Sekolah 2

As promised, here are pictures of the the boys in their Wednesday uniform.  It's the PE uniform and on Wednesdays the class usually does more physical games like taking turns jumping on a small trampoline or taking turns kicking a ball.

Pak Dody and the kids gather around a bucket of water to learn how the game works.  

On this day, we went to the alley behind the school and played a water relay game ....uh, kind of.   The pacing was pretty slow, so the line of the bucket brigade became very zig-zaggy and stretched out at times as little feet wandered!

Joshua receives the "bucket" from a classmate.

Some of the older kindergarten girls really enjoy playing with Joshua.

After the exercise time, there is snack/break time.  When the kids finish their snacks, they have some time to socialize and look at books or play with a few wooden toys.

Jonathan really enjoys looking at books during break time.

The classroom (really a converted garage) is transformed for table work.  

My favorite days are when we have table work.... only about once a week.  The boys seem to do better when they have their own place to sit and an individual task to perform.  

Josh is excited to be sitting at his own table!

Rare moments of focus....

On this day, the kids were working on a puzzle worksheet.  The pieces would eventually be put together to form the letter K.  First they had to use a perforating tool and a padded board to perforate all the puzzle pieces, so they could then be punched out and then glued onto the puzzle.  I was amazed at the amount of focus Jonathan was able to give to this project!  He and Joshua really enjoyed having a hands-on tool to work with!  They stayed on task much longer than the other boys.

As you can see, most of the boys have left their work and only the girls and Jonathan (and Joshua with some encouragement from me) are still on task.  

Going to sekolah has been much more difficult than I had anticipated.  It's only 2 hours a day, 3 days a week, but I feel like it has changed the entire rhythm of our lives and we haven't found our balance yet.  The 100% instruction in the local language just sounds like gibberish for the boys and the pacing is so slow that they just have a hard time staying engaged.  It would be one thing if the classroom control is good, but the reality is that most of the boys in the class are running wild most of the time.  When we decided to attend this sekolah, we knew of it's weaknesses but we chose to move forward.  Now we're feeling the weaknesses very strongly.  We are committed to sticking it out until the end of May, when we will start our summer travels.  God has given me the gift of persistence, and I'm just holding on to hope that someday soon, the language will start making sense to the boys.  We'll turn a corner and start having more good days than difficult days.  As the Lord reminds you, please pray for us in this endeavor!  

My eventual goal is to be able to leave the boys in class and just wait on the porch until class time is over, however after 3 months we're not at the point yet.  Another American mom, who used to teach preschool in the US, had been encouraging me to just drop the boys off at the door.  She has since started spending some time at the sekolah as part of her language learning.  Last week, after seeing the classroom experience firsthand, she told me "I get it now.  I understand why you will never be able to leave them there alone!"  I gave her a big hug!  

 On the plus side:  although our school days are still difficult, the boys' attitudes are already changing.  Jonathan used to say "I don't like those kids.  They don't speak our language."  Now Jonathan and Joshua both know the names of some of their school friends and talk about them at home.  They both are using more local language words at home and both sometimes sing some of their sekolah songs at home.  Joshua especially seems to be absorbing a lot of language and has learned several songs that he sings often.  Jonathan is more interested in learning local language words so we are all more motivated to be learning more language.  

This Saturday there is going to be a day long field trip to some local sights.  We'll leave at 6:30 in the morning and get home at 8 pm or later!  It will be quite the language immersion experience and we're hoping that the whole family can go!  We've all had colds.  Jonathan and I are better, but Dave and Joshua are improving more slowly.  I hope we all can be better by Saturday so we all can go!  

Ashes, Ashes -- Living in the ring of fire

Our backyard passionfruit vine covered in volcanic ash

Keeping our lungs safe from chemical irritation....Joshua, just don't breathe too deeply since you won't keep your mask on!

     It's been a month now since Mount Kelud "coughed," but although I am behind in my blogging, I think it's still worth a show-and-tell.  You may remember that 3 1/2 years ago another of our local volcanos, Mt Merapi, erupted for days on end.  It was only 14 miles away from us, but the ash clouds were blowing in the opposite direction from our town and we were barely affected.  

     In this case, Mt. Kelud is about 150 miles away and only erupted for one part of one day.  The winds were blowing our direction this time and our whole region basically shut down for 2 days! The strength of the created natural world never ceases to amaze me.  Despite all of our technology and intellect, a natural disaster can take lives and cause everything to come to a stand still in no time at all.  Fortunately, this volcanic eruption resulted in relatively little loss of life.... less than 20 fatalities, from such things as an ash-laden roof collapsing or chronic lung disorders being exacerbated.  (By contrast, the eruption in 2009 killed about 200 people who suffered severe burns).  200,000 people were temporarily evacuated from the slopes of the volcano, but they were soon able to return to their homes.  

Mount Kelud coughs

     We went to bed as normal and got up as normal too, eating breakfast and getting dressed.  I woke up and thought I smelled cigarette smoke, but people often smoke on the corner outside our house so I dismissed it.  We only knew something had happened when we got a text message that school was cancelled due to ash fall!  We looked out the window and sure enough, it was a white world!

No swinging today ....or for the next several days as we waited for a cleansing rainfall....

The ash is not really dangerous for a normal healthy person....it's just uncomfortable.  It contains sulfuric chemicals so it will stings the eyes, nose, throat, lungs.  It will activate allergies and asthma for people are susceptible.  You really ought to stay in the house.  That is what we did for the most part.  We wore a mask if we had to go out....fortunately I had a supply left over from the last eruption!  Basically we just didn't go out at all for 48 hours.  Although it was the peak of the rainy season, this ash fall occurred  just as we had about 3 days with no rain!  I really didn't want the boys outside until some of the ash was cleared away.

Here we have Ash Days instead of Snow Days.... but the color is the same.  The smell is different....Ash Days smell kind of like cigarette smoke or spent matches.

Ben's last calculus class in our living room....

We still had our guest, Ben, on the day of the ash fall.  School was cancelled.   The students thought what he had to share was more important than a day off, so we had an impromptu calculus class at our house.

Bed mattress being used as a trampoline and couch totally dismantled....this is what happens when little boys don't get to play outside for 48 hours! 

The boys and I stayed inside for 2 days and 2 nights solid.  Fortunately we had enough food and water that we could do it without difficulty.  What was difficult was keeping the boys happy and active while cooped up!  I felt a bit sorry for myself, but then I remembered mom friends living in rainy, cold Oregon where long stretches indoors are the routine!

For a break from the house, we had dinner at this local restaurant that has a sealed-off, air-conditioned room.  

From dust we came and to dust we shall return....

It was a gritty, dirty world inside and out.  Our homes in the tropics have windows that do not close completely.  Although the air quality was better inside, there was still a LOT of ash inside the house.  The pile of dust in this picture was from our kitchen.  I swept a similar pile from the same area at least 4 times in the same day!

The mountain coughed on Thursday night.  I think the first big rain came on Monday, with additional cleansing rains over the next several days.  That's life in the tropics, where we live in the Ring of Fire!

Our friend, Ben

Our family enjoyed hosting Jenn's special friend, Ben, for 11 nights in February.

In 1993, I went to nursing school in Klamath Falls, Oregon.  I met and was embraced by many in that town and so soon came to love it.  Ben and his dear wife Barb were very influential in my lif. Ben and Barb have been missions promoters in the local church, and so were very supportive of my interest in missions.  Not only that, but in my senior year, I learned that Barb had once served overseas at the very mission hospital where I eventually ended up going and working for 5 years! Only God could have placed me in the right place at the right time to meet Ben and Barb and be inspired and influenced by them.   Sadly Barb died of cancer last summer.  She is dearly missed and Ben is deeply grieving.

Ben and Barb

Ben and Barb had always had a tentative plan to serve overseas in various ways in their retirement. This winter, his first without Barb, Ben took his first post-retirement trip to help here at Mountainview for a week and a half.  An expert in calculus and recently retired from decades of teaching college level math, Ben was a big help to the Calculus students and to the newer math teachers.  One direct result of Ben's visit is the Calculus students will be much more confident in their Advanced Placement exams in May!

A special study session at our house for Advanced Placement calculus!

Ben was also our first non-immediate-family guest to stay more than a week.  That's quite close quarters for a long time with 2 energetic, rambunctious boys, not to mention their sometimes moody parents!  Ben has a bunch of grandkids himself, so he took it in stride and was dutiful in providing shoulder rides and reading bedtime stories.  Ben, you blessed us.  Thank you for coming!  Please do come again....

Ben is as tall as Abraham Lincoln, so getting a shoulder ride was super cool!