progress!

Last week I had a great conversation with a Cape Verdean friend about English-majoring university students (or would-be students) who have no native English speaker to converse with or consult. I could barely contain my excitement as we bandied about the idea of a weekly study session or conversation class. Although I had offered to teach a class or even just serve as a native-speaking assistant at the local UniCV, nothing has come of it so far (politics). But this would be outside the system, put together through local contacts, and so has a much better chance of happening. It was not easy for me to get into college and then complete my degree while working and scrounging for loans. I would love the chance to help other students accomplish the same goal here, by offering free tutoring and advice on applications and cover letters. I think if I could help even one person get into a program or job abroad – how cool would that be?

Meanwhile, A held his first internet club meeting –  and it went great! A is a small enterprise development/IT volunteer, with a “day job” at a local women’s organization, but as of yet no one there has expressed the ability or desire to learn about anything more advanced than Excel. The students and several faculty at my school, however, are open and excited about web design. So A has begun his secondary project – this internet club, which aims to teach the basics of wed design and coding in HTML, and then build a basic website for the high school (with blessings from the Director). And I get to sort of play assistant in the efforts, helping A break it down into units and lessons and translating into Portuguese. Everyone seemed excited to start, and although the ability levels vary, the end goal of a school website (and the prestige of being the ones who made it) seems to have the group pretty energized.

And sometimes that is the hardest part – or actually the part that sometimes seems totally out of our hands; whether these clubs and meetings will sustain the interest of the people involved. The people we have met here are curious and open to learning but we often find our sense of commitment (to a class, to a set time and date, to a learning goal) and their’s are quite different. We are here solely to serve the community and it is where we focus most of our energy – but their lives are just as varied and broad and complicated and distracting as the ones we left stateside (but can still fall into with one look at Facebook, oy). So as wonderful as my English language tutoring may be (maybe) or A’s knowledge of coding, we still have to compete with the rest of their lives for the time and energy to learn more; we have to either grab their interest and hold it, or convince them of the urgency of learning what we can teach in the time left to us in Cape Verde.

I am not entirely sure how one does this. Partially I think it’s just time, and becoming a part of their lives through exposure and small talk and the exchange of stories and ideas. On the other hand, I think some days I just need to put more energy into my classes, into my interactions with people – be more transparent in my intensity. So, we keep on keeping on. I will keep day-dreaming up big, bold dreams, but forgive me if somedays I say F it, I am happy with that one thing I did ok. The five students who wrote their essay assignment. The two girls who returned for tutoring all the way up until their TOEFL exam. An invite to play poker and drink too much grog – even if it wasn’t accepted, it was extended! Or even the smile of a local drunk, when he realizes you are speaking kriolu, has the strange ability to make you think “ok, we’re getting somewhere.”