I received some truly sad news last week: it was in the national paper that a student at my school had been sexually molested by her uncle for at least the past year. My counterpart was the one who told me and he kept saying it was one of our second year students, but when he told me her name my heart fell into my stomach and I got a shiver in the afternoon heat because it was one of my favorite and best students who I've taught since I came here 8 months ago and now it sounds like she won't be coming back to school.
My most poignant memory of this girl, her name is Jasmina, is from one of the worst weeks I had in the beginning of my service, I was doubting what I was doing, not motivated, and feeling like the kids weren't even trying to learn so what was the point. Jasmina was always one of the smarter students in class and so one day I called on her to read aloud the paragraph we had been working with. What I didn't know at the time is that she also had some health problems and so when she stood up to read and got nervous, she looked like she was going to faint. We got her sat down and I told her not to worry about reading the paragraph, but once she was recovered she stood right back up and read the whole thing. I was so proud I was literally speechless. That little event helped me get out of my funk and remind me that even though some of the kids could care less about learning English, there are those who do care and will work hard for it. I just hope that even if she doesn't return to my instituto that Jasmina finds another school to attend and that maybe this horrible event in her life won't keep her from finishing her education.
As to not end on a sad note, here's a picture from Playa Coco which is where I spent part of last weekend in a big house with at least a dozen people from six countries. It was a good weekend:
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