First day of school!

I started at my placement today, which is at the Beit Sahour Lutheran School. Marta, another volunteer from my group, is also volunteering there, so we navigated our way together and made it with plenty of time to relax and chat with the other teachers before school started. I am volunteering in the kindergarten, but the kids I am working with are mostly 3-4-year-olds, so it is comparable to a preschool. I felt a little lost today, as the kids only speak Arabic, and my knowledge of the language is very minimal. Hopefully that will come with time, and I feel like the kids will be good teachers. They are learning the days of the week, so hopefully I will be able to pick up on some of that too :) Back to preschool for me! The kids had a fieldtrip to a nearby park, so we loaded the the bus and headed out. It was a little chaotic, as the kids were climbing over seats and standing in the aisles. I don't know enough Arabic to prevent them from doing that, so I had to just sit and pray that no one would get hurt. The park was fun, and I realized that although I cannot talk with children, a smile and a push of a swing go far beyond language barriers. That was comforting, as I was feeling a bit lost. The teacher I am working with is very helpful and sweet and has already invited me to her house for dinner sometime next week. That is just another example of hospitality here.
My day at Kindergarten ended at about 1 PM, and then I was able to sit in on an English composition class and help a student write a composition about the situation of youth here and what the youth of today can do to improve their future. It was nice to work one-on-one and actually be able to communicate, because those students had relatively advance English. At the end of the period, he asked the teacher if I would be back tomorrow, so that made me feel like I was helpful in someway.
After school, Marta and I navigated our way back to our apartment. We experienced some difficulty when the bus ended its route at a station unbeknownst to us, but luckily a very friendly girl on the bus offered to show us how to get home. We talked to her for a bit and found out that she lives in Jerusalem and that it takes her 2 hours to get from Jerusalem to her school in Beit Jala. She is studying fashion and the only fashion school is in Beit Jala, and since the checkpoints make her journey so long, she is forced to spend 4 hours of her day in transit. I can't even imagine how exhausting that would be.
Marta and I stopped to talk with one of the vendors I met yesterday in the market, and he was telling us about life here. He was very pessimistic, possibly one of the most unhopeful of the people we have met so far. It was so hard to listen to his frustrations, especially when he said that his life is worse than an animal's in the US, because he feels caged up. All I could do was listen and sympathize, and I guess that is all anyone is expecting us to do. As individuals we can't necessarily change what our government is doing/funding, but we can be supportive and offer open ears and an open heart. I am really excited about the friendships I have been forming and the relationships I will continue to form throughout this year.