I spent two weeks teaching classes at the local high school and middle school in Kuqan as part of my practicum as a TELF volunteer. It was quite eye opening and fairly enjoyable. I had some success using group work in a few classes and watched as those same ideas melted faster than butter on a hot plate. I didn't have too many discipline problems although I did have to tell one kid to slow his roll when he was becoming a bit more of a distraction than I wanted him to be.
Most of the kids seemed to have fun, but it was interesting to see how many students were in the upper classes that knew no English. This problem stems from quite a few things: the use of the Russian style of teaching in which the teachers teach to the top ten percent or so and let the other kind of fend for themselves, the set up of the Albanian school system which makes it nearly impossible for a student to fail a class, often a lack of interest in the student. It can even stem from an undiagnosed learning disability. Whatever the cause there are always two or three students in every class that have no clue what is going on and most teachers don't have the time to help these students catch up.
My sitemates and I each had to teach eight classes and observe seven while still attending language classes and coming up with ideas for our community project. All I can say is that when practicum was over on Friday we really had something to celebrate. So we bought a few bottles of wine and played a few games of scrabble to relax once it was all over.
The following Sunday I caught a ride to the town of Belsh, or what I like to call the land o' lakes. There's something like 84 lakes in that area but I only saw one of them. I went to Belsh because another group of trainees was holding their community project and seeing as how the group had invited anyone who wanted to join them and I hadn't yet gone to that area I figured I'd pop in. The group in Belsh is split between community development (COD) and health (HE) volunteers, and they had decided to host a walk/ run around the largest lake near the city and follow it up with a field day in front of the local high school. While no adults got involved by the end of it about 50 kids joined in which was pretty awesome. We were all really happy because we thought the crappy weather would drive people off but the weather was ok for the most part aside from a few minutes where the sky spit rain.
The next day I caught an early bus to Elbasan and met with all the other trainees and head off to the capital city of Albania, Tirana, and the seaside city of Durres. After making a perilous journey through fog covered mountain switchbacks in a touring van, we made it to Tirana and disembarked to get a small group tours of the Peace Corps office and important sites around the city. The tours were led by current volunteers so they talked to us about their experiences in Tirana and in Albania in general while we walked. Almost as soon my group left the office we ran into trouble. One of the other trainees snapped a picture of the US embassy as we were walking by it and the security officers were more than happy to discuss with us at length the follies of taking pictures of secure facilities. All I'm gonna say is that perhaps they could put up a sign that says don't take any photographs. The rest of the tour was fairly uneventful aside from a car rolling over my toe as I was walking across the street. Good thing I was wearing my boots that day. When the tour was over, we returned to the bus and headed off to Durres.
After having to turn the bus around three times a busy road and almost parking in the lobby of a pharmacy, we arrived at the Tropical Resort. It's situated right on the Adriatic and has a semi private beach behind it. We were there to attend the Counterpart Conference and spend some time getting to know the people we will be working with for the next two years.
Well I'm really tired so I'll end it here and pick it up where I left off next time.
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