Madonna, Madonna, and the Power of Persuasion

Here is it, my second May in Central America. And, as usual, everyone is very excited about it being the month of Mary. Every class built an altar in their classroom, compete with a paper flowers and a little statue of Mary, Help of Christians. Each day, one grade offers Mary a flower in the morning assembly, and in the afternoon, they say a Rosary together and go to the Mass at the cathedral. It's a very serious business. Each grade is also learning a new song to sing on the feast day of Mary, Help of Christians (May 24th). I got to help by teaching the sisters how to download music and videos from the internet. If I'd had known that they ALL wanted to learn, I'd have given a class to them all at the same time. But they all asked me individually over the course of a few weeks, so I got to tell them all the exact same thing six separate times. But now they all know!

To shift gears a little, I just wanted to comment on the idea of international adoption (Madonna's been in the news for that recently - at least she has here). Before this whole experience, I was sure that any child who gets the chance to grow up in a developed country is the luckiest child in their home country. But after seeing the problems that can arise, hearing stories of adopted children in other countries, I have completely reversed my position (with one exception). Children should have every chance possible to grow up with their own family. If not with their parents, then with some other relative, or at least within their own culture.

For example, there's Alex, a guy I met yesterday. Right now, there's a group of students from the University of Maine here for two weeks. They went to visit the orphanage, and met Dani, so she invited them to go out to eat with us (and the two bilingual school teachers) for supper last night. Alex is Colombian but was adopted by a white couple in Maine. His major is Spanish, for the sole purpose of reconnecting with his heritage. He went to visit Colombia for two months and plans to move back there. Raising a child outside of his or her own culture, despite the feeling of a family, is harder than people realize. The child grows up with the sense of feeling like something is missing, and even though they know absolutely nobody in their country of origin, they somehow feel at home when they visit there.

There's also the example of the volunteer who went to a country in Africa. While she was there, she met a girl who is mentally disabled, and the volunteer found that the people there and the school she was in weren't really prepared to deal with the girl, or help her in a specialized way, so she decided to adopt her and bring her to the US. Wouldn't it be a better idea, however, to contribute to a program that trains psychologists/doctors/teachers to better help the child so she can remain in her own environment and so they can help other children like her?

My exception to this rule is when there is no family, nobody in the home country willing to adopt him or her, and there is immediate danger to the child. The child should be removed from the dangerous situation as quickly as possible, even if it means taking him or her to another country to be raised.

As for the power of persuasion, the sisters here have convinced me to stay here another month to help the new volunteers when they get here. I remember how helpful Sydney was in Chalchuapa and Teri here in Santa Rosa, so I'll be here to meet them at the airport and help with the transition. Which means I'll be leaving for El Salvador at the end of June/beginning of July instead of the beginning of June. Which is, of course, fine, because I really do love these girls here and it'll be hard to say good-bye when the time comes.

And, since I'll be here longer anyway, why not give me some more classes? I now have three more English classes with the students that come only on Sundays. I haven't mentioned this much (if at all) because I haven't really been involved in this aspect of the school until now. These are distance education classes, where the students are all ages and mostly women, and come from all over the area, from as far as Lempira, over three hours away. During the week, there's a radio program that gives lessons that go along with their workbooks. They only have to be present in class one day a week, so the teachers can answer questions, explain things better, and check to make sure they're doing their work. It's like the equivalent of a TA session for a professor's lecture. Then, we give standardized tests so everyone in the program in Honduras takes the same one. So I'm now with the 10th, 11th, and 12th graders, an interesting mix of girls who are actually 16-18 years old, single mothers, and about six guys (out of about 50 students). This is completely new for me, so we'll see how it goes!