Ethiopian National Project

So the past few weeks have been crazy. Padded cell crazy. As in "I've stabbed myself with a spoon and need to be placed in a padded cell" crazy.

About 4 weeks ago we got a phone call from one of the women in charge of our stay here in Israel. She runs the English program in practically all of the ORT schools in the country. She informed us that there was a new program desperately in need of teachers that we'd be perfect for. Naturally, she told us that the person in direct charge of the program would get in touch with us to discuss the details. For two weeks we waited by the phone. No call. Then, one Sunday afternoon, while driving around the North of Israel looking for supposedly pretty flowers that grow on the side of the road (the excursion came highly recommended) we received a phone call reminding us to be at a school in Kiryat Bialik at 4pm. The only problem was that no one had mentioned it to us in the first place. So, after cutting our flower hunt short, we arrived at aforementioned school completely unaware that we were walking into a trap.

Unprepared, unready, unequipped, uneverything, Gillian & I were handed schedules and shoved into classrooms where we met the first of many classes we were charged with teaching English. Given no materials to work with, no background on our students, no clue what the purpose of the program was or expectations for the students or ourselves, we submitted to the excruciating experience of being thrown to the wolves.

Now, after a week or two of being stunned, petrified and stuttering and stammering through each classroom encounter, we each teach approximately 6-8 classes of anywhere between 2-7 students, attempting in each session to evaluate their current skill level and inventing the best way to move them forward. At first we had no idea how to proceed (you know, NOT BEING TEACHERS and all) but we recently sat down for a few hours with a British lady who provided us with many worksheets and directed us to a number of resources on the web for struggling ESL teachers.

Anyhow, now that my nightmare has come true, perhaps I should tell you about the fantastic kids who have been put in the unenviable position to be taught English by yours truly.

As the name of the project implies, all of the students in our classes are Ethiopians. You might ask, "But the Ethiopians are from Africa, not the Middle East. Why are there Ethiopians in Israel?" Well, the answer is somewhat complicated, but I'll take a stab at it: They are Ethiopian Jews. "Black Jews?", you might say to yourself, to which I reply, "Fucking awesome, right?"

Anyhow, the simple explanation is that these Ethiopian Jews claim to be the lost tribe of Israel and have either been practicing the traditions for thousands of years or had been forced to convert to Christianity and are just now returning to the Jewish faith. They lived for many years in Ethiopia, often under persecution, and have been immigrating steadily to Israel since the 1980s. However, the majority arrived within one 36-hour period in 1991, when Israel air-lifted almost 15,000 Ethiopian Jews amidst growing political destabilization between the two countries. Operation Solomon as it was called is quite an amazing story.

Many of the students we teach are either first generation Israelis or were very young when their families immigrated. Most of them come from huge families of up to 12 siblings. Their English skills range from "able to communicate" to "barely understands a thing", but throughout they all seem like great kids and we've enjoyed meeting all of them. Below is a picture of a few students Gillian and I worked with the other day. It was Valentine's Day and we taught them about the holiday and had them make valentines for loved ones at home. If you haven't guessed yet, it was all Gillian's idea.



They even made valentines for us...

The thought of being a teacher scares the shit out of me and I'm not sure I'm cut out for this sort of thing but I'm trying and will hopefully not fail too bad. Gillian is much more enthusiastic as usual and seems to be taking quite naturally to the tasks of creating lesson plans and molding young minds. I for one am happy just to make them laugh every now and then between vocabulary words. Of course it's a lot easier to make someone laugh when they understand what you're saying but we're working on that... Also, if nothing else, I think my Hebrew is improving ever so slightly each time a student turns to another student to ask if anyone knows what the hell I'm talking about.

Frankly, I'm not so sure I know what I'm talking about half the time. English is a tough language...