Today I went to visit where my friend, Jennifer works. It's called Starfish and she helps mentor women who desire to get out of prostitution and make a fresh start. I went to visit to see if it would be a place that I would like to volunteer to teach and English class at. I met with the staff who are mostly women who have risen through the ranks of Starfish. Most women begin to work in the company as jewelry makers who live in a shelter a few blocks away from the office. Then, once they are a bit more settled a lot of women learn how to be accountants, work on publicity or customer relations for the company. Starfish sells its jewelry mostly in the United States, but is growing. All of the beads and stones come from China. All the jewelry is really beautiful.
Jennifer introduced me to the head office staff members and the team of women that design and create the jewelry. They were all lovely and were excited to have someone come in and teach an English class. A few were nervous because I don't speak Mandarin, which is totally understandable. I have agreed to start teaching a class on Wednesday afternoons and I'm pretty excited about it. A few of the women who are more intermediate English speakers told me that they haven't had a teacher since May and are worried that they have lost some of their skills.
The offices are located more on the outskirts of the city in a much more "rural" area. None of the streets are paved. Jennifer took me to take a look at the shelter so I could get a look at where many of my future students are living. They live in a house with a big kitchen and living room, but there are only two small bedrooms for lots of women and some of their children! It's pretty impressive. Then, Jennifer walked me over to the house where she is living with some of the founders of Starfish so I could borrow some teaching material. They live in a pretty nice house not too far away from the shelter. Jennifer has her own room and usually gets the downstairs living room area to herself. The founders of the organization are a married couple with three children and they live on the second floor, while a woman who also works for the organization lives on the third level. It was my first time being in a house since leaving Portland. I'm excited to get started next Wednesday.
Tonight, Marie came over for dinner and we got my DVD player to last through a half of a movie before it died again! My weekend felt like it went by too quickly! Back to school and Halloween planning tomorrow.
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