Call me Teacher Molly for now.

HELLO FAMILY AND FRIENDS! :)

It has been a hell of a week here in Myanmar..... It is called PST. This pre service training is filled with blood sweat and tears, literally. We are constantly itching our poor mosquito bites, we are sweating because it is SO HUMID and SO HOT here in the classrooms, and last but not least our poor poor tears. Crying because everyone is getting the bad case of our best friend, diarrhea (thankfully not me), the stress of actual stress with how many hours we have to survive of Burmese language (4-8 hours a day.) and crying because we are so full but our host family makes us eat until we have ate everything in their house (Imagine the Grinch).

Everyone in my cluster (cluster A) is so amazing. Out of all 33 volunteers, our cluster only has 11 so we are bonding every single second here in Bago. I have been amazing. From sharing our Malaria pills to always being together for 24 hours a day, I can finally say I have built such a strong community of amazing colleagues. I’ve been getting myself more acclimated within the Myanmar culture as well. I have been making frequent calls with my family and friends back in the U.S. making it more easier to do what I am doing here in Myanmar, as well as praying every single morning, afternoon & night. I am so proud of myself to see how far I have came as a person. I walk down the streets and all that comes to my mind is how lucky and blessed I had it back home. I have established GREAT relations with my community here in Bago as well as finding the best places to eat fried rice for breakfast lunch and dinner.

I taught my first English class last week, to 10 children! I had such a blast doing it. I embarassed myself by dancing HORRIBLY in front of my students, bombed my Burmese language in order to create concepts in my lesson and sweated so much because of the heat, it seeped through my armpits of my Longyi (cute huh?) But regardless of how embarrassing that was, I taught my students how to say mother, father, cousin, grandmother, grandfather, sister, brother and pets. I even had them learn more about me and my life. It was so so so so so heartwarming. After my first language lesson, all I hear is “SEH AMA MOLLY!” once I step out of my hotel and buy more chocolate snacks at this local food stand. Se Ama is teacher in Burmese. I have established such a great relationship with everyone here in Bago and I absolutely can’t imagine me coming out here without the support from all of you.

It is currently about time to start my lesson planing with my college Sarah, so I will fill y’all in on my success tomorrow! Wish me luck for my second English learning class, I NEED IT! Hope to hear from y’all soon :) love all of you! Xoxoxox

-Teacher Molly