hi guys!
the rainy season has officially started! for the first time since
april the sand is wet. 3 days of soft cloudy skies and rain on a tin
roof. it's so nice.
updates since late june! this is going to be another long one.
i finally got to walk with my host mamma #1, sister thandeka, and some
neighbors to madotsheni, the wetlands area of the village where
community gardens are plowed. the walk was about 7-8k through the soft
mostly flat grassy sand. the wetlands are literally on the border of
mozambique so we walked to the fence that separates the countries. on
this slight detour mamma #2 utilized her time by pulling up reeds from
the riverside. she collects them in huge bundles, carries them home on
her head, and spreads them out in the sand to dry for three days
before selling them in town.
the gardens were beautiful. the river flows all through the area and
tiny streams help to designate the different family plots. here banana
trees, sugar cane, beet root, sweet potatoes, carrots, lettuce,
spinach, onions, tomatoes, and local fruits flourish. as we were
walking around i followed my sister as she leapt across the streams
and landed in the muddy black soil. my host mamma was being a mamma
and yelled at thandeka not to take me that way because it was muddy. i
pretended to not understand and jumped right into the mud. i was mess,
and we all laughed. we sat around for while munching on sugar cane. so
delicious.
because the soil is sand and water can be quite a distance away in the
village, the community largely does all the subsistence farming in the
wetlands. the plowing is mostly done by the women who makes this trek
on an almost daily basis during the sowing and harvesting seasons.
many women take extra veggies and fruits to sell in town or at school.
for some families this is the only source of income.
during the winter school break i was extremely blessed to be with my
closest friend and boyfriend Danny, and his visiting mom and brother.
they came for about two weeks and invited me to come along with them
for several days. we got to peruse around our shopping town made new
and exciting again by the fresh eyes with us. we visited the lake
system near the estuary which puts the town on 'some' maps. we took a
sunset boat cruise through the salt water lakes and saw incredible
birds and hippos! next we drove through swaziland and stayed the night
at an eclectic bed and breakfast famous for Bushfire, a huge music
festival. im not sure i can really explain how weird it is to be
driving through beautiful brown mountains, stricken with poverty, turn
off on a road and be at this perfectly manicured green ridiculous
modern venue. really throws your mind off. the buildings were almost
completely done in mosaics and lush green gardens surrounded the
grounds. here we enjoyed delicious food and hot showers!
the next day we drove to our destination, Kruger National Park. this
is the most famous game park in south africa and is known for almost
guaranteed sightings of the big 5- the lion, water buffalo, elephant,
leopard, and rhino. we went on a safari with an experienced driver who
took us around the park all day. he was part of a safari company and
so he and the other drivers would communicate with each other and
report sightings in various locations via radio. if there was
something good, we would quickly drive to the spot to see the animal.
in addition to the big 5 we saw many hippos, giraffes, baboons,
monkeys, crocodiles, tons of birds, impala, kudu, wildebeest, and
vultures. it was really incredible. it was kind of strange though
because there were so many cars driving around on paved roads and you
knew something was around each time you came up on lines and lines of
cars with people hanging out the windows with binoculars.
everything we did was so much fun and at times unbelievable. just
being with danny and his family was equally, if not more amazing. it
was so nice to be together with his family and to talk and enjoy each
others company over meals and wine. they were all so welcoming to me
and i can't express my thanks and gratitude enough for letting me join
them. it is one of my favorite experiences thus far and definitely a
vacation i'll never forget it. i feel so lucky.
after the park i parted ways with danny and his family. they went on
to explore more of south africa and i went to visit my volunteer
friends maggie and mike in limpopo. this was my first time to really
see this province and the landscape reminds me a lot of new mexico,
which i loveeeed. soft red desert mountains and brilliant sunsets.
different province, different culture, different language. (side
tangent, at first i thought it was awesome that south africa has 11
official languages, but now i feel like it might be a bad idea because
it seems like no one can communicate with each other! everyone is
learning english and afrikaans is also widely spoken as a legacy of
apartheid. the next most widely understood languages are isizulu and
northern sotho. point being, south africa is home to so many languages
and cultures that it could easily be several smaller countries.)
after the long immensely enjoyed holiday it was back to the village. a
4 hour taxi ride from durban (1st world) is still much too abrupt of a
transition back to the village(3rd world+cell phones).
it was the end of july and going back to school was a hard adjustment.
what was even harder for me to process were the months remaining. it
had been just over a year that we arrived in south africa but we still
had 26 months of service left. in peace corps this time in service is
not so affectionately known as the 'one year slump.'
somedays i was slumping really hard. i think the slump happened to me
for several reasons:
1. understanding more about the place and culture
2. homesickness
3. mentally processing another year of volunteer service
4. questioning my efforts here
i have a much better understanding of what's going on here than i did
a year ago. granted probably 68% of the time i have no idea what's
going on, it's a drastic improvement from the 98% of the time when i
first arrived. quite frankly south africa feels like a laid back
twilight zone.
understanding more is a sort of double edged sword. it's so nice to
understand more of the language, approximately how long things take,
when to expect transport, understand how teaching works, the school
schedules, etc. but also, i understand all those things so i know it's
going to take a long time when the only ride to town is with the
slowest driver, or that when the learners are taking their
standardized tests it's nearly impossible to do anything at school. i
can more accurately predict situations and know what to expect, which
is both good and bad. but almost always requires waiting. which is
really helping me to develop lots and lots of patience.
i've felt really homesick over the past months. the newness and
romanticism of being a volunteer has well worn off. that's not to say
i don't still love being here and i don't get excited about things
anymore, just that a certain element is gone, the realness has set in.
somedays it's hard to imagine being away from the people i love back
home for another year. besides people, what i miss the most is riding
my bike. but, i knew this would happen and i was prepared for it.
sometimes it is just hard.
being a volunteer for another year at times (i can't emphasize enough
how temporary these feelings are) has felt incredibly heavy. mentally
processing this, and all it's implications has been difficult but is
forcing me to grow a lot and to find purpose and meaning in the time
i'm spending here.
as a combination of these things i've been questioning my efforts
here. 'what am i even doing?' 'why am i here?' 'does it make sense
for me to be here?' 'who/how am i helping?' etc etc. and so this has
lead me to first, feel pretty terrible, and second to dedicate time to
thinking and reflecting upon the projects and people i am working
with. i've learned that i have to engage myself in something i enjoy
doing, or im not going to be happy. and i know i am already doing
that, its just that some days all the struggles and challenges of
working with people get to me. so currently, im trying to reflect and
think about how to spend the next year. i want to be doing things that
the community needs, that are possible, that i have the skills for,
and that i want to do. searching for that overlap. i think many of the
projects im involved in meet these goals, and so i want to make sure
im on the path to making an impact.
peace corps is letting me feel the full range of my emotions,
sometimes all in one day.
right after the break i was busy working with the library committee at
the primary school to prepare for the library's grand opening. we've
been working on cataloguing, organizing, cleaning, and 'finishing' the
library since about february. i was able to teach the educators and
some learners about the dewy decimal system and the alphabetical
arranging of the fiction books. we also taught the learners how to
prepare a book to be used in a library. we showed them how to make the
card holders, where to put the issue slips, cards, labels, etc. a
class of grade 7 learners prepared over 250 books in less than an hour
with very few mistakes! the books kindly donated from my high school
history teacher Mrs. Judy Falls, are proudly displayed on a shelf with
a sign reading, 'donations from america.' we are so thankful for them.
we held the grand opening on the 3rd of august. a teacher and some
learners erected a chalk board in the sand outside the library and i
got to draw a sign announcing the day. i recruited some learners to
help me and it was definitely the most enjoyable part of the process.
how i love murals. we had library orientations with all grades in the
morning where we went over the rules and policies of the library. we
also gave them a tour of the books and study areas. i led the first
orientation with the committee members and they led the rest of them.
for the afternoon we designed a program which included prayers, songs
from the learner choirs, poetry readings, questions and prizes, a
guest speaker and a ribbon cutting ceremony (my principal's idea)! the
committee worked with the learners to write songs and poems about the
library and the value of reading. our guest speaker was a librarian
from town who encouraged us not to let the library become a white
elephant. i asked the learners questions from the orientation and gave
out bookmarks as prizes. at the end of the program we went outside and
cut the ribbon to officially open the library!
and alas, as of now, the library is a white elephant. but let me
explain why by explaining what happened next.
right after the grand opening we were preparing for the biggest
function of the school year, the Health Promoting School Launch.
everyday was busy. teaching was almost put to a stop in order to
prepare the school for this function as 'the big wigs' from the health
department would be attending.
it's all sort of a haze right now but the days were spent cleaning the
school, gardening, re-writing policies, printing pictures, practicing
songs and plays, securing food donations, and many more details. and,
this went on for about 4 weeks. haha.
i was able to another mural with the kids for the event. it was so
much fun and took us about 3 hours. the kids were very proud to have
worked on it.
the event mostly went smoothly. a huge tent was erected and almost all
the important people who were supposed to attend made it, with only a
few getting lost trying to find the school. some volunteer friends
from the area came and we were repeatedly referred to as 'the team
from america.' we helped with cooking by to cutting up the lunch, an
entire kudu donated from a nearby game reserve.
despite all the fuss, the purpose of the day was to celebrate the
school's promotion of health. i'm not really sure if that happened but
regardless, these kids know when to wash their hands. and for the most
part they do. they've been taught about food, safety in the area,
hiv/aids, malaria, tb, and they can can produce an awesome garden.
it's a beautiful foundation for these kids to grow up with.
and so, temporarily the library was put on hold. after the event
teachers frantically were preparing for national exams and so the
library was again put on hold. but our white elephant will not stay
white! our elephant will be vibrant, starting... next term. haha.
in the midst of all this there was a 10k in our nearest town! it was
so mysterious. i saw a poster in the grocery store and another
volunteer called the number to see who was organizing it/if it was
actually a real thing. and he was told, yes it's happening and
dumisani is organizing it. dumisani being just a guy's name. haha. so,
we went with about 40 others ran through the town.a running club from
a big town came and domintaed the race along with other serious
runners. there were about 9 females running and i got 5th place, about
$15 and a trophy! really weird. my host family was so proud of me and
told everyone that i practice every day after school and that i work
very hard. haha. they are so supportive and hilarious.
i'll continue the updates in another post. until then stay super well!
enjoy the changing colors of autumn, i sure miss those leaves.
much love!
