Karen Kaye in South Africa

So, what happened? The rest of the story

2011-08-27T10:51:00.000-07:00

Thank you all for following along on my Peace Corps South Africa experience. I have returned to the United States of America and am home now. Although I nearly completed my 27-month commitment, I left South Africa and my Peace Corps assignment abruptly in June, 2011—3 months shy of my “close of service” date. Many of you are asking why I left early and suddenly. So, I will tell you why and then “close down” this blog. Since I’m no longer living in South Africa, this portion of my journey has ended. Thanks for following along!

Before I begin, I must qualify this blog, because I’m reluctant to say anything negative about my Peace Corps experience, Peace Corps South Africa, and even the Republic of South Africa. I must further qualify the fact that my Peace Corps South Africa experience was mine alone and there were many, many (if not all) volunteers in my group who experienced nothing close to what I did. So, before you lambast me with admonishments and accuse me of spouting negativity, please know that I am claiming my experience only, and my thoughts, feelings, and reactions all resulted from my biases and understandings of the world. These are mine and no one else’s.

Two years ago, I was very excited to learn I would be serving Peace Corps in the Republic of South Africa. Like many, I was enthralled watching the fall of Apartheid and then amazed by election of Nelson Mandela and his attempt to bring South Africa into a democracy. I bought all of the excitement of South Africa’s “Rainbow Nation” and couldn’t wait for my Peace Corps tour of duty. I was especially excited to learn I would be working with the schools in rural regions of South Africa to help with the reconstruction of a school system devastated by Apartheid.

My enthusiasm for living and working in South Africa quickly waned after my arrival. In my rural community, I felt unwelcome and unwanted—and felt so for all of my two years in Africa.

The people in my community—a community in a rural area--seemed to strongly dislike three specific qualities in a person: they seemed to dislike women, they seemed to dislike Americans, and they seemed to dislike white people. For those of you who don’t know me, I am a middle-aged, white American woman. (The middle aged designation holds weight as well, and I’ll also speak of it.)

South Africa has one of the highest rates of sexual assault in the world. The reasons for this are certainly debatable and of a complicated and complex nature, but I believe this may be so because I experienced a culture of hatred of women in my community.

Women in my community and in my school were treated as inferior (to their male counterparts) at almost every level: so much so that the vice-principal and heads of departments at my school (all women) would lower their eyes and soften their voices whenever my male principal walked into the room. At one point it was suggested to me by my female colleagues that I would have an easier time in my school if only I would “submit” to the principal. I negotiated these realms as best I could but would learn later that I had offended my principal consistently because I, trying to be respectful and polite, would look him in the eye when I spoke with him and tried to speak very clearly. In this way, and unbeknownst to me, I was a threatening presence to him from the get-go. (Peace Corps prepared us to encounter “cultural differences” in our South African home-stays and at social functions, but I felt unprepared to deal with these gender-based cultural differences in the workplace.)

Also, and what was most upsetting to me, was how the men were blatantly sexually suggestive in almost every instance of encounter-- be it in a professional setting (at school), a formal function (a funeral), or in passing (being lewd while passing in the street). However, because of my age (the middle-age distinction), I did not suffer these indecencies as frequently as my younger American PC colleagues were experiencing. (People in my community reach an age of respect when older; although I earned much more respect than my younger PC colleagues, I was not free from being harassed.) I found dealing with this inappropriateness on a daily basis insufferable and exhausting and I couldn’t imagine what my younger colleagues were experiencing. Peace Corps warns us of “unwanted attention.” Volunteers might be better prepared if it were called what it is: ongoing sexual harassment. People in my country and in my culture-- in America-- go to jail for behaving in such ways.

Another way that helped me feel unwanted was my American-ness. There was very strong anti-American political sentiment in my community. I often felt and was told that my presence within my community represented the arrogance of all Americans: who are we to think we can help others? (This is a political sentiment I somewhat agree with.)

And lastly, because of the recent history of brutal racial tensions within the Republic of South Africa, the racial tensions in my community remain very high. Just the sight of me caused many to assume that I was Afrikaner (white South African). I strongly sensed from my black South African community that Afrikaners were unwelcome and the few Afrikaners I worked with at the college told me they felt unwelcome (and unsafe) living and working in my community. White people, quite simply, were hated in my community.

So why didn’t I leave and come home? To serve in Peace Corps is voluntary and I could have ended my service at any time. Why didn’t I leave? I didn’t leave because it was important to me to keep trying. It is a bit of an exercise to join Peace Corps and involves major life-changing decisions like leaving a job and a family behind. I did not take my invitation to Peace Corps lightly and it was important for me—and an honor for me—to serve.

In the end and when my service was nearly complete, I did decide to leave early and come home. A host-country national, who also served as one of my South African supervisors, said something to me that was not very nice. What he said to me was so not very nice that it would be considered a death threat in my country.

Coming on the end of two years of trying to respond to my community with love and kindness, this last encounter with a man who rightly should have been a supporter and protector convinced me it was time to leave South Africa. I would never be what I wanted to be in my community and to my people: Karen Kaye. I would always be a symbol of something my community disdained and despised.

So why am I saying all of this? I’m offering advice for any incoming Peace Corps volunteer coming to serve the Republic of South Africa: if your gut tells you something is wrong at anytime in your service, then something is wrong. Do not hesitate to discuss your concerns with your Peace Corps supervisor.

I voiced concerns to my Peace Corps supervisor early on and she immediately suggested I change my site. In hindsight, always 20/20, I should have. Also, I have since learned that I lived in a “location.” Locations are like small towns (versus the smaller, quieter villages) and are often much more politically active. Looking back, I think I would have been much happier living and working in a smaller, quieter village.

Also, I tend to check my reality by running things by other people. In this case, it was, “Hey, it really sucks at my site. Does it suck at your site?” If it does suck at your site, well, then, perhaps something needs to change. If it doesn’t suck at your site, well, then, something is wrong with me and I need to change.” None of my fellow Peace Corps volunteers admitted experiencing difficulties. (Although toward the end of our service, fellow volunteers DID begin to come clean and going public about experiencing difficulties.)

I’m 48 and most in my group were 30 and under, but there were 10 or so older than 55. When I tried to compare my realities with the 55s and older, they would look at me like I had horns growing out of my head: Why NO, they certainly didn’t experience anything like what I was experiencing at my site! I would later realize that of course they didn’t: the older volunteers had reached the age of respect and were almost revered (but certainly respected) in their villages and schools and did not suffer with any of the “harassments” I and other younger volunteers did.

And here again, to incoming volunteers: don’t hesitate to voice your concerns if you have them: Peace Corps does everything in its power to develop safe and appropriate sites for its volunteers; however, Peace Corps needs input from the volunteers at their sites to ensure the volunteer’s safety and satisfaction. This was my biggest mistake: I was hesitant to voice my most alarming concerns.

Knowing what I know today, would I serve Peace Corps in the Republic of South Africa? No, I would not. I feel that racial tensions are still too high in the rural areas of the country and I feel it too risky for Americans to be living and working in South Africa.

Do I regret serving Peace Corps in the Republic of South Africa? No I do not. I believe for the first time in my life, I am a true patriot for my country, the United States of America. I was indifferent to and critical of my country before I left. Now, I love my country very much and feel remarkably lucky and blessed that, simply by a chance of birth, I live in the great nation of the USA. I am lucky to live in a nation that is governed by democracy and that we as citizens have rights and a voice to change things. I feel grateful to return to my home of safe streets, safe public transportation, safe drinking water, good hospitals and emergency response agencies, good schools, and healthy and abundant food.

I know there is violent crime, poverty and many, many difficulties for many, many people in America. However, my life in America feels a billion times safer than what I experienced in South Africa.

But lastly, and I feel compelled to voice this emphatically as a parent to any parent with children headed toward the Republic of South Africa: I wouldn’t want my 20-something-year-old daughter serving in the Republic of South Africa. I wouldn’t want my 20-something-year-old son serving either.

In closing,

Karen

PS. That’s it! I’m shutting her down! I appreciate my readers and their ongoing encouragements. Thank you for your support. Maintaining my blog and sharing my experiences of my Peace Corps service has been one of the highlights of my two years in Africa.

AND, although my Peace Corps South African blog journey is ending, I will continue blogging and if you’re interested in film, you can hear me rant at http://www.karenkayefilm.blogspot.com/.

Saying goodbye to Pudimoe

2011-06-16T10:49:00.000-07:00

Baby and Mrs. B-- my So African family

On Tuesday, June 14, 2011, I visited my village for the last time. Many of you know that I was supposed to complete my Peace Corps service in Aug/Sept 2011, but something happened and I had to wrap up my service quickly. The something that happened wasn’t “very nice” and it made revisiting my village awkward. (For those of you needing to know “the rest of the story,” just shoot me a private email and I’d be happy to give you all of the sordid details.)

On Tuesday morning, first thing, I readied myself to ride to Pudimoe to spend one afternoon, one evening, and one morning to break down my household, pack my two bags of permitted stuff to carry home, and say goodbye to a community I’d been living with for two years. No, twelve hours is not enough time to accomplish these things.

My colleagues at Vuselela FET College

I couldn’t have done it at all if Emily Lesego, the nearest and dearest PCV to me, hadn’t come to my aid. She was an angel and bolstered me through a very difficult time.

While I was hoping to arrive in Pudimoe by 1:00 or 2:00 on Tuesday, I didn’t arrive until 3:00 and hadn’t realized how tired I would be after traveling/waiting around for 7 hours. While I had hoped to walk to the village grocer to say goodbye to my postmistress and my “grocer family,” there simply wasn’t time.

As soon as I arrived at my trailer, I threw down my suitcases and began closing down my house. Also, I began cooking what would be my last batch of chakalaka and was hoping Emily would stay for dinner. (She would do better than that—she stayed the night!) Also during this crazy, busy time, Mrs. B and her daughter Baby came by so I could give her some things to carry to the primary school for me. (The incident that sent me packing had to do with a person at the primary school, and I was not allowed to return. It broke my heart not to say farewell to the school children!)

Marina--the best cook in South Africa... She is also one of So African family

I was hoping to spend a bit of quality time with Mrs. B and Baby, and then later when her husband, Mr. B arrived, but it was just too frantic. If I were to call anyone in South Africa “my family,” it is these wonderful people. They were very loving towards me.

The B’s left; Emily and I had dinner, and then resumed the frantic packing. We packed until way past 8:00 pm. Finally, with a tiny bit of urging from Emily, we took a break to stroll around campus (my last time) and enjoy the nearly full moon. Fella, my second African dog, was happy with going for a late-night walk. It was chilly, but very nice.

I was pretty keyed up, but finally able to sleep. Fella spent his last night in my house, propped up on a comfy dog bed. He’ll have to go back to being an African dog now. He was an American dog for a few months.

Mr. K--his wife was my star student.
I love this shot because he would never, ever smile for the camera for me.
He has a lovely smile, doesn't he?

On Wednesday morning, Emily and I had a quick breakfast, shared out last French press of coffee, and she accompanied me to my college staff meeting where I would bid everyone goodbye. Because my departure was so sudden, most of my colleagues were shocked and dismayed at my abrupt departure, but all posed for farewell pictures with me, which made me happy.

It was an emotional time for me. Physically, especially while packing on Tuesday, I was having nausea and chest pounding. I was also physically trembling. I had a bit of this again on Wednesday morning, but Emily thought it more from the questionable eggs we had eaten for breakfast.  I didn’t cry at all on Tuesday, not even at telling the B’s goodbye, but began on Tuesday morning with my farewell speech with the college. I broke completely down at loading the car and telling Fella goodbye. I hated to leave him and he had experienced a nasty gash on his leg while I was in Pretoria. I hated to leave him AND he was wounded. I must leave him to the care of Mother Africa and the campus community. He was a good companion in my last months in Africa.

Goodbye Fella.
Thank you for being so good to me.

Israel--my star student and my Setswana teacher.
He's a great kid--I'll miss him.
Although he is on Facebook! :-)

Riding out of the gate, I had to bid farewell to one of my favorite people in Africa, Tanke, one of my college’s security guards who was very kind and helpful to me. Tanke, like many Zimbabweans, has fled his country because of the cruel leadership of Zimbabwe. All of the Zimbabweans I met are longing to return safely to their country when their leadership changes.

I cried all as we drove out of my village, knowing I would never see it again. It was a bittersweet time for me: I was sad at leaving but also relieved.

And I was crying still, when we dropped Emily at her house and I had to say goodbye. She’s a wonderful young woman, a fabulous Peace Corps Volunteer, and a dear friend. I could not have managed the departure without her—and likely not my two years in Africa either!

I’ll be home this time next week!
Karen

PS. I have more photos posted to my Facebook page. You need not be a member of Facebook to see these photos (Just click on the link):

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2179123157828.130877.1239371142&l=922cc03366

This is Tanke, my campus's security guard.
He has a beautiful smile, although you don't see it here.
He was very good to me.

Emily Lesego and I say goodbye.
The photo is fuzzy, but I love the mood of it.

Bags packed and ready to go.
Emily says I look much too happy here!

On being a tourist…

2011-06-11T12:04:00.000-07:00

I’m not sure if I’ve posted these photos before or not, so sorry if a repeat: these are of a trip through Namaqualand and a side excursion to Port Nolloth to see the beach. The ocean you see is the Atlantic. And the following is a little blurb about Port Nolloth from Lonely Planet’s South Africa: Lesotho & Swaziland, 6th edition:

“Port Nolloth is a sandy and exposed little place with a certain fascination. Originally developed as he shipping point for the region’s copper, it is now dependent on the small fishing boats that catch diamonds and crayfish. [South African’s call lobsters “crayfish.”] The boats are fitted with pumps, and divers vacuum up the diamond-bearing gravel found on the ocean floor. The town has attracted a multicultural group of fortune-seekers and they give it frontier vitality.” (512)

Quiver trees--my third favorite tree in Africa

Am switching gears on you abruptly now…

A gentleman I’ve never met in person, although we’ve become “friends” on Facebook, recently waged what felt like a personal attack at my excitement at coming home. To paraphrase his opinion, he seemed to believe that I would miss Africa on my return to the States—as I resumed my boring life of lazy complacency—his words—and admonished to me to see all of the lovely sights of Africa as I could before returning home.

His commentary more than a bit ruffled my feathers and I publicly rebuked him, but then my conscience bothered me enough to pull my comment off of Facebook a half an hour later. The last thing I wanted to do was engage publicly with a man I’ve never met and battle with him about his values and how he was projecting them onto me.

Anyway…

Others have raised this issue as well, although in a kinder, gentler fashion, and certainly not with the accusation that I would resume a life of complacency on my return home. My fellow Peace Corps volunteers have sometimes gently suggested, “I don’t get out enough,” especially when I’m voicing some of the concerns I have about living in my community. What they mean is, in their opinion: I don’t travel enough.

Now I will admit: If I had buckets of money and could travel about with ease (as having buckets of money would allow me), I would see much, much more of Africa than I have. However, I don’t have buckets of money and traveling about Africa is a bit more of an adventure than I care to enjoy on my limited budget. I have made a few small trips and have seen the sights I wish to see; specifically, I’m glad to have traveled north to see Africa’s famous “baobab tree” (Adansonia digitata) and I enjoyed very much traveling south to see Cape Town and Table Mountain National Park.

However, I’m in Africa as a Peace Corps Volunteer, not a tourist and become irritable when people suggest I spend more of my time (and money) being a tourist.

In general, I am happy to stay in my village and enjoy my home and community during school holidays and breaks. Basically, everyone leaves the community to go elsewhere to spend their holidays and the hustle and bustle of my community dies down considerably. I love having this time to walk about my village feeling relaxed and enjoying my neighbors and the beauty of my African “countryside.” I also enjoy the uninterrupted (with work) time to enjoy my home in Africa and in spending time in it.

As my departure date approaches, I have one more opportunity to travel in Africa and see more of its sights. I have a friend who lives near Port Elizabeth, a town on the eastern coast of South Africa. I have not seen the eastern coast of South Africa and would love to see the Indian Ocean while I’m here.

I haven’t decided if I’ll travel or not in the coming weeks. Although the trip sounds appealing, it will also be the last “holiday” in my village I’ll ever enjoy. Perhaps I could do a little of both: take the trip and devote a part of the holiday for being home (in my village).

Either way, I’m happy to know that it will be my decision about how to spend my time in the way I most favor. And I’ll invite the gentleman that challenged me to come to Africa himself to enjoy the beauty of Africa, instead of admonishing me to do it. After all, we are our choices! And I am happy enough with mine!

Soon, very soon,
Karen

PS. Since I’ve drafted this blog I’ve learned that I will be coming home much sooner than expected. My last “trip” in South Africa will be an extended stay in Pretoria.

On being a celebrity…

2011-06-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

Ok, folks… I’ve participated in the Mother Bear Project for my last time and here are some last shots of the little lovelies and their bears and yes—they are adorable! These children are from the Ikameng Early Childcare Center in my village. I’ve worked with Mother Bear Project three times in my two years in Africa and must say that the organization is exceptional to work with. Distributing the hand-made teddy bears to the vulnerable children of Africa affected by HIV/AIDS has simply brought happiness and delight into my communities that nothing else really did. I enjoyed the kids, I enjoyed taking the photos, and I enjoyed how the parents and educators seemed to enjoy the delight of it all. Mother Bear days were very happy days. So, here are a few of the last photos of my last time with Mother Bear. Remember, if you’re a knitter or have a few extra pennies, contributing to this great organization is a great way to spread a little love all over the world and how can you resist that?: www.motherbearproject.org.

Am giving you a bit of a warning here: In this blog, I’m mixing a bit of the good (Mother Bear) with a bit of the bad (unwanted attention received in my community). So, you will encounter unpleasantness in this blog. I will speak of racism here and I will speak in generalities: what I’m discussing doesn’t apply to every single South African I meet. Also, I’d like to point out that every Peace Corps volunteer’s experience in South Africa is very, very different and many—and most--of my PC colleagues are astounded when I tell them these stories and are appalled and strongly claim to experience nothing like this at all in South Africa. What I am speaking to is my experience and my experience only.

Also, I have since learned, two years too late, that because I live near a “location,” something like a big town where people are more politically active, etc., these kinds of hostilities—that I will describe--are more likely to be encountered. Two years ago, I should have asked to change my site. Two years ago, I thought I was the one that needed to change, and to keep trying. I kept trying, but to no betterment. Lesson learned!

Just a bit of background on me before we begin. One of the nicest things I’ve learned in my journey in this life is that I’m “just another Bozo on the bus”: I am no better or worse than any other human being. I seek a relationship of equality in everyone I meet: be it a child, an adolescent, an adult or a CEO of a company. Perhaps this value is the one that has been the most challenged during my Peace Corps service, and as a dear, fellow Peace Corps volunteer friend has tried to convince me: Just the fact that we are Americans will always displace us out of an equal relationship with our host-country nationals. I’ve fought for this my whole two years in Peace Corps: to not be treated as special, better than, or a VIP within my community. It is a lost battle.

One of the things I’ve gained in my Peace Corps experience—and completely unexpected—is the feeling, even if on a very small scale, of what it must be like to be a celebrity.

How many times have I rolled my eyes at hearing movie stars or super models whining on TV about how wretched their lives are because they are constantly hounded by the press, the paparazzi, and, well, everyone?

I have a whole new respect for what it must be like to be Oprah Winfrey or Tom Cruise. In fact, I am much more sympathetic to Tom Cruise’s meltdown a few years back, at jumping up and down on Oprah’s couch proclaiming to the world his love for Katie Holmes. I sympathize with his breakdown because he’s been living the life of a celebrity for most of his life; I have lived the life of a “celebrity” for only two years. Having the attention of everyone on the planet is tolerable for about three days, and after three days, your life as a celebrity becomes a nightmare.

I’ve come to the conclusion that my friend is correct: because I’m an American, no one in my community will ever approach me or relate to me as an equal, and this makes me sad.

Peace Corps warns us early to expect “unwanted attention” and how stressful it can be “living in a fishbowl.” But really, I had no idea what it would be like and I can tell you this clearly: I don’t like anything about it and one of the things I most long for on returning home, is the ability to “become anonymous and invisible” in my own world again. And I feel much, much more empathy for very famous celebrities that can never do this. (Well, OK! They do have millions of dollars to flee to exotic locations… but still!)

So, why exactly am I a “celebrity” in my rural existence in the Republic of South Africa? Is it because I’m a Peace Corps volunteer? Well, no. Sadly, and although I introduce myself as a Peace Corps volunteer and try to explain what Peace Corps is and what Peace Corps does, most people in my community have no idea about Peace Corps and could really care less.

So, why am I a celebrity? I’m a celebrity because I’m a white American woman living within a black community. There ya go…

Ok, ok. I feel your feathers ruffling. I understand… In my discussion, I’m speaking from the realm of “racism” and in my country, the USA, we don’t like racism and we don’t like racists. However, I’ve experienced a whole new reality in my temporary life in South Africa: because of South Africa’s history (which is, interestingly, very, very similar to the history of the United States), what “race” you belong to is very much a part of your “identity.” Identifying yourself as black South African, white South African, Afrikaner, Colored, Xhosa, Zulu, Indian, etc. is very important here and is the rule rather than the exception. South Africans consider their “color” and their classification in a group of people as a source of pride. This attitude is very much in contrast with the American attitude of “people are people, so why can’t we all just get along?”

(And yes, I’m speaking in generalities here.)

So, for Americans especially, I sense your discomfort at my “racist” discussion. I sense it and I appreciate it.

To live as a white, American woman inside a black community in rural South Africa is simply not done: She can live far away from it, and be separate from it, but she cannot live in it and participate with it. It’s simply not done. It is more than a bit out of the ordinary.

When I was very, very new in my service, I was on a taxi with several fellow PC volunteers riding through a town. A small group of young black South African girls saw us and became very excited. They pointed and shouted and ran with the taxi as it passed calling, “Magoa! Magoa!” The young women were excited at seeing a taxi full of “white” people riding through their town. I didn’t realize this at the time, but I was being introduced to the way my life would be for all of my two years living and working in rural South Africa.

So, what does it feel like to be a celebrity in this circumstance? It feels very uncomfortable at best and intolerable at worst; some days are better than others; but the constant strain of it every single day is trying… And thus, I can understand and appreciate Tom Cruise’s public “meltdown”—I often feel, especially at this late date, that I’m on the verge of one of my own.

I have lived and worked in my community for nearly two years. The people I work closely with of course are used to me and are loving and kind with me, etc. However, because my community is so large, I’m constantly encountering people every single day who do not know who I am or why I am here, simply in my walking from one place to another. I must first endure their surprise, which I’ve already encountered thousands and thousands of times, and which may be friendly and delightful, but often, because of the racial tensions that still poison my community, often are hostile and angry. Encountering hostility and anger, every single day, in some form is very trying… If I let it, it can shut me down and force me to withdraw: I have encountered hostility so many times and so regularly, it makes me not want to be friendly with strangers. To withdraw in this manner is harmful in many ways: in one way, I’m much more likely to miss the happy exchanges and in another, I seem like a hateful, American white woman—very much what Peace Corps doesn’t want me to present to the world!

So this aspect of “celebrity” is very trying.

One way I’m a celebrity is that I’m a white woman. I’m not really sure how the romantic realm operates between the men and women of my community, but I can tell you, when they’re trying to be romantic with me, it is more than a bit unpleasant. I was warned, at some point, that it would be a good idea to come to South Africa as a married woman and even if not, to pretend I was. I adopted this strategy and bought myself some “wedding rings” before arriving, but it rarely spares me the discomfort of the “unwanted” attention I regularly receive from men. It’s worse however, for my younger female PC colleagues. In Peace Corps it is called “unwanted attention”; in the USA, it is called “sexual harassment” and legal defenses and protections can be sought. In rural South Africa, we’re on our own. I won’t go into detail about what I’ve witnessed and heard with the younger, female Peace Corps volunteers, but I will say, I wouldn’t want my 20-something year old daughter serving Peace Corps South Africa.

I find unwanted attentions from men in my community extremely inappropriate, rude, and creepy. I have never gotten used to the sexual advances from strange men in my community and still react with shock and outrage, a shock and outrage these men seem completely unaware of and unbothered by, as if of course I would, after “Hello, it’s nice to meet you,” agree to have sex with them later in the day, “Say, around 4:00?” No thank you, I don’t think so. The faux wedding rings have never deflected these advances. There is also a vulgar gesture I’ve encountered with strange men when I’ve gone to shake their hands in introduction; younger female volunteers also know—and are repulsed by—this gesture. I’ve experienced it while shaking hands at church—yes, at church!--and by the police captain when I was introducing myself as someone who might rely on his protection. Needless to say, I felt more than a bit dismayed at the thought of this man coming to my aid in the case of an emergency. Once, at 7:00 in the morning, while attending a funeral, I was meeting a strange man my principal, my South African supervisor, was introducing me to. After everyone had a nice chuckle all the way around, I enquired as to what was so funny. Oh, the strange man was asking if he could kiss “the legoa.” Legoa is the Setswana word for “white” woman. Nice! I’m at a funeral, and it’s 7:00 in the morning, and I have a strange man making a joke about kissing me. Grr. I could go on with more instances describing this kind of “unwanted attention,” but I think you get the idea.

Sometimes I feel that every man in my community wants this kind of “shot” at me. Is it because I’m perceived as a celebrity? And in this way, I cannot feel equal with my “fellow man.”

In a similar way, but in a different fashion, I encounter these rude moment by young men of my community. These encounters are more likely endured from a distance: young men will shout to me “Marry me” or taunt and tease me, “I love you, I love you!” After becoming used to these kinds of attentions, they become laughable. However, the young men of my community are much more likely to respond to my greetings in passing with a hostile smirk and/or by purposely ignoring me. Of course, this is just “kids being kids” and I should be more tolerant of it and I do try to be. It’s the constant wear of such encounters every day, day after day, that feels demoralizing.

And in this way, I’m a “celebrity”—albeit and infamous one--and denied the opportunity to be equal community member.

Another way I’m perceived as a celebrity, that does not entail my “femaleness,” is the fact that I’m an American and as everyone knows: all Americans are rich.

I acknowledge the fact that I live in first-world country, have achieved a higher education, and am more likely employable than any in my community. In this way, indeed, I am very rich. However, I haven’t any money to give and Peace Corps doesn’t provide us with any money to give. In this way, I am very poor—cash poor.

Also early in my service, in my host-family’s village, there was a shop where we bought bread and such. The young children loitering about, and without fail, would demand: Give me five rands. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, I would be hearing this phrase and be approached this way for every single day of all of my two years in Africa. Not only am I asked for money from children, but also from educators and other community members—and most depressingly, from my South African friends. I’m asked to get jobs for South Africans in the USA; I’m asked for trips to the USA “just to visit for a couple of weeks and then return to Africa”; and I’m asked to find people homes in the USA. I try to tell people that a) I will need to find my own job in the USA once I return; and b) currently, I have no home and will have to stay with friends when I return; and c) I have no money for travel or to pay for friends to travel and the only reason I’m in South Africa is because I joined Peace Corps.

These explanations don’t make any sense to the people here, because they simply cannot fathom the idea that not all Americans are rich. The South Africans of my community are convinced that our streets are running with milk and honey and that everyone that lives in America is rich—no exceptions! There is no dispelling this myth—as hard as I’ve tried. I blame this belief solely on American-made TV and films.

So yes, being a celebrity and approached for money constantly from strangers is draining. I can’t imagine how Bill Gates must feel.

And in this way, I’m a “celebrity”—albeit and infamous one--and denied the opportunity to be equal community member.

Another way I’m perceived as a celebrity, that does not entail my “femaleness,” is the fact that I’m an American and as everyone knows: all Americans are rich.

I acknowledge the fact that I live in first-world country, have achieved a higher education, and am more likely employable than any in my community. In this way, indeed, I am very rich. However, I haven’t any money to give and Peace Corps doesn’t provide us with any money to give. In this way, I am very poor—cash poor.

Also early in my service, in my host-family’s village, there was a shop where we bought bread and such. The young children loitering about, and without fail, would demand: Give me five rands. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, I would be hearing this phrase and be approached this way for every single day of all of my two years in Africa. Not only am I asked for money from children, but also from educators and other community members—and most depressingly, from my South African friends. I’m asked to get jobs for South Africans in the USA; I’m asked for trips to the USA “just to visit for a couple of weeks and then return to Africa”; and I’m asked to find people homes in the USA. I try to tell people that a) I will need to find my own job in the USA once I return; and b) currently, I have no home and will have to stay with friends when I return; and c) I have no money for travel or to pay for friends to travel and the only reason I’m in South Africa is because I joined Peace Corps.

These explanations don’t make any sense to the people here, because they simply cannot fathom the idea that not all Americans are rich. The South Africans of my community are convinced that our streets are running with milk and honey and that everyone that lives in America is rich—no exceptions! There is no dispelling this myth—as hard as I’ve tried. I blame this belief solely on American-made TV and films.

So yes, being a celebrity and approached for money constantly from strangers is draining. I can’t imagine how Bill Gates must feel.

Along this line, as an American, I’m expected to “know everything.” In the classroom, at the grocery, on the taxi, in the streets… I’m simply expected to be a walking font of knowledge that can produce business plans, solve complex calculus problems, teach fourth grade natural science with three minutes notice, and pontificate smartly on why we Americans, simply carry on without mercy in killing the likes of Osama bin Laden. (By the way, Peace Corps strongly discourages our discussing American politics—or any politics-- while serving in-country.)

Along these lines, in every “gathering” type of event, where many in my community come together for meetings, weddings and the like, I’m often treated as a special guest, or a VIP if you will. When I’m invited to attend churches new to me, I will either be asked directly to speak or—as what usually happens—the service will be an interrupted so I can speak. (Yes, I want to die when this happens.) At social gatherings where food is served, I’m usually ushered to the front of the line. On this weekend past, a fellow PCV and I were attending a district meeting of our areas Department of Education. There were 600 principals in attendance, yet my friend and I were asked to step over to a special room where a special meal was prepared for the “very important people.” Gratefully, my friend declined for the both of us. I would have died being ushered off to be treated differently than my principal! This trend in my community is the one I’m most uncomfortable with: to be treated as special or different.

And then lastly, this experience has been most unnerving: people go through my trash. I’ve read of celebrities complaining of people going through their trash and how invasive it feels. It does! You would think that since you are throwing something away, that who cares who sees it or knows about it? But think about it: what you throw away can say a great deal about who you are and I find it very troubling to have people go through my trash. I sometimes do a silly little thing and write my prayers on slips of paper and place them in a “God box.” Well, these things are sometimes cleared out to make way for new prayers, and while there is something delightful about walking about on campus to encounter my prayers flitting about in the wind, there are other things I throw away that aren’t so delightful! I’ve made it a habit to carry my most sensitive trash into my shopping town to dispose of it in large, public trash receptacles. In this way, even if someone goes through my trash, at least my identity will be protected.

So, yeah, I think I kind of know what it’s like now, to be a celebrity: to be hounded wherever you go; to be the spectacle and the spotlight of everyone’s attention; and to encounter constant requests for favors and money. It’s exhausting, it’s unnerving, and it’s grating. Not everyone is made for the spotlight and not everyone is able to live in a fishbowl: I am one of these. I can’t wait to crawl out of my fishbowl and return to being another “Bozo on the bus.” And yes, I will be much more sympathetic to the Tom Cruises and Oprah Winfreys of the world!

Shh, don’t tell anyone, especially the mothers in my family, but there was a time in my Peace Corps service—a very short time--that I felt loved, and wanted, and, well, yes, an equal within my community. I had hopes of working more closely with the elderly and the orphans in my community and visited my area’s police department. I met this wonderful, vibrant strong black South African woman: she was the Lieutenant Colonel of the division. She spoke impeccable English and she had some great understandings of her community and was keen in seeing ways I could better help. We worked together and talked about several different ways I could become involved with the community and extend my time in Africa. I was so excited to find someone, someone I felt equal with, someone I felt I could forge an effective professional partnership with. I felt happy and fulfilled in Africa—FINALLY! And then she said the one thing that I fear to hear, the one thing I dread to hear, and the one thing that I always hear: Will you take me to America?

At that instant, I knew. I knew strongly, surely, and completely what my friend said to be true: As an American, I will never be perceived as an equal in my South African community. I will always be different, I will always be special, I will always be perceived as better than. At that moment, I knew I would come home.

Looking back over my two years as a celebrity in my community, I must admit some happy times at being the center of attention. It was fun when I initially came to my schools and initially met my coworkers and colleagues. It was fun to be wined and dined, and it was fun to be introduced to large crowds. And, it’s fun that everyone is so happy to see me on Mother Bear Days. But it all goes back to it being fun for about three days—and then the unrelenting grind of it that comes.

I am tired of my celebrity and so looking forward to being just another Bozo on the bus!

Soon,
Karen

P.S. ALL of the unpleasantness is worth it--the KIDS more than make up for it! :-)

An anniversary of a different kind…

2011-05-20T05:54:00.000-07:00

Notice lights glowing in the distance--these are from homes in Pudimoe

I’m celebrating and acknowledging my Peace Corps swear-in date, which is the 17th of each month, on Facebook. As my time for returning home draws nearer, I’m becoming more and more excited—especially on the 17th of each month and am having fun counting down the days!

However, I’m quietly celebrating another anniversary of a different kind. In May of 2010, I relocated my Peace Corps South Africa living situation from a very busy, boisterous “dorm room” setting, to a much more private residence on campus in a permanent “caravan home” at my college. (In the States, we call these “trailers,” or at least we used to call them this.) So, I’m celebrating a year in my little trailer here at the college and have been very, very happy living in it.

It was difficult for me to ask to move out of the “hostile hostel,” which I jokingly, but somewhat truthfully, began calling it. For one thing, when compared with my fellow Peace Corps volunteers, having my own private “flat,” with a separate kitchen and bath space, even if inside a girls’ dormitory, was considered a “Posh Corps” living assignment, and many of my friends expressed jealousy. For Pete’s sake, I had indoor plumbing, a bathtub, and a flushed toilet! (Many, many of my fellow volunteers live in homes without indoor plumbing and haul water for drinking and household use from a community tap.) For another, there was a lot I liked about living in the dormitory, especially my large glass windows that provided an “IMAX” viewing experience while watching the drama of the African sky. And when things felt threatening outside, be it a weather-related storm or a soccer-related storm (I could overlook the campus soccer field from my room), I felt snug and secure inside my second-floor castle room in a cinder-block building.

After eight months of desperately trying to find happiness in my dorm room existence, I did ask to move. I was living with, well, college-aged kids who were joyful, boisterous, and loud during restful hours. Also, since I was a captured audience, I had frequent visitors and it was difficult to hide if I need to rest or be alone. But there were other things about it, that were much more unpleasant. For example, the building itself was infested with rats and African-sized cockroaches and about 200 girls and I were pad-locked into the building each evening with no possible escape in the case of an emergency (and no sprinkler system in case of a fire). While I was living there, a sewage pipe burst and raw sewage bubbled up out of the ground underneath my bathroom window for months. Also, the building lost water and electricity regularly.

However, even with these undesirable living conditions, there was something else much more intolerable to me: Strange men would visit the dormitory on weekend nights and the solicit college-aged girls. I found this to be the least tolerable circumstance of my living situation and eventually asked to move. (Yes, yes, I did make my campus supervisors aware of this unacceptable issue but unfortunately, nothing was done. There are cultural differences between American and South African attitudes regarding sexual relations between “older men” and “young girls.” Although I find the practice unacceptable, unfortunately and sadly, it is accepted here.)

When I made my supervisor aware of my wish to make other living arrangements, she encouraged me to “start looking around” for other possibilities. I was assigned two schools, as we all are, and in addition to the college, was working for a primary school out in the village. I began seeking a place to live off-campus, as I preferred to live in the village anyway.

Before I decided to move I was in the habit of strolling around the campus and had found a row of caravan homes—trailers—that I learned were occupied by educators at the college. There was one abandoned trailer and I began to long for it. It hadn’t been inhabited for quite some time, so I wasn’t even sure if it were habitable. I found myself visiting a picnic table on campus and sitting dreamily, eyeing the vacant trailer and praying for the possibility of living there.

Long story shorter: I did find someplace else to live in the village, but hadn’t realized the problem of the college “losing face” if I left it. In rural South African culture, to be embarrassed or seen to “lose” something is highly, highly undesirable—and for the college, to “lose” their Peace Corps volunteer to a village home would have been embarrassing.

I approached the college about moving into the vacant trailer.

Now, keep in mind, no one had lived in the trailer for quite some time. I knew there was a reason it was uninhabited and figured it must be in pretty bad shape. At this point however, I would have rather lived in a pitched tent in the back lot of the college than in the dorm room, so I asked to see it. As imagined, it was in pretty bad shape: the stairs providing entry way to the trailer weren’t there, the toilet didn’t flush, the cold-only water trickled out of the faucets, the hot water heater needed replacing, and there were hot wires coming out of most of the electrical outlets. Furthermore, while I had water and electricity provided by the college in the dorm room, I would need to purchase my own electricity for the trailer.

I didn’t mind any of these things—I’LL TAKE IT!

My change in residence needed to be approved by Peace Corps, especially in regards to my safety and security. With my Peace Corps supervisor’s help, we negotiated repairs and made arrangements to have security bars put in place.

My new home was becoming a reality!

Well, in the end, there was quite a bit of unhappiness involved with my move. I would later learn that, even though the trailer had sat vacant for quite some time, my South African colleagues—fellow educators—raised quite a stink at my “getting” to move into the trailer when they were without campus housing. They viewed my moving as an example of “white privilege.” So AFTER Peace Corps had installed security doors and AFTER I had moved myself in (I hired college kids to help me move—none of my peers were interesting in helping); AFTER I had scrubbed as much of the filth and grime away as I could, I get a visit from the campus manager to explain that everyone at the college was upset at my preferential treatment and no, they wouldn’t be repairing the hot wires, the toilet, the stairs, or the hot water heater after all.

I was FURIOUS. :-)

In the end, I got to stay, and, well, the live wires were repaired, the stairs somewhat replaced, and the college bought me a “mini-geyser,” which is basically a device you drop into your bath water to heat it. Many, many rural South Africans heat their bath water with pots on the stove, pots over a wood-fire, or with electric kettles.

I was also warned too, by a sympathetic South African, that the trailer sitting unprotected from the African sky “would be an icebox in the winter, and an oven in the summer.” And she was absolutely right about this! It does become an easy-bake oven in the summer and now that winter is coming, has turned into an icebox.

However, even with the dramatic extremes in temperature, even with the disgruntled college educators, even with faulty wiring and a toilet that doesn’t flush, I’m much happier here and have been—for a whole year. I have privacy, I have a “yard,” I can garden, I can line-dry my clothes, I can “hide” if I need privacy or space, I have space to accommodate overnight guests, I have an oven, and yes, I have indoor-plumbing and a bathtub! I have been much, much happier here in my little African home and am grateful to have had it.

As my time in South Africa draws to a close, I’m rearranging my little trailer home one last time: I’m moving my “living area” back to my bedroom, which is on the east-facing end of the house, so I have good, direct sunshine (and heat!!) all of the day. Also, I have a door that I can shut to keep in the heat from an electric heater that I eventually broke down and bought last winter (after foolishly trying to “tough it out” most of the winter!)

I’m finding in the mornings now, I’m waking warm with my heater on, and dress into warm clothes, and then exit into the kitchen of my trailer—which is ice cold. I warm water immediately to wash and prepare my coffee. For my coffee, I must warm my cup and milk or, because my dishes are so cold, my coffee ends up being tepid. I return to my warm bedroom, which now has become my “living room,” to prepare for my workday. With my heater and my rearranged living space, I’m warm enough now that I go off to school feeling warm and my mornings feel bearable, rather than last year when I felt my hands and feet nothing but blocks of ice all winter.

In my rearranging my house for my last winter in Africa, I’m also making a mental note of who I’ll be leaving my Peace-Corps-purchased belongings to. (While Peace Corps provides us funds to set up our households, they also ask that when we leave and return to our homes in the States, that these same household furnishings be distributed to needy members of our communities.) I will be finding a home for my bed, my wardrobe (these were actually provided by the South African Department of Education), my linens, my fan, my dishes and all kitchen pots and utensils, my electric kettle, and yes, my heater. I’ve met some wonderful people here in my time in Africa, and have “earmarked” my friends for these things along the way.

Since my group is in the School and Resource Project classification in South Africa, most of us finish our teaching and work with schools at the end of June. By wrapping up our professional work assignments, and after an extended school break in July, this leaves us a month or so to say our goodbyes to our communities.

My Peace Corps service is quickly coming to an end. Although I’ve been away from home and not seen my family members, I’m already hearing my loved ones say, “It doesn’t seem like it has been two years.” (Meaning, for them, time has gone quickly.) For me, it has definitely felt like two years and has felt like a VERY LONG TIME.

So, I’m counting the days and gearing up for my last winter in South Africa knowing this one, with my heater, will be much more comfortable. I have loved living in my little trailer home and am sure I’ll feel sad to leave it.

Soon, Karen

PS. Although my dorm room provided an “IMAX” view, my trailer allowed “amphitheater seating”—and these pictures are of “my” South African sky.

Invictus

2011-05-15T10:57:00.000-07:00

Movie poster courtesy of Spyglass Entertainment, Revelations Entertainment, Malpaso Productions, and Warner Bros. Pictures

I came to South Africa to serve with Peace Corps in 2009 and the country was already very excited about World Cup Soccer to be hosted in South Africa in 2010 with soccer teams competing from all over the world. I’m not a sports fan, but the excitement for the upcoming soccer competitions was contagious—you couldn’t go anywhere in South Africa and not hear about the upcoming World Cup games. South Africa hosted one big party from June through the end of July, 2010.

Also in 2009, the year I came to South Africa, a film about the South African World Cup Rugby games hosted in South Africa in 1995, Invictus, was released in the United States and starred Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela. The film was based on John Carlin’s book, Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game That Changed a Nation, that recounts Mandela’s political strategy of using a national sport—rugby—to unify a newly democratic South Africa in 1995.

Please note the difference: 1995 was a rugby match and 2010 was a soccer match—this distinction has racial implications for South Africa.

The film’s title, Invictus, is also the title of a poem written by English poet, William Earnest Henley, a poem that inspired Nelson Mandela while in prison and in a way he hoped to pass along to the captain of the Springboks, François Pienaar. Translated from Latin, “invictus” means “undefeated” or “unconquered” and the film uses the poem as a core theme.

If you watch the film, Invictus, you will see a lot of the South Africa I see and live in, and you will be under the impression that at that one moment in time, when the South African Springboks defeated the New Zealand All-Blacks in that famous game in 1995, that the racial tensions in South Africa at the end of apartheid were completely healed thus culminating in “the Rainbow Nation.” I too, came to South Africa, under the impression that Mandela had done great things and that South Africa was truly a diverse and happily homogeneous—but racially diverse-- population, an impression that I was saddened to learn very quickly that does not exist, at least it does not exist among the South Africans that I live with. When I first arrived in SA, not understanding much about sports and soccer, I was asking a white South African about the World Cup Soccer and was told that white South Africans enjoy rugby while black South Africans enjoy soccer. (A “joke” in regards to this reference is made in the movie.)

I was also struck with how the black South African college kids that I lived with were outraged that an American actor, Morgan Freeman, was cast as their beloved Nelson Mandela. I told them that of course, it was an American made movie and that the movie makers were mostly interested in making money. But it saddened me to see how this one casting choice stood as yet another example of American imperialism: we’ll choose an American actor to play a famous South African leader.

Here are some general impressions that I came away with after watching the film:
• In the opening shot, you will see two schools: a white school and a black school. The white school children are impeccably dressed in smart uniforms, are attending a fine school, are practicing rugby, and are playing on grass. The black school children, on the other hand, are dressed in street clothes, are attending a modest school, are practicing soccer, and are playing on dirt. This opening shot, I believe, best represents the racial divisions that I still see in South Africa today. The two schools are divided by a road that Mandela’s entourage will travel and you will see the black children excited at Mandela’s passing and the white children observing with contempt. The white coach advises his team to “remember this day when our country went to the dogs.” Sadly, I still see these attitudes in the South Africa today.

Also, the family’s attitude of the white South African rugby team captain, François Pienaar, especially the father’s comments, mirror those of what I still see in white South Africans today, that “they (black South Africans) will take our jobs and drive us into the sea.”

• In the film, you will see wonderful aerial shots of Cape Town and Table Mountain National Park, where I spent Christmas holiday, 2010. Also, the South African rugby team trains in Cape Town throughout the film and there are lovely shots of Table Mountain against the backdrop of the city. These are the same views I experienced while in Cape Town, and yes, the city and the mountains are truly this beautiful.

• The film opens with the South African song, “Shosholoza,” and we, as Peace Corps volunteers were taught on our arrival in-country. The song was used controversially in the past by black South Africans as a show of solidarity in defiance of the apartheid government. Mandela speaks of singing the song with other prisoners while during his imprisonment on Robben Island. The song has since become a source of national pride and you will often hear it at sporting events and other national competitions.

• Many of the shots of Mandela as a statesman are at the Pretoria Union Buildings that I recently visited. Yes, these buildings are this grand and beautiful and I can only imagine how exciting it must have been to be in that crowd and hear the great Nelson Mandela at the fall of the apartheid era.

• In the film, we see Mandela residing in a “fortress-like” home with high security measures in place. This is how I see all white South Africans living in the South Africa of today: all of their homes are fortresses.

• Mandela was a brilliant political strategist, something you get a much better idea of in John Carlin’s book Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game That Changed a Nation (on which the film is based) and in my reading about him, I find myself comparing to Mandela to Abraham Lincoln in thinking about how these men were simply brilliant in their political strategies. When Mandela won the first democratic election in South Africa in 1994, the white South African Afrikaners hated black South Africans and vice versa, and this hatred had raged for 50 years. You get a sense of this hatred in the film when the police force, both newly-appointed members and members of the old regime are forced to work together at Mandela’s request: these racial tensions in the film are depicted as very, very high. (Also an attitude that I’m sad to report exists still today.)

What was brilliant about Mandela, is he knew that to undermine the racial hatred in his country was to approach the white South Africans, the Afrikaners, with their language, their history, and their culture. Mandela spent many of his years in prison learning everything he could about Afrikaners, and was especially careful to learn the Afrikaaner language.

Because Invictus is an American-made film, the actors are speaking in English and we lose the significance of the impact of Nelson Mandela speaking Afrikaans to every white South African he encountered and the impression that made. Therefore, in the scenes we see with Mandela and the Springbok’s captain, François Pienaar, they are speaking in English. In reality, Mandela would have been speaking to Pienaar in Afrikaans, not in English.

• There is also a shot in the film that juxtaposes the white reality of a white South African farm, a large, spacious, well-established house surrounded in an abundance of gorgeous landscape against the black reality of a crowded and poverty-stricken township: we see the sun rising over a “city” of tin shacks, where people live on top of each other. I see this as very much a stark reality in the South Africa of today, that the white South Africans are still in the role of the “haves” and black South Africans are still oppressed and limited in their roles of the “have nots.” Also, in the shots of the townships, you will see the donkey carts, street vendors, and street markets that are common in my village and shopping town. In several shots of the movie, you can see vendors selling their wares on busy streets, something along the lines of having people selling things on the side of I-65 in America, and yes, this actually happens in South Africa.

• In the film, you will see black South African women in roles of domestic servants (still a large reality today); notice their clothing of the drab fabric you frequently see black South African women wearing today. The cloth is still the least expensive of any cloth you can buy in the shops and is still the primary cloth used in “traditional” black South African fashions.

• The first rugby match in the film is played in Loftus Stadium in Pretoria. I have visited this stadium a couple of times: there is a restaurant inside that you can sit, and eat, and watch the teams practice. The rugby match of the World Cup match is played in Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg. I have not seen this stadium.

• At one point in the film, you see black South Africans being “led” by a choir in singing the South African national anthem, Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika. Black South Africans would never, ever need a choir to lead them in song; furthermore, the spontaneous singing of black South Africans is much more beautiful than that depicted in the film.

• Something fun to watch for: Clint Eastwood, the director of the film, cast one of his sons, who looks just like him, as one of the Springbok rugby team players. See if you can spot him. Also, Matt Damon is cast as François Pienaar, the white South African rugby captain of the Springboks. Mr. Damon is fine in the role but he is an American actor cast with true South African rugby players. If you’ll notice Mr. Damon’s physique when compared to the other rugby players, Mr. Damon is shockingly smaller than the sportsmen. Rugby players are giants, literally and in every way.

• At one point in the film, the rugby players tour Robben Island and the infamous prison where Mandela served most of his 27 years in prison. Yes, the prison cell in the film depicted as Mandela’s is indeed, the actual prison cell of Nelson Mandela. In the film, the “tour guide” is a white South African. However, I’m told that former inmates of the prison on Robben Island currently serve as tour guides—black South Africans and former inmates—and that these tours are not to be missed.

• Notice that the crews sweeping a rain-soaked rugby field are black South African women.

• The Pienaar’s black South African domestic servant is invited to attend the World Cup match. Watch for her to do the famous cry of black South African women: “Lee, lee, lee, lee!” I have been practicing this cry and am not very good at it, but hope to be able to demonstrate it for you when I come home.

• During the famous match, the film depicts black South African’s watching the match on TV in a liquor store: Zuki’s Liquor Store. You see these kinds of stores all over South Africa and they are made secure by the walls of metal grating that you see in the scenes. I have to say too, that the black South Africans watching the match on TV in the film are much more sedate and subdued than I imagine they would have been. I have never seen a group of black South African men gathered together and being quiet.

• In the film, you get a sense of the reluctance of the white South African rugby team to learn the new South African anthem: Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika. In the book, you get a much better idea of how the team’s learning of the song and then singing it publically impacted the nation. Also, the fact that Nelson Mandela wore the Springbok jersey and cap at the match was a very, very controversial gesture and you don’t quite grasp the significance of it by watching the film only—it’s better understood by reading the book. The Springboks as a team and especially the colors of their uniforms were strongly representative—to black South Africans—of the apartheid government and its brutality for a very long time.

• One of my favorite parts of the film is the closing credits: Mr. Eastwood has included actual photographs of the winning Springbok 1995 rugby team, so you get to see pictures of François Pienaar and his teammates during the world-famous match. It gave me cold chills to see them.

Again, the movie closes and gives the impression that black and white South Africans were united as one nation that day in love and kinship. This is the impression I hoped to see and experience in my two years in South Africa. I’m very sad to say, however, that the racial relations I have observed between white and black South Africans is hardly loving and kind.
Soon,
Karen

Happy Mother's Day

2011-05-08T12:25:00.000-07:00

Morning glories, having been mowed all the way back, but bloom beautifully still.
The little black barbs in the center--these are the seeds to South Africa's ubiquitous "black jack."
These seeds are in my bed, in my clothes, and everywhere in my house! They're everywhere!

It is my second and last Mother’s Day in South Africa. I didn’t post last year for Mother’s Day, and can’t remember why. Mother’s Day always seems to sneak up on me--something happens with being too busy in April, with Easter and all. And then, as a Louisvillian, the beginning of May signifies the coming of the Kentucky Derby for me, not Mother’s Day.

So, for this holiday especially, I run late with cards and greetings. And this one is no exception. So, if you’re a mother in my life, a card is on the way, but it will reach you after the fact. However, I’m thinking of you today, on Mother’s Day, so Happy Mother’s Day!

I’m posting photos of plants still surviving in my garden. These plants have endured a brutally hot, South African summer sun, the constant-throughout-the-whole-season-attack by hungry goats, a horrible infestation of weeds, a full, down-to-the-ground mowing, and a light frost. They have been growing for seven months and keep cycling through blooming, fruiting, and destruction —yet they endure. They are survivors and they are resilient, like mothers.

My green beans are blooming again!

I am a mother of sons, but I never think about my sons on Mother’s Day. I think instead about my mother, my grandmother, and my aunt--the “major” mothers of my life. I also think of the grandmothers I have lost and how important they were to me—and still are to me. And I think of others who are favorite mothers: this year a favorite niece is a new mother and I can’t wait to come home and see my grandniece! Two of my best friends are mothers, and one of my spiritual guides is a powerful woman who has raised a wonderful family.

I am blessed with many mothers in my life!

I woke this morning, early this Mother’s Day, to a text message from a fellow Peace Corps volunteer who is also a mother. Like me, she longs for home and family, and like me, has longed for them since she arrived in South Africa two years ago. I enjoyed very much this early morning Mother’s Day greeting, and we commented about how the closer the time comes to being reunited with our families, the longer the time seems to tick on “this side.” We both ache for home and on Mother’s Day, we are missing our families and our sons.

This is my amaranth... You can see the stalks lying on the ground--they were mowed down to the ground.
However, the amaranth refuses to give up and is generating new growth--and new growth with seeds!

There is a six hour time difference, so my early morning calls to express Mother’s Day greetings might come at 3:00 am. This, as you can imagine, might not be so happily received, even by the kindest and most compassionate of moms, so I decided to treat myself to a “Happy Mother’s Day” walk instead of waking all of the women in my family in the middle of the night. Mother’s Day is celebrated in South Africa too, so on my early morning walk, a wonderful young man greeted me, “ Good morning Madam, and Happy Mother’s Day.” Since he seemed the same age as my sons, I smiled especially big at hearing it.

As I walked, I thought about the roles of motherhood and the women who have served as mothers in my life. In thinking about these women and the definition of “mother,” I started wondering about what makes a mother what a mother is: What defines motherhood?

Must one give birth to a child to be a mother? What about adoptive moms? What about widowed dads? What about grandparents who “take on” the responsibility of raising their grandkids? What about older siblings taking on the maternal role of an absent parent or parents?

My tomatoes, also mown all the way back, are resprouting and reblooming!
It was a cold, rainy morning, so the blooms are closed up tight--but they're there!

And what about those dads, anyway? Can a dad be a mom? Of course a dad can be a mom: dads cook, clean, bathe, protect, and care for their children. Dads are certainly moms—or can be.

What about children? Can a child be a mom? Ever watched a little girl—or boy—care for a baby doll? A beloved stuffed-animal? Or a puppy?

What about women who haven’t birthed children? I have dear, childless friends who watch over me, are protective, nurturing, loving, kind, and maternal—they care for me. Same goes for childless male friends.

When I think about my mom and the other mothers in my life, these are the qualities I see: strength, perseverance, creativity, kindness, compassion, a giving nature, patience, quick-thinking, is fiercely-protective, smart, capable, loving, warm, faithful, loyal, and generous. However, in my musings, I found the consistent quality of “mothering” and the “ability to mother” is the demonstration of care. All mothers I know care and care deeply about another or others.

A watermelon on the vine that has been mowed, eaten, frozen, etc.

My faithful remaining one plant of Swiss chard.
The goats and I fight over it.

And what about this notion of giving birth, after all? Must we give birth to a child? What about giving birth to ideas, art, music, sculpture, and literature. Can we care about our ideas? Our art? Our films? Our stories? What about being a mother to kindness? Or a mother to compassion? Or a mother to patience? What about giving birth to a garden or a flower arrangement? How about giving birth to a salad or decadent soup? What about giving birth to a political movement or a new ideology? What about giving birth to a new nation? What about giving birth to a new earth or a new world? What about giving birth to a new way of life?

We are all mothers who care—or could all be mothers who care! So, Happy Mother’s Day to all of us, Happy Mother’s Day to everyone!

And a very special Happy Mother’s Day to my Mom, my Grandma, and my Aunt Bea. Thank you for caring especially for me!

Soon,
Karen

Have I enjoyed my time in South Africa?

2011-04-27T06:55:00.000-07:00

Living as a white American in a rural South African village is unusual, and not unexpectedly, my presence within a black community where, sadly, white people refuse to live, often raises curious conversations. I can’t tell you how many times I’m approached by someone asking who I am, where I’m from, and what am I doing here. These initial questions are always followed with one more, “How do I find South Africa?” As in, How do I like it?

Well, answers regarding my life and work in South Africa are variable and dependent upon my mood; however, I’ve learned that a pat answer of “I find South Africa very nice” satisfies everyone all the way around: I’m spared of having to devolve in a complicated discussion of how I find South Africa (South Africa is a very complicated country!) and, well, basically I’m telling them what they want to hear: that I find their country as wonderful as they do.

Now that I’m approaching the end of my Peace Corps service, this question has been revised, when it is asked of me, and one that I initially found very startling: Have I ENJOYED my time in South Africa?

I was first asked this a few weeks ago when I was in Pretoria for a medical concern, and a doctor, new to me, asked this. I was dumbfounded with the question and kind of stammered a vague reply, but it seems to have permanently replaced the original version of the question, so I’d better get used to it.

In thinking about how stunning this question felt I’ve realized my concern. Now, this will sound terribly negative, and perhaps it is, but I don’t mean it so: I would never, ever use the word “enjoy” to describe my time in South Africa.

Ok, ok… Let me unpack this a bit… I haven’t enjoyed my time in South Africa in much the same way I didn’t enjoy going to graduate school: I’ve found the experience difficult and challenging.

Am I not glad for having had gone to graduate school? Of course I’m glad I attended graduate school: It was a life changing experience and I learned a lot. Were there not moments and times when I enjoyed graduate school? Of course there were moments and times when I enjoyed graduate school! Would I do it again? Well, here it gets a bit complicated, because knowing what I know now (hindsight is always 20/20), I’m not sure I would have attended graduate school (or at least the same program I finished) and knowing what I know now, I’m not sure I would join Peace Corps again, or at least join Peace Corps South Africa.

(However, newly-invited Peace Corps volunteers have very little to say about where they will serve. Well, you can make a general request: for example, I said, “I’d like to serve in Africa—anywhere on the continent of Africa. Potential Peace Corps Volunteers who adopt the attitude of, “I would like to go where I am most needed” are the volunteers PC most wants to deal with.)

Now, being someone who believes everything happens for a reason, I don’t spend a lot of time wondering “what if” and “if only” and trust that my life is playing out exactly as it is for all of the right reasons and trust that I was “meant” to join Peace Corps at 46 years old and I was “meant” to serve in South Africa.

And I have certainly had moments and times when I've enjoyed myself very much living and working in South Africa:
• I’ve enjoyed every single church service I’ve attended in South Africa. Usually, I can’t understand a word of the service, but I am deeply moved by the spiritual devotion of the people I live with and have found nothing more beautiful than my community dancing, singing, and praying together in church.

• I have enjoyed, very much, working with the children of South Africa. I feel hopeful about the future of South Africa when I see the excitement and delight in the eyes of her children.

• As bizarre as this sounds, I’ve enjoyed being invited to my community’s funerals: To be invited to my community’s funerals makes me feel more loved and accepted and “a part of” than any other gesture offered to me. My community is very kind to invite me into such intimate gatherings. I feel special at being a part of these solemn (yet, at the same time, very festive) occasions.

• I have enjoyed working with my primary school. This professional relationship was rocky in the beginning but I feel we have grown to love and care for each other very much.

• I have enjoyed my relationships with my neighbors on the college campus: I’ve grown very fond of these people and love them very much. They are very good to me.

• I enjoyed working with a college student, Israel, in learning Setswana. He’s a very bright and dear boy, and he too, gives me hope in regards to South Africa’s future.

• I enjoyed very much attending both the primary school’s and the college’s “special events”: Heritage Day celebrations, end-of-school year celebrations, the college’s Academic Opening, etc.

• I enjoyed teaching both a Grade Six class at my primary school and an ENG Level 3 course at the college.

• I enjoyed my vacations in South Africa: I traveled north to see Africa’s majestic baobab trees (Adansonia digitata) and Northern Kruger (Kruger National Park) and I enjoyed traveling south to South Africa’s Cape Town to volunteer for Table Mountain National Park.

• I’ve enjoyed developing friendships with my fellow Peace Corps volunteers.

• I enjoyed living with my host family for my first 8 weeks in Africa.

• I’ve enjoyed gardening and growing food in South Africa.

• I’ve enjoyed spending time with the very old women in my community.

So, YES, I’ve enjoyed moments and times in my two years of living in South Africa.

And yes, I have certainly learned a lot in my time in South Africa:

• I’ve learned a great deal about South Africa’s history, its literature, its music, and its “rainbow nation” of multi-culturalism; I certainly know much more about South Africa than I did before arriving.

• I have learned a tiny, tiny bit of Setswana—enough to please people in my community very much in greeting them.

• I’ve learned how important it is to me to have collaborative professional relationships.

• I’ve learned how important it is to me to feel safe and protected from the threat of physical harm, that threat being from other people or conditions in my environment.

• I’ve learned that South African women, 80 years old or older, are tanks: they dig all day with handmade tools in soil with the consistency of concrete; they carry 5 gallons of water on their heads; they raise at least two families in their lives--their own and their grandchildren; they harvest their own firewood in the African “bush” and cook all their meals over a cook fire (and have been all their lives); that South African “gogos” are wonderful cooks; and that a South African gogo can be my most powerful ally and strongest protector!

• I’ve learned how wonderful it is to walk freely and unafraid after dark.

• I’ve learned that South African youth hold very strong and powerful political influence. (The police force in my community is afraid of the college students.)

• I’ve learned how WONDERFUL it is to have reliable water, electricity, a clothes washer, central heat and air, working plumbing with a flushed toilet and hot and cold water inside the house, and not needing to sleep under a mosquito net!

• I’ve learned how wonderful my friends and family are in their on-going support of my African adventure.

• I’ve learned that complete strangers can become dear friends via Facebook, email, and snail-mail.

• I’ve learned a great deal about South African flora, fauna, and birds.

• I’ve learned that yes, very dangerous snakes do live in my area and they can be found if you look for them.

• I’ve learned that the South African sky is one of the most beautiful in the world.

• I’ve learned how to build a thorn fence (to protect my garden.)

• I’ve learned how to ride the public taxis.

• And sadly, I’ve learned that there are many people, all over the world, who hate Americans simply for being Americans, and some of these are former-Americans themselves (ex-pats).

• I’ve learned that a little village dog can trot her way into my life and provide an affection and companionship I hadn’t realized I was craving.

I’ve learned very many more things in my two years in South Africa; however, I think the most important thing I’ve learned in my time in South Africa, is how much of an American patriot I am. This was a surprising revelation to me, as I’m certainly one to criticize my country and especially its politics. I could barely get out of bed when Bush defeated Kerry in 2004. I had no idea how much I loved my country or how lucky and blessed I feel to have simply been born in the USA. I had no idea how lucky I was to have infrastructure in place to keep me safe and protected: how we have safety codes to protect us from faulty electrical wiring in our buildings and our sewage safely disposed of and away from us; how lucky we are to have regular garbage pick-up and recycling; how lucky we are not to be locked—or have our children locked, with padlocks, inside of buildings that have no fire safety systems such as sprinklers; how lucky we are to have safe public transportation; how lucky we are that our children can attend good schools at no cost and are taught to think critically; how lucky we are to have heated, comfortable safe homes; how lucky we are to live in a democracy not tainted with corruption and the hatred resulting from the recent revolution; how lucky we are to have a safe and varied food supply that provides enjoyment and promotes health; how lucky we are that our children aren’t playing by breaking glass bottles in the streets; how lucky we are that our homes are homes, and not fortresses surrounded by razor wire or elaborate security systems; and how lucky we are that we don’t have armed guards with assault rifles guarding our ATMs.

Of course, these are broad generalizations and of course, we DO, in America, have problems with the exact issues listed above. And we are moving toward living in fortresses, with the trend of the “gated community” and for all I know, we do now have guards armed with assault rifles guarding our ATMs… But, for the most part, I feel very grateful to have such a safe country to return home to and to live in. I have realized how much I truly love my country and that I will likely never again leave it.

And lastly, I’ve learned that although Peace Corps hopes we, as volunteers, aspire to noble deeds, perhaps the noblest of deed is simply that we live with the people in our communities, that we love their children, that we pray with them, that we bury their dead with them, that we ride their dangerous taxis with them, and that we eat their rotten produce with them. Perhaps our willingness to live with the people in our communities and to try to be kind and loving is the noblest of deeds we can aspire to. I hope it has, for my community, mattered a little.

Has serving Peace Corps and living in South Africa changed my life? Of course it has! I left my Louisville home in 2009 at 46 years old, teaching college writing mostly but also developing interests in sustainable agriculture and living “off the grid.” I left Louisville considering a career switch from teaching to working in parks or perhaps moving into environmental education. I left two sons, the love of my life, my church, and my dear, dear family and friends. I left people who have loved me my whole life. I left my beloved city, I left my beloved State, and I left my beloved country.

I will be returning to my country in September of this year, as a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, at 48 years old, to my sons, my family, my friends and my community. I may or may not teach college writing on my return; I may or may not even live in Louisville on my return. My life will be brand new and wide open—a clean slate, so to speak. How much of a life change is that?? The feeling of this brand new life awaiting me is exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

So, have I enjoyed my time in South Africa? I have enjoyed times and moments of my life in South Africa. My life in South Africa has taught me a lot, perhaps mostly it has taught me a lot about myself and how much I love my country Has joining Peace Corps and living in South Africa changed my life?: Most certainly, it has, and more of that will soon be revealed.

Would I do it again? Knowing what I know now, would I join Peace Corps at 46 years old and live and work in South Africa? This is, of course, the “what if” question that I cannot answer at the moment—or perhaps will ever be able to. Maybe in several years, after I see where my life goes and can better tell how the effects of serving South Africa as a Peace Corps Volunteer has had on my life, I will be able to say, with a resounding yes, that, certainly, I would do it all over again. I would do it all over again in a heartbeat! We’ll just have to wait and see.

Soon,
Karen

PS. I couldn’t think of what kind of photos to post with this blog. I hope you enjoy seeing more shots of amazing South African children receiving toy bears from the Mother Bear Project.

On holiday!

2011-04-26T07:41:00.000-07:00

An African Harrier-hawk (Polyboroides typus)
Isn’t he gorgeous?
Photo courteous of www.treknature.com

So, did I mention?--I’m on holiday.

One of the things I love about the South African school year is that there are a LOT of holidays. There are so many national holidays in the last two weeks of April, that we basically have two weeks off from school.

It all started with Good Friday, April 22. No school!

Then, on Monday, April 25, we had a national holiday and no school: Family Day. I tried to find out the meaning of Family Day but could only find that South Africa changed its name from Easter Monday to Family Day in 1995. So, the Easter weekend has always been a long holiday in South Africa, and now, only the name has changed. It seems that several Canadian provinces, Australia, and a few states in the USA also honor Family Day.

Then, tomorrow, April 27, is Freedom Day, and also a national holiday and no school. This day is honored because 4/27/1994 was the day of the first democratic election held in South Africa after the fall of apartheid. Also, on 4/27/1997, the new South African constitution took effect. So, there is indeed, a reason or two to celebrate Freedom Day in South Africa.

And THEN, on Sunday, May 1, South Africa honors Workers Day. However, Monday, May 2 is a national holiday in honor of Workers Day, so there will be no school. I’ve read that the USA doesn’t honor Worker’s Day because of its communist origins, in that the Trade and Labor Unions of South Africa have always had a strong presence and important political influences in South Africa’s history. (Although, the USA does honor its workers and provide a holiday on Labor Day.)

My Easter dinner: curried rice and lentils with pan-roasted vegetables. No ham!

So basically, we have a 12 day holiday at the end of April. Many of my fellow Peace Corps friends are traveling now, because this is the last opportunity for volunteers in my group to travel before we come home.

Why didn’t I travel? Well, there are lots of reasons why I didn’t travel, but to boil it all down, it is because I didn’t want to.

I’m at home taking a “stay-cation.” For long holidays, all of the college kids and many of the college staff leave to spend their holidays with their families. So, everyone is GONE! Long holidays are the only time on campus when it is quiet. I happen to enjoy solitude and quiet, so I’m drinking these days up like a sponge.

I had hoped to use this time to initiate a serious job search so that I’ll have employment on my return home in September. However, when I tried to see about jobs on-line, I felt immediate and intense anxiety. So, I don’t want to be anxious on my holiday and have decided to rest and enjoy myself instead.

The weather here in my part of South Africa has been perfect: the nights are cool and comfortable and the days sunny and breezy. I’ve been taking long walks twice a day, morning and afternoon and am enjoying myself. I’m exploring my community a bit, meeting and talking to people, and exploring the thornveld. (The desert’s version of a “forest.”)

The African sky is breathtaking with its huge, white-puffy clouds blowing over and then the later afternoon appearance of the black-bottomed thunder clouds. I will miss the desert sky of South Africa! It truly has been a 24-hour/7-day a week entertainment source for all of my time in Africa.

Fella, my neighbor’s dog keeps me company, and, as with all dogs all over the world, I suppose, LOVES to go walking. He gets all wiggly and bouncy when he sees me changing clothes for a walk. We have a great time and are doing lots of exploring.

I enjoy having this time to better watch the South African birds and study up on plants and trees. I’m saddened to think about how busy I get with school in session that I rarely take time to enjoy South Africa’s natural world. I guess as with my life in the States, I tend to put all my time and energy into my work. (I was hoping to break that nasty habit!!)

So, I’m on holiday! But you guys have some big holidays in a row too: Easter, Derby, Mother’s Day... Hope you’re enjoying it too!

Soon,

Karen

Ok, here you’ll know I have too much time on my hands.
But this was my African sky, with a rainbow, and if you use your imagination,
and look to the lower-middle of the photo, you can see clouds that look like the shape of the African continent!

Fella is a sweetheart, but he is no Ounaai

2011-04-21T08:35:00.000-07:00

This is Fella. Isn't he gorgeous?

Many of you have followed along with my tale of Ounaai, the little African village dog that adopted me. Ounaai came to me last year when I was feeling particularly vulnerable and wiggled her way into my heart so deeply that I hadn’t realized how deep until recently, when she left, to go live happily-ever-after with a South African family who will take very good care of her. I missed her so much when she first left that I cried for days. And even now, with her gone for over a month, I still think about her and miss her very much. (And will cry if I think about her long enough…)

Prior to Ounaai, I strongly disliked friends and family sentimentalizing their pets in a way that made them the most important members of the family. And although I still try very hard not to sentimentalize my African canine friends, I’m finding myself quite a bit more empathetic to the practice. It simply adds another dimension to a person’s life: to care for a dependant creature who is consistently and overly appreciative of the fact.

Ounaai enriched my life in ways no other living person or animal has since arriving in Africa, nearly two years ago. She was consistently happy to see me, so much so that her whole body wiggled with delight on my returns from work days. She was devoted to me and became very protective of me in the very short time we spent together.

Many of you read of my ordeal at having Ounaai spayed. I invested quite a lot of money, time and care into this animal because, well, at that time I was considering extending my stay in Africa another year or two and wanted to avoid the trauma of dealing with several litters of puppies. And, well, as we’ve come to realize in the US, having pets spayed or neutered is simply the most practical way to deal with exploding pet populations that contribute to the suffering of animals. (Sadly, in rural South Africa, spaying or neutering pets is simply not an option, but my community has many, many starving, suffering, and homeless animals that eat garbage and are shunned by people.) It is heartbreaking.

Having Ounaai spayed became urgent for me in January of this year, because, well, she had gone into heat and I witnessed several attempts at her impregnation. While several strange dogs were hanging around, one in particular seemed a favorite: a quiet, passive dog I recognized from my neighbor’s house.

I have known of this dog all of my time in Africa. I have known of him because he is a fellow-colleague’s dog, or if not a family pet, at least a family-cared-for stray. On my walks around campus, I would pass my colleague’s house and another ferocious dog, chained near the house, would lunge at me, barking and acting like he would free himself and come to maul me. All the while this other dog, unchained and completely unrestrained, would lie passively nearby under the shade of a tree with his eyes turned carefully away in submission. While the aggressive dog barked constantly and loudly, I never heard this other dog make a sound.

So, after Ounaai went into heat, this other gentle dog, whom I’ve come to call Fella, was hanging around and I rushed Ounaai as quickly as I could to the vet to have her spayed. Fella hung around a bit longer after Ounaai’s spay, but he seemed very fearful and afraid of me. He acted like he wanted to follow Ounaai into the house and perhaps eat a bit of her supper, but he always seemed too terrified to come in.

Fella being playful

A month or two after Ounaai’s spay, Fella returned to my house and curled up in the tall grass beside the front steps of my house. He seemed terribly wounded: he had gashes of deep cuts in his legs and seemed listless in a way that I thought he had come to me to die: He wouldn’t even rouse himself to clean the flying insects away from his wounds. I would check on him throughout the day to simply see if he were still breathing.

He stayed for a few days and I began offering him a bit of dry dog food and water, outside the house but near him, and he began to feed. Because he seemed so weak and ill, I added a good dose of vegetable oil to his food for extra energy in what I hoped would help with his healing. Miraculously, he became stronger each and every day, but I still worried about his wounds.

As Fella became stronger, he became more and more interested in Ounaai’s being in the house and no doubt curious about what she was eating. He would timidly venture into the house, just a few steps at a time then fearfully retreat to the safety of outside. He did this for quite a long time, never ever seeming able to overcome his fear of being in the house when a miracle happened: one day it rained and he decided he’d rather be in the warm dry house than out in the cold wet day. He stayed in close proximity to Ounaai though, as if he felt safer beside her.

At last! I had Fella in the house and thought I might get some medicine on those wounds!

Fella has obviously been brutalized by people and will not let anyone near him—myself included. Our most stressful time ever has been when I tricked him to go into a small room in my house, closed the door, and basically lunged after him as he fled from me, racing furiously about the room as I tried to smear antibiotic ointment on his wounds. I got a glob of the ointment on the worst wound, and then gave up, but the experience traumatized us both. It was then that I learned Fella does indeed make a sound: he yelps in terror! Later, I would administer his flea/tick treatment and that experience would prove no better.

It wasn’t long after Ounaai’s spay that I found her a home and Ounaai left us. I was heartbroken, of course, but he would look for her too. I had made several “dog beds” and placed them about the house where she liked to lie as she followed me from room to room, and he would diligently check each bed in each room in hopes of finding her. I would gently whisper to Fella, “I know boy. I miss her too….”

I cried myself to sleep for several nights after Ounaai left. My crying must have distressed Fella, because after a few days, he brought me the “gift” of a dead bird in hopes of consoling me. (Or at least, this is how I’ve interpreted the gesture.)

It has been over a month now, and Fella no longer goes from room to room in search of Ounaai. I still think about her and miss her though, and smile at remembering her thumping tail when she was happy to see me. And, although Fella is a sweet dog, and I’m becoming fonder of him, he is no Ounaai.

We miss Ounaai

For one thing, in appearance, they are very different dogs. Ounaai wasn’t the loveliest of dogs: she was short and squat mongrel, had scars on her face, and her eyes could appear orange in color. Fella is a much larger dog, taller, with a narrow face and gentle, dark eyes. He is very attractive.

For another, Ounaai had a long, thick tail that seemed a fifth leg. When I would go looking for her, she would let me know of her presence by thumping her tail. So, if I was wondering if she were under my bed, I would say, “Are you in here?” and she would reply with a “thump, thump, thump.” I loved hearing the sound of her thumping tail.

Fella, on the other hand, has barely a tail at all. His tail seems bobbed or clipped, although I can’t imagine anyone in the village paying for a dog that is altered in such a way—these dogs are usually very expensive! Are any breeds of dogs ever born with stubs of tails that seem bobbed? It’s taken many weeks for Fella to feel safe enough with me that he will cautiously wag it, but his tail is so short, it makes no sound at all.

Ounaai was sharp as a tack. She was very, very clever. Ounaai would mind my voice commands and was easily trained. She would follow me into my village market and tuck herself under a shady tree to wait for me to finish my shopping so she could walk me home. She was confident and assured. Fella follows me into my village market and feels terrorized, becomes disoriented and flees for home. He’s getting better though, and will usually wait for me at the half way mark between my grocer and home. He is very nervous and afraid.

Ounaai would come running to me when she had a nasty South African thorn in her paw pad; she knew I would remove it. Fella will suffer for weeks with a nasty thorn in his and I pray that a friendly mouse will come along and remove it.

Ounaai stayed out of my way. Although she would follow me from room to room, she would tuck herself up under a piece of furniture or otherwise be out of the way. Fella has decided he likes to lie at the head of my bed and I’m constantly tripping over him. And, as both dogs are outside dogs (read: aren’t bathed), they are unpleasantly fragrant. And Fella is sleeping at the head of my bed… Pee-ew! And he farts too… Eish! Ounaai was very lady-like and did not fart, or not that I noticed.

Ounaai turned her nose up to store-bought dry dog food and I had to work especially hard at “dressing” it to get her to eat it. I would have to sweeten her pot with liquid from the tuna can, olive oil, or pan scrapings to entice her to eat it. She would eat it if hungry enough, but it wasn’t her favorite. Fella, on the other hand, eats it right up. He loves the sound the bag makes and comes running each morning when I prepare to feed him. In fact, while Ounaai would gulp down her cans of nasty wet dog food, Fella won’t touch it. (I learned this fact, sadly, when I had to dig out the pieces of dewormer I had broken up in the wet food hoping he would gulp it down. Yuck!) In this way at least, of eating dry dog food, Fella is easier to care for than Ounaai.

Both dogs submit in a way that they never, ever walk in front of me—always behind, but close behind. I’ve always thought a dog must be trained to do this.

Fella is an unneutered male dog, which I’m learning is much more trouble to deal with than it’s worth! Ounaai, although she would roam, could let herself in and out independently (she was small enough to squeeze through the security bars on my door) and was no trouble at all. Fella, on the other hand, is too large to squeeze through and his roaming urges seem to happen at all hours of the night. I am letting him in and out when I hear him whining. Eish!

Ounaai loved me but was afraid of the camera; Fella is fine with the camera but very afraid of me.

Ounaai was very protective of me. She would gently growl when strangers approached and would bark at night when she was disturbed. Strangers seemed afraid of her. Fella, on the other hand, is absolutely terrified of everything and everyone. I’ve never heard him make a sound, other than his whining to come in or his terrorized yelps when I’m trying to provide some kind of medical care. When strangers approach, he disappears.

However, strangers don’t know this about Fella and just his size and appearance are enough to provide the illusion of protection, or at least I hope this is so. We’ve begun taking long walks together and both of us are enjoying these walks very much. He is beginning to prance and play like Ounaai had, when he realizes I am readying myself for a walk.

It’s amazing watching these creatures transform from quivering, terrified beasts into confident, playful, happy ones. Although I still miss Ounaai sorely, I’m becoming more grateful every day that Fella is around to keep me company.

On my walk to school each day, I pass a starving dog cruelly restrained with about two feet of metal chain. He is scraggly and his eyes are cloudy (a sign of malnutrition.) He is forced to defecate and urinate only inches from where he eats and sleeps and he tries mightily to keep it all neatly mounded and as far from him as possible, as it is rarely removed. My heart aches for this animal and I dread passing by. His spot is in the middle of a dirt yard and he is exposed to the brutally hot sun or the drenching African rain. However, I once passed when his owner was approaching with a plate of food. This dog became animated and playful, leaping excitedly for this attention. I smiled in thinking the animal might know some moments of joy.

The dog died several weeks ago. I would feel sad passing his yard each day, but feel relieved that his suffering had finally ended.

Today when I passed, I realized a new horror awaits: a puppy is chained to the same two feet of metal chain.

Soon,
Karen

Saying “Hello” to my last South African winter

2011-04-20T08:46:00.000-07:00

A favorite to watch in winter, the hoopoe, or Upapa Africana

Photo courtesy of http://www.coda.co.za/

When I arrived in South Africa to begin my two years of Peace Corps service, I had left the mid-summer season of Kentucky to come to South Africa’s ending winter—which meant South Africa would soon be warming up. In other words, I was a very lucky girl to experience two summers in a row. Of course, I didn’t have the foresight to realize that, two years later, when leaving South Africa to return to Kentucky, I would weather two winters: We’re entering our winter in South Africa (as you are entering your summer in the States) and when I arrive back home in September, the USA, or at least the Kentuckiana region, will be preparing for the winter season. Drats!

Oh well. I guess having two winters in a row is payment enough for having two summers in a row!

As I write this, I have my first season’s batch of cornbread in the oven and am pan-roasting some root vegetables: two of my favorite wintertime foods.

On arriving in Africa, I was lucky enough to meet and spend a few days with the Peace Corps Volunteer who served at my site prior. She explained South Africa’s season’s in this way: There are really only two: summer and winter. And she’s spot-on! Luckily for us, however, the South African summer is much longer than the South African winter!

In hoping to garden for most of my time in South Africa, I took daily notes on the weather for over a year. This information helps me watch for similar weather conditions this year. According to my notes, by April 22 last year, I was already wearing a coat and gloves. Although we’re not quite that cold yet, I have retired my fan and have donned my pink fleecy pajama pants with green frogs on them. My sister sent me these and I just love them. They are silly enough that I’d never buy such an item for myself but they are such fun I always smile the whole time I wear them. They make me very happy and I’m so glad she sent them.

I’m sure I’ll be digging my heater out from its storage box very soon.

Speaking of my heater… Last year I survived nearly the whole winter without having a heater, but it was an unfortunate and unnecessary experience. To try to live in South Africa without a heater in wintertime is simply TOO PAINFUL. There was no escaping from the painful cold: as soon as I got myself out of bed each morning, I never seemed to thoroughly warm up. My hands and feet were always icy. Going to work at either the primary school or the college provided no relief, as neither the college nor primary school buildings have central heat. I would find myself always in search of a thermostat to turn the heat up, and of course, the thermostat was never to be found! I finally broke down and purchased a heater at the end of winter last year, and felt much more comfortable. I can keep the heater in one small room in my house and close the door, and be toasty and warm. So I’m grateful I will have this important coziness the all of my last winter in Africa.

A favorite to watch in winter, the blue waxbill, or Uraeginthus angolensis
Photo courtesy of www.flickr.com

In summertime, the African days are long enough and the sun hot early enough that I can launder and line-dry every washable item in my house in one single day! With the approaching cold, I’m noticing that I feel lucky to get one or two loads of laundry washed and line-dried by the end of the day—and very often, even after drying all day, they’re still not crisply dry like they are in summer.

With the approaching winter, I’ll soon resume my favorite practice of feeding and watering the wild birds. I cease feeding them in summer because, well, there is plenty of food for them to eat and the only birds that seem to frequent my feeding station in summer are the pigeons, which get on my nerves. I’ve already noticed some of my favorite wintertime birds; I don’t think these birds disappear in summer, but I think with the summer’s grass mown, my favorites are easier to see. I’m posting photos of my favorites. These photos are not mine—I don’t have camera equipment of high enough quality to shoot fine photos of wildlife—especially of birds that are in constant motion. These photos are gleaned from the internet.

I think I naturally withdraw a bit and somewhat hibernate when the winter months and cold weather come: I sometimes wonder if I weren’t a bear in a previous life. I’m finding this tendency beginning already, and I’m withdrawing a bit. Now that the afternoon air temperatures are milder, I’ve taken to going for long, late-afternoon walks with Fella (my surrogate African dog), and we seem to avoid people at all costs. I love these walks; it is the only time of my day I don’t have to experience the “fishbowl” effect. Peace Corps warned us of the “fishbowl effect,” and it is the same phenomenon that must drive celebrities absolutely bonkers: being the constant source of curiosity to every single person on the planet each and every single day. The stress of it is constant and relentless. I long to return home and resume my very-much-taken-for-granted ability to blend in and remain an ordinary Joe; to be simply just another Bozo on the bus; to have the ability to hide in a crowd and remain anonymous. I want to come home to people who simply do not care who I am!!

It seems I’ll be spending my last remaining months in Africa working primarily with orphans and vulnerable children. This is fine with me. I’ve had the chance to work with the college, the primary school, and now orphans and vulnerable children and my Pudimoe community.

Ok Kentucky… As your warming and sowing your season’s seeds, I’m gearing up to endure two winters in a row! Wish me luck!

Soon,
Karen

My pink, fleecy pajama pants with green frogs on them!

The King's Speech

2011-04-18T06:39:00.000-07:00

''Movie poster courtesy of See-Saw Pictures/Bedlam Productions”

I’ve only now seen the 2010 British historical drama, The King’s Speech, and enjoyed it so much I watched it twice—and paid a fortune to do so! Of course, it’s old news to you guys, as earlier this year the film won four Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Director for Tom Hooper, Best Actor for Colin Firth, and Best Screenplay for David Seidler.

This film features the enormously talented Colin Firth, who deservedly won the
Academy Award for Best Actor, but I have only this to say about the film: Geoffry Rush, Geoffry Rush, and Geoffry Rush!

I was introduced to Geoffry Rush’s enormously talented acting in his 1996 film, Shine, and have been a devoted fan since, but I delighted in every moment of Rush’s performance in The King’s Speech. Rush’s acting in this film is simply flawless and The King’s Speech showcases his talents brilliantly. Rush’s performance absolutely steals the show!

The King’s Speech dramatizes the story of King George VI of England’s ascension to the throne after his brother Edward VIII abdicated his rule prior to the beginning of World War II. Although based on historical facts, the film dramatizes the relationship that developed between the reluctant king, George VI, played by Firth, and his speech therapist, Lionel Logue, played by Rush, hired to help the King overcome his embarrassing and un-king-like stammer. The acting of both Firth and Rush is a delight to watch in the seeming sparring match as the men build a tenuous-at-first but ultimately a rich, lifelong relationship between a common man and a royal.

As with the 2006 film, The Queen, starring Helen Mirren, which depicts the lives of the royals in the wake of the tragedy of the death of Princess Diana, The King’s Speech beautifully allows us entry and an insider’s view into the lives of the royal family and what challenges they face as human beings, even though they are under enormous pressure to rise above the thoughts, feelings, and reactions to events as contrasted to those of “the common man.” Stories such as these make the families of the British monarchy more accessible to us all residing in the realm of the “common man.”

Also, since I’ve lived in the time of the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, it was great fun to see her portrayed as a child along with her sister, Princess Margaret, under the care of their royal parents. And it was fun too, to see a more playful, witty side of the Queen Mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, in her younger years played by the wonderful Helena Bonham Carter.

The story is based on true events but the historical facts are altered to increase the dramatic effect of the film. In particular, the film has been criticized for the portrayal of Winston Churchill’s part in the abdication crisis. In history, Churchill urged King Edward the VII to resist abdicating the throne, but in the film he supports the abdication. It is also said the characters of King Edward and King George V were made more antagonistic than they actually were to increase the dramatic effects of the film as well.

I was delighted in the casting of this film: the roles seem tailor-made for every actor. I can’t imagine anyone better to play the Queen Mother, Helena Bonham Carter, another fabulous actress and a favorite of mine, and Guy Pearce’s performance of King Edward VIII is delightfully wicked. The casting choice of Timothy Spall as Winston Churchill has been criticized, but I found him fine in the role. The more I see of Michael Gambon the more I like and he was a perfect choice to play the superbly strong but ultimately ailing King George V.

At first I was put off by the very dark and murky tone of Danny Cohen’s cinematography: the film seems washed in dark gray tones and I felt I was in a depressing cave the whole time viewing the film. However, such cinematography wonderfully captures the mood and dreariness of nineteenth century England at the beginning of another World War as Hitler and Nazism came to power. The costume designer Jenny Beaven was spot-on and it was fun to see the royals decked out in their impeccable clothes as contrasted to the attire of Logue and his family’s “commoner’s” fashion.

Again, I delighted in the film and felt a personal connection as I’ve lived in the time of the reign of the current Queen, Elizabeth II. I loved an insider’s seat to the story of her mother and father and I found myself, a closeted anglophile, running to brush up on my British history as soon as I left the theater. This film is a definite must-see if you missed it—and Geoffry Rush single-handedly steals the show!

Health Symposium, Spider bites, and sight-seeing in Pretoria

2011-04-16T03:04:00.000-07:00

Union Buildings in Pretoria

Hello all!

Peace Corps provides its in-country volunteers with training opportunities throughout a volunteer’s service. For example, we’re provided six weeks of training when we first arrive in-country to prepare us for living in a new country with a new language, a new culture, and (usually) new work assignments.

We’re provided more opportunities for training as our time passes: training opportunities to prepare us for teaching life skills and permagarden skills for our schools and communities; training opportunities to prepare us for grant writing; training opportunities to prepare us for community and school project management; and training opportunities to prepare us for helping our schools or NGOs with organizational development.

As a volunteer nearing my Close of Service (my Peace Corps contract ends in September of this year), I thought my training opportunities had all passed. However, I was surprised and delighted to learn that Peace Corps, in partnership with PEPFAR (The U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), was hosting yet one more training opportunity for me to attend: a Health Symposium hosted in a hotel near Pretoria for a week.

Often, our trainings invite us to bring along our counterpart from our communities: the people we most closely work with in our schools. My counterpart is a superstar teacher from my primary school, Rebecca, and also an HOD (Head of Department) in our school. She has accompanied me to all of the Peace Corps trainings I’ve attended in South Africa.

It’s strange, because as Rebecca and I live in the same community and work for the same school, you’d think we’d have all the time in the world to discuss matters related to our primary school. But for some reason, we seem to “fire up” for these training sessions and not only do we benefit from the actual training sessions, we also benefit from having this concentrated time together to think and talk about projects for our school. In every training, we seem to put our heads together and get really excited about projects for our school.

This time together was no exception; in fact, I think it was the best training time ever for us to spend together. There was, however, one problem.

The Friday before I was to travel to Pretoria, I noticed an especially itchy, what I thought at the time, a mosquito bite. Other than the itchiness and trying not to scratch it, I didn’t pay the bite much mind. (Due to the rain, the mosquitoes at my sight had become very bad, but in my stubbornness at witnessing the splendor of the South African sunsets, I continued to sit on my porch steps each evening for the sky show—and of course, was eaten alive each evening by mosquitoes! But it was worth it!)

Rebecca and I spent all day Sunday on the taxi travelling from Pudimoe to Pretoria. When we arrived, I noticed a sharp pain on the inside of my left leg. I would soon learn that my lymph nodes, in my groin area, were swollen in reaction to the insect bite.

On Monday, sessions started and my leg at the bite site became very painful and the bite was growing bigger and looking more threatening. By Tuesday, I had contacted Peace Corps medical and by that evening, had started antibiotics. Even with the medication, the wound and the pain from it seemed to worsen and I was also experiencing other unpleasant symptoms: head/body aches, fever/chills, malaise and I started developing shooting pains from the insect bite.

Throughout all of this, I attended sessions and felt Rebecca and I were doing very good work together. By Thursday though, I could bear it no more and left the Health Symposium to seek medical attention in Pretoria. (The hotel of the conference was located just south of Pretoria.)

I hated to leave Rebecca and the good work we were doing, but, well, I was no longer able to function on a professional level. She was able to remain at the Health Symposium and complete the training, even though I felt dreadful leaving her.

Long story short: my doctors were never completely convinced of the cause of my bite or the illness that may or may not have resulted from it. The doctors kept me in Pretoria much longer than I wanted just to monitor my condition and watch how I reacted to and recovered with the antibiotics. I was not able to return to Pudimoe until Wednesday, the week after the Health Symposium finished.

Now, a bit of information on me and Pretoria. I don’t visit Pretoria often and I usually only visit for medical reasons. If I am visiting Pretoria for a medical reason, I usually don’t feel very good. There are tons of fun things to do in Pretoria, but again, I have only visited Pretoria when I wasn’t feeling well and haven’t had the opportunity to “site see” in the Jacaranda City.

So, last week, I was in Pretoria, not feeling well, but staying in this dark, damp, depressing hostel room that felt filthy. I didn’t feel I was in a situation that fostered recovery so I did everything I could to get out of that filthy room every day, even though I didn’t feel well. (Peace Corps does provide a very nice venue for recuperating volunteers, but I was told “you must have a broken leg or something” to stay there.)

So, I got out every day and hobbled about Pretoria. Interestingly, I saw more sights on this visit to Pretoria than I’ve had in nearly two years of living in South Africa.

A dear and new friend Amy B, helped me hobble to the lovely Union Buildings of Pretoria, and graciously took these photos that you see here. If I look a bit green around the gills, it is because I was feeling a bit green around the gills. The buildings were absolutely lovely and I couldn’t believe how lush and well-kept the grounds were. It is now my favorite place in Pretoria and I’m so glad Amy helped me to get there.

I, with vendors in the background, standing beside some fabulous scarlett sage.

Here is a bit of information about the Union Buildings of Pretoria, taken from the 2004 edition of Lonely Planet’s South Africa: Lesotho & Swaziland:

“These buildings are the headquarters of government, South Africa’s equivalent to the Kremlin. The impressive red sandstone structures—with a self-conscious imperial grandeur—are surrounded by expansive gardens and are home to the presidential offices.

The architect was Sir Herbert Baker, who was responsible for many of the best public buildings constructed immediately after the Union of South Africa was formed” (411).

Since the buildings are an actual operating seat of the government, South African President Jacob Zuma may have been there that very day! And Mandela gave a historical speech from there on his release from prison. Thanks Amy for the lovely photos!

Again, I was in Pretoria, somewhat against my will and very uncomfortable. In the end, I convinced the drs. to let me return to Pudimoe to finish my recovery. Although the bite and the illness still remain something of a mystery, I feel it was a spider bite, rather than an infected mosquito bite, that caused my illness.

I’m very glad to be back in Pudimoe where I feel much more able to rest and better recover. So, sorry so quiet, but that is what has been up with me!

Soon,
Karen

Film Review: Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility

2011-03-30T10:40:00.000-07:00

''Movie poster courtesy Columbia Pictures”

Another indulgence…

Hello all, I’m practicing my skills at reviewing films… Will you be my practice audience?

If my choice of films seems odd, keep in mind that I’m reviewing what I have on hand, what I’ve borrowed from other Peace Corps volunteers, and what family and friends have sent me from the States. In other words, I’ve not chosen the films I’d like to review, but am going with what I have at my disposal. So, in this way, this will be good practice: I imagine film reviewers seldom get a choice in their film selections for writing assignments.

Sense and Sensibility is a film released in 1995 starring Emma Thompson, a very young Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant, and Alan Rickman. The film is directed by Ang Lee and Emma Thompson wrote, and won an Academy Award, for the screenplay.

I love Ang Lee as a film director. He is an absolutely amazing filmmaker and he won my heart forever with his Brokeback Mountain. As a director, he simply adores landscapes and captures scenery in a way that engorges his films with breathtaking beauty. And as Sense and Sensibility is a period piece based on the Jane Austen novel of the same name, the setting is early nineteenth century England full its dramatic aristocratic residences, dramatic aristocratic gardens, and dramatic aristocratic ladies and gentlemen in their period costumes riding around in lovely horse-drawn carriages. The film was shot in some of the most historic manors in all of England, including Saltram House, Compton Castle, and Trafalgar House.

The story follows a family of women who have recently lost their husband/father and his fortune, which then by law falls to the distant son. As a standard of the times, the women’s lives revolve around pursuing a marriage in the prosperous ranks and all of the worry and disappointments that go along with such a pursuit. Lee’s drama follows Elinor Dashwood, played by Emma Thompson, and Marianne Dashwood, played by Kate Winslet, in their pursuits of love and marriage. The sisters represent the “sense” and “sensibilities” of such endeavors: Elinor is the sensible one while Marianne is caught up in passion. Austen’s novel, as does the film, critiques the inequalities of women’s rights at the time: women weren’t allowed to even earn an income.

For modern day audiences, both now and when the film was originally released in 1995, a period drama showcasing the early nineteenth century lifestyles of English aristocracy, revolving around manners, etiquette, and culture of a time and place we have no relation to, is quite a stretch. In short, Americans are used to, and demand, quick paced stories set in current times with high-action and added special effects. Can one endure two hours of characters bowing politely with lowered eyes before resuming their needle point?

The answer is a resounding yes, but only with Thomson’s top-notch writing and Lee’s superb directing. Although Thompson herself plays the part of Elinor Dashwood, it is said Thompson wrote the screenplay with a much younger actress in mind—she had intended for Vanessa Redgrave’s’ daughters Natasha and Joely Richardson to play the parts of the sisters—and balked when Lee suggested Thompson play the character of Elinor, on the basis that she, Thompson, was too old. However, Lee insisted and Thompson was cast, of course, and the rest is history. Of course, Emma Thompson, the stellar actress that she is, does a wonderful turn with Elinor. However, I could not help but wish for the casting to have matched Rickman and Thompson as lovers and Grant and Winslet as a pair instead of the reverse. Of course, my casting would have proven untrue to Austen’s novel but in Ang Lee’s film, the love interests seemed inauthentic and I feel would have played better with the switch. Good thing I’m not Ang Lee, eh?

Greg Wise plays a wonderfully dashing scoundrel in John Willoughby that all but ruins Marianne, and it’s great fun to see performances of the supporting cast including Tom Wilkinson (too-brief an appearance!), Hugh Laurie, and Jemma Jones. Harriet Walter, as Fanny Ferrars Dashwood, and Elizabeth Spriggs, as Mrs. Jennings, are both a hoot!

The movie is lush valentine to nineteenth century England in landscapes, interiors, and manners and the acting is superb. Do yourself a turn and seek out Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibilities and be sure to watch out for the “period” sheep!

See you in Aug/Sept,
Karen

Contraception everywhere!

2011-03-29T06:36:00.000-07:00

I’ve never been surrounded by so much contraception in my life! I have over 800 male condoms, just under 100 female condoms, and birth control pills in my house! Why so much birth control for one, nearly-fifty year old woman who is not sexually active with others?

I walk by my garbage can and there are open, discarded condoms in my trash. The birth control pills? I’m taking them.

When I learned I was coming to live and work with South Africa in the United States Peace Corps, I knew two things about South Africa: a) that South Africa was the home of one of the greatest leaders in the history of the world, Nelson Mandela; and b) that South Africa’s people were dying in droves of HIV/AIDS.

As an education volunteer, I knew I would be coming to South Africa with a primary assignment to teach English. As with all developing nations, everyone wants to learn English, the global language, the language one “must know” if one wants to succeed in the business world. I couldn’t help but think to myself, “What’s the use of learning English if you’re only going to die from HIV/AIDS?”

Well, the good news is that as a Peace Corps volunteer, you can teach English and involve yourself with HIV/AIDS projects. This is what I’ve tried to do.

I originally hoped to have a “film club” project at the college with three goals: teach film studies (or at least promote interest in film), provide a safe recreational past-time for the college kids (I was hoping for a weekend “movie night,” on campus, for Friday and Saturday nights), AND to sneak in HIV/AIDS education (I hoped to scheme a plan to provide “free movie admission” for anyone interested in attending an HIV/AIDS discussion—come to my AIDS talk, see a movie for free!). So, I skipped off to the local health clinic and carried home 800 male condoms and 100 female condoms and applied for a grant for the movie equipment.

Well, it’s a year and a half later, the condoms are still in my house and I’ve resorted to using them for DVD repair. (Hence, the open, somewhat-used, discarded male condoms in my trash can: the lubricant from the condoms supposedly repairs scratches on DVDs.)

I had asked for the female condoms because I hoped to have separate HIV/AIDS talks for guys and gals. The burden of practicing safe-sex in South Africa (well, really, in probably every part of the world) lies with the woman. Due to cultural demands on female and male gender roles, the males hold the power and very much dislike using condoms, and it can become a power play if a female requests the use of a condom. I had hoped to have small, informal group discussion with the college girls to help them understand that female condoms are available and to help them understand how to use them. (A first for me: I inserted my first female condom in South Africa; I thought I’d better be ready to answer any question!) When I asked for the female condoms from the clinic, the nurse was very reluctant to give them to me because of the expense: she fussed, “I’d better not see any of these girls wearing the rings as bracelets!” (The female condom has two flexible rings to hold the condoms in place, and yes, the rings are flexible and large enough for the girls to wear as bracelets. ) I promised I would not distribute the condoms without educating first.

So, there in my room lies a box of nearly 100 female condoms.

So why do I still have them?

Cultural attitudes, that’s why. There is very much a parental disapproval of the dispersal of condoms on college campuses because they feel the college is promoting sexual behavior among the students. Not only is it the parents that feel this way, but it’s also the college educators that feel this way. There is some truth to this, that sexual behavior is likely to increase. However, I feel that kids will have sex anyway so why not give them the means to protect themselves? Mine is, of course, an American attitude and American attitudes often aren’t well received in rural South Africa.

The condoms are currently provided by the college but the kids have to ask for them from their Student Support Officer. Furthermore, the South African government has made condoms available to all South African citizens through the nation’s health clinics. When I talk to the kids about this, they say when they go to the clinic, or even the Student Support Officer, they feel the health care workers shame the kids about having sex, something along the lines of “You’re too young, you shouldn’t be having sex,” etc., so the kids avoid going to the clinic for free condoms.

Well, yeah! Come on people! College-age kids are nothing but walking hormone-producing, nothing-but-sex-wanting machines! And it’s killing them and it’s killing the future generations of South Africans because they’re having unprotected sex!

I have tried to sneak condoms into the dormitories and public restrooms on the campus, only to find whole packages with 12 or more condoms inside, thrown on the ground, in a defiant, “No one’s telling me to use condoms!” There is dreadful misinformation and rumors about condom use and the spread of AIDS in rural South Africa: one such devastating rumor is that the condom is intentionally infected with the HIV virus and therefore to use a condom is spreading HIV. By the way, it is biologically impossible for the HIV virus to remain alive in the prepackaged condom-environment.

Also, I detect an attitude of disdain at one more white, talking head telling black South Africans what they should do about HIV/AIDS. When I told them about meeting a man that was living with HIV for over thirty years, the kids countered, “Well, yeah, that’s because he’s white.” Their argument: white people have all the advantages. And, well, yeah, he is white.

So, I’d all but given up on the film club, but this is still a teeny, eeny, weeney chance it may still pull through. We’ll see. I’m running out of time… And quickly running out of time…

Oh, the birth control pills? I’m taking them. Eish! At nearly 50 years old, my body has decided to throw the hormones out of whack and the pills are to help it, my body, get back on track. (Sorry guys, I know you don’t like hearing about it—try living with it.)

So, here’s a girl that is all dressed up with nowhere to go!

See you in Aug/Sept,
Karen

PS. Condom payload update: I had approached my campus manager about his supporting condom distribution in the dormitories and public restrooms, so he knew of my significant “stash.” He called me this morning, to ask if I might carry the boxes of condoms to the Student Support Officer’s Office. Apparently, our campus, in its upcoming audit, will earn a “nonconformance” for not having any condoms on hand for the students. My contribution of condoms to the college now, although they may never be used by the college kids as intended, and therefore may never be used for STD/early-pregnancy prevention, has saved the college from a “non-conformance” on its audit. Eish! All form, no function!

Beginning goodbyes…

2011-03-27T05:15:00.000-07:00

My African spinach (amaranth) going to seed.

For many days during my Peace Corps South Africa experience, I wondered whether or not I would be able to remain in Africa and complete my Peace Corps service. This African world is very different from mine and I’ve had a hard, hard time adjusting. If a volunteer chooses to end their service early, before the 27 month time commitment is finished, the official term for the volunteer’s Peace Corps status is “Early Termination.” There have been times in my two years in South Africa that I’ve contemplated “early terminating.” When I would think thoughts of going home early however, I realized that if I did terminate my service early, that I would need at least six months to tell everybody goodbye, so I might as well stay. I would need at least six months to disassemble my house and distribute it to community members and I would need at least six months to mentally, emotionally, and spiritually prepare myself for the return home.

Obviously, as I’m still here in South Africa, I haven’t terminated my service early. As you may not know, I’m now within my six-month window of officially returning home. Official in that my service contract with Peace Corps officially ends September 16, 2011. So, I have six months to tell South Africa goodbye.

I am saying goodbye to my last summer and last rainy season in South Africa. The rain has transformed our little college campus into a vibrant, bustling wetland: dragonflies buzz by my open windows; the South African weed, blackjack, is taller than I; my equally tall amaranth is turning to seed; the black-headed heron is perched on a telephone pole outside my doorway each morning, surveying his domain; the grass is growing so tall and so quickly, the job of cutting it has overwhelmed the regular campus yardmen and the task has been contracted out. The blooms of the wild zinnia are fading and a lovely, lovely weed that smells like marigolds--is in bloom. I never did learn what this weed is, but I love it and I and delight in it. This will be the last time I see it. The field beside my house still bustles with butterflies pollinating the late season African weeds and the moths with the big eyes on their backs swarm into my house each night, attracted by my reading light.

My last African garden is fading and I’ve harvested the last of my tomatoes, okra, and wild spinach. There are watermelons yet to be harvested, however--they’ve come from volunteer seed that very much enjoyed my trenched bed. I hope I enjoy the watermelons as much! They’ll have to ripen before the killing frost, which will probably come mid-April. I’m not sure there is enough time for them to ripen.

I’m trying my best to sit with each one South Africa’s dramatic sunsets and hope to not miss a single one. Of all the things I’ll miss most of South Africa, I believe it is the South African sky that I’ll long for. There are very few days that pass in South Africa where the sky, in and of itself, isn’t completely engrossing in its dramatic beauty. I’ve spent many a late afternoon/early evening just sitting and staring at it. I’ll also miss the spray of the Milky Way that I can see outside my windows at night—so many stars! It is so, so beautiful and reminds me of the magnificence of the universe. I hope to spend time with each remaining full moon in Africa before I come home as well. The swell of the full moon in Africa makes my heart ache. And I will be careful to rise with each African dawn.

The heat of the South African summer has almost ceased for this season. So I’m saying goodbye to the hot African heat! Many would think it unbearable, but it was not for me. However, I love the hot, humid, sticky heat of the Ohio River Valley as well! At times, it would be very, very hot, but I wouldn’t notice until I picked up my phone and wondered why it was hot to the touch; or turn on the tap water, and wonder why the water was hot. I would, however, notice the heat of the African sun in late afternoon, when it would become so hot I would flee my caravan home in fear of baking myself alive. In these last few days, I’ve noticed in late afternoon, “The fan is not on and it’s 5:00 pm, what is wrong with this picture?” I know that summer is fading and I need to tell it goodbye.

For both of my summers in South Africa, I’ve had the pleasure of befriending a spider. For my first summer in Africa, I befriended an amazingly dramatic garden spider, situated up nicely in a thick bush of lavender. She was green and yellow like our yellow/black garden spiders, but her body had jagged edges instead of a smooth, oblong shape. I would visit her each day and delighted in her and in her web “spring.” She looked ferocious, but I knew that was a part of her strategy to deter predators. Although she would certainly harm a fly, she wouldn’t at all harm a person—other than with fright! I remember feeling sad at the end of that first summer, when she expired, as all spiders do. And I missed my evening strolls to check on her. Similarly, I had a spider friend this summer, a different kind of spider, who spun her web outside my living room window. I would spend my evenings watching her repair her web. I don’t know what kind of spider she was, but she was brown and chunky with red markings on her belly. She would disappear during the day, and just as night began to fall, and without fail, she would drop down and begin her evening of acrobatics backlit by the dramatic African sunset. I enjoyed her company very much. One day this week, she was out earlier than usual and hanging in her web in an unspiderly fashion. “Uh, oh,” I thought. Yep, her time had come too. I still pull my chair to the window each evening to watch the sunset, but I feel lonely without her.

Bad shot of me--nothing but nostrils--ok shot of Ounaai, but you can tell she's afraid of the camera.
This was our last day together.

I had to say goodbye to another of my companions this week: I let go of my little girl dog, Ounaai.

My aunt has had dogs in her life, but when she lost her last one, over 10 years ago, she said, “No more.” When asked why, she replies, “Because it hurts too much to lose them.”

When I first read Isak Dinesen’s Out of Africa, I was horrified at learning she wanted to shoot her African horses and dogs before she returned to Denmark. I remember thinking to myself, “What a cold and heartless woman.” However, I did not understand Ms. Dinesen’s motive; I did not understand it at all. I believe I’ve come to understand her motive now: She didn’t want to leave her beloved animals behind to suffer neglect, cruelty, starvation, or mistreatment. She would rather have shot them then worry of their suffering.

Ounaai became very dear to me very quickly and it was painful to let her go, but I knew I had to find her a home before I left Africa. Yes, I could have brought her home with me to the USA, but such a choice is simply not practical.

Ounaai has gone to live with a friend who owns a farm about an hour from where I live. His yard is fenced (so she’ll be safe) and the house is home for my friend and his mother, and they have a dog and two cats. Ounaai knows and loves this friend—he feeds her grilled meat!—so she’s not gone off to strangers.

The day before she would be leaving, I spent as much time with her as I could and took care to play with her lots and love her up well before she left. She, of course, did not know she would be leaving, so was completely unaware of the cause of my extra attentions. I don’t think she noticed my breaking heart either. I realized I had no photos of her and I together, so I tried to take one. Ounaai is very, very afraid of the camera and hates it very much, so I only took one shot instead of tormenting her on our last day together. Sorry, the photo is terrible of me—nothing but nostrils—but somewhat good of her.

The next morning, her new owner drove up and she was very happy to see him. I walked her to the car, picked her up, gave her a few extra smooches, and placed her in the car, and she was off! She was a very good dog for me, and I hated to see her go, but I knew it best.

I was unprepared for the hurt I would have at her loss. I hadn’t realized what a sentimental old goose I am, to have become so attached to this little dog. I guess there is a lot to be said for a creature who provides consistent love and affection to another creature who lives in a world she feels unwanted and unloved in.

I moped and cried for days feeling overwhelmingly blue. Fella, a neighbor’s dog, who has kept me company in Ounaai’s absence, even brought me a gift hoping to help cheer me (I’ll spare you of telling what the “gift” was.”) He was missing her too.

I miss her very much and still find myself looking for her, more than a week later.

I want to thank my parents, publicly, for helping pay to have her “cleaned up,” especially for helping me have her spayed. Although I hate the lost expense—and her spay was very expensive--I don’t believe my friend (or anyone else) would have wanted her if she weren’t. So thanks Nan and Pap, for helping me get my puppy a good home. She was a very good companion for me and had a lot to do with my finding happiness in Africa. Memories of her will be favorites from my Peace Corps experience.

So I’m saying goodbye to my last African summer, saying goodbye to my last African rainy season, and saying goodbye to a few of my important, South African friends. I have another South African winter to get through—Brrr!—but it will too be a last for me, so I don’t want to miss a moment!

See you in Aug/Sept,
Karen

A decent shot of Ounaai: she's unaware of the camera.
You get a sense of what a happy dog she is.

James Cameron's Avatar

2011-03-22T08:24:00.000-07:00

Ok, ok, I’ve only now seen James Cameron’s 2009 film, Avatar. Give me a break—I’m living and working in rural South Africa!

The short of it—I loved it!

Ok, ok, I know James Cameron’s films can be hokey and predictable. I know there is something obscene about supporting the work of a man that produces films that earn $760 million; I know he can be a bit clumsy in portraying delicate themes--like, spirituality; and I know we have to endure yet one more scene with a busty, gutsy woman in a white tank top, but you’ve got to admit: if you want a visually-stunning, sensory feast, then Cameron, more often than not, delivers!

Avatar is another telling of the Pocahontas/John Smith story, whereby an outsider comes into an indigenous culture and brings along a whole slew of incoming imperialists to harvest all the available riches and throw the indigenous ways of life into ruin. In this case, the imperialist is the overinflated, non-stoppable machinery of American capitalism and greed—and of course, the bad guys are coming into Paradise to ruin everything.

Cameron’s computer generated film is gorgeous. Cameron has always worked on the cutting edge of developing cinematic technology and it is said Cameron waited a few years for the technology to advance well enough to reach the vision he demanded for Avatar. He spent a lot of time under the sea filming other projects, mostly documentaries inspired by his oceanic filming of Titanic. The influence of Cameron’s long time spent under water is beautifully reflected in the landscapes and movement in Avatar: everything is vibrant in color, and even though Pandora is depicted as a lush rainforest, the flora is reminiscent of coral in its vibrancy and all movement in the film, from the humanoids to the seeds of trees, flows through the air as it would flowing under water.

The actors for this film are new to me: Sam Worthington plays the male protagonist and Zoe Saldana plays the female protagonist. While the film is computer generated, Cameron used sensory data (from electrodes attached to the actors’ faces) to portray emotion and gestures. By Cameron’s account, the film is 60% computer generated and 40% live action. Cameron’s heroines ultimately defeat the bad guy in all of his films, but Cameron’s female characters endure bone-crunching brutality in their quests. I wasn’t sure if Worthington would be able to carry off the task of becoming our hero, but handled the responsibility of a star turn quite well. I was impressed Saldana immediately. By the end of the film, I was online to see where else I could find these actors. Stephen Lang, of course, makes a great, Cameron-film bad-guy and it was fun to see some of the power-house, human-movement-generated robot concepts from the Aliens movies of twenty years ago.

Although it is evident why Cameron cast Sigourney Weaver in Avatar—she was showcased and ultimately a breakout actress in Cameron’s Aliens film in 1986--, Weaver seemed uncharacteristically vacant and detached from the role of the saucy and bold Dr. Grace Augustine. Even Weaver’s avatar wasn’t convincing: Weaver’s avatar seemed a young, hip, twenty-year old to Weaver’s sixty year old Grace Augustine.

The highlight of the film for me, is Cameron’s film embracing and celebrating the Gaia Theory, which views the Earth as a planet as a living organism in and of itself. I love this theory and often think of Mother Earth giving us her best doggie shake to knock all of these destructive human fleas (us!) off of her at any time now. By using the Gaia Theory as the central theme for the film, Cameron easily incorporates Native American Indian spirituality that celebrates earth and nature as “all of creation” and reinforces what all good naturalists everywhere know: all things on Earth are connected!

Soon,
Karen

PS. I hope you don’t mind the aside… It’s an indulgence. I’ve often wanted to review a film and now I have!

PSS. I’m posting a photo of me and a Mother Bear Project bear “dressed” in military camouflage. (The bear is not for me—it will go to a child—but I thought it darling… I LOVE camouflage. I wish I had brought my camouflage pants to Africa!) Other than avoiding Cameron suing me for copyright infringement (for using images that promote his film), can anyone tell my why else I might choose this bear in posting about Cameron’s film?

Come on! Let’s run errands in my shopping town!

2011-03-20T08:17:00.000-07:00

I'm showing you pictures of rainbows that have been gracing my sky the last couple of nights. Believe me; you don't want to see photos of my shopping town. Imagine the shopping areas of Preston Highway or Dixie Highway... Yep, that's what my shopping town looks like—U-G-L-Y!

I normally loathe going to my shopping town. Just the thought of the taxi rides coming and going can keep me home-bound longer and eating rice and lentils much longer than necessary. This isn’t so much a South African thing (although the taxi rides don’t help!) as a Karen thing: I’m known to procrastinate and put off shopping trips and errand running in the States too.

I do whine long and loudly about the need to visit Vryburg, my shopping town, when necessities run low. Which is why I was so surprised that, for the first time since arriving in Africa, I actually enjoyed a visit to my shopping town!

Recap:
• I use my mental crow-bar to pry myself from my home and head for the taxi to town. I have my shopping bags, sunhat, sunglasses, and umbrella at hand. The sun is shining; it will be fine.

• My ride on the taxi can take 40 minutes to an hour, depending on how full the taxi is and how long we have to wait for other riders. I’m lucky: I rarely wait more than 20 minutes for a taxi to fill and head to town. As my taxi heads north to Vryburg, four adult men engage in a spirited conversation about I-don’t-know-what (the conversation is in Setswana) but I’m more than a bit troubled by the fact that the phrase “protective order” keeps repeating throughout the conversation, for the whole of the 40 minute ride, and is met with rousing jocularity and hilarity. (I worry that these adult males think it’s funny that a woman has taken out a legal protective order against one of these men because of battering and that they think it hilarious.)

• I ask to be dropped a the “cemetery,” which is a bit out of the ordinary (for a white, American woman to be asking to be dropped at a very, very large, black South African cemetery) and a quiet falls over the taxi as I climb out of it. I’m not going to the cemetery; I’m going to the State Veterinarian’s Office that is on the same road as the cemetery. (If you’re curious as to why I was going to the vet’s office, see my blog:

http://karenkaye789.blogspot.com/2011/03/ounaai-suffers-my-improving.html

• After an entertaining visit with the veterinarian, (he coached me as how to better administer a vaccine and we chatted about a dog’s recovery from the bite of a puff adder!!), I’m walking down the dirt road to the main road and notice a bird of prey perched on a telephone wire. Wait! It’s not just one bird of prey, there’s another… And another… And another! Oh my goodness! There are like 50 of these birds of prey right here! Sure enough, there were many, many southern pale chanting goshawks (Melierax canorus) in the area! What a treat! This is the first bird of prey I noticed when coming to live in South Africa and I delighted watching him “hovering about” over a field in search of prey. They’ll scope, fly to a spot, then hover—much in the same way a hummingbird will, but a goshawk is much, much larger than a hummingbird--and pounce if prey is available or fly to another area if it is not, to hover again. Before this day, I had only seen solitary goshawks. It was a treat to find a field full of them and I stared at them for quite awhile. Then I headed toward the main road and the “sketchy” part of my walk.

• The cemetery and the vet’s office lie just outside of Vryburg and there is a 10-minute stretch I walk by the busy highway. I have the word “sketchy” in quotation marks, because this portion of my walk isn’t sketchy at all: it’s along a major highway full of cars moving in both directions at any hour of the day. As is always the case, a white South African will pull over and offer me a ride because they fear for my safety. If I accept a ride (which I rarely do—it’s only a 10 minute walk), they admonish me severely for walking here. “It is dangerous!” or “It is unsafe!” they tell me over and over again for all of the three minutes I will be in the car with them. “Yes,” I reply, “This is what people tell me.” (White South Africans have told me for two years now how unsafe it is for me to be living with black South Africans and they are just shocked—shocked--that we do so.) Whatever.

• I finish the sketchy, busy portion of my walk and head into the suburbs. I notice a tractor-trailer pulled up beside a grocery store and I can’t keep my eyes off of the cab of it. In the passenger’s side sits an abnormally-large, (not fat or too tall, just LARGE) woman with blonde hair that is smiling like she’s starring in a Broadway musical. She’s dressed like she’s starring in a Broadway musical too: I can see a low-cut, strappy blouse above that million dollar smile. Why in the world is she smiling? I’m mesmerized with the spectacle of this woman. Ha, ha! The joke is on me! It’s a cardboard cutout of a dazzling woman that the truck driver has in his truck to wow his friends. I almost double over from laughing so hard. This is the funniest thing I’ve seen anywhere, not just in South Africa!

• I go to the pharmacist to pick up my first of a three month prescription of birth control pills. Yes, birth control pills. I’m a bit irritated because I’m supposed to take them for three months and Peace Corps will only pay for a month at a time. Are you kidding me? A) I do not want to be taking birth control pills in the first place (my body needs a hormonal “adjustment” and B) I really, really, really don’t want to have to come back for two more times for these pills I don’t want to take. (But I’m being silly, really. I will have to come back to Vryburg for shopping trips and to make another stop in my errand day is really no trouble. But I feel irritated nonetheless.) However, on leaving the drugstore, I burst out laughing at the idea of my taking birth control pills. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve needed any of these!

• I make a visit to the editor/publisher of the Vryburg newspaper, the Stellalander, because they’ve just discovered that I dropped and left my winter hat in their house when I visited last winter. I’m happy to go because I will need this hat in a few weeks, as African winter is headed my way and because these people are happy to see me. I hadn’t realized how much my soul longs for company and companionship of those that seem delighted in me. I miss people delighting in me. So it felt good to exchange pleasantries with these wonderfully kind people who had no idea how kindness-starved I am.

• I leave the office of the Stellalander to go see another woman who delights in seeing me, the librarian at the Vryburg library. Wow, perhaps I should come to Vryburg more often… People actually like me in Vryburg. Elna, the librarian, often sends me inspirational text messages. Here is her latest: “Your dreams will not die, your plans will not fail, your destiny won’t be aborted, desire of your heart will be granted by God, may your life be clean, calm, and clear, like the early morning water. May the grace of the Almighty support, sustain, and supply all your needs according to His riches and glory. You never know when you will be blessed. Good things happen when you least expect them. God is with you this morning. Amen.” Isn’t that sweet? She knows I sometimes fall down in the dumps.

• I move then to a jeweler, to pick up my “faux” wedding ring that I had dropped for repair. I find things that I love in second-hand shops and then spend a fortune on them to repair or refurbish them. I bought a great pair of cowboy boots second-hand, then spent four times what I paid to have them resoled. I bought this ring, the week before I left for Africa, in a second-hand shop, and paid less than $10 for it. It’s sterling and I love its antiqued appearance. The band split on me a few months ago and I debated having it repaired. It was intended to ward off aggressive suitors here (and has somewhat worked) but I’ve grown very fond of the ring and love it very much. I inquired about the repair and having it sized. Sure enough, I paid more for the repair than the ring itself! ($15). I was surprised, and soon dismayed at how different the ring looked when I picked it up: It looked like a different ring! It was bright and shiny, and well, different looking! The lady at the jewelry shop said, “Oh, we cleaned it too.” Cleaned it? They removed the antiquing! That’s why it looked so different! I was upset at first, shrugged it off, then though, “Heck, I’ll rub some black shoe polish or something on it to get the antiquing back.” However, it’s dirtying up nicely on its own.

• Then, lucky me, I had lunch with American friends and they cheered me even more. They too, were happy to see me! .

• Now, the somewhat-urgent-reason I needed to visit Vryburg on this day, in addition to needing to run all of these other errands: I was meeting someone who was bringing me a warthog tusk. A warthog tusk? Yes, a warthog tusk.

In high school, I met and dated the guy that I commonly refer to as “the guy I should have married.” (He was very good to me.) He joined the marines as I finished high school and we lost contact. I hadn’t heard from him in years and we hooked up recently on Facebook. (Yes, Facebook is good for something!). He’s been asking, for a year and a half now, if I could please get him a warthog tusk. Now, you probably can find these items at souvenir type places, but I am very rarely at a souvenir type place. I couldn’t imagine how I would find him one and was even thinking of checking on EBay. (Shh, don’t tell!) Well, I didn’t have to look on EBay, because I met a nice young man on my bus ride back from Cape Town. We were chatting and he told me he was a hunter. I casually mentioned something along the lines of, “Hey, you couldn’t get me a warthog tusk, could you?”

Well, yes he could and he did. I met Rudi, my friend, in Vryburg as he was riding the bus into Pretoria and we knew it would stop in Vryburg. So, guess what I’ve got in my hot little hands? You got it! A genuine warthog tusk!

You just never know what’s going to happen in Vryburg. Perhaps I’ll be happier to go on my next visit! Perhaps YOU can meet me there!

Soon,
Karen

Mother Bear Project and SA's Human Rights Day

2011-03-18T10:18:00.000-07:00

I think I intuitively knew I’d be discouraged by my February project with the college, and had the forethought to plan something easy and fun for March. The great thing about the Mother Bear Project is Amy B, the woman that organizes the shipping of the bears, is a dream to work with.

I met these powerhouses of women that run this awesome day care center last year at the crèche graduation. I worked with these women this year to distribute the toy bears to their orphans and vulnerable children. We timed our event to honor South Africa’s national holiday: Human Rights Day.

The photos speak for themselves; the kids are darlings!

Of course, these little ones don’t yet understand the history behind their nation’s holiday, Human Rights Day, and the HIV/AIDS connection is that it is a human right for all to live in a world affected by HIV/AIDS to have the right to treatment if infected, and education for prevention if not.

Human Rights Day, in South Africa, however, marks a very significant historical event. The apartheid government darkened South Africa’s nation in 1948. Tensions regarding such a brutal separatism challenged the government almost immediately. In 1959, the tensions were worsening and national demonstrations were staged by protestors. On March 21, 1960, one such demonstration was planned for township of Sharpeville and sadly, police opened fire on the protesters and killed 67 and wounded 187 demonstrators. It is said that most were shot in the back. Eighteen thousand protesters were arrested.

Nelson Mandela, along with several other powerful, African leaders would be arrested only four years later and apartheid only later dismantled in 1994. However, the Sharpeville Massacre, which is remembered annually and renamed Human Rights Day, marked the turning point for the fall of apartheid in South Africa.

Heavy stuff, I know, for toddlers and toy bears—but hey, I’m an education volunteer!

Soon,
Karen

PS. For more pictures of our Mother Bear Project and SA Human Rights Day, see my public Facebook page (click on the link). You need not be a FB member to see the photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=115020&id=1239371142&l=a771f194f8

Ounaai suffers my improving veterinarian skills

2011-03-15T04:29:00.000-07:00

The only time Ounaai tolerates the camera is when she is sleeping.

Vaccination attempt: round one

I am nervous. I withdraw the liquid portion of the vaccine into the syringe, insert the needle into the vial of the powdered portion, squirt the liquid in with the powdered portion, mix the solution well, and then withdraw the now ready-to-use mixture back into the syringe. I am now ready to vaccinate. Ounaai senses something is up, but I sit with her, restrain her with my legs, speak soothingly to her, grab the scruff of her neck, and insert the needle. Jab is more like it--the needle seems as big around as a tree trunk. She yelps, struggles and I hurry. She struggles more, I worry of her escaping my grasp, and hurriedly plunge the syringe quickly. She struggles even harder, she is crying with pain, I am still plunging the syringe, but she struggles and I pull it out. Whatever was coming out of the plunging syringe, along with anything else pulsing through Ounaai insides, sprays into my eyes. She’s now thoroughly pissed at and frightened of me and I’m running to the sink to flush my eyes out with tap water.

As I’m flushing my yes, I’m thinking what it must feel like to be a healthcare worker, having just been sprayed in the eyes with a syringe full of something coming out of the human body. In the age of HIV and TB it doesn’t take a great leap to think of how frightening such a scenario could be, and for the first time in my life, I am empathizing with health care workers completely. After all, who knows what has just entered my bloodstream through my eyes. (A friend would later tease that at least I wouldn’t contract distemper.)

Perhaps she'll tolerate the camera if she is eating?

I call the vet, explain what has happened, and oddly, am more worried about whether or not I got enough of the vaccine into the dog than the condition of my eyes. I would hate having gone through such awfulness for nothing. I told him I had gotten “most of it”-- the vaccine-- into the dog and he told me she would be fine. As for me and my eyes, yes, he assured, I should be fine too, and to just rinse my eyes well. This I have done and do some more. Did I hear a chuckle in his voice? Did he think this funny? I have slight stinging in my eyes for the rest of the evening, but otherwise, all is well.

Nope, not tolerating the camera!

Vaccination attempt: round two

Poor Ounaai. If only she had a competent health-care provider.

I did round two of vaccinations this weekend past and thankfully, she won’t need any more. (Well, she’s supposed to get a yearly booster…) I went to the vet to pick up her second round of vaccinations and ask for some “coaching” as to how to better administer it. The vet, who is wonderful by the way—everyone at this clinic is wonderfully helpful—asked me back into the “no man’s land” of behind the scenes vet care. (He’s let me come back before and knows I’m curious and not squeamish.) I tell him how my disastrously bad my first attempt was, and much to my chagrin, he is delighted and reacts with hilarity at my account of poor Ounaai enduring such a blundering, painful shot. In the back room, where dogs are recovering, he pulls out a dog from a cage to demonstrate the proper administration of an injection. (The dog needed a shot anyway; he wasn’t just using an animal for my benefit.) The vet showed me how to grab the scruff at the neck, (I was correct here), but he further showed me to make a “tent” in the scruff of her neck to form a depression in her scruff within which to insert the needle and to protect her muscles.

Oh, so THAT’s how you do it!!

However, the best advice was that he told me that if she struggled, to release my grasp on the syringe. If she struggled, I was to release the syringe, with it still inserted in her neck, (but not release the dog), and let her calm. The worst of it was over, she felt the stick and the needle was in, so she would no longer feel it. He told me to wait for her to calm and then slowly and gently depress the plunger of the syringe. He showed all of this too me on the huge dog that was recovering, and while he demonstrated everything beautifully, I kept thinking to myself, “Yeah, but THIS dog is sedated. Mine will not be sedated.”

Nope, definitely NOT tolerating the camera!

And this is the cool, the cool part, the cool part… The demonstration dog HAD BEEN BITTEN BY A PUFF ADDER!! I was so excited! Not excited that the poor dog had been bitten by a puff adder, poor thing, but YES!, to have evidence that there are puff adders in Africa, even if I haven’t seen one. Before coming to South Africa, I read anything about South African flora and fauna I could get my hands on. In some of my reading, I learned that South Africa’s more common snake is the puff adder (Bitis arietans)—it’s found in all regions of South Africa. A family member, noting my excitement asked, “What’s a puff adder?” I replied, still excitedly, “It’s one of the most venomous snakes in the WORLD!” She was worried, I was excited! By the way, no, I do not want to be BITTEN by a puff adder; however, it would be thrilling to see one. As with all wild creatures, they despise being bothered and bite only defensively. They do not slither around with the sole purpose of seeking and biting someone. I have not come across a puff adder in the wild, even though I worried I would when building my thorn fence (but it was winter time). I have come across a cape cobra (Naja nivea) outside my village and a horned adder (Bitus caudalis) in Messina when I went to see the baobab trees. Thrilling finds!

Ounaai now very grumpy with my camera has decided to sit outside.

Anyway, back to the dog. I had often wondered what domestic animals do if bitten while grazing: the cattle, donkeys, and goats are all over the wild places between the villages. The vet told me that dogs actually do better than humans with a puff adder bite. This is because a dog has very loose skin that has plenty of “give” to accommodate the swelling of tissue that results with a snake bite. Humans, on the other hand, have tight skin and therefore have no “room” to “give” with the resulting swelling. The vet then he pointed out, of the dog, “See how big his head is? His head is five times its normal size!” (I couldn’t tell because I was unfamiliar with the breed. He just looked to me like a dog with a big head—hey, some breeds have big heads!—and woozy from his sedation.) The vet felt certain of this animal’s recovery and further added that the antivenin for dogs is very expensive. So, this guy had a very caring owner.

So, that was pretty cool. However, I still had to face Ounaai, so it was time to head home.

This is Ounaai’s former beau, Fella… Isn’t he gorgeous?

The “heat” of the romance cooled with Ounaai’s spaying.

Poor Ounaai. She just knew something was up. As soon as I walked in the door, she ducked her head and cast down her eyes. I just read Louise Erdrich’s Shadow Tag and Erdrich does a fantastic job of portraying the family dogs in the novel as ultra sensitive to the family dynamic—dogs just know, you know? I could tell Ounaai knew something was up. In the States, our vet back plies our animals with Pupperoni to distract them when administering vaccinations. I couldn’t find any Pupperoni in Vryburg, but decided to try biltong instead. (Biltong is a South Africa’s version of beef jerky. Go ahead, roll your eyes. But I’m telling you, a girl in Peace Corps has gotta do what a girl in Peace Corps has gotta do!) I approached Ounaai, with biltong in hand (and the syringe behind my back), but she would have none of it. Because she is a very, very good dog, she did not run from me, but sat bravely for the painful horrors that awaited her. I tried to give her the biltong, but she only tentatively held it in her mouth, not even biting it, but holding it between her lips! I tried to wrestle up some neck scruff, but she had hers bolted down like armor. Bless her heart—she knew what was coming. Her injection went much better this second time. I felt much better about administering it, felt better informed with the how and why of it, and was generally more relaxed all the way around. She did struggle a bit, I let go of the syringe, and she quieted immediately, just as the vet had said she would. I reassured her, the worst of it was over (she had already felt the needle stick), and I lightly depressed the plunger. With the needle withdrawn, she decided she liked biltong very much, could she have some more?

Fella is very shy.

Just think… If I kept at it, I could become the best vaccinator Ounaai has ever had! It’s too bad I only had a couple of tries and she had to endure my beginner’s clumsiness—especially in regards to a painful shot!

In thinking about Ounaai enduring the development of my veterinarian skills, I couldn’t help but make comparisons in other areas of my life. I shudder to think of my first class of freshmen composition students, and how in the world they survived me trying to figure out what in the heck I was doing. Surprisingly, my best student that first-go-round of teaching remains a very good friend, even today, and he remembers nothing odd or amiss about our writing class. And then my sons—oh my-- how they suffered from inexperience and my ongoing, blundering attempts at parenting! You can’t imagine how I wish for a second chance at raising my sons!

Ounaai suffers the development of my veterinarian skills; my composition students suffered the development of my teaching skills; and my sons suffered the development of my parenting skills.

Second chances? If only!

Soon,
Karen

PS. While I is easy to fall into a guilt-induced spiral of shame and regret inspired by the lost opportunities of second chances, it occurs to me that some things just won’t improve with second, third, and well, many more tries: No matter how many times I try, I cannot seem to cook a pretty egg; no matter how many attempts I make at homemade hummus, I can’t seem to find happiness with my resulting paste; no matter how hard I study or try to learn an additional language, I can’t seem to find fluency.

PSS. Ounaai is officially “ruined” as a dog. She knows that in a cabinet in my kitchen sits a tin canister containing a lovely biltong treat that she sometimes gets if Karen is anywhere near the kitchen. So guess who is lying at my feet anytime I’m near the kitchen, mildly begging for a treat? Go ahead, roll your eyes! I’m rolling mine too!

Fella usually lies curled up in the tall grass outside my home at the bottom of my stairs.

Christmas in March! How did you know...

2011-03-12T07:09:00.000-08:00

I would need such cheering up!

Last week I was feeling overwhelmed by receiving so many packages in the mail. My sister sent me a huge package full of love, my Aunt sent me my absolute favorite pecans (which make me delightedly happy, for some reason), and my friend Mary sent me a package full of sweets and school supplies.

Again, I felt overwhelmed with receiving so many packages and I always swoon and almost faint when I see how much my loved ones have spent in shipping!

Imagine my surprise when I went to the post office this morning!

A shout out to my friends who have sent school supplies: reward stickers, colored pens, notebooks, fun reward toys (glow in the bracelets!), and INFLATALBE GLOBES! Yay! And for me: stationary, stamps, back issues of the Sun Magazine (my favorite), spiritual reading, Dr. Bronner’s soap (another favorite) and SPICES! I’m a lucky girl!

My good friend Joe Y, who influenced me greatly in my naturalist pursuits, has sent along some children’s books with a nature focus to share with my school children. He’s doing wonderful things influencing our next generations to become stewards of nature!

Be sure to check out his company’s website at: http://www.childrensnatureguide.com/

I’m particularly fond of KK’s hope….Hmm… Wonder why?

My mom has assembled a posse of wonderful women who have contributed greatly to my South African adventure and they sent me this humongous package chocked with goodies! Thanks Teen R and Faye J! Their goody box had all things school supplies: maps, more inflatable globes (Yay! A village can never have too many inflatable globes!), colored pens, pencils, markers, scissors (these will be a hot item!), erasers, glue sticks, reward stickers, tape, and sharpeners. My primary school will be very, very happy to see me this week—thank you both!

For me, they included COFFEE, (yay, yay, yay!) vitamins and probiotics, spices, MOVIES (yay! yay! yay!), cardstock and envelops (was critically short—thank you!), and a heat resistant spatula! Oh, and some ladies under-things that I needed (blush). Thank you!

And a few of you have contributed funds to my bank account--which always makes life easier! Thank you!
It has been a particularly rough week and you couldn’t have known (nor would have I) how uplifting this shower of gifts has been. I feel bolstered, encouraged, and hopeful again! Amazing how a little bit—or a lot of bit!--of love from across the sea can be so regenerative.

Thank you everyone for your generosity! I am a humbled and lucky girl!

Soon,
Karen

Love crushes and the South African Dog Days of Summer

2011-03-06T07:28:00.000-08:00

Some people develop love crushes on people—and I certainly do! However, I also develop love crushes on old, abandoned buildings and here is my longest standing African heart-throb: the old abandoned Catholic Church in my village. This building, of course, is no longer in use and the current Catholic Church sits nearby in the foreground. I’m not sure how old this building is, but I know the principal at my primary school attended this church as his school when he was a child. I love the old ruin of it and have wanted to photograph it since I arrived. As with all things in South Africa, I wanted to photograph this church in the late-afternoon, early-evening light to avoid exposure to the blaring hot, African sun—exposure which creates unlovely photographs. And, as I’m still experiencing inconsistencies with uploading photos to my blog, so who knows what you will see!!--but hopefully the images are lovely enough.

As the day was late when I set off to photograph the church, I hoped Ounaai would accompany me as a companion; however, she is well-trained in not following me into the village as I’m usually off to school or church, both places where village dogs are unwelcome, and I scold her heartily if she tries to follow me. I need to figure out a way to better train her, about how to know when it’s fine to follow me and when it’s not. Will keep you posted. So, she was not with me this day, although I wished she were.

crossing the cemetary on the way to the church

As with many churches I suppose, it is necessary to approach this church by passing through a cemetery. I’ve wanted to show you photos of the cemeteries of my people before, but struggle with my conscious in regards to the appropriateness of the situation and with not wanting to exploit my people and their privacy. So, here you are and I apologize if anyone is offended.

the better-to-do are buried next to the poor

You can see, from the photos, that just like in living in rural South Africa, the poor reside by the rich, or if not rich, at least better off. The more elaborate the gravesite, the larger and lovelier the tombstone, the more elaborate the fencing, and the appearance of other fancier grave decorations, the wealthier the family of the deceased; or unfortunately, the more debt the family of the deceased has taken on to bury their loved one. The gravesites of the poor are marked only with stones. Three prominent dates are displayed on the tombstones of the well-to-do: the birth date, the death date, and the burial date. Also, both names of the deceased, the English as well as the African name are displayed on the tombstone. The most beautiful song I’ve heard since coming to South Africa was sung at a funeral: the men closest to the deceased sang only the two first verses of the national anthem, Nkosi sikelel' iAfrika. (They sang the black African verses-isiXhosa and isiZulu [first verse], and Sesotho [second verse] and excluded the Afrikaaner and English verses [third and fourth verses, respectively].) Their song was low in volume, almost a whisper, and very, very sorrowful. It was the most beautiful hymn I’ve ever heard and its singing so beautiful that my body ached.

oh wait! a donkey!

The people that I live with hold very strict formalities regarding the approach and entering of a cemetery and I couldn’t help but feel I was trespassing. It was eerily quiet, as all cemeteries are, I’m sure, and as I moved closer to the church to better photograph it, I was startled to hear quite a commotion coming from inside the abandoned, Catholic church. I was more than a bit spooked with the unexpected noise! Imagine my surprise at watching the resulting file of donkeys stepping delicately out of the church, one by one, ready to leave the cool interiors to munch about in the early evening dinner time.

Wait! More donkeys!

My visit to the church was a quiet, solemn time, and the visit foreshadowed the coming of the South African dog days of summer, which are now arrived.

I was told by the former Peace Corps Volunteer at my site that South Africa truly has only two seasons: winter and summer, and I concur. However, if there is a fall season in South Africa, or at least in my area, I believe we’re experiencing it now. My garden, after enduring a full-growing season, is petering out. The production of my vegetable plants proved exceptional, I believe, due to my “trenched bed” digging techniques, techniques learned in our “Permagarden” training provided by Peace Corps, techniques to ensure plenty of root growth and nutrition for the growing plant. “Trenched bed” gardening is the labor-intensive practice of digging deep, then adding soil amended with compost and/or composted manure, and char to promote healthy plant production. I am still harvesting tomatoes when the community garden was locked back in December, when their gardening season (without trenched bed and other helpful gardening practices) ceased. My tomatoes, now in March, are almost harvested, the amaranth is bitter, and the blister beetles and Batman bugs are chomping my okra blossoms before than they can open. (I don’t know what the Batman bugs really are, but they are black, beetle-like, and have barbs coming off their hind-legs that remind me of Batman’s costume.) The infamous South African weed, “blackjack” is taller than I and their nasty, impossible-to-remove barbed seeds are at the ready.

Emily and I normally cross the creek bed here, but with summer rains, our crossing is detoured.

I’m seeing other changes that signal the “dog days” of summer. I’ve noticed the past couple of evenings that it isn’t broiling hot after 5:00 pm; I’ve noticed it’s becoming dark sooner—night is arriving around 7:00 pm; I’ve noticed the dramatic and frequent storms are lessoning; and I’ve noticed I’m needing a comforter by the middle of the night. My weather notes indicate that I was wearing mittens in mid-April last year and I’m watching my friend the spider make her last attempts at web repair in the evening light.

It will be very cold again, very soon, and I’ll be entering my second winter (or really the third, because it was mid-winter when we arrived in Africa in July, 2009). For some reason, I can’t imagine ever developing a love crush on the South African winter.

Soon,
Karen

PS. For more pictures of love crushes and South African Dog Days, see my public Facebook page (click on the link). You need not be a FB member to see the photos:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=113481&id=1239371142&l=5597415392

Although she is not pictured here, Ounaai loves to run and jump in the long, late-summer grasses.

Valentine’s Day event to promote HIV/AIDS awareness: blow by blow

2011-02-28T08:34:00.000-08:00

A chaplain from the area South African Police Service opened our event.

November, 2010
I approach the college about hosting a Valentine’s Day Event to promote HIV/AIDS awareness as a “fun” event for the college students at the start of the new school year, 2011. I have something in mind like an open-air festival, with a free-flow feel, where the students can meander about between classes, have goodies and treats from community members who have agreed to donate goods and services, and perhaps take the opportunity to learn something about HIV/AIDs and/or seek counseling and testing for HIV/AIDS. The college is excited and supportive, but when I inquire about beginning with the planning in November 2010, I’m told to “wait until school starts next year.” When I object to waiting, because that will leave me only six weeks to prepare for the event, I’m told, “It will be fine.”

December 1, 2010
The World AIDS Day event hosted by my primary school is a smashing success and I’m heartened and hopeful about doing something similar for the college students.

January 10, 2011
It’s the first day of the new school year and I’m told to “go ahead and plan” the Valentine’s Day Event to promote HIV/AIDS awareness. I have five weeks to coordinate an event that hopes to attract about 1000 students and community members. In the USA, I would never, EVER have attempted such an event without at least six months planning time. I’m told “It will be fine.”

January 11, 2011
I find colleagues at my college who will help plan the event. The former Student Support Officer, who should be my counterpart but is no longer the SSO, reluctantly agrees to help. The school’s Hospitality Program can cater the refreshments, and the Hospitality Department has an exceptional instructor who is a friend and I trust completely, advises me we need money for ingredients to prepare the refreshments. How can we raise the money? This same woman knows of someone from the University of the Free State whose passion is “to promote HIV/AIDS awareness among the youth of South Africa.” This wonderful woman from the U of Free State agrees to come, but we must pay her transportation. How can we raise the money? I’m told we can ask the college’s Corporate Center to donate money to fund these areas of our event.

I seek out the woman in charge of the college facilities, the one who will prepare the seating for 1,000 or so guests, help the vendors set up their booths, etc., and ask her to help with our Valentine’s Day Event. She says, “Sure, just remind me.”

(I will remind her weekly about our event, so much so that whenever she sees me, she playfully laughs, points to me, and says, “I know, I know, Valentine’s Day!)

So much for an open-air, festival-type of event.

January 12, 2011
I draft a proposal to request funds from the college’s Corporate Center to pay for our Valentine’s Day refreshments and transportation for our guest speaker. My supervisor revises, correcting all of my American English, into English English, approves proposal and I fax the request to Corporate Center. (Or, as she would correct me: Corporate Centre.)

January 13, 2011
Worried that the college’s Corporate Center may not fund our event, I travel to Vryburg to walk door-to-door to illicit participation and contributions for our event. I’m told I need to hand out a “formal letter of invitation” for requests to be considered.

I return to the college campus to draft this “formal letter of invitation,” my supervisor reviews and approves it, and I return to Vryburg to hand-deliver the “formal letter of invitation.”

January 14, 2011
I spend the whole workday scouring the phone book to find potential donors for our event. I begin, what will become in the next weeks, a routine of daily emails, faxes, and phone calls all for which I’m begging for money or donations.

January 15-February 4, 2011
I fax every community member within a 100-mile radius: Will you come to our event, help make it “fun” for our students, and/or donate goods or services that promote your product the future generation of South Africans?

It is in these weeks that I realize that people seem to not understand what I mean by a “fun event for the students” and an “open-air festival,” although the taxi ranks all over South Africa are keen examples of an “open-air festival.”

It is also in these weeks that the guest speaker from U of Free State confirms she is coming, so I feel a bit urgent about not having money yet for her transportation. Also, I have invited the local community radio station, the local mayor, a team of HIV/AIDS specialists from another city two hours away, the District Health Department, the District office of the Department of Education and I realize I’m somewhat panicked about how we will feed all of these people should they show up, and somewhat panicked about if they will ever let me know they are planning to show up.

But another bomb-shell: the woman in charge of the Hospitality Program, who is a STAR in every way, who could single-handedly make this event a great hit, will be having surgery on February 7, and unable to be on-hand for the event. I feel a dark cloud of foreboding, but forge ahead anyway.

Still no word from Corporate Center in regards to funding our event.

I am wanting to dissolve into the floor.

Monday, January 17, 2011

I approach my college supervisor to express my concerns and suggest we “wait until we can better plan for such an event.” She waves me off and assures me, “It will be fine.”

More faxing, emailing, phoning, waiting… Still no money, still not sure who is coming…

I do this same thing of expressing my doubts on a Monday and my supervisor assuring me that “It will be fine” for two more weeks.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011, our event is a week and a half away…
My college hosts a formal program to “officially open” our school season. All of the “suits” from Corporate Center are in attendance. I find the woman in charge of doling out the funds from Corporate Center and she informs me that, a) Corporate Center did not take my request seriously, because I signed the form instead of my Campus Manager (who, at the time, seemed quite fine with me signing the form), and b) Corporate Center cannot just dole out money to anyone. I must tie this event to the curriculum: What will the students gain, academically, from such an event? If I can tie the event to the curriculum, Corporate Center will fund our refreshments and transportation for our guest speaker.

I have no idea how to do these things. We’re a week and a half out… Is there time to do such things? My supervisor assures me, “It will be fine.”

Thursday, February 3, 2011
I revise the submission request for funds for our Valentine’s Day event, tie the request to the curriculum to the best of my ability, have my supervisor sign it, and re-fax our request.

Friday, February 4, 2011
Our newly-appointed Student Support Officer, who should oversee these kinds of events (and perhaps become my counterpart), is too busy to meet with me, but suggests we meet the next day (a Saturday) with members from the Student Representative Council. I’m thrilled: finally, someone with a connection to the students is on board and finally, the students will have a voice. How can we make the fun for THEM?

Saturday, February 5, 2011, 11:00 am
I meet with the newly appointed Student Support Officer and the only one member of the SRC to show, and he is reeking of alcohol. The Student Support Officer suggests we change the day of the event, seems unconcerned that I have been circulating fliers about the event with a firm date and time for weeks now, suggests we change the style of the event (from an outdoor festival to a formal program), and worries that we have too many guest speakers and they will all feel competitive and jealous of each other. He also asks, “What are we doing for Valentine’s Day?” He doesn’t’ want it all to be about HIV/AIDS) and suggests we offer a session on the history of St. Valentine. I inwardly groan, but say nothing. How could a history lesson on St. Valentine be fun for the students?

Lighting the AIDS candle

I try to maintain composure at what feels like a rising panic setting in, apologize profusely (I don’t, after all, really know what I’m doing, and desperately need his help), and beg, “Can we please do it the way we’ve already planned and do the best we can and we can do it however you’d like the next time?” He reluctantly agrees and suggests a planning meeting for Wednesday, February 9.

I’m not terribly alarmed at holding a planning meeting at so late a date: the primary school held its planning meeting the day before World AIDS Day and pulled the event off beautifully.

I was hoping the college would similarly rise to the occasion.

Wednesday, February 9, 2011: T-minus six days and counting
We host our “planning meeting” for our Valentine’s Day event. About twenty of us show for the meeting, including fellow educators from the Hospitality Program, educators that have helped me link the event to the curriculum, members of the local police department (who have a team dedicated to HIV/AIDS related concerns within the community), people who just wanted to help, and two students (but no members of the SRC).

Again, silly me, I thought we could hold a very democratic meeting, a brain-storming session, if you will, whereby everyone felt comfortable (and perhaps excited?) to contribute to the discussion. I did not want this to be a “Karen Kaye” meeting, but a “this is our school event” meeting. Not only was this kind of meeting NOT to happen, but the men dominated the meeting, the women were mostly silent with downcast eyes, and I would later be publically upbraided for not having formally introduced everyone there. I still am a bit clueless to how to formally introduce people that stream in very late, well after the meeting has begun, and up to a half an hour late or even more. In my culture, late-comers are ignored (or even reprimanded!); in this culture, they’re revered. However, I have not yet mastered the art of revering the very special people who could barely be bothered at all to attend, and certainly not be bothered to attend on time.

The other major way I mis-stepped was that I brought the meeting back, again and again, to the students: “What would YOU GUYS like to do?” or “What do YOU GUYS think?” When I called on the students to contribute their ideas, they slumped their shoulders, lowered their eyes and heads, and apologized, “I’m sorry Mam; We’re just students. We have no voice here.”

Agrh!

The outcome of the meeting: we kept the date, changed the event time (uh oh), and still weren’t sure who was coming and when.

Long story short: I created a Valentine's Day “program” that was quite vague and could be easily manipulated on the day of, when hopefully, we’d have some idea of who was coming and when. I had relinquished my idea of an “open air festival,” because, well, no one seemed to grasp the idea of it.

Mr. S, a top-notch educator who sat in the hot-seat with me.
He was our "Master of Ceremonies"

Friday, February 11, 2001: T-minus three days and counting.
My guest speaker from the University of Free State cancels.
I repeat: My guest speaker from the University of Free State cancels.

Nice.

I take my forlorn, defeated self to my supervisor who is thrilled: Corporate Center has finally approved the funding! I’m ready to cancel, she’s ready to proceed!

I take a bit of heart… I have invited someone else who could serve as the guest speaker. He confirms, wants too much money, but I’m moving ahead now in full-steam, and hope the college rises to the occasion, no matter what happens. I feel certain they will help me navigate the mystery of organizing/facilitating an event at their school and will rise to any occasion on our Valentine’s Day.

Sunday, February 13, 2011, 7:30 pm.
I, to woman in charge of the food for tomorrow, say: “Are we all set for tomorrow?”
She replies, to me, “No, not really.”

Not really?

It’s too late. I can’t worry now. Everything is in place. What will happen, will happen and it feels out of my hands.

Monday, February 14, 2011: Valentine’s Day
7:20 am. The gentleman from the local police station, who insisted we change the event time in the last hour, cancels. He apologizes, but he has a family matter and will not be in attendance.

7:30 am. Staff meeting: As a show of unity and school spirit, it was decided everyone wear red for our event: red for Valentine’s Day. About ten of us are wearing red out of the forty staff members present. (I had frantically searched Vryburg a few days earlier looking for something red to wear, and eventually bought a red scarf.) I invite the staff members to gather for a group photo, so “I could show everyone in America how wonderfully supportive our staff was of the event.” That was the very wrong thing to say, everyone grumbled, and filed out. (Remember, in South Africa, the education system is teacher centered, not student centered, so hosting an event or otherwise doing something supportive of the students doesn’t go over well.)

Another blow: my supervisor won’t even be coming to the college today.

8:00 am.In a panic, I ask about the food for the event, the food for feeding perhaps 800-1000 people, and am told, “We still haven’t heard from Corporate Center.” This next person in charge assures me, “I will fax them in a minute.”

I fuss with having the programs printed, which takes me about a half an hour or so.

A star student bravely reading her HIV/AIDS message

8:30: I return to inquire about the food for our students and guests. My new person in charge is busy with other matters and doesn’t seem concerned about us needing to feed so many people in a few short hours, would she mind if I send the fax to Corporate Center? She is fine that I send it, so I do. Ok, I’ve faxed Corporate Center, there is nothing more I can do. If worse comes to worst, certainly the college will do something to feed our people something.

8:40: The local radio station that I had solicited weeks earlier but had never responded calls to say they will not be coming to our event. Fine.

8:45: I go to check on the main hall that is supposed to be set to seat 800 people. It is set to seat 35 people. I go find the lovely woman in charge of the facility, the one that jokingly laughed with me the weeks prior, about readying for our Valentine’s Day event. I show up in her office, she throws up her hands and can’t be bothered. I ask about the students (we have at least 650 of them) and how will they be seated? This is, after all, their event. “Tell them to bring chairs from the classrooms,” she replies.

Great. This is supposed to be a fun event for the students and the college can’t be bothered to ready chairs for them.

8:55: Phone rings, it’s the office administrative assistant, my guests had arrived. Great. Guests already… Seems like they were counting on, surprise, surprise, our originally and highly advertised program time of 9:00-4:00.

I go to greet our guests, who happen to be 20-30 of members of the local police department, the same police department of the guy that had cancelled on me at 7:20 that morning, the same guy who had insisted we change the event time, (but apparently neglected to tell his own staff of the time change) and a chaplain that was chomping at the bit to open the program because he had other engagements.

I apologized to our guests, pleaded for them to wait, and ran about finding someone to serve the guests coffee and tea. After a lot of shoulder-shrugging and nods of “no,” my begging prompted the appearance of beverages for the guests who will be waiting two and a half hours for an 11:30 start time.

9:30: Community-service providers invited to provide free HIV/AIDS counseling and testing services begin to arrive. People from groups I hadn’t invited arrive: Where should they set up their equipment?

I return to my formerly-joking facilities lady who becomes unhappier and unhappier each time I knock on her door. She is very unhappy with our Valentine’s Day event and can’t believe the attentions I’m requiring of her.

9:30-10:30: More community-service providers show, more people needing assistance with set up.

Mobile unit offers HIV screening and counseling

11:00: I’m notified that the local chapter of the Health Department, whom I had invited, were coming, but needed me to send them transportation. What? The Health Department needs me to send a car? At the same time, I’m notified that my too-early-arrived guests, who were really on time, had had their limit of waiting, and were marching to the Main Hall to begin the event.

Great. I really can’t be bothered now with the stranded Health Department and head toward the Main Hall.

11:00: We’re all in the Main Hall, I and the 20-30 members of the local police force, but there is not one other member from the college in the hall: no students and no teachers, no Master or Mistress of Ceremonies, only I and the select group of highly-irritated members of the police force.

I frantically phone the Acting Student Support Officer, my should-be-counterpart, to ask for his assistance: Could he come help me? No, he was busy with other things. Could he at least get the word to the students to come to the Main Hall? No, he was sorry, but he really was busy with other things.

I grab a student to find the gentleman that agreed to be our Master of Ceremonies. In the meantime, I try to stall and attempt to speak to our guests, attempt to explain to them who I was, why I was in South Africa, and the purpose of Peace Corps. My audience, the highly irritated and kept-too-long waiting members of the police force seem distracted and inattentive when I try to talk to them. A woman from the police force stands, approaches me, and leads me out of the room. She points out that my pants are unzipped. MY PANTS ARE UNZIPPED AND HAVE BEEN SO FOR ALL OF THE MORNING.

11:45: My Master and Mistress of Ceremonies arrive and help me with the chaos. Still, the students aren’t in the Main Hall. My colleague, familiar with student protocol, asks the girls to lead in song, all stand, and everyone begins singing. At hearing the music, students finally flood into the Main Hall, but have nowhere to sit. They stand about and sit on the floor. Our program begins. Someone informs me that Corporate Center had finally released funds and the Hospitality Team was off to Vryburg (40 minutes away) to purchase ingredients to prepare food for the 300-400 or so (as it turns out) guests that would be expecting to eat in only a couple of hours.

11:45-2:30pm. Miraculously, almost all the invited guests to speak arrive, file in, and seem to know when to “go on” for their parts of the presentations. I’m flitting about, trying to take photos and trying to figure out who is who and generally putting out fires. We are in the Main Hall, it is a hot day, there is no water to drink, and there is no water to be provided because our Hospitality Team is in Vryburg. The students are noisy and disrespectful of our guest speakers (and of me) because they are hot and have nowhere to sit (and likely can’t understand most of the English that the speakers are using). I grab and beg a fellow educator to serve as crowd control and he complies with limited success.

For the most part, I wished to dissolve into the floor.

2:00: My Department of Education supervisor arrives (I have so many supervisors!) and although I’m delighted to see her, am embarrassed at our floundering situation. I ask her to do the “Vote of Thanks” to close our program and while she initially agrees, she soon declines after seeing how the students are being so disrespectful.

I continue to want to dissolve into the floor.

2:30: The formal part of our program ends and another one of my colleagues sits in the hot seat with me and gives the “Vote of Thanks.” In her closing, she scolds the students thoroughly for being so disrespectful. We should now serve refreshments but the Hospitality Team still hasn’t arrived from their delayed shopping excursion. Everyone is encouraged to wait for the food. The team from LoveLife, the organization that had promised they would make the event “fun for the students,” show up after the program had ended. The community-service providers conducting the HIV/AIDS counseling/testing services send for their own food and tsk tsk about how the numbers (of students coming for counseling/testing) are so low.

People have been displeased with me all day, and have voiced it heartily. The former Student Support Officer, the one who was supposedly helping me in the past weeks, seems to be following me around saying, “You should have done this and you should have done that.” I flee from her admonishments as graciously as I can.

3:00: Emily, my nearly-next door neighbor Peace Corps Volunteer, shows up to support our event. At this point, I’ve not had even a sip of water since 7:30 am and have come unglued. She basically bolsters me up, provides moral support, and takes some great photos that I would be very grateful to later have (and most of the ones you see here).

4:20pm. The very angry members of the police force, who have been waiting unhappily to eat all day, are ushered back to the Hospitality Lab, where Emily and I assume the food is ready and the guests are finally being fed. Sure enough, we see them leaving and carrying “to go” box containers. The food prepared is nice, it’s a braii, with grilled meat and pap and salad. The students head toward the Hospitality Lab for their turn, and are summarily turned away. THE STUDENTS, WHO HAD WAITED ALL DAY, TO EAT THEIR PROMISED REFRESHMENTS, WERE REFUSED. The crowd of students becomes rowdy, obviously upset. I worried they would toi-toi, as their uprising is referred to, when they often do when promises to them aren’t kept, and Emily asked if I would like to spend the night with her.

The Valentine’s Day Event to promote HIV/AIDS awareness was not fine; there was no fun event for the students, invited guests were not fed, students were not fed, the college did not even provide water for the guests to drink. When I walked my very disgruntled and unhappy guests to their cars, I would see fellow-educators in the Staff Room, laughing and having tea, while our school event was limping along as a disaster.

I felt hurt, betrayed, and sabotaged by my college colleagues. The Valentine’s Day Event to promote HIV/AIDS awareness was a dismal failure and an embarrassment for me and the college.

The Aftermath:

I visited a neighbor later that evening to take her some tomatoes. She congratulated me. SHE CONGRATULATED ME. When I asked her how she could possibly, and voiced my complaints, she soothed me, “Oh, Ms. Kaye, it was not about the food today. It was about the MESSAGE. You brought some wonderful people to our campus today and the students were exposed to a wonderful message.”

I met my Peace Corps supervisor a few days later who assured me that the event had been successful, that having 50 college students receive HIV/AIDS counseling and testing was phenomenal, and that I was “being too hard on myself.”

Later that week, I would attend, as a guest, a similar event that was very well done. Many of the community-service providers that had attended our Valentine’s Day event were present, and I made my way to each of them to offer my apologies. All were more than gracious, and an area social worker said to me, “We could see that you were doing a brave and courageous thing, and that your school was not supporting you.” She further added, “If you’d like to do another event in the future, call us and we will help you organize and execute the event and we’ll bring everything you will need.”

I left my school to spend a week in Pretoria, which ended up being a very good thing, in that it allowed time and space that brought helpful perspective. On the Monday that I returned to my site, I made my way to the local grocer. As I passed the Police Station, on my way to the grocer, I heard someone calling my name: it was the Police Force Chaplain, the gentleman who arrived promptly at 9:00, waited impatiently until 11:00, then stormed the Main Hall demanding the program start, and was offended by my unzipped pants. On Valentine’s Day, he was rightly very, very angry with me and voiced it heartily. I cautiously approached him, expecting the worst. To my amazement, he was kind, gracious, and friendly. He seemed very happy to see me. I thanked him profusely for coming to our event and apologized for how badly it came off. He basically said the same thing Mrs. N had assured at the end of that awful day: That the message was the most important thing and to my concern that his staff hadn’t been fed, he replied, “It’s good for people to “go without sometimes.” He also asked me to try again and offered his help with the planning. He also invited me to his church.

When I returned to the campus from the grocer and my chat with the chaplain, someone else called me by name: “Karen, I have been looking for you. I live in a village 60K from here and want you to help me host an HIV/AIDS event just like the one you had here.” I assured him that I was happy to help and promised that this second attempt with his event would be much, much better. He replied, “No, I want the event to be exactly like yours.”

Soon,
Karen

PS. For more pictures of our Valentine’s Day Event, see my public Facebook page (click on the link). You need not be a FB member to see the photos:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=112579&id=1239371142&l=41314bec8d

Louisville RPCVs Lettie and Sally visit

2011-02-19T08:18:00.000-08:00

Lettie and I in front of my "guest room."

Lettie and Sally with the college kids

Lettie with my primary school children

Wow! What fun! My friends Lettie and Sally came to visit me this week and I had an exceptionally good time! It was fun to have friends from Louisville visit and as a bonus, friends from Louisville who happen to be Returned Peace Corps Volunteers! (RPCVs are volunteers who have previously served and have since returned to their lives in the States.) Lettie served Senegal from 2000-2003 and returns to Senegal each year. Sally served Ecuador, South America in the mid-70s.

I met these wonderful women about a year before I came to Africa. My recruiter for Peace Corps had told me that Louisville had a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer group in Louisville and I began attending their monthly dinners to meet former volunteers and hear all the Peace Corps stories. I learned very quickly that it’s great fun to be around former volunteers, as Peace Corps Volunteers share a special bond formed by our unique experiences.

And Sally happens to teach at Jefferson Community and Technical College—so we share employers as well!

Lettie and Sally are here only for a few weeks, so they could only stay a few days. However, I don’t think our visit could have been any more exciting:

• Lettie and Sally rode a bonafide Northwest Province taxi from Vryburg to my site. One asked, “Should we wait for another one?” as we spied a particularly dilapidated vehicle; I replied, “This is as good as it gets.” W were all crammed into the very back seat for our 50K ride to my site in true South African style!

• I had not before accommodated a whopping two guests at a time, but we managed beautifully and were a bit creative with sheets and towels and bed linens. Although I was worried that I had fed my guests too many eggs: fried eggs, boiled eggs, and French toast, they were very gracious and tried a lentil/rice dish and my chakalaka! I was sure to feed them fresh vegetables and fruit, and we delighted in a very ripe mango. Scrumptious!

• We visited my primary school and it was great fun to watch the kids swarm Lettie and Sally like a little hive of bees—and I remembered how it felt to be surrounded by so many school children at one time when I first arrived. There really isn’t anything quite like it! The children sang for us and the educators were very pleased to be meeting my guests from the USA.

For more pictures of our primary school visit, see my public Facebook page (click on the link). You need not be a FB member to see the photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=111511&id=1239371142&l=379dea3f1a

• The next day we visited my college. Sally was especially excited about my college, because she works for a technical school in the States. She has a great idea about both schools collaborating and was excited to find her very own counterpart in Mr. S to help facilitate a cross-cultural exchange between the South African college kids and the USA college kids. (I will, of course, help until I leave South Africa.)

• For more pictures of our college visit, see my public Facebook page (click on the link). You need not be a FB member to see the photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=111518&id=1239371142&l=789bd5d81b

• Just to add a bit of dazzle to our visit, we had rioting in a nearby town. The residents were protesting for better water services, the police came and fired rubber bullets into the crowd, and two little girls fled the scene to be later found drowned in a nearby dam (dam is the SA word for pond or lake). The drowning of the girls made the crowd even more upset, of course, and the police ended up arresting 42 citizens. We were fine, and the conflict has since resolved, but it was interesting to be hosting guests all the while receiving text messages from my PC security advisor giving me updates on the volatile situation.

• We were able to walk about the village one afternoon on a sizzling hot day. We encountered a family keeping a young Chacma baboon as a pet, a village cemetery, and a wonderful “pink apartment complex” where the landlord grows pomegranates, grapes, limes, lemons, and figs.

It was a lovely, lovely visit and my only regret is they couldn’t stay longer. Lettie and Sally were off to KwaZulu Natal to visit another Peace Corps Volunteer—another PCV from KY! We had a blast!

Soon,
Karen

During our village walk-about we spot a donkey cart

Sally with a Gogo and baby

The sun was sweltering this day.

Karen, Lettie, Sally, Ounaai, and the threatening African sky

Happy Valentine’s Day? Teacher-centered education

2011-02-12T09:47:00.000-08:00

I wish you could see this kid dance!

I have no nice new pictures of beautiful things to show you, so I’m posting some older pictures of the beautiful children from my primary school’s school concert from last year. However, hopefully none of these have been posted before, so they'll be new tot you! Other than the child posted above, the remaining photos are all of my Grade Six learners from last year. They are in Grade Seven now, and I refer to them as "my kids" in the captions. My heart bursts with pride fro them!

Hopefully, after Monday, Valentine’s Day, I’ll have current fun stuff to show you.

One of the goals of education reform in South Africa is to move from a teacher-centered to a student-centered classroom. What is the difference between teacher-centered instruction versus student-centered instruction? Simply, the student is the most important person in the classroom, instead of the teacher being the most important person in the classroom.

I’ve never understood how extraordinarily difficult this shift will be for the South African school system--from teacher-centered to student-centered—until now.

In the USA, we do a nice job of having student-centered instruction in our K-12 classrooms. Teachers in the USA want their kids to succeed and good teachers will do everything in their power to support their kids in learning and succeeding. For many teachers, again, the good ones, who have unsuccessful lessons or a struggling student, we will analyze what we, as the teachers, are doing wrong and make changes in our lessons to improve instruction or find ways to better help a struggling student.

In the USA educational system, we do tend to shift to teacher-centered classroom at the university level; after all, the word “professor” conveys the message “I know and profess and you (who know nothing) must listen.” In the college classroom, this is best illustrated in the “lecture” style of teaching: the professor stands before many students, sometimes as many as 300, and the students furiously attempt to note everything this wise one is saying. However, even at the university level, there is a shift to a more collaborative teaching and learning style, as is one example in with peer-review of student writing in freshman writing classes. With our current teaching/learning trend, we have decided that learning best takes place in smaller classrooms with more collaborative methods.

In all our schools and universities, the teach is there to serve the students; the whole learning environment is centered around supporting the students; the school works together and is proud of their students, and sporting activities and anything extracurricular highlights the talents of the students. We work very hard to keep our students happy and succeeding. And as a rule, the whole school has a loyalty and pride in itself, evidenced in “school spirit.”

Now I’m going to shift into my observations of the South African school system, with its current “teacher-centered” form of instruction. I will provide my disclaimer here: I am writing of what I observe in my schools in South Africa, not all of them. And too, my observations are prejudiced by my personal biases that I bring from my own cultural background and experiences. And as ever, who is to say that “our way--my way--is the right way.”

My grade six class -- they are in grade seven now!

I spent most of my time at the primary school last year, instead of the college (I will tell you why in my next blog posting), and my initial observations of the South African school system were at the primary school level. I was, of course, horrified by the corporal punishment administered, hated seeing the 600 students—young children--crammed in great numbers into too-small classrooms with unbearable learning conditions: blistering hot or freezing cold, no water to drink, no clean toilet facilities, and their teachers seemingly sitting in the staffroom pulling their hair out because of the paperwork required of them demonstrate to their supervisors that they are complying with policy. (In fact, I believe the educator’s primary purpose, in the current state of affairs, is to make sure they are complying with school and departmental policies, and are spending the majority of their school days preparing their reports and compiling their evidence instead of teaching their students.) Of the school’s miserable pass-rate, the educators would reply, “our learners are slow-learners (stupid) and cannot be taught.” However, what outraged me the most, other than the corporal punishment, was watching how the teachers interacted with the students: it’s as though the students existed only for the educator’s beck-and-call, they existed as their personal slaves, if you will. The children couldn’t wait to be summoned to fetch their teacher’s cold drinks, or carry heavy boxes of books, or even chop a tree trunk to build a fire. (When the school is short of funds, they cannot purchase propane, and the school cooks will prepare the children’s meals over an open flame; this is, of course, no small task when feeding +500 people.)

I could not imagine how students could love and respect their teachers, when their teachers were, in my view, so cruel to them, but they certainly did love and respect their teachers. In fact, I did not hold the respect of my students, because I would not beat them, until they saw how well they could learn without being beaten—and how fun it could be. (Then, gratefully, they came to love and respect me, and would miss me and ask for me if I could not come.) In my primary school, I did sense an attitude of pride toward their school—a sense of reciprocated love and loyalty between the teachers and students. And I did sense that (some of) the teachers genuinely loved their students. All of this was evidenced in school functions: Heritage Day, Parent’s Day, World AIDS Day, and the end-of-the-school-year celebrations. During these celebrations, everyone was happy, having fun, and very proud of their school community.

Two of my guys... I'm very proud of them.

On the other hand, in my return to the college this year, and especially with coordinating our Valentine’s Day Event to be held on Monday, I’ve observed the prejudices of the teachers toward the students on yet another level. The lecturers --here again, not all of them, but most, I think) feel contempt for their students and are more than a bit put-off at having to teach them. At having to teach them?

Again, coming from my background, I have worked for universities that plan and host events all for the benefit of their students. At many college campuses, a regular feature is a “welcome back” event hosted at the start of each new school year. Often, the event is held out-of-doors, and the school has vendors to come and provide free soft drinks, snacks, and small promotional gifts; often there is music or other kinds of entertainment; often school groups will set up booths to welcome and introduce themselves to incoming students. There is a general sense of fun and celebration created by the school, by the educators (adults) for the students. I was hoping to coordinate and help organize a similar event, put on by the school (the educators, the adults) for the students. My goal was to have a fun event catered for the students, to celebrate Valentine’s Day, while at the same time promoting HIV/AIDS awareness.

That was my hope.

I’ve really gotten a good dose of “teacher-centered attitudes versus student-centered attitudes.” Time and time again, I’ve come up against the attitude of, “What? Are you CRAZY? Why would I participate in such an event (that honors or celebrates the students)?” Time and time again, when I ask community organizations to come support our event (the students), I’m countered with “What is in it for me?” “How much is in your budget for me?”

I’m more than a bit put off by this attitude, as I was told South Africans honor a tradition of “Ubuntu,” or a common belief of helping others; a common attitude that all are responsible for helping others. However, I do not see my community practicing Ubuntu—at least for my college students; it seems more like my community members have been corrupted by the lure of money and that money is the only incentive to them for “helping others.” (And seeing these same people, business owners and organization leaders, who already have money and power, and use it in corrupt ways, is a whole other blog post.) So, it’s been a disheartening few weeks.

In the USA, a soft-drink vendor, like Coke or Pepsi, will often provide free refreshment for these kinds of events because a) they are recognized as a supporter of the school and the students and therefore earn a reputation for supporting their communities, and b) they know it is cheap advertisement for their product, and they have a good opportunity to “brand” themselves onto potential life-long customers. (I know; this in and of itself is inherently creepy.) I was hoping this opportunity, to raise their reputations and advertise their wares, would be a good enough sell on our community businesses to please come and participate in our school event and to please help make it fun for our students. No dice.

At the campus level, I would run into these kinds of brick walls: for our refreshment budget, I was hoping we could have a special treats for the students; it would always go back to: we’re feeding the guests and educators very nicely, will provide an elegant, catered, sit-down meal to the VIPS and the students will receive 4 slices of bread. (I’m not kidding.) I would plead: Please make this a special day for the student; Please help me think of ways to make it fun for the students. No dice.

We held a planning meeting for our event this week and I asked all interested in the event to come. We had about 20 to show, a feat that, in and of itself, I’m told, is a success story in itself. We had Hospitality educators come (who are preparing the food), Life Orientation educators to come (who are developing lesson plants so that our event is a learning opportunity for the students and one they’ll be given credit for), and the Student Support Officer. We had asked members of the SRC to come, the Student Representative Council, but they didn’t. It was very important to me that students could come, as how could we plan an event for our students without their input. In the end, we had two students there, one of my former students who had learned of the event and wanted to assist. We even had members from our police department come help plan our event: they have peer mentors in their HIV/AIDS outreach division.

My kids

Because I’m an American, and because I’m coming from a society that practices democracy on many levels, I was hoping that we, as a collective group of people with a common interest, (Valentine’s Day), could come together for a lively conversation with everyone feeling equally represented and feeling comfortable to share their own opinions. Not only did this not happen, I flubbed the protocol as the facilitator (in my culture, if you’re late, you are the loser; in this culture, if you’re late, everything has to stop so the late-comer can be honored) in that I ignored the late-comers and we continued on with our conversation. (I would later be publically upbraided for not properly introducing all of the participants, but how can participants be properly introduced if they all arrive late and at a trickle in half hour segments??) The men of the group dominated (and seemed to be challenging each other), women of the group demurred, (even though a very powerful female Head of Department was present), and the students were ignored and silent. As a facilitator, I would come back, again and again, to the students: What do you guys think? Do you have any suggestions of how we can make this event fun for you? The students were visibly shaken at my directing attention to them, and said something along the lines of “Sorry, Mam. We are only students here. Our opinions do not matter.”

In the end, on Monday, we hope to have an event, for students, that provides helpful information to promote HIV/AIDS awareness; we have invited special guests to make presentations and address the students; we have a team from the Health Department to provide HIV/AIDS counseling and testing; we have asked the choir to sing; we have asked for the Mayor of Taung to come and open our day for us; we have plans for refreshments to be served.

In all of this planning and preparation, which seems little and rushed to me (in the USA, I would have never taken on such an event without 4-6 months of planning—this has happened in 3.5 weeks), I have NO IDEA how this will come off. All of the phoning is completed, all of the faxing finished, all of the emails sent. I have made personal appearances, visited and pleaded, begged for money or donations. I have cajoled and schmoozed. There is nothing to be done now but show up on Monday and wait for the event to unfold.

As a unifying gesture, so everyone in the school can participate and support our event—in a gesture of school spirit--we have asked all of our campus community, lecturers and students, to wear red on Monday.

Yesterday, an educator pulled me aside to express her dismay: “Ms. Kaye, do the lecturers really need to wear red on Valentines’ Day?" (As if she couldn't believe she was being asked to lower herself to the students' standards. She added, "Can't only the students wear red?” Eish!

Teacher-centered, indeed.

Soon,
Karen

This shot is a bit blurry, but I love the mood of it. Again, my kids.

Say, "Cheese!"

2011-02-06T06:05:00.000-08:00

Our campus choir

Colleagues

My former and current supervisors with a happy award-winning student

All of us singing the South African National Anthem

The 2011 incoming students

The college had its official “Academic Opening” Ceremony this week. What exactly is an “official” Academic Opening? Well, my college, Vuselela FET, has six campus locations and to open each campus “officially,” the CEO and other VIPs come visit and we have a big “to do”-- a big, formal ceremony with caps, gowns, music, food, and awards. Ours was this week.

It’s so weird, because, in my little brain, I think these people would know that it’s kind of a big deal to have a Peace Corps Volunteer working for them. Or at least, in the USA, we tend to think it is something special to have a Peace Corps Volunteer working in communities in other nations. However, and alas, my schools seem to not think of my presence in a special way. They never provide a space for me in their programs, to address the students, so the students (and other staff) know who I am and why I am here. This is all very sad for me, and a bit frustrating, because I’m HERE to WORK WITH THE STUDENTS. You would think (I would think), the school administration would want me to address the students as we open the new school year. I kind of barged my way into the program last year and made space in their program for me to do this, but this year, I just let it go. I showed up as the token photographer. Everyone is always pleased to have a token photographer.

Last year, there was a lot of turmoil at my college campus and I somewhat ducked out to go work at the primary school instead. Last year, at the primary school, I had already gone through the process of setting boundaries with my camera. This entails a LOT of saying, “No, I’m sorry, I cannot take personal pictures”; “No, I’m sorry. I cannot take your picture, then ride an hour away to have it developed, and then bring it back for you, even if you pay me”; and “No, I’m sorry. I cannot do house calls for family portraits nor can I come to your house to photograph your car after the accident for your insurance company.”

The people that I’m living with LOVE to have their photos taken and they can get very aggressive about it. For example, if they are unhappy with the shot, they ask you to stay with them, for hours, to retake it 20 or more times. Sometimes, and quite often, especially with school children, (but even adults will do this), crowds will approach me and yank the camera out of my hands in order to view and approve of each shot. All of this crowding and grabbing is unpleasant for me, so it’s a lot of work, initially, to set clear boundaries around the camera and picture taking.

This news, of me not accommodating personal portraits or other personal requests, is not good news to hear and makes people less than happy. I need to be consistently firm and say it repeatedly without exception; and, not only to the kids, but to the staff members and other adults as well.

(This is all somewhat confusing to me, because in almost every case, even with the students, they ALL have their own cameras in their phones and all take pictures of themselves and others—all of the time!!)

It’s something of a tiresome, ongoing process, and I’m not well-liked in the meantime, but eventually, everyone finally understands that the camera belongs to Peace Corps (a handy little fib I tell for personal protection), and that the camera is for official use only, and eventually everyone quits asking and accepts the fact, and are happy with the fact, that I’m there to take pictures of their functions. And then, the young kids at least, ham it up for the camera. It makes great and easy photography.

I had already set clear boundaries with the primary school last year, but had forgotten I would need to do it all over again with the college kids. My saying “no” so many times, especially when I’m trying to better know and relate to the college kids, felt overwhelmingly distasteful. However, I got through it and snapped some nice shots, and am sharing all of them with the college (so the college can deal with making reproductions), but a lot of students, and even educators, were not happy at my not complying and providing their very own “Vogue Shoot.” (However, the idea of a “Vogue Shoot” might turn into a profitable fund raiser idea—especially if I can use the school’s camera!!)

The other thing I was reminded of, and saddened by, was the fact that most of older, teen-aged students and students in their early-twenties, and ALL adults (well, most) hate to smile for photographs and refuse to smile for photographs, (and can become aggressive about not smiling for photographs); so I was mourning the loss of my beautiful portrait shots of smiling, happy people. But then, I remembered I do have other events throughout the school year with the younger children, so I will be getting my gorgeous shots of beautiful, smiling children.

Which got me to thinking: Why do I insist on displaying only happy faces? Why is it not ok to show a photo of someone who is not smiling? And even still, why is it not ok to show a photograph of someone that appears to be scowling?

In America, we’ve learned that a posed, smiling shot makes the best photograph (well, as far as portrait shots go) and our kids, of course, grow up mugging for the cameras that are ever-present, chronicling their every move for all of their lives, so are well-rehearsed in mugging for the camera. So USAmericans have, I think, grown accustomed to, and even if the pose and smile are tiresome, will cooperate for a “candid” shot. But adults here, steadfastly refuse.

I am the USAmerican with USAmerican standards, trying to enforce the “smile rule” on all of my South African peeps. That caused a bit of conflict for me during our Academic Opening as well.

SAY CHEESE!

Soon,
Karen

PS. You may think I'm doing pretty good capturing those imposed smiles with these compliant, smiling faces here... I took 350 photographs. Three-hundred-fifty. These are some of the few what were "smile-able."

These two look like trouble! But they're not. The gentleman in the right is my former student.

Fellow English-teaching colleagues

My reluctantly posing for a photo

Housemates

2011-02-04T05:55:00.000-08:00

The photo is of a lovely wild zinnia that I noticed and fell in love with when I arrived in Africa last year. (Or whenever it was that I arrived in Africa… I’m losing track…) One morning, as I was walking to my primary school, I noticed a whole stand of these growing by the side of the road. They are all this brilliant red and the blooms only reach the diameter size of a quarter, but I just love them. In fact, I love them so much, that I gathered seeds and was intending to send them to all of my “flower lovers” back home in the States--and I know many, many flower lovers! I would walk by every day and pause to enjoy their beauty and I couldn’t wait until the flowers were spent so I could harvest the lovely dried seed heads. I harvested many, many of the wild zinnia seed heads, and put them aside to dry well before mailing them home to various friends and family members.

However, I knew better than to do this. Not only is it illegal to import seeds from a different country, I also know enough that regional flora grows where it is planted for a reason: because it is indigenous to the area in which it lives. These wild zinnias are living in Africa, not in the USA. Also, I know how devastating an “invasive or exotic species” can be in an already-established flora and fauna.

For example, in the USA, European starlings have become a pest and a “problem bird” because it lives, thrives, and reproduces very well in the USA. How did it come to the USA? Someone from England loved the bird so much that when he decided to come to the USA to live, he brought these “beloved birds” with him. Asian kudzu is another example of how an invasive/exotic flora can run wild. It was brought to the USA to assist with erosion control and now you can’t ride down any of our southern highways without seeing it swallow up everything in sight.

But I loved these zinnias so much, I felt very compelled to share them with family back home. (As did, I’m sure, the gentleman who so loved the European starling!) Eventually, I resigned myself to the fact that I simply couldn’t in good conscience do so, and dumped the lot of the seed outside my windows. I should have gone to the trouble to plant them carefully, but I did not. Nevertheless, these lovely beauties defied my carelessness and decided to grow anyway! And I’m so glad they did, because they have become my housemates. They send me off to work each day with their bright-red, cheery faces and it makes me very, very happy to see them.

Most of you know that a village dog has adopted me: Ounaai. As a fellow mammal and as a household resident, she is my most dedicated housemate. I love that Ounaai is an outside dog and she is very low-maintenance. Well, after the initial “start up” of spaying, worming, de-flea-ing, etc., provided by angels residing in the USA, she is now low-maintenance. And a special thank you to the USAmericans who provided for her—for us—in this way. Ounaai has brought me great happiness in my African home!

She loves to scratch her belly by lying with her legs straight back, and pulling her very long self along on the carpet or grass with her front legs: it’s a land version of “dog paddling” and she doubles me over in laughter to watch her.

My home is equipped with security doors and she is small enough to move through the bars. In this way I can leave my home open for her and she comes in and out as she pleases.

Although she has her run of all of Africa, she does choose to stay close. If I’m working at my desk, she is under my feet. If I move to another room, she follows right behind. She sleeps under my bed and barks at any suspicious noise she hears outside. Although she is welcome to stay inside my house when I’m gone, she remains on my front porch, regardless of the weather, to guard our shared abode.

Her new way of sharing companionship is to follow me out into the garden. I was away from my garden for nearly a month during the rainy season, and as a consequence, the weeds—and African weeds are FIERCE—have taken over. Ounaai likes it though, because she follows me out and lies in the tall weeds as I attempt to harvest. You can tell she delights in her “dogness,” in her way of lying hidden in the very tall grass. And that swirly-round thing that house dogs do when trying to settle? I’ve watched the village dogs exhibiting the same gesture, actually in the tall grass to dampen it and lie down. The gesture makes sense when you see it in its natural setting.

Ounaai has become a true companion and I’m already extremely fond of her. And--BLAST! I didn’t want a dog!!

Not quite as reliable are other housemates, and most of these are temporary—just visiting, so to speak. I used to be, like almost everyone I know and meet, very afraid of spiders and snakes. As I’ve learned more about them, I have come to admire and appreciate them very much. I’m not crazy about spiders in my house, but I don’t mind them. (And of course, don’t want snakes of any variety in my house!) I have a beautiful orb spider outside one of my front windows and each evening, as I’m watching the sunset, I watch her acrobatics as she spins and swirls to travel from one side of her web to the other. I believe she delights in the African sunsets as much as I! I especially like to watch her because she lives outside.

I have a different variety of garden spider that is sharing my living space, and she too, is outside. I haven’t gotten a very good look at her, because she resides in her web upside down and I haven’t seen her since our initial introduction. I’m hoping she’s still with me and will pose one day for a picture. While these garden spiders can look quite threatening, they are harmless and do a great job of keeping garden pests at bay. I usually fall deeply in love with my garden spiders and am heartbroken when the summer season ends, which sadly, also brings about the end of spider season too.

I’m not sure exactly where they are coming from, but I have a whole slew of baby spiders living in the vicinity of my bathtub. I try to relocate these whenever I’m drawing water for a bath or for laundry, but as I scoop one out, another appears. They are very tiny and I have no idea what kind they are, but I feel assured that they are valuable and necessary, so I attempt to rescue each one. I scoop them out with an empty toilet paper roll. I try to guide them inside the “tunnel” and drop them out the other by shaking the tube outside my window. In this way, I hope, they are outside of my house, yet still alive to flourish elsewhere—perhaps even in my garden!

I have a visiting bat, or perhaps one that stays in the house and comes out only on occasion. I had one come in a week or so ago, and watched him bounce around my bedroom trying to find a way out. This is no easy task for him, as my bedroom windows are covered in security bars and I have sheets of fabric pegged up as curtains. I love watching him circle around my bedroom, as I’m protected under my mosquito net (my anything-but-mosquito net!) and have a front row seat. It is a bit frightening though, because he bangs into the walls in an attempt to escape, and I worry about him becoming injured. Last night, he flew about and landed in a protected area behind my door. He heard, or otherwise sensed, a moth buzzing and bumping about near my overhead light and came flying out of his hiding place in hopes of a snack. (In fact, perhaps the bats are drawn into my house because the moths are drawn to my light as I’m reading.) The bat actually missed the moth, but did escape out of the hole in my broken window pane. I was worried the broken glass in the pane might harm him, but he seems to have escaped without injury. When lights were out, I heard Ounaai chasing and eventually chomping the huge moth that had earlier enticed the bat. Oh well--at least SOMEONE had a snack!

And I have a mouse. I’ve never seen this mouse, but s/he lives in my kitchen, and curiously, leaves my food alone. S/he does, however, leave “evidence” of nightly visits.

I learn a great deal from those I live most intimately with. When I was residing temporarily in Table Mountain National Park for the December holidays, I met and shared living quarters with a lovely woman, also a visitor to South Africa. She was from elsewhere in the world, a European, and she helped me better understand my “USAmerican-ness” probably better than anyone I’ve encountered in my life. But she gifted me in another way: she taught me to do the dishes.

I love to cook and do cook for myself, but tend to take shortcuts, mostly because I hate scrubbing dirty pans with cooked on/baked on food. For example, some mornings I will cook oatmeal for myself, while others, when I’m feeling short on time (or lazy), I will eat it raw—so I need not bother with scrubbing a breakfast pan. Likewise, I often eat eggs boiled so I need not scrub my fried egg off of the bottom of a pan. Good grief, have you noticed how difficult it is to clean a fried egg off the bottom of a pan? I have to use bleach to loosen it… And we put this substance in our bodies?? Now I understand why tempera paint (made from eggs) lasts FOREVER. And what about grilled cheese? Have you ever noticed how difficult it is to clean grilled cheese off of a plate? And we put this substance in our bodies? While many of you worry that I don’t eat enough meat, even in the States, I avoid cooking meat—because I don’t like to clean the greasy pots and pans! Gross!

Ok, back to the lovely housemate. Every single morning of every single day, every single lunch of every single lunchtime, and every single supper and every single snack, this woman would dirty every dish in the house to prepare herself a lovely, hot meal or snack: every single dish in the house! These meals weren’t even fancy: they consisted of simple fare, often only of toasted bread and pasta or a lovely fish omelet or soup. Even with her coffee break, she would trouble herself with toasted bread—toasted bread, like, in a pan on the stovetop! I would watch her and my head would hurt thinking of all those dishes she would wash; but in each and every instance, for each and every meal, she would go to the trouble.

I admired the way she troubled herself to practice self-care. Since my return to the village, I have been taking great care to cook wonderfully hot meals for myself throughout the day. And yes, I’m scrubbing pots and pans with cooked-on food, but each time I scrape, I think of her and the important lesson she taught me: life is too short to compromise on any meal, that each meal should be special and delicious!! And with this lesson and this practice, I’ve incorporated great joy into my life!

I am blessed with an abundance of rich housemates in Africa!

Soon, Karen

Spoiled

2011-01-29T07:42:00.000-08:00

The sun rises over Pudimoe.

I feel spoiled with the beautiful South African sky. It is gorgeous most of the time but I live for the sunrises and sunsets. This was a sunrise this week: it was well worth getting up at 5:00 am for! (South Africa does not acknowledge Daylight Savings Time.) This sunrise was so pretty I feel inspired to rise each of my remaining days in South Africa just to see the loveliness of each new day. I visited Key West, Florida, once, and was told that Key West is home of the most beautiful sunsets in the world. I think South Africa may be a very strong rival for this distinction. But I feel spoiled living in such decadent beauty of the South African sky, and will miss it when I return home.

I feel spoiled with the recent rainfall in my area. With rain coming down steadily for four days straight, my little patch of Kalahari thornveld has transformed into a wetland. The earth smells rich and wet, like a forest floor; dragonflies buzz by my windows like they wouldn’t dream of living anywhere else; flocks of butterflies have come alive and are feasting in the newly opened blooms of my campus’s lush new growth. For once, the rich wetness of my surroundings feels like home—my Kentucky home! I feel spoiled by the vibrant aliveness and the thick, humid air and am resenting the return of the blistering hot African sun which is drying everything out.

Ounaai is spoiled with her post-op pampering. She’s grown fat and happy and I swear this dog smiles. Currently, she’s thin and small enough to squeeze through the openings in my “burglar bars” (South Africa’s name for security doors), but not for much longer!! She’s making herself more and more comfortable in my trailer, and is becoming more of an inside dog than out. So Ounaai is being spoiled by my American dog-care tendencies.

Growing up, as an adolescent, I was terribly cruel to a neighborhood boy. He was a sweet kid, my age, but he had a speech impediment and was from an obviously poor family. He was often disheveled and didn’t wear the current fashions. He was just a kid, trying to fit in with “our gang” and I remember our group taunting him mercilessly and excluding him at every opportunity. But he continued to hang around, hoping for a way into our exclusive club.

One day he invited us to his house after school and, as we were so snotty, I can’t imagine why we accepted the offer, but we did. He offered us a snack of jelly sandwiches and I remember being absolutely horrified by the fact that he scraped the mold off of the top of the jelly and proceeded to feed us from the spoiled jar.

I was highly offended, in my snotty little self, that this neighborhood boy would offer me spoiled food.

In the South African summer months, food obviously tends to spoil much more quickly. I find myself cutting mold off of bread, or cutting away the rotten places off my cabbage, and throwing out rotting cheese Even though I place my groceries on the window sill to cool in the evening temperatures, it’s only a race with time, trying to outrun the bacteria that spoils my food. In the heat of the summer temperatures, the bacteria win more battles and are consuming more of my food.

Each day, as I scrape the rot off of my food, I remember that neighborhood boy and how cruel I was to him. I wonder if he’d find any consolation in the fact that thirty years later, this spoiled USAmerican is finally learning her lessons with spoiled food.

Soon,

Karen

Ounaai growing fatter by the minute.

The rainy season

2011-01-25T09:14:00.000-08:00

My former garden, now the jungle, becomes more and more frightening with each rainy day

Ounaai's salad is taller than she is

the dead end of our street is now a lake

This is my second rainy season in South Africa. It is the last week of January and I’m told it will rain from now until March and then stop completely until it resumes again next November.

This is my first rainy season in my trailer. I spent last year’s in the college girls’ dormitory and was nice and dry in my second-floor abode, completely protected from the weather. With the nice, large windows in my dorm room, I had an “IMAX” view of all of the African storms that blew through.

This year, I’m in my trailer and was delighted to find it very weather-resistant. I had one leaky window that I somewhat worried about, but overall, it was fine. However, on New Year’s Eve, a severe wind blew through and downed several trees and caused extensive structural damage throughout the campus. I was lucky, as far as structural damage goes, and came away with only broken bedroom windows.

Lucky, for sure, but am now dealing with a leaking mess as the rains continue to pour down. I’ve managed to plug the broken windows with a plastic table cloth which does a fabulous job of keeping the water out, but water came in for several days before I managed this unattractive repair. The carpet in my bedroom is soaked and the rain continues, so it doesn’t dry out.

The other problem is, my trailer, the wooden parts of it, are made from pressed wood. It seems that pressed wood becomes soggy cardboard when wet. Eish.

The other things I’ve noticed is that my window frames, door jambs, and plug sockets have all warped in a way to make closing doors difficult and plugging in my electric appliances difficult.

And nothing dries so everything feels wet and damp, even my bed: ick!

The other thing the rainy season brings, and that I had forgotten, is wave after wave of hoards of bugs! Yuck! The rain also seems to anger the biting ants and they become ferocious and the biting flies are bad too. Ounaai seems to be suffering the worst of it, as she has a fresh wound in her belly—and the bugs love it!

Ounaai has tired of her confinement, is tired of her leashed walks and enforced periods of rest, and is wanting to roam (and resume eating garbage). I worry that the muddy, messy water will infect her wound, so continue to imprison her.

So, I’m pretty grumpy and crabby and have no right to be: most of my neighbors live in tin shacks; their suffering is certainly worse.

Karen, Ounaai, and my village are longing for a sunny day or two to dry out and go out and play.

Soon,

Karen

more rain on the way

Finding happy work in Africa

2011-01-23T08:04:00.000-08:00

My fan base—my mom—gently inquired “Have you stopped blogging?” No, I haven’t stopped blogging, but I’ve been crazy-busy with school. South Africa’s school calendar year runs from January-December with generous school breaks throughout the school year. I hadn’t thought about it before, but I guess you can say we’re “year-round schools.” I’ve had a bit of time this weekend to pause and catch my breath and to catch up with you!

And truth to tell, blogging was the primary source of happiness for me during my Peace Corps service to-date, but I've found pleny of happiness in other things now, and don't feel so compelled to blog so much. And when coming back to Cape Town, I realized I was yammering on about things that aren't really important... But yes, I'm back and happy to be blogging.

The very strong wind storm knocked down several trees (and buildings!) at our campus and there is lots of clean up. One good thing that has come from the storm is that it has made firewood available to the poorer of our community members. Many people have visited the campus to retrieve wood and I wanted to show you one version of a donkey cart: as you can see in the photo, the rear-end of a truck bed serves as the trailer and the donkeys are hitched for pulling. The young boys that drive the donkeys can often be quite cruel.

Now to me and Africa--Yes, yes, I’m still deliciously happy in Africa! I thought my sudden and profound happiness might be temporary, but no, it’s still here! I think the shift in my happiness has come with finding happy work.

Peace Corps has only been coming to South Africa for eleven or twelve years now, since the fall of apartheid. While originally the South African government asked Peace Corps volunteers not to teach in the schools, as our teaching would displace resident South Africans from well-paying jobs, the government has since changed its mind in the wake of South Africa’s HIV/AIDS crisis.

My group, the one that came to Africa in 2009, was the first group allowed to teach in South African schools because of a critical teacher shortage (as a generation of South African teachers has perished in the HIV/AIDS crisis).

What did South African Peace Corps volunteers do when they weren’t allowed to teach in the schools? They assisted schools with various kinds of support and school projects: teacher training, school workshops, tutoring, computer training, school events (like World AIDS Day), etc. In coming to South Africa, while I was happy to teach, I really wanted to help support the schools with school/community projects.

For some reason I do not understand, education volunteers are introduced to their schools at the school year’s end, when everyone is the busiest trying to finish the school year: lessons need to be finished, reports need to be filed, and grades need to be turned in. The South African teachers and students are swamped at the end of the year, and well, to have a Peace Corps volunteer tagging along trying to figure out how best to help the schools is something of a difficult situation. (Or at least it was for me.) Although I had two months to get a feel for both of my schools (I teach for a technical college and a primary school), by the end of the school year and my introductory period, I felt clueless as to go a about school/community projects. I thought, What the heck, I’ll teach for both schools. In this way I’ll be in familiar terrain and I can scope out how to later coordinate school/community projects.

So that’s what I did my first year in Africa: I taught a business level English class for the college and I taught two sections of Grade Six English for the primary school

I learned very quickly that I was somewhat swamped with my teaching load, although my Peace Corps supervisor had warned me. Not only did I need to prepare to administer curriculum for two different grade levels, I was “thrown into the deep end” of swimming through how the South African school system works. One thing I was quite surprised by was the amount of paperwork thrown at South African educators: all of the administrative work seems quite beyond the pale to me. The policies and their resulting requirements are tricky too: lots of reading and interpretation. And I had a supreme advantage over my colleagues, as the policy documents are written in English. More than once I thought to myself, “Gosh, this is difficult to understand all on its own. I can’t imagine trying to understand it if English weren’t my first language.” It was like reading “lawyer-ese.” The other thing, as any good teacher can tell you, teaching is front-end loaded work; What I mean by this is, when you teach a brand new class for the first time, you really don’t know what works and what doesn’t, and your first year with a new class you see a lot of what doesn’t work, and then tweak things to the coursework runs better for future classes. It generally takes me a good year and a half to work out my course “bugs” and my classes aren’t really into top form until the second or even third year. And, well, Peace Corps volunteers don’t have that much time.

So, I found myself drowning in my teaching load, averaging 9.5 hour workdays, and working all weekends. Also, I was running back and forth between the schools, sometimes several times a day. But my workload with teaching wasn’t really the cause of my stress and unhappiness: as weird as it sounds, I felt isolated in my teaching.

What? How can one feel isolated teaching? You deal with people all day every day. Yes, this is true: I came to love my classes very much, and I felt very connected with my own students, but I felt very isolated from all of the other students, from the other educators and from the people in my community. I came and went, was always in a hurry, and felt very much “my own island.” As most of you know, I was pretty miserable for a long time.

Peace Corps, in its 50 years of service (2011 is Peace Corps’ 50th anniversary!), has learned that it takes quite a long time for (some) volunteers to feel comfortable in their communities and find happy work. Although the length of service asked of a Peace Corps volunteer is 27 months, and feels quite formidable going in, Peace Corps has learned that although 27 months seems a very long time, in reality, for the volunteer to be truly effective, 27 months isn’t a long enough period. Many, many former volunteers will say, “I had a very difficult first year, and my second was so much better and flew by in a blur.” They say this, because many of them didn’t find happy work until their second year. In fact, Peace Corps has learned this so well, that it is trying to make 3rd and 4th year extensions more desirable to established, in-country volunteers.

Perhaps in my eighteen months, I took a bit longer than the average volunteer to reach that happy point in my Peace Corps service. I’m just grateful that I stuck in there and kept trying. I was somewhat stubborn about it too—I felt I was being robbed of a happy Peace Corps experience and didn’t want to return home with an unhappy one!!

But all has changed for me, I’m happy to say. At the very end of last year’s school year I was relieved of my teaching duties so that I might better concentrate on school/community projects. (I was lucky and grateful that my supervisors and colleagues were as happy about the shift to project work as I.) The end of my last year’s school year was beyond satisfactory to me: in my primary school we participated in a World Wise Schools project (a letter exchange with a USAmerican school) and we hosted a World AIDS Day event. Everyone was happier: my principal was happier, my fellow educators were happier, the kids were happier (and I had much, much more exposure to many, many more of the school children), and the community members were much happier. (The community members in this case were the parents of the school children.) But most importantly, I was much happier.

So I was happy and joyous at the end of the school year last year, went to Cape Town, was happy and joyous there, and quite frankly, worried that on my return to my village, the happiness would have disappeared.

Not true, Oh I am so happy to report, not true. I’m crazy busy trying to pull together a Valentine’s Day Event for the college in February, where we hope to make a strong push for HIV/AIDS awareness. (Get it? Day of Love? Love one another safely?) We reported for school on the 10th of January, and feeling a time pinch (Valentine’s Day IS on February 14th!!), so I’ve been in planning meetings with my colleagues, begging for money from the college’s corporate center, writing letters begging for money and donations from local businesses and organizations. In short, sending a million faxes and following up with a million phone calls! And then too, following up with personal visits. But I’m having SO MUCH FUN and MEETING SO MANY PEOPLE than I had been. I finally feel that I’m doing the Peace Corps work I dreamed of doing: working with community members to build relationships and bringing community members together to better our lives. I feel ridiculously happy and so very grateful. I love my community, I love my life, and yes, finally, I LOVE MY PEACE CORPS EXPERIENCE! I’m a very lucky girl!
Soon,
Karen

Ounaai

2011-01-22T06:30:00.000-08:00

“We can do no great things—only small things with great love.” --Mother Teresa

Ok, ok, and no, the looks are not deceiving you… Yes, that is a dog… Yes, that is a dog sleeping on my furniture. Yes, I am the person that has spouted “NO DOG” for more than a decade. Yes, I’m the person who claimed, “I can barely take care of myself! I can’t possibly care for another living thing!” So what happened?

This is Ounaai, the little dog that adopted me in November. Actually, I’ve learned she has two names: one provided by her Afrikaner daddy, Ounaai (OOO nay), and a second name given by her Indian daddy as well: Chakkra (Shah—KA-rah—and role the “r”). I guess I’ll continue to call her Ounaai, because that what I’ve been calling her all along, but will use Chakkra as her surname… Her surname? You mean, to name a dog like a human being? Like a CHILD??

I grew up in suburbia in the 70s and I must have lived through the first big push for leash laws and having pets spayed or neutered. I can remember we had dogs that ran wild outside and I remember these same dogs would sometimes have puppies. My parents were smart enough to know that if we had a family dog, spaying or neutering was a must, and well, having a pet is an investment in more ways than one. I remember my parents less than happy to hear our cries of, “Oh PLEASE, CAN WE KEEP THIS DOG?” when one followed us home, or sometimes, but very rarely, a cat. However, being tender-hearted as they are, we always had a family pet, and the family pet was always spayed or neutered and came and went in and out of the house at will (before the leash laws). In my family, a dog was loved and appreciated, but it was clear that the dog was a dog (and not a human being), ate regular dog food and sometimes table scraps, and well, we just didn’t pamper our pets.

In the last 10 or 15 years, I’ve noticed and have become increasingly irritated with the American trend of pampering pets: prescription dog food, dog super stores, dog beds, dog sweaters, dog Halloween costumes, dog snugglies, dog treats, dog portraits, vet house calls, and dogs so pampered they are carried, rather than walked. This trend grated my nerves and irritated me highly and I would think to myself, “There is so much suffering in the world, yet many of our dogs in the USA live better than I do.” I just didn’t get it, I just didn’t understand, I just couldn’t get my mind around it.

So, for most of my adult life, I haven’t owned a dog nor even desired to.

When I came to Africa, I noticed a lot of suffering: I noticed a lot of people suffering and I noticed a lot of animals suffering. I live with some of the most impoverished people in the world and I live with children who have lost their parents to HIV/AIDS. However, much to my dismay, it was the dying pigeon or the cruelly tethered cow that I would come home and cry about; It was the donkeys braying in desperation as they were brutally beaten by the young children trying to drive them that shredded my heart; It was the starving dog, wobbling on unsteady legs and too weak to stand that went right through me. I felt more sympathetic to the suffering of animals and couldn’t figure out why (and of course, felt extraordinarily guilty for it).

Ok, back to the dog: Ounaai. So, Ounaai shows up when I’m feeling especially down and she seems very happy to see me, the “wiggly-all-over-happy” and of course, endeared herself to me immediately; although, of course, I didn’t want a dog. I noticed right away that she was a very gentle dog and she seemed timid and afraid around people. I also noticed that she had recently had puppies and wondered if she had a puppy cache somewhere. She hung around for a few days and did that wiggly, very happy-to-see you thing, and then I did the thing I knew I shouldn’t: I fed her. At that point, she began to sleep in the pine needles under my trailer and would bark through the night at anything that she found threatening. I began to appreciate her protection and affection more and more. I went from feeding her crushed crackers and milk to buying dry dog food. (Notice the increased investment.) I learned that she isn’t all that crazy about dry dog food, because she has at least two other daddies that love to braii (the South African word for grilling meat) and feed her generously from their table. I put the dog food away but felt happy to know that she has an extended family large enough to rotate through: she had a mommy and two daddies and establishes a pattern of nights with me, breakfast with Daddy #1 and dinner with Daddy #2. I very much like having a part-time dog.

But I worried about the potential puppies that were certain to come: yes, the three of us were taking care of the one dog between us, but what if she had a litter of puppies? With the poverty in the village, there is no way it could absorb litter after litter of puppies. And then it was time to go to Cape Town for the Christmas holiday. I knew I’d be gone for nearly a month, but it seemed between the three of us, arrangements were made for her care and feeding. (But I would learn on my return that she hadn’t been fed or cared for.) In my leaving, I decided if she were still be around on my return, getting her cleaned up and see about spaying.

I cried at leaving the dog when I left (already so attached) but hoped she would find a magical, happy family to care for her in my absence. (Like THIS would happen in rural South Africa!)

I returned, a severe storm passed my village in my absence, Ounaai’s #1 dad’s trailer had flipped, and I worried that Ounaai were lying dead under it. On my second day home, she returned in all of her wiggly-all-over happiness. (Actually, she had returned that very same night I’d arrived, but I didn’t recognize it her scratching at the door.)

So, as I had promised, I set about treating the fleas and the worms and the ear mites. I gave her a bath and picked ticks off of her and made her greatly perturbed. And then of course, it would not go away—the biggest of all dreads: I would have to address the potential puppy problem. I phoned vet after vet, called the State Veterinarians in two towns, visited the public library for information, and even went to my shopping town’s city newspaper to plead: I need money to have this dog spayed. Can you help me? I was told “no” in every instance. (South Africa, it seems, at least in Vryburg, has no charity or organization dedicated to spaying and neutering dogs and cats, and you can just imagine the pet problem in the villages. To have Ounaai spayed is just a drop in the large sea of the problem.) I was crying on the phone and two of my family members, sensing my distress, mailed me the money to have her spayed.

So, Ounaai Chakkra was spayed yesterday. It was an ordeal for both of us. For her, it was a first time on a collar/leash, first time in a car, first time in a vet’s clinic, first time to have a surgical procedure. For me, it was a couple of weeks of begging for money, and begging even more for a ride to the veterinarian, feeling very anxious about the plans for the ride not working out (as I am still experiencing “indirect communication” in South Africa, which is people telling me things that are not true, like, “Yes, I’ll pick you up at 4:00,” but then not showing until well past 6:00, when the vet’s office has closed, and I can no longer wait in their office, and I’m carrying a very groggy, freshly spayed dog, wrapped in her bloody sheet, crying, because it’s after 6:00 pm, I’m an hour away from my village, will need to catch a public taxi that will probably not pick me up because most of the people on the taxis, including the driver, have a deep-seated fear of dogs, on a Friday night, when everyone is drinking, and it is nearly dark. So I’m crying, and walking, and the guy eventually comes, but it was a very long day.)

So, Ounaai is spayed, I’ve had laundered all of the blood and fear out of my clothes and her bedding, she is resting now, on my furniture, convalescing because I feel it is the least I can do after the trauma I caused. After all of this investment, she will officially become “my dog.”

So, why all this trouble now, for a dog, from the famously-proclaimed, “Not I”?

It has been a difficult 18 months for me: I’ve lost my home; I’ve lost family members; and my sons continue to struggle horribly with consequences of their life choices. I feel far away and powerless. I come to South Africa and live with people that live in tin shacks, with no heat or air, little to eat, and have rags for clothes. I see orphaned children in shoes that are so worn, they are barely recognized as shoes. I see children so malnourished, their hair is brittle and discolored. I see children that play by breaking glass bottles, because that is all for them to play with. I see domestic animals and pets starving, because their owners can’t even feed themselves. And I feel powerless.

And then the light bulb: I care about this one dog, because I can do something to help her. I have the power to help with this one small, living creature, to decrease her suffering. I can stop the suffering of one living creature in this great big world of pain and suffering. (Actually, in her spaying, I may be preventing future litters of dogs and puppies from suffering starvation, neglect, and abuse.) I can’t do anything for my sons; I can’t do anything for the suffering people in my community; I can’t do anything to alleviate suffering in Africa; I can’t do anything to alleviate the suffering of the world. But I can do something for this one, small, suffering animal. I’ve cleaned her up and had her spayed.

So, I have a dog. Maybe now I can better understand and appreciate the American need for doggy-day care. After all, while living in the wealthiest country of the world, isn’t there a lot of pain and suffering we cannot alleviate?

Soon,

Karen

Telling on myself: the Cape Flats smile

2011-01-10T04:17:00.000-08:00

Ok, I’m going to tell on myself here and remind you of how critical and judgmental I am—in case you had forgotten!

While in Cape Town, I met a lovely young man and he was very, very handsome. I couldn’t help but notice though, that he was missing all of his top-front teeth. I remember worrying about what happened to him at such a young age: Was he in a car accident? Was he in a fight? Could he have suffered with such horrible tooth decay? He looked marvelously healthy in every other way. We spent a bit of time together and I had an occasion or two to observe him eat. As I watched him tackle an apple, I was saddened at the thought of him trying to eat with such difficulties, and again, at such a young age.

After a few days of my ranger duty, I noticed a BMW in the office parking lot. I don’t know about you, but I haven’t met many park workers making enough money for such a high-end car, and curious, I asked to whom it belonged. I was told that the car belonged to the parents of the very handsome young man who had no teeth. And in my critical and judgmental thinking, I thought, “His parents can afford such a nice car, and yet they cannot afford to fix their son’s teeth?” (Notice too, my thought of “fixing” the teeth… I’m becoming aware of my USAmerican notions of “fixing things” instead of letting things be. Is this a Karen tendency? Or a USAmerican tendency?)

A-N-Y-W-A-Y.

A few days later, my housemate commented that she had noticed several Capetonians of the colored race having missing front-top teeth and was curious about it. Was it a cultural thing? (And I can feel the collective cringe from the USAmericans at my designation of a people by their race. Sorry folks! That’s the way it’s done here! It takes awhile, but unfortunately, you somewhat get used to it, or at least I have, which is sad…) She later confirmed that when she inquired with Captonian friends about it—this missing of top-frontal teeth—it is indeed, a cultural thing and is considered a very, very attractive attribute from those who practice it.

Yikes! I just shudder at the thought of a dentist extracting perfectly healthy teeth!

So, I learned a completely new cultural thing about a new group of people (to me) living in Cape Town. I’m posting an article from News24 and a photo I’ve borrowed from the internet. (The photo of the toothless young men was not a part of the article.)

Can’t quite wrap my mind around this one, but hey, I don’t have to! And, I must admit, I don't understand the attraction in a lot of USAmericans "fashions" either!

Soon,
Karen

The Cape Flats smile

2009-10-09 14:26

Fran Blandy

Cape Town - The laughing young man has a perfect set of teeth, his golden incisors glinting in the sunlight.

Suddenly he pops out a pair of dentures, revealing a gap-toothed smile, the four upper front teeth missing, a common sight among coloured Capetonians that has spawned outrageous myths and stereotypes.

A group of youngsters clad in baggy sweaters, caps drawn low over shiny sunglasses, mill around curiously before they start to pop out their own dentures, showing off gummy smiles and striking gangster poses.

"It is fashion, everyone has it," said 21-year-old Yazeed Adams, who insists he had to take out his healthy incisors because they were "huge".

One of the most enduring images of coloured South Africans is the frequent absence of their front teeth, a mystery to many but popularly believed to facilitate oral sex.

Fashion, peer pressure

This sexual myth - not borne out by research - has seen the trend referred to as the "Passion Gap" or the "Cape Flats smile", after a populous neighbourhood.

Jacqui Friedling of the University of Cape Town's human biology department studied the phenomenon in 2003 and found fashion and peer pressure the main reasons for removing teeth, followed by gangsterism and medical reasons.

"It is the 'in' thing to do. It went through a wave, it was fashionable in my parents' time," she said of the practice which has been around for at least 60 years.

Dental modification in Africa is historically found only in tribal people, including filing of teeth and ornamentation, but in modern Cape Town the practice abounds, often as a rite of passage for teenagers - almost exclusively from poorer families.

Rob Barry from the dentistry faculty at the University of the Western Cape said the practice has surged, even though dentists are ethically barred from removing healthy teeth.

"Almost every week I get some or other teenager in here wanting teeth out," he said.

Dentures

He said he has made thousands of partial dentures for people who need to look acceptable at work or for special occasions.

Friedling said the dentures themselves have become a fashion statement, some decorated with gold or bits of precious stone or various designs.

She noted that the Cape Town trend preceded the hip-hop culture fad of wearing ornate gold or diamond "grills" on teeth that swept the United States in the last decade, in which people opted for removable gold or ornamented caps rather than extracting the actual teeth.

"Here, it was a case of them elevating themselves above the rest of their peers, (it was) not to do with hip hop culture. The minute they can afford different sets of dentures then (the idea is) 'I am a bit better than you'," Friedling said.

"That's what makes it here in South Africa so unique," she said.

Kevin Brown, 33, sits in his "office", a crate on the corner of Long Street, the city's nightlife hub, where he hands out cards for an upstairs brothel, popping out his teeth at passers by - often tourists - and laughing at their reactions.

"I am the pimp," he smiles, displaying four gold incisors. "It is a fashionable thing."

Form of identity

Ronald de Villiers, 45, lost all his teeth after he initially put in gold dentures which infected the rest of his mouth, a common occurrence.

He said his 11-year-old and 14-year-old had already had theirs out "to look a bit prettier" and says it is easy to find a dentist to pay a bit extra to remove the healthy teeth.

"I think it was initially a form of identity. If you look at the coloured people they are a hodge podge of everyone that came in, they couldn't claim any of those ancestries of their own," said Friedling.

To her surprise, she also discovered the practice among a few whites, blacks and even one or two Chinese living alongside poor coloured areas.

In interviews with 2 167 people, 41% had modified their teeth, of which 44.8% were male, in the only study of its kind.

Gangsterism

Peer pressure was cited by 42% while 10% removed their teeth due to gangsterism practices - a huge problem on the Cape Flats - a mainly coloured area on the outskirts of Cape Town.

"They said when they have gang fights they take the people's teeth away, it is taking a bit of their wealth away," said Friedling, adding that different gangs would also have different implants.

Not everyone is pleased with their decision.

Ebrahim Jardin, 33, is not wearing his silver, gold or plain pair of dentures today. A cigarette is clenched between his gums.

"I should have kept my front teeth. Most of the younger people do it, but I don't think it's cool anymore. It is people expressing their stupidity."

- AFP

http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/The-Cape-Flats-smile-20091007

photo from internet: www.ifashion.co.za

Return of the prodigal gardener

2011-01-10T00:43:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the jungle!
Thorn fence blown apart; African spinach (back left) towering as behemoths;
tired zucchini on right;
tomatoes and okra hiding in the weeds

Several of you have asked about my garden and how it fared in my absence and how it weathered the storms. W—e—l—l… It did ok, all things considering.

I almost fell over at the sight of the 2’ high weeds on my return—so much for deep mulching! Oh well, at least the weeds were happy and thriving in their mulch! The weeds, it seems, is the most formidable challenge of repair on my return. They’ve had massive, massive rain while I was gone and have been living quite happily and growing to monstrous proportions in my vegetable bed!

A portion of my thorn fence was lifted over onto my beans/green bed. This has happened before. The beans seemed to be happily blooming up through the thorns! My African spinach (amaranth) as happy though and had grown into 4’ behemoths. Zinnias too, were happy blooming in the amaranth’s shade. (I’ve since had a couple of dinners of African spinach, so the shade problem has been solved.)

My tomatoes were sprawling (as the plants were quite small when I left and I hadn’t yet tied them to their stakes) but seemed to be doing well in spite of the weeds; they were in bloom when I returned. Maybe I’ll have decent maters yet! My heirloom okra is alive and well too, again, in a tangle of weeds. I had asked a neighbor to come “take what you’d like” from my garden, hoping she’d take the zucchini, so it would keep producing. I confused her, however, as I told her it was a “squash plant” and so she was expecting to see butternut squash. Since the plant was producing, well, green zucchinis, she didn’t know what they were and did not harvest them. (They call zucchinis “baby marrows” here). So I SHOULD have said, it’s a baby marrow plant. Oh well. So, I had some bloated, tough zucchinis rotting on the vine. I’ve removed them, in hopes of reviving the plant, but we’ll see.

I’m debating what to do next. I will certainly salvage the tomatoes and okra and keep the amaranth, of course. (It will produce all season with cutting.) Will watch the zucchini plant to see how it fares, but I may need to go ahead and put it out of its misery. Any suggestions?

I think I will not rebuild my thorn fence and will dismantle what is left of it. The point of the garden was to see if a home garden could be (somewhat) easily constructed by someone living in rural South Africa, and even more to the point, someone who is living in rural South Africa and affected by HIV/AIDs. So, the hope was that the installation and maintenance of the garden would be somewhat easy. I have learned that it is not so easy, even with a healthy, able-bodied individual. The digging of a trenched bed is labor-intensive, although community members could help an ill person with digging; and a home garden most certainly needs proper fencing and without it, goats are a formidable problem (proper fencing being too expensive for most ill, rural South Africans).

Also, I was hoping my “demonstration garden” would be a point of interest for community members and, well, it was not.

Ultimately, I garden for personal satisfaction and enjoyment, and will likely continue to garden a bit during my last days in Africa; however, I think I’ll downsize considerably—and be free from the danged thorn fence!

Soon,
Karen

Zinnias thriving, despite shade from the towering African spinach

Did I mention that Ounaai is ok??

The college brings in the New Year with a BANG!

2011-01-09T08:16:00.000-08:00

A neighbor who had it the worst, but he was away and is ok.

School on Monday? Maybe not...

wind strong enough to bend a steel security fence

A BANG to the drum of a a terrible, terrible storm.

At one point in my South African career, I erroneously believed tornadoes only occurred in North America: NOT TRUE, NOT TRUE, NOT TRUE! Tornadoes most certainly occur in South Africa and if a tornado didn’t blow through my village on New Year’s Eve, then tornado-force winds certainly did! My trailer fared very well, considering my neighbors’ damage (as you can see)—mine only suffered only a broken window. And I am more than a bit grateful I was not here for the bringing in of the New Year!

As you can see from the top photo, my furthest neighbor, Mr. J, had his trailer flipped: the good news is that he wasn’t home either! School is supposed to resume on Monday (the 10th) but with all of the power wires down, I’m somewhat doubtful. Thorn trees were snapped at the trunk, huge pepper trees were uprooted, steel fences were twisted, and roofs were blown off of several of the educators’ houses

.I’ve not heard of anyone being hurt—if this is the case, my village is lucky indeed! Eish!

In this awful aftermath, I have developed an emergency evacuation plan: run for the most secure structure, and in my case, the students’ toilets—a stinky but much more protected spot for waiting out the fierce African winds!

Soon,
Karen

another neighbor's home shifted about 5 feet--note former staircase into home

trees down everywhere

But Ounaii is ok!

African Penguins at Boulders Beach

2011-01-05T03:01:00.000-08:00

In my remaining days of the park, I was lucky enough to hook up with a group of incoming conservation students and sit in on their orientation and get the full tour of the park as well as gaining helpful history and background of the park. On the second day of the orientation, we visited all the major areas of the park: the northern section where Table Mountain is; the central section, where the Silvermine Dam and Silvermine River Valleys are (where I have been residing in the park), and the southern portion of the park, where Boulders Beach is along with the very famous Cape Point.

I have pictures of the penguins at Boulders Beach and was delighted to actually be seeing the birds that I had taught a lesson on with my sixth graders last year--and was wishing more that my sixth graders were there to see the penguins as well!

Here’s a bit on the penguins from Mountains in the Sea: Table Mountain to Cape Point: An Interpretive Guide to the Table Mountain National Park, 2004:

“Penguins are among the creatures most loved by people, and with good reason, for they are perhaps the most human of all birds. Slow, comical, and clumsy on land, they are incredibly swift and graceful in the water. Brave, loyal to their partners, and good socializers, they are also feisty individuals given to odd eccentricities. Penguins are a flagship species for conservation, and nowhere else on Earth is a member of this remarkable as accessible to people as Boulders.

The African Penguin (Spheniscus demersus) is one of the 17 penguin species, all of which occur in the southern hemisphere. It is Africa’s only penguin, with a breeding range from Namibia to Port Elizabeth. There are 27 breeding colonies, 24 on offshore islands where a protection from predators is greatest. Mainland breeding colonies are rare because the birds are much more vulnerable here. . . . They are accustomed to human presence and this is the only place in the world where you can get this close to wild penguins. (138-39)

Soon,
Karen

Amended New Year’s Resolution: or, Falling in love in Africa, Part Two!

2011-01-02T10:04:00.000-08:00

Hiking over the forests and winelands of Constantia.
I'm told that Constantia is home to the "oldest winelands in the Cape."

“This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something.” As (re)told by Elizabeth Gilbert

In 1989, I discovered 12-step recovery and my life would change forever. Of the many, many lessons I’ve learned, the most helpful is “stay in today.” If I’m able to stay in the day, and this simple instruction is by no means easy, I am free from worry of tomorrow or pain from the past, and life feels much, much easier. In learning to live one day at a time, I gave up my habit of making “New Year’s resolutions” because really, I needed to be making “new resolutions each and every day” instead. In 12-step recovery, this is called “trying to do the next right thing.” So I quit following the tradition of New Year’s resolutions, and hadn’t made any for almost 20 years. But all of this changed for me last year, when I decided that yes, certainly, I would live my life one day at a time, but it would be nice to set a yearly goal for myself, to have something I could monitor and adjust and evaluate, (I AM an American, from the USA after all!) and in 2010, my tradition of New Year’s resolutions resumed. Last year, I resolved to cease complaining and dedicate each and every Sunday to spiritual devotion followed by a day off. In other words: NO WORK ON SUNDAY! I think I made it to the third week of January for NO WORK ON SUNDAY and the complaining, I’m sorry to say, resumed even earlier!

Alas, I’m trying again in 2011. I had originally decided that I would try to meditate each and every day of 2011, and so far so good (today is Jan 2), but in my meditation, another idea has come up. (I love how that works!)

I will probably remember 2010 not only as a challenging first year in Peace Corps South Africa, but also as a year of healing (again) from a broken heart. I’m far from finished with my grief, but believe I’ve made great gains. In my struggle with healing from the grief of loss, I’ve spent a great deal of time in prayer, asking for prayer support, feeling my feelings, and reading spiritual texts. Two texts have helped me immensely in my recovery from a broken heart: Pema Chodron’s When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times and Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love. (Go ahead and roll your eyes!)

Pema Chodron, in her retelling of Buddhist philosophy, advises to lean into the pain, embrace it, and run towards it (rather than numb it with anything: tv, computer, reading, eating, drinking, or –and this is my favorite way of avoiding the pain of a beak up--falling in love with someone else) and although I find the practice daunting, to lean into the pain, I find it very effective.

Elizabeth Gilbert has helped me in many ways too, although her memoir Eat, Pray, Love is probably not considered a spiritual text by most people. But her book (in part) tells of her quest to find a true(er) spiritual connection, and in telling of her spiritual journey she has greatly helped me with mine.

In her search, she examines the notion of true love, long-term passionate love, and the notion of being so in love, you’re convinced you have a “soul mate.” I was particularly struck by Richard from Texas’s (one of Gilbert’s many spiritual guides along her journey) definition of a soul mate:

“People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, the person who brings you to our own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then they leave. And thank God for it” (Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love, 149).

And thank God for it indeed!

I love Richard’s spin on soul mates because I can shift my perspective to one from my many “failed” relationships to one of being blessed with a lifetime of soul mates! And it’s true when I think of it: in all of my presumed “life partnerships,” each and every “spouse” has helped me to change my life in ways that I discover more about myself—and really, what a blessing! Although they are painful blessings!

While there is a part of me that still searches for that “one true love” or the “love that lasts forever” (which is why I’m enamored with finding couples in their 70s, 80s, or 90s still being publicly affectionate with one another), I’m gently reminded that my one true love has been with me all along: me. And if there were something “wrong” or something “needing fixing” because of my seemingly inability to sustain a long-term committed relationship, the “problem” would be with me; because as much as I like to believe that I’m a whole, completely self-sufficient, evolved, intact human being, and therefore an ideal partner, the fact is that I still wrap myself (and my identity) up in my partner and come to depend on that partner for my “happiness.” Shame! And what a batch of problems to lay on a life partner! Yikes!

All of which has prompted me to amend my New Year’s Resolution: while yes indeed, I hope to devote time each and every day to meditation, I also devote and dedicate the year 2011 to falling in love with Karen! I hope this New Year is a passionate, joyful, compassionate, sensuous, sexy search for that unconditional love for me, and in so doing, that I will ultimately—and eventually--evolve into whole-heartedness. So, that’s it! I’m devoting 2011 to having a delicious love affair with Karen--and no one else is invited!

Soon,
Karen

one of the original reservoirs for Cape Town on top of Back Table

New Year’s Day on the beach: People-watching on Fish Hoek Bay

2011-01-01T11:13:00.000-08:00

protected pool

rocky point, high shark alert area, kelp beds, mountain range: Hottentot's Holland in background

I woke on New Year’s Day to a steady rain. I was hoping the rain would allow a leisurely morning with plenty of good coffee and then clear later so I could walk down to the beach to engage in one of my favorite hobbies: people watching. It did and I did!

And perhaps I should wish more for rain: after the rain cleared, there was no wind and not a white cap on Fish Hoek Bay: it was absolutely the calmest I’ve seen the sea. And even now, when I’m home and settling in for the evening, there is no wind breaking down the doors and I can still see the calm bay—not a white cap in sight!

A friend recently noted that she doesn’t approve of my hobby—people watching--because she doesn’t like to be stared at. In my defense, I people-watch in a loving, affirmative way, not a mean-spirited, cruel way. People-watching brings me great joy. I love to watch people, well, almost anywhere really, but I especially like to watch them at happy places: like parties, or wedding receptions, in malls, in airports, or at the beach! And Bardstown Road in Louisville is an especially good people-watching spot!

I’ve been especially watching for happy families—probably because I so keenly miss mine. And Cape Town has its lion’s share of happy families, I’m pleased to report!

On Christmas Day, while Raquel and I were sitting on the beach, I was watching a huge, HUGE family having a wonderful meal on the beach. There were many grandfathers bouncing babies, many grandmothers fussing with food, and many children running in and out of the surf. I delighted in their interaction: everyone seemed so happy! The next thing I know, a grandmother approaches us, plates in hand ready to dole out some lunch for us. We politely declined, as we had just eaten, but I was moved by her friendly generosity.

There is also a large, family group staying at the Sunbird Center, having a family reunion for New Year’s. They too, have included me as part of their family! They’ve just delivered my share of their New Year’s Day braii: much meat (chicken and sausage), not the usual 5 pounds of pap—but plenty, and a nice serving of veggies. I’m a lucky girl!

Today, I was treated to families, many families having New Year’s Day fun on the beach. And I treat the world “family” very broadly, and even a single person on the beach, like me, qualifies! The older I get, the more I appreciate the beauty of children. I remember being a kid, being mean about so and so being so ugly! Now I can’t find an ugly child anywhere! Each and every child I see seems so perfect! So beautifully perfect and full of joy! I love watching the little ones play in sea. They’re precious.

I too, enjoy seeing the different body shapes. We are really unique and beautiful, no matter our body size or shape—no matter what the media tries to tell us! I love too, how unselfconscious everyone seems. Everyone seems perfectly happy with their bodies and very comfortable, and that makes me happy to see!

But the plum prize, for whenever and wherever I’m people watching, is to find an elderly couple being openly affectionate with one another. I love seeing an elderly couple holding hands or having their arms about one another, and it gladdens my heart to see long-lasting love! I got my plum prize today when I saw a man and a woman, sitting at the point, him with his arm around her! I almost cried!

It was also super-dooper nice to see people of all colors playing on the beach together! South Africa as truly the rainbow nation! At least in Fish Hoek Bay, on New Year’s Day!

Happy New Year everyone!

Soon,
Karen

kelp beds

protected pool with stairway down to