Three days in the life of the Miles Family

Leaky house

For the last few weeks we had been experiencing a variety of water problems in our house. Some of the problems had been fixed but there was still a lot of water coming through the roof of both of our bathrooms and in the hallway. Some of this water was dripping through the light fixture and had caused the light bulb to blow.

The plumbers were coming in and out of our house, the flat above us and up and down from the roof, trying to diagnose the problem. Were concerned that the house was a rather unhealthy and unsafe environment for our family and not quite ready for Kate to give birth in, but we also knew that the birth was imminent.

Good timing

The next morning we managed to have a bit of a lie in because it had been declared a national holiday on account of the snow forecast. Shortly after waking up, Kate's waters broke and so we called the midwife who made her way to our house, and we also called a friend of ours to come round and play with the kids while the birth took place.

 

Labour pains started a short while later and we put the gas heater on full blast to try and get the bedroom warm enough for giving birth. In the winter, we normally only keep the lounge warm and the bedrooms can get as low as 8 C. I was aiming for 18 C, but only managed 16 C. Fortunately, the midwife was busy warming up towels by the heater and laying them over Kate's shoulders. After two hours of labour, the baby was born. We still hadn't settled on our final name choice, and the midwife suggested 'Thelgy', which is Arabic for 'Snowy', on account of the imminent snow. In the end, we agreed on Jenson, which means 'God is gracious' and 'God protects'. We were thinking particularly about the time when Kate had a threatened miscarriage after 4 months of pregnancy but God, by his grace, protected both her and the baby.

A couple of hours later, the snow started and I gave the midwife a lift home before she would become stranded at our house. Travel in Jordan in the snow is very dangerous because there are no gritters and a lot of steep hills. Last time it snowed there were 100 accidents in the first hour of snow and a further 500 accidents over the next two days despite the 6pm curfew.

Snow baby

The following morning, we woke to find a foot of snow and I managed to take the kids out to do some tea tray sledging and make a snow man while Kate stayed home with Jenson.

In retrospect, it's amazing that Jenson came into this world the day after all the plumbers were coming in and out, and just a couple of hours before the snow would have forced me to be the midwife. The plumbing problems upstairs are still not diagnosed but at least the water has stopped coming through after they closed off one of the upstairs bathrooms.

The village which is not on the map

I left home at 7.30 am to drop the kids at school and carry on to the village of Qastal. It was my first time in the village, but the first of many as I am starting my village English teaching project. I am starting an English class, which I can use later for coaching the English teachers from different schools in the area. Today I was going to do level testing for the local children who would like to take part in the class.

What village?

The village does not exist according to the gps app on my phone, so I had to use the satellite view to find the village library, where our training will be taking place. Kate has been there before for the village playgroup, so she put a star on my phone map and I followed it like the three wise men.

Follow the star

Village time keeping

The local children had been told to arrive at 9am but only two of them were there at 9am. I was not surprised at this and felt confident that a lot more would drift along later. Over the course of the next two hours, 35 local children came to have their level assessed.

What is your name?

I had a page full of questions to ask them in order to determine their English level. The first question was 'What's your name?' which received a blank look from the majority of the children. When I repeated the question very slowly I still had a blank look from most of them. If I said it in a very strong Jordanian accent, some of them understood. Out of 35 children, I considered 8 of them good enough to start a beginner class and the others need to start with some literacy work to learn the English alphabet.

What do they learn in their English classes?

All of these children have been receiving English lessons at school but the lessons consist of learning grammar rules and memorising huge dictation paragraphs. Even those who get full marks in their English classes are hardly able to utter a word in English. One lady explained to me that her son's English teacher gives them a ball and tells them to go outside to play football.

Speaking focussed lessons

My aim is to model and then coach the English teachers in teaching speaking-focused lessons, but first, I suspect that I will need to help the teachers to improve their own English level and pronunciation.

The village of Qastal

Day in the Life of ... Isaiah's 6th Birthday

I got up and I opened some presents from my family. Then I had to go to school. I got given a party hat at school to wear. 

I invited friends from school to my birthday party in the afternoon. But Daddy picked up some of my friends with me from school earlier so they came to play.

When my party started, we drew stuff that are for space, like rockets, planets and the moon. We stuck them on a black piece of paper and stuck stars on to make a space picture.

We played games - finding the planets, obstacle course, pass the parcel, space freeze, space dancing. We had lots of fun. The girl who won pass the parcel tried to give me the prize (which is a Jordanian thing to do - give the birthday person the prizes!!) but I told her to keep it.

I got lots of presents, like spy binoculars, lego and cars. My friends tried to help me open the birthday presents (which again is a Jordanian thing!) but I didn't want them to.

We had party food and a space rocket cake that Mummy made. It was yummy.

We all had a good time.

Day in the Life of ... a Village Playgroup

Early Birds

We arrived early to set up the toys, snacks and craft materials we'd brought with us to the community library in a village not too far from the capital. We were amazed to see one mum with 3 children already waiting an hour and half before we were due to start! Word had spread that there was a new fun time for Mums and Toddlers, although the local ladies had no idea what a "playgroup" would actually be like.

We set up the toys that we'd managed to collect and buy cheaply second hand in the main room. There was a small library room with children's books which we put tables with playdough and colouring. Then another room we used for the craft.

Another surprise occurred when a bus full of children arrived from a local school. It had been explained that the Playgroup was for mums with toddlers, but the school teachers had thought it would be a trip out for the children. We were so grateful for our local friend, who had invited us to do the Playgroup in her village, as she very diplomatically handled the situation in a culturally appropriate way. We were sad that the children could not join us but there would not have been space or appropriate supervision for them.

Copycats

By the time we started at 10:30am there were 32 mums and nearly 40 children! Our local friend introduced us and then I gave an introduction in Arabic to explain what would be happening in the morning. We started with a welcome song and other songs in Arabic and then songs in English (such as head, shoulders, knees and toes!). The children loved copying the actions and joining in.

Funky Fish

Then we divided into groups and took 8 children at a time, with their mums, into the craft room to stick coloured paper to make a fish. Some children looked like they'd never seen glue before! They were all pleased with their finished fish. Meanwhile other children played with the toys and playdough and colouring.

We told the mums to help themselves to tea and coffee and snacks. Since they rarely get tasty treats like this, everyone was piling their plate high with cookies and cakes. Also some were popping snacks into their handbags to take home to share with family. We hadn't expected this and what we thought was plenty of food, was soon all gone! We enjoyed having some time to talk with the mums but most of the morning we were busy organising things.

Why should the kids have all the fun?

The mums also surprised us by asking for a competition! Again our local friends helped us in dividing the mums into teams and thinking up a quick competition – writing down as many fruits beginning with the letter … (in Arabic of course!). It was surprising how competitive the women were!

We finished by going outside and the children catching bubbles from a bubble machine. Everyone said how much they enjoyed the time and what fun they had!

After clearing up, we were invited by the village sheikh’s wife to visit their house for a cup of tea. The ground floor of the large house was a big space with lots of seating for holding village meetings and ceremonies whilst the upstairs was the family home. Even upstairs, the lounge was large and we relaxed and chatted drinking mint tea and eating home-made date biscuits. Arab hospitality is renowned and we were invited to stay for lunch but sadly had to decline since I had to get back home to look after Kira and Isaiah after school.

A busy day, by Kira

On Fridays, we normally go for a bike ride on our local streets, because it's a day off from school and there are less cars on Friday mornings. It was Isaiah's first go to ride on the roads. We left later than normal because it was raining earlier in the morning. “I loved it.”, said Isaiah afterwards, and he carried on with daddy and did another lap of the block after I finished.

My first parade ever

In the afternoon, we went to Rainbow Street for a parade with the British Council who were celebrating their 80^th anniversary. There was a big band that was very noisy and there were also some big motorbikes which were even more noisy than the band.

Then, we went into the British Council and did some craft activities for kids on the second floor. We also saw daddy's work room where he teaches English now. 

Dancing in yet another dance show

Then we went home for a break before going to the big Hamley's toy shop because I was going to do my show there. It was the same dance that I did last week for my dance school.

No time to cook dinner

After we went to Hamley's, it was late, so for dinner we went to McDonalds. They had a big fun play area, but we couldn't stay and play there long because we needed to go home to go to bed.

The End.

The last day of my CELTA course

The last day of my CELTA course

It was the final day of my CELTA course, which I took at the British Council in Amman. I had enjoyed it a lot, despite the intensity of the course. I especially enjoyed getting to know my fellow CELTA trainees, who were mostly Arabs of Palestinian background. I got on well with one of them in particular and I hope to keep in contact with him.

Challenging time

The previous week had been a worrying time for us, as Kate had experienced bleeding during the 14th week of her pregnancy and there was a big risk of miscarriage but, thanks to the prayers of all our family and friends, she and the baby have both recovered from this. As a result she had to rest completely and this was a big challenge for us, while I was so busy with the CELTA course. Our friends in Amman were a great help to us during this time.

Complete loss of steering

The final day of CELTA was mostly a formality, completing paperwork and saying goodbye to our teachers and to the guinea pig students who had to endure all of our teaching mistakes for four weeks. However, after dropping the kids at school, there was a creaking noise in our car which was followed by a complete loss of steering. Thankfully, I managed to stop the car in a safe place and left it there as I took a taxi to the British Council.

Sad goodbye

It was sad to say goodbye to everybody. The students we taught were mostly refugees from Syria and Iraq. I asked them what they would be doing next, but they had no ideas or plans. Most people who have fled the problems in Syria and Iraq have received some help from the UN, but are unable to find any work and have nothing to do. I have been trying to organise a continuation of some free lessons for them, but it has proved difficult to find a good venue and a good time for this.

 

Phone a friend

We finished at 2pm on the last day, and I phoned a friend of mine to get him to pick me up and take me to the place where I had left the car. He was also a great help in talking to the car recovery truck and then he guided the recovery truck to his favourite mechanic. It took 2 hours for the recovery truck to arrive and then it took a long time with many heart-in-the-mouth moments to get the car onto the recovery truck without any steering. Both steering rods had to be replaced, but car repairs in Jordan are very cheap, and the mechanics only charged £15 for the labour.

Future opportunities

I later found out that I passed the CELTA, with a B grade, which was the grade which I needed to be able to join the mentoring programme for new teachers at the British Council. Given the challenges which we had faced during this time, this was a great blessing and we are very excited about what opportunities it will bring for us in the future. 

A Day in the Life ... University Visits and Surprises

The Clinical Skills Labs were all prepared ready for a special visit from an important army colonel. The University is preparing to teach a new course in crisis management jointly with the armed services. The manikins within the Clinical Skills Labs may be used to teach trauma management and wound care. 

Thankfully we had been told about this visit 2 days before hand so we were able to ensure all the manikins were displayed in each of the clinic rooms of the labs. We'd had difficulties before when we've been told to prepare the labs just 10 minutes before a visit! 

The lights are on, but ....

Before the visit, we started the morning with further training in the use of electronic patient records. There is an initiative to introduce electronic patient records to all government hospitals and clinics in Jordan and we are receiving training to then train our medical students. The system is very impressive but we were a bit limited by password restrictions which needed fixing. Security is a very important issue for electronic patient records but it can be frustrating when you need access and don't have it! 

Parting words of exhortation

Whilst the company giving the training sorted out a solution for the passwords, one of the 3rd year medical students called to ask if I could see him. I went out of the lab and was surprised to see about 150 third year students in the hallway. I was even more surprised when they suddenly started clapping and cheering for me!! The student organiser gave me a bunch of flowers and gift as well as giving a little speech thanking me. So I gave a little speech thanking them and telling them not to forget what I've taught them and they'll be great doctors! The third year students are moving on to clinical rotations so I won't be teaching them again (and it may be my last year teaching anyway). 

It's nice to be appreciated

I was really touched that the gift was a beautiful watch, since I'd lost my watch a few months ago and the students had remembered me mentioning it. I was even more touched by the words in the card "we learnt from you the practical skills we need as doctors, but most importantly, through you we understood the heart of medicine. You graced us with such elegance of character that we not only appreciate, but also aspire to become."

After lots of photographs with the students, with me keeping a look out for the approach of the visitors to the lab, I went to meet the visitors and show them around. They were impressed with the facilities and enjoyed their tour. 

Days like this show me that all the hardwork and effort really is worth it and that through teaching the medical students and being a role model, the practise of patient-centered medicine will become a reality in Jordan.