saying goodbye

hi there! i just got back from a cultural presentation the students at Christ The King put on for us. it was amazing! they sang their national anthem in garifuna and then in english, and then had us sing them our national anthem. one class recited the pledge to belize, and one class recited a poem. there was dancing and four little girls from the infant 1 class (=kindergarten) recited a poem called "I Love Myself." it was the most wonderful thing i have ever seen! three girls did traditional punta dancing while two boys played the drums. then a young boy came out dressed in a headdress and costume to perform a dance that is traditional for christmastime and new years. for that dance one of the drummers keeps the beat and the other drummer looks at the dancer's feet and has to follow every step he takes on the drum. it is very cool to watch! the last dance they did was from five older boys. three of them came out dressed like girls (!) and did the girl parts of the punta dance, to laughter from all of us and the students, and then a boy dressed in a scary mask came out with a stick in his hand followed by a boy dressed like a bull with a stick in his hand. i didn't quite understand what was being represented, i think it was kind of a silly fun dance. all the kids were so excited, jumping up and down during that dance and creeping up to the boy in the mask until he would turn around and pretend to scare them and they would run away. it was really entertaining, and we took lots of pictures. at the end we called the hogs for the whole school and sang the fight song, then we taught them to call the hogs with us! it was so cute! the teachers will probably want to kill us because the "woooooo" sound became very popular very quickly :)

yesterday morning we had a town-wide trash pick up. we were in charge of about twenty kids from Christ the King and we picked up trash in Bangashe Park, which is about a 20 minute walk away from the school. this was a major test in us being able to motivate! i used an old St. Paul's trick of find the "magic piece of trash" and that worked for a while, then we were able to use snacks as a bribe to pick up trash. here they have these snacks called ideals, they are flavored ice in a little plastic package, kind of like an oversized pop-ice. they also sell plain water in plastic packages, too - it is a funny way to drink water! anyway - our morning was spent cleaning the city until we had to leave for pomona. we had mrs. e's for lunch - which is the little shack with chicken burritos homemade for $1 - they are incredible.

i have had three of my last tutoring sessions now. yesterday was with the bojorges family in pomona. this week we talked about the parts of a story. we had three extra kids all from a different family with us too. everyone picked characters and a setting together, and then we all wrote our own story up until the "problem" stage, and swapped papers with a partner who finished the "resolution" part of the story. then we read green eggs with ham which is proving to be a favorite. every day i am more amazed by the miracle of dr. seuss! consuelo brought me a burrito and some baby bananas - those really little ones - here they call them "gold bananas" she said. when we drove them home she invited us into her house to give us what i thought would be one coconut already ready to go from her kitchen. really what we did was follow her out behind the house where she, then isaias, then her husband mr. bojorges proceeded to break down a whole slew of coconuts from the tree for us to take back, using a very long stick, a homemade ladder and a machete. then mr. bojorges (who i met all of 10 minutes before this) chopped open two coconutes with his machete for us to drink. it was awesome. consuelo also sent me home with some fresh flour tortillas and when i told her i liked the beautiful purple flowers that kind of form an arch over their front door, she picked some of those for me too. they are the most wonderful generous people, and they have a beautiful family! she came out to the bus and blessed all of us. i told her we could write letters and stay friends and she said "yes, friends always. 'til God comes."

today i had my last reading session with dylan. we also read green eggs and ham and made up hand motions for each little phrase aka in a house, with a mouse, in a box, with a fox, etc. he loved it. in the middle he stopped and said "miss, i like this book!" he did a great job reading today, and was excited to get to take four books home with him. when i saw him later at the cultural presentation he kept waving to me from his seat and giving me a thumbs up.

we ate at our new german friend's restaurant again today. it was very tasty again! and we have had rain every night this week which has made the nights so much cooler for sleeping! i can't believe we really just have one more day here! i am excited to be back to air conditioning and going to bed without dousing myself in bug spray first.

miss you all and can't wait to see you in a few days! hope everyone is surviving the summer heat so far!

lots of love, hill