This Sunday we went outside of the apartment for the first time with our family. We took them to the Hindu temple (International Society of Krishna Consciousness) off of Lunt and Paulina. It was a pretty nice day out so we walked from the apartment at Estes to the temple. We first went in the morning, but there was not much going on. As we were heading out, the workers at the temple informed us that there would be a big ceremony later at 5 pm. We wanted to see what this program was about so we decided to go back with our family at 5 pm.

We were already running late for the program when we arrived at our family’s place to pick them up, but even then, they did not fail to feed us.  As we walked into the apartment, there were 3 neatly filled plates of cooked vegetables, sweet selpuris and chai tea waiting for us.  We explained that there would be dinner at the temple, but they still insisted that we eat, so we stuffed our faces as quickly as we could, worried that we would miss the program.  Also, by 5pm they had already told many of their neighbors that we were going to the temple, and word must spread fast in the neighborhood because we not only had our family join us but 5 other neighbors came along too!

`We were a bit late to the program, but we didn’t miss much. It was really cool! There were hundreds of people there! And the people there were all very friendly. There was singing, chanting and dancing. There were two speakers who talked about evolution.  The talk dragged on a bit, but afterwards, there was a huge vegetarian feast. We had puris, rice, dal, cooked vegetables, yogurt, and sweets. Everything was delicious. By the end of the night, Sarah, Kesha and I were overstuffed from the food both from our family and the temple.

Overall it was a very fun experience! The family enjoyed it a lot! It made me really happy to see them enjoying themselves and experiencing new things. This was their first time going to the temple ever since they had arrived. They were excited and I think they’re planning on going again next Sunday night. And the best part is, it’s free and walking distance!

I feel like we have grown very close to our family over the past couple of months, and each visit seems to get more exciting than the last. Every visit is super exciting because our family is just absolutely incredible. It is so easy to make them laugh, and they always make the best out of any situation.  They are the prime examples of people who live life in the moment and to its full potential. I absolutely love spending time with them, and they inspire me in ways I have trouble explaining. I cannot wait to go back again next weekend. We were thinking of painting their nails!! Sarah is really good at that so it should be fun! And if it’s nice out again, we were thinking of bringing them to Loyola to show them our school and possibly inviting them over for dinner!

This past weekend, my partner and I went to go visit our family.  My partner had her mom bring up old VHS tapes from when she was little, so we brought over the videos for the kids.  The kids were SO excited!!!  It was the cutest thing.  They would put in a tape, watch it for a few minutes, and then pop in a new video.  They were so excited to have videos that they could watch, and it was nice to see them watching something that was age appropriate.  A boy that we had never met before, came by this weekend as well.  He was fifteen and spoke pretty good English.  He seemed to like us and said he would come back next week when we are there.  The father was working again which is wonderful news.  We have not seen the older man for a while; I usually teach him English so I kind of wonder where he is.  The mom was able to tell us in broken English that she had been really sick recently and had had to go to the clinic in order to get medicine.  Regardless of whether or not she was sick, she was still wonderfully hospitable and managed to make us an amazing dish.  It was a plate of spicy noodles…so good   We are always so well taken care of every time we go over there.  I know it is time consuming to go over there and sometimes it is hard to drop all the school work that I have, but it is always rewarding when I go.

I’m very glad that I went job-hunting with K last Tuesday for a few reasons: 1. we applied for some jobs! and 2. the G family was too busy to see me on Sunday.

I arrived at their home at 2:30 as planned, but S wasn’t ready to go pant shopping yet, so I ended up hanging around with K and his brother until 4:00. His brother’s girlfriend is pregnant (he is 18, she is 20), and so they are applying for welfare as well as filing Medicaid papers. He asked me to go over the paperwork and tell him where to sign. I read through everything to make sure it was legitimate, then told him where to sign and to make sure to go over the forms with someone at ECAC just in case, since I’m not familiar with that type of paperwork (it was confusing!).

K and I drove to a few restaurants downtown and dropped off his resume. I then explained what red line station he would get off at and how much time he should allot to get to the interview/work. After we dropped off some resumes, we went back to the apartment to pick up S. We drove (family and friends in tow) to a nearby discount outlet, where S was able to find the pants she needed, as well as some new clothes for baby J.

In our last visit with our Burmese family, Macrina and I were quickly began the usual routine. We were promptly greeted, assisted with homework and reading assignments and began to play a game. This week, the family had a new game, Sorry! As we taught them the rules how to play, they loved the part of the game when you choose a ‘sorry’ card and get to send someone back to their home base. Macrina picked up a couple of magazines for the boys at the nearby dollar tree that were about Spiderman, one of the boy’s favorite super heroes. Although they quickly got frustrated with the large use of vocabulary in the comic, they did enjoy looking through the pictures, especially because they love to draw. Towards the end of the visit the grandmother came over and the mother return from work. She made us two cups of the delicious coffee and some sort of dish that tasted like ramen noodles. One of the boys had brought home a survey for the parents to fill out to assess the education that their son was getting. We helped them answer the questions as generally as we could but I think it was difficult for them to make an adequate assessment because they are still so unfamiliar with the American education system. There are so many events that the school hosts to involve families in the student’s education such as conferences, open houses, book clubs, etc. and if the school is not reaching out to invite them then the family doesn’t even know that it is happening. Furthermore, I am skeptical of the support of the schools in helping each boy make friends. Neither of them is enthusiastic about school and it makes me wonder how other kids are treating them in school. It breaks my heart that they play alone at recess or don’t run home telling fun stories about what happened with their friends during lunch. Although their language skills are excellent the transition into the American school system is invariably going to be difficult and I just wish I could help in some way to make it easier for them.