…and then the horses came

Closing the gate one night, something snapped and the gate fell on me.  Fortunately, my friend, Christy was around and she, with the help of two neighbors, helped rescue me.  Luckily, I escaped with just bruises.  One of the things I’ve learned in Antigua is that you can count on your neighbors.

and here leans the gate...

The good news is that I don’t have to open and close the gate.  The bad news is that any creature who wants to graze on my grass is welcome to enter the yard at will.

I awoke this morning to the sweet sounds of horses neighing. I grabbed my camera and rushed outside. I carefully sidestepped the rather large deposit of poop and took this picture.

The horses are very pretty to look at, but they needed to go (if you will) somewhere else.

The horses are happily eating my mangoes.

Fortunately, my neighbor saw the horses, grabbed his stick, and barked like a dog.  The horses took off.  Thank you, neighbor!!

and off they go...for now.

 

Kindergarten at Pigotts Gets Tiled Floor

The Kindergarten class at Pigotts

Wonderful things happen when families and schools work together.  The brainchild of the project was Mrs. Jacqueline Agile-Joseph, kindergarten teacher at Pigotts Primary School. She asked parents to find sponsors to support tiling the floors in the kindergarten classroom.  Through their efforts, $1800 was raised.  Over the Easter break, Mrs. Joseph and a team of parents and friends purchased the materials and put down the new floor.  Special thanks go to Yolanda Celestine, Sean Thomas, Steven Azille, Byron Weekes, and Winston Joseph for helping to make the project a success.  The team wishes to thank Mrs. Crofts, principal of Pigotts Primary School for all of her “behind the scene” help.

When asked how they liked their new floor, kindergarteners made a resounding response, “Yes!”

Mount Obama in Antigua

The island of Antigua was formed from an underground volcano about 35 million years ago.  Over the many years, continued volcanic activity accumulated debris and created the foundation for the island.  The highest part of the island was called Boggy Peak. This became a wonderful home for corals and shellfish.  Pressure built and the reefs gradually become coral limestone.  As the sealevels began to lower, the island emerged.

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A Yankee Swap in Antigua

IJTBE/LIT 101: Promoting Reading in the Primary Grades 

Here is my literacy class, posing on the last day of class.

Thursday was the last night of my Antigua State College literacy class.  I wasn’t sure how to say good-bye to these wonderful students who helped me to learn about Antigua and schools here.  I so enjoyed working with them.  They were enthusiastic and creative and eager to learn.

Students worked in small groups during class and on occasional assignments. I believe that students may be more willing to try something in their classroom, if they have tried it in class.

Here students present work on their creation of mini-books on various topics of literacy.  I believe that the training that the students receive is very high quality.  Despite the difficulty of getting written materials and texts into the country, the students work very hard to master the objectives of the course with the resources they can find.

St. John’s Anglican Cathedral

Across from the Pedagogy Center is the Anglican Cathedral which is undergoing extensive renovations.  These towers were designed in a baroque style overshadow St. John’s.  This Cathedral has been called “the most imposing of all Cathedrals in the West Indies.   It was originally built 1681, replaced in 1722, reconstructed in 1847.

This is the view from the Anglican Cathedral, looking south.

At the south gate of the property are two wonderful figurines.  They are said to have been taken from a French ship on its way to Martinique during the Seven Year’s War in 1756.

St. John the Baptist at the South gate.

St. John the Devine at the South Gate.

Within the grounds of St. John’s is a very old cemetery.  Some of the graves dates back to the 17th Century.  They reminded me of a fad in the 80’s of gravestone rubbing which would have been helpful to read some of the engravings.

The cemetery was truly a beautiful and peaceful place.

Pedagogy Center – Antigua

Sign outside the Pedagogy Center

Tonight my good friend, Christy Hammer, who is visiting this week, and I met with my Antigua State College students at the Pedagogy Center in St.John’s.  The Pedagogy Center is a unique resource that is available for both teachers and parents.

Here are some of the resources available. Parents and teachers may come to this Center and borrow books for their children and their students.

It is filled with many books…children’s literature, teacher-idea books in every school subject, lamination, AccuCut machine for cutting letters and  shapes, book binding, and manipulatives.   I wanted to make sure that my students were fully familiar with all of these wonderful resources.

Here the students are learning to use and having fun with the accuCut machine.

A number of students welcomed Christy to Antigua.  They were very interested in learning about sociology and philosophy.  They also discussed teaching social studies concepts to young children.

Here Christy and a few students are posing for a picture. I think that this was just after one of them did an imitation of me.

It was a fun class for the students and  nice way to wind down the semester.

Dame “Nellie” Robinson…an Antiguan hero

Miss Georgiana “Nellie” Robinson is a national hero in Antigua.  She was born in 1880 in St. John’s, Antigua.  At the time, many worthy and able young blacks were not admitted to the all-male, Antigua Grammar School (AGS), which had been established in 1884 by Archdeacon Branch, first because they could not afford the tuition and later because they were deemed undeserving.  Miss Nellie Robinson had many conversations with the Archdeacon about the admission of blacks to the AGS to no avail.  So, in 1898 at age she opened the Thomas Oliver Robinson (TOR) Memorial School that admitted not only young black men but women as well.  As one article stated, “she had struck two birds with one stone,” opening secondary education to both male and female students.  Miss Nellie Robinson was headmistress of the school from 1898 until 1950.

Poster of the Four Antiguan National Heros
This poster can be seen in many places around the country.

Easter Monday

The Monday after Easter is a National Holiday in Antigua.  It is a tradition for families to get together for a day at the beach.  It is also a day for flying kites.

At Devil’s Bridge there was a Kite Flying Festival on Easter Monday.  The kites were beautiful against the beautiful Caribbean sky.

On the Beach

One day when Pat was in Antigua we went to Fort Bay Beach and met an Antiguan women who was selling jewelry.  She was a retired teacher, now working at a private school.  She entertained us you will see…I’ve been trying to learn imovie to make a proper video, but am having real difficulty, so here is the uncut version.  Hope you enjoy it as much and Pat and I did.

Driving in Antigua

I’ve been driving in Antigua since the day I arrived.  Frankly, driving here has been a struggle.  I’ve had multiple minor mishaps that have cost me money, but even more importantly my confidence as a driver.

One of the obstacles of driving here is not driving on the left side of the road.  Actually, I think it is probably safer to drive on the left…passengers get in and out of the car on the side of the road…much safer for them.  While I still on occasion turn my windshield wipers on when I want to make a left turn, even that is dissipating after three months of living here.  No, the obstacles are the other drivers, the ditches wadis, sewers, gullies and pits on the side of the road, and the potholes.

The drivers.  There is little patience when an Antiguan gets in a car. While many other aspects of Antiguan culture signal slow down, enjoy the moment, this does not pertain to driving.  When an Antiguan gets in a car, they just want to go.  Drivers think nothing of passing on a two-lane road that curves and swerves, going uphill and down.  They do give you a toot of warning that they are going to whiz by.   Antiguan drivers also seem to enjoy getting as close to you as possible…especially when you are traveling on a 2-lane road where people are parked on both sides. Paula, my mentor told me to just stop and let other drivers hit me.  Actually this is pretty good advice…if only I could heed it all the time.  But the problems with driving go way beyond the drivers.

There are gullies, pits, wadis and severs on the sides of the road that may or may not be protected by a barrier of some kind.  While I have never seen a car plunged into one of them, I dream about the possibilities.  Some of these gullies are just a few inches wide and not very deep, but others are just plain scary.  Old Parham Road is unbelievable.  It is no wonder they call it “old.”

Potholes in the roads are a way of life.  With the intense rains, the roads don’t have a prayer.  It seems that they fix a pothole and another springs up just as quickly.  At first, I tried to avoid these potholes, by swerving the car, but usually I ended up hitting the potholes directly on when I did this.   The roads are not made for relaxing driving, and unless you are very familiar with them, you find yourself hitting deep potholes, scraping whatever it is under your car that scrapes.  It is very nerve-wracking!!!

Lest I forget the sheep, goats, donkeys, horses and cows that frequent the roadways here.  Actually the sheep and goats are pretty savvy travelers.  However, on the way to the beach this afternoon, a baby sheep was taking milk from its mother in the middle of the road.  The cows don’t get out that much, so they don’t seem to have a clue as to what to do on the road.  Best if you worry about hitting them, because they don’t seem to be worried about hitting you.  The donkeys can be ornery on the road.  They don’t seem to care if you hit them or not.  Because they are such a problem, the Antiguans have developed a Donkey Sanctuary in the middle of the country to get them off the roads.

The season has seemed to change a bit.  It is less cloudy and getting hotter and with that, there are more things in bloom and more tractors on the road.  Following a tractor with five or six Antigua drivers behind you is not pretty.