April 16, 2013

I woke up to another gray day with signs of an impending thunderstorm. Then I sat down at my computer to learn about the tragic bombing in Boston when people were gathered for what should have been a felicitous event. I have to declare that I will never understand the nature of a human being who can conceive and carry out such a senseless act in the name of whatever ideology it might care to profess.

I was practically sick to my stomach reading the reports and knowing deep inside me that the repercussions of such act is bound to heighten the police state already imposed on us and to make it look as a natural response to the attack.

Elvira called me early on to informed me her daughter was sick once again and she wanted to postpone our meeting for Thursday. It had started to rain cats and dogs by then and I was more than happy to agree to the deal.

I called Natalia to ask the status of the package my sister had sent more than three weeks ago as I really needed the ground coffee to take with me when heading to Osh. She promised to look into it and then confirmed we’d be holding a session at the Children’s Library with FLEX alumni to guide teachers on the use of the video game “Trace Effect”.

I got through most of the TEA applications as Natalia corroborated my hunch that applicants who were already participating as Peace Corps counterparts, or had been trainers for those volunteers, had already received their share of professional development.

Naziba, one of the FLEX alumnae, called me later on to set up a meeting for us to coordinate the Saturday session. We agreed to meet at AUCA before I got together with Elvira on Thursday.

I started work on the presentation on lesson planning that Elvira had requested for the teachers down south. There are so many possible approaches to this topic, but without knowing what they know or practice already, it’s rather difficult to aim my presentation. I’ll discuss it with Elvira on Thursday to decide on a more specific approach.

It rained most of the day and the temperature dropped considerably back into the 50s. Let’s hope this is that period of “April showers bring May flowers”. Natalia called me back to confirm my package had arrived. I pleaded with her to see if she could possibly drop it at Lingua to keep me from having to make another trip to the embassy, and she promised to look into it.