Settling In

Jess writes:

It’s been two weeks since the family moved out and Adam and I are finally starting to feel “settled in” to our new home. Our South African roommate, Leonard, was moved in over a week ago and we’re beginning to make a day-to-day schedule of somewhat normal, “family”, happenings – Leonard plays music in the mornings, we play music in the evenings, we trade-off sweeping days, we all share in washing dishes, the boys collect water and I distribute water (to the kitchen, bathroom, etc.), and since we’ve been experiencing a bit of snack-addiction as of late, we’ve introduced Leonard to the gloriousness of buttered popcorn and ice-cold Coke – what could be better!

As you can probably tell from Facebook photos, the house is coming along quite nicely – I think it’s really starting to look like a “home”, in fact! (I’m neglecting to mention here that our dining room looks a bit too much like a make-shift conference room, with its perfectly white table cloth and perfectly black chairs, surrounded by very educational maps and breakdowns of local government – ha!) Outside, we are beginning to plan out where the soon-to-be-built Braii pit will go (this will be super helpful on the weekends with no electricity) and how exactly we want to plot our mega-garden (we are calling it this because mom has bought us one of every known vegetable and a selection of fruits – so excited!).
At work, the kids have finally stopped chanting “Malungu” (“White Person”) whenever we enter the Center and have taken warmly to high-fives and “Sharp” thumbs instead… it’s a nice change! We are slowly getting to know some of the individual kids and have also had some great moments with the staff as of late. On the kid front, Adam has taken to a little guy that is too young to tell us his name, so we just call him “Sharp Sharp”, because he will seek out Adam to get to the thumb – ha! I have two little followers – the smallest one named Siyabonga and the slightly taller one (lol!) named Princess. On the staff front, the carers are finally calling us by name (instead of just “Ma”, etc.) and this last week we played “dress up” with some donated clothes for laughs. Slowly but surely we’re making headway at this Center, where we still don’t speak the language and still aren’t quite sure what our actual hour-to-hour responsibilities are. But it’s working!

As for the actual work part, Adam and I are in the initial phases of our “Organizational & Community Needs Assessment Report” as part of Phase II of Peace Corps Training. The report covers everything from government & infrastructure in Huntington (and at Swa Vana) to issues relating to health, education, transportation, social organization, communications and environment. In the end, we hope to have a report that will not only suffice as a Peace Corps requirement, but also serve as a document to help direct our work and the future work of Swa Vana, in relation to the needs of the Huntington community. I am also becoming more and more involved each day with the Girl’s Club’s “Bottle Project” (see bottle photos in our Facebook albums) and am beginning to outline some of the necessary steps in getting this project actually off the ground (its fumbling it’s way off the ground currently) and hopefully making it a sustainable, income-generating activity for the girls and the organization. Adam and the Boy’s Club are still awaiting further training on the “Brick Project” which will focus first and foremost on building the new Drop-In Center and then establishing a business plan as a second income-generating activity. Along the way, we’ve been assisting here and there with some of the high-schoolers academic projects, organizing some games, and making some initial attempts to feel out the staff and kid’s perceptions of currently available HIV/AIDS education and awareness programs. Suffice it to say, there’s not much being done in this respect at present, but it will obviously be a primary focus of ours to ensure that some education and awareness programs take shape at the Center.

The weather, you ask? Well it’s “Fall-to-Winter-ish” right now… but we’re coming to realize that this means little on most days. Our best guess is that this last week averaged somewhere between 34-38C, which should translate roughly to the mid-80s-90s. So… not quite winter yet. Although we do hear tales that it can get down to the 20sC… I’ll believe it when I see it. As for rain – oh that glorious, glorious rain – we don’t really have any anymore. So sad. It seems that most rain occurs in the Spring and Summer months (October – March) and not much at all in the… what do they call this… oh right, Fall and Winter (ha!). Sadly, this means that our beautiful JoJo is no longer collecting much water and the majority of our bath and dishwashing needs are met with 15L jugs that we haul to a borehole tap at the local Pre-School. Luckily, Swa Vana’s bakkie (truck) is now housed in our garage, so this actually makes getting the full jugs back to the house feasible on days that the bakkie is out and about!!

Finally, we’ve been able to spend some great time with local PCVs in the recent weeks. We typically meet up with our closest PCV, Jules, when we head into Hazyview for grocery and house shopping (she lives only a short walk from the main shopping center). We’ll usually make plans to meet at one of several eateries at the mall – Maxi’s, Nando’s, Debonair’s or Steer’s – and indulge (and by indulge I mean over-indulge) in a rather large and greasy burger and chips combo. Usually, this also means we’re quite physically ill in the following couple hours (our stomachs are definitely not accustomed to that hobby anymore!) and so, we try to plan lunch for the end of the shopping day, when only a coombie ride and some walking stands between us and our wonderful pit latrine!!! We also spent a stupendous “Ocho de Mayo” (yes, we were working on “Cinco de Mayo”) with a bunch of local PCVs from the SA18 and SA21 groups! Just picture it: toasty tortillas, spiced chicken and peppers, Mexican rice, minced meat, mounds of guacamole, mild and spicy pico de gallo, real sour cream (REAL!!), refried beans AND black beans (oh my!), and some good ‘ol Margaritas!!!! Yes, we were sick after this meal too – lol! But its soooooo worth every second of gut-wrenching pain (literally, gut-wrenching) to enjoy a Mexican feast! And of course, time spent with fellow-PCVs is always thoroughly enjoyable – filled with lots of stories, lots of complaints, and always tons and tons of laughter about the ridiculous situations we often find ourselves in! And yes, just as this paragraph suggests, we spent a lot of time thinking about food, so yes again, time spent with other PCVers is often filled with not only eating, but talking also, about all sorts of food!!! We’re sort of slaves to good food in this country!!

So let’s see… house, roommate, work, actual work, weather, food, fellow PCVs, and more food… I think I’ve covered it all! As always, we’ll be sure to keep you posted with our Peace Corps happenings, and of course a selection of “Random Weekly Observations” whenever they pop up. And also as always, we love to see your comments and get your messages via Blogger or Facebook, so be sure to keep in touch!

We love and miss you all – Sala kahle!