How to know it’s the first day of school in Albania? The four inch heels and fire engine red dresses come out. Also, life becomes a little more Kafkaesque as far as multiple levels of confusion and overall ambiguity are concerned. Thankfully, we’re all long past the stage of being surprised by anything anymore.
My counterpart was let go the week before school started. Our enrollment continues to drop and the outlook isn’t great going forward. It’s not so wonderful for me either. I wanted to work on a more solid and beneficial relationship with my counterpart this year and was disappointed for the both of us when I got the news. Even though I have a year under my belt, it’s every bit as difficult this year to define my role and get activities up and running. The other English teacher that remains at our school is openly hostile towards me ever since he asked me to help students cheat on national exams and I denied him. He interpreted my saying no as me thinking I’m somehow better because I’m an American and inexplicably brings all conversations back to my nationality. Dealing with him is tedious and I largely try to avoid him. This year may be more challenging than the last.
Staying motivated is hard right now. We have eight months left and it’s simultaneously under- and overwhelming. Fortunately, my old counterpart ended up getting a job at the neighboring 9-year school. I asked her if I could go help her there, where she’ll be teaching much more agreeable 4 – 8th graders, and she accepted my offer. I feel good about that and I’m hoping we can take this time to finally get on the same page. Aside from school work, I’m developing an entire course on American History through the Arts with another volunteer who teaches at the university level. Another friend of mine has extended to serve a third year and is working with the English Language Teachers Association, so opportunities exist there as well. There’s also a teacher training that I’m helping to plan and conduct with two other volunteers as well as the Peace Corps projects (the newsletter, VAC) to keep me busy. So although my formal assignment is a high school, I’m involved in so many other things that it’s hard to keep track. I’m trying to document things well so I can easily recall them for job interviews and applications as well as examining my experience and seeing what other things I’d like to add to it in this last year. I’m trying to think about the future and what I can do here.
I don’t need a lot of praise. Most of our work is undervalued or goes unacknowledged, and that’s fine. We don’t often see the results of what we do. So maybe it shouldn’t be so surprising that I was close to tearing up last week when I was at the village seamstress’s house. I have taught and privately tutored her daughters pretty much since I’ve been here. She said she wanted to buy me a gift because of how grateful she is for what I’ve done. “I would never be able to afford it,” she told me. That’s something I’ve always known and always kept on my mind during the times when I’ve wondered what I’m doing here. I think it’s that really, so many of the small, regular interactions add up for a much larger and significant effect that we sometimes can’t see. And Serg spoke for me when she said, “Sofie doesn’t want anything. Being able to work with such great students is enough.” And it is.
