More observations, of things I like
(this seems to be mostly Mark, so far), and some not so much:
The previous blog was sent in a hurry,
when a turn in line to use the internet at our training facility
arose unexpectedly (recognizing that we were bumping each other off
line, they've organized a system for 1 at a time.) One of the
trainees, a young woman with whom I'd had little contact so far, saw
we were getting repeatedly bounced off the net and offered to help us
download our entry to her flash drive, and then get it on her Mac,
which was holding the net link better; she spent almost ½ an hour of
precious communications time doing that with us. So getting
to know these splendid young folks is really fun. Several call me
“Dad,” one in a Tennessee accent (that can be done) who asked a
few days ago “are those dimples or wrinkles?” (The khumbi (bus)
row agreed my middle finger response was appropriately eloquent.)
I've heard one or 2 call Katherine Mom. And when we stumbled out of
an especially frustrating language class yesterday afternoon and got
excited by a good-looking new bird with a brilliant blue-green back
and orange-red throat (probably a white-fronted sunbird) they said we
were “so cute.” Oh, well.
We are making progress speaking with
our host family, as we learn more siSwati words and some grammar.
They are very protective of us. I wonder what they think of us?
Within the first hours we were here I'd made 2 big blunders, hanging
my water pail from the bore hole tap – could have snapped it off –
Make Olpa pleasantly showed me to set it on the stone below the tap.
And walking in our street shoes all over the floor of our hut. Those
shoes had walked through the road and dooryard – they had poop and
dust on them, and the hut floor had been carefully cleaned. They
never wear street shoes inside.
Friday night as I made my last latrine
visit I heard the most wonderful singing from down the valley, that
distinctive southern African style of harmonized chorus, punctuated
by solo intervals, a style that I first recall from Paul Simon's
Graceland album, and that is in the background of every movie about
South Africa. In fact, there were at least 2 separate choruses.
Practicing for church? On Friday night? They were still at it when
I repeated my visit around 2 a.m., although the singing was
noticeably less precise. Ah ha! Saturday is burying day (that's the
literal translation – tells you something about what's happening
here). They keep a vigil, singing through the night, and bury the
body at dawn.
Other things I like:
Nailing a word in language class
learned way back last week;
The food. Lots of rice, some meat,
tasty gravy.
We got out of class early Friday PM,
so I fit in my first run from my training homestead, across a ridge,
in the golden twilight (lots of wood fires?) Hilly – a challenge.
As I neared our homestead some women stopped me, asking where I
stayed, my siSwati name, more I couldn't follow. Everything I tried
in siSwati prompted gales of laughter, especially when I closed with
my carefully memorized 10 syllables intended to say “I'm happy to
meet you.” On my run Tuesday afternoon someone asked my name and I
gave my siSwati name – Sipho (means “gift”, so they say) as I
headed out, and on my way back at least 3 groups of people greeted me
by that name. Not too many skinny old white guys running around the
dusty roads here.
Night skies. Still working on my new
constellations.
Great new birds everywhere. A
striped kingfisher Sunday morning, and others we haven't had chance
to identify yet.
Some things that will require getting
used to:
During training (until September!),
having nearly every moment directed by others, directed by people ½
my age (or less) who can be focused more on completing their
requirements than what may be on my agenda just now. This is
compounded by having quite a few people managing different portions
of this operation, so we frequently get caught in the middle and end
up in a big hurry, only to wait, or not have the right things with us
. . . .
Getting on without the things that
make life at home smooth: hot water by turning a knob, hot showers,
plentiful table space (our propane burner takes up ½ our single
table – no bureau, no shelves or hooks – just floor and our
luggage), washing machine, buildings in which you can regulate the
temperature (its winter, and cool at night; we hold a 2 hour language
class most mornings in the village church (not in use) where I have
measured the temperature at 58 F.
The PC's repeated insistence that we
“look smart” in “business casual,” in a dusty environment
where we wash our clothes ourselves in cold water from a bore hole,
and it takes most of a dry to dry – on a good day. The women wear
skirts below the knee. Curiously, this need to dress up comes more
from the Swazi than PC – the Swazi instructors all dress quite
nicely – shoes polished on a dusty road waiting for the bus. And
Swazis are upset, it seems, by the sight of women's thighs. No short
dresses, no pants, and certainly no shorts for women. Left to their
own way, I suspect our group would quickly settle for a low standard
and then, we are told, the Swazis wouldn't respect us. Many in our
group are trying to keep their tats covered, and have removed their
piercings, till they get to “permanent” sites and have a time to
let the village get to know them; tats and piercings are said to
identify “gangsters.”
There's one thing I doubt I'll ever
adjust to: those damn roosters, right outside our door it seems, all
through the night (don't they know?) but tuning up especially
starting around 4:30 a.m. or so. And my sense is that the night we
take our Mefloquine each week, those roosters are right in here with
us.
If we get enough signal to send pix,
we'll show Katherine learning from our Make (the Mom of the
household) how to wash clothes from the water tap on Sunday, maybe us
in front of the church where we meet for language class, and
Katherine reading in bed. It gets into the low 50s at night, maybe a
little colder, and the houses are unheated and drafty.
OK, couldn't get enough bandwidth when
we were at the training facility to send this Wednesday. Been out in
the village since then, with no signal; back to the training town
tomorrow – maybe we'll have better luck.
Yesterday we continued our hands-on
learning of PC approach to gardening, intensive organically improved
small plots, intended to deal with food insecurity among the many
child-headed households. Then in the afternoon we planned and bought
locally a lunch to be cooked and eaten with our host families. All
of it was more instructive and fun than it may sound. I've come to
give the PC a lot of credibility; things I think can't work tend to
be pretty sound once we get into them. The PC runs around 2k
trainees through this every year, and they are rigorous and
determined to justify what they do. I have frequently in mind our
economist son Scott's references to inefficiency in this approach. I
keep reminding myself to wait and see. The cooking with Katherine
and 2 young trainees, and the 26 year old who does all the cooking
for our host family, was interesting and fun. The Swazis wanted way
more mayo in the slaw, and were a little disappointed that there was
no meat – one of the trainee cooks is a vegetarian.
KUF is really getting the language
quickly – converses with the ladies in our homestead, sometimes
catches what they say to each other, or to the kids.! Mark finds it
a struggle.
Whoopee – on a shopping trip we've
paused at an internet cafe! Here goes!
