Living in Lesotho: It's been a year, ya'll.

A Year in the Mountain Kingdom

Well, I’ve been here a year. If I were a baby I would be eating solid food, crawling around eagerly, babbling away in my own language and starting to learn to walk (can you tell I worked in a pre-school?).

I’ve imagined how I would feel around this time throughout my first few months here, made predictions for what I would be dealing with and made lists of personal and professional goals that I hoped to achieve by this marker.

The irony, of course, is that I hardly remember any of them. I realized months ago that very few noticeable changes can be made in a year of teaching, so I probably threw those lists away. And most of the personal goals I made (50 pushups? No thanks) have dissipated as well. As with all things worth our time, the most profound lessons learned and changes within me and in my school are things that I never actively pursued, but that found me instead. Here are a few of them:

1. I don’t rush, ever. I used to get to places early on the regular, and nearly always left my house when I planned to. I remember having days where I did like six different things, often in different parts of the city. Thinking about that now makes me cringe and laugh. Call it what you will- settling in, cultural adjustment or just realizing that taking the time to enjoy and fully experience whatever I happen to be doing makes me happier and, ironically, makes the time pass more quickly.

2. I’m realistic. It takes time to understand just how long new things take to sink in. I started the year planning to cover two topics in one week because there are so many things my students could possibly be tested on and so little they understood (and no, the people who teach the concepts don’t create the exams. What an idea!) Now I’m better at the balancing act of teaching to the test and teaching for comprehension. If I had come to the Peace Corps with plans for doing all kinds of projects or believing that my presence would make a truly PROFOUND difference, I would probably be pretty down (who was it that said the thing about expectations being disappointments waiting to happen?) As it is, I’m just more realistic, and always figuring out ways to do what I do better.

3. Happiness is a choice. It’s a hard concept to get, because we are used to basing our happiness on outside circumstances. It’s also a hard one to embody, but being here has totally affirmed this truth for me. I wake up every morning and choose to be happy, which means that I let go of hard things more easily and am able to be more present with whatever is going on. It’s not about what’s on the outside-my skin has become worse, I’ve gained a little weight and I’m certainly not my cleanest. My clothes are usually dirty and they are all falling apart, little by little. All this, and I’m happier in a deeper and more profound way than I’ve ever been.

4. Life happens. Lots of sad and hard and wonderful things have happened to people I love while I’ve been here, thousands of miles away with only a small screen to take it in from. Weddings and deaths and accidents and new jobs and new boyfriends and girlfriends and racist police brutality. Coming to the year mark has made me feel more self-confident and assured than ever, but also to feel farther away than ever from the people I hold dear. It’s a good reminder that life happens no matter where in the world we happen to be. Control is an illusion.

5. It’s the little things. I notice and appreciate the small gifts that life gives every day, now more than ever: Realizing that a particular student is so much more confident and outspoken than she was at the beginning of the year, a new plant in my garden pushing it’s head up through the dirt, a letter in the mail (seriously, it’s like Christmas every time), a short conversation with someone in my village, spontaneous singing with my teachers, “beat-boxing” in the school office with one of my grade six boys, a cool breeze after a day of pure heat, talking to my grade six girls about the importance of self respect while sitting in the sun. There are a lot of hard things about being here, but if I focused on those I'd probably be depressed. I’d rather soak up the quirky, spontaneous, beautiful things that Lesotho imparts on me every day. After all, I only have a year left!