When the Day is Done

I think I'm now settled enough into my routine that I can finally determine what the best time to make myself write is. I think. There could be another week or fortnight of e-silence and for that I apologize, sort of.

It's time to introduce you to my daily schedule. Here's what it looks like on paper:


Monday - Friday

6:15am - 7:15am: Prepare breakfast for the kids in our house. Oversee their preparation for school. Walk them to school.
7:30am: Volunteer Breakfast
8:00am - 9:30am: Playgroup.
9:30am: Take Playgroup kids home for rest time.
10:30am - 12:30pm: Supervise play
12:30pm: Volunteer Lunch
1:00pm - 4:00pm: Cheke Chea (Kindergarten) at Gyetighi Primary School
4:30pm: Assist in bath time according to schedule. Set up afternoon snack of egg and bread
On Thursdays, I have Girls Club at Gyetighi from 3:20pm to 4:30pm
7:30pm: Volunteer Dinner

Saturday
6:00am: Wake up and press snooze. Actually snooze, as none of the kids in the house is bothering to wake up as brightly as on school days.
6:15am: Prepare breakfast for the kids in our house.
7:15am: Volunteer Breakfast
8:00am to 9:30am: Oversee kids in our house -- cubby clean-up, Saturday chores, laundry, return movies to the library, clean up and restock bookshelf in the living room
9:30am - 10:30am: Free play with older kids.
11:00am - 12:30pm: Man the library. Read aloud to kids and help kids take out books or choose a movie.
12:30pm: Volunteer Lunch and rest time
2:30pm - 3:30pm: Monitor library. Participate in a structured activity with older kids.
3:30pm - 4:15pm: Supervise free play with kids
4:15pm - 4:30pm: Village-wide clean-up. Supervise kids to find and balls and return them to the office. Collect shoes and clothing from the grounds and rec hall, etc.
4:30pm: Assist in bath time according to schedule. Set up afternoon snack of egg and bread.
7:30pm: Volunteer Dinner

Here's what my schedule is really like.
Monday - Friday
6:00am: Wake up and press snooze. Lie in bed for ten minutes, listening to the sounds of the house ensuring against any extra moments of rest.
6:15am - 7:20am: Prepare breakfast for the kids in our house. Come up with new and more effective ways of asking "Where are your socks?" and "Whose shirt is that and why aren't you wearing your own?" and saying "No, you know that the rule is that you have to ask for that the night before," and "Serengeti House, we are the last ones to leave for school, again!"
7:30am: Breakfast
8:00am - 9:30am: Sit on the floor in Rubondo House with all the children in the Village who are too young for pre-school and too old to be considered babies. Watch. Tickle. Serve as a floor cushion. Identify colours. Sing. Clap. Practice sternly commanding "acha!" Read aloud for as long as the attention span or interaction with another child allows (<20 seconds for most of the kids). Plead with one or two kids to go blow their noses. Try not to get peed on by Natalie. Settle debates over who gets whichever book, Lego piece, or crayon is the hottest commodity that morning. Watch Kilimani Sesame (the Swahili Sesame Street) which totally rocks because it helps me learn how to count, and identify colours and locations. Request that the fake crying stops.
9:30am: Chase, catch and deliver kids to their home for the much protested nap time.
10:30am - 12:30pm: Work on my chore for the week (eg, alphabetize movies, re-shelve books, clean up pre-school closet). Find some unsupervised kids or join an overwhelming cluster of under-supervised kids and just make sure that please oh my god no one gets hurt. Spend time with other volunteers.
12:30pm: Volunteer Lunch
12:50pm: Change into a skirt and walk to the school.
1:00pm - 3:30pm: Cheke Chea (Kindergarten) at Gyetighi Primary School. Attempt to absorb as much Swahili as possible from the all-Swahili school day. Help with English comprehension through reading Dr. Seuss books and teaching shapes. Realize that the amount of made-up words in Seuss books may be a bit of an impediment to the learning process in this context.
3:45pm - 4:30pm: Rest. (Blog?) Hang out with Serengeti House kids as they wind down from school.
4:30pm: Set up afternoon snack of egg and bread. Bath time is pretty easy at Serengeti house since all of our kids are old enough to bathe themselves. Hang out with kids and reflect on the day, watch and coach their new acrobatic tricks, answer their bizarre questions, and correct their bizarre acusations.
5ish: Shower and try not get to peeked in on by the kids going through their "special changes"
5:30pm: Hang out around the house or head over to the Volunteer House and read or chill until for dinner. (Blog?)
7:30pm: Volunteer Dinner

Saturday
6:00am: Wake up and press snooze. Actually snooze, as none of the kids in the house is bothering to wake up as brightly as on school days.
6:15am: Prepare breakfast for the kids in our house. Chill out with them for a while.
7:15am: Volunteer Breakfast
8:00am - 9:30am: Listen to every kid's triumphant and hopeful tale of natural cleanliness and a lack of chores to do.
9:30am - 10:30am: Trick anyone willing into some sort of team-based physical activity (eg, volleyball)
11:00am - 12:30pm: Protect the library! Help kids read a book or find Waldo, or figure out who Waldo is because NO that's just some guy.
12:30pm: Volunteer Lunch time
1:15ish - 3:30pm: Gravitate towards stray children and lure them into the Library. Answer the older children's questions about Bill and I, bugs, what books I/we like, and how to make a paper airplane. Lounge on the comfy floor pillows. Play guitar. Draw. Sketch. Doodle. Realize that I'm the worst artist in the room, and that even the girl with the broken arm can stay within the lines more than. Play hacky sack, volleyball, or catch with Bill and any/all interested kids.
3:30pm - 4:15pm: Let if flow, let if flow...
4:15pm - 4:30pm: Remember, hopefully, to walk around looking for things that don't belong where they are. Enforce the minimal but excruciating clean-up.
4:30pm: Again, make sure Serengeti House kids are walking around in different, transitional stages of cleanliness.
5ish: Shower and try not to get peeked in on by the kids going through their "special changes"
5:30pm: Hang out around the house or head over to the Volunteer House and read or chill until for dinner. (Blog?)
7:30pm: Volunteer Dinner. Eat. Drink. Be Merry.

Sunday
Sweet, glorious day off.

When I say "Serengeti House," I'm referring to the one of the five houses here in the Children's Village: Serengeti, Mikumi, Rubondo, Manyara, and Tarangire, and then India Howell's house, Kirin. Bill and I live in Serengeti with two Mamas, Mama Upendo, who is Maasai, and Mama Marietha, and 12 tots ranging in age from <1 to 11 or 12ish: Isaka, Eva, Christopher, Christina, Boaz, Mole, Paulo, Vincenti, Simon, Happy, and Baby Grace, but there are 6 or 7 years between Gracie and Boazi, the youngest non-baby in the group. This makes our house quite the challenge sometimes. They're old enough to have distinct and assertive personalities and understand that they can manipulate new volunteers, and most of them have grown out of being ticklish, which is my biggest weapon against riffraff in Rubondo house when I'm there. In the mornings, it can be incredibly difficult to convince the kids that it's important to do their chores, find their socks, wear their own uniforms, and get school on time. Until Bill and I initiated this week's bribery tactics (be prepared, dressed, well-behaved, and out-the-door on time every single day this week and we'll have popcorn on Saturday), we were always late to Volunteer Breakfast since our kids were the last out. The intrinsic value of preparedness and learning may be more than a little overshadowed this week, but so far, our house has been the first one out of the gate every morning.

I'm not as comfortable with Serengeti's age group as I am with the younger kids, but I really like ours. They can be difficult, but also intensely sweet, cooperative, charming, or simply strange and amusing. So, basically, they're kids. They're also rather sharp. I like the grades on the tests that come home (at least the ones I see). It's a good group of kids, manipulative as they can be at times.

Alright, time to go find young'ns to tickle. More later tonight.