January 5th - The first English lesson and before!

The program has been set in place and at this stage twenty people from the clinic have shown interest. We intend teaching four afternoons each week from 5.15 p.m. till 7.15 p.m., the four afternoons being Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

But first of all you need to realise that we have to negotiate our way to the clinic by walking with all our gear down the road….

turn right at the bottom and head to the brown clinic front door.

And then two hours later when the lesson is over…

head back up the hill to the welcome sight of Hotel Tres Mascaras!

On the eve of the big day we made sure that all was in readiness for our ‘first performance’. Checking the room did mean that we had to purchase four new tables from a small furniture market, flag down a taxi, strap them to the roof of the car and then deliver them to the clinic.

Quite a normal practice here when transporting all types and sizes of furniture items to and from the market!
I also wanted to make sure that all the required power points were alive and well! Nothing like having an audio visual failure during the first lesson, not good for one’s pride!


Our students all arrived before the designated starting time; they had obviously taken to heart our constant referral to beginning lessons according to ‘gringo time’! Twelve females and two males presented themselves and were duly issued with pens, note books, folders and their personal place cards. The later was purely and simply to assist the ever fading memory of the male teacher! They were really excited to receive these handouts.
The audio visual presentations went to plan and were also a big hit.
Our approach will be basically similar to that we took in 2008, split the lesson into half, Marion teaches one half and I take the other. However, it has already dawned on us both that this group is far more advanced than those we taught in Montenegro.