It's the Time of Year For. . .

...Spring? Over the past couple of months, pouring rains have rinsed the dusty city revealing a brighter, greener place. Gardens flourished (my assistant teacher asked me if I wanted some spinach from her yard and when I answered in the affirmative, delivered it to me in a bag so enormous it was like being handed a sack of trash) and were then ruined by the hail that followed. The hail stripped the evergreen trees of their needles and for once, the school campus, which never seems to get green no matter how much it rains, appeared to have a lawn. For days, the gardeners did nothing but collect these clumps of needles in their wheelbarrows, slowly restoring the natural beige and removing the intoxicating smell of wet pine. There were several thunderstorms, so rhythmic they lulled me to sleep, and a few that had me jumping out of my skin in accordance with my relatively new fear of lightening (getting struck by lightening is more common in Lesotho than in most places and my neighbor can attest to this fact from personal experience). Then we had a string of several breezy, sun burnt days, the kind of days that are perfect for hanging laundry to dry. I had my classroom heaters put in storage yesterday, and replaced with a fan just in time for cold, gray rains. In complete denial, I braved the day with no jacket and no umbrella and then, for the second time as of late, ended up having to go to the library to strip and lay my clothes out to dry. (I use the library for this purpose because it is really the only place on campus without generous windows and because the librarian doesn’t get startled when I say, “Can I take my pants off in here?”)

The other good thing about the hail stripping leaves of their foliage is that it restored the line of sight to my far off classroom and I got internet again!

Nice green campus. . .

…Harvesting stone fruits. Subsequently, the Cherry Festival (just a little ways over the border into South Africa) is taking place this weekend. It’s really just a mediocre fair in what is probably the dullest part of the country, and my determination to attend despite these facts is a true testament to the fact that I have been in Lesotho too long. My equally determined colleague agrees and our attempts to remain excited border on pathetic. She’ll say something about the food being good, and I’ll say, “yeah, if you don’t mind what it tastes like so long as it’s served on a stick.” Then I’ll say something about the quality of the crafts and she’ll call it boardwalk junk. Then I’ll mention two stands out of one hundred that had nice crafts (which I only remember because I bought things at them) before conceding that even those weren’t that nice. “Pony rides?” I’ll say, helpfully. “Cherry liquor?” she’ll reply in the same tone.

...Thanksgiving. This same teacher invited me to celebrate Thanksgiving with her family. I asked if they go around the table and make everyone say what they’re thankful for. She confirmed that they do not participate in this awkward ritual so I agreed to come bearing a stone fruit inspired dessert. Last year at this time when I was constantly stir-crazy, I had planned a long weekend at the beach for the Thanksgiving break. What should have been a five-hour ride on public transportation became a 36 hour string of zigzagging rides on public transportation to four different towns. In three of them, as I walked around, cars pulled up alongside me and two Afrikaaner and one Indian driver told me to get inside and that I was crazy to walk around. In one of these towns I ended up having to stay overnight, and my hotel room had accidentally been double-booked for a play pump-building (www.onedifference.org/water/projects/playpumps) South African who gave me quite a shock when he appeared in the doorway. I think I’m ready for a calmer, less mobile holiday this year.

…A new cohort of Peace Corps volunteers descends on the capital. This matters only to me as an elementary school friend I have not seen in more than a decade is among the freshly arrived. As you know, Peace Corps gave me a hard time about meeting up with her at first, but finally a friend in the office took pity on me and gave me a detailed list of instructions on how to find her. I have never before in Africa entered a roomful of white people and have them all turn around and stare. They had been locked up in the training center for five days and were seriously lacking contact with the outside world. We had a brief but joyous reunion that mostly consisted of us taking turns saying, “this is soooo crazy!” She was even more disoriented than I with the jet lag, culture shock and general confusion that results from newly moving overseas. A crowd of volunteers surrounded me and attempted to pump me for information about Lesotho but I kept my mouth shut, one of the conditions of being allowed to infiltrate the training session.

…Parent-Teacher Conferences. I have five hours to talk about 20 children with no breaks in between. And what do we talk about? Well, I am slightly concerned about the way one only child is approaching the impending birth of his first sibling, whom he has named named Spritzel (Spritzy for short) while in utero, and wants to christen Dino Ghost after birth. There is another parent who I can show no samples of student work (drawings, paintings, etc) except every available surface of the classroom that Refiloe took the liberty to scribble on. Then there is Isabella, with the most endearing quality of being attracted to expensive and/or dangerous appliances like a moth to a flame, until her curiosity was somewhat curbed recently when she peered at the book scanner in the library and accidentally scanned her own eyeball. I’m looking forward to a pounding headache and a parched throat by Wednesday evening. A far more experienced teacher than I told me that if parents ask an uncomfortable question about my teaching methods, I should tell them they should believe half of what their children say about school and I will believe half of what their children tell me about them!

I'll be thinking about all you far away people on Thursday. Watch out for the tofurkey. . .