Busy week. We had conferences half a day Wednesday and all day on Friday. Every parent is scheduled to meet every teacher for every class. And 85 percent of the parents came. I had a few conferences that took a little longer due to the fact that someone had to translate. Funny how their children speak English without an accent, yet the parents don’t know any English. Sometimes, one of the parents could speak it well enough to translate for the spouse. Other times, I had to grab another teacher who knew the language. But the parents were just thrilled that technology was into the curriculum.
Wednesday, Wayne went with one of the pastors of the church to go work in the slums. The church has a ministry in one of the larger slum areas in the city. They purchased a building and are now trying to set up a school to teach the kids some English and eventually some computer skills to help get them out of the slums. Currently, there is only a single kindergarten class, but the plans are to eventually have a K thru 12 school. Wayne enjoyed the experience and he hopes to go back. I would love to go myself, yet don’t have time at the moment. I guess they have these huge dumpsters for trash at the edge of the neighborhood (like you would find in the USA). Except in the US, the trash truck comes, connects to the dumpster and it is dumped into the truck. Well, in Panama, those type of trash trucks are not common, so on trash days (yes, the trash men are once again working) they come, someone gets in the dumpster and tosses everything into the street. Then, a front loader is used to scoop it up and transfer it to a dump truck. When Wayne was there, there was huge pile of trash in the street since the dump truck was filled up, then had to go empty it and return. Funny and totally inefficient
Somehow I got connected to a group of women that meet monthly for a ladies luncheon. We did that yesterday and went to another place I have never been. Interesting group of ladies. There was one there this week that was the first woman jockey ever in Panama.
Wayne found a government office in Panama that is actually efficient (rare?????). He went to try to get a Panamanian passport, since he is considered a Panamanian citizen. Anyway, he dropped me off at school at 7:00 AM and took off to go downtown to meet the “non-English speaking” lawyer’s assistant. He walked out of the office an hour later WITH a Panamanian passport in hand. Needless to say, he is still in shock. However, he is married to an almost illegal. Nothing has been accomplished with me yet about my immigration status. Getting a visa for me to stay is so much more complicated. Most of the other teachers have their missionary visas now (or a least a temporary one). Yet the school suggested I should try for a different visa being that I am officially married to a Panamanian. Just getting that paperwork in line is a major task. All these hoops I have to jump through to “prove” we are truly married. I guess they think I only married Wayne to get into Panama, so I can work for a fraction of what I made in the US??? All you can do is just look at every situation and smile. It IS a different country.
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