Kalcho understands...

The Bulgarian "children" I teach are getting more and more inventive with their schemes for lying, cheating, stealing and general rabble-rousing.

Yesterday I gave a fifth grade class a test. Vladislav cheated, so I ordered him to give me his paper (I had told them that if I caught them cheating, I would take their paper and mark it with a dvoika -- a 2, like an F). He brought the sheet up to me, and I happened to glance at the name. He had written Georgi, the name of one of his classmates, on his test. Clever, very very clever. I simply took out my pen and wrote HIS name on the paper, and he scoffed away.

Then, later in the day yesterday, I decided to give out some pencils from my huge supply to those who actually DID the work I asked them to do in my sixth grade class. All they had to do was answer 3 questions...Three simple, 4-word-maximum answers. But this is the class that I routinely leave feeling like I want to smack them...What do these kids do? Two of them (the two who can actually put together a noun, a verb and maybe an adjective to form a mildy-coherent English sentence) wrote their answers down, showed them to me to check, then HANDED OFF THE ENTIRE NOTEBOOK TO ANOTHER KID. It's not even like the other copied the answers into their own notebooks...They simply bought me the SAME NOTEBOOK to grade.

I laughed at them, literally. They kept insisting, "Miiiiss, Miiiiss, this is my notebook!" And I just kept laughing, and lead them back to their chairs. (It makes me wonder what they get away with in their other classes...) As I lead them back to their chairs, however, children towards the front of the room began pilfering pencils from the bag on my desk...Stuffing them in their pockets and trying to dash away before I caught them. But I caught them, and when I asked them about the pencils they had sticking out of their pockets, I got a lot of, "Oh no, miiiiiss. I brought this from home."

Jerks.

Then today, in the same horrendous fifth grade class, I was at my wits end. They were complaining that it was hot (when last week you could see your breath inside and the school's windows were covered with ice from WITHIN) and the little boy who is obsessed with me and writes my name over and over again on his desk tried to jump out of a window. They were playing music on their crappy GSMs and dancing kuchek and when I tried to comfascate them they ran around the room screaming. THEN, to add to the chaos, the random hallway kids who always seem to be there during the last few periods of the day found some sticks to beat the doors and floors and walls and windows with, creating a near-unbearable racket. What is a Peace Corps Volunteer to do?

I gave up, is what. I took Gosho and Kalcho, the two kids who I can tell want to learn, and talked with them in a corner, hoping the others wouldn't take money out of my purse or draw various private parts on my chalkboard (the true problem there is that yesterday someone stole my eraser, so the drawings would be sticking around...) Finally the class was over, the demons were set free, and I began my trudge home.

Kalcho and Gosho and some of the crazier kids somehow ended up walking with me. Kalcho, who is maybe 3'6 and has the high-pitched, delicate voice of a little angel, said, "Sorry we are so bad Miss. You came all this way, so far, and we are just so bad. You just want to help us, right? Poor Miss."

I almost wanted to cry. This kid, this one solitary kid in this class of complete jerks, who has probably been hindered somewhat in his education by having to deal with them, understands why I am here, and understands my frustration. I love that kid. He, and Gosho (who has a severe speech impediment and can't write his way out of paper bag in English or in Bulgarian, but who can pick up English phrases from movies and always answer my questions when it seems like he has spaced out) and a handful of the other kids I come in daily contact with, are making my time here worth it.

I never set out to save the world. I know I alone can not do that. I didn't set out to change any foreign policy or work out the kinks in any culture. I came to help who I could, and if that means 5 kids go though life knowing one teacher cared enough about them to take them aside in class to teach, then I will have succeeded here. If one single life is benefited from my work, then I will have succeeded. Because you know what, one person will be benefited by life I helped...And one person from that life. I don't mean to get all sentimental and wishy-washy, but I think it is time for all of us in Bulgar-land, and in Peace Corps in general, to revaluate the work we are doing, as well as the reasons why we are doing it. I know my objectives are keeping me much saner and more satisfied than I have been in a long, long time.