April 26, 2011
So not much has happened this week. We’ve kind of just been going through the motions. We have a set schedule that we follow, and we just roll through them each day. It’s funny though, sometimes I’ll just stand on the side of the road and think to myself…wow, I’m in Botswana right now. WTF. It’s crazy that it hasn’t hit us that we’re here, even though we’ve been living here in Botswana.
Though on Friday, we finally got our shadowing assignments. I’m heading to Middlepits with another trainee. We’re excited. It’s gonna take us about 5 to 6 hours to get there by bus. We’re finally getting out of Kayne! And it’s about time. Others are going other places. A few of my friends are heading to Maun, others are going to Francistown. We are just scattering about all of Botswana. We’ve all been mad jonesin to get outta here and to get some space from each other. There are some people that I feel like I could live without here already, and we’re starting to really figure out who we get along with and who we are ok with being without. No offense to anyone, everyone just has their preferences with people they like to be friends with. We type A personalities can’t be friends with everyone. In fact, no one is going to be friends with everyone. We aren’t all going to like everyone we meet. And this is no exception. We don’t hate. We just don’t prefer. Lol. Sorry, I can’t lie, and I’m going to be honest that not everyone is going to like everyone. And if you do, then you’re just fake, or have no idea who you are or what you like. And trust me, you’ll know what you like if you’re confined in the same room with the same 38 people every day for 8 hours a day for 3 weeks and everyone is trying to get their two cents in. A little harsh? Sorry…I just say it how it is. Can you sense the bitterness? Lol. Ya…I need to get some space. Excited to take a break. J
This week has been a day by day kinda week. The monkeys are always amusing. I’m thinking about trying to capture a monkey to keep him as a pet. Maybe I can pull on his tail, lol. Then I was thinking about getting a pet rooster also. That way I can have my family with me! J haha…I know I know I know, SO ASIAN. But monkeys and roosters are EVERYWHERE here. I can’t help but think about it! Lol.
Last night, I had to go hunting for someone, cuz my sister’s cousin had run off. So we went out searching for her at night. It was a clear night. And OMG, it was AMAZING. Go lefifi. It’s dark! But…the stars are fricking AMAZING. I remember staring at the stars in Yosemite, and I couldn’t stop staring at them. They were so beautiful. But dude, that was in a national park! Do you understand how awesome it is to be able to step outside of your house and you can see the milky way?! I’ve NEVER been able to experience that. It’s just something awesome all in itself. Even though we were walking around “looking” for someone (we couldn’t really see), I couldn’t take my eyes off the sky. I hadn’t noticed the stars because it’s been mostly cloudy since we’ve gotten here to Kayne (and OMG…I am seriously over this rain…mud…puddles…). But last night was crystal clear, and I felt like I could see every star in the sky that we were meant to see, and it was right in my front yard. Haha…I bet you people who live out on farms think that what I’m saying is funny. And I’m sure it is. I just grew up in a city, went to school in a city…I had never seen in like that in a LIVING environment (as opposed to a camping environment). It made me really feel like I was connected to the universe again, and not just stuck in our own little human technological world.
Tonight, I need to pack. I leave for Gaborone at 530AM. Then take a 6 hours bus to Tsabong. Our volunteer is going to pick us up at Tsabong and then head to Middlepits with us, though we’re not quite sure how we’re gonna get from Tsabong to Middlepits yet. But I guess, I’ll find out tomorrow. Right now, the rain is pounding on the tin roof. I have my music up as loud as it can go, and I can still barely hear it. I’m just trying to move things around on my hard drive, yay! It’s working! But I gotta pack. Then gotta go bath. Tonight I told my host father, ke batla go tlapa. Which means I want to bath. And he understood! Yay! Improvement! I will catch up with you later!
Also, if you want to send something, you can send educational packages for a flat rate as long as it is under 20 lbs. ;)
May 1, 2011
Just got back from shadowing in Middlepits. It’s a village on the South African border in the Kalahari Desert. Like seriously…ON THE BORDER. At the volunteer I was staying with, she is a house away from the border. So this was the journey.
April 27, 2011
We got picked up on Wednesday morning at 530AM at our houses. Was driven to Gabs to catch a 8 AM bus to Tsabong. Another trainee and I slept for a lot of the way. On the way down to Tsabong, we met up with a volunteer in Werda which was along the way to Tsabong. This was a brief meeting, being that he was dropping off a mixing bowl and midsentence the bus almost took off without me, and I had to jump back onto a moving bus as it is driving away. Then we had a 4 year old girl stand in the aisle…and persistently, unblinkingly stare at us for about 20 minutes. There were no seats left on the bus. The mother apparently figured her daughter would be fine just standing in the aisle by herself staring at some “white” people (I put parentheses, cuz I’m including myself in that assessment). After her awkwardly staring at us, I wasn’t quite sure as to what else we were supposed to do, so I asked her if she wanted to sit on my lap. She jumped right on. 10 minutes later, she’s passed out in my lap. In America, this would be absurd, and I would be incredibly uncomfortable about offering my lap as a seat to a child in fear of child molestation accusations. But here, I guess it’s no big deal, and in fact almost expected for someone to just have a random child sit on their lap on a bus ride. They are much more trusting and much less fearful than Americans. Either that, or we have way more creeps in America. 1 hour later, I was finally able to move her to an opened seat next to me (and frantically checked that I was not peed on…thankful not). Yay! We make it Tsabong at 3 PM. We are greeted by our volunteer. She’s cool. J we wait around til 430, then jump in the back of an ambulance (which btw…is just a covered pickup truck with a foam mattress in the middle) with 5 other people, and ride for about another hour along the South African border. We finally made it to Middlepits! We’re in the middle of the desert. There’s 900 people in this village. Where the heck am i?! We make chili. It was yummy. We hang out. We chat. We have a few glasses of wine. We go to bed at 9 PM.
April 28, 2011
Thursday. We get up at 7 AM. We are out the door at 715AM. We make it to a 720AM meeting. We meet the staff at the Middlepits clinic. We get a tour of the clinic. We see where the maternity ward is. There is a woman that had a baby the night previous. They don’t do first births at this clinic, they are sent to the Tsabong hospital in case there are any complications. Though if it is any birth after the first one and they didn’t have complications, they will do the other births here at the clinic. The midwives are the ones that deliver the babies. We check out the medicine store room. Way less medicine than you would find at a pharmacy in the states. We go home to get some breakfast. Then we get picked up to go to Kgare. To get to Kgare, we jump in the back of the ambulance, and this time, we spend an hour riding on an unpaved road, littered with dirt and rocks, going at 120 km/hour. We haul ASS out there. On top of it, we pick up 5 hitchers, so we are jammed packed into the back of this ambulance. We are basically popcorn. It felt like we were on a wooden rollercoaster like Colossus for an hour straight. He would go down hills, and our stomachs would be in our throats. This is the first time I think I have almost gotten car sick…I spent most of the ride staring at my knees, just trying to focus on the nearest “non-moving” object.
We reach there…we are in the middle of the desert and sand dunes. We hike around the sand dunes. These things are awesome. It’s just mounds of red dirt everywhere. We just walk around the dunes. It’s sand dunes. Sheep. House. Sand dune. Cow. Sand dune. Corn cricket. Dung beetle. Sand dune. House. Goat. So on so forth. Just sand dunes. And what’s funny about these sand dunes…are there are trees just growing out of the sand. Which I’m so confused about. They look like oak trees…clearly they are not…but I didn’t know trees other than palm trees could grow out of sand. I didn’t know anything taller than me could grow out of sand. I was confused. Correct me if I’m clearly just being dumb. Anyways…pictures of the sand dunes will be going up on facebook…so keep your eyes open for them. We walk around for about an hour and half, just wandering around sand dunes and such. We get back to the health post.
Oh…and the reason we were able to hitch a ride there was because one of the midwives from the Middlepits post was out there to weigh and monitor babies. And the way they weigh these babies…you know the old weights they had at the supermarket where they have a hook attached to it? And you hang your produce on it to use the weight to pull down on the hook? Ya…well, you basically wrap a baby in a pouch and hang the baby on the weight. Of course the babies don’t like it…they’re screaming and crying, and the weight is just swinging back and forth from the flailing baby. Lol. It’s ok…eventually they just estimate or the baby calms down. We take a nap in the back of the ambulance for an hour and half as we wait for the midwife to finish his rounds.
Oh another thing about how the health care system works here. So there are hospitals, health clinics, and health posts. Hospitals are located in the cities. Health clinics normally have a doctor and a bunch of nurses and midwives working there. Then a health post is normally for much more remote areas and they are run by one or two midwives. So if something urgent needs to be done, they are normally taken to the hospital. If a check up or a headache or meds are needed, then they go to the nearest health clinic. If you’re super remote, and you are just doing monitoring, you go to the health post.
Finally, we are off again.
Once again….120 km/hour down the unpaved rocky road. This time we pick up 3 hitchers along the way. There were 3 of us (3 girls) and 3 of them (3 guys). It was like an 8th grade dance…guys on one side and girls on another side…just in the back of a pickup truck. Lol. This time…no car sickness, so I got to enjoy the ride way more. This time I was laughing. WEEEEEEEEEE….boing boing boing. Lol. Never knew how good paved road really works. Haha.
We grab lunch. Finished up our chilli from last night. Went back to the clinic. This time, really showed us more, like where the doctor works. We watched a nurse prepare medical kits, which apparently is sterilized in a pressure cooker. Interesting…never knew they had multiple purposes other than cooking! We went to the post office. They have internet there! Haha. that is the only place in Middlepits that has internet. We walk around the village, check out the tuck shop (a tuck shop is a side shack/tiny building that just sells random stuff, like air time, random veggies, soda), walk past the bakery that apparently sells terrible breads, and make it back to our volunteer’s house. Wow…it’s 430 PM already. That is another day in the life of a PC volunteer...apparently.
We get back to her place…we all need to take a bath. We are seriously matted with a layer of dirt from road we were driving on. So, we take a bucket bath. And I mean a REAL bucket bath in a bucket. I’m beginning to realize how tiny I really am. When I can scrunch up into a little ball in a bath bucket and still fit, and still be able to bath, it makes me feel like a baby. I do the same thing I have been doing, except in a bath tub, I am in a bath bucket. We bath in the volunteer’s bedroom, and mop up all splash that occurred during the process. Haha…sweet, whatever, I’m clean. I’m beginning to just take things in stride. If this is what is needed to be done, then so be it! As long as I feel like the job is done, then it’s a success. J haha.
Anyways, omg, we make PIZZA. We love pizza! J well, we clean first, cuz clearly we need pots, pans, and plates to cook and eat with. We make the dough. Then the tomato sauce. We have an onion, broccoli pizza. We had some leftover broccoli, so we stir fried that up. We devoured that in 1 minute. And the pizza was perfect. Perfect gooeyness of cheese. Omg, you have no idea how much we take for granted at home. I have never been so happy with pizza. We watched some really strange and unnerving movie called Hard Candy with Ellen Page. I’m not gonna get into it, but I’ll just say…I’m surprised she got nominated for Juno and not this movie…OMG she was soooooooooooo creepy and scary in the movie. Lol. We were tired by then…and there we go…I pass out in my mummy bag. I love my mummy bag. J
April 29, 2011
FRIDAY.
We wake up at around 8AM. We make French toast with honey. Yummers. We head out to the junior secondary school. Our volunteer teaches out there. But unfortunately there was a strike going on with all the civil workers, so there were no classes going on for this week. We get there…and there are 3 teachers running about 250 students. WTF. these kids are ridiculous. There are no teachers around. No one supervising them. And…they are sitting in their classrooms, reading, all dressed in their uniforms!!! You have no idea. This is a completely foreign concept to me. Dude, if there was a strike in the US and no teachers were around, we would be running away from school. Kids would be throwing stuff. Kids would be fighting with each other. Trash would be littered everywhere. It would be CHAOS and disastrous. But nope. Here in Botswana, they just sit in their classrooms. Read. Study. Chat. A few were outside playing soccer. Some were outside just sitting in the sun. others were just doing the computer homework in the computer lab (which btw…had even better computers and monitors than ING…wow, that is sad).
I’m beginning to really see a sticking difference between Botswana and America and how children are raised. In America, it’s always about who’s kid is the best, which one is better, which one is smarter, which one is smarter, which one is bigger, and you can really see where our individualism stems from. It’s all about competition. In Botswana, they don’t care about that. They just help each other. The kids are hungry…they will cook themselves food, along with anyone else that wants some. They just work and coexist together without any resentment and smiles on their faces. They aren’t trying to beat each other down. I have only seen this kind of bonding at one other place…in Tijuana at the orphanage. I find it absolutely astounding. And it allows me to continue to believe that people are born innocent and good and believe in the cause that children are who I want to work with because their intentions are still true and pure enough. It is all learned behavior…they weren’t born inclined to certain behaviors. And the sooner behaviors are taught in an individual…the sooner behavior changes can be seen and stick throughout the generations, and hence starts the cycle of change. Oh, here my idealism is coloring my naivety. But I’ll keep to it, until proven otherwise. Which I’m sure will be in less than a year. Lol.
Anyways, we gathered a following. So many “white” people in one group! I had about 3 people at a time running their hands through my hair…”Ah! So soft! So nice!” lol. They really love my hair here. It’s such an anomaly here. They always ask me what I put in my hair…and are surprised to learn that nothing goes in it. Haha. I can continue walking and they will continue petting it. Lol. Anyways…they do love asian hair. But it’s funny, cuz some of the trainees do the same. Haha. I think it’s just that everyone loves asian hair. And don’t get me wrong, I am very grateful for my hassle-free asian hair. It has made my bathing here, oh so much easier. Sorry, super tangent. We say goodbye and head to the primary school.
Oh shoot, another thing about this junior secondary school. It’s a boarding school. So many of the kids that are at this school are from the surrounding villages and towns and just live at this school. It’s not a private school by any means, it’s a government run school. So many of these kids, though they were dressed in uniform even though they probably didn’t have to, it may be because that is all they have at the school or even at all (which makes me feel bad about having trouble with only having 2 pieces of luggage). Just thought that was an interesting tidbit.
So, we go to the primary school. It is much smaller, because here…it’s is just Middlepits kids that go here. We check out the library that my volunteer had started. It was pretty cool. They had different types of books, from Dr. Suess to Babysitters Club. It was a good variety and the books were in decent shape! Yay! There was a class in the library, well, more like a PTA member standing there with a stick threatening the kids to be quiet and to read or they will get beaten (though it didn’t really seem to scare them too much…being that they continued to giggle and whisper). We leave because we don’t really want to disturb the kids anymore, and we go and see her HIV/AIDS flag project. This project is where she got kids to paint on a flag something about HIV/AIDS, or how it has affected them, or to write a message to someone that has passed from the disease. It was pretty cute. Some messages didn’t make sense. And some were pretty upfront. All in all, at least it got the kids thinking about the disease. So I thought it was a pretty cool project. I may steal/borrow it from her if it can be useful in my community.
We go back to the clinic. Here she opened the HIV counseling building for us to see. Here they have a lot of educational material on the disease and the medicine (ARVs) that people will need that are living or are affected by the disease. There was this really cool book which was basically a printout from a computer that put how HIV works into very very simple terms that help children understand the virus and what it does. They had characters like soldiers and bad guys, where the soldiers are our T-cells, and the bad guys…well, are obviously the virus. Simple. It then proceeds to explain why you need to take the medicine to KEEP you health, as opposed to GET you healthy. So the ARVs were described as protective gear, like a helmet and armor for the soldiers. Our volunteer said that it seemed to go over well with the children and the parents, which was very encouraging to hear.
It’s Friday and there is a strike. We go home. Make lunch (lentils and rice). Then attempt to watch Dexter, but end up napping for a couple of hours. I wake up…need to pee. Go to the pit latrine...which is like almost a block away and out of the compound of the volunteer’s place. Awesome.
And…I’m gonna go into the whole pit latrine experience. I know you’re super stoked to hear about this. Lol. So, being the spoiled American, I try as hard as I can to avoid using pit latrines. And this trip to Middlepits gave me my first pit latrine experience. Let me start with…it is WAY better than using a portapotty in US. You bring a roll of toilet paper with you, so everyone knows that you are going to the bathroom. When you get inside, basically, it is a concrete block, with a toilet seat (which I think is an added luxury from other pit latrines already). It is strategically placed over a LARGE hole in the ground. How large? I honestly have no idea. I just know that it at least takes over 2 years to fill the hole…with shit…literally. But if you are sharing this pit latrine with someone or just a few people, you can keep it clean. I can get into so much more detail about this subject…haha, but I’ll spare you. Lol.
Anyways….i pee. Haha. like that? Haha. I go back, they are still sleeping. I don’t want to be the creepy person watching them sleep, so I decide to go outside and go on a walk to follow the ominous clouds. I follow them down a dirt road (which most of Botswana is), then decide to turn towards the border (since the clouds were clearly moving too fast for me to follow). However, in between the two borders is a huge river valley, with of course…no river. I just keep walking. I want to walk into the valley, but figured since I had no cell phone service, it probably wouldn’t be the best idea since no one knows where the fuck I am. In the valley I see a maize field. Interesting, in no man’s land, there is a maize field. Who owns it?! Botswana or South Africa?! Haha. Apparently, it’s a Batswana’s family, and no one really cares about what is going on down there. I head back, they wake up to me opening the door.
We clean the kitchen. Then head out to the bar 5 minutes away that is BUMPIN. And when I mean BUMPIN…I mean, their music can be heard from about a quarter of a mile away. The funny thing is…there is no one there. They have a pool table and an outside patio. I order a Black Label, which is a South African beer. The bartender just stares at me, hesitantly. I try to order it again. He asks me “are you sure?” and stares at me strangely…”ya…I’m sure.” He gives it to me. I ask my volunteer later what was with the strange exchange…and she says “oh…ya, it’s the cheap beer. And when a girl orders it…it normally means they are…well a bit trashy because it has a higher alcohol content.” Oh shut…whoops! Haha. shush to all you out there who I know is laughing….but hey! I just like that beer, nothing else to it. Haha. oh well. We chill and just chat it up. And watched the most awesome sunset, it had EVER color imaginable. The sunsets here are breath taking. They go on and on and come from all directions just from the reflections. I have seen some awesome sunsets. And this one is definitely up there. We head back to the volunteer’s house…we walk into the house….*drip drip drip* it starts raining. PERFECT timing. We make mac-n-cheese. Our volunteer invites a friend over from the clinic, and we devour our mac-n-cheese and Russian (which is a beef sausage that basically tastes like a pork sausage). It’s so good, the other trainee and I, are at the pot and serving spoon scraping the cheese with leftover macaroni. Wow, we are awesome. Lol.
It was a strange sensation, and I’ve felt it a few times here. It’s hard to watch something on TV and see home…all the time. I’ve watched The Hills, I’ve watched a few movies, we watched Valentine’s Day. 1) it’s hard to believe that I am watching my home city from Botswana. 2) it makes me miss home and everything I used to do there. It just reminded me of all the memories I have of LA and everything I used to do there. I saw Venice Beach. I saw downtown LA. I saw Hollywood. These were all things I used to do on a regular basis. And what makes it so much stranger now is that is so far away, when before it was my everyday life. It made me miss home a bit, but it also transported me out of where I was at that moment, so it a bittersweet feeling.
After the movie…bed time.
April 30, 2011
SATURDAY.
We get up at 8 AM. Pack. Clean up. Sit on the side of the road. We are trying to hitch a ride. People are either drunk. The police. Or just sticking around Middlepits. We’re hoping that we can use me as bait to snag a ride with the Chinese men, but they didn’t come around. I’m curious to see what I can do with my Chineseness (or more like my looking Chinese…lol). We end up hitching a ride with a family in the back of their open pickup truck. In America, I would normally have called this the perfect convertible day, but here in Botswana…it’s the perfect hitching a ride in the back of a pickup truck day. J The weather was amazing. Just the right amount of wind and the right temperature. I was in a tank top. And it was probably one of the best rides I have ever taken in my life. Life was going at the right pace right then and there. It gave me time to think. It gave me time to reflect. The sun was perfect. The wind was perfect. Fresh air. I am in Botswana in the back of a pickup truck that I had just hitched from. All I could think of was TIA (This is Africa), but very much in a GOOD way. J We ride for about an hour, then we get off in Tsabong.
We get there, and we decide to grab a chicken pie. So something interesting about here and their meat. The chicken pie was delicious. And it’s basically like a chicken pot pie. Unfortunately, there are many a times where you end up with inedible/unchewable pieces of chicken in your in pies or shredded chicken. The week earlier, I had gotten a chicken mayo sandwich, and spent half of my bites pulling out little crushed chicken bones. Well, this pie, was no different. I remember back in the US, I would just stop eating or just end up gagging from food like that. But here…well, haha, I guess I’ve just gotten used to it and pick it out, or just spat until the little piece comes out (I know, attractive, huh?), and continue eating. It’s funny how some food things just are ok now. like onions, green peppers, and small chucks of cooked tomatoes, and crushed bones in my meat. Haha…as I said before I left…if I’m starving, I’ll eat it. And so be it. That has happened. Though I may not enjoy what I’m eating. Lol.
We stop at the grocery stores and grab a few snacks for our bus ride for the next day, then head to the lodge that we are going to be staying at for the night. Our room has 2 full size beds…AND…a SHOWER!!! What what?! (lol…our how our standards have changed a little since we’ve started). We are so excited…a SHOWER!!! Lol. We are teeming with anticipation for our shower for the night. But we head out. Hitch a ride from some guys that our volunteer knows. Get dropped off. Head to another volunteer’s place. She lives in government housing, with a kitchen, running water, a bath with hot and cold water, 2 bedrooms, and a living room. Pretty sweet deal. Most government housing is the same. Not too shabby, hopefully that is something I can look forward to in the near future. And on her coffee table, what does she have?! Apple cinnamon muffins, crackers, and CHEESE SPREAD. We pig out, and eat some chips and bean dip. Delicious (yes…all us trainees are obsessed with American food, or more like non-setswana food). We end up hanging out, and the other volunteer that I was mid-sentenced with the few days before joined us. We hop into the truck bed, and head out to the camel farm. No one is there. No worries, the volunteer from Werda doesn’t cease to amuse us. He is attempting to feed then camels with cut grass, then manages to herd them into a corner of the pen, the manages to get a hold of one by the reigns. We get to feed the camels and pet one all under the taming of ourselves. Lol. The man in charge of the camels arrive and we get to ride them. Sweet. I rode a camel around in 2 circles for 15 pula. Haha. we went on a hunt for the baby camel, so small and cute. Then ride back just to see an enormous rainbow. Beautiful. we make vegetarian tacos for dinner. Hang out some more and just talk. Eat a yummy chocolate cake. Then head back to the lodge. SHOWER TIME. OMG…SHOWER!!! J best shower EVER. Lol. Never knew I could be so happy with something so simple. My goal to learn to appreciate what I have is being duly tried right now, and it’s ringing very true. Lol. Congrats to me, I pat myself on my back. Lol. Nice and clean…and off to bed. EXHAUSTED.
May 1, 2011
SUNDAY.
We head out at 545 AM to catch the 6 AM bus. Of course, Africa time, means 645 AM. We get on the bus, only to be kicked off 5 minutes later. Haha. apparently, there really isn’t a concept of customer service here. The 6 AM bus didn’t come til 645 AM. The 7 AM bus was mad. They are 2 different bus companies. The 7 AM bus stops our bus, calls the police, and accuses the 6 AM of stealing all their customers. So we all get kicked off the buses to be redistributed. Haha. wtf is going on?! At this point, it’s just funny. We just sit and wait. Not much else we can do. We have a few laughs. And of course 10 minutes later, we just get right back on the bus we were originally on. Though, now we’re SUPER late, and since the other bus took the other half of their customers, our bus decides to circle around Tsabong 2 more times to see if there are any stranglers they can pick up. Haha. we don’t leave Tsabong til about 8 AM. Lol. Oh Africa time. 6 hours later, we “miss” our Kanye stop, and end up back in Gabs. Shucks. Well, we’re hungry, we go to game city to scour for food. PIZZA!!! YUM. We conjure up a gathering. And manage to get a PC driver to drive us back to Kanye.
Finally get home. Ke lapile. I meet my host mom for the first time. She’s very nice and laughs a lot. They make dinner. We watch Jandi!!! Yay! I love Jandi! J BEDTIME. Shadowing is over. The next checkpoint…SITE ANNOUNCEMENT in 2 WEEKS!!! AH!!! J CAN’T WAIT…and I’m super nervous. Please don’t put me in Middlepits!
April 2, 2011
Back in Kanye and training. We process our shadowing in groups. Then we start gardening. We learn how to garden. Fun times. Then we find out we are losing one more from our group. L For personal reasons, she wants to go home. We’re gonna miss her! Now we’re down to 37. Dropping like flies. How many more? Who knows…I guess we’ll find out. Send me good wishes! Miss everyone!
