Turtle Poop

Dinner... Yum!

This week has been great and really flown by! Monday I finally broke down and took Cipro for my stomach bug and felt completely better the rest of the week! We also discovered another cool place on the island that has great local food, so I had that for dinner twice this week! They serve panades (which are like fried cornmeal with either fish or chicken and onions on top), Garnachas (which is like a giant chip with beans, tiny sweet onions and cheese), and Tostadas (which is a hard shell, with cabbage, chicken, cheese and tomatoes). The best part about the little place is that the food is so unbelievably cheap! And Yes, Mom, I still picked all the veggies off! It was great to be able to really eat real food again!

Hunting Lionfish

Wednesday and Thursday, Nick and I stayed after school to take some footage for our documentary on the reef! It was really fun to talk to some of the students and we found out how knowledgeable they are about lionfish! Thursday was a really awesome day overall! I got observed and then filmed by a film crew from UNCW that are doing a documentary on how teachers that are studying abroad adapt to their environment. I taught a lab to the students in which they devised a way in which to dissolve sugar. It was really different than when I did the lab at home partially because it was the first time many of my students here had EVER been in a lab. It was really fun to be able to teach them their first lab, but if I had known that prior to doing the lab I definitely would have changed things a little bit. I also got a chance on Thursday to go with the students to a health fair to chaperone. The teacher decided that day to take the kids for their Life Skills class (can you imagine taking kids back home to the center of town with no permission forms!). The health fair was a very different experience than what I would have expected in the USA. They had various tents set up talking about things from the Water Cycle, Hygene, Drug and Alcohol prevention, all the way to HIV/AIDS. It was good to see that they were educating their public because Belize has the second highest rate of HIV in the world. People could even get tested on the spot.

Friday we didn’t have school because the track team and business school were both going inland, so there weren’t enough teachers to run school. Here, when teachers are absent they fill classes with other teachers who have planning, so it is not like you can easily call in a substitute. Can you imagine if a school in the USA decided to just close school?

HUGE Grouper!

Since we didn’t have school I went and did three dives on Friday and I’m going diving again tomorrow! Friday I saw turtles, and spotted eagle rays, and huge green morays! It was a great day of diving. We went to the South end of the island where we had 100 foot visibility and the reef was in great shape. Then we dove the reef in the middle of the island, and then the last dive was at Hol Chan, which is the national marine park. For the first time in my life, I saw a turtle poop! (If you're wondering, it looked a lot like dog poop.) I can't believe how many new, and simple things that I have experienced on this trip. I've really gotten the opportunity to push myself out of my comfort zone!

This week (Wednesday- Friday) I get a once in a life time experience, I’m going to go inland with the Science students at the high school. Each year, the juniors and seniors go on a trip to visit their country and see some of the local business that they could look for jobs at, as well as some museums and national parks! Monday, the school is hosting all of the eighth graders, and so we are going in to proctor the exams. Then, on Tuesday, my class will be reading and responding to my letters that my students at Topsail High school wrote to them, and I will be teaching a first aid class. That means, that Thursday was my last REAL day teaching in Belize! That’s crazy! I’ve learned a lot about myself and how I teach while being here. I was really surprised at how difficult it can be to implement certain classroom management techniques when students are so used to one type of instruction. I was also very surprised and proud of myself at how flexible I have been able to be in such a different teaching environment!

I can’t wait to do my 300^th dive tomorrow!

Until next time,

AAA