First Day of School!

First day of school! First day of school!

If you did not read that in Nemo’s voice as he was “jumping” on his dad, Marlin, in Finding Nemo, then you need to reevaluate your life. Just kidding...Maybe.

“The first day of school was blur…a stressful, surreal blur” Sorry for the movie references. Without Netflix or a Red Box, they are the closest thing I have to the actual film. (Points if you got that reference)

The first day was not actually a blur. Or stressful. It was actually stress free! It began with the three of us (Saba, Vanessa, and I - the three KSU Student Teachers working at KISU this semester) in a meeting with Mr. Garbett. He talked with us some about our roles at KISU over the coming months; we asked questions, and he answered them. Typical first day activities.

Next, he took us on a more extensive tour of the school than what we got last week. He introduced us to most of the teachers in the Secondary school, and showed us where the important areas were (the staff lounge, the cafeteria, etc.) before having us meet with the Learning Support teacher at the school.

[One of the things the administration at KISU wants us to experience is the Inclusive Ed. program. Each week, we will spend around 5 or 6 periods (a period is 40 minutes) with her and EAL students, or in classrooms providing more personal support to two or three students in whichever subject they happen to be in at the time. For example, I will be providing in-class support to three students in a Year 10 English class, and will be working with 3 EAL students (2 Chinese, 1 Angolan who speaks Portuguese) in the Learning Support classroom. We all think it is invaluable experience that we know we would not get in the States.]

The LS teacher is super chill (but really, EVERYONE at KISU is super chill. No lie). We really enjoy spending time with her and her students, and she has extended to us an open invitation to join her whenever we have a free period (just as so many of the teachers also have).

After that, we had a break. Every day from 10:50-11:10, the Secondary is on a break. There are no classes at the time, and students and teachers alike are free to roam the halls, work on homework/lesson plans, etc. during these 20 minutes. During our break, we all sat in the staff lounge with the other teachers and just hung out. It was during these 20 minutes that I overheard one teacher say to another “Do you remember that episode of FRIENDS when…” and it was then that I confirmed that this might be an alright place to be for the next few months. Break is nice, even if it is only 20 minutes.

Our meeting with the CAS teacher came next. CAS stands for Community, Action, Service, and is a crucial part of the International Baccalaureate Program on which KISU operates. As part of our Education Abroad program through Kennesaw State, we are required to give back to the community in which we live and work (in this case, Kampala) through some sort of community service. Normally, students are to come up with and execute the ideas on their own. However, we have a resource at KISU that will help us every step of the way. The CAS teacher was really nice to us, and since we will be working with his students once a week, he was also very thankful for the help. More on that topic will come later as we begin to work with the students to organize and execute our community service project.

Because we did not have a set schedule yet, we headed back to the staff lounge until lunch. Seriously, we were spoiled with how much we were able to hang out there. I feel as if no teacher is regularly there as much as we were.

LUNCH - One of the best parts of the day. The school is owned by a man who also owns two country clubs in Kampala and Munyoyo (the Speke Resort we went to last week), and because of this (and student tuition, no doubt), lunches are WAY above the average American high school cafeteria meal and good portions, too! It is only going to cost us $4 per day to eat school lunch if we choose, which, for those of you just joining us, is 10,000 shillings. Lunch was so good on Monday, and I have no doubt that it will continue to be as good for the rest of the term (here they are ‘terms’ and not ‘semesters’).

Mr. Garbett had wanted us to go into classrooms after lunch, but then decided that getting our ID badges was more important, so he sent us to the Admin office to get that taken care of. There are 3 ladies that work in the Admin office, and each of them is so nice and was willing to help us right away. We had our pictures taken for the badges, and one of the ladies said we could just pick them up in the morning, but we ended up just staying in there until they were done. They spelled my name wrong, but I did not want to put more work on them just for a missing letter, so I let it go (here ya go, Disney fans).

As the end of the day drew near, the three of us sat in the office and, without really saying it, asked each other how we were getting home. Our coordinator had a driver pick us up and take us to school, but told us that he was not going to be able to take us home, so we were on our own.

We thought about walking, but since the girls were not wearing shoes appropriate for walking, we decided to get a driver. We asked a few people at school if they knew of a driver we could call take us home, but they sent us to the security gate at the entrance to the school and said we should ask them. When we got to them, they sent us to the main road, saying we could find a driver there.

Only, we did not find the main road. Not at first, anyway.

Forget planes splitting in half, a mysterious island, and a random sequence of numbers (4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42), this was real.

LOST: Kampala, Uganda

We walked for a bit, and then decided we would just walk home. It was not very far, or so we were expecting.

After walking for a while and turning every now and then, asking each other “Does this look familiar?” and convincing ourselves “Yea, I remember that,” we finally admitted that we were lost. We flagged down a boda boda driver (boda bodas operate like taxis, but they are motorcycles, and the drivers ignore all traffic laws to get their passenger to their destination as quickly as possible, even if it means sacrificing his or her safety to do so) and asked him for directions, but all he wanted was for us to pay him to take us home, except there were 3 of us, so that would not work. He reluctantly gave us directions, but told us “far. It is very far.” We thought we knew where we were going, so we ignored him. Mistake. Walking another half mile or so, we found a police woman, and asked her for directions. Her response was “it’s too far for you to walk. Let me call a driver,” but we just decided to walk. Mistake. By this time, the girls were both saying that their feet were hurting – one was in flats and the other in high heels – but we had to keep moving (hindsight says that we should have called a driver at this time, but being the stubborn Americans that we were, we just continued to walk). I do give them props, though, for continuing on. Only about 20 minutes later were we stopped by friends we went on the safari with, who told us that it was not very far, and that we could make it. She would have taken us, but she had four kids in the backseat, so there was no room. Alas, we pressed on.

Finally, things started to look familiar. The bank. The country club. The little diner we found last week that had really good food and a waitress who made fun of us. We were almost there!

We finally found our road, and as we turned on to it, the woman who set up our housing flagged us down and told us to hop in, that she was going to show us the public transportation system. Rather than getting home just after 4:00, we got home closer to 5:30. Looking back on it now that we know more of the roads, ONE WRONG TURN ended up more than doubling our trip. UGH! So annoying.

Immaculate (that is the woman’s name) took us home and we changed into more comfortable clothes. After that, we headed back up the main road, on foot again, to wave down a taxi. Taxis in Uganda are big 15-passenger vans that are super cheap to ride in, but you will commonly be riding with close to 20 other passengers. Drivers REALLY pack those things full of people in order to make as much money as they can. It costs 500 shillings (20 cents) to ride from the end of our road to the end of the road our school is on, and only takes about 5-10 minutes, depending on traffic. Immaculate took us all the way to the school, and then said she wanted to show us a few more places in Kampala where we could hang out.

First was the Kabira Country Club, a SUPER FANCY resort right in the heart of the city. Anyone can just walk in, provided they pass through security, but you have to pay to use any of the facilities. Immaculate encouraged us to come to the Club, order food and/or drinks, and take advantage of the free WiFi. Not a bad idea, especially when it is cool and the atmosphere is so nice!

Next was the Cayenne bar/restaurant. Food and drinks at the bar/restaurant are super cheap, and they have deals every night. What a find! We even saw a few of the teachers/administration there, including the director and the secondary principal of KISU. From our quick conversation with them, it sounded like they were regulars. We will definitely have to check the place out sometime!

Walking back home, we decided to go ahead and grab dinner while we were out (because none of us had actual food at our apartments), so we walked past our street for about 5 or 6 minutes to a Lebanese restaurant that two of the girls in our group (they are studying at a different international school in Kampala) had seen when they went exploring. [SIDENOTE: I love that although there are so many local restaurants, Kampala also offers many international restaurants as well!]  I ordered steak and vegetables, which was such a good choice! My order came with TWO huge steaks (though not very thick) and half a plate of delicious veggies. Add this restaurant to the list of places close by that will be valuable resources to us in the coming months! We will definitely be back!

It was about 8:30 by the time we got back home, but we were all so exhausted that we went right to our respective apartments to get ready for bed. After talking with Vanessa and Saba for a bit about our day and life back home, it was lights out by 10:00pm. 

The life of a teacher – up too early, getting home way too late, only to have to wake up and do it all again the next day.

Here’s to the next three months!

Cam

As you can see, my Monday was a roller coaster of experiences. How was your Monday? How is your week going? Tell me about it!

Connect with me though Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram! Links provided!

- Facebook is more for general updates on how things are going (Cameron Yarbrough)

- Twitter is more thoughts about things I am experiencing (@TheGrandCameron)

- Instagram is for cool pictures and things! I am using the hashtag #CAMpala2014 on all of my pictures during this experience, so you can find my pictures that way as well! (@TheGrandCameron)

The school I will be working at this semester!

This is a map of part of Kampala. The green dot is our apartment, the red is the school, and the yellows are two stops on the taxi routes. Every morning, we walk from green to yellow, taxi yellow to yellow, and walk yellow to red. Every afternoon, we do the same thing in reverse! (I wish I could show you the distance in a better way! It is only about 10 minutes to walk from green to yellow, and yellow to red!)