(THIS IS MOM --- I RECEIVED THE FOLLOWING OVER 3 DAYS AND FINALLY HAVE A COHERENT GROUPING TO POST! THE VERY END IS QUITE ABRUPT, PROBABLY BECAUSE JOHN'S HOUSEMATE'S FAMILY WAS LEAVING AND HE JUST HAD TO RIP AND SEAL IT UP! FYI, I HAD A LONG TALK WITH JOHN ON NEW YEAR'S DAY AND HE'S DOING WONDERFULLY WELL AND SENDS HIS LOVE TO ALL.)
I just had a conversation in English for the first time in about 6 days. Wow.
There's a geography teacher here named Kingston who's from Zimbabwe. I speak Portuguese with him after saying "Good morning", etc., usually, and today when he stopped by my house with a friend, we switched to Portuguese on my cue.
Then he introduced his friend in English after a couple of minutes, and I asked him whether he spoke Portuguese. He didn't, so for his benefit, I continued the conversation in English.
It was hard, because I was so used to having to translate my thoughts, so about half of things I was saying came out like my Portuguese - choppy and slow. But it was really cool to feel like English was my second language. It's going to be hard when Tober and Blake come back and I don't have to speak Portuguese all the time. Maybe I'll make Blake speak "so portugues". That could be interesting...
I met a friend of Jorgito's who does theater teaching about SIDA and drug abuse with Jorgito, and we discussed where they perform, who they perform for, etc. I asked if they had a script that they worked from, and they said they would bring it. It was downright exciting to start my actual development work, however tangential this one meeting was to getting anything done.
But I know two years is not a long time when it comes to helping a community as large as C---.
My first impression of all the DJs here is "Man, this guy sucks."
But then it dawns on me that a DJ is a public servant, and he needs to do what people want to hear. So, by American standards, these DJs would suck, but by MOZ standards, American DJs would similarly suck.
It's like knowing a lot of biology, but not speak the language that people need to learn the material in. So I'm working on sucking less.
Peace
John
