I <3 Gaston

Howdy y'all

So we've been here in NC for a while now! I've had a really great time so far. I have so much to share..

I'll start by telling you a little bit about our friendly neighbors!! A couple of nights ago, a friendly lady came over to the house to introduce herself. Turned out, she was our neighbor! Neighbor lady was suuuuper friendly. (v. southern & cute) She kept on asking us to come & visit & hang out with her son....so we did. After a good amount of persuasion, myself & a few others went over to visit the fam. We all played Mad Gab (its a really fun game, I highly reccommend it to anyone who hasn't played before!) while Neighbor Lady offered us Screwdrivers & Fuzzy Navels. Being the good AWBers that we all are, we declined her kind offers of alcoholic drinks. It was really cool to hang out with some locals.

I'm sure someone has already posted about our Saturday Habitat for Humanity trip, but I will add my own opinion. Although it was freezinggg outside, I had a really fun time at the Habitat house. I mean, we really didn't help much...we each hammered in a few nails. It was a really neat experience, though. I got to talk to the full-time Habitat workers, along with the woman who will be recieving the house. The workers & the woman were all really wonderful people. The construction workers work on the house every Wednesday & Sunday. They have been working on the house for about a month & they've made so much progress! By the end of Saturday, the entire frame & roof were up! I was very impressed. I made friends with one of the workers. He was missing a few teeth, but he was really nice! He surprised us by following us to Starbucks after we were done building for the day.

So at the school this past week, Sophie & I have been working with the high school math teacher, Ms. Chen. She's a 2nd year Teach for America teacher & she's awesome! She's teaching 3 classes: Precalc, AP Stat & Topics in Mathematics. Since this the first year for the Topics class, Ms. Chen & another teacher have been writing the entire cirriculum. Sophie & I have been giving her a hand for the past week by helping with grading, filing & some lesson planning. We even got the opportunity to tutor some kids who were falling behind in their math courses. I have found that the kids are smart, just some of them need a little extra attention.

Last night was really fun! A few of the teachers & students came over to our house for hotdogs & hamburgers. I ate dinner with a student named Lomar. He's so cool! Just last week, he found out that he got into Wake Forest. (one of his top choices!) Lomar is really reallyyy smart & transferred into the KIPP high school only 2 years ago. He was at another local school, but transferred into KIPP so that he could better his chances of getting into a college of his choice. Lomar isn't just smart. He said that he loves to sew & is involved a student committee.

I'd really love to come back for the Pride High graduation on June 6th. Its super exciting because its the school's FIRST graduating class! The graduation will definitely be a huge deal in this town. I can't even imagine how proud everyone will (and should) be!

K I'm sick of typing.

YAYYYY GASTONNNNN

Clare