The Books are Here! (and so are viruses.)

 This week we distributed 572 boxes containing between 45,000 and 60,000 books, weighing roughly  28;690 pounds to 30 primary and high schools all around Swaziland. It was fun, and feels really good.

But first, we want to say that the form for on-line donations to Books for Africa had donor anonymity as a default, so that unless you unchecked an easily-missed box, we do not know that you made a donation. We have written (OK, emailed) all whom we know made donations. For those we have not thanked individually, it's not for lack of appreciation or good breeding (although some may think that anyway); we just don't know you gave.

So the books arrived some time on Monday, May 5, and we were notified that morning; we notified our schools to show up to pick them up on Wednesday, and Katherine and I traveled early Tuesday to one of the central commercial towns to help unload the books into a warehouse and distribute them to be picked up by the schools. As we walked up to the warehouse, we learned the books were still on the railroad car and could not be unloaded till the next day. Ah, Swaziland, why must you be so . . . Swazi? Also, the US Embassy had stuff stored in the warehouse bay we'd been offered for 2 free days of storage, but the shipping firm that had offered that arranged for adjacent space.

What does the well-trained clever PC volunteer do in such a situation? Why, go to lunch, of course. Then we shopped for dinner ingredients, and made our way to the “backpackers'” hostel a few miles away; Katherine and I stopped at the National Museum on our way to catch some details we'd missed when we visited it last winter during training, that made more sense now that we know the country a little better. We notified our schools to come pick up the books a day later, on Thursday, not Wednesday.

Katherine had to wait to use the more reliable hot shower, just off the kitchen.

Then we cooked dinner together.  Well, "we" - I lit the stove.

It was really fun to be with some of our gang again. Katherine is one of the 6 who will be running the Books For Africa program in Swaziland next year, and this was a chance to work out their new roles. Although all the volunteers are of equal rank, they all kind of look to Katherine for guidance and leadership. And they should.  But she's drawing out the skills in each of them.  Our teaching is not only confined to Swazis.

The books were to be at the warehouse by 9 the next morning, and were to be off-loaded in ½ an hour. As we sought our morning sustenance at a local bakery at 7:45 a.m. we got frantic calls – the books were there. We rushed over and spent the next 1 ¼ hours unloading the 18-wheeler parked in front of the warehouse bay. (4 hours later it was still there.) Most of the rest of the day we sorted each school's requests, so that each school got about 19 boxes of basically what they'd ordered.

Textbooks can be really heavy.

Another night at the hostel – hot showers! Thursday the schools were to arrive in 15 minute intervals, from 8 a.m. till 3:30. And they did – every single one of them. Nearly all more or less on time. 30 schools! This is a very big deal for them. 

We got so we could bring a pickup into the warehouse, pack it, and have it out, in around 7 minutes. We were done by 3:45!

And were the recipients grateful. School principals and teachers from all over the country. So proud and pleased to have the makings of a library. Determined to get the books labeled and on shelves, and into the hands of their kids. They beamed with delight, and each repeatedly thanked us - as if we'd donated the books and carried them 1/2 way around the world!

This was really exciting. And fun. Let's hope the momentum continues.

And all of you who contributed generously to help make this possible for our high school – many heartfelt thanks. This is really important. (and such fun!) We are very grateful for your help.

When we got back to site Friday and visited 2 of our schools 2 different girls ran up and hugged Katherine, they were so excited to see her and tell us about their Easter break.  One, a senior who is interested in a career in medicine and is one of our very favorites,  had done a shadowing day with a doctor who had befriended us, in a nearby town.

We'd been noticing some odd stuff on our computer for more than a week: the desktop picture of Martha's wedding was gone, and most troubling, we couldn't activate our virus protection. 2^nd thing we did on returning to site (after doing the wash) was to go into the public library branch and try to activate our virus protection. Short version – we spent all afternoon trying unsuccessfully to download it, came back 1^st thing this morning and had more success with quicker downloads, and we seem now to have virus protection working again. Some very demoralized times, last night, again this morning when it appeared not to load several times. With the number of sites we plug into, our computer would be quickly fried without good protection, and without a computer we'd be isolated and mostly unable to function. (Wish all the free condoms we give out would protect our computer. We've distributed more than 3,500 in our community, all carried here in our backpacks from Manzini or Mbabane, 1 or 3 kumbi rides away, respectively. (The PC is big on reporting this kind of detail - “What behaviors have been changed by your activity?”)  This in a community of maybe 5,000 – boy, that's a lot of love. Think they're all used?) Plus, we'll be seeing other volunteers at training this coming week, and the first few evenings need to be spent downloading media from each other (do you have the new Homeland? No, but I've got Downton Season 4. Anyone got a downloadable House of Cards?), but if we didn't have protection, we'd be wall-flowers at that dance.

KZN

The schools get 3 weeks Easter break. We worked the 1st week finishing registering books for the “wealthier” primary school's library and preparing some lesson plans for the 2^nd term (when we plan to get directly into HIV and STIs, and we'd like to also do some nutrition – hate to be the elderly white couple always talking about sex.). During the 2^nd week we went to Kwazulu-Natal, the South African province south of Swaziland. We hired a car and a driver to meet us at the main road near our site and drive us to the border, where the driver took public transportation back to his home and we headed to a terrific hilly wooded game preserve, the ancient hunting land of the Zulu kings. Driving on the other side of the road and shifting with her left hand were challenging for Katherine, but we are happy to report no mishaps!

We saw wild animals

birds (brown headed kingfisher – you should see the woodland, pied, malachite, and giant kingfishers – this guy is drab compared to any of them, but he was close and willing to pose)

and lovely country.

Then on to a World Heritage Site, St. Lucia Estuary, on the shores of the Indian Ocean. Through a guide we'd liked in our Kruger trip in February we'd located a terrific young birding guide for St Lucia, who met us at 4:30 a.m. at the backpackers hostel where we stayed

and walked our legs off searching for rare, and some not so rare but we had not seen them yet, birds of the area. This was the only rainy day, but we kept going till 2:30 – a long day, but some great birds.

The yellow-billed horn-bill was the smart-ass bird in The Lion King; every Swazi under 40 knows that movie:

We also saw trumpeter and crowned hornbills. My top prize goes to the Livingston Turaco, a green bird with a nice white and green crest – pretty good when perched but not so special, until he flies, when his whole under-side glows bright red, like a church window in the afternoon sun. Just fabulous.

And finally we stopped at uMkhuze, another game reserve,

with a guided walk through the giant fig tree forest

and “hides” where the birds can be seen and animals come down to drink.

(blue wildebeest)

This is all on my little pocket camera.

In booking this trip I had assumed Swazi cost structure, where US $35 per night buys you the best guest house with a veranda with a view. Doesn't go quite so far in SA; no place we stayed had “en-suite” facilities. At our last stop that nocturnal foray tested my spirit for adventure:

As I walked from our hut to the communal toilet at 2 a.m. I heard grunting and growling in the shadows. The next morning we saw hoof marks, and then large paw prints in the sand by our hut. I figured out later, from similar sounds I heard in daylight, that I'd heard an alpha male impala talking to his harem. Although impala are not known to be carnivorous, at 2 a.m. it was harder to be so sure.

More than 50 new birds on this trip.