Before I begin, let me first give a big thanks to my pops for getting my first Zambia photos uploaded! Please click on the photo log to see the first views of my new home. I have taken more than 100 new pictures and will be sending them home again soon.
Back at the house for the third weekend in a row! Yesterday we left our sites a little earlier than expected because of a major demonstration in Mufumbwe over a power outage in the boma that has lasted more than two weeks. There’s no real cause for concern as I never felt in any danger, but the road between my house and the boma was extremely exciting. I will not go into the politics of the situation, but it was extremely interesting to watch the progress from my tiny town’s student body staging a peaceful demonstration over perceived injustice to an active protest with tree blockades in the road, tear gas, and vandalism. Mufumbwe called in police from three other districts to help contain the activity. Bizarre.
My 28th birthday was Monday and a few Peace Corps friends came by my house to celebrate. A new Zambian friend brought over a huge rooster as my birthday present and pulled me aside to see if I wanted to eat it for dinner. At first I was a little shaken. I had anticipated eating soya piece tacos, but soon enough I found myself with a knife in my hand sawing through a chicken’s jugular. There are moments when I have a feeling of being out of body and wondering who I am! I did actually apologize to the chicken for taking its life and thanked it for letting us eat him before I slit its throat. I’m not sure that helped my emotional state. I did, however, actually help gut, dress, and fix the chicken tacos and I have pictures to prove it. We had a diverse and interesting group for dinner: four Peace Corps volunteer friends, the post man, my friend who goes to the high school, my friend from the water & sanitation department, and a Spanish Father from the Catholic church.
The celebration was great, but I certainly missed my friends and family! I received a birthday package Monday that said “don’t open until June 25th,” and the timing was perfect! I had a present to open by the bonfire!!!
I’ve also had the distinct displeasure of having pig fleas in my feet this week. After making fun of a friend for being “dirty” and digging the nasty things (“jiggers”) out of his feet, I found my own. These nasty things burrow in under the skin and lay eggs. I never knew they were there until I discovered odd blisters that ended up being giant egg sacks. (Sorry if that’s too graphic.) Disgusting. Fortunately, I have been around people who have skillfully dug them out for me.
This week I travel to Central and Northern province to visit friends. I’ll be back next weekend to check in. And I’ll be at the house until tomorrow night if you want to chat!
Lots of love,
Stacey J.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Sun Damage and Shopping
My trip to Solwezi has been relaxing, but much busier than I expected! We are preparing for the next group of volunteers to arrive and have spent the last few days cleaning out the house and organizing. It's amazing just how messy a house can get with 40 individuals using the facilities on a constantly rotating basis. I won't get into the things we found under the beds, but you can well imagine... I've been quite impressed with how everyone pitches in to take care of chores and I really wanted to take photos of the boys doing housework to take back and show my village:)
I also went on a market shopping trip for new clothes since mine are already in a state of abysmal disrepair. I have nary a tshirt without little holes from washing them by hand and everything denim has becomes stretched out and dirt-stained. A friend from this province went with me and we found a couple of decent second-hand tshirts in a store called DAP, a charity store that contributes clothing primarily from Europe and the USA. I was amused to think all you who donate to Goodwill may actually clothe Peace Corps volunteers! I also found a chitenge dress that sort of looks like a 70s mumu and a couple of ridiculous hats to add to the costume pile at the house. I've never worn anything so comfortable as a mumu in my life. It was also very reasonable on the pocket: 25,000 kw or the equivalent of about $6.00 USD.
It's kind of fun to "graduate" from the newest group of intake volunteers to more seasoned volunteers. We get the chance now to brag with the new folks at fly-in a bit about our stories: the snakes, starting fires, cultural mishaps, etc. And now I realize that we do get in the habit of bragging about how hard-core we are when it's amazing just how quickly we can get over a lack of shower or the loss of McDonalds. I certainly complain about it, and I will be absolutely thrilled to come back to comfort, but I don't think about it all the time like I used to in the first few months. I do find, though, that if I'm watching a movie at the house, I get most distracted by seeing American beds. If I see anyone sleeping on a nice bed, I feel absurd jealousy and obsess about it for hours.
We had a mini birthday party for me and my nearest PC neighbor yesterday. He will be turning 26 on Sunday and I will be turning 28 next Monday. I will be back in the village monitoring schools and he will be training new volunteers, so my friends here baked us a cake from scratch and made us giant birthday hats made from poster and toilet paper. I'll upload the photos when I get to Lusaka. Unfortunately, the power has been going on and off all week so they really had to scramble to make the cake one step at a time. We reveled in the cake, even eating the middle portion that had been burned by accidently sitting the pan on a hot burner that was turned on and forgotten during a time of no power.
Zambians do not really celebrate birthdays the way Americans do, so I anticipate kind of a quiet day. My other two PC neighbors are cycling to my house and we are having soya tacos that night. It's been fun telling my counterparts that I'll be 28 this year since they absolutely won't believe it. One fellow observed last week that I look "not older than 12." Ha! This was particularly amusing to me since I've been very concerned about aging lines on my face. I have wrinkles popping out all over the place because I always forget to put on sun screen and now I'm tan and have skin damage. I made a vow for this birthday to daily apply sun screen and take care of my aging face, but completely forgot during the chaos of the morning cleaning binge.
I must leave to pick up my chitenge coulots (never actually spelled that word) and skirt for the village. I've decided biking in a skirt is a complete joke, particularly when it is extremely taboo to even show a shadow of knee and we ride large male mountain bikes. So now I'm going to try wearing chitenge coulots and then tying a chitenge around my waist when I go to meetings.
I will write again either next weekend or the 1st of July. All my love to everyone!
Stacey Jean
I also went on a market shopping trip for new clothes since mine are already in a state of abysmal disrepair. I have nary a tshirt without little holes from washing them by hand and everything denim has becomes stretched out and dirt-stained. A friend from this province went with me and we found a couple of decent second-hand tshirts in a store called DAP, a charity store that contributes clothing primarily from Europe and the USA. I was amused to think all you who donate to Goodwill may actually clothe Peace Corps volunteers! I also found a chitenge dress that sort of looks like a 70s mumu and a couple of ridiculous hats to add to the costume pile at the house. I've never worn anything so comfortable as a mumu in my life. It was also very reasonable on the pocket: 25,000 kw or the equivalent of about $6.00 USD.
It's kind of fun to "graduate" from the newest group of intake volunteers to more seasoned volunteers. We get the chance now to brag with the new folks at fly-in a bit about our stories: the snakes, starting fires, cultural mishaps, etc. And now I realize that we do get in the habit of bragging about how hard-core we are when it's amazing just how quickly we can get over a lack of shower or the loss of McDonalds. I certainly complain about it, and I will be absolutely thrilled to come back to comfort, but I don't think about it all the time like I used to in the first few months. I do find, though, that if I'm watching a movie at the house, I get most distracted by seeing American beds. If I see anyone sleeping on a nice bed, I feel absurd jealousy and obsess about it for hours.
We had a mini birthday party for me and my nearest PC neighbor yesterday. He will be turning 26 on Sunday and I will be turning 28 next Monday. I will be back in the village monitoring schools and he will be training new volunteers, so my friends here baked us a cake from scratch and made us giant birthday hats made from poster and toilet paper. I'll upload the photos when I get to Lusaka. Unfortunately, the power has been going on and off all week so they really had to scramble to make the cake one step at a time. We reveled in the cake, even eating the middle portion that had been burned by accidently sitting the pan on a hot burner that was turned on and forgotten during a time of no power.
Zambians do not really celebrate birthdays the way Americans do, so I anticipate kind of a quiet day. My other two PC neighbors are cycling to my house and we are having soya tacos that night. It's been fun telling my counterparts that I'll be 28 this year since they absolutely won't believe it. One fellow observed last week that I look "not older than 12." Ha! This was particularly amusing to me since I've been very concerned about aging lines on my face. I have wrinkles popping out all over the place because I always forget to put on sun screen and now I'm tan and have skin damage. I made a vow for this birthday to daily apply sun screen and take care of my aging face, but completely forgot during the chaos of the morning cleaning binge.
I must leave to pick up my chitenge coulots (never actually spelled that word) and skirt for the village. I've decided biking in a skirt is a complete joke, particularly when it is extremely taboo to even show a shadow of knee and we ride large male mountain bikes. So now I'm going to try wearing chitenge coulots and then tying a chitenge around my waist when I go to meetings.
I will write again either next weekend or the 1st of July. All my love to everyone!
Stacey Jean
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Productivity, Puff Adders, and Sticky Fingers
My dear friends and family: I have survived my longest stint in the village so far! After 3 ½ weeks, I have finally gained some ground in my projects and feel like I’m forming relationships with my neighbors and counterparts. We are actually in town sooner than expected because we will be moving around a lot in the next few weeks to take advantage of vacation days and attend an in-service training in Lusaka in mid-July. So, if you would like to call me while I have access to a landline, I will be at the house until Thursday morning.
I will celebrate 5 months in country this week and passed the 70 day mark in the village! These were huge markers for me since I feel like I’ve made it over the initial culture shock! I’m sure there are more uncomfortable moments to come, but it’s nice to say the first huge surprises are over and I’m getting far more comfortable with getting around the markets, transport, and conversations. Plus, I finally received parcels in Mufumbwe! Apparently the parcels truck had not made any trips up to town recently, so I received FOUR packages in one day. It was like Christmas and I've been pigging out on American junk food ever since. I've probably gained 5 lbs just this week! Big shout out to my mom, Peg, Andrea, Sis. Bass, and the gang from M&M. Seriously, I never knew dehydrated food packets and granola bars could taste so amazing!
I have lots of stories to write, and will try to do as much blogging as I can while I’m in town. For now, I’ll offer up the highlights.
First, I’m very excited about potential projects in the near future. I’ve been attending some teacher training workshops in the past few weeks and working closely with the schools in my zone and the administration on “school monitoring.” This is essentially evaluating how current curriculum is being administered, how the teachers are functioning in their classes, how effective Ministry of Education programs are at the school level, and also reporting on the state of facilities. I’m working hand-in-hand with the administration to create a streamlined monitoring form and process so that each school is monitored objectively and equitably.
I’ve also been working with an adult school very close to my house. It’s a private school that works most closely with women who have had to quit school for one reason or another and want to return to complete their education. Starting August, I will be helping them with a Life Skills and Adult Literacy program. They have almost 100 motivated men and women who attend classes every day during the afternoon. I’m so impressed with this group of community members who see the value of education and are working diligently to increase their capacity for providing for themselves and their family. I’m also working with a small group of girls in their mid-teens in an HIV/AIDS awareness and life skills program. It’s my hope to work with this small group intensively in the next few months and then establish a peer mentoring program so that these young women can work with other young women in a “straight talk” format that may not be comfortable for older teachers.
In other news, my phone went missing this week. So, if you’ve been attempting to send an SMS, no luck! I was able to get another phone this weekend and will have my old number programmed in on Monday. I’m learning to be more attentive to my things since in just this past week I've had a disposable camera nabbed out of my backpack and 50,000 kw taken from out of my wallet while I was on transport. I’ve had no problem with theft until just recently, but I think I’ve also been a bit less vigilant than I was the first few months.
Finally, in the big news for the past few weeks, I saw my first scary snake! I was home briefly one afternoon for dinner and while I was inside my house munching on amazing pasta, I saw my neighbor fly by my door gripping a giant pole in his hands. I walked outside in time to watch him bash a 2-3’ puff adder to death. My kitty Mio saved the day! My neighbor saw the cat stalking something moving in my yard and came over to check in and noticed the snake. I took a photo of the snake and took it with me on a visit I paid to missionaries near my house and we confirmed in the Africa Snake Book the type of snake. One of the missarionaries, a nurse, let me know that puff adders are quite poisonous, but are very slow and I shouldn’t really worry about them. So, now that I’ve gotten that first encounter out of the way, something I had been very concerned about, I feel a little more at ease with the knowledge of snakes in my area. I actually even felt a little bad for the snake—he never had a chance.
I’ll be back later in the week! Hope all is well with all of you.
Stacey J.
I will celebrate 5 months in country this week and passed the 70 day mark in the village! These were huge markers for me since I feel like I’ve made it over the initial culture shock! I’m sure there are more uncomfortable moments to come, but it’s nice to say the first huge surprises are over and I’m getting far more comfortable with getting around the markets, transport, and conversations. Plus, I finally received parcels in Mufumbwe! Apparently the parcels truck had not made any trips up to town recently, so I received FOUR packages in one day. It was like Christmas and I've been pigging out on American junk food ever since. I've probably gained 5 lbs just this week! Big shout out to my mom, Peg, Andrea, Sis. Bass, and the gang from M&M. Seriously, I never knew dehydrated food packets and granola bars could taste so amazing!
I have lots of stories to write, and will try to do as much blogging as I can while I’m in town. For now, I’ll offer up the highlights.
First, I’m very excited about potential projects in the near future. I’ve been attending some teacher training workshops in the past few weeks and working closely with the schools in my zone and the administration on “school monitoring.” This is essentially evaluating how current curriculum is being administered, how the teachers are functioning in their classes, how effective Ministry of Education programs are at the school level, and also reporting on the state of facilities. I’m working hand-in-hand with the administration to create a streamlined monitoring form and process so that each school is monitored objectively and equitably.
I’ve also been working with an adult school very close to my house. It’s a private school that works most closely with women who have had to quit school for one reason or another and want to return to complete their education. Starting August, I will be helping them with a Life Skills and Adult Literacy program. They have almost 100 motivated men and women who attend classes every day during the afternoon. I’m so impressed with this group of community members who see the value of education and are working diligently to increase their capacity for providing for themselves and their family. I’m also working with a small group of girls in their mid-teens in an HIV/AIDS awareness and life skills program. It’s my hope to work with this small group intensively in the next few months and then establish a peer mentoring program so that these young women can work with other young women in a “straight talk” format that may not be comfortable for older teachers.
In other news, my phone went missing this week. So, if you’ve been attempting to send an SMS, no luck! I was able to get another phone this weekend and will have my old number programmed in on Monday. I’m learning to be more attentive to my things since in just this past week I've had a disposable camera nabbed out of my backpack and 50,000 kw taken from out of my wallet while I was on transport. I’ve had no problem with theft until just recently, but I think I’ve also been a bit less vigilant than I was the first few months.
Finally, in the big news for the past few weeks, I saw my first scary snake! I was home briefly one afternoon for dinner and while I was inside my house munching on amazing pasta, I saw my neighbor fly by my door gripping a giant pole in his hands. I walked outside in time to watch him bash a 2-3’ puff adder to death. My kitty Mio saved the day! My neighbor saw the cat stalking something moving in my yard and came over to check in and noticed the snake. I took a photo of the snake and took it with me on a visit I paid to missionaries near my house and we confirmed in the Africa Snake Book the type of snake. One of the missarionaries, a nurse, let me know that puff adders are quite poisonous, but are very slow and I shouldn’t really worry about them. So, now that I’ve gotten that first encounter out of the way, something I had been very concerned about, I feel a little more at ease with the knowledge of snakes in my area. I actually even felt a little bad for the snake—he never had a chance.
I’ll be back later in the week! Hope all is well with all of you.
Stacey J.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Calling Me & Transport
Hello all!
I have not been at the internet as much or as often as I anticipated this week. This has been mostly because I've been at the house on the phone a lot with all my friends and family back in the states and also with fellow PCVs talking about our upcoming vacation to Livingstone in July after a week of training in Lusaka. We discovered a great web site, www.zprepaid.com, which allows my friends to chat with me in Zambia for .10 or less per minute. I spent nearly all day Saturday chatting with one or the other of my family members and getting caught up with all the happenings at home. These conversations alone have picked me up and helped me focus on an exciting four weeks in my village. If you are interested in chatting with me, you can contact my mom at rfjbosslady@hotmail.com for the telephone numbers where you can reach me here as I'm not comfortable posting it online.
This blog update will have to be quite quick because I have to go to the grocery store and stock up on necessities like powdered milk, cereal, and sponges for my next stint mu muzhi (in village). We are catching transport back to site tomorrow and I will spend the longest uninterrupted period of time alone in my hut since arriving. I'll be back at the provincial house from June 21-June 26 to renew my visa again and to celebrate my 28th birthday! It's incredibly hard to believe that a whole year has passed since my birthday in the Fort Collins condo.
I'm not necessarily looking forward to getting transport again. Transport has been one of the single most frustrating aspects of living in Zambia as it's not at all reliable or consistant. Last week my PCV neighbor and I went to Kasempa to visit our fellow PCV for her birthday. Her location is very close to ours, but requires a round-about trip by road to get there. We had very little trouble hitching up to her site, but on the return I wore out my shoes walking 25 k from her house to town and then spent several more hours in a mini-bus with twenty other people and then in an oil rig, which was so tall that we had to climb a ladder to get in the cab.
My grocery shopping buddy has arrived, so I must be off. Some of you have asked what I am needing at site, and in brief, I have all the necessities. I'm always short on batteries and have the most need of AA batteries. Any luxury items are fabulous! Magazines, stationary, dried foods, snacks, anything that smells pretty, spices, funny articles. I have SO appreciated everything I have received and experienced so much serendipity with receiving exactly what I need when I need it: like a potato peeler the day after I realized I really needed one!
All my love to you and will write more again soon.
SJJ
I have not been at the internet as much or as often as I anticipated this week. This has been mostly because I've been at the house on the phone a lot with all my friends and family back in the states and also with fellow PCVs talking about our upcoming vacation to Livingstone in July after a week of training in Lusaka. We discovered a great web site, www.zprepaid.com, which allows my friends to chat with me in Zambia for .10 or less per minute. I spent nearly all day Saturday chatting with one or the other of my family members and getting caught up with all the happenings at home. These conversations alone have picked me up and helped me focus on an exciting four weeks in my village. If you are interested in chatting with me, you can contact my mom at rfjbosslady@hotmail.com for the telephone numbers where you can reach me here as I'm not comfortable posting it online.
This blog update will have to be quite quick because I have to go to the grocery store and stock up on necessities like powdered milk, cereal, and sponges for my next stint mu muzhi (in village). We are catching transport back to site tomorrow and I will spend the longest uninterrupted period of time alone in my hut since arriving. I'll be back at the provincial house from June 21-June 26 to renew my visa again and to celebrate my 28th birthday! It's incredibly hard to believe that a whole year has passed since my birthday in the Fort Collins condo.
I'm not necessarily looking forward to getting transport again. Transport has been one of the single most frustrating aspects of living in Zambia as it's not at all reliable or consistant. Last week my PCV neighbor and I went to Kasempa to visit our fellow PCV for her birthday. Her location is very close to ours, but requires a round-about trip by road to get there. We had very little trouble hitching up to her site, but on the return I wore out my shoes walking 25 k from her house to town and then spent several more hours in a mini-bus with twenty other people and then in an oil rig, which was so tall that we had to climb a ladder to get in the cab.
My grocery shopping buddy has arrived, so I must be off. Some of you have asked what I am needing at site, and in brief, I have all the necessities. I'm always short on batteries and have the most need of AA batteries. Any luxury items are fabulous! Magazines, stationary, dried foods, snacks, anything that smells pretty, spices, funny articles. I have SO appreciated everything I have received and experienced so much serendipity with receiving exactly what I need when I need it: like a potato peeler the day after I realized I really needed one!
All my love to you and will write more again soon.
SJJ
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Monkeys, Mio, and Getting Through the First Month
I am back at the provincial house for our Peace Corps NW province meeting this weekend and will stay through the first part of next week in order to renew our visas. Our work permits should come in soon, but for now we continue making trips every four weeks into the capital for visa extensions. My last two weeks have been challenging and extremely busy. I’ve been much more “movious” (a slang word the villagers use to describe our frequent trips) than I anticipated, but I’m starting to get a better scope of the enormous amount of work there is to be done in my area. (More on this later in the week.)
I’m also really starting to settle in. The first day I arrived back at site, I biked 66k round trip to go pick up a kitty and bring her back to my house. I needed to install a mouse avenger in my hut to exterminate the family that had settled in nest inside my wall. Her all out war against the rodents was pretty disgusting—the carnage was splattered in clumps on my floor—but now I’m much less bothered by the pattering of feet and the clanking of my things in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, she is not as excited about chasing frogs and a family of frogs has moved into the space the mice once occupied. The frogs, however, are not as likely to destroy my belongings, so even though I sometimes feel like I’m experiencing a plague of Biblical proportions, I am not so afraid of shredded clothes and papers. Now if I could only find a way to destroy the termites who like to tunnel my walls and my wooden porta-potty seat in the latrine, I’d be living in a bwana house!
The cat and I are excellent companions. I named her “Mio,” which is short for “Hermione” since I’ve undertaken a reread of the Harry Potter novels before the next book comes out in July. She’s a bit temperamental, incredibly brave at chasing things a hundred times her size, and an affection hog, but I like being a bit more focused on taking care of someone/something else when I’m feeling lonely rather than just sitting in my house after dark thinking.
Because having too much time alone to think can end up being really depressing.
The kids who live around my house are equally scared and fascinated by the cat. They will scream and run if she tries to rub up against them for a good petting. It’s interesting to me that the children are picking up English faster than I am Ki Kaonde just by listening to me talk to the cat or to myself for that matter. The other day when one of the little girls had flown half way across the yard screaming after Mio surprised her under her stool, the kids took up the chant, “Iz ok. Iz ok. Keety, Keety, Keety.” I hadn’t even realized that I say this every time the kids and the cats encounter one another as I try to reassure the children while chasing the startled cat around the yard. If the cat doesn't come home by dark, the kids will scatter around the village howling "Mio, Mio, Mio, here keety." One of the littlest girls gets confused and will call "kissemee, kissemee," which is the Ki Kaonde word for "family."
In the past two weeks, I’ve ended up with small dinner guests frequently. I have to be very cautious about the exchange of goods with my villagers as I live on a very low income and want to establish a firm precedent that I'm not a bank or an NGO in myself, but since I always cook far more than I can eat myself, and the kids near my house are often hungry, I share my meals with whoever might be in my yard. I have no way to refrigerate left-overs and I can’t leave much out without attracting an enormous amount of ants. The kiddos absolutely love pancakes and so I’ve started making every kind of pancake I can think of on the brazier. Potato pancakes, oatmeal pancakes, banana pancakes, and standard breakfast pancakes. They are also huge fans of cinnamon oatmeal and creamed greens, which I eat a lot. In fact, I think more about nutrition when I'm feeding them because I know how desperately they need the nutrients. The family I live near have started including me on their harvest give-aways in return and I’ve received lots of ground nuts (peanuts), eggs, cooked pumpkin, a whole pumpkin, and sweet potatoes. It’s great. I really dislike cooking for myself and this has given me a way to connect with my adopted family.
My favorite story from the past two weeks also has to do with food. My friend Heather was cycling to visit me and stopped off to buy some bananas on the side of the road. The kids selling the bananas also had a little monkey they offered to sell her for ten pin (roughly $2.50). Heather was really intrigued by the offer, because who gets offered a monkey these days? She tried to ask the children what the monkey ate, but in the language confusion she realized the kids were telling her what she could eat as relish with the monkey. Heather finally refused the offer knowing that the animal could carry disease and might eat her cat—my cat’s neurotic sister—and she would not be able to properly care for it. Still, she finally saw wildlife in her area!
I have much more to write, but I want to attempt to get back to the provincial house fairly early this morning in order to assist with the great Cleaning Effort all the volunteers are undertaking today. Sharing one average sized house with forty people can be challanging and messy! I will probably be checking mail daily until Wednesday and am available on the land line at the house if you have gotten a calling card for Zambia.
I miss you all and think of you often!
I’m also really starting to settle in. The first day I arrived back at site, I biked 66k round trip to go pick up a kitty and bring her back to my house. I needed to install a mouse avenger in my hut to exterminate the family that had settled in nest inside my wall. Her all out war against the rodents was pretty disgusting—the carnage was splattered in clumps on my floor—but now I’m much less bothered by the pattering of feet and the clanking of my things in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, she is not as excited about chasing frogs and a family of frogs has moved into the space the mice once occupied. The frogs, however, are not as likely to destroy my belongings, so even though I sometimes feel like I’m experiencing a plague of Biblical proportions, I am not so afraid of shredded clothes and papers. Now if I could only find a way to destroy the termites who like to tunnel my walls and my wooden porta-potty seat in the latrine, I’d be living in a bwana house!
The cat and I are excellent companions. I named her “Mio,” which is short for “Hermione” since I’ve undertaken a reread of the Harry Potter novels before the next book comes out in July. She’s a bit temperamental, incredibly brave at chasing things a hundred times her size, and an affection hog, but I like being a bit more focused on taking care of someone/something else when I’m feeling lonely rather than just sitting in my house after dark thinking.
Because having too much time alone to think can end up being really depressing.
The kids who live around my house are equally scared and fascinated by the cat. They will scream and run if she tries to rub up against them for a good petting. It’s interesting to me that the children are picking up English faster than I am Ki Kaonde just by listening to me talk to the cat or to myself for that matter. The other day when one of the little girls had flown half way across the yard screaming after Mio surprised her under her stool, the kids took up the chant, “Iz ok. Iz ok. Keety, Keety, Keety.” I hadn’t even realized that I say this every time the kids and the cats encounter one another as I try to reassure the children while chasing the startled cat around the yard. If the cat doesn't come home by dark, the kids will scatter around the village howling "Mio, Mio, Mio, here keety." One of the littlest girls gets confused and will call "kissemee, kissemee," which is the Ki Kaonde word for "family."
In the past two weeks, I’ve ended up with small dinner guests frequently. I have to be very cautious about the exchange of goods with my villagers as I live on a very low income and want to establish a firm precedent that I'm not a bank or an NGO in myself, but since I always cook far more than I can eat myself, and the kids near my house are often hungry, I share my meals with whoever might be in my yard. I have no way to refrigerate left-overs and I can’t leave much out without attracting an enormous amount of ants. The kiddos absolutely love pancakes and so I’ve started making every kind of pancake I can think of on the brazier. Potato pancakes, oatmeal pancakes, banana pancakes, and standard breakfast pancakes. They are also huge fans of cinnamon oatmeal and creamed greens, which I eat a lot. In fact, I think more about nutrition when I'm feeding them because I know how desperately they need the nutrients. The family I live near have started including me on their harvest give-aways in return and I’ve received lots of ground nuts (peanuts), eggs, cooked pumpkin, a whole pumpkin, and sweet potatoes. It’s great. I really dislike cooking for myself and this has given me a way to connect with my adopted family.
My favorite story from the past two weeks also has to do with food. My friend Heather was cycling to visit me and stopped off to buy some bananas on the side of the road. The kids selling the bananas also had a little monkey they offered to sell her for ten pin (roughly $2.50). Heather was really intrigued by the offer, because who gets offered a monkey these days? She tried to ask the children what the monkey ate, but in the language confusion she realized the kids were telling her what she could eat as relish with the monkey. Heather finally refused the offer knowing that the animal could carry disease and might eat her cat—my cat’s neurotic sister—and she would not be able to properly care for it. Still, she finally saw wildlife in her area!
I have much more to write, but I want to attempt to get back to the provincial house fairly early this morning in order to assist with the great Cleaning Effort all the volunteers are undertaking today. Sharing one average sized house with forty people can be challanging and messy! I will probably be checking mail daily until Wednesday and am available on the land line at the house if you have gotten a calling card for Zambia.
I miss you all and think of you often!
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Going Back Into the Bush
It’s been wonderful to recuperate from the adjustment period I’ve been going through in my village, but now I’m feeling refreshed and ready to get back and start working!
Today I want to write a bit more about what I’m learning in my little home about myself and about Zambian culture.
First, I am learning just how important holding on to local languages is to the communities who speak them. One of the other PCVs said that there are less than 50,000 people in the world who speak Ki Kaonde as their first language. Even though English is the Zambian national language, it seems equally important to my neighbors to be faithful to the language of their tribe as it is to be able to communicate with other neighbors in the official national language. Most Zambians work around the tribal language barriers by learning multiple languages from a very young age. Most of my neighbors speak three, four, or five local languages and they freely mingle them. This makes it extremely difficult for them to understand why I have such trouble learning only one additional language—and it’s easy for me get confused when I’m hearing hybridized languages constantly. They tell me that it’s easy, that I’ll pick it up, that I’ll be conversant in just a few months. Unfortunately, I feel ridiculously slow and I spend most of my time saying in Kaonde, “I am learning Ki Kaonde, but just now I don’t speak it well, so please speak slowly.” And then I’m forced to switch into English.
For the most part, it is men who are educated and fluent in English, so I spend much of my time chatting with educated men, fielding proposals, and convincing my community that I don’t have a lot of money to give them for development. I’m not sure I’ll ever be accustomed to riding my bike and hearing people greet me from the road, “Hello, my future wife!” It sounds like it would be flattering, but instead it makes me feel awkward, uncomfortable, and irritated. I often want to stop and say back, “You don’t know me. You don’t even know my name. Why in the world would you want to marry me?”
Because this is the key: Gender roles are incredibly defined in rural Zambian, and the women are rock stars! They are unbelievably strong! I have seen the women carry their weight in goods on their heads. The women work the fields, raise the children, take care of the household, run shops, and generally keep processes running smoothly. I want to say, “But me. This one, she does not like to clean, or cook, does not know how to farm, cannot lift 50 kgs of water on her head, does not want to raise a handful of children, is short tempered, obstinate, expects respect, will not allow drunken infidelity, and will want you to participate 50/50 on chores. Why would you want to marry me?” That’s what I want to say. And I am getting a bit more sassy about it, but I am trying to find polite and culturally sensitive ways to assert that I have a choice of how I want to be in a relationship. Additionally, I am learning to establish immediately that my time in Zambia will be spent in furthering my education, assisting in development, immersing myself in a culture, and not looking for a Zambian spouse.
I feel pretty passionately about working with the young women in my community. So many girls get pregnant at a very very young age and have to drop out of school in order to take care of their new families. The schools are doing a good job of working on programs that assist girls in finishing their education if they have started a family as a teen, but it’s incredibly difficult to take care of their babies and get the money for school fees and take care of their homes. The burden of responsibility falls squarely on the “girl child” and I am incredibly burdened by the necessity to let girls/women know that they really do have a choice about their future. Of course this means getting a solid understanding of the language.
I’m thinking a lot about these incredibly complicated issues. I have a large group of young girls (between the ages of two and sixteen!) who show up at my house nearly every day. They teach me Sunday School songs in Ki Kaonde and I teach them the ABC song, the Hokey Pokey, and Sunday School songs in English. We jump around a lot and do a lot of laughing and yelling in confusion since we often do not understand each other at all. But since it appears they are making their appearances a habit, I’m trying to think of how to make that time constructive learning time. I’m hoping to get my hands on some really simple kids books in English to act out as stories and help them with their English skills since it’s imperative that the girls have a good grasp in the national language for potential employment and access to resources.
I’ll wrap up by giving you a glimpse of my daily life. I wake up about 5:30 a.m. and pop open the window near my bed to watch the sun come up. I’m up and out of my mosquito net around 6:00 ish and try to get a fire going. (This has taken me up to an hour and a half.) I am reading through the Bible this year and so I do my Bible study every morning and plan out my day while I’m waiting for my water to boil. I cook breakfast (mostly oatmeal!) and have tea, sweep my house, and do laundry if necessary. Then I get myself out of the house to either attend meetings or walk in the market and introduce myself to strangers or say hello to my acquaintances. I don’t really cook anything for lunch because making three fires in a day is just a pain, so I am eating through my protein and granola bars at an incredible rate! Most afternoons I ride into the boma to take in whatever mail I’ve written the night before and to pick up any yummy stuff from the bakery. Once I get back to the house I read through a portion of my training materials, evaluate what I can do next in my community entry observation period, play with the girls, sew, and start dinner. After dinner, I am locked in my hut by 7:00 p.m. when it gets dark and read. I’m usually asleep by 9:00 p.m.
As I get more comfortable, I’m sure this schedule will change, but for now, it’s really nice to have the time to get settled in, meet people, and contemplate this amazing cultural experience. I’ll be returning to Solwezi in a few weeks for a Peace Corps meeting and I’ll update everyone then with more stories.
Keep the letters coming!
Stacey Jean
Today I want to write a bit more about what I’m learning in my little home about myself and about Zambian culture.
First, I am learning just how important holding on to local languages is to the communities who speak them. One of the other PCVs said that there are less than 50,000 people in the world who speak Ki Kaonde as their first language. Even though English is the Zambian national language, it seems equally important to my neighbors to be faithful to the language of their tribe as it is to be able to communicate with other neighbors in the official national language. Most Zambians work around the tribal language barriers by learning multiple languages from a very young age. Most of my neighbors speak three, four, or five local languages and they freely mingle them. This makes it extremely difficult for them to understand why I have such trouble learning only one additional language—and it’s easy for me get confused when I’m hearing hybridized languages constantly. They tell me that it’s easy, that I’ll pick it up, that I’ll be conversant in just a few months. Unfortunately, I feel ridiculously slow and I spend most of my time saying in Kaonde, “I am learning Ki Kaonde, but just now I don’t speak it well, so please speak slowly.” And then I’m forced to switch into English.
For the most part, it is men who are educated and fluent in English, so I spend much of my time chatting with educated men, fielding proposals, and convincing my community that I don’t have a lot of money to give them for development. I’m not sure I’ll ever be accustomed to riding my bike and hearing people greet me from the road, “Hello, my future wife!” It sounds like it would be flattering, but instead it makes me feel awkward, uncomfortable, and irritated. I often want to stop and say back, “You don’t know me. You don’t even know my name. Why in the world would you want to marry me?”
Because this is the key: Gender roles are incredibly defined in rural Zambian, and the women are rock stars! They are unbelievably strong! I have seen the women carry their weight in goods on their heads. The women work the fields, raise the children, take care of the household, run shops, and generally keep processes running smoothly. I want to say, “But me. This one, she does not like to clean, or cook, does not know how to farm, cannot lift 50 kgs of water on her head, does not want to raise a handful of children, is short tempered, obstinate, expects respect, will not allow drunken infidelity, and will want you to participate 50/50 on chores. Why would you want to marry me?” That’s what I want to say. And I am getting a bit more sassy about it, but I am trying to find polite and culturally sensitive ways to assert that I have a choice of how I want to be in a relationship. Additionally, I am learning to establish immediately that my time in Zambia will be spent in furthering my education, assisting in development, immersing myself in a culture, and not looking for a Zambian spouse.
I feel pretty passionately about working with the young women in my community. So many girls get pregnant at a very very young age and have to drop out of school in order to take care of their new families. The schools are doing a good job of working on programs that assist girls in finishing their education if they have started a family as a teen, but it’s incredibly difficult to take care of their babies and get the money for school fees and take care of their homes. The burden of responsibility falls squarely on the “girl child” and I am incredibly burdened by the necessity to let girls/women know that they really do have a choice about their future. Of course this means getting a solid understanding of the language.
I’m thinking a lot about these incredibly complicated issues. I have a large group of young girls (between the ages of two and sixteen!) who show up at my house nearly every day. They teach me Sunday School songs in Ki Kaonde and I teach them the ABC song, the Hokey Pokey, and Sunday School songs in English. We jump around a lot and do a lot of laughing and yelling in confusion since we often do not understand each other at all. But since it appears they are making their appearances a habit, I’m trying to think of how to make that time constructive learning time. I’m hoping to get my hands on some really simple kids books in English to act out as stories and help them with their English skills since it’s imperative that the girls have a good grasp in the national language for potential employment and access to resources.
I’ll wrap up by giving you a glimpse of my daily life. I wake up about 5:30 a.m. and pop open the window near my bed to watch the sun come up. I’m up and out of my mosquito net around 6:00 ish and try to get a fire going. (This has taken me up to an hour and a half.) I am reading through the Bible this year and so I do my Bible study every morning and plan out my day while I’m waiting for my water to boil. I cook breakfast (mostly oatmeal!) and have tea, sweep my house, and do laundry if necessary. Then I get myself out of the house to either attend meetings or walk in the market and introduce myself to strangers or say hello to my acquaintances. I don’t really cook anything for lunch because making three fires in a day is just a pain, so I am eating through my protein and granola bars at an incredible rate! Most afternoons I ride into the boma to take in whatever mail I’ve written the night before and to pick up any yummy stuff from the bakery. Once I get back to the house I read through a portion of my training materials, evaluate what I can do next in my community entry observation period, play with the girls, sew, and start dinner. After dinner, I am locked in my hut by 7:00 p.m. when it gets dark and read. I’m usually asleep by 9:00 p.m.
As I get more comfortable, I’m sure this schedule will change, but for now, it’s really nice to have the time to get settled in, meet people, and contemplate this amazing cultural experience. I’ll be returning to Solwezi in a few weeks for a Peace Corps meeting and I’ll update everyone then with more stories.
Keep the letters coming!
Stacey Jean
Sunday, April 22, 2007
The First Two Weeks of My New Life:
It’s impossible to know where to begin. I called my parents at 4:00 a.m. because I was in the provincial house and having trouble sleeping due to some sniffing, sneezing, and general allergy melancholy. I talked to them for more than an hour and a half and just rattled on and on and on without really saying much of anything. So rather than do that here, I will just share some of my reflections that I journaled on my first day and add some stories in the next couple of days while I have internet access.
Oh, and I’m getting mail in Mufumbwe! I’m so excited! We only get mail on Fridays, but I make almost a daily run to the post office since I’m catching up on my responses. Thanks again to everyone who has been sending letters. Yesterday on transport I made a bit of commotion laughing out loud at the letters that had come into my box this week—it’s so good to be connected to home.
April 5
Today is the first full day at site and I had the same experience upon arrival as I did when I first arrived at homestay. I almost cried when I walked into my house and wanted more than anything to run away. Run as fast as I could back to my comfortable couch, air conditioning, and car. Fortunately, though, it is 9:00 p.m. and I have not seen any roaches. A vast improvement over my old house.
The night before we arrived I got very little sleep at the house because of jitters and then thoroughly cleaned the provincial house office the next morning in an effort to calm my nerves. (Who knew I would be that girl?? Certainly not me.) By 12:30 we were picked and packed and had our final shawarma and a quick last minute trip to Shop-Rite to purchase final food item purchases.
Because we got a late start, Caitlin had to stay with me for the night and then get posted this morning. It was nice to have the company and we stayed up and played Uno, ate chocolate, and read a magazine. I am plagued with anxieties. I fear that I won’t do anything positive in the next two years, that I won’t have any close friends, that I will not pick up on the language, and yet I have pride that I’m actually here at least trying to make a difference for others and for myself. And I’m trying to really believe that I will really be living in this tiny tiny hut for the next two years.
Reflections on my April 5 journal:
My emotions have been on a fast-moving swing. I alternate between euphoria, anxiety, and longing for home. But I can say that I’m finally settling into my house! Unfortunately, the roaches did indeed find me as well as a couple of frogs and a mouse, but I am getting a cat at the end of this week and I’m hoping that she will help alleviate those issues! I’ve also put up photos from home on a mini-clotheslines in my ‘living area’, given my dolls “little Kim” and “little Shirley” a prominent place on my table, and hand sewed curtains! (hoorah for me!) The community is working hard at making me comfortable. They made me a little wooden porta-potty looking seat for my pit latrine—very funny story there—have finished a gazebo, and are putting up a fence.
Work has been slow, but I have started meeting people and I force myself to go into town often and just greet, greet, greet.
I’ve also gotten much better at starting a charcoal fire every morning and evening and I’m always in by 7:00 p.m. to write letters and read. So, if you’ve written me, expect a response very very soon! (Well, soon as soon is from Africa)
I’ll write some of my stories out in the next couple of days.
All my love to everyone!
SJJ
Oh, and I’m getting mail in Mufumbwe! I’m so excited! We only get mail on Fridays, but I make almost a daily run to the post office since I’m catching up on my responses. Thanks again to everyone who has been sending letters. Yesterday on transport I made a bit of commotion laughing out loud at the letters that had come into my box this week—it’s so good to be connected to home.
April 5
Today is the first full day at site and I had the same experience upon arrival as I did when I first arrived at homestay. I almost cried when I walked into my house and wanted more than anything to run away. Run as fast as I could back to my comfortable couch, air conditioning, and car. Fortunately, though, it is 9:00 p.m. and I have not seen any roaches. A vast improvement over my old house.
The night before we arrived I got very little sleep at the house because of jitters and then thoroughly cleaned the provincial house office the next morning in an effort to calm my nerves. (Who knew I would be that girl?? Certainly not me.) By 12:30 we were picked and packed and had our final shawarma and a quick last minute trip to Shop-Rite to purchase final food item purchases.
Because we got a late start, Caitlin had to stay with me for the night and then get posted this morning. It was nice to have the company and we stayed up and played Uno, ate chocolate, and read a magazine. I am plagued with anxieties. I fear that I won’t do anything positive in the next two years, that I won’t have any close friends, that I will not pick up on the language, and yet I have pride that I’m actually here at least trying to make a difference for others and for myself. And I’m trying to really believe that I will really be living in this tiny tiny hut for the next two years.
Reflections on my April 5 journal:
My emotions have been on a fast-moving swing. I alternate between euphoria, anxiety, and longing for home. But I can say that I’m finally settling into my house! Unfortunately, the roaches did indeed find me as well as a couple of frogs and a mouse, but I am getting a cat at the end of this week and I’m hoping that she will help alleviate those issues! I’ve also put up photos from home on a mini-clotheslines in my ‘living area’, given my dolls “little Kim” and “little Shirley” a prominent place on my table, and hand sewed curtains! (hoorah for me!) The community is working hard at making me comfortable. They made me a little wooden porta-potty looking seat for my pit latrine—very funny story there—have finished a gazebo, and are putting up a fence.
Work has been slow, but I have started meeting people and I force myself to go into town often and just greet, greet, greet.
I’ve also gotten much better at starting a charcoal fire every morning and evening and I’m always in by 7:00 p.m. to write letters and read. So, if you’ve written me, expect a response very very soon! (Well, soon as soon is from Africa)
I’ll write some of my stories out in the next couple of days.
All my love to everyone!
SJJ
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