My Long Hot Summer

Since school ended at the end of May you may have been thinking I’ve been taking some time off like most of the other people around town.  They all asked me, just as they did last summer, if I was returning home for the summer.  Another part of my job that’s misunderstood-they know me as only a teacher and think that when the other teachers stop working, so would I.  But alas, I’m not here just for working during the school year and I continued working the very next day, only this time it was for my English clubs/camps for the summer.  

While a lot of other PCVs travel during the summer and visit other PCVs in other regions to help out with camps and other projects I opted to stick around town this year.  With limited time left in my service I want to make the most of my remaining days and the reality is if I were to go somewhere else the kids of my town would have nothing to do.  When I say “have nothing to do” I literally mean: nothing to do.  I know this may seem hard for Americans to understand and it boggled my mind at first- my childhood summer memories are filled with camps, trips to the pool, block parties, carnivals, picnics, camping and other social gatherings with my peers.  Life here- leaves a lot to be desired.  The kids have no sporting teams, no clubs, no pool, no movies theatres, bowling alleys, shopping malls, etc.  They don’t even go to hang out at one another’s homes or sit for hours on the phone. We have a river, but only the boys would ‘wade’ in the water and I doubt much of that will happen this year given the terrible flooding from this past spring.  Their days consist of waking up, eating breakfast, then probably spending the rest of the day watching tv, eating lunch, and resting in the afternoon since not much can be done outside in 100+ degree weather.  (I kid you not, I swear I’m boiling from the moment I wake up until I try to go to sleep in such heat.  I cannot seem to find another layer to pull off.  I feel like I’m roasting.) 

Yet I know that as bored as I am with little to down around here it’s only because I’ve known better.  I couldn’t leave the kids with so little to do.  Plus making this clubs gives me something to work on and time passes much faster when I’m not sitting around complaining about all this sweat.  As drained as I felt at the end of the school year, teaching in the summer is actually enjoyable. I looked forward to going to school that first day because all the kids who were there wanted to be there and wanted to learn.  Gone were the kids who constantly resisted learning or trying; now I only had to work with kids who actually cared and wanted to try.  I’ve learned that I can’t force anyone to believe in him or herself and work harder if they don’t want it for themselves.  (You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink. This is just so true.)

Four days a week I have clubs at school.  Mondays is typing club for grades 9^th and up to learn how to use the keyboard for typing.  We have nine somewhat new computers in a computer lab but sadly the computer teacher cares little about actually teaching the students.  I found an easy typing course online and loaded it on the computers.  Unfortunately only four computers run the program but I figure four is better than none and so I arranged for three hour-long typing sessions, allowing at least twelve students to learn how to type.  If they go to university it will be useful for them to know how to type-whether it’s in English or not—this club isn’t for only the strong English language students-just anyone who had the desire to learn.  Tuesday and Thursday mornings I hold clubs for the 6^th-8^th form students to practice their English grammar, with an emphasis on speaking and listening.   A lot of it has to be review since it’s likely that most of the students aren’t at the actual level of their grade, but I try to make it interesting with games and new topics.  With 3 ½ months off, without any practice come September, it might feel like starting all over again to both the students and English teachers. Any practice they get, even if it’s 2 hours a week is better than nothing. (Or at least I tell myself this so I feel useful.) 

After this club, one of my 9^th form students, Amina, (who helped me with a conversation club last winter and probably is my best local friend around town despite being 10 years my junior) gives a club for the 4^th and 5^th formers.  This is the most basic, very beginning instruction of English since before the 5^th form most students can’t retain any English as the textbooks are way too difficult and just not arranged in any order that makes sense.  Amina teaches this group for a few reasons: she wants to be an English teacher, she loves young children and she knows Azeri better than I which is necessary to explain the complexity of basic English grammar.  You might think English is easy to learn-and for some it may be but after teaching it for a year and half I’ve learned how many irregularities and random rules we have.  I now know and understand English much better than I ever did during Language Arts class.  And I tell you I’m pretty sure there are some Azeri-English teachers who know English grammar a whole “hell” of a lot better than the majority of Americans. They put us to shame.

I’m glad to say that while I helped Amina plan for the first few weeks of club she’s doing it all on her own now and really catching on with different techniques.  Sometimes I have to stop myself to realize that she is only 14, practically bilingual and doing more than other paid teachers with her summer off.  If she’s this great now, I can’t imagine how she will be once she is actually teaching children years from now.

On Wednesdays I hold a speaking club for the students in the higher forms. A lot of the kids say they want to be able to speak English but just don’t have enough vocabulary or ability to put together sentences.  I can’t hold complex conversation clubs where we talk about the meaning of life or their ideal worlds but I try to make it interesting and useful for them.   It’s sometimes hard combining different levels since some students know a lot more than others.  I had to speak privately with a few regulars who keep showing up but just wouldn’t offer a word.  I know they want to speak but they are just so afraid to make a mistake.  Soviet teaching style has taught most of the kids it’s better to be silent and ignored than to be incorrect and thus, criticized.  It’s taken me so long to ensure my students that making mistakes is okay and that together we’ll learn from them.  Sometimes I feel I’m banging my heads against the wall with how many times I’ve said “If you don’t understand, please ask me.”  I think I may finally be getting somewhere since the girls I spoke to participated a bit more the following club.  Only a year and eight months right?  Phew. I get why this service is two years…

Besides these clubs, as it only occupies a few hours of my morning, followed by about 20 minutes in front of the fan and 2 liters of ice-cold water to cooling off, what do I do with the rest of my time?  Between the hours of 1 and 5 the town literally shuts down.  Shops are closed, people have eaten lunch and are napping and staying out of the heat.  I try to match my schedule to this by prepping for clubs, GRE studying and reading or doing yoga in the afternoons.  Most evenings I’m off to a students house to do private FLEX exam prep or I visit my counterpart and old host family.  Usually I’m sweating when I get there, despite it being after 6 or 7 at night, and have to refuse hot tea and ask to use their freezer during my stay for some water.

I did take a nice break the last two weeks to visit some fabulous family friends in Italy but I’ll post on that later.  This is my summer.  This is my last summer in Azerbaijan. While I sometime wonder what will happen next summer when I’m no longer here I’m forcing myself to live more in the moment. As much as it sounds like I’m complaining of the heat, I’m not really. Every time I wake up in the middle of the night because it’s still over 80 degrees and my fan is just not cutting it I think to myself how much more I will enjoy that AC when I do get it.  I have to live like the people I’m with to understand them.  Either this summer is way hotter than last or I’m just really understanding everyone really well.