One of the other things that is different about the schools here is that they students do have so much more respect for the teachers. One way that they demonstrate this is to stand up and say Good Morning Sir whenever I enter the classroom. They won’t sit down until I tell them too in Swahili. It is still funny to me that they do it but I am slowly getting used to it.
The attention that I have been getting for being an American however, has gotten really old. In some ways I am used to it but in others I am not. I am basically like a celebrity wherever I go in that people always greet me first, they always feed me first, everyone always says hi to me on the street, people always tell me how grateful they are that I am here, kids will sing songs and dance for me, people give up their seats on the dala dala, etc. My family also still gives me their utmost attention. My younger brothers never want me to be alone and so will watch me study. My younger brother has asked to sleep in my same bed (since he normally sleeps with is brother) but I think that would be way to much. There is not that much privacy in the Mexican or Hispanic cultures but sometimes I feel like it is a lot worse here. So if anyone wants to get the feeling about how it feels to be a celebrity come to Africa and you will get your chance. I can so relate to celebrities saying they can’t go anywhere with out being noticed now!
We killed another chicken this week. Last time they killed it at the neighbors but this time they killed it out by the front porch. Thank god I didn’t have to watch it and I was busying cooking atole so I didn’t have to hear it. I told them that in America people have meat for almost every meal but they still don’t believe me. We only have meat to eat about once or twice a week and each person only gets like a half of cup of meat. For example, when we had chicken everyone only got a little leg. The chickens are smaller here too, since they are natural, so people really don’t eat that much meat.
I found out that one of the students at my school speaks a little bit of Spanish and wants me to teach him more. I am not for sure how the kid found out that I knew Spanish but he just randomly came in my Swahili lang class one day and asked my teacher when I would be able to talk with him etc. I was really surprised!
One day this week my brother got out of school at the same time I did and so he gave me a ride on his bike. At first I didn’t want to ride on the back of his bike since I didn’t think it was comfortable but he kept asking me since he didn’t want to have to ride so slow while I walked home. I have seen many people ride on the bikes before like that. I have even seen 3 people ride on one bike (one on the back and one on the front bar!). It was more comfortable than I thought but everyone that saw me riding started laughing and yelling even more than they usually do! I know that there are not that many white people that ride on bikes like that so I guess they have to take advantage of the opportunity when they get the chance!
Ramdan finally ends this upcoming week so we get off on either Thurday or Friday to participate in the celebration. I will have to tell you about it next week. I am not for sure if you heard but one of the VP candidates died (Tanzanian) so they are postponing the elections until December. One of my Father’s sisters died too so most of my family has been in Dar es Salaam these past few days. My grandpa that was staying with us finally got all healed up and went back to his village this week. It was sad to see him go. He was really a funny grandpa. However we now have another aunt staying with us and I think another cousin. The fun never ends!

This week was another fast one but so many things happened. I am not for sure if I will be able to write about them all. This week was my second week teaching so I am starting to really get used to doing it. I have two Form II classes (which would be the equivalent to Freshman). One of the classes is really active and interested in what I have to teach and the other has half of the class that likes to learn and the other half doesn’t. This week I totally went off of the syllabus since it is so freaking vague. I taught the kids about blood and a little bit about how the nervous system works. I was only able to get thru about a fourth of my planned lesson since they kids had so many questions that related to what I was teaching. They asked me why blood was red, and how come the brain knows so quickly when we cut or finger etc. I have always heard teachers talk about the joy that they get from seeing kids eyes light up when they are interested in something or amazed by science. This week I had the great opportunity to see it first hand with many of my students. It is really amazing! The thing is that most of the teachers at my school do not have a degree in the subject the are teaching or a degree at all for that matter. They also are only paid every other year and then they have to do stupid stuff like proctor exams that they don’t get paid for. For this reason the teachers just barely teach what they have to teach so they can get paid (and because they don’t know that much more). Actually this next week will be my last week teaching and all of the teachers have decided that they are going to cut school short and stop teaching a month early. So they will stop teaching after we stop teaching their classes. I can understand how they feel but it sucks for the students that just barely learn the stuff they need for their national exams and nothing more. The relationship that the teachers here have with the students is very different than it is in the USA. They teachers still beat the students and so this really freightens the kids and I think makes it harder for them to learn. The first few days I taught I tried to learn all of the kids names and when I mispronounced one of them I would tell the kids sorry and ask them how to pronounce it. They took it as a criticism in that I was a teacher and better than them and did I the “master” teacher make a mistake. The students would most times not respond to my question and another student would have to pronounce the name for me. I think my students are a little bit more comfortable with me since we have shared stories and stuff.
This week for like 2 or 3 days we didn’t have running water or electricity. I guess I wouldn’t be a problem if I would have been used to not having it from the start but it really sucked because we would have it in the morning but when I got home we wouldn’t have it. I made ATOLE for my family this week. For those of you that are not familiar with it it is a Mexican drink that my family has ever year for xmas. It is made of oatmeal juice, milk and cinnamon. I had to make it when we didn’t have water, electricity and after a hard hot day of teaching so I was really worried about how it would turn out. My family was also a bit doubtful since they had never seen oatmeal before and I had to buy more refined sugar then they are used to and use it. I was blessed that it really turned out well! My family really liked it a lot and wanted me to make it again the next day but I told them I would make it later. I am going to try and make some guacalmole or something else for them.
I bought some MANGOS this week at the market. I have been waiting for them to be in season ever since I got here. They were only 10 cents a piece and they were so fresh! My mom said that they get cheaper and sweeter when the season for them officially arrives!
I think I have avoided describing the DalaDalas that I use all the time so I will explain them more now. Tanzania being a poorer country than the USA only has the opportunity to buy used cars from Japan and England etc since the people can’t afford new ones. They also only get the white models that are not popular. The government doesn’t provide any form of public transport so private individuals (I think) buy these old run down Toyota mini vans and take people around in them like buses. They have a little bit more head room since it is possible to stand up in them. I have seen them get as many as 30 people in them at a time! We normally are able to pack at least 20 in them! So if you can imagine 30 people crammed into one of these old beat up Japanese minivans then you can imagine the Dala Dala. They are only seats for about 10 or 15 people so the rest of the people are standing! They only cost 15 cents so they are well worth the price. We don’t have to travel long distances either to get to the city (only like 15 mins) so it’s not as bad as it sounds. Somebody has actually taken a picture of them!
http://www.kagera.org/photo/daladala.jpg
http://www.tampere.fi/ir/mwanza/raportit/072005/mwanza05.jpg
The only thing that sucks about them now is that if you sent all the way in the back then when you have to get off you have to climb over most of the bus to get off. LOL! They also try and get as many people in them as possible so they will stop to pick up more people even if they have 30 people already! When we first got here I didn’t think it was possible to fit that many people on them but I soon learned! This weekend we rode in one just to get down this long hill from the place that we come into town to train at. In order to save gas they didn’t even start the car but just left it in neutral to coast all the way down the hill! The dala dala we rode in that time was an old ambulance and it was missing all of the windows, and would just have these random wires hanging all over the place. I have gotten so used to them but they really are so hysterical to write about and I used to really crack a laugh when they first made us scramble in them when I first got there.

The network went out this past Saturday while I was at the internet café. That is why I have been late writing this.

This week went by really fast. Each week seems to go by faster and faster. This week we found out that we will be having Thanksgiving Dinner at the American Embassy in Dar es Salaam. I also found out that one of the teachers at the school that I am training at was Fulbright Scholar. I have been telling my host brothers that they should take advantage of that program or ones like it and then I meet someone that has already had the privilege.
The class that we have our language class in is a classroom that only has the cement bricks up and nothing else. For some time we will have kids that are done with one of their classes stand outside where the windows should be and listen for hours to our class. One day my teacher had them come in and we practiced talking with them. Another time he let them come in and ask us random questions. It really amazes me at how thirsty these kids are for knowledge! One time they beat us to class and had all of these science questions for us since they know that we are science teachers.
I finally got my haircut this week. My mama mentioned it and it has been a month so I decided to get it cut. It only cost 40 cents. I was expecting on at least paying $1 for it. They basically just buzzed all of my hair off. I don’t think there are places that I can go to get it cut with scissors since no one gets and education to cut hair here. I will just have to get used to the short style. My family really liked it after I got it cut.
They are up to 4 pieces of bread and sometimes these African sweet cakes and fruit for breakfast. This is way too much food for me so I have just been leaving most of the food there so my sister who cooks my food can hopefully get the hint.
They are almost done with the gas station in front of our house. It is weird because the gas station is building a mosque right next to it. Like I said earlier about 50% of the people here are Muslim. I have talked to some Tanzanians and I guess that is common for gas stations to do that.
At the place where we have training there are always all of these monkeys just randomly swinging from the trees there. The place is basically a part of the major mountain range that is here. Last week when I was walking to lunch I was able to see this really cute baby monkey and its mom really up close. There are actually a lot of animals that are just running around randomly. We get to see a lot of lizards and strange insects.
A few days ago I had the privilege of seeing them butcher a chicken. There are a few butchers but the meat is so expensive for them that they normally do it themselves. My brother, who killed it, couldn’t figure out why I was so grossed out by it.
Last week there was a chicken that climbed thru this one intentional hole in our fence. I tried to chase it off but my mom soon yelled at me that it was our chicken! I guess he leaves for most of the day to play with his friends or something and comes home at night.
They still use corporal punishment at the schools here so the other day I was able to see some students outside their class kneeling. They were there for a long time. Another time this teacher got really mad at like half of the class and beat each of them really hard. They normally do the beatings out in the courtyard that we have at the school. I guess that is something I am just going to have to get used to although the PC will not allow us to take part it in so I am glad about that!
I helped one of my host brothers with his physics homework since he couldn’t figure out how to do this problem. I asked to see his notes and the teacher really didn’t give them a good example as to how to do the problem. I found out from my brother that if the teachers don’t know how to do the problem the just make it up and act like they do so they don’t look stupid in front of the class. He was really happy that I knew how to do the problem. I threw away the paper that I worked the problem on after he left my room but the next day he wanted the paper. He ended up taking the torn up pieces of paper and putting them back together so he could show his friends how to do the problem.
Celtel, one of the cell phone companies here, is giving away this really nice Tanzanian Mansion set on 9 acres. I asked my teacher how much it would be for this house that would be for someone really rich and he said it would be 18 million shillings (or $18,000). He said that a basic house with electricity and plumbing here is $5,000 and a house as big as mine would be $10,000.
One of the volunteers said that last week almost everyday these girls students at here school would pay this other student to take pictures of them with the volunteer. She said that was fun the first few times but now it’s getting out of hand. It’s not hard for me to believe since we get so much attention here!
It finally rained a few nights ago at night. It woke me up since we have a tin roof but I was so happy that I didn’t mind. My Baba said the rainy season is coming and that I will be sick of rain when it gets here. It is just so dusty here and windy all the time. The day after it rained it was really windy but the dust wasn’t able to move!!
We watch a lot of English TV since we get this BBC sort of channel. One of the programs that we almost always watch is this Latin American Soap Opera called La Recheza that they dubbed over in English. My Baba really likes it and I have found out that a lot of the people here do. I wish they had sub titles and didn’t dub it so I could hear the Spanish! They also like a lot of the Nigerian movies here. Africa in this cool way is in its own country since they all share music and movies with each other. The Tanzanian national anthem, which I will have to post on here sometime, starts off with a blessing for the tribes and countries that makes up Africa and then later in the song talks about Tanzania. I was really impressed when I read the lyrics to it.
Last week we did a community mapping project with some kids at our school. It is the same project that I will have to do at my site so I can target what problems they have with their area and what resources they need etc. With this study we found that all of the students love to go to school and church! I was really surprised to find this out since so many kids back home resent school so much. I guess here if they don’t go to school they would have to do more work at home. The main things they wanted were their road to be paved and better access to a library since the nearest one is in town. I had a chance to go to the library in town this week since we got out really early from school. It is about half the size of my high school library. Most of the books that they had were donated from the World Book Fund and so they were really ancient.

This past week was really a fun one. One night I went with Mama on our normal night banana buying walks and this girl yelled Mznungu (traveler) at me. I am almost immune to all of the attention that I get now so I didn’t think anything of it. Then out of nowhere Mama yells ANAITWA JOSHUA (his name is Joshua). It was SO funny since I didn’t expect it at all. Then when we were at the market the lady asked about me and used the munzungu word again and Mama had to correct her! LOL. GO MAMA!
This past week for lunch one day they brought us to town to practice the resturant vocab we learned and we go to EAT OUT! The food was pretty much the same like we normally eat but it was really a treat to come to town. I also had ice cream for the first time in what seems like forever. The ice cream wasn’t the best quality but it really reminded me a lot of home and it was different than the sugar donuts we have all the time so I got that warm fuzzy feeling. It was weird because I have never gotten it from eating ice cream before. What a treat! One the way to town we had to take this Tanzanian type bus (I will have to write more about these later because they are truly unique) and all of the people that were on there that had seats all let us have their seats and stood the rest of the way so we could sit down. We get spoiled like that a lot more than I would have ever expected.
My host brother Enoshi thought it would be fun to catch these small little birds and scare them with me. He brought one in the house when I was studying and was holding it by its legs and making it flap its wings as he held it closer to me. I haven’t been scared of anything in such a long time but it really freaked me out! He also showed me where he cut this one’s bird’s wings. One of my fellow volunteers said that the other day at the school they are at this one student was selling a monkey that he had caught. He had it in a plastic bag. They told the school but I doubt they will do anything. People don’t see animals as pets here at all. Basically if it doesn’t have any economic value to them then see no point in keeping them.
My family has been taking of the fact that I know Spanish lately. My Mama now knows all of the foods in Spanish and the kids know how to say Tu simpre estas jugando con migo (you are always playing with me). I told them that one time and the just went nuts so I have coached them on how to say it. The other night we watched this Brazilian Sopa Opera in Portuguese on the TV during dinner. It was really neat. The also said the word MALARIA in the right way and it made me realize that it was a Spanish word that means BAD RIVER!
My Kiswahili is progressing! One night this week one of my host sisters’ just started laughing for know reason and I thought that she was laughing at me so I asked her in Kiswahili if she was playing with me. I think I caught her and the rest of the family off guard because it made her and the rest of the family burst into laughter. It funny because people will just randomly laugh when we say common greetings to them because they are not used to Mznungus learning their language. For example the other night I asked my Babu (Grandpa) if he wanted another beer and it did it in perfect Kiswahili. Again he was not expecting it and so he just burst out into laughter. It basically doesn’t take much for me to amuse my family. We seem to be always laughing!
The little baby Julianna has still been crying when I pick her up and stuff. I think that I might be the first white person she has ever seen in her life! This week my Mama told me to take her with me to the market at night when I went. So I did and right after we got a little ways from the house she stopped! I was so amazed! My brother went to the market with me because I don’t think it looks good for a white person to be carrying a black baby out in public. She has actually been sick with what we think is Malaria. My Baba (dad) and Mama had to take her to the hospital this week. It is common for them to get it. They only run into problems with it if they don’t get the antibiotics early or at all.

Habari za leo? Za shule? Za ashubi? (How is today, school and morning)
I haven’t said anything about my host family yet and since they are a huge part of my life I figured I would at least introduce you to them today. The thing is that I have so much I would like to write but I don’t have enough time or energy.
My Baba is slightly older. In his 50s I think. The house that I live at his second wife’s house and she is younger like in her late 20s or 30s. My teacher said that it is very common for an older man to be with a younger wife here. My Baba (father) also has another house and he said that he will take me to visit it later. I still don’t understand the whole culture concerning family but I take it that he is what we would call divorced from his first wife. He has a total of 8 kids but I am not for sure if all of the kids that live with us are his since it is very common for the rich member of the family to house kids from various family members. There are currently 5 kids (Katiba who is 16, Kejeli who is 10, Enoshi who is 13, Julieanna who is 1 year I think, and Monica the house girl who is 18 or older). Babu (grandpa) is also living with us now. He just recently had an operation the week I came so I thought that he was living with us because of that but now I think he might live with the family permanently but I’m not for sure. We also have traveling family members that live with us for weeks at a time and then go back home or back to school. For example, Wilfred lived with us this week and he goes to a boarding school just down the street. He is 18 and really smart. He told me he wants to study theology but I don’t think he will end up a priest since he might just be telling the school that so he can go there. Tanzanians have many ways of saying and getting things they want indirectly but it is perfectly okay since everyone does it.

We live in a very nice home. It is surround on all four sides with a huge wall and fence on top. The house is fairly new. We also have a security guard that comes at night although the area isn’t that bad. Baba is an accountant for one of the universities here so he knows a lot of the higher up people. One of his family members also is a head of the parks department here so he said that we will have to visit some of them some time. Since we do have a fenced in compound a few of our neighbors keep their cars inside our compound. Our house faces toward the large mountain range so every morning I get to see the beautiful mountains! The house has 2 African style bathrooms (2 pit latrines), a shower room (with a real European shower but I haven’t used it since I want to get used to the bucket baths), 4 total bedrooms, one large living room, a backroom with another bed and the kitchen. My house is very large compared to some of my fellow volunteers. I also have running water and electricity which only a few other volunteer’s families have. I was surprised to learn that since most of the houses in my area have electricity. I have my own bedroom with a huge bed. The other family members obvious have to share bedrooms.

The kids are a lot of fun to spend time with and they are always wanting to know what I am up to and doing. The one that I spend the most time with is Katiba. He is responsible for most of the housework that goes on even though all of the kids have to clean etc. He is also responsible for the food shopping at night. I normally go food shopping with him at night which is fun. There are no street lights or really lights of any kind other than from laterns so we have to take the flashlight to go to the nearby market. It was really strange the first time we did it but now it’s fun and I look forward to going. He is a practicing Muslim (the rest of my family is Cathlolic) and right now is Ramadan so he has been going to the mosque a lot and he can’t eat or drink anything during the day light hours. I have really learned a lot of Islam from him. I would say that about 50% of the people in this town are Muslims since there are so many mosques everywhere and you always see people on the streets with veils or the guys with the Muslim caps.

My breakfast and dinner are provided by my family everyday, but I have lunch at school. I will have to explain that later. Every morning I have a really nice breakfast. It consists of 3 pieces of bread, an African like omelette, and hot water. I should have chai (tea) but I don’t like it so they just make me hot water. They give me honey to put on my bread but they put sugar in it to make it sweeter (go figure) so I don’t always have it. They put sugar in everything. If you do have chai and they serve it for you they will put like 3 spoonfuls of sugar in it after you have put 2! They basically js like to have sugar water.
The sugar is just pure from the cane (not refined) so it is healthier but they still put in in literally EVERYTHING! Three pieces of bread may seem like a lot and it is along with the omelette. It started out being 2 pieces of bread but in the Tanzanian culture they put way more food on your plate on purpose to make sure that you have gotten enough. This is very similar to Mexicans putting lots of food on your plate. I would eat the 2 pieces of bread and clean my plate so I think they thought I wasn’t getting enough to eat and so they put 3. I feel bad not eating all of the food on my plate (although at dinner I have to leave about a cup of food left otherwise they will pile more on) so I eat all of my breakfast even though the omelets is enough. People keep telling me that I must live in a rich family because they only normally have bread for breakfast.

The house girl (who does most of the cooking and cleaning) Monica wakes up really early before I get up at 6am to cook my breakfast. She is really happy to do so. One time I had to go to school early and forgot to tell here so I went to school without eating and when I came home my Mama, Baba, brothers and here all told me how sorry they were that I had to go to school without breakfast and that if need be they will buy me food to eat or they will get up earlier!

Morogoro is a huge town to me since people seem to never work and are always out walking or doing something! It reminds me a lot of Madrid or the bigger places in Europe. It is very similar to the other places I have lived outside of the US in that it is surrounded by mountains on all 4 sides and is in the valley! Natural AC! =) It is normally really windy (I wonder why they don’t tap it with windpower) and the other day it was so windy that it was blowing our papers and stuff in the classroom all over the place. I asked my teacher if he could turn down the AC and he really got a kick out of it!
The wind also blows the dust in my eyes all the time so I have gotten used to walking with my eyes half open.

I forgot to mention that when we first got at our hostel our Tanzanian teachers were there waiting for us. They did this AWESOME dance and song for us but they wouldn’t let us take pictures or anything. They also had COLD sodas and water (maji) waiting for us. It is really hard to find cold drink since they don’t like to keep their frigs cold and then when something is really cold the want to warm it up by putting hot water in it! I tell ya! I don’t think they really like their stuff cold.
My teachers are from there like I said. They have also worked with PC for more than 15 years and really enjoy their jobs. They are VERY energetic, passionate, and entusiatstic even at at 7 or 8am in the morning! It is actually really hard for me to call them teachers since I don’t feel like that they are since we are always with them and they are so awesome! Right now we are in small groups of 4 students and one teacher for our Kiswahili cram classes so we get ALL one on one attention!
I don’t have a lot more time to write but I want to let you know that MY HOST FAMILY IS AWESOME! There are 5+ kids and they are very well off. They can easily take up an entire blog entry so I will have to tell you about them later. If you were to ask me if I was happy I would have to stop and think about what happiness is again!! LOL. I have been really busy with my training, HANDWASHING my clothes, etc and it is not something that I normally think about like I would in the USA. Know that everything and then some is well! Salama.

It is harder than I thought it would be to communicate here but it hasn’t been as bad as a I thought it would be. Yesterday all of the networks in the internet cafes were down so I was unable to use it. Today the one by our house (I found out there is one!!!!) was not working. I haven’t walked to town yet from where my host family is staying so I decided that since I was a bit there I should see how long it takes. My teacher told me it was about 2 hours but it only ended up being 40 mins. However, It was in the hot sun and on dirt sidewalk. I am glad that I found this place and it is OPEN because we don’t really have that much time to come to town or do much other than training.

I am with an awesome group of 37 volunteers. Most of us are from the east and west coasts but there are a few of us from the Midwest (Kansas and Illinois). I am amazed at how similar all of us are. We are all science people obviously, but we also all seem to like to run, workout, journal, recycle, read, etc. The flight to Dar was a total of 22 hours but it went by really fast since the we rode on a new KLM plane that had this new video game like monitors that let you watch on demand movies, music games etc all for free. I don’t think they have that many of these planes since the Air France people were serving us too just for that one flight. It was a bit confusing about the days changing. When I got to Amsterdamn I was able to sleep for 3 hours in the chapel they have there. They also had leather lounge chairs to sleep on but they were full. It was funny because there were these muslims there vocally praying while we were sleeping. The Peace Corps has been very good to us in many respects. They gave us more than enough money to eat out in Georgetown (DC) and they pay for meals here and there. The PC loves to give us shots to protect us so I have gotten a lot of them lately. I lost count after 5 but I have gotten Yellow Fever and 2 Rabies. I am grateful that I have been in such good health these past two weeks! I didn’t have any of the “normal” travelers’ illnesses that I normally get when I travel and that has surprised me! I have been really careful about what kind of food I eat etc. The PC is also very concerned about our safety. We have to tell them everywhere we are going and if we travel etc. Know that I am safe and accounted for because they have an Emergency Action Plan. Basically if they find that we are missing they notify Washington and the family and then send the marines out to look for us. I feel like I have a parent again that is watching over me! I found out that one of the most famous PC volunteers is Bob Vila. He actually built houses in Panama. I also found out that the PC only uses 1% of the US Foreign service budget even though one of the popular generals of the military says that we should have more volunteers! There are also 20 countries that currently want us to serve there but we are unable since our man power is too low. I also learned that the PC will only place a volunteer in a place where only 2 or 3 other volunteers have served because the village quickly develops expectations for their incoming volunteers. If one volunteers builds a house or volleyball net then they want the next volunteer to do something better. This puts us volunteers in a tough spot.

I had a time stand still moment at the DC Dulles aiport when we were waiting to leave for Amsterdamn. They have all of the flags of the world hanging in the airport and they just so happened to have SPAIN’s right by our gate! It was a really awesome sign to me!

The training is really intense but the use all Tanzanian teachers (I will have to talk about them later…they are a blog entry in and of themselves!) and have a returned volunteer that trains with us to answer any questions we have.
For the first week of training we all stayed together in this really super nice NEW hasn’t even openend Catholic hostel. They were still adding the wall around it! Now we are all in our own host families. The hostel was only $10 a night all inclusive and the food that the nuns cooked was AMAZING! I haven’t had any dish other than ugali (which is this bread like stuff that isn’t supposed to have any taste) that I didn’t really like!

One time when a group of us volunteers were running in the early morning (6am) this little kid ran all the way across his yard to the road yelling how are you? How are you? The kids are always the ones that get super excited when they see white people or mznungos as they call us. Every where I go people stare and stare and stare some more. It used to really suck at first but I am now used to it. A few of them say mzungo but there has been a memorable amount of them that have welcomed us to their country or smiled when we walked by. White people are really rare here especially in a town the size of 200,000. One time we went to the market as a group and this lady said what is going on with all these white people here today. My teachers normally translate what the people tell us when we are walking but like I said so much of it has been positive.