Update... With pictures!

Dumela Friends and Family!

I cannot believe it’s been almost a month since I’ve written a detailed blog! I apologize – even though I’m running on Africa Time, days have been passing by quickly.

First of all if you notice on your right, there is some new information! There is a link to my photos and ways to send me extra love =). The photo album labeled “through my eyes” is the album that holds my favorite pictures. Enjoy =).

Shoutout!:

*hugs* to Sue for your postcard! I miss you and I hope that job search is going well!

Hmm… lots of things have happened since my megablog… oh one thing I forgot to mention. I got to see the main clinic in Mabutsane and see Bill and Melinda Gates’ money at work. They provided an infectious diseases control center for Mabutsane’s clinic which was built on the side of the main clinic building and the counseling trailer. Although there were only 2 or 3 patients in the entire clinic, it was nice to know that this clinic was available. I’m pretty sure that I want my secondary project to be somehow involved with a clinic. There were no doctors available however, because they were bitter about being picked up late (around midnight) from a neighboring village and decided they could have a day off. Maybe that’s why there were no patients.

Anyway pictures are up of my shadowing experience. The photos I took on the game drive doesn’t do the real thing any justice. Who thought the Kalahari would be absolutely stunning?

So here’s a little blurb about what I am doing as a Life Skills Volunteer. The LS group will be working with guidance and counseling teachers in schools to implement the new Botswana Life Skills Program (which incorporates HIV/AIDS). Most of will be living on teacher’s compounds on a school site, but will be responsible for all the schools in the area. The Botswana government wants to try out this LS program (hence being a pilot) in Kweneng district and then if it is successful, it will be implemented throughout Botswana. The LS program talks about a broad spectrum of topics, everything from nationalism to nutrition and of course HIV/AIDS. Our job (well every PCVs job) will be to network Batswana because there is a huge communication problem especially between parents and children and men and women. Soooo we have to be involved, but not too involved because it is best if Batswana takes care of sustaining their own support groups and/or networks. More on this later…

So as an Asian American, I am a minority in the US and a super minority in Botswana. The few Asians in Botswana all seem to own shops (filled with everything from radios to clothes to coffee tables) and so these shops are coined “China Shops.” Besides the “Hey China China China!” I sometimes hear on my walks, I get other kinds of discrimination. 1) Batswana have asked me if I was going to open my shop that day 2) On the way to Mabutsane, a man squinted at me everytime I looked over at him (so I decided to squint back) 3) If I am surrounded by other PCTs, they either ignore me (after they bombard my white friends with greetings) or if they don’t ignore me, they ask “and where are you from?” after someone has already explained we are all from America. No I haven’t been asked if I know kung fu yet. Yes I am a little disappointed.

Another thing I have been experiencing. Batswana women (strangers) love to grab and squeeze my body. All over and every part of my body and they especially like placing their hands on my chest. I mean they see me and after they find out I am a “friendly” Asian looking American, they start squealing “oh you’re so fat! You’re so fat!” Of course these women are bigger than I am. I wonder how they would feel if I started grabbing at their body and saying the same thing. I think I’ll try it.

Oh in my pictures, there is an album filled with the PCTs relaxing. So “Lekgoa (white person) Lodge” as I fondly call it is where I am on Sundays instead of church (sorry grandma). In fact, some volunteers have called it Kereke (church) to their host families. In Botswana, if you go into a bar, you are labeled as a drunk, even if you only had a coke! So we had to find a place where we can relax and be… Americans. The pictures should be self explanatory.

Some random things I have noticed:

- There is definitely a lack of good cheese here. Almost all of it is processed. The cheese that isn’t processed still tastes processed. I am so sad

- Finding hand crafted stuff is difficult

- There are some crazy delicious chip flavors here. Like Doritos has a sun dried tomato, chili and poppy seed flavor here. Oh and of course tomato flavor and fruit chutney flavor, and STEER and my favorite… these whole wheat crackers called vita-snacks that come in cream cheese and chili flavor.

- Electricity is prepaid for. When you need electricity, you take this paper card (not unlike a BART ticket) run to the electricity store (yes run, because no one remembers to get electricity before you only have a couple minutes left) and then stick it in this bomb looking machine in the kitchen. The number resets and it feels like you just survived a near death experience.

- Gasoline comes in huge tanks and I still haven’t figure out how to attach it to the stove.

- I am now washing my underwear in my dirty bath water everyday because I am tired of laundry and my gigantic loads of underwear and socks. Since I often have water crises in my house, I cannot risk doing saving laundry for a specific weekend or I will have nothing to wear.

Weather has been nicer during the day. No more of those crazy storms and crazy winds but it has definitely been colder. In fact, I wake up in the middle of night absolutely freezing. I sleep with a tank top, shirt, undershirt, and fleece sweater and two blankets. I know, I know, I am being a Katie Lenhoff.

So today we got an extensive lecture on the reasoning behind “Africa/Botswana Time.” Most of you could have guessed the whole sunrise, sunset, and noon thing. There’s also a star that comes out right before dawn which signifies a specific time in the morning. The most interesting though is the claim that the roosters here crow every hour. I think my rooster is broken because my rooster crows whenever and how ever long he wants to. Another thing is our trainers told us that the goats go home around before or around 6 pm and so that is a time of day for them. During training, we were pretty much told that we a meeting is an all day event and that we needed to live in a “polychronic” time not the “monochronic” time we are used to in the states.

INSECT BITE UPDATE!:

I have some nasty huge bites that my calf, my right middle finger knuckle is swollen and my the back of my right hand is huge. Oh and I have a huge huge huge bite on my neck. I think I’m going to cover myself in saran wrap before I sleep.

I’ll put up pictures of the house I live in soon.

Any requests on topics or pictures? I’m open to anything. =) I miss you all!

Go Siame!

--Tshego--