Week 95: No Goats Allowed

Shhh don’t tell because it’s a surprise but I found out that the Kgosi (traditional leader of the village) called a Kgotla meeting to discuss my leaving. I was informed, secretly, that at this meeting he asked for a committee to be formed to start planning my going away party. The important parts of the meeting that made their way back to me included the Kgosi’s advice that no one was to gift me any of their chickens or goats since I would not be able to take those back with me.  Previously that would have struck me as funny however now I am just grateful to him that he saved me some potentially awkward situations. I also feel honored that this meeting happened. Regardless as to whether this party comes to fruition, the intention was there and that is something I will carry with me, which consequently will be much easier to get past airport security and even fit in my carry on.

Week 94: A Lesson in Setswana

Dumela mma/rra         Good morning/day madam/sir         The most common way to greet

someone

O tsogile jang?             How are you?                                    Literally, How have you risen?

Ke tsogile sentle           I am well                                            Literally, I have risen well. This is

  rude to ask people older than you in  

  some parts of the country.

Le kae?                      How are you?                                        Literally, Where are you? The “you”

  is plural in this greeting however it can  

  be used to address a group of people or  

  a single individual. If it is used for a 

  single individual it is assumed the asker 

  is inquiring after the person’s family.

Re teng                       We are fine                                            Literally, We are here.

Go siame                   Goodbye or Alright                      

Ke kopa…                 I am asking for…

Dijo                            Food

Metsi                         Water

Week 93: All Volunteer Conference

This week there was an All Volunteer Conference for Peace Corps Volunteers in Botswana. I spent three days surrounded by more Americans than I have seen in months. This is usually a source of some anxiety for my and leads to some inevitable comparisons amongst volunteers. However, with less than 5 months left of my service and only two more working moths (the last three months I am not supposed to start new projects but simply stay in my village and start saying goodbye) my attitude was very different this time. I was able to celebrate the accomplishments of my peers, provide stories of both my successes and my failures and mostly just have a great time catching up with people. It was the first, and probably the last, time that I saw some volunteers who were not in my intake group. I was able to make new friends and catch up with old ones. For many people in my group who do not live near me, I will see them one more time at our close of service conference in July (before we are all commanded to stay put in our villages until we leave in October). I am so grateful to have shared this experience with so many amazing people. Through out our service there has been a lot of talk of the “Peace Corps Family” which I did not necessarily buy into and was more of the mindset that these were some “government mandated friends” however after over 21 months together and a multitude of shared experiences, even if they were happening on opposite sides of the country, I know that this is my peace corps family. These people will be my Peace Corps family no matter where in the world we are.

Week 92: A Compliment

Change takes time. I have been living in Moshana village for 19 months and working regularly with 14 teachers. Many of these teachers have come and gone, left to have babies, and returned, however there are a few that I have been working alongside since I arrived. After my initial push to get to know my co-workers and my new community, I identified people that I felt I could work well with and simply tried to keep up a polite relationship with the others. One teacher specifically appeared to only ever want to talk about my physical appearance and although I also think about my physical appearance, I wish I didn’t and consequently I have tried to keep my distance. I did not feel like this affected my performance since how I look on any given day did not appear to me to be of vital importance to the education of her students. However, in recent months, this teacher has started to bring her kids to the library regularly, where I teach reading comprehension to them for one hour a week. Even more exciting is that this teacher has started to stay for the lessons which gives me hope that she will continue to utilize the library after I am gone. I know she is there of her own volition as it has taken her over a year to decide that the library is a useful place for her kids. This week the teacher even complimented me on my teaching style and told me I am doing good work. Those few words took me months to earn and felt like the biggest victory. I wanted to sing and dance and say, “see I am more than this week’s pimple or yesterday’s cute outfit.” Which reminded me, I may be doing some good things in the classroom but I still need to work on not taking it personally or being vindictive. 

Week 91: GLOW II

As I mentioned last week I just completed a GLOW (Girls/Guys Leading Our World) camp in the southern region with 7 other PCVs and teacher counterparts. GLOW camps were started by a group of PCVs and their counterparts in Romania in the 1990s and since then have spread to numerous Peace Corps countries worldwide. For this camp we took 67 boys and girls from 10 schools and hosted a four day camp that included such topics as leadership, gender, HIV, and self-confidence to name a few. These camps can be extremely rewarding and a good test of patience. You learn what to do with 67 kids when dinner is three hours late. How to get a group of 30 boys to go to sleep since you will be the one waking them up in 6 hours to start the fire to heat their bath water. Throughout the weekend I fine tuned my disciplinary techniques as I was one of the volunteers sleeping in the hall with the boys. It was after 11pm one of the nights and the boys were still being rowdy, all I could think of was having to be the one to wake them up at 5am and that finally did the trick as I calmly threatened the boys with moving my sleeping bag to where they were sleeping. One of the ring leaders said, “No ma’am we are afraid of you” At 11pm all I could say was good go to sleep. Although that was not a highlight of the GLOW camp for me I do think it showed my growth. I know that previously I would have placed a higher value on getting all of the kids to like me however this year I was more comfortable being a disciplinarian and getting the kids to like me was secondary. First I wanted their respect and some sleep. I was so happy that I was a part of the Southern Region GLOW camp this year and I am also okay that it was my last PCV driven GLOW camp. Next step is getting my school to transition from vocal support of the camps to putting one on themselves. The best part of having a GLOW camp at Modisi (the school I work at) is that at 11pm at night I will have been sound asleep for hours and not sleeping at the foot of a bunch of 15 year-olds beds worried they are sneaking out.

Week 90: Grieving

 This week a teacher who I used to work with at Modisi passed away. Before entering peace corps I was given material on how to deal with death of community members in my service. I am lucky that this was the first time the material was relevant. I have been to countless funerals here but never of people that I was close with. I went to show my support of the community since I had just arrived and because I thought this made me part of the community. This week not only did my co-worker pass away but two of my closest friends in the village had family pass away as well. I felt as though I was surrounded by death, I was sad for the family, friends, and children that the loved ones left behind and more than that I was sad that as a culture the Batswana have become accustomed to death. I am not saying that any of these deaths were related to AIDS, I honestly don’t know if they were, as it is still not common for people to disclose their status, even to close family. However, when the HIV/AIDS epidemic came in the 90s it ravaged the country and no family was left untouched. I believe in a small way it normalized the death of family members. I am not saying it made it any easier but it definitely made it more common. This devastating part of Botswana’s history has left the people stronger in my opinion. Upon hearing of the death of my co-worker and my friends’ family members I was distraught and unclear how to proceed. For each of my friends I could see that they were hurting but they each took it in stride and their lives continued just now there were more mouths to feed at home and no more visits from Uncle. Peace Corps is full of highs and lows and through out this week I was also working on last minute preparations for a GLOW camp that I will tell you about next week.

Week 89: A Week Well Spent

Lesego is back. Last week grumpy city loving Dawn was being grouchy around the village but this week smiling slow paced Lesego is back. I really am grateful to live somewhere with such beautiful sunsets and the time to watch them. This week I spent an entire afternoon making Vindaloo, finished working on some Gender Based Violence lessons, and worked with the Eye nurse that came to the village. I also was able to celebrate the birthday of a peace corps friend with cake and the knowledge that I have met some amazing people who continuously remind me to see the positive and eat more cake! Back in the village I was able to hang out with my friend’s kids and share the simple pleasure of a candy cane. All in all I would say I am pretty lucky, a week well spent.