Little Personalities

For the past couple of days we've been trying lots of new forms of afternoon/evening entertainment.  Last night we discovered the joys of competitive Pictionary, the prize being that the losing team had to do the winning team's dishes at lunch today.  My team was a little overconfident going into the competition, which ended in several rounds of sudden death.  We lost.  We even cheated, and we still lost.  Soo, as we washed extra dishes, we had some time to think about how honesty is always best.

Last night, a few of us went to an aerobics class at the gym in town.  It was led by this INTENSE Costa Rican couple...I mean, if their home life is anywhere near as energetic as their aerobics class, I don't think I could handle the household.  It was fun though...until the final abs/butt workout, when I was seriously considering jumping up and saying "Aghhh no mas!".

At school today, I spent a lot of time helping Nina clean out the drawers in her desk, which I'm pretty sure she's just been shoving random things into for at least a year now.  Half of the stuff in there looked like it needed to be thrown away, but she just wanted it all to be organized and put back, so I had to refrain myself from getting rid of all the random bags and sticks and drawings and such that I'm fairly certain will never be used.  Anyway, everything was going fine until I pulled a shoebox out of one of the drawers, opened it to organize its contents, and 4 huge cockroaches were inside running around.  I screamed.  I typically handle bugs pretty well, but I don't do cockroaches.  Nina, however, with her calm and composed self, simply came over, grabbed the box, swept the roaches out one by one with her hand, and smooshed them each onto the classroom's tile floor.  Then she looked at me and said, "What? You don't have cockroaches in your house?"

I don't know what anybody would do without Nina.

Also, Emily (the 2nd grade volunteer) came back to class with me today.  She and her dad are going to start coming to my school again on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  Her dad is helping someone paint the buildings, so she joins my kindergarten class and plays with the kids/helps out.  Emily is reserved, a little bit perfectionistic, and, with her tendency to focus on maintaining organization and suppressing chaos, a fitting product, at only age 8, of the values that most separate the American school system from that of Costa Rica.  It's mostly a coincidence that it happened that way, as there are definitely American kids whose personalities would fit right in to the more disordered and lenient Costa Rican schooling style (like Emily's little sister, who is always providing entertainment for the house), but, I must say, I love the days when Emily comes to class because it's so interesting to watch her and the other kids interact.

She doesn't speak any Spanish, and the kindergarteners can only count to ten in English, so the language barrier doesn't help Emily's shyness.  The kids are always inclusive though--the little girls run over and try to make her put on lip gloss, and the boys, namely one first grader, Mikey, have crushes on her and come over with timid little hopes that they might be able to understand each other when they interact.  Emily doesn't seem to enjoy playing with the kids so much though; I think she likes it better when she gets to observe from afar.  She watches them make messes and forget to clean them up, leave the caps off of all the markers they put back in the box, and run in and out of class with no apparent reason.  And then she makes comments like, "Are they supposed to be wiping the paint off on that faucet?", or "My teacher would never let them do that".  She seems most content when Nina gives her some sort of organizational job, like putting the caps on all those cap-less markers, or sweeping dirt (and cockroach guts) off of the perpetually dirty floor.  With a perceptible amount of focus, she always does these little tasks with more effort and diligence than Nina asks.  And I can look at her and see how determined she is to do them right.  I feel like she puts pressure on her 2nd grade self, holding most of her playful urges back in exchange for what she deems as higher standards of composure and regularity--standards that are magnified when she's thrown into an environment that's somewhat chaotic.  In her little ways, she's giving what she knows how to the classroom: a gift of order and control.  She doesn't impose these things on the kids; she's too timid (and incapable of Spanish) to do that...but, I can tell that as she organizes she's watching the kids in their rambunctious ways and thinking a lot, wondering why their standards don't seem to be as rigidly placed as her own.  And while I think her character is, in reality, probably more shaped by genetics than by the structure of the American school environment, Emily's presence in the class sets up an undeniably visible Costa Rican-American contrast.  

I guess I like watching how Emily interacts with the kids because, in a way, she reminds me of myself.  I don't know that I was just like her when I was younger, but, from the older perspective I have now, I feel like I can detect early beginnings of the high standards that, for me, came at a young age and then continued to grow.  But I've realized, partly through this experience and partly through others, that it's things like volunteering that allow me to push those standards, and the pressure that I often put on myself, aside.  When I'm helping other people, it's like a release from thinking about how I might like to change or improve minute aspects of myself...because I've learned that when I think about these things, I start to think too much, sometimes so much that it's like I forget to speak, or act.  I've decided that, in some cases, for those prone to high standards, or perfectionism, not thinking might be the best option.  Maybe not not thinking, but at least recognizing a sort of separation between oneself and one's thoughts.  

So, I guess my point is that I'm really loving my time here in Costa Rica, being able to have a focused and productive outlet, and knowing that my thinking is being used (hopefully) to better someone else.  And I like that helping doesn't require any intense or burdensome kind of thought.  When you're helping, what's needed is more of a presence, a perceptible effort--simply enough to let those you are helping know that your support is there.  You don't have to concern yourself so much about the hows and ifs and whys when you aren't being held to any sort of standard.  Your actions can set their own standard, and even the smallest action is good enough.  I feel like I could keep going on this train of thought forever, but I think I'm going to leave the subject at that for now.

AH my blog posts are getting excessively long.  Having this blog makes me wish I had always kept a journal. I still have a little more to say! (up to now was yesterday, and this is my only journal type thing, so I have to write everything I want to remember on it)

This morning, I was accompanying Cecil to the bathroom and she squatted in her uniform RIGHT next to the toilet, lid closed, and just peed in her pants!  Then she looked at me all worried and said she didn't know what had happened.  I said, "Cecil! No puedes usar el piso para el bano!" and all she did was laugh.  

Antony came back to class today, thank goodness.  I'm in love with that little boy.  He's just the happiest thing I've ever seen.  He and this other boy, Jorge, are the two continually well-behaved ones of the class.  I'm in love with Jorge, too.  He is so precious and has this scar on his face that makes him look older and wiser, or maybe a little more weathered, somehow.  And he is wiser--he's the only kid in the class that knows how to read, and whenever we do craft projects, he sits happily and quietly and focuses on doing a good job.  When Nina asks the kids a question and others shout out nonsense answers, she calls on Jorge and he always knows the correct response.  It's so cute how perceptible their little personalities are from so early on.  I don't think I'd realized that so much about young kids until these past couple of weeks...or maybe I knew it was true, I had just never reallly experienced it..

Ok that's all for now, finally!  Tonight is the US vs. Costa Rica world cup game, which is apparently supposed to be a big deal, so we are going into town to watch it.  I can't decide who to root for..

:)