Why I love Afrikaans

Afrikaans is a new language, developed in South Africa in the last 300 years or so. It stems from Dutch, and had influences from some of the native languages, as well as the languages of the other European colonists. They all had to communicate, so out of this hodgepodge arose Afrikaans. As it is a new language, it doesn't have all the oddities of spelling that older languages have, which makes it awesome.

Amalgamation of Successes

Sometimes it seems that Peace Corps is nothing more than time spent being frustrated over inequalities, incompetence, cultural differences and general lack of progress. And that is most definitely not Peace Corps. Tangible results are initially hard to come by and in those early stages success is measured in smiles, small steps, and trust. I don’t mean to belittle a volunteer’s contribution during the observation period (first 3 months at site), lovingly termed lock-down by fellow volunteers.

But it’s in those initial months were the community sees you every day and either accepts you as one of its own or holds you at a distance. Success comes when the stares stop and the smiles abound. When the children scream your name from afar and come running toward you… rather than run screaming away from you. Success is your first sickness free week.

Peace Corps during that period teaches you to appreciate the small things. The smiles, the nervousness, the unknown.

It was during those three frustrating months when I got my first bright ray of sunshine. My former host sister called. Peace Corps paired us with a family in the training village during training. During this time, she and I had spent hours going over math and whatever other subject she needed help with. I admired her tenacity; she was not only going to school, but was in charge of cooking meals at times, cleaning at others, and basically running the household. She also studied. She studied every night. We went over math together when she asked for help and the first thing I did was take away her calculator. She depended too much on it, using it as a crutch to cover up not knowing basic math theory. We spent hours honing her skills, reviewing. Before long her friends were coming over and she was helping them.

She called unexpectedly after I had been at site (different from the training site) for about two months and I could hear the excitement in her voice,

“Thabiso, I got top marks on the maths examination!”

I was impressed.

“And I’m going to get a certificate because I received some of the highest marks in the class!”

The long sought after feeling of accomplishment had arrived.

I know my work may not be acknowledged nor even appreciated right away, if ever. I do relish the few times it will be acknowledged, but don’t dwell on them. When times are less fruitful and I really need a boost, I’ll look back at them and realize that these small moments make everything worthwhile. Learning to appreciate life’s small additive successes makes life worthwhile.

A rocky day

A typical day for me begins slightly before sunrise around 6 am. At that time the birds begin to sing, the donkeys bray, the cocks crow, the dogs bark and I turn over in my bed, especially when it's cold (freezing.. remember I have no heater, stone walls and a zinc roof don't do much against the cold/heat) . Fortunately, we only have dogs. The other animals I can hear in the distance.

Usually I get up, make breakfast and check my gmail and the New York Times on my phone, bathe, brush teeth, change, shave and head to work. I throw in playing with the dogs at one point in time as it would be hard to ignore them, they are super energetic and always ready to play and fight over my attention. If necessary, I'll do some polishing of my shoes and cleaning up before school as well.

I work at two primary schools (for the most part), so depending on where I am headed for the day, I either walk along the road until I can catch a ride with a taxi (minibus) or walk 10 minutes to my closer school. The other school is about a 50 minute walk away, which is doable, but I prefer not to arrive dusty to school.

This morning I was walking to my close school when I heard something odd. A metallic clang. Followed by another. And another. As I drew nearer to the school, a man was taking bricks that had been laid in the yard to prevent erosion and throwing them into a donkey cart. Odd. I supposed that the bricks were needed for something else.

I noticed my host mother, also a teacher at my school, standing outside the gate. The gate was locked. She explained that man who was now throwing rocks into his donkey cart had locked it and that there was not something right with him. Teachers who had already arrived had taken their classes into the classrooms, but one class was still waiting outside for their teacher. I took another look at the man.

Two more teachers approached the locked gate. Looking at the man with annoyance... and a bit of fear. It is well known in the community that the man is prone to madness, but to a large degree it is tolerated. It is viewed as shameful to send a family member away for treatment or schooling, so though we had known about this man before, we had just had harmless incidents.

I asked the teachers if it would be acceptable to call the police, as this man had rocks, was mad, and was near children. They responded affirmatively and I dialed the police and handed the phone to one of them. The children outside the classroom bothered me. I looped around the buildings and beckoned the children to follow. Once we were on the other side of the buildings we sang a lively few rounds of "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" until I checked and saw that the man was now building a barricade with the stones in the road. This meant that the children could go back to class and lock the door, which is what all the teachers ended up doing. I decided to call the police again as they had previously told the teachers that there were no police cars available. This time they assured me there was one on its way.

The man blockaded the road with his donkeycart for a bit and after stopping a few cars, decided he needed more bricks, so he came back into the yard. My principal then called the police. The head of the SGB (School Governing Body, like PTA, but with more power) was now trying to get to the school, but had his progress hampered by the man.
I decided to continue working, but to keep listening in case I was needed. I followed up with one of the teachers I had been working with and she asked me if I could review verbs with the third graders. So a game very similar to Simon says evolved, which then led to the hokey-pokey. Then it was time for them to write a test, so I left and saw that the police had arrived. They were driving off with the man... but his donkey cart was still in the yard. Though very tempted to take a joy-ride, I continued with my work.

At break-time, two of teachers asked me if I would kindly help them bring truant learners back to class. The learners had decided that attending school for half a day was enough and that they wanted to spend the rest of the school day outside playing a game involving coins. As they saw me approaching, they ran. The teachers and I then met to see what options were open to us. They had already contacted the parents previously, had the learners write a contract, and didn't know where to go from there, so we went through a few options in the school's disciplinary policy, including calling the police to the school a second time. We decided to give them a written warning, warning them that they could be expelled.

The day went on. I helped the adminstrative assistant complete some database work and then helped some teachers with subject knowledge. Then, shortly before school let out, five learners were escorted into the office. Some of them obviously terrified. The head of the SGB had been walking through the village and stumbled across the errant learners hiding in a donga or gully. They were in trouble and they knew it.

Luckily for us, the principal had already printed out the letters and we had already discussed what we were going to do. The children received quite the verbal haranguing.

Then after-school I hosted had a professional development workshop on Mentoring and Coaching which had been requested by the principal.

Eish, what a day.

A sheep of Thanks

As I've warned you before, this blog follows chronology only very roughly, this entry is about nine months old...

My host father has asked me several times if I can take a sheep or a goat back to America with me as a gift of thanks. He said I could then slaughter it in the states to show how thanks is given in rural South Africa.

That is an accurate picture of life here. Gratefulness is still measured in cows, sheep, and goats. For my birthday, in fact, my host family slaughtered a sheep for me (well, I helped… wearing gloves this time) and told me to invite people over, which fortunately coincided with Thanksgiving, and even though we were on travel restriction, Peace Corps allowed us to visit our closest volunteer and share Thanksgiving with them. Luckily I’m the closest neighbor to several volunteers. So I turned 23 in the Thanksgivithday celebration.

This proved to be quite an occasion as one of my teacher’s shared my birthday and was over for the braai, a South African BBQ. We, all of us, prepared half the food South African Style- Pap or bogobe, a stiff porridge made of maizemeal, and then threw in some American overtones, salad, mashed potatoes, and green beans. Sharing cultures through food…. There really is nothing as lekker.

One wonderful thing about South African families is that you know who your relatives are… that is unless you are a Peace Corps volunteer and suddenly have 30 or so more new and intriguing names and faces to remember. I ended up making a rather elaborate family tree to help me out on this one. But I digress, family is central to the interconnectedness of rural South African life. I don’t mean this in a traditional western sense. Family, especially the term uncle, is a much looser concept. Uncle is both a term for your parent’s brother or brother-in-law, but also a term of respect for someone who wouldn’t be considered your uncle in the western sense. Family is everyone who is remotely related to you.

And so part of the family came over from the neighboring village and partook in the feast, as did the local family. One interesting feature of the evening was when we brought tables outside, the Americans were quite a ease sitting at the candle-lit table and sharing the meal in that manner, whereas my African host family chose to sit in a circle, as they was their custom. In the end, we did manage to mingle, but it was quite humorous and poignant to see the differing cultures reflected so visibly.

It was also amusing to see the different interactions we had with one another. Some of my host family seemed to feel a little awkward around the handful of Americans that were there. The volunteers were less awkward, or to quote a volunteer, “Awkwardness becomes the norm for us, so awkward ceases to exist.” Since I knew everyone who came, I could see how differently some people acted.

One of the remarkable aspects of the BaTswanan culture is their openness to strangers and eagerness to be hospitable. The visitor is well treated, to the point of the ‘Tswana avoiding any particular topic that might lead to conflict. Now this is true in other cultures as well, but I found a particular iteration in my time here, where I notice people doing everything to make me feel well for the moment, including the extreme of telling me they’ll do something, even though they have no intention of actually doing it, just so that I will feel good at the moment. The fact that I will be let down later can be tempered, but there are very few times a person will tell you something that will let you down. And so some in my host family were exceedingly cautious in talking with the volunteers not wishing to disappoint, which lasted until they were repeatedly invited to come and sit with us at the table in a typical Thanksgiving style. Please don’t get me wrong, I also joined my host family’s circle, but felt that unless they were invited repeatedly to the table, they would not come. And so, surrounded by some of my friends in Peace Corps and my host country national host family, we celebrated Thankgivirthday until the candles had burned low on the tables and the Milky Way stretched brilliantly across the night sky.

A few weeks later, my host father asked if I could take a goat home on the plane with me. I was honored.

“We really liked the camp Thabiso”

As I was broke from Youth Day (we operated on our own personal funds until funding came from the states which was only accessible two weeks later), I decided be a villager for the break. The fact that I traveled home during the school year might have had something to do with it….

But as usual, I decided to run a camp for the children and a computer workshop for the educators that were also in town (Excel this time- how to keep a gradebook), and I’m glad to say, there was learning going on. I awoke the first day of camp was heavily loaded. A backpack, guitar, 5 kg bag of flour (I’ll explain) , another bag full of tangrams, and a bucket in which I usually wash clothes.

As a looked towards the school, a handful of children were already there. I knew that there would be more coming from our house, because well, the host cousins come over every time I have a camp. They also tend to be immensely helpful in preparation.

The camp worked like a charm, very few discipline problems, a massive papier-mâché globe was made, and about 50-60 children excitedly asking me daily to look at their tangrams to see if they got it right. Some are quicker than other, some require a little help, but on the whole tangram time is something looked forward to by all, but it can be mayhem. On occasion, I calm the room down by having a sing-a-long, which tells you just how loud it can get when the tangrams come out.

By far the favorites are “Oh Susanna!” followed closely by an Africanized version of “This Land is your Land” i.e. from Table Mountain to the shores of Durban…

The final event in the camp was a math competition for two prizes my family had sent me. Yes, the children got excited about math… too excited at times as they would literally jump out of their seats to answer a question. This led me to move the competition outside, where everyone wanted to see the flashcards.

As this was the third camp I conducted, I’ve begun to see personalities in the students. Two particular students had enjoyed darting in and out of the previous camps and now came early, trying to read. This tells me that I’ve either learned a bit about classroom management, or skipping camp has lost it’s novelty, perhaps a little of both.

Happy Birthday Madiba

"I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die." Nelson Mandela - Rivonia Trial, where he could have been sentenced to death.

Today was Nelson Mandela's 90th Birthday, so I wish him all the best and would like to thank him for inviting the Peace Corps to South Africa.

This remarkable man is both the grandfather and father of post-apartheid South Africa and is a role model, not only for South Africans, but for many in other parts of the world.

Branded as a terrorist, and to be sure, he was one. He sought to overthrow the state, using terror if necessary. However the leader that emerged in the transition to democracy was one of compassion, forgiveness, and self-sacrifice. Many South Africans hold him up as the model of South Africa. Well-versed in his traditional culture, yet educated in the ideals of democracy, a smart humble man.

To be sure, his presence at the helm is missed, but I do feel, it's time for people to follow Nelson's model, not just clamor for him to lead them again.
God Bless you Madiba, I pray for you and the future of South Africa.

Another congrats!!

And congratulations to Erica! My younger sister graduated in June from High School and I am exceptionally proud of her. I’m told her valedictory address was amazing and I look forward to seeing it at one point in time… and then again whenever I return home and you can tell me who everybody is. Just know, I was definitely thinking of you on your graduation and praying that you wouldn’t fall while climbing the stairs. Heels and stairs just don’t seem like a good idea.

It was quite something to be at the “Night with the Stars” with you Erica. You have grown to be a remarkable young lady and I know you’ll do well in everything you do. You are very true to yourself and I pray that you continue to be blessed and share this blessing with others.

Added July 2: I finally watched the speech on YouTube (took me an hour and a half to load... slow connection), it's the by far the greatest high school graduation speech ever, check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxvcnuWmx-U