"Everything we have in Liberia is foreign, even our English"

The day started off with organizing the supplies we had brought with us and gathering for breakfast. It is a beautiful day here and even cooler than back home which surprised me. We are not in 100 degree heat, but that good old humidity is just the same!

 We spent the morning at BW Harris School and met with George Jallah, Director, Educational Secretariat of Liberia. We had a great discussion, reviewing with him the curriculum that we planned to teach. He made several good suggestions and we launched into a discussion of the uniqueness of this wonderful and different country where we are. The title of this blog is from this discussion and I found it striking....Yes, everything here in Liberia is foreign - their currency is US Dollars, their language is English, their main religions are Christianity and Islam. All of this makes for interesting discussions in the western history classes he teaches.

To a people who live with so much that comes from other places, how difficult it must be to demand recognition of what is here and find true value in it. On top of that, to fight the economic hardship of being a recovering war-torn country, rediscovering national selfworth and fighting for true independence.....Mr. Jallah knows these are the things that will be combated by the education of Liberia's children. These are the things we are here to help with.  Our contribution is small, but it will be a start.

Next we spent time in Monrovia - market day and the streets are jammed. Every inch of side walk is taken up with food, shirts, jeans, shoes, herbs such as Bitter Root to help fight the symptoms of malaria. Whatever you need is right there on the sidewalk and everyone is selling! We even found a food market at the gas station - not exactly a 7-11 but boy, those tomatoes looked good!


I told you yesterday about the ladies balancing all manner of things on their heads. Well, here you go....this is definitely not a skill I possess.

We did stop off at the tailor shop to see about getting some shirts made. There was a child ironing with an iron heated by charcoal. That was something I had never seen. The afternoon filled me with the joy of getting to know a new place and meeting wonderful new people and understanding different customs a bit better. God has blessed all of us with the rich experience of Liberia.




Now we are ready to begin our work for the evening. It is time to make sure we have all of our lessons ready for Monday. Because of the shortened teaching schedule, there are lots of corrections and adjustments to be made. We are all excited to begin and face the task with enthusiasm.

As always, I cannot wait to begin tomorrow. God has so many lessons for us here, and it is with great excitement that we try to hone our teaching skills to give back as much as we are getting.

Jaq and the Team