C is for ...

So what is the worst part about teaching in Mongolia? Cheating.

Cheating, of course, is a problem everywhere. Students will always cheat if they can get away with it. So is the strife of a teacher, right? But it's not the student cheating that's difficult to deal with. It's the teachers.

Unfortunately in my town (I'm trying not to overgeneralize) "cheaters never prosper" is merely a theory that no one buys into. So not only do students get away with cheating, but they are indirectly taught to cheat by the teachers. The scholarship application process here isn't a student spending their after-school hours typing out essay draft after essay draft, asking teachers and parents to edit and give advice. No. I sat in a room where four teachers and a mother were filling out an application, writing essays, and deciding which lies would help their student the most ... all while the student sat popping bubble gum and reading a magazine on the sideline. For a week straight, I was also asked to write the English essays for these students. I was given every excuse in the book for why I should, or why it wouldn't be so bad. My school's manager, who just couldn't understand my persistent "no" to this request, looked at me in amazed confusion and ask what religion I am.

This isn't an isolated event, but it was definitely the worst I experienced. My idealism was nearly down for the count. Especially when I considered all the other small incidents:
- someone texting me during the English Olympics for an answer (after two months of preparing people for this test.
- Being yelled at because I wouldn't raise the grades for teachers who never attended my English lessons.
- Being asked to sway the decision for multiple English tests, oral tests, etc.

But, luckily I'm writing this a few weeks later. If not, you'd have a horrible rant about how it's pointless for me to be here. But I'm passed that phase. It's part of the culture, as it is many a culture. It's of course also a problem in America. It just so happens that in most of our schools, they at least work to give us a bit of a conscience when it comes to cheating. Here, they haven't started that process yet. So if nothing else, in the future I'll be a passing thought in someone's mind when they're deciding to cheat or not to. Maybe they'll say, "Hey, remember that blonde American ... she wouldn't help us cheat." Then, hopefully it won't be followed by "Glad she's not here anymore."

I'm sorry (head hanging in shame)

Wow, has it been this long since we last spoke? And I don't even have a good excuse. Can I just say I was busy? Will you believe me? Would you forgive me? I won't make any more promises about writing on this blog. After each entry, just assume that I'll probably never write again. Then any additions will be a welcome surprise.

But congratulations to me and the others in my group. We've survived a year. Amazing, huh? And welcome to the M-17's, of which there are 57 now beginning their training in Darkhan; 3 of whom will join me at my site.

The weather is warm (inside my ger it was 82 F yesterday!). School is unofficially over for me. And now I've started my laid-back summer work: tutoring, English camp preparation, and visiting friends. My health is good, according to my mid-service check-up. Just waiting for reports from my MIF kit (which is an acronym for something that means poop analysis) to show whether there's something living in stomach. And, no Christopher, Dude no longer has bad gas. Life is good. But you've caught me at a good time. If I do ever make it back to this site, I'll start to explain the incredibly frustrating fourth quarter I had at school, and the most difficult part, for me, of working in this culture.

Hope all is well. Let me know how you're doing.