Is America a place?

That sentence was actually uttered by one of my C level university students (a junior) during one of my classes. The assignment was to write a paragraph about where in the world you would like to visit. America would qualify, if you knew it was a place. It took everything I had not to make a remark or smirk or laugh. I just couldn’t believe she was asking me that. She later asked me, after I had told the class that their homework was to write an essay on why I should visit Madagascar and then used Seattle as an example (and by example I mean I outlined a whole essay on the board for them to see), if Seattle was a place. I kinda get the feeling that she doesn’t know what a place is.

The other blog title for this entry could have been ‘why, hello there invasive diarrhea. How nice of you to stop by’. Ya I got that. Its my first real big illness I have gotten in country. I thought I had malaria. I had the chills, my body ached so bad I couldn’t move, had a low grade fever and like clockwork, every 3 horus I had to use the bathroom. Turns out, not malaria, but invasive diarrhea, which I got from eating street food. This happened my second week in diego so no more street food for Megan after that. That was a bummer, cause the street food sandwiches are so cheap and tasty. I should have known though. Other people have gotten dysentery from that kind of food. I was just holding out hope that I would be lucky and miss out on any illness. No such luck.

So this past month (all of September), I have been in a city called Diego, in the far north of the country. If you are trying to find it on a map it might be called Antsiranana. That’s the Malagasy name and the one that is more commonly used on maps. It’s the furthest city in the north and its wonderful. I never wanted to leave. There is so much to do there, so much to see, so many cool things to buy. I was up there for a reason however, beyond sightseeing. I was working at the university. I taught academic writing to C and D level students (juniors and seniors), in a workshop style, for a month. I mostly taught the D students, but the C class got 8-ish hours of my time every week. In total, I worked about 2o hours a week, which is more than I thought I would be teaching, but it was fine.

The students were fine. I got to know my D students more, just cause I saw them so much more. I actually knew their names. Since I saw them more, they had more assignments to do. They had to write a research paper for me at the end of the month, where my C students just had to write an essay. Every class period started out with all students writing a paragraph about the topic of the day. I had them write about why they chose to be English majors, what they wanted to do after they graduated, where they wanted to go in the world, what super power they would have, yada yada yada. Then after they finished, we went over the mechanics of writing. One day it was paragraphs, another citing sources, another capitalization. Then they usually had some time at the end (these were 4 hour block classes for the most part) to work on their papers that were due. When my D students were writing their research paper I gave them class time to research, just to make sure they actually researched.

I did have to fail half of my C class. My D class everyone passed, except the 2 students who never came to class. They failed. But my C students were a different matter. 5 people didn’t turn in their final paper, so they failed and then 6 people copied and pasted information from online onto their papers. The topic was why a visitor should come to either Diego, Nosy Be (an island that a lot of people vacation on) or to Madagascar in general. So these 6 brainiacs thought I wouldn’t notice that they were writing in perfect English and that the words they were using were words I knew they didn’t know. When I talked to the whole class about this, I told them they should be making mistakes, that even great writers make mistakes and as non-native English writers there are very specific mistakes they should be making. When I don’t see those mistakes and instead see perfect English, little warning bells go off in my head. 2 guys approached me after class to talk to me about their cheating. One guy apologized and asked if he could re-write it and I said no. The second student started arguing with me about how I should have given hi partial credit cause he only plagiarized a paragraph and a half out of 5. I said no, that’s not how this works. He had lifted his whole first paragraph from one source. He kept telling me I needed to give him partial credit and I kept saying no. He finally gave up.

Diego the town is really cool. There is a brand new hotel there that has a swimming pool you can use, and I did. Twice. There is also a beach about 20km from Diego that we went to twice as well. I say we because there is another PCV in Diego who is teaching at the university. She is still teaching there through December. We did a lot of stuff together. (wow sorry my English isn’t the greatest at the moment. I guess all the intense English teaching the last month has fried my brain). I also went to my friend Jasons site for a festival. Well it wasn’t really a festival. The town was christening a new monument for women in the town. They even slaughtered a cow right in front of us. It was off to the side a little bit, so we didn’t actually see the animal die, which I didn’t want to anyway, but we saw the pieces of cow being carried off to be cooked. Yummy. We had to sit up with the mayor and other dignitaries, and it was real hot that day. Way too hot to be sitting out but at least we were under some shade. The town had a concert that night but I didn’t go. I was too sleepy.

Well below you will find my book list eventually (I am posting it without the book list cause the list is upstairs and I am being uber lazy right now, but eventually I will get up, get it and type everything out). Have a happy day!

Shock Wave

Lamb: the Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Hunger Games

Catching Fire

Mockingjay

Sarah's Key

Why do Men Fall Asleep After Sex? More Questions You'd Only Ask a Doctor After Your Third Whiskey Sour

A short History of Nearly Everything

Dave Barry's Only Travel Guide You'll Ever Need

The Bourne Identity

Coyote Blue

I am Nujood, Aged 10 and Divorced

Mozart's Blood

The Irresistible Henry House