually found that, after getting turned around several times, and going up and down stairs several times.

After buying our Venice tickets, we were starving, so we wandered out of the station in search of lunch. We finally settled on this little hole-in-the-wall “authentic” looking restaurant which ended up being a restaurant that went deep, deep back into the city block, and was probably not the most authentic Italian restaurant in the world—although we did have another little old Italian waiter who spoke no English. Or pretended he spoke no English for the sake of authenticity…We’ll never know.

So, we decided that our first sight would be the Coliseum. We took the metro to the Coliseum stop, walked out of the station, and BAM! There it was. The coliseum is right across the street from the metro stop. I mean right across the street. You could practically touch it. It’s a remarkable sight, and it’s just set in the middle of ordinary Roman traffic and bus stops and metro lines.

We crossed the street to the Coliseum, and approached the entrance, when we heard someone ask us: “Hey, do you guys speak English?” It was a young woman with a very American accent trying to get us to sign up for a tour of the Coliseum and of the Forum (they are kind of combined sights)—only 10 euro, she said. She stood there, pressuring us, really—telling us a tour was about to start, and how great it was, and how there are no signs or anything in the Coliseum itself—just a bunch of rocks and stuff, she said.

We were debating whether or not to do it—I was half for it—why not? I thought, but others didn’t want to, so we said no. Besides, we had Rick Steves and Alicia, and why did we need a tour guide? We told her no, and she said: “Well, if you get bored inside, my name is Dana—I can still sign you up for a tour.” By the way, she was a total liar, because there were plenty of signs in the Coliseum about the Coliseum. Plenty.

I don’t know, but I find it hard to believe that we would find the Coliseum boring. Maybe that’s just me, since I like history, but still—boring? Hardly.

We were not bored.

It’s incredible, horrific place, the Coliseum. It’s huge—not as big as a modern stadium, of course, but still huge. There are no seats any more, no marble—it’s mostly just the remaining brick work, but the sense of the place is still there. The middle of the Coliseum is the area where the gladiators and others would have fought. There’s no stage an more—it’s now an open space with the tunnels beneath the Coliseum showing. What they did in that place is sickening, revolting, and deeply fascinating. It still holds a repulsive charm, I think, for anyone who goes to visit—a “fascination of the abomination” to quote Heart of Darkness.

The whole time we wandered through the Coliseum, Alicia listened to Rick Steves on her iPod—because he has free podcasts for different famous sights—and then she would tell us about what she had just learned. This was the beginning of Alicia’s official role as tour guide.

I was instructed by one of my students that we had to stage a battle at the Coliseum (and take pictures), so we did.

The Coliseum had a really cool cross that was placed there by the Church at some point to honor the Christians who died at the Coliseum. We thought it was cool, and since we’re Christians and missionaries and everything, we took a picture in front of it.

After the Coliseum, Rick Steves told us to go to the Roman Forum and Palantine Hill (these are sort of the same sight). We wandered the wrong direction from the Rick Steves tour, which got us a little bit turned around, but Alicia got us back on track, eventually. We even prepared a readers theater presentation of a Rick Steves introduction to the sights for Cori and Kari. I’m not sure they were terribly impressed with our efforts.

We had a scare when Kari lost her camera—because we had all stopped to take a picture in some grass that we found, and it fell out of her pocket. Fortunately, she found it. She lost it again a bit later—but it was in her pocket the whole time.

Rick Steves continued to guide us, through Alicia.

We finally saw almost every sight of the forum, staged a picture of Julius Caesar being killed...

(

(The one with the puffy hair is Caesar...)

...when we wanted to find the shrine of the Vestal Virgins. The Vestal Virgins were 6 virgins (duh) who were in charge of keeping the undying flame of Rome from dying. If they ever let it die, Rome would die. And, “according to Rick Steves,” if they ever had a boyfriend, they would be burned at the stake, or something gruesome like that.

So, we though it’d be fitting to get a picture of 4 DA Virgins (or, “Singulars” as Gloria calls us!) in front of the temple of the Vestal Virgins. But, as we found it, the guards started whistling—no, not because we were in trouble, or because we were very good looking (although I thought we were), but because the sight was closing. So, we took a very fast picture, and didn’t even manage to get the Vestal Virgin temple-thing in the picture. Oh well.

After being booted out of the Roman Forum (that’s not a sentence you get to say every day, eh?), we sort of wandered aimlessly down the road, and we were headed toward this massive white building, which some thought must be the Pantheon, since it was so big. We finally got to the front of the building, and it was the Italian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier—and a modern structure. By this point, we were utterly foot weary, and needed cappuccino, even though in Italy, it’s considered gauche to drink cappuccino after eating anything with tomato in it—but we did not care and threw social custom to the wind, once more. While drinking our coffee, Kari noticed that the ladies at the café next door had gelato, and decided that she wanted gelato—or else. So, she got her gelato—and I also had some. Now, Rick Steves claimed that the Gelato stand near our flat was the best gelato in Rome, but Kari claims that this café had the best. I am still on the fence. Perhaps we can send a note to Rick next time he goes to Rome to try this place.

Alicia's cappucunio:

After coffee and gelato, we decided to try to find the Trevi Fountain. Rick Steves had a walking tour in the area that included the Trevi Fountain, and ended with the Spanish steps. So, we set off for the Trevi Fountain, and got lost. It’s quite simple to get lost in Rome—there’s nothing to it. We had to stop and check maps again and again. And by we, mostly I mean Alicia and Kari, because I lagged far, far behind the group (eating my gelato) and Cori was somewhere in the middle. We’d stop, I’d catch up, they’d decide on a direction to go in, we’d go in that direction, and then, get lost again. I wasn’t worried, Cori wasn’t worried, but I think Alicia and Kari were feeling frustrated—which was understandable, because it’s frustrating to get lost. Eventually, we decided in a direction that would take us to the fountain, and it did.

We walked down an alleyway (of course, nearly every road that isn’t a main road in Rome is an alleyway), and there it was: The Trevi Fountain. There were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people. And who did we see? Barb and Fran, teachers at DA who were also traveling in Europe! We had no plans to meet up with them—we just happened up on them, and they upon us! It was so exciting—A DA reunion in the middle of Rome, unplanned. We had to take a picture, of course, to document the occasion.

We also threw our coins into the fountain. I was the only one who made a wish—but I can’t tell you what that wish was, of course. (Alicia said she made her wish after the fact—not sure if that counts, though.)

Then, we had find something to eat. We were famished—famished! But, of course, we had to find the perfect restaurant—not too expensive, but nothing like McDonalds (gosh, who would eat there?). This took some time. While wandering to find the Perfect Restaurant, we managed to find The Spanish Steps.

At this point, it was about 8:30 at night. We climbed the Spanish Steps (Oh my word. Stretch before climbing the Spanish Steps. Stretch well.), and still didn’t have any place to eat. Someone mentioned that the metro might close at 9:00—we had seen a sign somewhere, sometime. There was a metro stop just below the Spanish Steps, so we took the elevator down to check and see. Don’t judge us until you too climb the Spanish steps after walking miles and miles and miles that day. Don’t judge.

We walked into the metro tunnel, but saw no signs. We looked at a map of the metro, and it said 12:00 AM. It looked like an old sign—but not too old—and so we decided to “risk” that the Metro wouldn’t close at 9:00, and continued on our search for the Perfect Restaurant.

Finally, finally, finally we found the Perfect Restaurant. We were nearly at the end of our ropes, our stomachs were completely empty, but we found it.

It was kind of a strangely decorated restaurant—it was decorated like a boudoir, I thought. But, the food. Oh the food.

Alicia ordered pumpkin ravioli with truffle sauce, and she found the Best Pasta in Italy. (Later, Alicia commented that it was slightly anticlimactic to find the best pasta in Italy on the second night of our stay, but oh well—she does not regret it one bit, despite the narrative flaws). Everything else was very good, as well, but oh, that pumpkin ravioli. We are all still drooling over it.

After The Best Pasta in Italy, we were ready to go home, so we headed back to the metro stop. We traveled under many, many miles of tunnels, and found the official sign that told us that the metro was closed—and had been closed at 9:00, as suspected.

Blast.

So, we followed the signs that led us through many more miles and miles of tunnels till we finally came to the end of the tunnels, and a bus stop in a place we had never seen before. We were ejected from the tunnels with a group of equally confused looking people—other tourists, as well, surely (who else pulls out maps at strange bus stops—not the locals). The four of us stood in a clump, and wondered what to do. By this point, I was extremely tired, and extremely cranky. I’m sure the others were, too, but I think I may have been the most tired and cranky.

Anyway, as we stood in a clump, a man asked us: “Do you need help?”

I’m so used to “helpful” people in Africa that I automatically said: “No, thank you.” Cori, however, is not so skeptical as I, and walked over to him.

This man was like something out of a movie. He was of a heavier build, had a long black pony tail, a top hat, and a coat with tails, and a cane. I think he looked like either someone in the mafia, or an opera singer.

“Where are you trying to go?” He asked [please insert Italian accent here].

“We trying to get to the Vatican,” Cori said.

The man dramatically put his head into his hands, and rocked his head back and forth: “Oh no!” he cried, “It’s too late. You can’t go. It’s closed.” He told us.

Cori managed to keep a straight face, but the other three were having trouble holding it together while we listened.

“No, no, we’re staying near the Vatican.” She explained.

“Ooohh!” He cried again. “Okay, you have to take the 116 bus to [insert Italian name here that we didn’t understand], get off and take the 64.”

“The 116, then the 64?” Cori repeated.

“Yes. One. One. Six.” He repeated.

And then, he walked off into the night. He turned around one more time, held his cane out into the air: “One. One. Six.” He called. Then, he disappeared under an arch, never to be seen again.

We never found the stupid good for nothing One. One. Six. We searched and searched for the stop, we started stopping buses as the passed to see if they went near the Vatican, and none of them did. Someone suggested we just try walking, but everything in my being did not want to walk, and I think in other people’s being, as well, so we finally hailed a cab, and he took us home. It was about five miles away, so we were quite glad we didn’t walk.

We finally got home around midnight, and collapsed into bed.

This little adventure with the Roman transportation system was the first of many frustrations with the Roman transportation system.

But that’s for Day 3.

The Fourth Lizard

2011-04-04T15:48:00.000Z

We got home from lizard-free Italy on Thursday morning. Now, I'm sure that there are lizards in Italy, but I didn't see any. I didn't even think about lizards while I was in Italy, either. That would be weird, probably.

I didn't see any lizard signs for a day, but on Friday morning there were poops by the fridge, and I knew the battle was resuming.

I was lying on my bed in the early afternoon, and I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye, on the ceiling. I looked up, and there was the head of a big lizard, peeking out of my light fixture, like the head of a snake peeking out of a hole. I have this wide glass light fixture with a space between the ceiling--it's basically like an upside down bowl on the ceiling, which my lizard friend must have found to be a nice, cozy, warm spot.

I leap up from my bed, squealed like a little girl and ran next door to the neighbors to tell my woes. Alicia offered to kill it, but I told her not to bother--it would be too hard to get to. I stayed next door and watched TV with them till later in the afternoon, when I came back over to go to the bathroom. Feeling apprehensive about the lizard, I went into my bathroom cautiously and tentatively peeked in. I could see it reflected in the mirror: it was clinging wickedly to the wall right behind my door, and it was a big, fat one--probably about 6 inches long: a foul, freckled bulbous beast.

Have I mentioned I hate these lizards with the passion of a thousand burning suns?

Well, I do.

So, I did not go to the bathroom, but once again ran across the hall. Alicia, my fearless neighbor, grabbed some basins, a mop or a broom, and came over to take on the lizard. I followed, and Cori and Kari came also. Alicia peeked into the bathroom, but it was nowhere to be seen. We checked the ledges and behind the sink and toilet, but that lizard had skidaddled.

So, we went back to watching TV. Of course, this called for a facebook status update, so I posted that I had a lizard sighting again, and tagged the names of the 4 boys who had helped me before. Now, Will and Tanner were--no, are--highly indignant that we had asked the twins to help us before--highly, highly indignant. So, my plea for help and my tagging of all four boys prompted a minor name-calling war via my facebook status. Or, not so minor, actually (you can go read it for yourself, if you like).

I just wanted someone to come and kill the lizard. I kept listening all evening for a knock on the door, but there was no knock until the next day.

Meanwhile, while we waited, Cori spotted the lizard run under the fridge Saturday morning. I was glad that it wasn't in my room anymore (and yes, I did have a slightly-restless nights sleep with the thought of a lizard lurking somewhere in my bedroom).

The knock came in the afternoon, and the twins were at the door:
"Uh, hello. We, uh, heard there was a lizard?" said one.
"Are Will and Tanner here?" said the other.

We blocked the bottom of our doors with towels to prevent the lizard from running into our bedrooms--we've learned our lesson by now!

They were armed with all sorts of weapons--mops, basins, brooms, etc. I showed them to the kitchen, and Cori and I stood back and watched them through the door. I stood on a chair in the living room/dining room. They moved the fridge--the lizard ran out from the back of the fridge.

Much hollering and whooping and scuffling followed.

This is me cowering with fright:

Somehow that stinkin' lizard manage to give them the slip. It went somewhere--but they couldn't find it. They moved the fridge, the stove, the shelves all over the place (and this is a tiny kitchen, folks), but they couldn't find it at all. We finally concluded that it had gone under the balcony door, and outside.

Blast!

The forlorn twins left, leaving their conquest unconquested.

So, later that evening, Alicia and Kari were over at our flat this time, and we had just started Gladiator (it's spring break, so we can watch a lot of TV if we want, and we've just come back from Rome, so we were in the mood for movies about Rome. Geeze. Don't judge us for our TV watching. Gosh.). There was a knock on the door. From the scuffle, I knew, somehow, that it was Will and Tanner. Plus, the people who usually knock on the door were already over.

I opened the door, and it was Will and Tanner. I said: "Oh. my. word." Not sure why. Maybe it was because they were both posing--yes, posing--with multiple guns--yes, guns, a machete, and some assorted mops and brooms, and fierce expressions on their faces: lizard-killing expressions. I let them in, and led them to the kitchen. They said: "Are Kent and Joel here? Because if so, we're going to kill them. If they've killed the lizard, we're going to kill them." As I said, they were highly indignant that the twins got to kill a lizard.

I explained that the lizard was probably gone, and that the twins had already tried. But, they decided to have a go, anyway. Everyone was up at this point to take part in the action. Tanner handed Kari and Cori the guns--they were BB guns, of course, not real guns, sillies.

"Shoot at it if the lizard comes out. Or Kent and Joel."

They moved the fridge--and there was the lizard!

Much hollering and whooping and scuffling followed.

Some action shots (all shirts were kept on for the killing of this lizard, by the way):

Please notice the machete:

The lizard went behind the stove, and so they moved the stove. When they did, there were 2 lizards! One big, one small.

"Ewwww!!!!!!" was the reaction. Well, my reaction. And a little girly dance. I'm sorry. Lizards make me squeal and dance like a little girl.

However, both lizards slipped away, apparently into the stove, which meant that the stove had to be taken apart.

I heard a knock on the door, opened it, and there were Kent and Joel, with extremely hopeful looks on their faces, armed for battle. In my imagination, when I picture them, I see them wearing pots on their heads, like little boys--but my friends tell me they weren't.

Will and Tanner came rushing out of the kitchen, hollering loudly, and chased the twins away. They (the twins) ran down the stairs quickly while Tanner and Will yelled mean things to them.

Highly indignant, remember. Tanner explained that it was a matter of honor. Maybe all that chivary stuff I mentioned the last time they killed a lizard went to their heads? I'll just let boys be boys. (When I suggested that they might want to apologize to the twins for their meanness, I was met with looks of utter revulsion and and horror. Boys take their honor seriously, apparently.)

So, back to the lizard. They try to take apart the stove, so they need a screwdriver, which of course we don't have. I don't know why I say of course. It's just that Cori and I aren't really into tools and stuff, I guess. So, Will goes to the family upstairs to find a screwdriver, and Tanner proceeds to use our potato peeler to take off the back of the stove.

Meanwhile, Cori and Kari are playing with the guns. Cori shoots a BB, it rickochets off the wall and hits Alicia. Yes. Alicia got shot.

Eventually, they go out to the balcony to shoot the guns. These are grown women, by the way.

Here are Cori, Kari, and Alicia with the weapons. Alicia's is probably the most helpful:

So, Will gets back with the screwdriver, but Tanner's already got the back of the stove off. Then, the foul beast peeks his head nonchalantly over the top of the back of the stove--and the fighting began.

Much hollering and whooping and scuffling followed

Tanner: "Dude, you have the dullest machete in the world!"
Will: "I didn't have time to sharpen it, dude."
Tanner (or Will): "We need wooden spoons, dude."

I may be adding some extra dudes in there, but boys use "dude" a lot. So do girls.

Cori cries: "Not the wooden spoons! Why is it always the wooden spoons??"

Why is it always the wooden spoons?

Somehow, they kill the lizard dead.

Oh, yeah: Will did bring his laser gun. Of course.

Then, they go in search of the 2nd lizard, leaving the dead lizard just lying on the floor, exposed to all the elements. Little Benjamin from upstairs comes down to take part in the action, offering the hunters a bowl of french fries. Apparently they offered the fries to Will when he went to borrow the screw driver. Then, I hear people coming up the stairs, thinking it's the twins, I went to get them. It wasn't the twins, but Mr. Cook and Andy. For some reason, I assumed they were coming to check out the commotion, so I pull them inside to see the lizard. They come in, look at the lizard, act impressed and then said: "Well, we were just doing laundry." And left.

I'm not really sure why I forced them to come see the lizard. It was just the adrenaline of the moment, I guess.

Oh, and Cori and Kari are still shooting BBs off the balcony. Samuel (Benjamin's older brother) comes down to check out the action--we were all still looking for the second lizard. He brings a bigger BB gun--more like a rifle. He shows Cori and Kari how to shoot it. They continue shooting BBs of the balcony.

We didn't find the 2nd lizard. But, they did get the big lizard, thank goodness. Everything basically calmed down. No one else was shot or anything. The boys showed Cori and Kari how to reload the BBs because they shot all the ammo. Alicia seems to have recovered from her gunshot wound. Afterwards, Tanner and Will proceeded to ask me about AP Lit homework and to try to get out of a couple of the poem assignments I'd given them for break as payment for killing the lizard. Being the gracious and compassionate teacher that I am, I said no, of course.

And that's the tale of the fourth lizard. We have to wait for the fifth lizard to get big and fat before the next lizard installment. But don't worry, friends, don't worry: it will. Our apartment seems to have some sort of strange radiation that grows these lizards to epic proportions in short amounts of time. So, the tale of the fifth lizard will come. It will come.

"When in Rome" Part I

2011-04-02T18:45:00.002Z

My three friends, Alicia, Kari, and Cori, and I decided to go to Italy for spring break. Kari had the brilliant idea several months ago when she found out her brother and sister-in-law would be in Italy around the same time as our break. She wanted to see them, but didn’t want to go by herself, so, she invited the three of us along, and we accepted, of course. We set off for Italy on the third day of our spring break, eager for pizza, adventure, Italian men, and a brief escape from Africa.

(Incidentally, we almost missed our flight, because we thought we were leaving Wednesday morning, but actually we left Tuesday morning. Fortunately, we checked our flight information...it’s always good to check your flight information.)

While on the trip, we decided to keep a group journal of our travels together. Alicia was the note taker, Cori was in charge of keeping us on task, I was responsible for writing up the journal after, and for some reason Kari didn’t have a job.

So, what follows is a day-to-day account of our travels in Italy—mostly Rome with a day in Naples (actually, Pompeii), and 2 days in Venice. To not overload poor BlogSpot with the-longest-blog-entry-in-the-world (because I cannot—nay, will not be concise: it’s the inner Dickensian in me), I’m going to divide it up day-by-day—and also to keep the readers coming back for more, and to make my blog look incredibly popular. Maybe I’ll even get more than 9 followers on my blog.

But that’s just my selfishness coming out. It’s really not about how many followers, but who the followers are.

Whatever. I want as many followers as possible. I was on this other blog that had 40,000 followers, and I thought: “Well, I have 9. And I know every single one of them.”

I want 40,000 followers.

But, I digress.

So, I was elected to write the journal. I apologize to those who have tolerate the travels in Italy through the filter of my thoughts and sense of humor. However, this is a group journal, and all the experiences were contributed by the whole group. So. There you go. No more disclaimers.

Although, I do love disclaimers. I feel like they cover a whole multitude of irreverence—insurance from lightening bolts, or something.

But I digress.

Disclaimer: I tend to digress. Have you noticed? Get used to it. It’s the price you’ll have to pay for reading the group journal.

Okay, Day One:

Day One was a very, very long day. Actually, Day One started before Day One actually started, but I’m going to include going to the airport as a part of Day One, because we didn’t really sleep—especially Cori—more on that later.

Mr. McLane took us the airport that night. Apparently, the only reason he took us the airport was because Kari and Alicia brought him saffron from Spain at Christmas. Kari was slightly “offended” when he lifted her bag last, and let her know it was the heaviest. She felt like it was only the heaviest since it was sort of the biggest, and the last to be lifted. We’ll let heaven be the judge of whether or not it was the heaviest, since Alicia’s and Kari’s bag were weighed together at the check-in.

Mr. McLane gave us some advice as we drove to the airport. He told us that “The coliseum and the forum—they’re nothing.”

Right.

He also told us to beware of the pickpockets. Especially: “Watch out for the Gypsies. They’re everywhere.” And, he told us to go the catacombs, because they were awesome. And they were—Thank, Mr. McLane!

We arrived at the airport, checked in with no problems, and headed through security. I was indignant because some French people budged us in line at the check-in—I felt like they should know better (I mean, really, shouldn’t they?).

At passport control, the customs official asked me for a piece of gum. I didn’t hear him correctly, and thought he was offering gum, which I thought was weird, so I said: “No, mercie” as sweetly as possible, because when talking to passport officials, always, always be sweet. Cori was next in line, and he asked her for some gum, and she did actually understand him, so she said yes, she had some. He asked for the whole box of her precious Canadian gum. She said: “How about two?” and went on her way. Fortunately, they did not put her in lock-up for her insolence. That would have been a bit inconvenient.

So, we waited in the lounge to leave and talked about the coming trip. Someone had to go the bathroom. This was the beginning of my little plan that I had all throughout the trip. See, as it turns out, I am a bathroom snob (one of the reasons why I’m a bad MK—that’s a whole ‘nother blog entry, though). So, my ploy was to let others go to the bathroom. If it was clean, I would go. If it wasn’t, well, I wouldn’t. But I’d let them scope out the place, or even clean it up a bit. I didn’t know this would turn into my ploy, but it ended up being that way.

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I feel like I need to be honest about my problems. I just mostly hate it when the floor is wet, and you’re wearing trousers, and then you have wet trousers that are wet from who knows what—but one can only guess.

(Sometimes I call pants trousers. A shout out to my British friends.)

The bathroom was pretty clean, much to my surprise, for I remember well the days when it wasn’t, and using it scarred you for life. Or infected you for life. (For anyone who uses the Dakar airport women’s restroom—watch out for the first stall, though, because the light bulb was burnt out, and it was very, very dark in there).

The flight wasn’t terribly eventful. Which is good, because this is already long enough, and we haven’t even arrived in Europe yet.

We got into Lisbon with no troubles, we didn’t have to wait in the longest line in the world, as one normally has to wait in, because our plane was actually on time (a rarity with Air Portugal), and we settled ourselves in the food court area to wait a couple of hours. We were happy to find McDonald's, and we indulged in the wonders of a fattening American breakfast.

Please don’t judge us. We live in Africa. We don’t usually eat McDonald’s in America.

I should say that we ended up eating at McDonald’s a lot throughout the trip, and I feel like there are food snobs out there that are going to judge us. Well, I really have nothing to say to you except for two words: “Festival de Glace.” Which is actually 3 words for the math snobs out there. And I don’t care.

Cori can’t sleep on planes, and by this time, she had been up for almost 24 hours, since our plane left in the middle of the night from Dakar. Cori is funny when she’s had no sleep. I’m just going to put that out there. Yes, we did mock her a little bit. But, actually, not because of the no sleeping, but because she attached her airplane travel pillow to her belt, and walked around with it in public.

We got our flight to Rome—no stories there. I don’t think any of us remember the flight to Rome because we were so wiped out. Oh, wait, the flight was delayed, but, we got there, eventually.

We wondered about the man who was coming to pick us up. See, we rented an apartment for the week, and Marcello (pronounced “March-ello” which Cori actually pronounced “Marshmallow” to be funny), the owner, was coming to pick us up. In our “planning” meetings (quotations to indicate that not much “planning” actually took place, much to poor Alicia’s dismay), Alicia called Marcello Mr. Rome. So, we wondered what Mr. Rome would look like—I guessed that he’d be an older man with a white handlebar mustache. We walked out the gate, and there was Mr. Rome—he was indeed an older man, probably over 60, but he did not have a handlebar mustache, and I was extremely disappointed..

But, oh, Marcello. He was a little old Italian man with tight pants, sunglasses (that he wore in the house) and a scarf. He was holding a sign that said: “Karin Ford”—the first time Kari’s ever had her name on a sign at an airport before—quite the rite of passage, I must say. So, pretty much Marcello had eyes only for Kari, since she had been the contact person. He greeted her, but not really the rest of us, took her suitcase, and let her out of the doors of the airport—we followed obediently and quickly. His car was right outside.

And it was a little, little two-door Ford Fiat. And we had 4 American-Canadian sized suitcases with us. He looked at our luggage with dismay:

“Karin—you said small luggage,” He chastised poor Karin.

“No, no—I said “good-sized luggage,” she pleaded.

Note to all travelers in Italy: “good-sized” in America does not mean large in Italy.

We piled two bags in the back, which still left 2 suitcases, our carry-ons, and 5 people to fit in the cab. He offered to take 2, and come back for 2—but we vehemently protested we would fit. So, three of us piled in the back, he passed the 2 “good-sized” suitcases in to our laps, and Cori, Alicia and I sat very, very closely and snuggly in the bag while Kari got the front seat and the awkwardness of talking to Marcello.

He told us that we could ask us any questions that we wanted. The three in the backseat were mostly silent, and so Kari was stuck with the questions and the talking. She handled it well, though. It was funny, because she’d ask him a question, like “What’s your favorite restaurant?” and he’d answer with “Well, the kitchen is fully stocked. You can make spaghetti, or whatever you would like, you can make. And you can go to restaurant and take out pizza, if you like.” Not quite what she’d asked—but still helpful!

We got to the apartment, which was in a building in a courtyard that looked just like Italy.

It was a tiny flat, but it worked for what we needed. Marcello continued to latch on to Kari, and Kari only, and he showed her everything—how the key worked, the doors, the cupboards, the bedrooms, the bathroom, everything with: “Karin, Karin, look—look,” he would say, over and over again. “You turn the key—look, Karin, look—you turn the key like this, Karin. Turn it twice. Not once, Karin, twice.”

He was a funny little man.

We were all exhausted, of course, so once he left, we sat and sort of stared at each other, figured out the room situations, and talked about what to do next. We were famished, so we wanted food, but we didn’t want to break social custom completely, and eat early. So, we went to the little grocery store across the way and bought some provolone cheese, ham (prosciutto in Italy) and bread for our snack and possibly breakfast.

We came back, ate our snack (which was yummy—provolone cheese is yumminess), and Alicia took a shower. Marcello warned us that the hot water didn’t last very long, and that we had to be careful, but it was okay, because no one else was going to shower yet. After eating our snack, we were ready to explore, so we set out on a walk around the neighborhood. It was a cool neighborhood—very European-city-ish, but close to the Vatican—it was almost literally right across the street, and we could see it’s walls as we walked through the streets. We stopped in a few stores, and eventually made our way to our first authentic Italian restaurant of the trip, Rustichella.

It’s important that I take a moment to talk about Rick Steves. No, no, don’t look at your watch. I know it’s been a long time since you started reading this blog post, but it’s just a little bit longer, and it’ll be worth it, I know.

So, at parent-teacher conferences, Mrs. Hampton (during a lull when there were no parents) told me about this awesome travel book writer and guide named Rick Steves. I’d never heard of him, but that's probably because I’ve never traveled using a guidebook before. So, I mentioned it to Alicia, who was the main mover and shaker on our trip to actually get us to plan to do things, and we found it on Amazon as a Kindle book, and Alicia downloaded Rick Steves Rome and Rick Steves Venice onto her Kindle. And thus began a journey between Rick Steves and Alicia, because Rick Steves became Alicia’s muse, and Alicia became our wonderful tour guide because of Rick Steves. Rick Steves was sort of…a 5^th traveler with us, speaking wisdom into our trip and our decisions. We even adopted the motto at one point: “What would Rick do?”

He became our friend.

So, Rick Steves actually recommended the restaurant that was right around the corner from our flat, so we went the first night. We really didn’t know if we needed to follow all the social protocols of Italian dining—because that would mean ordering 4 courses of food, and spending a lot of money, so we didn’t follow social protocol, and if they judged us, well, we were willing to take it.

Cori, Kari and I ordered pizza—Cori got the “Funghi” pizza (mushrooms) and Kari and I both got the 4-cheese pizza. Alicia got ravioli. Alicia was on a quest for the best pasta in Italy. That ravioli, apparently, wasn’t.

Cori was so, so, so, so tired by this point—remember that she couldn’t sleep?—that by the time the pizza was delivered, Cori was barely holding herself together. We all were tired, but Cori was exceptionally so. She cut up her pizza, and then, for a long, long, long time held one piece in her hand while the rest of ate.

We were all pretty quiet, and I felt pleased that we were not being the stereotypical North Americans. Basically, we weren’t talking at all. We finally noticed that Cori wasn’t really eating. The rest of us were about half way through our pizzas, and we were almost full—but Cori had only taken 2 bites.

“I’m just…I just…I’m just so tired. And cold.” Cori said feebly.

“I hope they don’t think you don’t like it.” Kari commented.

That was all Cori needed. She finished the one piece like a big girl, and we asked for the check, for carry-out boxes, and went back to the flat.

Alicia was really cold, and so she decided to take another shower to warm up. I mention this as foreshadowing. You’ll have to read the next installment to find out why it mattered. Don’t you like how I am teasing you with little hints? I know, super exciting.

We all went to bed, utterly exhausted, but happy and eager for the next day, the first real day in Italy.

One more disclaimer: yes, yes, yes the name of these blog entries are cheesy. But, first of all, I poured all my creativity into writing the actual account, and secondly, how often in your life can you actually say "When in Rome?"

That's what I thought. Not too often. Unless you're Cori, because this was her third time to Rome.

Wanna finish the story? There's still Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI and Part VII to go!

Senelec (the inevitable blog post topic)

2011-03-10T20:59:00.001Z

I have refused to mention the power cuts on Facebook, because if you are friends with anyone in Senegal, you know that they have been awful.

Just awful.

If you've lived in Senegal before, don't try say "remember the time...the year...the month when it was so bad that..."--because you absolutely can. not. top. this. I'm sorry, but you can't. Don't try. I will win this game of topping you over remembering and living through the worse Senegalese power cuts.

We're pretty frustrated as a whole community. I'm actually, for once in my life, not exaggerating-we've been experiencing 6-12 hour cuts (6 to 8 to 12 hours off, 4 hours or so, then another 8 hours off--WITH NO RECOGNIZABLE PATTERN OR SCHEDULE) for months and months and months now with no hope in sight. It's actually a really bad situation--like, politically bad--and that's never good in third world countries. In all seriousness, please pray for the country of Senegal to resolve these problems with providing basic electricity for its residents.

I think it's building character. It's hard to say--some days I feel like "I can rise above this!" and other days I feel like I can't take much more of it. Whole school days with no electricity--day after day after day after day after day--well, it makes it a challenge to get things done. (I do want to say that we are grateful it isn't hot at the moment--if it was, it'd be much more difficult to take).

But, enough of that: the power's on, for the moment. Hip hip!

Here is a picture of my latest piece of jewerly--it's a Senelec fashion accessory. Be sure to buy yours to match your favorite outfits:

Supposedly Teaching, Part IV

2011-03-06T19:31:00.001Z

My AP Lit class is the best. I don't think I've really talked about them much this year (on the blog, that is), but they really, really are. They make me laugh every single day in so many ways that have nothing to do with AP Lit. They are the highlight of my day, and I so look forward to them each morning.

(Just so they don't get big heads--because some of them will read this, and then their heads will swell up like a person who's allergic to shellfish who ate shellfish, like Hitch in Hitch, and, also, they would make my compliments about them as a way to not get homework, which is a ploy that will never, ever, work with me: I always seem to love my AP Lit class--and that doesn't mean that the other groups aren't likable and/or lovable.)

Sometimes it's not really the students making me laugh, but me making me laugh (and them) in AP Lit. I seem to have a propensity to try to say witty and irreverent things that mostly just come out irreverent and stupid. But, this blog really isn't about me, is it?

Oh, that's right. It is.

I have two stories to tell--one about a student, one about me.

Every class period, I usually start by reading a Psalm. I'm particular about this part--I don't want students talking or interrupting--I want them being respectful when I read the Bible. Makes sense, eh?

So, Wednesday, I was reading Psalm 110, and I noticed that someone was talking. So, I prepared The Glare of Doom. Every teacher should have one--it's quite handy. But, before I cast my Glare upon the Wretch who dared to interrupt, I inserted: "Arrayed in holy splendor, your young men will come to you like dew from the morning’s womb. And students should not be talking while Miss Bowers is reading the Psalms or the wrath of the Lord will come upon them." Something like that. And then, I looked up from my reading, and delivered The Glare of Doom to the talking student.

He looked up very guiltily, jumped a little (The Glare, you know), and then, suddenly, as if he had a stroke of inspiration (quite literally, as it turned out), said:

"Holy, Holy, Holy, Holy!" in his defense.

Well, what can you say to that?

This caused us to laugh a lot. So, from that point on in the period, whenever anyone did anything that I needed to mildly correct, they said "Holy, holy, holy, holy!"

Magic words, apparently, that will get you out of trouble with Miss Bowers, and that will cover you from The Glare of Doom.

Later that class period, I needed to try out the "Holy, holy, holy, holy!" cover.

A little background information: We're studying The Heart of Darkness, a novella by Joseph Conrad set in colonial Congo. It's considered either one of the strongest indictments of Imperialism, or one of the most racist novels ever. In the reading from the previous night, the narrator describes his first encounters with the Africans in the Congo--and, yes, it's pretty strong stuff--racist or not.

Put a pin in that sidenote.

When I read the daily announcements to the class that morning, it said that the boys' bathroom was closed in D building because of some intentional messes created by students. We all paused to mull over how inconvenient this was, and how annoying people in general are.

Then, I put them into groups to discuss the reading. We are finally to the actual story.

Of course, they were not entirely talking about what they should be talking about--discussing the reading. But, I was sitting at my desk working, and only paying half-attention to what was going on--I was about to "make my rounds" of the groups, but I was getting a couple of assignments graded till then. As I worked, I overheard someone say: "So, do you think the workers complained about the conditions?"--something to that effect.

I innocently assumed they were discussing the conditions of the abused African workers in The Heart of Darkness. And, so, I said rather dramatically (because I always have to be witty and irreverent and dramatic):

"Do you think the workers complained about their conditions?!? Do you think that they didn't know about the abuses and oppressions their white overlords put upon them???!!"

Suddenly, there was silence in the whole room as my comment cut through all the conversation, and the realization washed over me: they were talking about our janitorial staff (who are, by the way, all Senegalese) and the disgusting bathrooms, not the abused African workers of the colonial company of Heart of Darkness.

"MISS BOWERS!" all the students cried in mock outrage at my comment--perhaps one really shouldn't talk about the janitorial staff and their "white overlords" in such a way--perhaps. I grew very, very, very, very red (despite my frequent malapropisms and verbal faux pas I still possess the ability to blush deeply).

"Holy, holy, holy, holy!" I announced!

And that, my friends, seems to have covered me so far.

Beautiful

2011-02-11T16:05:00.000Z

Here is something I find beautiful: watching my students praying for each other, praying over heartaches, praying over sins, praying for freedom. There is nothing more beautiful than the Body of Christ caring for each other.

Last night (Thursday), an incredible thing (thing is absolutely not the right word) happened at high school youth group--it was a night of confession, repentance and Grace. I need to preface it, however, with a couple of comments before telling the story. First of all, two weeks ago, we had Spiritual Emphasis Week, or, SEW, at DA. This was a good week--it's always good--and, I don't think this one was any better or worse than others I have been to. I really believe that the effectiveness of SEW lies not in the speaker, but in the receptiveness of the student body at the time. The speaker this year was good (a DA alumnus, actually) but the reason it was good was because the students were ready for spiritual growth and change in a way they hadn't been in more recent years. There has been a lot of growth in the last few weeks after SEW, and I think the students are hungry for God in a special way at DA right now.

The second thing I need to preface this post with is a confession that I am a pretty cynical person--about many, many things, but especially spiritual matters. I don't think this comes across in silly blog posts about lizards and exploding candle wax, but, when it comes to the spiritual, I tend to be rather...pessimistic. I've just been through a lot of "revivals"--I've experienced emotional and spiritual highs myself, and I've been left in the lurch, spiritually, many times after these revivals. I don't mean that God has left me in the lurch--oh, no! I'm the one who's left myself in the lurch. I'm sure you know what I mean, and, if you don't, well, I envy your spiritual fortitude. I've grown pretty callused toward revivals and spiritual movements, especially if they have a high emotional factor. I know this about myself, and I really am working to not be this way. I just get so worried--and sad--at times that we set our kids up for such heartache after these spiritual emphasis weeks, and I get so frustrated when I see them so frustrated about "failing" so soon after recommitting their lives to Christ. I guess because I've failed in this area I've built up a resistance to this kind of thing. The problem with being a Christian and being cynical is that when you're a cynical Christian, you're actually a Christian with a problem concerning true faith in God.

One last thing: two years ago, after SEW, several senior girls met together, and decided to share some areas of sin and/or struggles in their lives with the youth group. These were not confessions in that it was the first time they had told anyone, but rather testimonies of God's working in their life, of God's freeing them from sins and struggles in their lives. This was a powerful youth group--because what happened after the girls spoke was even more powerful: students began sharing with the whole group about sins that they struggled with. We're talking a group of over a hundred kids here, not just a small gathering. This was an awesome youth group--one that stood out in my mind, and that I have remembered as one of the most intense and...breathtaking gathering of believers I have ever been a part of. Not just of DA youth group--but of all the many, many services I have attended through my life as an MK.

Last night was the first youth group since SEW, and it was really the first time the students had met together spiritually since SEW. I didn't know what was scheduled for youth group this week, but when I went in, and saw the chairs arranged in a huge circle, I knew what was coming, and groaned to myself. Here's where the skepticism was coming out--I'm ashamed to admit that I felt like this youth group could only be an attempted copy-cat of the spiritual fervor of two years before--an attempt at a recreation of that evening, but surely it was not possible to have that same thing happen again.

The joke was apparently on me.

Six students--boys and girls, of mixed grades--shared. I'm not going to into details, because it's their story to tell, not mine, but they shared some private and personal struggles with sin. Really personal struggles. And, afterward, the group was given the opportunity to share and to confess sins to the whole group, and, lo and behold, they did. Student after student confessed their struggles with sin, and, after each student, almost the whole room--a hundred kids or more--would get up to pray for each one. Students got up and told of personal pain and struggles with depression and feelings of worthlessness--and asked for prayer--and the whole room got up and prayed for them. Over and over and over again for almost two hours.

There really aren't words to describe what it's like to see a hundred kids gathered around someone, praying for them and holding them up. I wish that I could find the words to describe it--but all I can say is that I think that is what it should be like, all the time, every day. I have never felt so proud to know them, to be their teacher. I have never felt so humbled to see their faith, which so exceeds mine, and their bravery and courage, which so exceeds mine. Last night went beyond the confession time of two years ago--there was something even deeper, even truer than two years ago. I honestly believe that last night could be the stuff of legend--the Dakar Academy version of the Haystack Prayer Meeting. I sat there and thought, over and over and over again: "This isn't normal. This isn't normal. Normal kids don't do this. This is a gift. We have to cherish it; hold onto it; treasure it up always."

As I sat , thinking about what was happening, and praying over these students, I felt oh-so-convicted over my cynicism. Ultimately, I realized that I had been doubting that God has the power to triumph over human nature--that the Master of the Universe is not powerful enough to bring about sincere and real transformation in people. Foolish, foolish Danielle. This was a shocking moment of illumination--a cold, icy bath of water splashing unexpectedly over me--that maybe, I've been resisting sincere and real transformation in myself and in my walk with Christ for so long that I doubt its possibility in others? I don't know, to be honest, and, well, this is something between my Savior and myself, and not for public blog posts.

But, I sat there with my hands held open as I prayed, and I stared at them--clean, white, unblemished small hands--and I imagined Jesus' bloody hands, pierced for our transgressions--pierced for my transgressions. I knew Jesus was weeping with Joy--as I wept with Joy at that moment--at the beauty of His children praying and calling out to him.

I don't know where this group of kids goes from here--I mean, life goes on, and it's easy to be swept away in the hum-drum dull-drums of the life. But, I think that it could be a starting point for so many--I think that they will look back on that night as a night when things changed for them. I think they will probably stumble again, but I know by God's grace, that He will be there to catch them when they fall. One my favorite images of what God does with our sin is the verse (Psalm 103:12) that says that God casts our sins as far as the East is from the West. I don't know why exactly, but this has for some reason always been the best explanation, for me, of how thoroughly God takes away our sins. As far as the East is from the West. I think that a lot of young people experienced a personal understanding at last that God has rescued them from the bondage of the slavery of sin, and has cast our sins far, far, impossibly far, away.

I am so privileged to work with these students, and to see them grow. I know that I may never see again anything so lovely, so tender, so beautiful as those hands lifted high in a circle around a broken brother or sister, voices chorusing in unison, in prayer over their friend, praying for healing and freedom from sin and temptation.

What a mighty God we serve.

One of "those" people...

2011-02-10T13:14:00.069Z

(A Cautionary Tale)

I'm beginning to suspect that I may be one of those people that things happen to. Do you know the kind that I mean? The kind of person who slips and falls in the middle of teaching Macbeth and who accidentally says "ovaries" when she means "over" and who asks a 17 year old boy if he hurt his boobies?

I never used to be like this. Or, maybe I was, and I simply have been living in denial for 25 years of my life.

Last week, the power cut. Pause here for a little moment of bitterness/rage/frustration.

Got it out of your system? I haven't. (In all fairness, the power's been much better these days, and, even though it was cut for 7 hours in the middle of the night, it was actually the longest we've had in about a week. Knock on wood, if you're superstitious, which of course, you shouldn't be, so take back that knocking...)

Of course, candles were lit. I had bought a nice scented candle at the Hyper-Marche the other day, and this was one of the first times I had burned it. I actually don't like the smell--it's sort of supposed to be a cedar smell, and after burning it, I wasn't really in love with it.

Anyway, this power cut was about two hours long, and the electricity came back on around 10:30 pm. When the power came back on, I went around blowing out candles. I blew out all the ordinary candles, and the little orange scented candle was last.

I leaned over to blow it out, and for some reason didn't get it on my first try. Or my second. So, with my third attempt, I took in what was apparently an enormous breath, and blew.

I blew so hard that the wax from the candle exploded in my face! Hot wax hit me, and instantly stuck to my visage. Yes, visage. It's a word we should use more often.

Fortunately, I closed my eyes at the right instant, but the wax got all over my face, my eyelashes, in my hair, and all over the vicinity of the candle.

I ran to the bathroom to scrub it off--how does one scrub off candle wax?--and had an especially hard time because that day, Friday, was Olympics Day at DA, and I managed to get an EPIC sunburn on my face (Yes, yes, I know better--it was a series of unfortunate events wherein I couldn't find my sunscreen, and my bedroom was dark because the light is burned out and I'm too short to change it but too chicken to get a work order because we're not supposed to put in housing work orders for things that we can reach and fix, but I can't reach the light, but, well, I'm afraid they'll yell at me anyway...I know you really wanted to know all of that.), so, instead of potentially hardening, the heat from my face made the candle wax extremely difficult to take off. It kept hardening, and then sort of melting again on my poor nose, which was the reddest of all, and then clumping around my nose stud. Ugg. Stupid nose stud.

When I got most of it off (there were still globs that I just couldn't pick off yet), I went to the living room to survey the scene: wax was everywhere around the coffee table--a huge puddle all around the candle, but then the splatter went all places--on my roommate's laptop, all over my mom's ebook cover (sorry, mom!), all over the books on the coffee table, the floor, and the sofa. I had managed to speckle everything with orange wax. And, the wax itself must have some kind of oil in it, so it proved extraordinarily difficult to pick off of all of our belongings (and, of course, my face). After the initial scrubbing of my visage, I spent the next twenty minutes peeling wax off my face and when I woke up in the morning, I still found speckles.

We're talking a little candle here. Not a big candle. Tiny, like a sample sized candle.

So, in conclusion, I am simply going to accept that I'm one of those people: a person who has extraordinary mishaps with ordinary household objects. At least it makes for amusing (hopefully) blog posts...And really, isn't that what it's all about?

(If I was an lol kind of person, I'd insert an lol here, but I'm like totally so not an lol person. For realz.)

(By the way: notice there were no lizards in this post...!)

Famous Last Words Or: The One With No David Copperfield Part III: The Third Lizard

2011-01-21T09:39:00.000Z

Perhaps you are getting tired of lizard episodes. Perhaps you aren't.

I am getting very tired of lizard episodes.

But there are just so many darn lizards.

We found another lizard in our house. This one was pretty big--bigger than the last one. For about five days, I had skipped around the house feeling free, singing a little song in my head that went like this: "Ding-Dong, the Lizard's dead...The wicked Lizard's dead!" Then, Thursday night, I was reading before turning out my light, when Cori called: "Danielle...There's another lizard."

Icy fear crept into my heart like the cold fingers of death.

It was in her room, so I don't know why I was so distraught, but I was. This one was bigger than the one the boys--aka The Lizard Slayers--had just killed last Friday, but not quite as big as the first one. We grumbled (that's far too mild of a word to use) together over the fact that we couldn't believe we had another lizard. I offered to let her sleep in my room, but, Cori is a much braver woman than I (except when it comes to cockroaches), and she said she could handle it. So, I went back to bed and even though I didn't really have trouble getting to sleep, I kept waking up all night with the thought of the lizard. I really am developing a lizard-complex. No, I've developed a lizard complex. Let us call a spade a spade.

So, the next evening (last night), Cori went to youth group, and I stayed home from youth group because of the sniffles. Around 7:00, the power went out. This is what the electricity does in Dakar these days: it goes off. Please read as much bitterness into that sentence as possible. So, I perched my kerosene lantern high on a stack of books, and read till Cori came home around 9:00 (the power was still off--I have no idea when it came on again, but we've stopped keeping track).

She was about to go into her room when she saw the lizard--it was right above her door, clinging foully to the ceiling. Anything that can hang upside down on the ceiling with suction cup hands is evil.

"I can't go in my room now." She declared. I was with her: I could barely leave the living room. We sat on the couch, and wondered what to do.

"Well...we could call Will and he could laser it..." I said halfheartedly. I was seriously considering calling Will to come kill his English teacher's lizard--again. Fortuantely, I thought of The Corbins Boys--twins Kent and Joel who live downstairs. So, Cori and I zoomed down the stairs (well, I zoomed and left Cori in the dark with no flashlight--whoops!), and we hesitantly knocked on the Corbin's door. The twins weren't home, but Mr. Corbin was.

"Do you think...you could come kill this lizard?" I said in a timid little voice. Mr. Corbin agreed, and brought battle weapons to the scene--a bright LED lantern, and a broomstick. About a week ago in the staff lounge, I had mentioned our little problem, and Mr. Corbin had made fun of my developing phobia. So, I felt gratified when he saw the lizard and said: "Oh--that is a big one!"

He attacked--he maimed it and took out part of our ceiling, but didn't kill it, and it scooted under Cori's door. Unfortunately, it went behind the armoire (wardrobe), and he couldn't get it. Cori helped him by banging the doors of the armoire to chase it out, but it wouldn't come. So, Mr. Corbin needed reinforcements--his sons.

Fortunately, we didn't have to wait long--the twins came home, the three of them went into Cori's room and shut the door (but didn't take off their shirts or anything) and in less than five minutes, it was dead. I do think there was probably a little bit of a Lord of the Flies moment, because the dead lizard was rather mangled at the end of it all. I took a picture--well, they took the picture for me because once I saw it lying there mangled and gory with bulging eyes on the floor I couldn't look at it. It's too disgusting to post. (I find it a wonder anyone could look at it, and not be transformed into stone--although, I suppose that's only for Basilisks, and not geckos--but I truly believe these geckos are second cousins to a Basilisk). Mr. Corbin said that it was the father of all lizards, and the twins were duly impressed with its size--that's because they didn't see THE Lizard. (Now, I really wish I'd gotten a picture of that). If this one was the Father of all Lizards, the first one was the Grandfather, for sure.

Maybe this is the end--I don't know. While it makes for amusing blog posts, I'm not sure it's worth it. We think that the lizards were drawn to the apartment because of this carpet that we had stored in the corner of Cori's room (we asked them to put the carpet in the stairwell, and we'll get rid of it soon). With the removal of the carpet, inshallah, no more lizards. At least, hopefully, no more massive Granddaddy Lizards.

With our record, though, I'm finding that a little hard to believe...

(Probably Not) The End

The One with No David Copperfield, Part II or: The End

2011-01-15T20:31:00.003Z

The cast of characters: The Senior Class Officers, Cori, myself, and, of course: The Lizard. Well, not THE Lizard, but a cousin of the foul, bulbous, evil-emanating creature of October.

The place: Sandcastle 33--my apartment.

The time: 7:50 PM

The Electricity: None.

The Saga of the Lizard Continues...

When I wrote about THE Lizard a few months ago, the problem was, it wasn't the Lizard--as in, the only one. It had a friend--or a child or a mate--who knows? But, our lizard problem wasn't actually gone, and this, my friends, really, really, really bothered me. More than I care to admit, actually!

I had been meaning to have my senior officers over for supper for a long while, and the start of the semester before what I call "The Crazy" begins seemed like good timing. When I say "my senior officers," first of all, I really do mean my senior officers: I'm possessively partial to them, and I don't want to share. But, they actually are mine in the sense that I'm the senior class sponsor this year. All of this to say: I wanted to have them over for supper.

Now, what you have to understand about this supper is that there were no ulterior lizard motives in my invite. You see, I thought the lizard was dead, when I hatched up my little plan. One of my students (and his family) stayed in my flat over break, and my one stipulation to Lee was: Kill the Lizard.

He didn't.

But, I didn't know this when I invited the officers for supper. I was just doing it out of the goodness of my heart. I feel like I have to establish this before I continue with my tale.

I found out that the lizard was still living on Wednesday, but I knew in my heart it was still alive because when I was cooking on Tuesday, happily unaware of lizards, I heard it rustling by my stove. No, we don't have mice (Thank Heaven!)--so, I knew it could only be it. This disturbed me, and I had a lot of difficulty putting away my food that night...I could feel its wretched presence.

After innocently inviting the officers over to supper, they asked me if I really just wanted them to come and kill the lizard. I also must say that even after I discovered The Lizard was yet living, I didn't make the connection that the officers could kill the lizard--the three boys who killed THE Lizard the first time are three of the officers. But, then, my heart began to beat pitter-patter as I dreamed of the boys killing the lizard.

What you have to understand is that we haven't seen the lizard, we just know it's there. How? Because of the poops. Yes, poops. Large, disgusting, nasty, awful things around our living room and kitchen. But, we rarely saw it. We heard it, but didn't see it.

So, this morning, I was all by myself because my flatmate is house-sitting, and, there it was. In. My. Bedroom.

My bedroom.

Yes, I ran out of my room and danced around, squealing like a little girl. I've allowed this lizard to become larger than life--it grew in my mind till it was several feet long, and nearly six inches wide. It wasn't, but in my mind, it was. (The funny thing is that in my parents' house, in Kayes, we have these kinds of lizards in the house, but they don't bother me, much. I think 1) because we have drop ceilings, so they just escape quickly and 2) we have a dog who lives to hunt lizards. Security.)

So, I danced around and squealed like a little girl. It's ridiculous, but tears even sprang to my eyes as I anticipated facing the lizard--being in my own bedroom with the lizard--and then I gave myself a pep-talk: "Danielle...it's a school day. You have to get dressed. You have to shower. You can't go to school in your PJs because of a stupid lizard."

And so, I went into my room. I looked into my nemesis's beady black eyes, and it did not destroy me with its evil. I went into my bathroom and took a shower, and when I got out, it was gone.

So, this evening, the kids came over for dinner, and we had a lovely time (at least, I think it was lovely). Around 7:15, the power went out, as it usually does these days around 7:15, and we sat in the dark a while longer talking easily with the absence of light (something about the dark that loosens tongues, oddly enough). They got up to leave about quarter to eight, and we stood around in the front room saying goodbyes, taking our time, talking a while longer.

Just to be funny--because, well, I tend to want to be funny a lot--I suggested: "Hey, guys, are you sure you don't want to try to kill the lizard? The conditions are perfect." (The power being off, just like last time). I didn't have time to notice the reactions to my oh-so-witty comment, because then, something happened:

"Is that the lizard?" Laura said timidly, and she pointed to the corner of the room, where, indeed, the lizard clung to wall.

The boys sprung into action: Will had a laser gun with him, and he pointed the red light at the lizard (don't ask--long story involving a military themed game night), Tanner and David asked for bludgeoning implements again, we got them wooden spoons quickly, and Cori emptied out our washbasins so that they could trap it against the wall. Meanwhile, Will continued to train his laser on the lizard.

We are not exactly sure why, but he did.

Tanner and David proceeded to kill the lizard with several whacks (it took a while to die--ugg!) after the failure of capturing it the washbasin, and, quickly, quickly, it was over. Laura, Cori and I hovered at the back of the room, squealing like little girls and squeaking with each whack.

I was certain it was going to leap off the wall, and into my hair, even though it was at least 10 feet away.

And that, my friends, is the end of the saga of The Lizard. I'm glad it's over.

I'm also glad, once again, for our knights in shining armor: those fearless three lizard-slayers who came to their (wimpy) English teacher's aide.

Don't despair, for chivalry is not dead--it only lies dormant for a chance to rise up and right the wrongs, rescue the damsels in distress, and slay the dragons.

I actually had the presence of mind to take pictures this time. Enjoy...if you can...

This is The Lizard. Notice the red light? That's Will's laser gun.

Here are the three ferocious lizard killers--they will ever hold a special place in my heart!

In the background, you have Cori and Laura posing--quite realistically--in fear. I love that no one is really looking in the direction of the camera. The power was off, so no one could really see. I also love that Tanner is holding The Lizard sort of off to the side--almost like The Lizard is now an afterthought. Thank goodness!

The End

Decisions, Decisions

2011-01-07T17:37:00.000Z

Today, I'm making an announcement: I've officially decided to stay one more year at DA.

It's been a restless road to the decision, but I feel a tremendous enveloping peace about deciding to stay one more year.

Thanks for praying for me and with me over the past few months. Since the end of the last school year till about November, I was extremely restless and uncertain and very much not at peace, and I know it was because I was wrestling with making this decision. However, once I made the decision, that restlessness was released.

Thanks, again, for your prayers.

A Malian Camping Trip

2011-01-04T12:11:00.000Z

We survived our camping trip--we made it there, and back again. Was the adventure as epic as last year's? Oh, no--thank goodness!

I should admit something to my audience: I don't like camping. I know, I know. I'm a terrible missionary kid, and a terrible person. But, I just don't love it. I like clean feet. This sounds terribly prissy (in fact, my sister did tell me "Danielle, you're such a priss.") but I just like clean feet, and when you're camping, you're just never clean, especially your feet. Even if you jump in the river, and you're temporarily clean there, when you get out, you can never quite get your feet clean.

There are other things I don't like about camping, but never-clean-feet sticks out in my mind. Judge me as you will, but that's just how I am.

This year was special for the Bowers family: we actually had tents and sleeping bags (sort of). Most years we take mattresses, folding cots and mosquito nets, and we have this make-shift campsite. This year, we borrowed a real tent, and bought this mosquito-net tent. Miss Daniels slept under a mosquito net, but the rest of us were in real tent-like shelters. You don't know how incredible this is for our family.

Our celebration of the New Year came at 9:30--we set off bottle rockets, toasted in the New Year with sparkling grape juice, and then went to bed...Somehow staying up till Midnight was just impossible!

Here are some pictures of the trip:

This is Diamou. Last year, we made it only as far as Diamou. Well, not even as far as Diamou. we broke down about 3 kilometers outside of Diamou, and we had a drunken "mechanic" tow us into down with his dinky little sedan and a 4 foot rope that kept breaking each time we went over a bump too hard. Then, we sat in Diamou and waited for rescue. All. day. long. Anyway, all of this is just to show you that we made it past Diamou. Hooray! The road, by the way, from Kayes to Diamou is now amazing. Seriously amazing. I know you don't care, because you'll never travel that road, but this is a road that used to take us 4 hours, and now took us about an hour and a half--and less than an hour on the way back! (Our friends traveling with us had a flat tire on the way to Diamou, but we made awesome time on the way back.)

Another plus for Diamou is that we got cold "glass" coke (as in, they were in glass bottles, which is rare these days)--normally the coke is barely cool, but for some reason, we drink it anyway. Okay, I don't usually, because I'm also a coke snob. I've been discovering that I'm a pretty snobby person, actually. What can I say? I like the fine things in life: clean feet and cold coke...

Here we are setting up at the campsite. Did you notice the tents? We are officially real campers. Our friends, however, had to settle for the moquito net options. But, since this was their first time camping in Mali, they must camp at least 5 more times at Gouina before they are allowed to upgrade to tents. It's an official rule of missionary camping. Mosquito-net hardship first: then, tents. Maybe. (Back in the olden days, when we drove to Dakar or Banjul for vacation, we used to have to camp on the road, because it would take us 2+ days. We set up the mosquito net tents, even then. I remember thinking that lions would come and attack our little camp, because we were, quite literally, in the absolute middle of nowhere, but they never did. Good thing I didn't realize that the hyenas were a much more realistic threat...)

We took our dog, Chester, with us. Chester's mission in life is to catch basa, or lizards. Chester went crazy at our campsite, even climbing trees, in the hunt for basa. He spent a lot of time in this tree in pursuit of lizard. I don't know if he ever caught one, but he was so happy! He smiled and wagged his tale the entire time, and was completely worn out each evening.

The kids played the whole time in the water, and with their own personal fire, which was often fed by wood from the "grown-up" fire. Hmmm...

And, basically, we did all the camping things that you do--played games, swam, hiked, roasted marshmallows, made attiya, and played with fire. A good time was had by all...even me, the camping grinch.

Tomorrow, we head back to school. It'll be good to be back and to see my "kids" again (after three weeks away, I'm actually ready to see them and like them again), but I love being able to read and relax without feeling guilty. That's something I need to work on, but that's another blog post about Becoming Miss Bowers.

Happy New Year to all of you. May you find this year of 2011 a year of blessings, challenges, true love, and adventure; a year of growth in character and in Christ.