Sarah goes to FIJI: Moniti and Tusite

Moniti means Monday and Tusite means Tuesday :)

Monday (yesterday) was an interesting day. I went to Costuless with Carly to do some grocery shopping for the team meals (they provide breakfast and dinner Monday-Friday). Costuless is basically a smaller version of Costco or Sam's Club. It was cool! Except that things like cereal were literally $25.00. Not even kidding. I bought a granola type cereal for $14. That's $7 in the US, and the cereal box is actually kind of small. CRAZY. We bought a ton of canned stuff for our meals for Tiko to use to cook. Then we went to the butcher and got some meats. Home for lunch and got ready for my first Professional Development (PD) with Meghan. We went to a secondary school called Gospel High School. They actually say prayers over the PA system, which I found kind of cool. The principal here was.... ummm..... not the most friendly person in the world. The school day was running late because they had had an assembly run over that day. And I guess this school had a problem with a volunteer there before or something- I'm not really sure. Either way, she was not the most welcoming woman and we felt like we were such a burden and inconvenience to her. Anyways, she had told us to come for the PD (we are doing a workshop on student motivation and reading comprehension- giving the teachers some ideas on how to use more activities to help the students learn and not be so disruptive- it's actually really cool. Meghan is awesome.) from 3-4, and that all the staff would be attending. We got there at 2:40. We didn't start the PD until 3:45. A lot of the teachers were really late, and they were also not extremely welcoming. We felt pretty frustrated and like they really didn't want us there. So we got our presentation done in about 25 minutes so we wouldn't take up too much of there time. But guess what. The presentation went REALLY well and there were quite a few questions and comments at the end. The principal was in there and she loved it and really took on what we said and challenged her teachers to apply the things we taught. It was really cool how she completely changed her attitude towards us (she even sent us a thank you e-mail the next day). We left and we were just like whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat just happened. It was funny. But frustrating. But good that it went so well after all.

Then we went home and we had some time to kill before dinner. So I did my laundry. Now, we don't have a washer and dryer here (well we did, but they aren't working, and the launder mat is crazy expensive) so we hand wash our clothes. I WILL NEVER TAKE A WASHING MACHINE OR DRYER FOR GRANTED AGAIN. OMG. I HATE DOING LAUNDRY BY HAND. It was horrible, took forever, and I'm pretty sure I didn't use enough soap on my whites, and too much soap/didn't rinse enough on my colors. Guess we'll know if it rains next, and my clothes start to have suds to rinse better. Anyways. We literally have a huge bucket in a shower that we use for laundry. Least favorite experience so far. Woof.

Ate dinner with the team (always a great time). And then we did house cleaning, which was much needed. Our house has smelled as of late. Probably just because nothing ever dries here and everything is mildewy. It's gross. But cleaning really helped. Then we did team building and told ghost stories and played taboo. Way funny. Then we made a giant cookie and got ice cream. So delicious and so fun.

Today I got up and went to the store to print out some stuff for my first exercise class at Hilton Special School! I was actually really nervous for it! We went a little early (I was told the class would be from 12-1) so I got there at 11:50. We started at 12:35. OH FIJI TIME, HOW I LOVE THEE. Not really, but that's ok. Now I know from now on it will start later. We started by talking about some of their favorite exercises. Then we did a quick warm-up and stretches. Then straight into relay races. First, they didn't really understand the concept of a relay, so that took some explaining. But after the first one... THEY LOVED IT. It was SO much fun. We did a running one first, then skipping, then hopping, and then they either skipped or walked fast. It was great. So fun. Kind of chaotic, but very fun. We ended with 10 sit-ups and some stretching. I felt like overall, it went fairly well. I think in the future, I will do the hokey pokey- I think they will love that and it well help them review the body parts in English.

Then I went home and changed for another PD at the Assemblies of God Primary School. We felt much more welcomed at this school. They had us sit in these special chairs in their staff room for their meeting. Not very many teachers attended, but they were so nice. They started it off with a prayer, which was awesome. During the presentation, which we had much more time for this time, they were kind of quiet and didn't participate all that much (they all seemed really tired). But then we started talking about games and examples (multiplication war was HUGE hit!) and they started getting into it more. They asked us a lot of questions after it was over. It was kind of cool. Then they ended with a prayer, and brought out all this food for us to eat. And they only had plates for us- the teachers just used their hands. They wouldn't let us wash our dishes or anything. I felt so special! Then we told them we had to go, and someone immediately ran out to call a taxi for us. Everything they did was just so nice. Go AOG.

We went straight to tutoring at FENC after this, and we were so late because we had to stay for the food (it would have been super rude to just leave and not accept their offer- not that I minded because I was hungry!). I helped Louisa (who is also Mormon!) study for a science test. We studied all about blood and we made up funny things to help her remember (like Dad used to do for my stupid vocab and geography tests in high school!). We had entirely too much fun. Then we took some pictures (it was Meghan's last day of tutoring) and they gave her cards and had this little goodbye speech. It was so cute.

As we (me, Meghan, and Audrey) were walking home, a car drove by and someone yelled "HEEEEEEEEEEY LADIES! I LIKE THE GREEN ONE!" We started laughing and looked around b/c we had no clue what he was talking about. Then, I realized..... I was wearing a bright green skirt. Meghan and Audrey DIED laughing. Oh boy. HAH!

Got home for dinner. There are only 4 of us at the house right now, everyone else is on trips. So we ate and then we were just listening to music... when an NSYNC song game on. So we did the only logical things we could think of. Brought all the extra mattresses downstairs and had a dance/singing party, complete with remote and phone microphones. We're the best.

Tomorrow we have a lot of school visits, and hopefully a rugby match!!!!

Moce and much love,

Sarah

PS a few pics

1-The cookie! With all 8 of us and our spoons.