Happy Anniversary.... An Entry From the Edge... Or is it the Middle?

April 16, 2009

“Let me know..
Do I still got time to grow?
Things ain’t always set in stone
That be known, let me know

Let me..

Seems like-
street lights, glowing
Happen to be,
just like moments,
Passing, in front of me

So I hopped in
the cab and
I paid my fare

See I know my destination
But I’m just not there
All the street lights, glowing
Happen to be, just like moments
Passing in front of me, so I hopped
In the cab and I paid my fare.

I’m just not there
In the streets
I’m just not there
Life’s just not fair.”

Kanye West “Streetlights”

Although this song centers on several increasingly foreign concepts to me, namely streetlights (streets, or lights or really, electricity… hmmm cabs? Perhaps in Maun). This one has been on some sort of terminal repeat on the ipod (along with the rest of the CD-lifesavingly fantastic-screw you Rolling Stone, you’re just wrong) in some sort of effort to self destruct the whole machine. I love it.

A year ago today I got on a plane to Philly, which lead to a bus to JFK and another plane to Jo-burg (and thus begins a typical model for Peace Corps travel, minus the vehicle breakdowns). I’ve been ruminating about the fact that the anniversary of the crazy decision I made has been approaching for a while. I’ve plunged into the depths of depression, reveled in the joy around me, questioned it all, answered quite a bit less, learned some, forgot some, lost some, won some, found some, let some go, gained some, gave some more up (occasionally against my will) and would do it all again. I guess that’s peace, at least. Which is all one can really hope for. In the end, I'm still here.

In gratitude,
Namaste
Go Siame
Lorato

A Simple Task.....

I just want to give a small example of what can make life irritating in a rural generally unelectrified Botswana village.

The nurses at the clinic asked me to make a few small changes to a form they were going to use as part of a project to compare diagnostic and treatment methods for malaria.

(There is a lab technician who has come from down south to complete a study on whether the tests we are using to diagnose malaria are effective as well as the effectiveness of the drugs we use to treat it. He arrived in late March (the height of malaria season here happens to be in about January or Feb, when the rains are still frequent) and so the timing was a few months off for maximum effectiveness and he incidentally has been able to examine about 1 case of malaria. The whole thing is likely going to be a bit of a waste of time and money.)

I quickly recreated the form on my laptop, making the changes and completing the whole thing in less than ten minutes, as the generator was still on at the clinic because it was morning. The nurse asked me to get about 30 copies of the new form. It should have been easy enough.

I saved the new form on my flash drive, put my laptop in my backpack and headed off to the police building on foot, as all the ambulances were gone. It’s maybe a kilometer or two from the clinic. No problem.

When I get to the police their generator is on (hurray!) and one of the police officers shows me to where the computer that is attached to the printer is. Within two minutes of inserting my flash drive it becomes infected with no less than 73 viruses, the worst of which is the dreaded “re a leboga” (we thank you) virus, which works by pulling up thousands of windows attempting to connect with the internet, effectively freezing up the computer. How every computer in the village can be infected with the same virus when only two can (rarely) connect to the internet is beyond me. I remove my flash drive and head back to the junior secondary school (half a kilometer back in the direction from which I had come).

I arrive at the junior secondary school and am told that the computer there also has the virus, and cannot perform any function involving a flash drive. Sigh.

I cross the road to the mortuary, where I plug the flash drive into my own computer to remove what have now become 761 viruses. This takes about 20 minutes, all the while quickly draining my battery, as despite constantly carrying 2 plug adaptors to connect my computer to a power source, I have forgotten to schlep along the square to round plug that I need to charge at the mortuary. I head back to the school to borrow a plug adaptor, which takes another 30 minutes to find and swear in my blood that I will return it.

Back to the mortuary. So at this point I am busy trying to make plan, as it seems that the three computers in the village that are connected to printers are all so virus ridden that I cannot print from my flash drive, and as none of them are currently connecting to the internet, I can’t plug in my laptop to try to download the installation software in order to try to print from my computer. Ok.

I scan through the rolodex of people in the Okavango subdistrict in my brain, scanning not by name or location but by access to resources. I try to think of the people who might simultaneously have the following: electricity, a working computer that has working internet, a printer, and a fax machine. I come up with Ricky in Shakawe as the closest and most likely candidate. I call him to see if he has all four of these resources at present. He does. I head back to the mortuary, and email him a copy of the form to print and try to fax back to the junior secondary school, where I should then be able to make the 30 copies provided they have paper and the generator stay on. I text Ricky the fax number for the school.

I send the email. Ricky receives it. He prints it. And his fax goes off line. At this point I cannot bear to go back through the mental rolodex and trying to get this to work again. He tries again for the next few days. I put the whole situation out of my mind in order to avoid losing it. He decides to give the form to P, who will be going through Shakawe the next day. When she gets to Gumare she will attempt to fax the form back to the school. I will meanwhile have to keep calling around to see if the fax has been sent, and if they have had paper in the machine to receive it. And there is how I spent the better part of a Monday. Hopefully we can get the forms by next week. I don’t think I will ever lose it when the copier jams again.

To Give is to Receive.....

A story of pseudo micro-finance (?), flying the coop, and cherry chocolate m&m’s.


In the end there are lots of things I should probably be ashamed about, but my shame has been gone a long time in this life through the looking glass. Now that I’ve said that, I’m forced to admit I don’t know exactly how it began, how we met, which is the part I should probably be embarrassed about. I should have been paying more attention. But as is common with us humans, we don’t pay attention to the signs and helpers that come into our life to guide us and teach us until they nearly smack us on the head, or shake some sense into us. Typical, know-it-all, stubborn, overly theoretically educated white chick. That would be me.

It must have been one of those moments numbering in the millions, which while initially passing through my life and consciousness in a shocking or disruptive manner, feeling constantly three clicks to the left of normal, have now become ordinary in this village far from home. In retrospect it should feel more significant, or perhaps I just wish it did, so I could claim I saw it coming from the start in my ever alert state of Zen. In the end, which happens to be the present, I only know what it has come to, which is one of the magic experiences that are the reason I decided to come here, the ones I hedged my bets on, and the ones that fulfill my dreams. But enough flowery reminiscence from me, as she wouldn’t stand for it, or she might, as she’s very polite, but she’d likely stand with her arms crossed over her chest, waiting for the obligatory meal to be served. So on with the show.

In my memory her story begins as she enters my life-stage right-as one of several dozen women who asked me for a “piece job” when I arrived in Seronga.

(A piece job is a small, generally one time only cash job. Prior to coming to Seronga I always associated piece jobs with day workers- migrants or refugees. Never did I imagine that there were places in which the local residents of a community survived and tried to squeak out a living this way. Although the community here is quite tight knit, and families are expected to take care of each other, it’s hard to imagine having to try to get by or even get ahead by hoping someone who is likely equally poor has some laundry or something to do to earn money. And although I had an idea that poverty might be slightly contributing to HIV, I certainly didn’t foresee living in a community within one of the wealthiest countries in Africa where this was the main method of employment for local women who are unmarried with children. While government handouts in this country can be too numerous to count, they do little in terms of helping a person actually get ahead, or building a life on. But I digress.)

Now when I came to Seronga I was certainly as green as they come, by Peace Corps or anyone’s standards, wary and distrustful after all the bs they feed you in pre service training, traditionally a mishmash mindfuck of kum-bah-yah “be one with the village” yoda speak and the endless safety and security briefings that admonish us to Mitigate, Eliminate, Deviate, Elevate or some such always-be-on-your-guard danger speak acronyms (sorry Thuso). Although I generally feel as though I’ve come a little ways in differentiating my head from my ass in this country, more often are the times when I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.

So as I’ve said, I cannot remember the conditions under which we met. But the one thing I can always remember, and the thing that makes me grin when I think of her, is her smile. This woman has got a million watt high beam coming from her face when she turns up the corners of her mouth, which occurs often to nearly always. Cracked lips and a slight overbite are barely visible in the shadow of the light coming from her eyes.

Months before I could consistently remember her name I could identify her by her smile, and by the fearless way she would greet me in English. This was usually followed by a quick stream of words thrown together which I would only sometimes be able to catch the meaning of. Her enthusiasm and her smile would cause me to stop the endless and mindless pantomime of nodding and smiling that I was used to performing amongst toothless old women who were usually begging me for two pula for Chibuku (traditional beer, I tried some recently, it tasted to me like a sip of a flat wine-beer solution that has been left out overnight after a party and warmed to just above room temperature) to really try to hear what she was trying to communicate to me.

The first time she asked me for a job she was given my standard (and at the time, truly earnest) response of “If I give you a job now, what will you do in two years when I am gone?” or “If I give you a job, what will I do for all the other women in the village who also want to buy their babies new clothes?”

In my stupid American arrogance I truly believed that all they ever saw me as was a white meal ticket, someone to throw money at this village as a beauty queen tosses candy from the Cadillac float in the small town parade, smiling and dutiful in her trumped up role posing as something special. She smiled serenely at me and nodded graciously in response to my now obvious stupidity and went back to waiting in the endless line at the clinic.

Of course, as these things have a way of happening, I soon found myself asking her for something. In the floundering searching of my first few months at site (Or wait, that hasn’t completely ended yet, has it? Hmmm) I spent a lot of time asking people at the clinic and my counterpart what I should do in the village. My counterpart was always good for suggesting projects he had very little intention of doing anything more than serving as my translator.

One of these ideas was to form a PMTCT support group. My smiling friend was the first on the list. I soon learned that she was HIV positive with 5 children. I’m not going to lie, my immediate thought upon hearing this was to judge her, and to wonder how she could possibly convince anyone to practice safe sex when at 29, with 5 children, it didn’t seem to be her forte. As I got to know her, and eventually became comfortable enough to ask about the fathers to her children, she plainly informed me of the circumstances of every child’s conception. Each story included a man who had promised to love her, and support her, and marry her if she had his children. Of the two different men who fathered these children, none kept his promise, and the father of her infant has just become engaged to a woman in Maun. He continues to string her along.

Now if there’s anything I can relate to and feel empathy for it’s a good “But I thought he was a good guy” story. Her unfortunate history with men has lead my friend to the conclusion that she must no longer pray to God send her a man who would love her, but each day makes the heartbreaking plea that God close her heart off from any man who might even try. Her sole concern now if providing for her children, and she emphatically (and repeatedly) informs me that with her HIV status, having another baby ever is completely and totally out of the question, as she must remain healthy to provide for the ones she already has. I emphatically (and repeatedly) ask myself if I would be so strong, if I could maintain a million watt smile in the face of such adversity.

So after several failed attempts at getting a PMTCT support group started, I got involved with the men’s sector event. I put myself in charge of the HIV health quiz, and needed someone with a strong confident knowledge of HIV and AIDS who would not only correct and educate the men who were answering the questions of the quiz but also to ensure that the younger school girls I had also recruited for the task were doing so as well. She immediately offered her services, and was always on time for the preparation sessions I had arranged. She did beautifully at the event, and even came to give the quiz to the many women waiting at the clinic in the morning several times while I was away.

We came to be close acquaintances, as close as two people from such very different life backgrounds and cultures (and an extremely limited overlap of linguistic understanding) can be. I learned that she lived very near me, and I would sometimes stop by her house, which was more immaculate than should be expected for a woman with five children.
On these occasions she would always offer me some of the precious meat that I knew would likely barely be enough to feed her children, and which I always managed to find a way to politely refuse. She was always offering to make me any handicraft she could think of, and telling me it would be free, “for friends”. I also tried to politely refuse this idea, thinking a woman with so little should be selling her wares in order to feed her children. She couldn’t possibly be able to afford to waste the time and effort on me, for no money.

On one of these visits she told me she wanted to add to her impressive portfolio of certificates of completion (she was already doing non-formal education in the village teaching the elderly to properly count money and sign their names, and had her own brown wooden phallus with which to demonstrate the proper way to put on condoms as a peer counselor) by creating a free range chicken coop (which seems to be an oxymoron, but what do I know about these things?). She knew that there was a woman in one of the Etshas (there are several villages called Etsha-with-a-number on the other side of the delta, as it seems that when people move out of the originally named settlements to farm and raise cattle eventually small villages grow. In order to keep track of where people were living they began adding numbers after the main village’s name –as in how many kilometers from Etsha. Apparently there is 1 through 13. On my side they have Dungu 1, 2 and 3 as well as a few Xaus. And there’s today’s little known fact, courtesy of Cliff Clavin….) who knows how to do it, and her brother could help her build it, but she would have to find the money.

In this village, where self reliance and motivation are less than common, I am always chomping at the bit and pretty much falling over myself to help anyone who seems even a little motivated. At this moment I was torn between my own need to “help” and also being very cautious about appearing to be the great white cash cow. Regardless I tentatively asked how much money she would need to get her project off the ground.

“Sixty pula” she responded.

Although this is about ten pula more than I think I am allotted for my needs for a day, it ends up being less than ten American dollars. After all the girrrl power and “if you educate a girl, and give her a goat…..” articles, email forwards and utube viral videos that inevitably make me cry I knew I was gonna figure this one out. I imagined it would have to be done in such a way that wasn’t compromising my own principle of teaching a chick to fish rather than taking her to Red Lobster or whatever. I couldn’t stomach just giving her the money, as I felt that if I did it once, all of a sudden everyone would show up on my door step, wanting money.

It was getting close to the time (oh let’s be honest, it was frighteningly long overdue) for my sheets to be washed, a task I hate worse than anything (pause for all you fine folks at home to imagine hand washing your queen sized sheets in your bathtub, rinsing them in a smaller bucket, wringing them out and carrying them across your floor and the sand yard to hang them on the line all the while inevitably dropping one of the corners in the sand and having to start nearly over again. Finished. Yeah. 2 years, people). 25 pula is the going rate for this type of work in these parts so I quickly struck a deal with her for her to do my laundry twice for 30 pula each time. Then she could buy the materials and I would help her construct her chicken coop. Whether this project would actually happen or not always remains to be seen, but these are the times when one must just have faith.

She showed up each time I asked her to come, sweating in my oven of a bathroom as she laundered and graciously accepting whatever food I mustered up for her (usually a thick starchy sort of something- Batswana tradition, filled with vegetables-my tradition, and with me always making a point to promote the health benefits of vegetables for those on ARV’s. She smiled politely. I usually stuffed a few more carrots or something in her pockets as she left as well, but my big point of pride is that she’s since expanded her formerly exclusively corn producing garden to produce tomatoes and eggplant.)

She earned her 60 pula. I heard nothing about the chicken coop, and relegated myself to the idea that at least I had put some food on the table for a while. I decided that was still good, and even a success, for a woman with five kids to get a little respite from the worry of how to feed them every day.

Time, as it tends to do, moved on until one day I was at the clinic. I was absentmindedly studying my little manuals for the several languages I am attempted to massacre (or wait, I’m supposed to be SPEAKING them, right?) half listening to my coworkers shooting the shit, when I suddenly heard a soft sob. I looked up to find her there, frantically copying the details for a new job posting down from the clinic wall. I’m not sure what shocked me more, that she wasn’t smiling or that she was crying.

One of my male co-workers began to taunt her and grab her arm. (WHY is this always an appropriate response from men here? They seem to think that no matter what a woman’s demeanor is, whether it is tears or irritation or a refusal for sex, their answer seems to be to tease them and grab arms. There have been weeks here where I myself have gotten bruises on my arms from wrenching them away from overzealous, stupid men who are grabbing my arms to get my attention as they profess their love for me or something equally annoying. I’m going to plead the fifth as to which parts of their bodies end up bruised, but the men in my village are slowly learning to address me by speaking to me only, without grabbing my arms. I’m trying to expand this to be an expectation for all the women they interact with, but baby steps I suppose). I jumped up and grabbed his arm, glared at my coworker until he laid off, and guided her to a quiet corner to ask her privately what had happened. Through her tears and crying she lost most of her English, and she sort of told me a convoluted story about her grandparents taking her to the kgotla (tribal court) and making a slew of accusations, some of them centered on her HIV+ status.

I could barely begin to understand the story when she had to leave, as she had three of her five children with her, but I promised to check her after work. I gave my co-worker a brief and tersely worded (and inevitably immediately forgotten) review of the lesson on sensitivity I have been giving him for quite some time. He smiled and said that he wanted to marry me. I made every attempt not to backhand him, and abandoned this exercise in futility to attempt to focus on my friend.

What on Earth could I do for her? How can I help her with this problem I had little hope of beginning to understand? Frustrated and not able to accept the answer that kept coming of “nothing”, I quickly looked through the package I had just received for something to give her (why is it that Americans always need to give something to someone to make them feel better? I guess this is what you do when you don’t have the words- in English or any other language). I found some cherry chocolate m&m’s (what a crazy novelty!) and left the clinic early to walk to her house.

I gave the standard “ko-ko” (when there are no doors, much less doorbells, in a place one learns to improvise in announcing one’s arrival) as I entered her yard. She had the smallest of her children strapped on her back, and quickly yanked a small chair out from under the next youngest for me. I smiled apologetically at the stunned child in the dirt and sat down.

I offered her the m&m’s, (which are clearly the appropriate answer and method of soothing whichever predicament I had failed to understand earlier) which she immediately distributed amongst her children, not even bothering to pop one in her mouth as she disappeared into the house, singing my name, as people here have a tendency to do when they have nothing else to say. (Lo-Rah-toe….I’ve asked people at the clinic and in the village why they do this and get a whole range of answers, but the one I choose to believe is my favorite- “because we LOVE you!” –also in a sing song voice.) She returned to the courtyard a moment later, the huge smile on her face completely betraying the tears that had been flowing freely less than an hour before. In her hands was a traditional woven basket (Incidentally, sale price? Probably around 60 pula). She proudly handed it to me.

“It my first try. It not perfect. I made for you, because we are friends.”

Yup. Tears. I tried to hold them back. There are enough occasions of sorrow around these parts that they don’t waste tears on joy or any other emotions. And I didn’t have the words to explain. I just nodded and grinned, and thanked her profusely. Later, as I left her gate, I turned my face to the sky and let the tears fall. I whispered “Thank you” to the heavens and anyone else paying attention as the tears burned rivers onto my face.

I walked by her house the other day, shouting “ko-ko” from the gate. Over in the corner was a mesh structure, covered in old blankets. The chicken coop was finished, ready to house the new birds that would lay eggs and provide income. So the crazy white bird from America did nothing to save or solve or throw money at this woman’s problems. She figured out a way to do it herself. I’ve got a lot to learn…..

The Feminine Mystique

It began, as many things do, by me being frustrated with being here. Feeling sorry for myself is what it is in actuality, so long as we’re being honest. I was tired, bored, frustrated with being here and the lack of things to do at the clinic, and the slowness with which my projects were progressing. I was beginning to feel stuck in a rut and on the verge of one of my famous “what is it all about” fits of confused and anxious hysterics when I decided to make a plan.

In an effort to avoid becoming the miserable cow I know I can be in times of frustration and irritation, I fell back on my oldest and most common Peace Corps motivation, self improvement. I’ve been trying to read “The Feminine Mystique” for what feels like the better part of a decade. It was recommended to me a few years back by Abby, a friend from college who now lives in Utah (congratulations of the recent wedding by the way, darling!), and whom I always seem to find in moments of turmoil or success, and is consistently a great source of perspective and wisdom. Despite only speaking about once every 3 or 4 months (or really with international long distance to consider it’s been a bit less recently) we can always catch up on each others comings and goings quite quickly and then launch into the sort of gossipy “our-own-problem” solving sessions that have become the lucky hallmark of our friendship. I trusted her judgment (along with the raves reviews and constant cultural references I was always running across) and knew now was the time to read it.

I had begun to delve into it several times prior to coming to the Peace Corps, and as it was the 40th anniversary edition there were several introductions and forewords that I had to get through before even getting to the actual book. I threw it in my m-bag as something I figured I’d finally have the time and motivation to get through. After a few false starts in this country, it was heavily referenced in another book I was reading and I knew I could avoid the mystique no longer.

For those of you residing in the same cave of dark unawareness of one of the most influential books of the 2nd wave feminist movement as I previously was, let me give you a short briefing. I’ll begin by letting the cat outta the bag that if you are in the mood for a lighthearted page turner this, it not it (but try something from the Shop-a-holic series-they’re cute and I heard they’re turning them into a movie! Which I’ll probably get this side by the time I leave? Perhaps it’s already come out?).

The Feminine Mystique, while well written and organized, can get a bit…heavy. I had out my highlighters and marking pens like I was taking a course on the damn thing (apologies to those I’ve promised to lend it to after this). This was due not to my lack of opportunities for interactive intellectual pursuit in the bush but more for my constant shock and indignation at things present in modern day American society that are remnants of “the problem that has no name.” I was surprised that despite being born several generations after the naming of the feminine mystique there were still so many relevant references within it’s nearly half century old passages (although I must admit there are some embarrassingly outdated Freudian references to homosexuality and a glaringly offensive under representation of women of less means or minorities).

I have long known that I am a member of a generation whom, while not suffering the same pressure and lack of options by which the women of the 50’s and 60’s were oppressed, is still struggling with having it all. It is now more acceptable to be living outside the societal boundaries of marriage and motherhood, and indeed while many of my agemates are married or have children, there is still fair amount who don’t. There are plenty of role models for women who don’t want to be married, or have children, or have found ways to have both of the above as well as a meaningful career.

I found the book to be as engrossing and interesting as any modern day conspiracy theory tome due to Friedan’s extensive research of the historical, political, economic, societal, pop-psychological, and baby boom trends that led women back into the home with the goal of reaching “sexual role fulfillment.” Having had a few desperate housewife sort of near misses with marriage in my day, it was fun (in a completely sick way of course) to read about what I sometimes wondered if I was missing out on, look out the window at the African sky (or dirt, crazy trees, mating donkeys, whatev) smile (or really, smirk) and think…. Nope. Glad I’m here.

Overall I think it is an amazing book and would recommend it, whether you’re male or female. It’s been interesting to try to translate the message of it to those who are not from America, but luckily(?) our culture is pretty pervasive and most people of European descent that I spoke with could at least relate to the concepts. It was admittedly more difficult to me to describe it to the Batswana women in my village (read, it was a complete comedy of errors) but at least provoked some interesting discussion.

Towards the end of the book, as I was slowing down in a victory lap of competition, Friedan puts forth a chapter on the “New Life Plan for Women.” In the heart of her description of the concept that is will be a difficult transition for women to make, to go from being unaspiring, unactualized, unfulfilled homemakers to the risk of self discovery through meaningful work, I got to thinking about the value of things. Not physical, economic, material things, but the value we place on our interactions with others, the relationships we foster, and the ways in which we show that we care. With this theme in mind, please bear with me now, as I’ve been thinking about this one for a while.

One of the interesting things I’ve experienced during my time in the Peace Corps is an overwhelming generosity from people. Friends, family, and complete strangers have reached out to me to send me stuff, letters, encouragement and kind words via my blog or email or the post. People I’ve met throughout the delta and the country have helped me, fed me, sheltered me, and taken me out to the bush or to really nice hotels or somewhere when I need to escape it all. I have been extremely blessed and lucky. It is this support that has undoubtedly helped buoy me along, especially in times of personal crisis, so common and natural and occasionally overwhelming during an experience like this. I’ve often struggled with how I can repay these generosities, or even what I could have done to deserve it. It’s especially hard under conditions like I experience in Seronga, when I question if I could even be having any impact in terms of “paying it forward”. I’ve found that unfortunately, in some realms it seems I “keep score”. I’ve always had a hard time accepting things and feeling indebted to people, especially when I grapple with trying to determine the means with which to repay someone. I’ve really struggled to come to terms with it here.

I wanted to ask people “If I could give you a gift, in the form of something I could do for you, rather than buy or create, what would it be?”


My thought process in arriving at this question came from ideas about: How often are we able to offer up something of ourselves, something only we can give, or offer, in the face of possible misunderstanding or rejection? How often are we able to ask someone for something we need that cannot be purchased? How can we connect with people we know and love and have often evolved in relationships with in which we operate on a series of assumptions rather than caring, vulnerable inquiry? Especially when the ins and outs of our every day lives may have become so different and varied as a result of the inevitable time and space that results when one chooses an experience like mine? This is admittedly something I’ve struggled with a lot since being here. For some back home their lives are rapidly changing on a scale in which I will have a hard time recognizing them and their situations when I return. This is certainly true for them with mine.

It’s an interesting question to be asked via text message but you make do with what you have..

I began with my mom, and have to admit I was kind of nervous as to what her response would be. Her being my mom, my best friend, and, as she tends to be, my safety net for this experiment, she of course responded with the obvious but touching “Come home to me safe and sound and happy I love u.”

I realized I was putting myself in a vulnerable position. When taken seriously the question often puts the other person in a vulnerable situation as well. A big theme of “The Feminine Mystique” was real versus imagined (or created, or oppressively enforced) vulnerability as women, and how often a path to fulfillment or enlightenment often involves risk of some sort. I think emotional vulnerability is as real of a risk as any other so I tried to plough ahead.

I decided to “man up” and send the text to several more people (so now if you received one you know the whole deal, if you didn’t, now I’ve explained the concept in many, many more words that a text could carry, and so you know what I was up to. I’m still interested in everyone else’s response if we haven’t spoken about this yet, it seems with my internet time being limited as it is these days my blog is my main forum from which to speak with most of you.) and ask a few people face to face.

The responses I got were great. They ranged from sincere, to sexual, to sarcastic, to confused. It opened up several great conversations that wouldn’t have happened otherwise, and presented a powerful jumping off point from which to build deeper relationships with people that for many reasons I may not have had that connection with before.

I guess the point I’m very round about-ly trying to make is really an attempt to share some of the contemplative thoughts (Truths? Conclusions? Bullshit?) I occasionally feel that I come to here. I’ve been feeling quite lonely lately, and desperately miss the type of late night (or occasionally happy hour) discourse in which people sit around a table collectively pondering anything from the meaning of life to the beauty of the label on the wine bottle. I am realizing here that although I can hack a hell of a lot more that I previously thought in terms of solitary living, I am inherently a very social person. I crave the sort of deep connection that was present in so many of my relationships back home, that I may have taken for granted, that has come more slowly here in my efforts to rebuild the wheel of my social life from scratch. I want this connection, over something that feels as real as my life here, to be the basis for my relationships in the future, rather than defaulting to the typical question of “what do you do” as the defining element of who someone is. Perhaps this is the mid-service crisis. Perhaps I’m too far into my head with no one to pull me back out? Who knows. Read the book.

A dark, dark time... Avoid if you don't feel like reading about me being sad....

The Eleventh Month Mark is Tough

Although I’ve had stories running around my head, and life has continued to happen, I was finding it difficult to have the discipline to sit down and write about it. I’d started dozens of times, and although the words were coming, they tended to be very dry, and quite honestly boring. Due to an unsuspecting series of events I have again been inspired, and am ready to share again with you fine folks. The story begins a month or so back.

Recently I’ve been a bit depressed after my whirlwind adventure in Gabs, in which I was treated to five star hotels and poker games in marble palaces. I was able to spend time with the people I’ve come to think of my immediate southern hemisphere family, watched a movie in the theatre (“He’s Just Not That Into You”. Completely traumatizing in the sort of “someone has been secretly observing my life down to the Home Depot detail and has written a movie about it and Jennifer Aniston and Jennifer Connoly’s names are in the credits and not Jennifer Katchmark’s and I’m waiting for my royalty check” kind of way.) and ate curry and had a altogether too brief romance with a mojito. I spoke with interesting people and learned the ins and outs of residency and citizenship in Botswana (Not easy. Not at all easy. The Queen and I spent a number of days roaming around the government administration buildings in Gaborone in an unsettlingly circular fashion without getting anything achieved. She had to leave the country about a month ago on a Tuesday. I don’t wanna talk about it). I attempted to procure art supplies. I finally visited the fish farming project and met with some really potentially helpful people who are helming the adventure that is the future of commercial fish farming in Botswana. I’m looking so forward to having some drinks with them in 10 years when I’d like to come back to this country.

Through experience I’ve found as I am living in a place like Seronga, by the time I leave I am really ready to leave, and in order to not go crazy when I come back I must always try to stay away long enough to really miss the place. When I come back before I’m ready it’s really hard to settle back into life here. The little things I thought I’d grown used to expecting grate sharply on my nerves, having been fleshly exposed to the way things can be in the world, whether it be ordering the sort of food I want at a restaurant (and the restaurant having food) or turning on the tap and knowing there will be water. Peace and acceptance are hard to come by. The queen has just left, and other circumstances have led me to sink into a bit of a depression stemming from helplessness and irritation. Add to this the anniversary of my coming to the country it appears to be the recipe for a perfect storm of personal angst.

Having nearly been here a year, I of course like to jump the gun and start ruminating about things a month and a half prior to actually being in the country for a full year. My projects seemed to number in the extremely few and any forward motion I’d tried to implement at the clinic has already fallen by the wayside in the absence of me hounding people to continue on with the things they had previously committed to doing. Being that I have spent a year of my life doing something, and left family and friends and the opportunity for a more reasonable income back in the states, I really want to believe that what I have done in the past year is worth it.

I develop an alternating aching and sharp pain that travels throughout my neck and my back. I would give my firstborn for a chiropractor right now. Running helps occasionally, but I sleep and the pain realigns in the morning. It lasts for too long, and no, ibuprofen doesn’t help. People email me that they have been trying to call and it won’t go through. The mail hasn’t been delivered with any regularity since before the New Year. I occasionally call people whose numbers I can remember in the States and hang up before their voicemail picks up, hoping they will see a strange number, realize it’s me, and call back, and relieve me from myself. This rarely works.

It would be accurate to say that I’ve been spending some quality time with myself lately clawing with my way out of a pretty deep, dark pit of despair. It reminds me of the dog that sometimes gets into my yard, and stupidly jumps into the rubbish pit after some rotting piece of Styrofoam that may have once had contact with a piece of meat. As he flies through the air into the pit, taking a leap of faith based purely on his sense of smell, he realizes that he’s really just in a big mess of trash. After his sorry, skinny self realizes there’s no feast to be had, he attempts to clamber out, each time he reaches out to escape the hole he’s found himself in he just pulls more dirt down on him. I don’t laugh at him any more.

But then nor do I cry, for myself or for the dog anyway. I think I’ve finally drained the embarrassingly large well of self pity and have nearly exhausted my supply of excuses. The one time I do cry is when I watch a movie, or read a book and someone is trying to do something really good, or they really want to help someone. Then I cry because I think, hmm, I used to be one of those people.

What has happened here? What has changed? I suspect I’ve become a little bitter here, a concept most notably clear when I compile my quarterly report for Peace Corps. As I fill in the form, and try to figure out which tangible, measurable little goals I can mark off to account for the ways in which I spend my time, the things listed seem so few. What the hell am I doing here? How am I spending these hours that seem to be creating days that in some ways are flying by. The song from “Rent” plays through my head on occasion, asking me how do I measure the joy in a year? What about all the other emotional shit that has been shoved full to overflowing in this poor calendar of mine?

It’s been a pretty self indulgent dish of misery- swirled with loneliness, sprinkled with homesickness with a nice helping of boredom and feelings of purposelessness, defeatedness with a large side plate of what have I done here, what can I do with the time I have left, and what will I do after. Nothing like living in the present, huh? ;-)
Owing to my flare for the dramatic (who, me?) it seems I’ve become one of those people whose social skills have become extremely limited, and I find myself saying things that appear to shock whichever audience I’ve been lucky enough to come across, whether the topic be the village, the country, my own country, the past, the future, nearly anything.

I’ve been spending a lot of time with uncertainty, which I chase down by making plan after plan about what to do. Here, there, after this before this during this. I am such a ball of anxiety that I can’t even really focus. I’ve stopped sleeping as much at night after one of the longest periods of my life of having enough sleep due to both lack of actual electricity as well as lacking anything concrete past more of what I spend my days doing. It can be difficult to relax.

I make excuses, excuses for excuses; I abhor myself for my lack of discipline. I sit around staring for long periods of time sometimes. I am a toxic mess of emotional nastiness, and quite unpleasant to be around. I resent people, here and back home, for ridiculous, uncontrollable things. I am jealous and envious and covetous. There are times when I can’t stand myself. This is officially some sort of desperation, which I also detest, because I tend to think it unattractive.

In my former life, my course of action would have been to chase the depression away, to run like a demon, to read and strive and achieve. Here in Botswana, as in Rome, I’ve found the most effective cure for melancholy is to approach my self pity the way the locals approach nearly any challenge. They wait. And wait. To see what happens. In Southern Africa it seems that when one if not actively “making a plan” one is waiting. Everything always sorts itself out in the end.

(Around this time the Peace Corps medical officer did send out an email which I skimmed and understood to be a quiz about compassion exhaustion or some such “how are you fairing mentally” questionnaire. It struck me as ironic that this was the distribution method which they chose to use reach the volunteers that were likely suffering most from this condition as a result of poor accessibility to communication home and otherwise. I snidely scoffed at it, deciding for myself that with my limited internet time it would do my mental state more good to speed read my emails from home and attempt to pluck out two line responses rather than complete the survey that could likely give me a rating of exactly how hateful I was feeling. Sorry, PC.)

I’ve danced the tango with enough instances of various low grade depressions over the years to learn a few steps to cope with it. The most powerful is to just accept it. I sit right down next to it, breathe it in, invite it to dinner (although not always the best idea as it can usually bring with it the uninvited guest emotional overeating).

And so again, as I seem to do doing more and more here, with an alarming level of regularity that leads me to believe I can’t do it again, I let go. I seem to be living my life’s largest experiment in letting go. I accept the depression. I own it. I try to stay out of people’s way (or at least keep them out of the war path that is mine) and dwell in my misery until I can’t stand it, and until it goes away. I breathe and try to create things to look forward to. I begin to preemptively announce the dark cloud’s departure, knowing it’s not completely gone, but forcing myself to look for the rays of light I know are there. The sun comes back slowly, and I suddenly find myself smiling again.

It’s been a few weeks. I’ve been here a year, and I’m happy I made it. Some projects are moving forward again, and I’ve developed a renewed sense of purpose and hope, and drive, while also becoming more able to accept the things that can easily frustrate me (for now). I hesitated to post this one, as it’s pretty sad, but felt it needed to be included in this record of my experience. I know this is not the last black cloud that will shadow these few years in my life, but I feel more confident each time of my ability to deal with it until it passes however long that may take. I am occasionally blessed with moments of grace, in which I can feel gratitude for these dark times, and can give thanks for the lessons they teach me about myself. I guess this is peace.

I am not my hair....

“I am not my hair,
I am not this skin,
I am not your expectations, no
I am not my hair,
I am not this skin
I am the soul that lives within…”

“I hate to say it cause it seems so flawed
But success didn’t come till I cut it all off.” Akon featured with India.Arie on the track “I am not my hair”

India.Arie

Living in a place like Seronga, spending most my time not passing anything resembling a mirror and knowing only from pictures that I generally look like a constant fashion “don’t”, not to mention the obvious unfamiliarity to myself of having really short hair and being regarded by strangers for having white strange skin, this lyric goes through my head quite often.


It seems like a dumb and insignificant thing, hair. It's dead cells after all. And yet when Buddha became Buddha, he cut off all his hair and he took a new name. I get why he did it now. (I'm still working on the enlightenment bit.)

Amongst the other factors of life that have made my time here in Africa unique is my appearance, namely cutting my hair off. I will admit that the idea of shaving my head was always synonymous with joining the Peace Corps, but I never could have predicted the ways in which in which it would influence both the ways I am perceived and the ways I perceive myself.

After a bout of frustration with bathing over a basin during training and being tired of how much water I had to carry to feel "clean" (my how that definition has changed...) I went after my midback length of hair with a pocket knife and sent the remains home as a joke. When I found out I would be coming to Seronga and the water conditions there I knew the rest had to go. I had my friend buzz it off the day I took the oath that committed me to this new place and this new way of life for the next two years.

I think in the past I tended to perceive myself as someone very defined by my looks, I was "the girl with the hair". I had friends that I met in high school who had remembered me growing up, playing softball, I was that girl who played catcher and had all that long hair. I had had it cut short a few times, but never shorter than a bob, and it always grew out quickly. As an attention grabbing stunt in high school I grew my hair out for the whole year and then cut it off the morning of graduation. I've planned on donating the proceeds of the drastic haircuts I usually get to locks of love but it seemed my cat usually got it first.

In foreign countries, strangers would grab at my hair. Hell it even happened in the States. I've been petted more than I care to admit. People have preconceived notions about hair. I didn't understand it completely until now, having had them myself. It was something else I had considered in coming here, I knew I wanted to cut it off because I wanted to be taken seriously, I didn't want to have the stupid distraction of my hair. Nor did I want all the attention from men around here (that aspect of it didn't seem to matter).

When I first cut off my hair it was empowering, watching as another symbol of the life I had lived before this fell to the African soil. I quickly acquired a clippers from the China shop and when I broke those I had someone send me another set. When I blew out the charger on that (before I even used the damn things!) I resorted to heading down the road to “the box”.
I had my hair buzzed by men in small netted structures, frightened to put the clippers too close to my scalp, as they have never cut a white person’s hair before, much less a white lady. The ever present children giggled and shrieked, chanting my name as they do in the way they would never dare to do with any other adult, who would likely swat at them. I usually ended up just grabbing the clippers and finishing myself, usually ending up with long pieces here and there that I would inevitably try to cut myself and screw up later.

During this time I was often mistaken for a lesbian, a cancer patient, or a guy. None of these bothered me in an "omigod" sort of way, and I usually thought it was funny. After a while though this type of mistake gives a person reason for pause. Who am I, again?

Although it’s common for woman here to wear their hair cut very closely, apparently it was entirely unexpected that a white chick would do this. I've read about women of African descent and the political and other implications of the way in which they choose to wear their hair, be it chemically straightened, with extensions, cut closely, or in an Afro, and it's impact on the way they both perceive themselves and are perceived. I never had any idea of what this would be like until now. It seems that between the "hair thing" and the "white skin thing" and the whole "Peace corps" and "living in the bush thing" people perceived me (and thus treated me) as someone other than the person I've always thought myself to be. And I began to act it. No longer in my mind was I this girly girl who cared about her appearance or wore make-up (although really, any time I got anywhere near a town I did what I could to find some make-up or something to make me feel a little more like the person I remember myself to be), and I acted like I cared even less than I pretended to before about what people thought of me. I carried myself differently, and often found myself reacting more defensively and aggressively to stuff. Where did the old me end and the new me begin? Which parts were gone for good, and which were just on vacation?

I went about making style decisions as I seem to go about most things here, by waiting to “see what happens” and “making a plan”. I thought at one point it would be easier to keep it short, but then I realized that between taking pc prescribed pre-natal vitamins and the heat that this would mean getting a hair cut about every two weeks.

Then I decided to perhaps grow it out, thinking that at least it would be an interesting process to watch how many phases of craziness could be achieved by my mop top (it turns out there are many). Finding hair products in Botswana to tame the wild white beast was another fun challenge, and I can assure you that hair wax means something different here than there.

On the way to vacation in Mozambique, as we traveled through the booming metropolis of Jo-burg, I decided that this was not the week I felt like having one of the three weeks out of the month that I enjoy a bad hair phase (I’ve gotten it down to a scientific formula that every three weeks of growth produce one week of awesome hair, followed again of course by three more weeks of fugly in-between weirdness). I went to an actual salon and got a real hair cut. I was so happy I actually hugged the shampoo lady, who was not expecting that kind of behavior from a mop topped white chick. She was startled but then laughed and clasped me to her ample bosom. Having a proper hair cut rather than just a clipping from the box has helped immensely with the proper growing out process.

Since then I have resorted to covering it with a scarf, a hat, and again going after the stuff with a pocketknife (this was an emergency- I was developing a mullet). I've sat at the tuck shop down the road where I always see women getting their hair woven and demanded that someone corn row me (it didn't work, it was too short, and although they wanted to give me a weave with black wool, that was more than even I could handle). I have found myself fantasizing about highlights, and sometimes I offer to give my friends french braids just to feel the weight of long hair again. I guess I now know my natural color- and I was right with all those color jobs over the years, it's a severely boring brown. My gray streak is present on a daily basis and the cowlick in the front presents interesting challenges to creating all those cute short hair styles I remember from magazines (and which created a collage out of on the back of my door). I've also just run around looking nappy headed. In the end most days I decide that it just doesn't matter.


I still haven't decided what the future holds for this head of mine. In some ways short hair is so easy, in other ways it's a pain in the ass. I just know that I'm glad I've done it, and tried to figure out who exactly the girl behind the ponytail is...And I'm still not completely certain. The one thing I do know is that no matter what I end up doing with it, I am not my hair.

Dithapi Trust

“I was lost because I didn’t have a sense of where to put my passion, and my fight.”
Angelina Jolie.

Although the similarities between myself and Ms. Jolie end abruptly after the characteristics of having a lot of energy, idealism and a certain level of feistiness (and perhaps eccentricity) are exhausted (as I can’t really see myself picking up Brad Pitt and adopting and birthing a crayola box brood of children) over the past few months in Africa I think I may have found a place to put my passion and my fight.

I’ve got this quote on my facebook page, and I’ve always been able to relate to the idea of not quite having “It.” Having found “it,” having achieved “it”, knowing what or where or who or how “it” is. Through the previous and continual confusion, lack of fulfillment, and search for meaning there has often been something missing from my professional endeavors. Although the expereinces have all taught me a lot, I’ve yet to find a place or a project that can hold my attention for longer than about 6 months (I usually end up staying a year just to make it appear that I’m not quite as impulsive as I may actually be on my resume). After a lot of soul searching, ruminating, bitching and moaning, I’ve come to surmise that part of the problem is that I’ve been racing down career paths that although intriguing, and often powerful, weren’t at all for me. I’ve taken many jobs that have bored me quite nearly to tears (although generally with really decent people) just to be around the people with the big time jobs (therapists, attorneys) that I thought I might want, and have used years of my life as an extended career day. I have had no idea what I want to be when I grow up (and really for the most part still don’t).

But I’ve got something in the mix.

I’ve been a bit reluctant to speak about it wildly, or to put it on my blog, as for a long time it’s been a very long shot project, a pie in the sky idea that would be a miracle if it occurs. I’ve been hesitant to fully reveal such a crazy plan, as if it fails then everyone will have read about it (a potentially embarrassing situation, and as I’m always so adamant that I don’t believe in embarrassment, what the hell am I afraid of…?). It’s not that I’m basing my entire service on it, or that I would feel that my time here was a waste, but I think I would possibly feel an acute sense of loss. It would public, and potentially painful to have so many witnesses to the birth and death of something that has been born of my very soul, and that I will have invested so much of myself and my sense of hope in to have it all be a failure would be devastating.

But that’s another lesson that Africa is teaching me with all the grace and kindness of one of Disney’s wicked stepmothers. When you’ve already given up (or in some cases, lost) most of what you hold dear to heart, you haven’t got much else to lose. And you should always follow your dreams (cue the Phil Collins theme song…) even if you’re not quite sure what those dreams completely are or how to achieve them. Hakuna matata and all that.

And so, with that overwrought introduction, (cut Phil Collins abruptly, call for the drumroll, please) I reveal the project that could keep me in this world through the looking glass longer than my allotted two years:

The Dithapi Trust of Seronga Village.

Part 1.) It began with my meeting with Thuso, the local math teacher, when I asked him what he would want to do if he could do anything in Seronga, what would it be? I told him to dream big (because at some point I got the idea in my head that one must “go big or go home”). He said that he would like to build a fish pond for the local children (he is also the advisor to the ecology club) to be able to learn about and identify the fish of the delta, and run some science experiments and gain a better understanding of their surroundings. Having just finished Pre-Service Training (the official brainwashing of the Peace Corps program) I was able to quickly see that this might not have much merit as a primary HIV and AIDS reducing program but resolved to think of a way to incorporate it, and in my mind I took on the fish pond as a exciting secondary project.
Part 2.) I mentioned the idea to Simon, who, at 60, in addition to getting older and slightly more cantankerous, is also at the prime age for beginning to contemplate the twilight years of his life and what contribution he’s made to the world. After mulling Thuso’s pond idea around in my brain I thought it would be lovely to also make the pond into some sort of tourist attraction, perhaps by adding a glass wall to the pond. It seems simple and easy enough. Nine months back when I arrived in Seronga, all shiny and new and idealistic, I think I charmed Simon a bit while he waited for the enthusiasm to wear off and the jadedness to set in. He is the type who has always been up for a challenge. Simon seemed to think it was all perfectly do-able, and in his mind there was no reason their couldn’t be a commercial fishery involved to make the pond more self sustainable, and I pointed out that something like that could also provide jobs for the community, who at that point were still begging me for money and jobs every day. The dream seemed to be moving right along in its own unlikely little phases.
Part 3.) Simon mentions the fish idea to Graham, who’s got his PhD and is married to Anna, who is getting hers doing elephant research down the road at her camp in Gunitsoga. They had joked about doing fish research while out fishing one day, and Graham mentioned that he would like to get some funding to do research so he could be closer to Anna. Simon mentions this and Graham seems interested. I mention the project to Dudu, who has experience in grant writing and getting funding, so I added her to the mix.
During one of our regular “sundowners on the floodplains” adventures in which we happened to have Thuso with us, Simon brought me to the site he had in mind. As the sun set over the old quarry, I got tears in my eyes. I am usually not one who is able to physically look at a space and envision what could go there. I have a wild, wild imagination and am a big dreamer, but I have trouble choosing paint colors because I cannot imagine what they will look like in different lights. But as I stood next to the ancient baobab trees that would be preserved to provide perfect shading over the large whole in the hill in which the pond could be built I could envision it. I suddenly understood what parents experience when they first see their new baby. So much pride and marveling at its beauty, and a nearly heart crushing joy and thrill at the potential a baby holds locked inside of itself. The fear that it might be hurt or fail in any way, and the powerful energy used to will for nothing bad to happen, and the realization of the helpless inevitability of the very fact that unimaginable things will occur. It was amazing, and despite having been there only once, I often see the place in my dreams.
Part 4.) We all met to discuss the idea for the project on Simon’s veranda. By this time the idea has been stewing around my brain for a few months, and as it has not lost any of it’s inertia in my own mind, and I was damn excited to have all these people who are interested in this project together in one spot. Anna and Graham have spent the last few years founding an animal preserve in Francistown, and are thus relatively experienced on the potential feasibility of something like this, and they seemed to be cautiously optimistic. I spent a long old car ride to Francistown (complete with a car breakdown to keep things interesting, but also to extend the length of the chat) with Graham, and was able to discuss the possibilities of the project. We had tossed around the idea of forming a private trust, and were sort of brainstorming names. We both liked the idea of using “Dithapi,” which is the Setswana word for fish (plural), but also wanted to incorporate the Seronga Village as part of it, as it will inevitably involve and benefit the community. Plus it invokes the importance of the people of the village and the village as an actual place worth being noted. Anna came up with the name we are using at this point, as if it is a trust it may be something that might be replicable if it’s successful in its initial incarnation in Seronga perhaps there could be other villages supported under the umbrella of the Dithapi Trust.

Parts 4, 5 and 6, and on and on and on…..
I’ve been running around the country speaking to people about this idea, including a few impromptu performances for the wildlife, fisheries and delta management departments in Maun. These meetings generally included lots of laughs at my introduction of myself as “Lorato” and my attempts to speak Setswana. As the meetings would progress eventually the fiery passion that I feel about the project would take over and despite my nearly complete and total lack of concrete knowledge about fisheries, business, non-profit management, ect, ect they were taking me quite seriously. In the end they would look me over with an air of slightly bemused satisfaction and much indication that they were impressed…. But…. This was a huge, multimillion pula project. Yes, it was certainly a great idea and would be wonderful for the village and the area.. But. They were honest with me in admitting that there were only two masters level fisheries people in the country, residing, of course, in Gaborone, the capital city two days journey from the site I have in mind. They questioned my knowledge of inputs and outputs and I again cursed my undergraduate degrees for not being in this very subject, or at the very least something business-like. They offered whatever support they could, always reminding me that in a few years the infrastructure (and bridge across the delta to the crazy place I live, a completed road, electricity) might be more appropriate to create and sustain something of this magnitude. They wished me luck and told me what I would need to do to get the land allotted to the project, as well as mentioning a few people I’d already been in touch with in the country who knew about fisheries.

I’ve since contacted and met several of the who’s who of fish farming in Botswana (the beauty of a small country is that everyone doing most projects can relatively easily be put in contact with anyone else looking to do a project. This part has been somewhat easy.). They all say it’s possible… But. There are a few people in particular that have done small model fish farms and I’ve learned a bit more about what it would take. Not Easy. At All. The main places where people are doing these sorts of projects are in or near Gabs, and electricity, reliable clean water, paved roads, no unreliable ferry boats to negotiate. The difficulties generally lie in the delicacy of fish farming and balance, as well as the economics of setting something like this up, which I have exactly nil experience with.

But along the way I continue to run into people who encourage me, that it is possible, somehow, someway.

Just this week I met with a consultant who happened to be in town working on a project with human animal conflict in the delta. I run into some of the most random and connected people this side! He suggested that for the educational part of the plan he could definitely help me package the thing so as to be supported by the government, which would be a first step (although damn, it seems like there are so many first steps. This is beginning to feel like some crazy tango I’ll never learn!) It seems so strange to not be going about something like this in my typical American way, to make a list, make a plan, and “git ‘er done”. It’s been a slow strange seduction of just when I think I’m ready to quiet my mind and put the issue, and this idea to bed, I manage to come across someone who has just a little more information, and teaches me about one more aspect I need to know in order to make this dream a reality. The whole progression has been very strange, and yet I feel it unfolding just as it’s supposed to. It’s hard for me to just flow with this one, but when I can I find it’s giving me pretty good results.

So I’m to the point where I haven’t given up on the idea, but I’m realizing it cannot be done in the time I have left here. And it’s also not something I would be willing to start and then leave and allow it to fall apart. I’m not ready to say Botswana is the place forever yet either. I want to see more of the world, as well as get some more education under my belt before I commit to undertaking what I suspect would be a life project. I’m quite seriously flirting with the idea of trying to set a time line in which to come back and undertake this thing once we have a little more infrastructures this side, in the form of electricity, a bridge, a paved road, ect. The project lives on in my heart, and it’s a very tough thing to not throw myself desperately at hoping that I can move it forward on the strength of my will alone. I've had the best results come to me through being patient and letting the passion I feel for the potential of this project keep me slowly chipping away at the numerous challanges in the way. It’s been a new thing for me to consider doing something I don’t have the inclination that I am more than capable of accomplishing it, to look into and dream about doing something for which I could possibly fail completely. Sometimes I think the only expertise I have to offer this idea is the love and passion I feel for it. Other days I am certain of it. But these are the kinds of things that happen to a soul in the depths of Africa.

We’ll see what happens…..

She is Bame, She is Mine....

She is the type of girl who is scuffing her sneakers in the dirt of the path that will take her from smoothly athletic tomboy into a slightly more awkward teen before she slips them off and slides her feet into the kitten heels of a self assured young woman.

She is in that beautifully blatant stage of realizing the world offers bigger things to yearn for, even though she’s not quite sure for what she might long.

She could stretch out her fingers, previously curled up and clamped down by the oppressing force of expectations and reach out into a world of the unknown and previously uncontemplated to grasp the sharp edges of whatever challenge might present itself and heave herself over the barrier. She would do it with style, grace and grit, and I think this is what draws me to her.

She is in a ripe position for a mentor, and it’s something I have been aching to provide, to share the wisdom that has been imparted on me and that I have gained over the years. I could see she was craving a challenge and there was nothing I would love more than to be the one to challenge her, to guide her, to advise her. Call it my bossy streak, call it my histrionic personality, call it what you will but I have such a burning desire to mentor this girl.

And she wants to be mentored. She unabashedly calls and texts me, suggesting “now”, when I ask when she’d like to meet. She is polite, extremely inquisitive, and is always willing to openly explain to me things I don’t understand, to translate the curiosities of her culture to me. She is one of perhaps three Herero in the entire school, she should be an outcast by any standard there is, and yet she’s not, they all know her and accept her. She is of her people, and most importantly she is unwilling to forsake her own culture for a blind transition into mine, which so many here want to see as superior without proper dissection. She knows her culture; she knows the parts she wants and the parts she wants none of. This satisfies me greatly, as it is a thin line I must walk with many people here, to learn about their culture and also share mine without the worry that they think I want to turn them into “African-Americans”. She looks past my whiteness; she forgives my English, and wants what I have to give.

Whichever one of us chose the other matters not, as with other instances of brilliant serendipity we both knew we needed each other. I secretly smile to myself, whether I’m pleased that the gaping insecurities that lie within me like still ponds that I’m constantly stumbling into and soaking myself in are unapparent to her, or if she can sees me for all that I am and chooses me for someone who has something to offer her matters not.

She has seen a spark in me. And I have seen one in her. We’ve chosen each other and I silently thank every woman who has helped me and pushed me to reach this point, the one from which I can continue the circle. I have been searching for a realm in which I can feel accomplishment, and she provides an avenue I am familiar with. It will be a win/win situation.

I noticed her at the first practice. Average height, lanky, with the kind of athleticism that comes with a little extra push out the door of the assembly line of creation and honed by a confidence instilled in her by God only knows who. I think I initially thought she looked like someone I had met in the village, someone’s daughter met in passing. She gave off that certain sense of familiarity that makes you certain you’ve known her before.

She was great at softball, one of the only one of the bunch who could actually throw and hit, and she was constantly yelling at the others to play harder, smarter. She wasn’t intimidated by the boys on the team, and while she didn’t play in a show off type way, the grace of her natural movements drew your eye to her. In time, I came to realize I had been thinking she reminded me of myself at her age, although whether a generous personal enhancement of myself in my memory occurred is a possibility.

I was working on batting with some of the other girls and she ran up and somehow managed to get herself in the line of fire. The bat struck her squarely on the back of the head with a resounding thump. She immediately fell to her knees, cradling her head in her hands. I knelt down next to her, seeing the tears that had sprung spontaneously from her eyes fall to the dirt, as her jaw fixed, gritting her teeth together in an attempt to prevent any more from escaping. The other girls clucked “sod-dy, sod-dy” which always sounds a little strange to me, when even those who don’t speak so much as a whisper of English will comfort a baby or someone who is hurt with the word “sorry” repeated. I guess they don’t have an appropriate Setswana equivalent.

Eventually the 2 male coaches sent the rest of the teams off to run a few laps and I helped her up, asking a few questions in the English I knew she understood in an attempt to sound like I could authoritatively diagnose a concussion or some other type of head injury (which I cannot, but I was doing a damn bit better than the other two adults on the scene when I determined that we would need ice- which they were at a loss as to how to provide. They just stared at me blankly when I asked for it. You’d think this would have taught us our lesson about being prepared with a first aid kit, but we were no more prepared the next day when a kid took a ball in the face and ended up bleeding all over the place. Great).

I led her down the path to the main area of the school where the teachers housing was with the plan of checking all the houses until I found one with ice. It seemed important to keep her talking (who knows how hard of a hit she had taken- right on the back of the noggin-really!) and so I asked her her name, (Bame, which means “mine” in Setswana) where her home village is, ect. We eventually found some ice and Bame had taken my cell number and quickly endeared herself to me.

A few days later after softball practice I had retreated to the computer lab at school to write for my blog while there was electricity. Several other girls found me and wanted to sit around chatting in Setswana and hang out, and I told them they either had to sit quietly or go so that I could focus. They tried several times and couldn’t stay quiet so finally I banished them and they went outside giggling. Bame came in so quietly I didn’t even notice she was there as I wrote the entry about the girls and boys softball teams. She was quietly reading over my shoulder and suddenly she exclaimed “That’s exactly how it is! The pregnant girls and all of them wear skirts!” She smiled. “How do you do that?”

“What?” I asked.

“Write things as they are, who are you writing to, how do you know what to write about” A million questions tumbled out of her mouth. I smiled, at this point completely distracted from what I was doing, but with the most sincere sense that she was really the thing I was meant to be paying attention to anyway. I explained the concept of a blog, and told her I was writing the story of my life here for people back home, and that I hoped to publish it as a book someday. When I had asked her about her goals and dreams on our walk to the teachers quarters the other day she had listed off about five, including writing, being a gospel singer and an actress.

Our chat continues, and I am given the opportunity to launch into one of my unrehearsed pseudo speeches, in which I speak directly from my soul about the ways in which I’ve followed my dreams, and thus of course she can follow hers, no matter what they are and no excuses. No of course it won’t be easy but then how often have you done things worth doing that weren’t hard, at least initially, at first? But I assure her that it is absolutely her personal responsibility to reach for the stars, - she can do it and I absolutely believe in the promise and possibility that I see in front of me.

As I make these declarations I can tell I believe them wholeheartedly by the way my hands get cold, and begin to shake, and I notice that my voice trembles ever so slightly, and spouts out of me altogether too quickly. I can feel my eyes shining as though someone has flicked on the high beams in my brain and they are shining through not only my eyes, but also my face, which begins to hurt with the wattage at which I am smiling.

It’s an experience I’ve only ever had when falling passionately (and often tragically, dramatically) in love with the noun-like trilogy of a person, place or idea. It rings with the flowing logic of truth, and I feel the passion of my life being awakened inside me. I recently asked my mother over transcontinental long distance what her passion in life was, and when she in turn asked me I surprised myself when the unpremeditated answer came flowing out of me-

“My passion is reaching people, and helping them grow, in finding their strengths and helping them foster them, when I can see learning in growth happening in someone’s eyes, when they realize their worth and the potential that I have seen in them all along.”

For me, this can even sometimes be in telling people something they don’t want to hear, and I’ve done it, because there is nothing better than that feeling of understanding and caring and connection. I hesitate to call it truth, because what is that really, and who can possess it enough to dole it out to others? I could perhaps settle for calling it beauty, as it is the same feeling I get when I am moved by a work of art, an expression of music, a fleeting irreplaceable moment.

Sitting in the computer lab, we keep talking. She tells me about her life and her goals, and I look at her in wonder. It seems such a simple thing, a bright young girl who wants to do something, and yet it feels to me like so long since I’ve seen one. As it gets dark it occurs to me that I have to get going. She reaches over to help me pick up my bag when I see a silver ring flashing on her finger. Jewelry is not very common in this village, especially not on a young girl.

I grabbed her wrist and examined her hand. The ring looked so familiar. I faced her palm towards me. The ring is inscribed “FEAR NOT.” It was mine. It must have been amongst the things that had been stolen from my house a few months back, and had somehow come to be in her possession. I had failed to even notice it was missing until now. There had been a long story behind how I came to have the ring, and I had made a point of bringing it with me to Bots, somehow knowing ahead of time that its message would be something I would need to remind myself again and again. When I first came to Seronga I had worn as a wedding ring, finding it easier to just hold up my hand and let people believe I was married rather than explain THAT convoluted chain of events. I had worn it exactly as she was now, with the inscription toward the inside of my hand.

The realization of the fact that this girl, this small woman, this person who made me feel like I had just found a buried treasure was wearing a ring I used to wear to reassure myself that things would be fine here struck me, at that moment, as both poignant and hilarious. I was again reminded that indeed things will be fine, or perhaps even great. There is nothing to fear as the universe will continue to find a way to put things right, and will send you little reminders of this from time to time. The ring, like me, had ended up exactly where it was supposed to be.

We have continued on, she and I. She is the main reason the girl’s group I’ve started works. I’ve had her over to watch movies at my place, and she has written a story I’m trying to help her get published in the sub-district newsletter. (I’ve posted it here on my blog. I find it to be a powerful piece that beautifully illustrates the factors that lead to the high transmission of HIV in this country and gives an accurate account of teenage pregnancy at her school. She’s excited to have an international audience! I’m ridiculously proud of her.) I hope to eventually help her write some articles for the district or maybe even national newspaper.

She brings me back, this one. During times when I just want to say f*ck it, I think of her and it all makes a little more sense. She helps give me purpose and reminds me what I’m striving for- in Seronga, in the Peace Corps, in my life. In my attempts to be her mentor, and to encourage her to work hard and reach for her dreams and live up to her potential and steer the course of this village and probably this country, she has led me to try harder to do the same in myself. She has already given me so much more than I could ever hope to give. Even when things are desperate, or annoying, or depressing, or whatever they can be here (and my how they run the gambit) when I think of her and the other girls that I work with I’m reminded of how much I’ve been given. Every day I am at least once reminded of the presence of my pulse, and a passion through my veins; a condition with which I did not find myself afflicted in my former life. I am grateful.






Bame’s article for the newsletter is as follows. This is the third or fourth version and she worked very hard on it. I want to give a disclaimer that it’s very common to have a bit of a morality lesson in any articles written in this country so that’s what the bit at the end is about. I’ve given this article to several village leaders in the hopes that from the words of one of their own children they will be motivated to begin the conversation that can create change in this village. As with all my hopes and dreams for this place, we shall see, but whatever happens, I consider this to be an achievement and a success. Thanks for reading!


Teenage Pregnancy in Seronga
By Mbenovandu Bame Jaruka

It is becoming a problem in Seronga that some of the young girls schooling at Ngambao JSS are dropping out of school because of teenage pregnancy. This is defined as pregnancy occurring amongst young girls below twenty. The most common cause of this is unprotected sexual intercourse, although pregnancy can also result from improper use of contraception. One of the risks of teenage pregnancy is contracting sexual transmitted diseases like HIV/AIDS. In addition, delivery of the baby is likely to be difficult as the girl’s body has not yet matured. This may lead to serious complications, including death if there needs to be an operation. Other problems include excessive bleeding, or possibly anemia-which is caused by lack of iron in the blood.

I interviewed one of the teenage mothers who dropped out of school and came back to continue with her schooling as she was given a second chance. She was lucky enough to have enough support to be back in school. She told me the story of how she got pregnant and it all began like this:

“In 2006 while I was sixteen doing form two I started to drink too much alcohol with my peers and my boyfriend who was six years older than me. One day while I was at the bar alone I met another guy from Bobonong. The only thing I knew about him was where he came from. I did not know his family, behaviour or his age, which I estimated was almost twenty years old. I just told myself that all of that does not matter; I will know a lot about him as time goes on. He asked me to be his lover and I agreed even though I had a permanent lover. The reason I agreed was because my permanent boyfriend was not around, as he was gone to the camps where he works for six months. All I wanted was not to get bored and to have some money for buying alcohol.
One day after a week in a relationship, we went out to the bar to quench our thirst with some wines. We drank too much until bars were closed and then we went to my place to rest. While we were in the house we started kissing and romancing each other. We went on and on romancing each other until we could not control our feelings, even though there were no condoms. We started having unprotected sex. I did not think about contracting HIV/AIDS or falling pregnant as I was very drunk.

After missing my periods for two months I started feeling abdominal pains. That’s when I was taken from Seronga Clinic to Gumare Hospital to be examined by a doctor. Unfortunately the test results came out positive which means I was pregnant. I went back to Seronga and told the guy from Bobonong that he had impregnated me. I was very surprised when he told me that he had done this knowingly, because he did not want to lose me. All I had thought was that if abortion was legal in Botswana I should have committed it in order to continue with my schooling. At this point there was nothing to be done so I had to continue with the pregnancy.

My mother was the second person to know, but she was not that angry as it was a mistake. She said I should learn from my mistake and never go through the same story again. The guy from Bobonong promised my mother that he would take care of me and my unborn baby. He kept the promise until I gave birth to a baby girl. He is also paying for my school fees. I was able to return to school after my mother begged the teachers to take me back as I needed to continue with my education. I am now a mother and a student doing form three.

Being a teenage mother is so difficult because you have a child to think of. The advice I am giving to my peers is to not engage in any relationships especially sexual relationships. They are too young and they should be focused on their studies. They must avoid negative peers and avoid drugs and alcohol. Alternatives to this lifestyle include: engaging in sports and clubs, reading school books or novels or any activities that keeps themselves busy. I urge my peers to think about the consequences of teenage pregnancy, like finance to support their babies. They should not take a chance to destroy their future. They should abstain from sexual intercourse or use condoms if it is difficult to abstain. I hope teenagers will learn from my mistakes and not go through the situation I have gone through by taking my advice and practicing it.”

Teenagers are very lucky as they are given second chances to go through their education. Teenagers do not have to engage in bad things like alcohol, drugs and unprotected sexual intercourse, as these things can lead to unwanted pregnancy. They should also choose positive peers to avoid bad things and always concentrate on their school work. They can have bright futures as long as they remember that everything has its own time.

Ashes to Ashes... A death in an African Village

It’s a long one… Hopefully something to read over your lunch break at your desk?

“Jen? Jen, are you there?” In typical Botswana fashion there is a poor connection and a slight delay even between a town and a village less than a 45 minute bush flight apart. In typical Jen fashion, I have of course been sleeping with my cell phone in my very bed with me, and after wrestling it from the covers, have answered it before even completely waking up.

She took my thinly disguised grunt that was masquerading as the proper polite response as enough confirmation that I was indeed there. By the tone of her voice I could tell something was terribly wrong, and the next words out of her mouth confirmed it for me.

“Jen, we have a problem,” Debbie’s voice broke. At the sound of this my mind attempted to spring to full attention, and the voice in my head that I would next be attempting to project out of my mouth took on the tone of someone who is completely ready to move heaven and Earth to fix whichever problem we may be finding ourselves up against. Somewhere in the catacombs of my sleeping mind it occurred to me that whatever time it currently was in the morning was pretty early to already facing a problem, but this is Botswana, so in some ways, nothing surprises me. Except the fact that Debbie is crying.

In the short time I’ve known her; I’ve come to think of Debbie as remarkably strong. Not that remarkably strong people cannot cry, but it’s just something I haven’t yet experienced from her. She’s been through a great deal during her time on this planet, and always seems to react with Herculean grace, so for her to be calling me in tears at half six in the morning means the worst has happened. Before she could say anything more I sharply gasped in an attempt to take in the breath that seemed to be alluding me after having answered the phone in what was likely mid-snore. My muddled mind was able to deduce, through the hazy struggle of waking that despite being on my way out of dream world I was actually experiencing one of my worst nightmares. It seems I was the recipient of a phone call before the Minnesota Lutheran prescribed “civil hour” of 8 am, which could only mean one thing. Someone had died.

My brain went from zero to sixty in a nanosecond. My poor body struggled to keep up and in following the incoherent mumblings of my waking brain fumbled around in what I would imagine I thought was “make a plan mode” but really was a lot of getting tangled in my mosquito net and bedding. I attempted to as spring from my cocoon in what I imagined was an impersonation of a heroic leap. I immediately began pacing the one square inch of floor that was cleared enough for pacing (and by cleared I certainly don’t mean that it was free of the inevitable sand or thorns, a particularly sharp specimen of the latter which I immediately found with my left foot like a blinking heat seeking missile) and began to flounder around for the best tools with which to make a plan for the news I hadn’t yet received.

My first thought was Simon. Cold terror griped me. The logical part of my brain slowly and stubbornly sauntered after this idea despite the emotional part galloping off at a full sprint. In the quick flashes of multitasking my increasingly coherent mind was beginning to be able to accomplish I was able to identify the error in this idea. I live in Seronga with Simon, Debbie lives in Maun, and she had just gone home and wasn’t due back for a week or two. The village generally considers me to be what would effectively be Simon’s next of kin, and he would certainly be the first person they would call should something happen to me. It wouldn’t make sense for her to be calling me with this news.

“Jen, Willy Phillips has died. Anne is with him at the clinic. Is there any way you can go there?”

I feel the need break into the story at this point to give a disclaimer for the narrative that follows by admitting that the deceased was not one of my favorite people. We’ve got a few moral, ethical and political differences. In an attempt to not speak ill of the dead, I will make every attempt to not let that fact color my story unduly. We’ll see how it goes.

Willy Phillips is the councilor (Sort of like a mini-senator? Or sort of Governor? A Mayor? But then what would the Kgosi (chief) be? Well it’s tough to say, but he is a man with political power) of Seronga. His father was white and his mother was black, and his white third wife Anne is from Britain (I hate that I point these racial aspects of people out, but in my life here color is very relevant, and it’s also a part of the story. My life certainly is changing… Moving on). He is in many ways a man in between cultures, not quite white and not quite black, and in that way I can sort of relate to him, myself being not quite a villager and not quite an ex pat.

Debbie has known Willy for the better part of probably 30 years, and he is Godfather to her two sons, with whom I have also come to be friends. As she has become a great friend to me has so often been there for me in times of trial, I was desperate to return the favor to her in any way that I could. Willy has on occasion given me lifts back from Maun where he ends up spending a great deal of time in meetings for the district. In Seronga his campaign strategy has always been to give out free vegetables to his constituents, as well as to occasionally help people with lifts to funerals or to Shakawe to get their ARV’s.

In Seronga, it is a very patriarchic culture, and the people here come to think of the figures of government as their fathers or caretakers. There is a lot of dependence on the government and due to diamonds, and income from tourism, the fact is that the government does have money, they can and do provide. Willy is another example of this. I say this to give background to the type of figure Willy was amongst the community, and to illustrate the sort of figure he became immediately upon his death, and the way that the people reacted, and the string of small town controversies that ensued.

But back to that morning. I told Debbie of course I would go to the clinic and in fact I was on my way. Debbie laid out a plan (which of course ended up changing several times over the course of the next hour) and said she and her sons would be chartering a plane from Maun to Seronga. I quickly threw on the first clothes I could find from the pile of items which I have come to think of as clothing purgatory, clothes worn maybe once or twice, not clean enough to be hung back in the wardrobe, but also not dirty enough to go in the completely foul smelling wash pile. It usually consists of mostly pants and jeans, so from my wardrobe I found a freshly clean tank top and threw a do-rag (bandana or a Duk, depending on your cultural preference) on my ever expanding pile of unruly hair.

I called Simon as I brushed my teeth and gave him the news, as Patricia from the clinic called on the other line. The ambiance amongst the white people in Seronga is a strange thing, while we are all quite interdependent in terms of transport out and getting food and supplies in, Simon in particular has an interesting way of getting along with and relating to people. Most of the villagers think that we are all automatically friends because we are white (and generally think we are from the same place, -although the lot of us come from no less than three different countries- and despite the fact that I am the third Peace Corps to come through Seronga, many of the people say that Simon is my uncle or some other form of relation. I can’t completely figure out if this is due to the different ways in which the Batswana determine family relationships, or due to the fact that our cultures are more similar to each other-a point Simon would ardently disagree with- than to theirs or what). But despite this common belief among the villagers that we’re all one big happy white family, Simon and Willy haven’t gotten along for years. They “fell out” as Simon recounts it, a long time ago, although over what is a question with an answer as elusive as the one that accompanies the question “what does Simon DO in Seronga?” In the end it all becomes legend. As I seem to have become friends with Simon first this meant that by default I wasn’t very close with Anne and Willy. We weren’t unfriendly; we just didn’t ever hang out, or really communicate past the requisite greetings in the village. This was about to change.

Patricia continued to call back looking for me as Ma Willy (the other name for Anne, when a couple is married the wife becomes Ma whomever the husband’s first or last name is- they are interchangeable) is at the clinic and I guess at this point it has been decided that I, as a white person will know best what to do with this situation. I have to say, I have been lucky enough in my life to not have had to deal with a lot of death personally, and haven’t seen altogether too many dead bodies. That too was about to change.

I arrived at the clinic and was ushered into the room with all the beds, my authority regarding what to do about something finally being respected by my colleagues, of course at just the moment in which I have less of an idea of what to do than I ever had in my life. I had just seen Willy in Maun two days before, and had almost caught a ride back to Seronga with him (I had ended up hitching with the police instead). Now I enveloped his grieving widow in a sort of awkward hug as my colleagues faded back into the other rooms of the clinic. I searched my mind for comforting words for a virtual stranger, whom the world was treating as my sister. We awkwardly embraced and she quickly went back to cleaning and dressing her husband, a task which I did my best to help her with. I didn’t really have time to process the fact that I was now heaving the weight of one of the first deceased bodies I’ve ever had this much contact with around as his wife struggled to dress him. I was busy thinking of how hot it was already getting at the clinic.

After this task was thankfully finished we walked out to the front of the clinic, where I was immediately saved by Benson. Ben is my good friend who comes into town for a month once every three months as he works as a mechanic for one of the luxury camps in the delta. He is the Kgosi’s (chief’s) son, which makes him my cousin, a fact I had quickly informed him of the first time we met, and has served to keep him in generally gentlemanly like behavior ever since. He has been pretty good friends with Anne and Willy for a while, and had heard the news and had come to be of whatever service he could be to Anne. He also ended up being a huge help to me.

The first problem he solved was the driving. Now I’m not allowed, under any circumstances, to drive as a Peace Corps Volunteer. This is the type of stuff over which they will immediately send you home, so I wasn’t about to do it here, grieving widow or not. In addition, the car Anne had driven to the clinic in was Willy’s and was loaded down completely with stock for the shop he runs in town, as well as being a manual, on the wrong side of the car (for me). Ben came to the rescue to drive us around to search for the girl who ran the shop and thus had the keys. Being Seronga, and the time of day being morning meant that the Mascom cell signal was down, and so we thus had to drive around searching for her. We had to unload the stock into the shop (which is essentially a semi truck container with shelves inside) in order to free up the pick-up for whatever arrangements would lie ahead of us.

It was when we found Kay that I had the first opportunity to do the unsavory task which would become my main job of the day, which was to inform people of Willy’s passing. I quickly found there was no easy or pleasant way to do this so I sort of just went against everything that is generally a part of my nature and tip-toed into the news as gently as I could. Kay was upset, but I maintain that the nerves and framework of African women’s emotions are made of steel, and so she helped unload the contents of the truck into the shop, even directing us what needed to be reloaded to be brought back to the house as the tears slowly slid down her face.

I have to admit that I found a bit of comfort in unloading the truck, as it felt like a tangible thing I could DO to be helpful. My Midwestern roots demand that during a crisis I be USEFUL, and DOING something in order to be effective in any situation, in this case comforting the grieving. I then worked on arranging for Benson to meet Debbie at the airstrip and finding tea and such for the mourners that had slowly begun to arrive at the house. Debbie stepping in was a big help, as she’s a very take charge kind of woman, and this being my first funeral to help coordinate, I was very glad to have some guidance. My main job for the day ended up being to answer Willy’s phone, which lead me to perform my uncomfortable task many, many times, to perfect strangers whom I generally had no idea how they had known Willy or why they were calling. It could have been the garage in Maun or one of his oldest friends and I had nothing but the number on the caller ID (it seems Willy hadn’t really believed in storing numbers to the phone’s memory) and the voice on the line to guide me.

At Willy and Anne’s house the mourners kept coming, and soon nearly all the village elder men and women were there, and as the day went on, most of the village had come. Throughout the day the “plan” which is of course what always needs to be made in absolutely any case in Botswana had changed several times. The first and most pressing issue was getting the death to be certified by a doctor, which took a better part of the day under the hot African sun to complete. It was a horrifying circus of phone calls, pleas, threats, demands, planes, boats, trucks, interventions by councilors from other districts and a menagerie of various other government officials as well as the rescheduling of doctors scheduled to be administering ARV’s at several villages in the area to get a doctor here to confirm that our beloved councilor was indeed deceased.

There were enough different stories going around as to if and when a doctor was coming or whether we would have to drive with the body the one to three hours over the long dirt road the ferry at Mohembo to thoroughly confuse everyone involved, and as the mascom signal was still down, it was between my cell phone and Willy’s cell phone to get it all sorted. (Anne and Willy had a land line in the house, but no one but Anne and two of their house servants could go through their gate as they have three extremely vicious dogs who have been known to attack people and have been rumored to have put people in the hospital. So the planning was executed from the guest house. Just to add another element of fun to the day.) It was finally confirmed that the body was indeed deceased and more importantly that the generator was working and had been turned on at the mortuary. The corpse was finally transported from the clinic to the mortuary in the afternoon, setting off the first of many controversies that would occur in the next week.

The culture of the several tribes in the area demands that, amongst other traditions, the body be viewed by all of the mourners before it is buried. This means there should be witnesses through every step of the process. The staff at the clinic was rather insistent that someone watch as the doctor certified the body, although Debbie and Anne refused this. Again, I haven’t had much intimacy with the process of death in my own life and culture, so I didn’t know if this is common in my country or not. My understanding of this tradition here is to prove to everyone with their own eyes that the person has indeed died, rather than as in the Western tradition, to convey a last sense of goodbye. Anne of course, being English, felt that this was all a bit inappropriate, as having died of what was believed to be a heart attack, Willy’s coloring was not very good at this point, especially after having been in the heat for the better part of the day. Many of the villagers were sort of following what had become a regular convoy of vehicles around the village, arriving after us having walked, and sitting down in the sandy roadside whenever the ambulance with the corpse passed.

In a land of extremely strong traditional beliefs mixed in with that special brand of missionary Christianity fanatically popular in this part of Botswana, the basis for people’s beliefs can be rather difficult to describe to an outsider, as it tends to be much more complex than “because the bible tells me so.” I’ve often asked about details of traditional beliefs in relation to religious beliefs but have yet to get many profoundly satisfying answers. Much of what is “traditional” contradicts what I understand to be the teachings of the bible, or Christianity, but again I have to respect the villagers for being able to hold so many contradictory beliefs close to their hearts and not experience much confusion or fugue or angst about it. I can’t decide if it is the complexity or the simplicity of the whole situation that eludes me, but I’m often left with a sort of confused respect.

The one thing I do find quite amusing in regard to the religious diversity in Seronga is that despite nearly everyone in the village actively identifying with one sect or another of what they name as Christianity, we still also have our own family of Christian missionaries in Seronga. It sometimes strikes me as shades of The Poisonwood Bible, but then they and I don’t interact much past the transport and supplies issues either. I’ve gathered that their general outlook is that despite all being Christians, the villagers still have a lot of work to do on being properly saved. So in essence if you throw some traditional beliefs about spirits and witchcraft into the Christianity mixture this village is a regular holy rolling jamboree. It is, in a word, interesting. And soon came to be even more so.

Throughout the day there was great discussion of what the plans for burial would be. Debbie and the boys flew back to Maun in the afternoon, leaving me as one of the last voices of “Western reason”. I soon found that part of my job was to be the ambassador between the African and Western (I’ve always thought it weird that one of the terms for white people around these parts was Westerners, or Europeans. How can Europeans be called Westerners when we are only one time zone east of Paris? And how can Australians be called Westerners? They are so East, or even kind of Asian in some ways but we never call them that. How can I be called European when I come from the States? I’m at least as far removed from my European roots as most white Africans are, but they seldom refer to themselves as Africans. It’s always confused me, and I’ve never known the rules of this particular game, what people are usually referring to is someone’s classification as just white, but it seems we can’t just say it. Hmmm.) camps of opinion regarding what would be done next.

At some point during the day Anne decided it would be most appropriate to cremate her husband, and most of the Westerners agreed that as he is her husband (although they were, in some senses estranged, which added a whole additional element of things to be a bit sensitive about on many, many levels that I won’t get into) she had every right to do. I suggested that if this was indeed her decision she would have to somehow allow the villagers to have their ceremonies with the ashes as well. The logistics of getting the corpse down to Mahalapye (a two day journey unless planes were involved, and even then might be more than a day with transfers and what) and then back to Maun, where it was determined there must also be another memorial as Willy had spent most of his life there and had many friends who would not be able to make it on the long journey to Seronga, coupled with the Batswana tradition of burying on Saturday, (and this being Wednesday, and there was already another funeral that most of the village was meant to attend this weekend-who knew the scheduling of funerals in a rural Botswana village could be so difficult) put us out almost two weeks.

But it was more than timing that became a matata (problem). The villagers, represented by the elder men, felt that as their councilor and thus their father, they had just as much say as she did in Willy’s final resting arrangements. And burning was blasphemy. Anne tried to quote the bible with the idea of ashes to ashes, but methinks there may have been something lost in translation. During the heated discussion that ensued someone remembered speaking to Willy within the past 20 years and him saying that he wanted to be buried out back in his yard (under a big tree that of course ended up being in the flood plain- and incidentally under water at this exact moment). Another villager concurred that he had also heard Willy say this and soon nearly the whole village remembered having an intimate conversation at some point in their life with dear departed Willy about what to do when he passed. It became a virtual chorus. Anne was totally outnumbered. She conceded.

The next bit of drama involved an attempt to get permission to bury Willy under another tree in his yard, which was thwarted by a letter from the Land Board, arriving after the grave had basically already been dug and no less than 6 planes had been chartered to fly into Seronga for the funeral the next day. In a huge display of dramatics Anne got the village to support her in disregarding the Land Board’s decision, amongst them several members of the Land Board. And thus is the beauty of politics in Botswana. Everyone agreed Willy would have wanted it that way.

Sidenote: Let me just take this opportunity to let everyone know that my mom knows what I want done should I croak any time soon. I kind of talk about it all the time. But just in case there’s any confusion…. Burn me. Put my ashes in a bench at the Rose Garden overlooking Lake Superior. Don’t go crazy with some dumb flowers (sorry to every florist I’ve ever worked for- Karly you can go wild if you really must, but I’d really rather you throw some money at a charity or spend some time doing volunteer work while you think of me (humming the tune from “Phantom of the Opera” in my head… did I mention that some chick sang that at Willy’s funeral- acapella, accompanied by her ipod-which only she could hear? I live through the looking glass for Sheezy. Anyhoo.)) I want Shakespeare and show tunes at the funeral. Make it a party. Please serve pizza. The end. Peace Out.

It is standard mourning procedure that the entire village shows up at the home of the bereft to say prayers every day at 6 in the morning and 5 or six in the evening until the body is “at rest” read: buried. Anne initially tried to limit the prayer services to one day, with a break until the funeral but people just kept coming. I felt for her that in her husband’s death she was forced to play hostess. Willy’s position as the councilor of Seronga (and an official figure of authority, and thus most of the villagers “father”) meant that most of the village felt entitled to have the mourning process and funeral proceed in the traditional manner that they expected. Many of them stayed all day, and some even camped in tents on Anne’s lawn. In short, some never left. It is tradition to always be with those who are grieving in Batswana culture, but as a “Westerner” I found myself becoming increasingly annoyed.

After all, how can one properly fall apart with all these people around? From my strange new position of relevance at Anne’s side during these prayer services I was stunned to see how many women essentially threw themselves on Anne’s lap in grief as they came to pay their respects by greeting her. Sobbing and carrying on to his widow, and forcing her to comfort them. Sitting right next to her I caught more than a few of them, and spotted a few more as they swooned during the actual prayers. It felt a little over the top to my ethnically Lutheran sensibilities, and even the Catholic floating around in me kind of wanted to slap them.

Being from a Midwestern “casserole/hotdish” culture I found it quite rude (again, by my own standards) that so many people were going to show up and sit around, and not bring any food. By the first night I realized that no one was really making much effort to make sure that Anne had something to eat, and decided my duty would be to cook (which I don’t know if I’ve made it clear that I hate cooking?) some things that Anne could eat and have at least some leftovers to nibble on so she wouldn’t have to be bothered. This brilliant idea was quickly thwarted when I realized the next day that I had forgotten to factor in several elements of Seronga life that meant that most people here didn’t have a concept of leftovers.

In a world of communal eating, no refrigeration, little concept of budgeting leading to days toward month end with no food, an affinity for extremely carb heavy meals resulting in very full bellies, many mouths to feed and plenty of dogs around to take care of whatever scraps weren’t consumed, the idea of leftovers was completely foreign.

The first day I had brought a pasta dish which should have been enough for Anne and a few people to eat for at least two meals. As we couldn’t go into her house there was no other real place to eat than right there amongst the mourners. It felt incredibly rude to eat in front of people, but I reasoned that there was also an element of rudeness of so many people just showing up and moving onto someone’s lawn because of their beliefs, which were different than hers, and she was supposed to be mourning. One might wonder if perhaps Anne hadn’t thought about some of the finer points of difference between her and her husband’s backgrounds prior to their marriage (and indeed I did wonder, a great deal in fact) but at this late stage in the game it was all a bit irrelevant. So my hopeful little leftovers were soon consumed by the village elder men, who also had the nerve to make faces as they ate (hey I never claimed to be Martha Freaking Stewart but cut a girl a break, it wasn’t nasty face worthy!).

Three more days of this cooking and schlepping food across the village in the rain followed. The chaos at Anne’s guest house continued.

Mourning Management became my new job description during this week. I was rarely at the clinic and when I was there most of my coworkers were asking why I had left Anne. Back at the ranch, most of villagers spent their days sitting around, (which came to be quite a problem as it seemed that we were in the Serongan Monsoon Season- the few days out of the year that it rained or was at least misty for four days straight.) blowing the circuitry with their ever increasing number of cell phone chargers being plugged into too many adaptors in one outlet (I don’t blame them-free electricity!) and demanding hot water for tea. The old men seemed to sit (or place their walking sticks- I was constantly tripping like it was my job) directly in any pathway, chatting loudly in various languages (chatting loudly sounds like yelling and arguing to the untrained ear, and made finding a place to have a delicate phone conversation informing someone of a friend or family member’s death additionally challenging) while Anne and I and various other “Westerners” struggled to make lists of people who had called, who needed to be called back, details about tents and planes and transport and food and arrangements. Eventually, as is custom, Anne had to purchase a couple cows and goats to be slaughtered and get many bags of various starches brought over from her store to be prepared in an improvised kitchen of huge cauldrons over open fires which sprung up under corrugated iron roofs tied between trees and poles which appeared out of nowhere. The place was beginning to look like a refugee camp.

Eventually (FINALLY!) we laid Willy to rest. The funeral ended up being a big production of political grandstanding, advertising plugs for the funeral home, and eulogies galore. My personal send off ended up being that I threw together an impromptu choir to sing Amazing Grace (God bless the amazing harmonizing abilities of the Batswana. I was able to get the words for 4 verses –several via text message thanks to a certain missionary kid- I owe ya a beer, buddy- and main melody and they immediately harmonized with it, learning it in the span of an afternoon.) which is a bit more recognizable for the “Westerners” in the crowd than the Setswana hymns, which are pretty impossible to follow. I cut out during hour 3, as I reasoned that I had properly said my goodbyes.

The whole experience for me was a huge lesson in the pervasiveness of culture, and reiterated for me exactly how deep my own culture runs through my veins. It is in times of what would universally be considered trial that we most readily fall back into our own norms and values, and in which we become most quick to be irritated with and judge the beliefs of others. It’s the rituals and standards and expectations which we hold sacred that, when challenged, bring us most quickly to defend our own as right regarding issues that are so ingrained in us that we may have never questioned them before ourselves. These are the situations that may lead us to deem others as most wrong, strange, or in some way bankrupt when in reality they are just different, born out of the same sense of the respect for the sacred (although not observing it in the same ways) as our own. It has been one of my most valuable learning experiences in Seronga to date.

Let me be clear that I don’t mean to make complete light of the situation surrounding Willy’s death. I've observed that the Batswana tend to have what I would consider a more healthy viewpoint surrounding death, most specifically that it is indeed a natural part of the living process. Willy's passing is unfortunate, although he lived a long, productive life (he was 73) and did some positive things for the people of Seronga. I found the circumstances surrounding the whole process of the funeral rather than the death itself to be humorous, and as with most things in this village, if one does not laugh (at least a little) one may never stop crying.

So now, with the realization that I’ve wordily recounted the details of one funeral in a rural African village, and the contributing social and cultural factors that make it so interesting as a foreigner, as well as my own reactions in as many pages as I wrote my paper on Japanese policing techniques for my international criminology class which counted for 50% of my grade when I was schooling in London I shall sign off. With one of the longest run on sentences of my life. Cheers.

Willy Phillips, RIP
Died 28 January 2009, buried 1 February 2009