My Life in Kiswahili...uhhh, Setswana

mood: nostalgic

81 days. 81 days of not much. 81 days that have flown by and dragged all at once.
82 days ago, I was in Africa; a world away and a lifetime ago, or so it seems.

    While I was there, I didn’t always feel that my work was effective. Often it felt like a futile effort. But I did feel that it was important work. Now that I’m home, I'm feeling useless and bored. I’m back in the “rat race”, which seems to revolve around making money to have things and I miss the simplicity of my life abroad and the sense of significance I felt in the work. Being idle with nothing of interest or importance to keep me busy leaves me feeling lost.
    Thinking about money, bills and success incessantly is trying. The longer I’m home, the less I sleep, the more often my head hurts and the more often I feel down. I pull myself out of it constantly like that woman on the medication commercial who has to wind herself up like a doll. It’s not just the stress of job hunting in a hopeless market or taking aptitude tests to apply to grad school; it is the noise, the pace, the omnipresence of electronics, the constant stimulation, the expectation that I be doing something/anything, my expectations of where a (soon to be) 28 year old should be in life, my desire for my own space. Sometimes it’s just the lack of darkness and stars. In Africa, I used to go outside in the complete blackness of night just to stare at the sky in awe. Clearly, I didn’t have much entertainment! Now, I sit outside on the balcony every night with my glass of red wine and my obligatory cigarette (I told myself I wouldn’t quit until I got a job – still smoking!) trying in vain to unwind. The street lights blare at me while the sky shines with an eerie purple or orange light. I search for the single star I can see in the brightness from my balcony and I stare at in longingly. I think, “How can another place on this same planet be so different?” I never thought I would long for that other place, but it’s not the tangible that is recalled so fondly, it is the thing you can’t put your finger on, a way of life that is easier even as it is more difficult. I mean, I bathed with a bucket, had no electricity, used an outhouse, walked everywhere and had limited food options. At home, I have all the opposite amenities and appreciate them much more than before. Everything is easy in a way that reduces all day tasks in Africa to a few minutes here, which then leaves the question, “what now?”
    Everything is easy, but nothing is simple. I don’t know what the rest of 2009 will hold for me, but as of today I’m feeling positive. I do have the feeling that what happens in the next few months will determine the next few years of my life and so on. But that’s life; dynamic, unpredictable. The world of possibilities that felt so exciting and invigorating before I returned to the states now feels a bit daunting. As I slowly recalibrate myself to this fast paced and money driven “concrete jungle”, I look for ways to calm my mind and find the quiet catharsis of silence and darkness that is missing in the city. I look for something that feels significant.
    Now I suspect what I never would’ve guessed; a piece of my heart will always remain in an African village with a way of life that is lost to us city folk. And sometimes, just for peace of mind, I may need to travel far from the city to a deserted place where I can at least see the stars. I need that humbling connection to keep me down to earth and make my new reality bearable.

mood: discontent

As I impatiently wait to begin the next phase of my life, I bounce back and forth between quiet panic and contained elation. I am uncharacteristically internal with my feelings these days; mostly I’m not sure how I feel except that whatever it is it doesn’t feel good.

            I do nothing but think about a future that I can’t prepare for yet, a school I can’t yet apply too, a career that I’m not yet qualified for, a romantic relationship with a man I have yet to meet (or have I?). It is mind numbingly frustrating. I’m on edge. I’m stuck in between the place I was, that in many ways I don’t want to go back to, and the place I yearn to be but am a little afraid of. This middle ground, this nowhere, this purgatory…it really sucks. I can’t decide if I’m depressed or just on pause; like with VHS cassettes, when they make angry lines across the screen and eventually shut off as if in an impatient hissy fit.

            I have few things at work to distract me from my torment. I have medical appointments and administrative appointments to tie up all loose ends before I’m allowed to reenter the U.S. I have a trip to Mozambique for rest and relaxation that I suspect won’t penetrate my deepest levels of distress. I have to go home. I need to be home. I don’t remember when it became an urgent need but it is now. I’m beyond ready and beyond finished and beyond tired; I’m exhausted. And all I have is a long task list ahead of me that I want to get started on.

            All I have is 34 days, 12 hours, and 45 minutes (15 seconds…) before I step off a plane at LAX airport, but that time stretches out before me like an impossible length and gets longer everyday as every day becomes more difficult. I’ve never felt this way before and I hope never to again.

Purgatory…it’s a bitch!

mood: thoughtful

                Yes, I heard the infamous pick-up line, “I’ll kill my wife for you”, as well as many other, less violent ones. On our last day in Cairo we walked through the famous Old Market where many tourist items are sold. Afterwards, I called it the market of higher self esteem, as almost every vendor is male and almost all paid us compliments: our eyes, our hair, our skin color, our dress - all beautiful. I realize they were trying to sell their wares, but I like to imagine there was some actual admiration.

Our trip seemed months long and only a day at the same time. We went to several other cities where we spent less than 24 hours before moving on and managed to see all of the major, well known attractions from Giza to Lake Nasser. It was an exciting trip with armed convoys, pushy taxi drivers, endless tombs, many Gods, camel rides, early mornings, late nights, long bus rides, sleeping in transit, excellent food, floating in the extraordinarily salty Red Sea and an overly friendly horse and buggy driver named Mr. Lovely who drove us home from Pizza Hut. The best part for me though was having my sister along for the ride.

Now, I’m back at work and I can barely remember the trip. It seems like a distant memory. With one less event to look forward to, I’m preparing myself for our close of service (COS) conference happening the first week of March. We’ll do a lot of discussing our feelings and the particulars of the COS process we all must go through, which consists of endless paperwork, rules and medical tests. We are to begin preparing ourselves mentally for reverse culture shock, the “real” job market and thinking about the future we’ve procrastinated about for the last two years.

I feel a sense of elation and disbelief that I made it this far, that this chapter is closing (would it be bad to say “finally closing”?). I also feel a sense of foreboding about going home, which may have fueled my short-lived fervor for a third year. I didn’t realize that feeling was there; it is difficult to detect amongst all the feelings of happiness about going home and having made it to a legitimate COS. I think it is just a fear of returning to a place that is unfamiliar no matter how familiar, if that makes sense. The home I left will be different not only because I’m no longer used to it, but because many things have actually changed; from small things like music and technology, to the more important economic and political changes. These differences may be good or bad, but I’ll have a lot to process either way. And here, in Botswana, I’m adapted, for better or for worse, whether I like it here or not. It is familiar even when sometimes unfamiliar. It is home. How scary.

 *Update: about a week after we returned from Egypt, there was a bombing in the very market in Cairo where we bought many of our souvenirs. It was my first time being in an Arab/Muslim country, and I enjoyed the hospitality and the contagious love of culture and faith that is prevalent. I left with a new respect for Islam and a wish to return as soon as possible. I wish that my trip was not marred with the memory of the extremism of a few, which plagues the Middle East and Northern Africa. I’m sorry for those who were harmed, for the many Egyptians whose livelihood depends on the tourists who are being scared away and the issues ongoing in the West Bank/Israel that keep igniting controversy that I believe many in the region wish would leave them in peace.

mood: calm

I asked for rain; I should have specified how much. For so long it seems, I had bemoaned the heat, the sun, the sweaty sleepless nights, wishing for cooler weather and rain, rain, rain! But I forgot when it rains it pours.

It has been raining almost non-stop for three days. Usually this little corner of the desert is dry as the Kalahari of most imaginations, but, now, rivers run through it. The mix of sand, clay and ordinary earth has become a thick soup that threatens to suck off your shoes at the slightest provocation. Gaping holes in the earth have appeared as if a giant stomps around at night in the downpour and the village slowly washes away. I shouldn’t complain; the farmers can now plant their maize (if it ever stops raining) and at least the nights are cool. Sleepless nights due to loud rain on a tin roof is somehow better than not sleeping due to laying in a pool of one’s own sweat. I just wish I didn’t have to leave the house.

The extremes of desert living are difficult to get used to. It is interesting that the mood swings of the climate mirror the troughs and heights of Peace Corps service. It is all about the extremes; highs and lows of success and failure, camaraderie and loneliness, new homes and homesickness. As I draw closer to the close of my service at my current site and possible third year extension at a new site or going home, I am on the emotional rollercoaster. The decisions I make now are defining; they can change the course of my future. I try to believe that there is no wrong decision in this situation; I have endless possibilities at home and abroad. But I can’t help but feel a little nervous. I mean, this is my life. Luckily, I feel more open to different options than I ever have before and have somehow managed to adopt an almost detached attitude about what comes next in the immediate future. It’s easy to feel that way when I always have the option of going home and that is never an undesirable option for me.

Rain, rain, go away…but don’t bring back the sun!

mood: cheerful

So she sang, and I listened. I am, aren’t I, I thought; closer to my dreams that is. 

            I’ve made many a new year’s resolution that I haven’t kept; in fact I think I haven’t kept any, even after I began making them easier and easier so that I would be more successful. But last year and the year before, I didn’t make any resolutions. I had made decisions that changed my life, or circumstances were changed for me, for better or for worse, and living my life, finishing what I started, became my unspoken resolution. I was resolved to live and stop talking about living and what I wish I was doing or what I half-heartedly planned to do.

            Last year was a year of past resolutions come to be. I’ve travelled, I’ve volunteered, I’ve become healthier, more self assured, more focused, more positive. I believe in a future that was once just a dream. Sometimes, I even believe I can have it all.

            So, this year, I’ve decided to give up the boycott on resolutions, although I really hope I don’t jinx myself! My resolutions are that I will follow my heart because it’s led me this far, I will do what’s right for me without being derailed by unworthy distractions and I will not take for granted my loved ones who support me unconditionally. The more mundane resolutions, I’ll keep to myself; they’re less important.

            New years and resolutions can be stressful. It can feel like a lot of pressure, that all of a sudden you are supposed to change your life - all those habits, choices, aspects of your life that are a part of you, you should just magically get over it all and throw your old self out the window; how unrealistic and utterly hopeless. Why do we torture ourselves? Change, a new beginning, a new life, so to speak, came to me when I stopped trying to orchestrate it, schedule it, force it, say it aloud to appease myself and others who might be paying attention. I simply had to take that first difficult step and everything somehow fell into place. Not to say that the last two years have been easy; I doubted myself when things were difficult, when I was homesick, when things changed drastically with relationships I thought were static. But in the 20/20 vision of hindsight, I see with clarity the mistakes of the past and the unforeseen wisdom of leaving it all behind for what was sometimes hardship but is ultimately an opportunity for more life. All I can say is “gimme more.” Stagnancy is boring and I never wanted to be ordinary anyway.

mood: optimistic

            Immediately after my stint in the forest, I got a real, well deserved (if I may say so myself) vacation. And by vacation, I mean I had to travel across a country by small bus or offered ride, usually sitting uncomfortably with some part falling asleep, until I reached my destination, the beach, where I’d be staying in a dorm style hostel. But, “vacation” nonetheless. That’s how we do it.

            Despite kind of roughing it, as I’m used to now, I had a great time in Swakopmund, the small German coastal town that attracts all the tourist. I missed the ocean like a piece of me; I’m truly not meant to be landlocked. The beach and ocean were beautiful, even under the overcast sky and the cool weather provided just the relaxing environment I needed to clear my head; a nice break from the sweltering Kgalagadi.

            Swako is a top destination for adrenaline seekers because it offers many extreme sports. I know I’m not an extreme sport kind of person but I felt compelled to try something new. So, between quiet walks on the beach and window shopping at the boutiques in town, I went sand boarding on Namibia’s famous dunes and skydiving! Having never skied before, looking down impossibly steep sand “mountains” and preparing myself to slide down with my feet held captive in a deathtrap (i.e. sand board) was incredibly scary. But I did it anyway and it was so much fun except for climbing back up afterwards (no ski lifts in the desert). That, I would do again.

Skydiving is another story. First I was excited as I was putting on my jump suit and riding to the airstrip. Flying up, I was strangely calm, almost too calm; maybe I was in denial. Then, I was quickly strapped to my tandem jumper at 10,000 feet and before I could think of what was happening I was outside the plane. There is no feeling of falling during free fall; it’s more like free float. I think my brain shut down. Looking at the patchwork earth and sand dunes so small below me, I just couldn’t allow myself to believe it; I think I would’ve lost my mind. Once the shoot was open and we were spiraling towards the ground I could no longer deny the truth because my stomach was in my throat and I had to close my eyes to fight the nausea. I reached the ground with a disoriented “Thank God!” and threw-up about twenty minutes later, promptly. That, I feel no need to try again, although, until the nausea hit, it was an amazing and surreal experience. I’ve discovered I’m not a junky of the adrenaline persuasion. The ground is fine for me.    

            We made it back home in the same tedious way we got there. We actually got lucky with rides but “luck” doesn’t always feel like luck (flat beds of 18 wheelers, cramped buses etc.). We made a pitiful picture sitting on the curb at the border, but we made it home successfully and exhausted. It was a whirlwind trip but well worth it. Now, I have a few more weeks of school break, the holidays and a new year. If I travelled to five countries and jumped out of a plane this year, I wonder what next year will bring.

mood: distressed

            We had finally made it Shakawe, the little village way at the top that everyone pronounces differently (SHAK-away, SHA-KA-way, Shaka-WAY…), in just under 17 hours of travel in one day. Whew!

            Shakawe, however you say it, is the exact opposite of where I live in the Kgalagadi (Kalahari) Desert. It is lush and green, full of birds and other animals and, most of all, full of water. We crossed the huge river on a ferry; the only way across unless you want to swim with the crocs. The villages across the river are isolated and less developed than Shakawe. It was in that area that my friend Patrick’s organization held the camp, at a school for troubled boys called Bana ba Metsi (Children of Water) that was closed for holiday.

            We spent our first day cleaning and setting up, including a few horrendous hours in a boy’s bathroom that appeared to have never been cleaned. The next day, the other facilitators and the girls arrived.

            The topics covered by the facilitators included HIV/AIDS, women’s rights/rape/abuse, and life skills. Specifically, the life skills topics covered by me and my two friends (Patrick and Jackie) included behavior change, good decision making, assertive behavior, negotiating condom use/delaying sex, role models and life goals/plans of action. It all seemed to go quite well and we had an amazing group of girls; many of whom participated actively and responded well.

            Overall, it was a nice break from my regular grind and I feel satisfied that we may have reached some of these at-risk girls.

            On a side note, this wonderfully lush, wet forest we slept in with only a tent happens to also house the most diverse and disgusting menagerie of insects I’ve ever seen. We regularly threw the nearly foot long stinging millipedes out of the tent, the scorpions were three times the size of those in my village, the variety of biting flying things was unprecedented and the unique sand colored tarantula looking spider was enough to send me jumping onto the nearest chair (or keep me awake all night with imaginary things crawling on me after we found two in our tent). I didn’t love the wilderness, but I did love working with the girls. Oh well, one can’t have it all.

mood: hopeful

Tomorrow, I’ll travel about 15 hours by bus and begging rides towards the Okavango Delta where I’ll be facilitating at a girls’ retreat that was organized by a fellow PCV and friend. We’ll discuss with the girls everything from sex and drugs to goals and heroes. Maybe learning new behavior is like learning a new language; having a young malleable mind makes accepting and adapting to the new knowledge easier. It could be too optimistic to think that we can change these girls’ outlooks on life in just three days but maybe we can present viable options that give them hope, bolster their self-confidence, and be the catalyst for the inkling that she is somebody special with no predetermined lot in life despite society’s underestimation of her. I believe it can happen; I guess that’s why I’m still here.

Until next time, peace.

mood: contemplative

            It’s funny how the ridiculousness of one’s culture can be revealed when it and another very different culture are juxtaposed .

            I was sitting on a kombi (small twelve-seater van used as public transport) sharing a seat with a rather large woman. This was one of those days that the tout felt compelled to pack us in like sardines. As we’re speeding down the bumpy tarmac towards my village, the windows only cracked despite heat in the 90’s (lest someone get “flu” from fresh air), my very near neighbor makes herself comfortable with her arm slung over my shoulder like a hot ham while she idly cleans her teeth, sucking in my ear.

            Now, there are several things wrong with this picture. But what was really bothering me? Flying down a narrow bush road packed in a flimsy metal death trap without seatbelts? The dizzying heat, lack of ventilation and possibility of embarrassing myself by fainting? The passengers turning around in their seats to stare at me without shame? No. When I noticed my teeth were clenched, I made a conscious effort to relax. I realized it was the nearness of my neighbor; the situation was too intimate for comfort with a stranger.

            I’ve acknowledged this issue before and somehow I have never gotten used to having my space invaded even with as often as it happens. The problem is my invisible bubble that in America is an unspoken boundary that only weirdoes or very close friends cross but here is unknown. I’ve begun to think I’m strange for sometimes not being able to stand the fact that someone’s in my space and has the nerve to be touching me.

            I don’t know how long I’d have to live here for things that are second nature to me to change to accommodate the differences. For example, it’s considered to be rude not to greet someone even if you must interrupt a conversation to do so. For things like this, where I’ve known all my life that interrupting a conversation or phone call for any reason is rude and should begin with an apology, I have difficulties. I find that although I know what is expected of me, it is nearly impossible to make this a habit because it feels so wrong. I’m literally a slave to my culture, which is so closely tied to my feelings of right and wrong that it is inseparable. How odd.

            Not to look too deeply into an uncomfortable kombi ride, but this chain of thoughts lead me to the issue of “behavior change”, an important concept in the fight against the spread of HIV. It seems so illogical that when it comes to life or death a person won’t trade risky behavior for safer practices. But when that change requires that you go against what you’ve always known to your core to be true and necessary, what generations have done before you and your concept of right and wrong, how difficult is it? How possible? Women here aren’t truly women until they have children. That one accomplishment is more important than marriage, college and other aspirations or so it seems. It is not something that you choose not to do. So when you tell these same women to practice safe sex, abstain, plan families it is counterintuitive and many see it as impossible. Even telling HIV positive women that they should not have unprotected sex (thus shouldn’t get pregnant) is taboo in a culture where having children is so important. It is tantamount to denying the women her life purpose and her most basic guaranteed right.

            I fear for these women and abhor the sacrifice they make to do what is expected when roughly one third of their choices for a mate have HIV. I’m also horrified that they follow through, but I come from a culture that is all about women’s myriad choices. I find that I can at least imagine the chains that bind them; not wanting to be a social outcast, wanting to be a woman and not a girl, wanting to fulfill your perceived purpose when other life paths seem out of reach. I can see it would take extraordinary courage and strength to step away from culture, to single oneself out to close-knit village scrutiny, to be seen as a freak. My rant about the one woman freak show that I perform daily helps me to understand on some level. I just hope there will be more who are willing to break the mold or at least find a way to reconcile their culture with the bleak realities that can kill them.

mood: calm

This week at the school everything that could go wrong did. Our coordinator was away at a week-long “workshop”, or what I like to call “obscene waste of time and money-shop”, our gas for the stove ran out, we could get no fire wood, and half of the present personnel needed a few days off for various reasons. All this while we’re trying to plan our own waste of time (i.e. workshop), organize a PTA meeting to plan graduation and reschedule a cancelled board meeting. These things wouldn’t be so much to handle if it didn’t take me half the day just to make copies of invitation letters just so that no one can show-up at the scheduled meeting and I have to organize all over again. Usually when I have many things to do, I have a sense of purpose and I appreciate the acceleration of time that busyness affords. But lately, be it the heat, the work, my health or whatever, I just feel exhausted.

As I trudged through the sand to an office across the sweltering village for the third time in three days to print and/or deliver letters and I suddenly saw the desert scenery blur before my eyes, I first thought that the sweat had rolled into my eyes; then I thought hopefully that this was all a mirage; finally I realized that my Judas eyes were leaking the little bit of fluid that was left in my body. This time, not tears of sadness or even frustration but tears of unadulterated weariness. The heat had sapped my appetite, my tolerance and my will to move. I ached for the next rain that brings the cool night air, when I can sleep soundly not in a pool of my own sweat.

The next day was my worst nightmare come to life. I arrived at school prepared for a hectic day due to us being shorthanded but for some reason disproportionally anxious with knots in my stomach that stopped me from eating breakfast. I saw most of the children were already playing on the playground but no adults were there. I sat and waited at the locked school for a while before I realized the reason for my anxiety; I had somehow known since the night before that no one would show-up to work that day. When I realized I was alone at a locked school with 55 non-English speaking children under the age of seven who I had no idea how I would feed or send home, I experienced a whole range of emotions that I’ve never felt before in such a rushed succession; rage, disappointment, sadness, resignation, frustration, helplessness, hysteria. Sitting on the ground, I put my head down and couldn’t help but cry…again. My favorite little man, nicknamed Chewbacca, came and sat by me. He held my hand, or actually my index and middle finger, in his little hand and caressed my cheek with his other hand. He looked worried. This poor two year old, characterized as “vulnerable”, whose primary caregiver is his resentful four year old sister, was grown-up enough to try and comfort me. It just made me feel sadder but I smiled at him as reassuringly as possible through my tears. Could it be true that I was the only one who really cared?; the only one willing to show-up, in more ways than one?

I walked to a house near-by in hopes of finding the keys and I got lucky. I opened the office and called a top member of the organization telling her in a voice bordering on hysterics that I needed help NOW! She laughed and then managed to recognize my outrage and said she would send someone. Someone came, I lost my cool (read: futilely yelled and cried about the injustice of it all) and nearly my sanity, and left someone else in charge while escaping the situation with a two year old on my back and two others trailing behind. I was so angry I could scream but so weary I couldn’t manage. I just felt drained. To make matters worse, I had to return to the school that evening for a PTA meeting that I doubted would even occur.

I spent the day venting about the disregard of my colleagues who knew they had left me to fend for myself and just didn’t care. I arrived at the meeting feeling dismissive and angry still. As people slowly made their ways to the school and the meeting took place my mood noticeably improved. We made some small progress and arranged another meeting to discuss further. Even this small thing is a success when accomplishing anything is difficult. I was buoyed considerably by this bright end to what started out as a horrible day. As I walked home smiling at the sunset, a cool breeze was blowing, the huge sun hid behind friendly clouds tinting their edges with burning orange and pink, and in the distance over the hill I noticed the darker clouds as bright lightening split the sky. The rain was coming, just as I had wished for. I hoped the wind was blowing my way.

mood: surprised

            Again, my birthday. They just keep coming don’t they. I think about where I was, literally and figuratively, around this time last year and I couldn’t be in a more different place.

            Last September 25^th, I was just starting out at my new site in Kenya, feeling at once scared and hopeful. I had a lot of time in Africa to look forward to. Now, in a different landscape and culture, after a traumatic uprooting, I’m more experienced (euphemism for “jaded”?) and I venture that this year, unlike those in the recent past, I truly did learn some things – about life, love, the world, people. I’d like to think I’m wiser; at least as wise as a 27 year old can be.

            I can’t help but wonder, as 30 looms, if I will look back fondly on how I spent my twenties; that famous and infamous decade during which we’re supposed to sow our wild oats and become responsible grown-ups simultaneously. Honestly, it’s a blur. I remember working a lot, rushing through college classes and feeling romantically frustrated and unfulfilled. Then there’s Peace Corps. I think just in the way I was a “non-traditional” college student (i.e. not living on campus, working full time), I was also a non-traditional twenty year old in general. Sometimes when people talk about crazy spring breaks and drunken dorm daze, I feel a little left out. But maybe that wasn’t for me. My wild oats were sown in high school, so my life in my twenties was more responsibility than debauchery. Anyway, I’ve had more fun in Africa than seems politically correct, although it is duly earned through endless frustration and is required to treat mental and physical exhaustion.

            I felt compelled to acknowledge this day by writing something, but the day will pass without much notice (right now I sit at work, typing in a hurry with screaming children in the background). It’s just another day that is a marker of the year older that I feel to my soul. It’s a shame that once you learn something you can’t unlearn it. Denial is not a place I visit often. Even the Vogues my mother kindly forwards to me are slightly diminished by their grotesque extravagance and excess. Some things I’ve learned will never leave me, like a weight forever on my shoulders, a shadow on my mind. Is that what getting older means?

            On a lighter note, I will have a drink with a friend today in commemoration and will have a nice meal and maybe a movie in the capital this weekend.

            I’m still working towards something, still planting and hoping to contribute a tiny portion of the “solution” to a huge, unworkable problem that sometimes haunts me. And, I admit, I’m looking forward to going home in a mere eight months and hoping like hell that I leave something positive in my wake.

*Update: I ended up having a really great birthday party at a Thai restaurant with a bunch of friends, a birthday song, lots-o-wine and a homemade chocolate torte that was delicious. Thank goodness for sweet friends and unexpected treats  :)

mood: thoughtful

*all quotes from Huletts® Sunsweet Brown Sugar packets

I work closely with a woman from the village at the children’s center. She is the center coordinator. I appreciate her for her ideas and her humor. Despite what my culture might consider to be shortcomings, she has shown a commitment to helping the community that I’ve seen in very few people here, regretfully. The days when I don’t enjoy her company, it is mostly because of my own ill-humored disposition caused by whichever cultural norm I’ve allowed to rub me wrongly that day. A previous employee, a Motswana college student and “technical advisor”, did much of the work that the coordinator would usually do. She spoke to me conspiratorially about the coordinators lack of education as if I, a foreigner and therefore obviously educated and condescending, would agree with her conclusion that the only thing the coordinator was good for was buying groceries and passing verbal messages. She occasionally humored her by informing her of plans for the center. When our technical advisor’s contract expired, I began trying to un-teach the coordinator her codependence and lack of faith in herself. All I could really do was stand my ground against taking on all the work myself under the assumption that no one else was capable. At first there was resistance; the coordinator was used to low responsibility. But slowly she embraced her role and proved to be just as capable, if not more so, then our “advisor.” I know that I have been guilty of this offense; thinking I’m the only capable one who can do the given task correctly. I guess it is an issue of control; fear of life going awry if you loose it.

 “Treat people as if they were what they aught to be and you will help them become what they are capable of becoming.” – Johann Wolfgang Von Geothe

If I learned anything in Africa, it is that there is always a way to improvise. There are toys made with items from wire hangers, soda cans and old flip-flops; there are people who can repair a shoe with a toothpick and some super glue; cars can be fixed with a plastic bag. And when people work together, problems can be solved with a little quick thinking; like when our gas ran out at the school and instead of panicking my colleagues simply gathered wood, made a fire and continued to cook a hearty lunch for the kids. Seeing these things has affected me. I’m less likely to see a dire situation. Instead I look for simple solutions and accept that things won’t necessarily be exactly the way I want them to be but at least I can still accomplish the task at hand. Shoving 9 people in a four-seater will never be my favorite thing, but knowing for a fact that it is doable in a pinch is a small comfort.

“Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is.” – Ernest Hemingway

I remember reading about Peace Corps experiences before I became a Peace Corps volunteer. The stories that touched me the most were the ones in which the volunteer had gone back to visit several years after leaving and found people who had known them, who said that their lives had been affected in a positive way by the volunteer. I remember thinking - I want that. I want to know that I had a positive effect on someone. I think often about what I will have left behind when I leave here. I’m not so arrogant, especially now, to think that everything will be changed forever. Most will only vaguely remember the strange “lakgoa” who walked through the village and did God knows what. But I hope one day, years from now, I’ll come back to my village and someone will remember something I said or did and say to me “I’m glad you were here.”

“Everything’s a circle. We’re each responsible for our own actions. It will come back.” – Betty Laverdure

A “duh” moment:

Survival trumps all things. It takes an extraordinary person to be able to worry about and provide their next meal by any means necessary and still give selflessly to people less fortunate. This helps me to understand. This helps me not to judge.

“Truth always expresses itself with the greatest simplicity.” – Pierre Schmidt

I’ve realized while in Africa what it means to truly take advantage of an opportunity. “Opportunist” usually has a negative connotation; some people would say “hustler.” But why is it so bad to seize an opportunity, as long as you don’t hurt anyone? Here, where I am often seen as a wealthy westerner who obviously holds the secret knowledge that leads to success (if only!), I am the opportunity. People approach me daily to ask questions about how to start a business, the best industry to work in, how to apply to move to the U.S. or U.K. I’ve been asked what to do for high blood pressure, how to lose weight and do I know anyone who wants to be a pen-pal. People get up before dawn, work in dead-end, break-back jobs and wait for something or someone like me who might know something or someone that can change their lives. Some people sometimes blame the plight of Africa on laziness. But most people I’ve met, in Kenya and Botswana, Zimbabweans, South Africans and others are working with what they have in a microcosm nearly vacant of opportunity, where the majority, the poor, have no control and are waiting with heartbreaking patience for anything different to happen. That people continue to hope in the face of such adversity makes them the strongest and most enduring people I can imagine. Even though I have goals in mind for myself, I am conscious of the relaxed way in which I think of the future; as if one missed opportunity is not a big tragedy because surely another will come along. In my village, unlike my neighbors, I often roll out of bed late and sometimes wait for the next bus rather than rush or run. I can learn something here. Sometimes you have to seize opportunities because the next one isn’t guaranteed and the size of the tragedy cannot be foreseen. Sometimes you have to run.

“When we can’t dream any longer, we die.” – Emma Goldman

And a few that sum up why I’m here:

“Be the change you want to see in the world.” - Ghandi

“Even if the world were going to fall to pieces tomorrow, I would still plant my apple tree.” – Martin Luther

mood: exhausted

            I’m watching the sand clouds blow across the desert that my village sits in. The sand stings my eyes and my skin but I stay outside because in the shade of the small office, I shiver while I work.

Today is a day when every list I make, every report outline, every calendar entry seems futile. Today, all I want is peace and quiet…AND a grande, two percent latte. Fuck it, a whole milk latte!

I need to talk to the local expat for advice. I’m lost. I’m frustrated. I think I’ll walk in the sand storm to his office. It’ll be so dramatic; exactly the way I feel right now.

Almost every day, lately, I am frustrated to the point of tears and a dark cloud hangs over my mid-service. But I can’t cry; at least not where anyone can see. When you cry people here are uncomfortable or even mocking; there’s no crying in Africa. I’ve never seen the family with HIV cry, nor did the child with no parents and even the ridiculed mentally retarded. That’s not to say they don’t ever cry but they certainly don’t cry when I would. I want to cry every time I encounter a preventable tragedy, a needless delay, a senseless obstacle, a lazy “helper”, a deliberately obstructive employee, a bureaucratic maze. It’s not that people here don’t notice these things, they just have bigger fish to fry: hunger, health, death, the subsistence farm, the family orphans – Survival. The everyday “tragedies”, delays and obstacles that make me miserable don’t even make their list of minor problems.

I don’t want to perpetuate a stereotype of African hardship. Many people feel they’re living good lives and are happy, even with fewer amenities than Americans are used to. Things like this are relative as evidenced by my happiness in a dull gray room the size of a cell with no running water or electricity. Even though in America I’m used to more amenities, I recognize that in the village my living situation is middle class. Maybe they just have things in perspective, have their priorities straight. Maybe I’m weak; weakened by a life where tragedy is traffic on the 405 and a delay is a ten minute wait for my latte. But I want to see positive change in this organization that has so much potential and that I have come to care for deeply. I want to see an improvement in the lives of the children in the community. And, selfishly, I don’t want to end my service feeling that I spent my time butting my head against obstacles but circumventing none.

I know this is a part of my mid-service funk, and it is dissipating, ever so slowly, but dissipating nonetheless.

I miss home, I’m frustrated, I’m ornery but I’m still here. Now, if I could just get that latte…

mood: busy

I walked with purpose in the direction of the school, hoping that they had moved to the new building while I was away. When I saw children playing at the new building I was relieved and when the children began singing “Teachara…” at the sight of me and ran into my arms my day brightened despite the dark clouds. Us being in the much nicer and larger building meant that I could begin on the many projects that had moving as a prerequisite. I really needed that sense of purpose when I felt so much doubt.

My relief quickly turned into disappointment as I was told that the electricity in the village owned building hadn’t been fixed before we moved in (meaning we couldn’t get the desktop or use the refrigerator) and the water was not running (meaning we couldn’t use the kitchen sink or the flush toilets). These were the reasons we were waiting to move in the first place and they ended up moving before the repairs; probably a good idea because we may have waited forever.

            These problems just added things to the long list, but at least I will be busy. Maybe things are looking up.

I won't go on and on about how wonderful Italy and Cape Town were, for the sake of those of you prone to jealousy ;p. Just kidding of course!

Italy was wonderful. The best thing was that I got to see my mom and sis! They are the same people, thank God, and I love them to death. Now I think I miss them more than ever.  Despite the luggage debacle, we had a great time in Rome. After my sis went home we continued to Assisi and Florence with a day trip to Pisa. It is so beautiful there and I had a great time thanks to my mom and sis. I just wish my sis could've stayed for the whole trip.

I went to Cape Town just a day after getting back. Even though we traveled like backpackers (i.e. cheap and uncomfortable) we had a wonderful time and the Cape was like being in Europe; very developed. Robben Island and the District Six Museum were the most impressive and moving sites we visited.

It was a nice vacation but it was difficult to return as anticipated. Oh well (*sigh)!