Exams and Athletics

I will be back in the capital when this is posted. I haven’t gotten to the internet in quite a while so I have some updating to do!

I’ve been pretty busy at school the past few weeks. My students will begin writing their quarterly exams on Tuesday (in Lesotho students “write” exams and teachers “set” exams) and I had a bit of an experience setting them for the first time. Most teachers at my school set their exams by hand (written on paper) and then give them to the secretary to type up. I decided to type mine up myself to cut out the handwriting part and to help the secretary out. I’d made six diagrams between my two bio exams and I felt bad making her draw them out in Paint, plus they were pretty intricate and I wanted to make sure they were done accurately. I knew I wouldn’t see the final copy because I would be in Maseru by then for phase three training. So I spent most of Thursday this past week in the computer lab typing them up and making my diagrams.

Our school’s computer lab is connected to the principal’s and secretary’s offices and it is powered by a generator (a car battery) that they turn on and off as needed for classes and administration stuff. We have about 20 computers that the students use to practice typing skills, which is awesome because for some of them it’s their first time and only experience with a computer.
So anyway, Thursday I was type-type-typing away, I had finished my time-consuming diagrams and three of the four exams when the generator ran out of gasoline and shut down. Computers off. Black screen. No way to access my beautiful diagrams. I ended up having to handwrite them all anyway. T.I.A.

Thursday they let the students go a little after break (around 11:30) to “prepare themselves” for the following day’s event. Our Athletics (track and field) team was to compete on Friday at Quthing district’s qualifying meet. Athletes who placed 1st-3rd qualified to go to Maseru for the national competition.

I met up with other faculty members and about 80 students (runners and supporters) on Friday morning and we all loaded into 2 Sprinters (very large vans), the school truck and the principal’s truck and took off for Quthing’s public grounds. I wasn’t sure what to expect about the day (I hadn’t been to a track and field even since elementary school), would there be bathrooms? Would I be standing in the sun all day? Was the field as rocky and unlevel as ours? How many schools would be there? Was there a snack bar? I packed a bag complete with toilet paper, sunscreen, water, a jacket, a book and some money in case there were soft pretzels and Sweddish fish at the snack bar.

I arrived at the grounds around 10 a.m. with the other teachers (the students had gone ahead of us). The meet was supposed to begin at 9 a.m., but in typical Basotho fashion, things were still being organized, the students were just finishing their warm-ups, etc. I was happy to see that the field was rolled really flat and well-line (no lanes, but a thick white line going all the way around). There was a gorgeous soccer field in the middle and it made me want to go play. When our soccer team competes later on in the year we’ll play there!

The day proceeded like I’d expected—I used my sunscreen, I drank my water and as it got to be later on in the evening I put on my jacket. No snack bar, but there were bo-m’e here and there around the grounds selling drinks, fruit, chips, Russians (which are like hot dogs, I think, I haven’t been brave enough to try one yet), moquena (which are delicious fried balls of dough), guava ice and even some kind of ice-cream looking concoction. No soft pretzels, but overall just as good as a snack bar. They even had a really nice looking pavilion, complete with a beautiful thatch roof. The police were set up there, but people filled in to get out of the sun as the day went on.

Our students performed great. We had 12 who qualified for Maseru, which, after talking with some of the other teachers, was a lot and really good for us. They will compete this coming Saturday and since I’ll be in Maseru for training I’m hoping I’ll get a break to get over to the stadium to catch of few in their races. Since it’s a lot further than Quthing (the camptown in our district, only about 1.5 hours away, Maseru is about 5 or 6), we don’t send supporters unless they go on their own, so I’m sure if I showed up they’d appreciate it.

There are a few differences I noticed about the races. A decent number of runners never finish their race, particularly in the longer ones (1500m, 3000m, etc.). If they fell back far enough they just dropped out. After dropping the baton on the first handoff, our boys’ 4x100 team gave up. I was a bit disappointed in that. My favorite thing, though, is the cheering and celebration that goes on for the runners who do well. Students get in a circle and dance and sing cheer-songs to give them support, people go to the path and run along with the runners to push them on and when they finished some supporters will run out to the field and carry them off on their backs, skipping, singing and dancing all the way back to their team’s bench area. They really are supportive (of the winners at least) and it’s great to see. It’s a community-like celebration—so different from the individualistic one we do in the states. You might say, but baseball players rush the mound at the end of the world series, and hockey players rush the ice, and soccer hooligans cheer and scream the whole match etc.etc., but it’s different here, it’s just different. You can feel the community aspect. No one boos and the cheering is continual and PG (well, it feels PG, I have no idea what they’re singing).

I will post pictures later this week!!