pregnant

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

No, not me, one of my students.  One of my favorite students just came up to my office, I am very happy to see her as she wasn’t quite able to finish the semester last year because she had become very sick, supposedly with malaria…  I have been concerned she may not return because of that so I am happy to see her smiling face.  We discuss what she needs to do to finish those classes and get a grade so she can register for this year’s classes.  After which she tells me she is 5 months pregnant!  She giggles and covers her mouth which she always does when she talks, her comments and observations are very straightforward but from habit acts a bit embarrassed to actually say them.

Five months means she may barely finish this semester before she has the baby.  As if it isn’t hard enough being a student and being a female here (maybe 1 out of 4 students is female here, and that’s on the high end)…but she has a good attitude and says that it’s only hard if you make it hard.  I ask how her family feels about it, her dad is mad and doesn’t want her to marry the father (personally she doesn’t seem to be too interested in marrying the father anyways).  If her mom or sister care for the baby she will continue school the following semester, otherwise she won’t be able to.

She says there are a lot of returning pregnant students this year, hm…I guess cancelling classes for five weeks due to riots is having a longer lasting impact…  She jokingly says that the guys (in general) pulled lines like ‘I might die tomorrow…’  She says it’s a joke, but it does make me wonder how many really ‘intelligent’ guys pulled lines like that…

I’ve seen a few more students from last year (none of them are pregnant that would require a miracle of nature)…