No Dari Progress
Work stress here is non existent. At Stetson Middle School, every day would open with a burst of energy; no one could pass near my room without some interaction (you Stetson teachers probably remember the repertoire of choreographed hand shakes, whispered secrets like "good morning" or "today is Wednesday" etc.). Mornings always lifted off enjoyably. Eventually, the problems of youth from severely troubled families would wear on us all and by the end of the day I had sometimes pretty much given up on spirited learning and was striving to maintain an educational routine that would keep the kids safe from each other. The day starts here much as it did there. But at the end of the day, you can find me standing on the playground, playing with the kids much in the same fashion that I used to interact with the North Philly kids as they were entering the building . It is as if the stress of the day never occurs here.
I have not been able to get and stay on any kind of a language learning curve. From July to August things were going pretty well - ISK responsibilities would be occasional interruptions in days devoted to Dari. Then, in September, Dari became the interruption in days devoted to teaching. Now, less than 5 hours per week are spent in Dari, as other things draw my time and energy. Dad and I had discussed something different in our planning sessions. Perhaps during the Winter Break the opportunity will arise, for the first time ever, to devote the entire day to Dari language acquisition.
One of the activities that gets done instead of learning Dari is the production of this journal. At first, e-mails were being written and sent just about every day. After a while, entries were copied and pasted from my e-mails to form a single document, saved as "journal". Then it became more productive to chronicle in the journal and copy and paste the results into e-mails. The later writings were less frequent but the product of deeper introspection. The journal that started as a daily diary was gradually transformed into a topical forum. But always, journaling has been an activity done instead of conversing in Dari. That is the paradox of "m" work: the better I communicate, the more work folks in the US think that I am doing, the less I am really accomplishing. Please think of that in a soon-to-come future epoch when communications might become more scarce.
No one seems upset by my recent lack of progress. I retain the ability to converse on a superficial level, and a limited ability to read and write (the envy even of some long-timers). My teachers are able to offer fewer hours due to the daylight restrictions (electricity is not dependable) and they notice my recent lack of preparation for classes. And Dad also knows. Yet I do not get the impression that anyone is upset. Another epoch is coming when a refocusing will occur. Maybe that epoch will start tonight.... (I tried to start it last night)....Dad is ultimately the One who controls the times and epochs.
This is so different from the intensity with which I learned Spanish. For my first year in Costa Rica, no one who spoke English would get much more than a polite greeting from me. Learning Spanish was not just my day time job, but also my life environment. Here, my day job is in an English only school (children speaking Dari can be accused of cursing) and there has been no success in establishing "a life" outside the compound after hours - "after hours" has a different connotation in a war zone. You can count the hours (and they are not many) spent in Dari.
Then, "add on" challenges abound. Pashto and Urdu are frequently spoken here and mix into the Dari. Hezarat Dari has an accent distinct from standard Dari. Tajik and Farsi are, like Dari, Persian dialects and are also often encountered. In fact, reading and writing happens only in Farsi, so that literacy is one thing and conversation something else. Some people translate the Farsi words into Dari as they read; this is not necessarily considered incorrect (as if, in English "t-h-e-e" was written but pronounced as "you"). The writings have a different alphabet and go from right to left (perhaps dyslexia would be an advantage). They are phonetical, but usually vowels are missing. Outside of these details, (and the fact that the ancient Greeks are the bad guys here), its just the same as life in Philly.
I have not been able to get and stay on any kind of a language learning curve. From July to August things were going pretty well - ISK responsibilities would be occasional interruptions in days devoted to Dari. Then, in September, Dari became the interruption in days devoted to teaching. Now, less than 5 hours per week are spent in Dari, as other things draw my time and energy. Dad and I had discussed something different in our planning sessions. Perhaps during the Winter Break the opportunity will arise, for the first time ever, to devote the entire day to Dari language acquisition.
One of the activities that gets done instead of learning Dari is the production of this journal. At first, e-mails were being written and sent just about every day. After a while, entries were copied and pasted from my e-mails to form a single document, saved as "journal". Then it became more productive to chronicle in the journal and copy and paste the results into e-mails. The later writings were less frequent but the product of deeper introspection. The journal that started as a daily diary was gradually transformed into a topical forum. But always, journaling has been an activity done instead of conversing in Dari. That is the paradox of "m" work: the better I communicate, the more work folks in the US think that I am doing, the less I am really accomplishing. Please think of that in a soon-to-come future epoch when communications might become more scarce.
No one seems upset by my recent lack of progress. I retain the ability to converse on a superficial level, and a limited ability to read and write (the envy even of some long-timers). My teachers are able to offer fewer hours due to the daylight restrictions (electricity is not dependable) and they notice my recent lack of preparation for classes. And Dad also knows. Yet I do not get the impression that anyone is upset. Another epoch is coming when a refocusing will occur. Maybe that epoch will start tonight.... (I tried to start it last night)....Dad is ultimately the One who controls the times and epochs.
This is so different from the intensity with which I learned Spanish. For my first year in Costa Rica, no one who spoke English would get much more than a polite greeting from me. Learning Spanish was not just my day time job, but also my life environment. Here, my day job is in an English only school (children speaking Dari can be accused of cursing) and there has been no success in establishing "a life" outside the compound after hours - "after hours" has a different connotation in a war zone. You can count the hours (and they are not many) spent in Dari.
Then, "add on" challenges abound. Pashto and Urdu are frequently spoken here and mix into the Dari. Hezarat Dari has an accent distinct from standard Dari. Tajik and Farsi are, like Dari, Persian dialects and are also often encountered. In fact, reading and writing happens only in Farsi, so that literacy is one thing and conversation something else. Some people translate the Farsi words into Dari as they read; this is not necessarily considered incorrect (as if, in English "t-h-e-e" was written but pronounced as "you"). The writings have a different alphabet and go from right to left (perhaps dyslexia would be an advantage). They are phonetical, but usually vowels are missing. Outside of these details, (and the fact that the ancient Greeks are the bad guys here), its just the same as life in Philly.
posted by Terry at
8:33 PM
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