The First Forty-Two
Last week I ran the Soweto Marathon, a 42 kilometer (26.2 mile race). Soweto is a township of Johannesburg, South Africa, and this was my first time to experience the city outside of the airport. The race is advertised as an interesting and surprisingly good way to get a flavor of Soweto, which, as once the center of apartheid resistance and home to Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu, has a significant place in South African history.
Registering was easy enough and I even arranged to have the day off from work post race. But getting myself there was trickier. As much as I like to believe I am an incredibly lucky person and can outrun the bad guys (and gals), even I know that to be in taxi rank at night in Johannesburg is an idiotic risk (although I did try to manipulate a few people into admitting it can’t be that bad). I couldn’t find any other marathoners in Maseru, but as my search for a lift circulated through the expatriate grapevine, about a dozen people conspired to keep me out of the exhaust fume, mugging zone jungle of public transportation. In the end it was my supervisor’s wife’s colleague’s friend who gave me a ride. People were appalled that I considered arriving in Jo’burg in the evening alone on public transportation, but no one thought twice at the idea of me driving across international borders with a man I’d never met before.
We planned to leave on the afternoon of Halloween, but being the last Friday of the month (pay day), I knew that the lines at the border would be hours long, so I went there at 5 am when the border post is fairly deserted. I was following the popular but shady advice of stamping out of Lesotho and into South Africa, and then coming back into Lesotho without getting a stamp. Thus you come back to the border any time that day and can skip the lines because you already have a stamp with the correct date. Even though people do it all the time, I felt like a fugitive and was utterly paranoid that all of the immigration police were intentionally surrounding me. (They weren’t. They were more or less sleeping while standing up). In any case, no one paid any attention at all to me as I “snuck” out of one country and into another, but just in case, I tried to look as lost and stupid as possible (“Wait, which way is South Africa? Oh, right, there’s that gargantuan ‘Welcome to South Africa’ sign. But how the heck am I supposed to get there from here?’ Oh, the sidewalk. Ok, well thanks for your help”).
After a day of over-stimulating Halloween festivities at the school, I was off. We drove into the city at twilight, and it was the closest thing I’ve seen to America since I watched New York City peel away from the airplane when I took off in June. The highways were like those you’d see anywhere back home, and lights glowed in the windows of high rises. Melville, the neighborhood of Jo’burg we arrived in, reminded me a bit of Williamsburg, Brooklyn- bars and bookshops and bakeries and nice restaurants and a tattoo parlor. About a dozen of us from Maseru-dwelling foreigners met up for dinner, where I was really excited to try ostrich, but was really disappointed with what ostrich actually is- a slab of red meat (although surely not to those with a more sophisticated carnivorous palate). A woman sitting across from me kept saying over and over again that she couldn’t believe we haven’t met. She seemed really distressed by this fact, like I was missing very important meetings of the Pale People in Lesotho Club. The following night- the night before the race- I met up with a friend and he and his family loaded me up with my favorite carbs- pasta, couscous and chocolate cake.
On race day, my biggest initial concern was how to adjust my brain to pace myself in terms of kilometers. Even in cross country races or road races in which the total distance is measured in kilometers (a 5K race, for example), the splits are still marked by mile. Until now, I never thought about how weird it was to talk about 6 minute miles in a five-kilometer race. ANYway, this shouldn’t have been my concern because although there were kilometer markers, there were no clocks to go with them and I didn’t even have a watch. Plus, at about the time I realized that I would have no way of timing myself (kilometer 3 or so), something inside my body I have yet to identify was threatening to turn off and I decided I would be lucky just to finish. I didn’t get any blisters, the chafing was not as comprehensive as it could have been, I had no pain and even my knee that gets funky from time to time behaved itself, but I was dragging myself the whole way. The woozier I felt, the slower I went, so the later it got and the hotter it got, which made me even more woozy.
But the internal revolts I felt in my body are hardly as interesting as what I saw (blurred vision and all) and heard around me. Lining up for the race, I strategically positioned myself alongside a circle of runners singing and dancing. The race officials gave all of the instructions in Zulu and Afrikaans, and if they were also speaking English, between the crackle of the sound equipment and South African accents, I didn’t recognize it as my language. So even as I felt myself inching forward with the crowd I didn’t know the race had started. Suddenly I was passing over the starting line through a stream of confetti, boxed behind a man whose shirt said, “I run for Jesus.”
It was 6 am and we were in a residential neighborhood of tiny one-story homes. People were standing outside in their pajamas looking doubtfully at us. One large woman in too-big, metallic gold negligee was holding out a tub of Vaseline for the runners. We ran by a hair salon and a man on the roof blew his horn for us. Passing the gas station all of attendants looked up from their pumps or from underneath cars and cheered. On street corners here and there, people stood holding messages scribbled on cardboard signs, and shouted in languages I didn’t recognize. At nearly every kilometer, people of all ages handed out plastic bags of water. When the crates of water emptied, mothers put their babies inside to sleep and pulled them into the shade. There were also the same sachets filled with sticky, colored sugar water and a dozen meters from each “juice” table were a slew of neighborhood kids begging the runners for their drinks. One man grabbed about ten and carried them for several minutes before depositing them into the hands of shirtless, sweaty children who shrieked with delight.
As the day wore on, the heat from the sun was staggering and relentless. The lack of trees along the route, and the black asphalt made it all the more suffocating. Sympathetic spectators stood on their lawns spraying hoses at the runners. Others filled buckets with water, dipping a single mug into it again and again, offering it to any runner passing by. Still others invited the passing crowd into their homes to use the toilets or fill their bottles from the tap. I was a bit wary of the share-the-mug-with-a-thousand-other-people method, and I had a feeling that if I went inside someone’s home, I would never want to leave. So I drank sachet after sachet of water that tasted more like the plastic bag than any other experience I’ve had with H2O.
As the morning wore on, I saw many more people going about their daily business who just happened to be in the path of the race. Young people hawked produce on the side of the road, old ladies walked out of churches singing and I even went by a backyard wedding. For several kilometers I ran alongside a man with yellow sunglasses and long dreadlocks, who periodically told me to “take it easy baby.” At one point we ran through the neighborhood in which he lives, and he pointed out his neighbors, his doctor, his minister among the spectators to me. I wouldn’t have guessed he knew any of the spectators if he hadn’t said anything, not because they weren’t cheering for him, but because they were cheering for everyone. All of the spectators were just screaming for the runners as if they knew them personally. Part of that is just marathon culture, but there was a much more intense level of commitment to the runners on the part of the spectators than I’ve seen in New York or Philly or Boston. And I think I can say the same for the level of commitment from one runner to another. When I finished the race, I stood swaying in the grass, trying to unsuccessfully open a bottle of water. An equally sweaty and exhausted, if more lucid, South African mom in shining armor scooped me up into her car and drove for ages to her home for lunch and then way back across the city to my hotel. So ended my first 42 kilometers in South Africa.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
20 Questions
I have recently become the subject of interview for a charming class of fourth graders. They are studying the fifty states under the direction of their incredible Masotho teacher, who is teaching in an American school, and therefore American geography, for the first time. The three other American teachers and the American director have also been pulled into similar service of answering questions about “their” state. Originally, I was to be interviewed by three different students on three separate occasions and thought, “I’ll talk about a different state- NJ, NY and MA- for each interview to widen the scope of their 50 states knowledge.” I went with NJ first, because I was being interviewed by a fourth grader and I attended fourth grade in NJ. It seemed like a good idea.
My first interviewer happened to my brother’s Fijian born twin- same coloring, facial features (especially the ears), visible ribs, sense of humor- they even run the same and it’s a little freaky. I was all ready to talk about the Jersey shore and toll booths and all the undeserved crap NJ takes from the bigger, more boring states. But this kid wanted to know how many people live there (No idea. Pass). He asked what the economy is like (I don’t even know what that means. Pass.) He wanted to know what people eat there (I said, “tomatoes. Well, I eat them anyway.”) When he asked if New Jersey is safe, I told him that the smaller towns are quiet and safe, but that urban areas are more dangerous because of crime. I looked over his shoulder and saw that he wrote “safe and dangerous.” When he asked about natural resources, I told him about lumber from the Pine Barrens (I don’t even know if that’s an actual resource. I mean, the Pine Barrens are full of trees, and people cut down trees, but for all I know it could be a protected area) and all of the things you can grow in Garden State soil. Under natural resources he wrote, “Wood. Dirt.”
Despite the success of that first interview, the teacher reworked the process and decided to have me come in and be interviewed by the whole class. This time, I knew the questions so I was better prepared. I was able to jot down the answers I knew and look up ones that I didn’t, so I wouldn’t appear completely oblivious and ignorant. When I got through the history, economy, politics questions, I was able to move on to the good stuff, like diners and autumn leaves and Spanish and trains to New York City. I then got into a passionate exchange with two students who claimed they ate bagels in India and China (please don’t accuse me of ethnocentrism, but impossible!). I tried to explain to these poor bagel-deprived children that they were merely eating bread with a hole in the middle. Another kid tried to compare a bagel to a doughnut, and I almost lost it. When I went through all of the questions on the list, they asked me more, like how New Jersey is one of the wealthiest states in America, while Newark one of the poorest cities in the country (anyone?) and how to spell “Representative”- slightly easier, easier than “Appalachian,” anyway. After my interview, one of the Virginian teachers asked me if I talked about the mafia. In turn, I asked him if he talked about rednecks, and he said, “yes.”
While I’m still in interview mode, I’ll move along to some of the questions some of you have been asking me:
What country are you in again?
This question is from my brother. Really. Lesotho. And please, it’s pronounced, Le-soo-too.
Why don’t I get notified when you update your blog?
If you mean, why don’t I email you when I update the blog, it’s because that would defeat the purpose. Namely, unwanted emails can become annoying and I tend to ramble. The blog is available for perusal whenever you feel like it and easier to ignore. But if you mean, why doesn’t blogspot email you when I update the blog, I have no idea how that stuff works.
Why is Lesotho inside South Africa?
I’m still trying to work that one out myself. From what I gather, the story may go something like this:
Early-mid 19th century Basotho people (in what is now Lesotho and the Free State of South Africa) fought Boer (people of Dutch Calvanist descent) and British invasion.
Basotho perceived the Boers as a bigger threat (I think?) and asked England for protection.
Britain annexed the land and called it Basotholand.
When the Union of South Africa was formed, Basotholand was a British protectorate and so, not included.
For 45 years, Basotholand remained a British protectorate and then became independent. And became Lesotho.
My neighbor thinks Lesotho shouldn’t exist and says the only it hasn’t become incorporated into South Africa is because “South Africa doesn’t want another two million problems.” He loves Lesotho.
How is veganism in Africa?
Ha! In Africa, or rather from my experiences in Ghana, Malawi, Lesotho and places in between, you eat what’s around, you eat what people serve you, you eat what makes sense. You also eat what is fresh and local and often that includes fish, meat, eggs, (but my disgust with milk long predates my veganism and I don’t think that will ever change). I ate all sorts of Indian Ocean treats in Mozambique, and I’m curious to try South African game- kudu or ostrich or something like that. Basotho carnivore staples are beef and chicken, and to a lesser extent, goat and lamb and those options are less appealing to me.
What is the town you live in like?
It’s hard for me to judge the scope of Maseru, but for the capital city, it seems small. The downtown is small anyway, but the outskirts seem to sprawl and I can’t get a definitive answer about where Maseru ends and begins. There are a few major streets, and many, many smaller ones, which often don’t have names, such as mine. My neighborhood, which contains a little cluster of Americans, is very small, although I don’t know my neighbors (outside of my compound). There are banks and Kentucky Fried Chicken and a few South African chains here and there. There is one café where you can get filter coffee, and a pizza place that has good food although not actually pizza (the other pizza places are foul- one place makes a pizza they call Rustica, which among other things contains bananas, hotdogs and thousand island dressing). I got back recently from a conference in Swaziland, and the other American teachers and I couldn’t stop making comparisons. One described Mbabane, the capital of Swaziland as Maseru on steroids. Another heard Swaziland described “like Lesotho that learned.” I thought it was more like “Lesotho with stuff.” There are just a lot of things you can’t get here like construction paper and fat markers and tahini and vanilla and big picture frames.
What is your school like?
The school is small and close knit. We follow an American style curriculum and go from preschool to grade 8. Just over half of the students are Basotho and others come from America, Holland, Germany, France, Australia, Mali, Kenya, Palestine, Phillipines and more countries than I can remember. Staff hails from here, Uganda, Malawi, Zambia, Sweden, America, Australia and DRC. The school used to be USAID housing so it’s made up of small buildings and looks like summer camp.
What do your days look like in Lesotho?
I teach preschool in the mornings and early afternoon and then I teach art to first, third and fourth graders. And I assistant teach P.E. (Ha!) I’ve been trying to get out of that since day one, but perhaps someone will listen when we begin swimming lessons. Anyway, when I’m not teaching something or other, I’m at a local orphanage washing and feeding and tickling and changing babies. And when I’m not doing that, I’m running.
What have been the most challenging aspects of your time so far? The most joyous?
Relocating to a new place, especially one halfway around the world is just inherently challenging. I have to get used to doing things that are completely stupid and hilarious to locals, and not be offended when they are amused. I have to train my brain to think in rand and Celsius and liters and meters, and say “bin” and “jumper,” so I don’t get blank stares when I tell students to put their tissue in the “garbage can” and their “sweater” on the hook. But I refuse to say “trousers.” It’s a horrible word.
I get lost more than usual here, and the public transportation system is senseless.
Learning Sesotho has made me long for the French I used to dread, or even Hebrew. Simply reading my students’ names on a list makes me feel illiterate: an “l” followed by a vowel sounds like a “d,” “t” followed by “l” becomes a gurgly k, “h” followed by “l” becomes phlegm, and “q” is an explosive click I will never master. “Oe” sounds like “way,” “oa” sounds like “wa,” “u” sounds like “o,” and as you’ve all learned, “o” sounds like “oo,” sometimes anyway. I have a student named Lehlohonolo for goodness sakes, and another who has four vowels in a row in his name. And then there’s learning how to actually speak in sentences. The school custodian who is tutoring me insists that I’m making progress, but I don’t know the word for “liar.”
Lastly, it can be a little confining living in gates inside gates, and being told I can’t walk around alone at night. Not that there’s much to do, or any light to see by, but I’d like the option.
Many of the challenges are also the most satisfying aspects of being here- being forced to see everything freshly, to always be aware and alert and interested in some little thing you pass by.
Joyous? Happy children. And less so, happy parents and happy colleagues. Beautiful runs.
Are you dancing?
Yes. I sing with my students every day and this often involves dancing. I also teach a dance class once a week for my preschool class and the first grade. I’m going be teaching dance after school for the next few terms, and I may have been tricked into putting something together for the play in December. (It’s so tricky, I don’t even know if I was tricked or not). I’m still looking for dance classes and spaces for me though.
Are you meeting many new people?
There are a lot of people here. And I didn’t know any of them when I arrived. So . . . yeah? I mean, it’s impossible not to, but I could probably be more proactive- about finding people who share my interests for instance.
What is surprising you about this place?
This neon pink meat everyone loves. It looks like baloney. They call it paloney.
What is the expat community like where you are living?
Small, incestuous and drunk. Or small, incestuous and Jesus-loving. Overall good people, but I am trying not to get sucked in to having a convenient, ready-made group of friends. I mean, I didn’t come all this way to hang out with a guy from Connecticut. People look out for each other though, and that’s nice.
What is the funniest thing a kid has said or done so far?
I can’t pick one. I have one student for whom English is a second language. Somehow she learned to say, “I don’t want” instead of “I want.” Before I realized this, we had a few conversations that went like this:
Child: I don’t want to paint
Me: Ok, you don’t have to paint.
Child: (Louder) I don’t want to paint!
Me: That’s fine. Don’t paint. I won’t give you paint.
Child: I DON’T WANT TO PAAAAAAIIIINNNNNNT!!!
ME: OKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!
I have another child who refused to go the music room with the rest of the class so I said, “You have a choice. You can walk to the music room, or I can carry you.” He flung himself under a table, so I had to crawl under after him, extract him and carry him kicking and screaming with the rest of the class to the music room. When we got there, he threw himself on the floor sobbing, “I have no choices! I have no choices!”
In one of my art classes, the students had the option of making a drawing at home on the theme “world harmony” to celebrate the world harmony run, a relay race that is going through Lesotho the first time this year. One girl didn’t quite understand the torch part of it (they will be carrying something like the Olympic torch) so drew three girls holding hands with torches on their heads, and they look like they are burning to death. Another boy missed the theme entirely and brought in a picture of a scuba diver being eaten by sharks.
The funniest things I’ve done so far was take a colleague’s advice that it’s really fun for kids when you make popcorn with the lid of the air popper off, letting the popcorn fly all over a clean sheet on the floor, and having the kids eat off the sheet. I failed to take in the part that the children should stand back while the kernels are actually popping. I think I even told the kids to “gather ‘round” to see better. If you have keener foresight than me, you may be envisioning the children being pelted with scalding hot kernels. I had to kiss a lot of popcorn wounds that day, but no one was scarred or blinded and I didn’t even get fired.
What are the ways you take care of yourself and maintain yourself?
I don’t know if this counts, but I go to the only store in the country that sells M&Ms and I buy a bag. I run. I write letters to all of you or read the ones you have sent. If I have a reason to vent, I find other Americans and do it at them. I read. Listen to good music by good people:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=11140956
www.myspace.com/amylousings
www.myspace.com/joshlerner
www.myspace./laurameyermusic
Does it hurt your feelings that when I see barf bags I think of you?
Not in the slightest. (This questions from the Kate Lechstar, in a letter that she wrote on a barf bag).
MY TURN:
What color(s) are the leaves outside your window right now?
What are you going to be for Halloween?
How do you feel about the upcoming election?
When are you coming to visit?
My first interviewer happened to my brother’s Fijian born twin- same coloring, facial features (especially the ears), visible ribs, sense of humor- they even run the same and it’s a little freaky. I was all ready to talk about the Jersey shore and toll booths and all the undeserved crap NJ takes from the bigger, more boring states. But this kid wanted to know how many people live there (No idea. Pass). He asked what the economy is like (I don’t even know what that means. Pass.) He wanted to know what people eat there (I said, “tomatoes. Well, I eat them anyway.”) When he asked if New Jersey is safe, I told him that the smaller towns are quiet and safe, but that urban areas are more dangerous because of crime. I looked over his shoulder and saw that he wrote “safe and dangerous.” When he asked about natural resources, I told him about lumber from the Pine Barrens (I don’t even know if that’s an actual resource. I mean, the Pine Barrens are full of trees, and people cut down trees, but for all I know it could be a protected area) and all of the things you can grow in Garden State soil. Under natural resources he wrote, “Wood. Dirt.”
Despite the success of that first interview, the teacher reworked the process and decided to have me come in and be interviewed by the whole class. This time, I knew the questions so I was better prepared. I was able to jot down the answers I knew and look up ones that I didn’t, so I wouldn’t appear completely oblivious and ignorant. When I got through the history, economy, politics questions, I was able to move on to the good stuff, like diners and autumn leaves and Spanish and trains to New York City. I then got into a passionate exchange with two students who claimed they ate bagels in India and China (please don’t accuse me of ethnocentrism, but impossible!). I tried to explain to these poor bagel-deprived children that they were merely eating bread with a hole in the middle. Another kid tried to compare a bagel to a doughnut, and I almost lost it. When I went through all of the questions on the list, they asked me more, like how New Jersey is one of the wealthiest states in America, while Newark one of the poorest cities in the country (anyone?) and how to spell “Representative”- slightly easier, easier than “Appalachian,” anyway. After my interview, one of the Virginian teachers asked me if I talked about the mafia. In turn, I asked him if he talked about rednecks, and he said, “yes.”
While I’m still in interview mode, I’ll move along to some of the questions some of you have been asking me:
What country are you in again?
This question is from my brother. Really. Lesotho. And please, it’s pronounced, Le-soo-too.
Why don’t I get notified when you update your blog?
If you mean, why don’t I email you when I update the blog, it’s because that would defeat the purpose. Namely, unwanted emails can become annoying and I tend to ramble. The blog is available for perusal whenever you feel like it and easier to ignore. But if you mean, why doesn’t blogspot email you when I update the blog, I have no idea how that stuff works.
Why is Lesotho inside South Africa?
I’m still trying to work that one out myself. From what I gather, the story may go something like this:
Early-mid 19th century Basotho people (in what is now Lesotho and the Free State of South Africa) fought Boer (people of Dutch Calvanist descent) and British invasion.
Basotho perceived the Boers as a bigger threat (I think?) and asked England for protection.
Britain annexed the land and called it Basotholand.
When the Union of South Africa was formed, Basotholand was a British protectorate and so, not included.
For 45 years, Basotholand remained a British protectorate and then became independent. And became Lesotho.
My neighbor thinks Lesotho shouldn’t exist and says the only it hasn’t become incorporated into South Africa is because “South Africa doesn’t want another two million problems.” He loves Lesotho.
How is veganism in Africa?
Ha! In Africa, or rather from my experiences in Ghana, Malawi, Lesotho and places in between, you eat what’s around, you eat what people serve you, you eat what makes sense. You also eat what is fresh and local and often that includes fish, meat, eggs, (but my disgust with milk long predates my veganism and I don’t think that will ever change). I ate all sorts of Indian Ocean treats in Mozambique, and I’m curious to try South African game- kudu or ostrich or something like that. Basotho carnivore staples are beef and chicken, and to a lesser extent, goat and lamb and those options are less appealing to me.
What is the town you live in like?
It’s hard for me to judge the scope of Maseru, but for the capital city, it seems small. The downtown is small anyway, but the outskirts seem to sprawl and I can’t get a definitive answer about where Maseru ends and begins. There are a few major streets, and many, many smaller ones, which often don’t have names, such as mine. My neighborhood, which contains a little cluster of Americans, is very small, although I don’t know my neighbors (outside of my compound). There are banks and Kentucky Fried Chicken and a few South African chains here and there. There is one café where you can get filter coffee, and a pizza place that has good food although not actually pizza (the other pizza places are foul- one place makes a pizza they call Rustica, which among other things contains bananas, hotdogs and thousand island dressing). I got back recently from a conference in Swaziland, and the other American teachers and I couldn’t stop making comparisons. One described Mbabane, the capital of Swaziland as Maseru on steroids. Another heard Swaziland described “like Lesotho that learned.” I thought it was more like “Lesotho with stuff.” There are just a lot of things you can’t get here like construction paper and fat markers and tahini and vanilla and big picture frames.
What is your school like?
The school is small and close knit. We follow an American style curriculum and go from preschool to grade 8. Just over half of the students are Basotho and others come from America, Holland, Germany, France, Australia, Mali, Kenya, Palestine, Phillipines and more countries than I can remember. Staff hails from here, Uganda, Malawi, Zambia, Sweden, America, Australia and DRC. The school used to be USAID housing so it’s made up of small buildings and looks like summer camp.
What do your days look like in Lesotho?
I teach preschool in the mornings and early afternoon and then I teach art to first, third and fourth graders. And I assistant teach P.E. (Ha!) I’ve been trying to get out of that since day one, but perhaps someone will listen when we begin swimming lessons. Anyway, when I’m not teaching something or other, I’m at a local orphanage washing and feeding and tickling and changing babies. And when I’m not doing that, I’m running.
What have been the most challenging aspects of your time so far? The most joyous?
Relocating to a new place, especially one halfway around the world is just inherently challenging. I have to get used to doing things that are completely stupid and hilarious to locals, and not be offended when they are amused. I have to train my brain to think in rand and Celsius and liters and meters, and say “bin” and “jumper,” so I don’t get blank stares when I tell students to put their tissue in the “garbage can” and their “sweater” on the hook. But I refuse to say “trousers.” It’s a horrible word.
I get lost more than usual here, and the public transportation system is senseless.
Learning Sesotho has made me long for the French I used to dread, or even Hebrew. Simply reading my students’ names on a list makes me feel illiterate: an “l” followed by a vowel sounds like a “d,” “t” followed by “l” becomes a gurgly k, “h” followed by “l” becomes phlegm, and “q” is an explosive click I will never master. “Oe” sounds like “way,” “oa” sounds like “wa,” “u” sounds like “o,” and as you’ve all learned, “o” sounds like “oo,” sometimes anyway. I have a student named Lehlohonolo for goodness sakes, and another who has four vowels in a row in his name. And then there’s learning how to actually speak in sentences. The school custodian who is tutoring me insists that I’m making progress, but I don’t know the word for “liar.”
Lastly, it can be a little confining living in gates inside gates, and being told I can’t walk around alone at night. Not that there’s much to do, or any light to see by, but I’d like the option.
Many of the challenges are also the most satisfying aspects of being here- being forced to see everything freshly, to always be aware and alert and interested in some little thing you pass by.
Joyous? Happy children. And less so, happy parents and happy colleagues. Beautiful runs.
Are you dancing?
Yes. I sing with my students every day and this often involves dancing. I also teach a dance class once a week for my preschool class and the first grade. I’m going be teaching dance after school for the next few terms, and I may have been tricked into putting something together for the play in December. (It’s so tricky, I don’t even know if I was tricked or not). I’m still looking for dance classes and spaces for me though.
Are you meeting many new people?
There are a lot of people here. And I didn’t know any of them when I arrived. So . . . yeah? I mean, it’s impossible not to, but I could probably be more proactive- about finding people who share my interests for instance.
What is surprising you about this place?
This neon pink meat everyone loves. It looks like baloney. They call it paloney.
What is the expat community like where you are living?
Small, incestuous and drunk. Or small, incestuous and Jesus-loving. Overall good people, but I am trying not to get sucked in to having a convenient, ready-made group of friends. I mean, I didn’t come all this way to hang out with a guy from Connecticut. People look out for each other though, and that’s nice.
What is the funniest thing a kid has said or done so far?
I can’t pick one. I have one student for whom English is a second language. Somehow she learned to say, “I don’t want” instead of “I want.” Before I realized this, we had a few conversations that went like this:
Child: I don’t want to paint
Me: Ok, you don’t have to paint.
Child: (Louder) I don’t want to paint!
Me: That’s fine. Don’t paint. I won’t give you paint.
Child: I DON’T WANT TO PAAAAAAIIIINNNNNNT!!!
ME: OKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!
I have another child who refused to go the music room with the rest of the class so I said, “You have a choice. You can walk to the music room, or I can carry you.” He flung himself under a table, so I had to crawl under after him, extract him and carry him kicking and screaming with the rest of the class to the music room. When we got there, he threw himself on the floor sobbing, “I have no choices! I have no choices!”
In one of my art classes, the students had the option of making a drawing at home on the theme “world harmony” to celebrate the world harmony run, a relay race that is going through Lesotho the first time this year. One girl didn’t quite understand the torch part of it (they will be carrying something like the Olympic torch) so drew three girls holding hands with torches on their heads, and they look like they are burning to death. Another boy missed the theme entirely and brought in a picture of a scuba diver being eaten by sharks.
The funniest things I’ve done so far was take a colleague’s advice that it’s really fun for kids when you make popcorn with the lid of the air popper off, letting the popcorn fly all over a clean sheet on the floor, and having the kids eat off the sheet. I failed to take in the part that the children should stand back while the kernels are actually popping. I think I even told the kids to “gather ‘round” to see better. If you have keener foresight than me, you may be envisioning the children being pelted with scalding hot kernels. I had to kiss a lot of popcorn wounds that day, but no one was scarred or blinded and I didn’t even get fired.
What are the ways you take care of yourself and maintain yourself?
I don’t know if this counts, but I go to the only store in the country that sells M&Ms and I buy a bag. I run. I write letters to all of you or read the ones you have sent. If I have a reason to vent, I find other Americans and do it at them. I read. Listen to good music by good people:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=11140956
www.myspace.com/amylousings
www.myspace.com/joshlerner
www.myspace./laurameyermusic
Does it hurt your feelings that when I see barf bags I think of you?
Not in the slightest. (This questions from the Kate Lechstar, in a letter that she wrote on a barf bag).
MY TURN:
What color(s) are the leaves outside your window right now?
What are you going to be for Halloween?
How do you feel about the upcoming election?
When are you coming to visit?
Monday, September 22, 2008
Settling In
My traveling served one of it’s purposes well because by the time I got back to Lesotho, I couldn’t wait to have an address and my own room (not to mention house) and to store my stuff in drawers instead of on my back. I live in the capital of Maseru in a pretty safe neighborhood, although I haven’t yet found someone who will tell me it’s fine to walk around at night (and I only ask the people I think are most likely to tell me that I can). The flats where I live have 24-hour security and there are iron bars on all my windows and iron gates over the doors. They are decorative enough that I don’t feel like an inmate, and to be honest, I’m more afraid of being trapped inside, than of someone else getting in.
I live across from the Pope’s Field, a huge green space with a little white cross-adorned podium in the middle, which was built a few years ago when the pope came to speak. I don’t have a yard, but I have some scrubby grass and I can watch the king’s goats and sheep and cows graze on it while I do my laundry (The king and prime minister are the only people allowed to have livestock in the city. Technically, it could be the prime minister’s animals, but that doesn’t make hanging my socks to dry as exciting as when I think I’m in the company of the royal sheep). I haven’t seen the king yet, just his sheep and cars and children who attend the Kindermusik classes held at my school. He lives around the corner from Shop Rite in a mansion-sized version of the Brady Bunch house.
My friend Angela asked me what my favorite thing about Lesotho is. I’m pretty sure that it is even in the city, which isn’t very attractive as far as cities go, anyway I turn there is a gorgeous view. Every time I go out for a run, I like Maseru- and Lesotho- more. Every road eventually winds around a hill or a mountain, and as I run around and around it looks like the whole city is spinning underneath me.
Today, I could see snow in the mountains. Down where I was, it was warm and sunny with bright blue skies but some nights I sleep in a sleeping bag stuffed with hot water bottles underneath a down comforter, with a heater on and I’m still cold. Some days I teach with my jacket on, and other’s I strip off layers as the hours pass, chug water and get sunburned. We’re in the dry season and when the wind blows, everything becomes coated with a layer of dust. But the seasons are changing. I saw rain for the first time yesterday, and am still waiting for one of the spectacular lightening storms I have heard so much about.
After getting back from Zambia, I stayed in Maseru for about 12 hours before heading to South Africa. As happy as I was to have a permanent home, I was scheduled to start working the next day, and I anticipated itchy feet in the near future. More importantly, the principal offered me a ride with him and his family to a pretty little town that cannot be reached with public transportation. Unlike the rest of the Free State, Clarens, South Africa is full of art and antiques and gourmet food shops and four-star restaurants (with $7 meals!). We arrived mid-morning and since the principal and his wife insist on eating in their favorite restaurant twice each trip, we had breakfast at 11 am and lunch 2 hours later. In between, I strolled the town and art gazed and bought some toilet bowl cleaner and sponges. When the principal surveyed my purchases he said, “important things,” but I could tell he was appalled that he brought me all the way to Clarens (which Lonely Planet describes as “the jewel of the Free State”) and I shopped for bathroom cleaning supplies. Before we headed back to Lesotho, I bought two homemade truffles and a bar of peppermint soap to make up for it. The chocolates were delicious, and frankly, I licked the soap, which was not as delicious but tasted edible.
When I got back, I tried to get as organized as possible. My house came with seventeen keys and I spent a good amount of time trying to figure out what they are all for (impossible). My living space is enormous for one person. Not seventeen keys enormous, but I have two bedrooms and two bathrooms, a kitchen and a huge living room. It’s falling apart a little, but it’s nice to have space and lots of big windows. My house was stocked with basic supplies when I arrived, and since there is a South African department store called Ackerman’s, it was pretty cool that when I arrived half my stuff was labeled with my name.
At the same time I was organizing my house, I was also setting up my classroom. So I had a pretty good first week of work listening to Bob Marley and organizing closets. That week, the whole staff had a HIV/AIDS training, and I suspect it is one of the few times a year we are all (secretaries, teachers, custodians, bus driver) in the same room together. It was more or less 8 hours of icebreaker games punctuated with power points on universal precautions and pathology. But the real icebreaker was adorning rubber genitalia with male and female condoms with my new colleagues. It definitely beat Two Truths and a Lie.
And then the children arrived. For most of these children, this is their first time at school. As I teach in an international school, my students hail from several different countries. About half are local, and I also have students from America, England, Ireland, Ethiopia, Malawi, India and Libya. They youngest is two and 8 months, and the oldest are more than four. One speaks English as a first language. One understands English as a first language, but she has Down syndrome, so speaks very little. Three speak English as a second language. The rest speak Sesotho, Arabic or German only, although that is sloooowly changing. 90% of my students arrived in tears, and that too, is slowly changing.
There is really no other way to describe the first day than awful. The only children who didn’t sob, were those whose parents/nanny refused to leave. They interfered with what little I had planned, and glared at me as if I personally was making the children cry. One girl, Sushmita, came with her mom and dad and both stayed the whole day, and the dad had his video camera in my face all day and when he thought I wasn’t looking, opened my cabinet doors and filmed the shelves. The nanny, who is conveniently named Nanny, insisted she had orders from her employer and permission from the principal to stay in the classroom for an entire week. The latter was definitely not true. Plus, the child showed up in diapers although it is school policy that all children be toilet trained. I had to spend my break calling the Libyan embassy, trying to find someone who could convey to the top diplomatic official that little Moheb’s disgruntled and exhausted preschool teacher doesn’t care if he’s the ambassador to Heaven, his child may not from this day forth, enter her classroom with a babysitter or a diaper. Then there are the German parents who ask me questions about the class and when I answer look at me as if to say, “why are you speaking?” The mother is from East Germany and attended a government preschool there, where are children are toilet trained by the age of ONE. Personally, I think she’s a little scary.
Overall though, the parents, including (and especially) the video taper and ambassador are satisfied and appreciative. In fact, when I gave my presentation at the school open house and asked if there were any questions about the class or curriculum, most just commented on how happy they were with the class so far, rather than asked questions. Except for the Germans. Oh, Germans.
In class, while the tears have subsided, the chaos has only grown. Fortunately, the children seem happy (if very wild) save for my temper tantrum maestro. All the staff at the school were given a book called The First Six Weeks. It is about how it takes children six weeks to settle into the routine of a new school year, to adjust to new classrooms, classmates, teachers, materials and rules. As I begin week five, I have a feeling that our first six weeks are going to take more like six months, but I’m trying not to think too much about the distant future.
As it’s warming up here, I hope you are all enjoying those crisp autumn days that I love so much. Crunch on some leaves for me, ok?
I live across from the Pope’s Field, a huge green space with a little white cross-adorned podium in the middle, which was built a few years ago when the pope came to speak. I don’t have a yard, but I have some scrubby grass and I can watch the king’s goats and sheep and cows graze on it while I do my laundry (The king and prime minister are the only people allowed to have livestock in the city. Technically, it could be the prime minister’s animals, but that doesn’t make hanging my socks to dry as exciting as when I think I’m in the company of the royal sheep). I haven’t seen the king yet, just his sheep and cars and children who attend the Kindermusik classes held at my school. He lives around the corner from Shop Rite in a mansion-sized version of the Brady Bunch house.
My friend Angela asked me what my favorite thing about Lesotho is. I’m pretty sure that it is even in the city, which isn’t very attractive as far as cities go, anyway I turn there is a gorgeous view. Every time I go out for a run, I like Maseru- and Lesotho- more. Every road eventually winds around a hill or a mountain, and as I run around and around it looks like the whole city is spinning underneath me.
Today, I could see snow in the mountains. Down where I was, it was warm and sunny with bright blue skies but some nights I sleep in a sleeping bag stuffed with hot water bottles underneath a down comforter, with a heater on and I’m still cold. Some days I teach with my jacket on, and other’s I strip off layers as the hours pass, chug water and get sunburned. We’re in the dry season and when the wind blows, everything becomes coated with a layer of dust. But the seasons are changing. I saw rain for the first time yesterday, and am still waiting for one of the spectacular lightening storms I have heard so much about.
After getting back from Zambia, I stayed in Maseru for about 12 hours before heading to South Africa. As happy as I was to have a permanent home, I was scheduled to start working the next day, and I anticipated itchy feet in the near future. More importantly, the principal offered me a ride with him and his family to a pretty little town that cannot be reached with public transportation. Unlike the rest of the Free State, Clarens, South Africa is full of art and antiques and gourmet food shops and four-star restaurants (with $7 meals!). We arrived mid-morning and since the principal and his wife insist on eating in their favorite restaurant twice each trip, we had breakfast at 11 am and lunch 2 hours later. In between, I strolled the town and art gazed and bought some toilet bowl cleaner and sponges. When the principal surveyed my purchases he said, “important things,” but I could tell he was appalled that he brought me all the way to Clarens (which Lonely Planet describes as “the jewel of the Free State”) and I shopped for bathroom cleaning supplies. Before we headed back to Lesotho, I bought two homemade truffles and a bar of peppermint soap to make up for it. The chocolates were delicious, and frankly, I licked the soap, which was not as delicious but tasted edible.
When I got back, I tried to get as organized as possible. My house came with seventeen keys and I spent a good amount of time trying to figure out what they are all for (impossible). My living space is enormous for one person. Not seventeen keys enormous, but I have two bedrooms and two bathrooms, a kitchen and a huge living room. It’s falling apart a little, but it’s nice to have space and lots of big windows. My house was stocked with basic supplies when I arrived, and since there is a South African department store called Ackerman’s, it was pretty cool that when I arrived half my stuff was labeled with my name.
At the same time I was organizing my house, I was also setting up my classroom. So I had a pretty good first week of work listening to Bob Marley and organizing closets. That week, the whole staff had a HIV/AIDS training, and I suspect it is one of the few times a year we are all (secretaries, teachers, custodians, bus driver) in the same room together. It was more or less 8 hours of icebreaker games punctuated with power points on universal precautions and pathology. But the real icebreaker was adorning rubber genitalia with male and female condoms with my new colleagues. It definitely beat Two Truths and a Lie.
And then the children arrived. For most of these children, this is their first time at school. As I teach in an international school, my students hail from several different countries. About half are local, and I also have students from America, England, Ireland, Ethiopia, Malawi, India and Libya. They youngest is two and 8 months, and the oldest are more than four. One speaks English as a first language. One understands English as a first language, but she has Down syndrome, so speaks very little. Three speak English as a second language. The rest speak Sesotho, Arabic or German only, although that is sloooowly changing. 90% of my students arrived in tears, and that too, is slowly changing.
There is really no other way to describe the first day than awful. The only children who didn’t sob, were those whose parents/nanny refused to leave. They interfered with what little I had planned, and glared at me as if I personally was making the children cry. One girl, Sushmita, came with her mom and dad and both stayed the whole day, and the dad had his video camera in my face all day and when he thought I wasn’t looking, opened my cabinet doors and filmed the shelves. The nanny, who is conveniently named Nanny, insisted she had orders from her employer and permission from the principal to stay in the classroom for an entire week. The latter was definitely not true. Plus, the child showed up in diapers although it is school policy that all children be toilet trained. I had to spend my break calling the Libyan embassy, trying to find someone who could convey to the top diplomatic official that little Moheb’s disgruntled and exhausted preschool teacher doesn’t care if he’s the ambassador to Heaven, his child may not from this day forth, enter her classroom with a babysitter or a diaper. Then there are the German parents who ask me questions about the class and when I answer look at me as if to say, “why are you speaking?” The mother is from East Germany and attended a government preschool there, where are children are toilet trained by the age of ONE. Personally, I think she’s a little scary.
Overall though, the parents, including (and especially) the video taper and ambassador are satisfied and appreciative. In fact, when I gave my presentation at the school open house and asked if there were any questions about the class or curriculum, most just commented on how happy they were with the class so far, rather than asked questions. Except for the Germans. Oh, Germans.
In class, while the tears have subsided, the chaos has only grown. Fortunately, the children seem happy (if very wild) save for my temper tantrum maestro. All the staff at the school were given a book called The First Six Weeks. It is about how it takes children six weeks to settle into the routine of a new school year, to adjust to new classrooms, classmates, teachers, materials and rules. As I begin week five, I have a feeling that our first six weeks are going to take more like six months, but I’m trying not to think too much about the distant future.
As it’s warming up here, I hope you are all enjoying those crisp autumn days that I love so much. Crunch on some leaves for me, ok?
Monday, August 18, 2008
ZAMBEEF!
Zambian noticings:
1. Piercing blue sky and air so dry the entire country seems likely to burst into flames at any moment.
2. Lots of Zambians know lots of English. Although it’s one of the national languages, I was still surprised to hear very young children speaking it (I hadn’t expected it to be a first language) and to hear Zambians speaking to each other in English rather than a local language. This assisted my eavesdropping, my preferred method of information gathering.
3. A disproportionate number of individuals with disfiguring growths.
4. ELEPHANTS! ON! THE! ROAD!
5. Horrible roads (elephants aside). I felt this with my stomach more than I saw this with my eyes. Poor Carissa. She’s probably seen more of my vomit in a month than my mother saw in my whole life. In fairness, the potholes are not entirely to blame because I also got sick on a canoe, much to my amazement.
5. Zambeef! This is the national beef company. Zambia is full of cows. You could drive dozens of miles without seeing a soul, unlike Malawi, Jersey and other densely populated places dear to my heart. But you can’t even go to the bathroom without crossing paths with a cow. Zambeef also works as an expletive (Zambeef! I stubbed my toe!), and a catchall phrase (“I can’t find my Zambeef-amajig”). Note: Zambians and normal people do not do this, just me.
The preplanned highlight of my trip was a few days at Victoria Falls, of Seven Natural Wonders of the World fame. It is so massive and stunning it is difficult and seems pointless to describe. But imagine a really, really long row of really, really tall staircases. But instead of stairs, water. It was really loud too, but didn’t quite drown out the sound of unauthorized tour guides getting shot at (but not shot) by park rangers.
Victoria Falls is populated by lots of baboon families. Have you ever seen a baboon up close? They are like small, ugly humans. Mama baboons cradle their babies as they nurse them, and while sweet in a creepy sort of way, it made me a tad nervous to be so close to mothers and their young. But what I really should have worried about was taking that orange Carissa offered me. Before I could finish peeling it, I had the baboon town hall meeting at my feet and they all came looking for oranges. Using my NYC brain (if someone is trying to mug you, throw your wallet away from you and run the other way), I chucked my orange at the biggest baboon’s hairy, old man head and speed walked the opposite direction (passing a sign that said, “Don’t feed the animals.”)
Victoria Falls straddles the Zambian/Zimbabwean border. There is a bridge along the falls connecting the two countries that people bungee jump off of: $130 per plummet. Despite all of the unfamiliar languages and countries and cultures I have come in contact with over the past several weeks, the one thing I have ultimately had the most difficulty understanding is the appeal of flinging yourself upside off a bridge between two countries which at the present time are not particularly noted for high quality construction nor stellar medical services. Watching person after person fall made my stomach drop and my heart pound in my throat, but I couldn’t stop looking- it was like rubbernecking at a car wreck. Bungee jumping is actually just one of many “attractions” at the falls. You can microlight and helicopter over them, raft and kayak and river board in them, and several other activities. But just watching them was more than thrilling for me, and when two rainbows appeared in the spray as if on cue, I couldn’t have been happier.
When my eyes got their fill of falling water (and humans), I headed to Bovu Island via pickup truck and dugout canoe. This tiny island in the Zambezi River is unpopulated except for the cook and night guard. There were no other guests while we were there and the owner was away so Carissa and I had the entire island etched with mazelike paths, library with termite eaten books, nightly batch of salt and vinegar popcorn, and David, the guide, all to ourselves. David told us to be mindful of the crocodiles and hippos on the shore. When I asked if there are any snakes on the island, David said, “only pythons, puff adders and spitting cobras.” Then he quickly assured me that these highly poisonous species are in hibernation. At night I could hear the hippos grazing a few feet from the tent, and in the early mornings I watched monkeys sneak into the kitchen, squat between the half-melted candles stuck in wine bottles and slurp strands of spaghetti from last night’s dinner.
Bovu Island was my last stop in my travels for heading back to the capital of Zambia and then to my new home. I drugged myself in preparation for the long, bumpy bus ride to Lusaka which was made memorable by running over someone’s hand and the endless stream of low budget Christian music videos. In Lusaka, I met a Peace Corps volunteer on vacation from his assignment in Malawi. While explaining to him my presence on the continent, he said, “Lesoo-what?!” I tried pronouncing the name of my soon-to-be country of residence the way it is spelled: “Le-SO-THOW,” but he still stared blankly. I am used to people from home not knowing where or what Lesotho is, but when people residing a few countries away not having a clue makes me a little uneasy. . .
Here I come, oh country of mystery and funky spelling.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
So We Kept Going
My insides were rebelling in Malawi, and I wasn’t in the best state to keep moving. But I was also feeling cranky and lethargic and nothing makes me giddier than careening toward the nearest border in a crumbling excuse for public transportation. SO, we kept going.
Although my visa was free when I was in Zambia last year, this time, I had to pay an insane amount for a three-year visa, the only option now for American citizens. Then it was on to Chipata, on the Zambian side of the border with Malawi to catch a bus to the capital. We bought our tickets from Zoom (HA!) Bus, whose slogan is “You Snooze You Loose,” and then spent the next many hours sitting on what we came to refer to as the stairs of defeat.
Since I was in Ghana in 2005, I have marveled at the comparative lack of the time I’ve spent waiting on the side of the road in other sub-Saharan African countries. My luck ended in Zambia, although rather than the side of the road, I was confined to the small, dusty bus depot, trying to figure out why every other bus was entering, filling up and leaving the station except the inaccurately titled Zoom bus.
The bus depot was like its own tiny, weird, fantastic city. In truth, it wasn’t a bad place to be stuck waiting. The setting was ideal for people watching and an entertaining introduction into local Zambian life. Alongside ticket booths were multiple liquor stores (and subsequently drunk passengers, and quite probably, drivers). The longer I waited, the more I understood the market for alcohol in a bus station. There was also a jail cell to lock up the rowdy drinkers, essentially a lone train car reinforced with iron bars. A man with blue coveralls was mopping the outside of the jail, but didn’t bother cleaning the inside.
I didn’t patronize the liquor stores but I was a loyal customer at the fee paying toilet and shopped at the open air stall equivalent of a bodega. I bought a package of cookies, and the woman behind the counter shone the plastic wrapper with a rag. Another stall was a cell phone kiosk whose only entrance was a miniature door, Through the Looking Glass style. I was beyond shocked when the tiny door opened and a tiny man emerged- an actual Little Person. I don’t know if the door was made small to fit the user, or if he got the job because he could fit through the door, or this was just a serendipitous set of circumstances. In any case, I was thankful I had a companion to witness this small, incredible moment with me and to confirm that I wasn’t having a malarial or (malaria prophylaxis) hallucination.
Zoom somehow crashed or broke down or the driver quit or gave up or drove the wrong way, because at some point (more accurately, at a point six hours later than when I arrived), all of the passengers were instructed to pile onto another company’s bus. Waiting for the bus to come was a blink of an eye compared to the ride to Lusaka, the capital. The roads are crappier than the distances between cities are long, and Zambia is a huge country. We played word games to pass the time and to distract ourselves from full bladders. I was so desperate that Carissa offered me her water bottle as a temporary makeshift toilet. I very seriously was considering using it (hallelujah for skirts) when the bus pulled off the road. A single naked bulb in the lone village shop and the stars were the only light in the pitch black night. A Zambian woman from our bus directed us to a patch of dirt that was to be our toilet and side by side we exhaled sighs of relief and peed on our feet.
We arrived in Lusaka so late, we didn’t bother trying to find the hotel we had booked, and slept on the bus until 5 am. When I stepped off the bus, I saw that the Lusaka station had no hint of the weird charm of Chipata and seemed more like Port Authority in New York City. I loved it. Beneath a sign that said, “No Call Boys, No Standing, No Loitering, No Sleeping, No Illegal,” people dozed on quilts and leaned against garbage cans, and I’m sure there were call boys and any number of illegal activities going on in the near vicinity. Even though no buses were coming or going at this hour, the place was bustling and full of noise. People bought and sold wigs and hair extensions, crocheted hats, plastic dolls and roasted maize. Everywhere I tried to walk, there was pushing and spitting and an impressive feistiness for 5 am.
After about ten minutes of fresh air, I found my next bus, and while we waited for it to fill up, the early passengers (lucky us) got a visit from the bus station preacher. I’m pretty sure the buses are this guy’s church, the passengers, his congregants. Because I was sitting at the front, and the aisles were crowded to walk up and down, I got the brunt of the preaching. Within a few minutes, my ears were ringing and I was flecked with the preacher’s holy spit. He ended by praying we wouldn’t crash, and who wouldn’t say amen to that?
Although my visa was free when I was in Zambia last year, this time, I had to pay an insane amount for a three-year visa, the only option now for American citizens. Then it was on to Chipata, on the Zambian side of the border with Malawi to catch a bus to the capital. We bought our tickets from Zoom (HA!) Bus, whose slogan is “You Snooze You Loose,” and then spent the next many hours sitting on what we came to refer to as the stairs of defeat.
Since I was in Ghana in 2005, I have marveled at the comparative lack of the time I’ve spent waiting on the side of the road in other sub-Saharan African countries. My luck ended in Zambia, although rather than the side of the road, I was confined to the small, dusty bus depot, trying to figure out why every other bus was entering, filling up and leaving the station except the inaccurately titled Zoom bus.
The bus depot was like its own tiny, weird, fantastic city. In truth, it wasn’t a bad place to be stuck waiting. The setting was ideal for people watching and an entertaining introduction into local Zambian life. Alongside ticket booths were multiple liquor stores (and subsequently drunk passengers, and quite probably, drivers). The longer I waited, the more I understood the market for alcohol in a bus station. There was also a jail cell to lock up the rowdy drinkers, essentially a lone train car reinforced with iron bars. A man with blue coveralls was mopping the outside of the jail, but didn’t bother cleaning the inside.
I didn’t patronize the liquor stores but I was a loyal customer at the fee paying toilet and shopped at the open air stall equivalent of a bodega. I bought a package of cookies, and the woman behind the counter shone the plastic wrapper with a rag. Another stall was a cell phone kiosk whose only entrance was a miniature door, Through the Looking Glass style. I was beyond shocked when the tiny door opened and a tiny man emerged- an actual Little Person. I don’t know if the door was made small to fit the user, or if he got the job because he could fit through the door, or this was just a serendipitous set of circumstances. In any case, I was thankful I had a companion to witness this small, incredible moment with me and to confirm that I wasn’t having a malarial or (malaria prophylaxis) hallucination.
Zoom somehow crashed or broke down or the driver quit or gave up or drove the wrong way, because at some point (more accurately, at a point six hours later than when I arrived), all of the passengers were instructed to pile onto another company’s bus. Waiting for the bus to come was a blink of an eye compared to the ride to Lusaka, the capital. The roads are crappier than the distances between cities are long, and Zambia is a huge country. We played word games to pass the time and to distract ourselves from full bladders. I was so desperate that Carissa offered me her water bottle as a temporary makeshift toilet. I very seriously was considering using it (hallelujah for skirts) when the bus pulled off the road. A single naked bulb in the lone village shop and the stars were the only light in the pitch black night. A Zambian woman from our bus directed us to a patch of dirt that was to be our toilet and side by side we exhaled sighs of relief and peed on our feet.
We arrived in Lusaka so late, we didn’t bother trying to find the hotel we had booked, and slept on the bus until 5 am. When I stepped off the bus, I saw that the Lusaka station had no hint of the weird charm of Chipata and seemed more like Port Authority in New York City. I loved it. Beneath a sign that said, “No Call Boys, No Standing, No Loitering, No Sleeping, No Illegal,” people dozed on quilts and leaned against garbage cans, and I’m sure there were call boys and any number of illegal activities going on in the near vicinity. Even though no buses were coming or going at this hour, the place was bustling and full of noise. People bought and sold wigs and hair extensions, crocheted hats, plastic dolls and roasted maize. Everywhere I tried to walk, there was pushing and spitting and an impressive feistiness for 5 am.
After about ten minutes of fresh air, I found my next bus, and while we waited for it to fill up, the early passengers (lucky us) got a visit from the bus station preacher. I’m pretty sure the buses are this guy’s church, the passengers, his congregants. Because I was sitting at the front, and the aisles were crowded to walk up and down, I got the brunt of the preaching. Within a few minutes, my ears were ringing and I was flecked with the preacher’s holy spit. He ended by praying we wouldn’t crash, and who wouldn’t say amen to that?
Thursday, July 31, 2008
From the Bottom
After gazing at Lake Malawi from hundreds of feet above it, Carissa convinced me that the next logical step would be to experience it from the bottom. It took quite a lot of prodding to get me signed up for a scuba diving course, but not only does Malawi have the nearly superlative distinction of being the second cheapest place to dive in the world, the upcoming course ended on the same day that the best health insurance I’ve ever had was due to expire. I mean, who knows when the next time I’ll be covered for lung overexpansion injury is? The fact that one of the instructors also happens to be the best baker in the world sealed the deal (this country just turns me into a cake monster like no other place on earth).
From the first morning of class, I was definitely the special kid in scuba class. I was uncoordinated at snorkeling, but adding a wet suit, oxygen tank and weights to my tendency to flail in water did not help the situation. The first time we dove from shore, I was so heavily weighted that I was basically crawling along the bottom of the lake. Despite the fact that I was hands and knees in fish crap, breathing underwater is perhaps the coolest sensation I’ve ever experienced. Lake Malawi has some really beautiful fish, including one type in which the mothers scoop their babies in their mouths when you swim near, and another species that feeds on the plant life growing on the underside of rocks, and thus spend their entire lives upside down. My instructor thinks it’s really fun to go through rock tunnels. I was not nearly stealthy enough to navigate them without crashing, but although we communicate under water with hand signals, there is no sign for, “if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll just go around.”
The second half of the course involved diving from the boat. Unfortunately, as it turns out, I get sea sickness, including but not limited to sitting in moving boats, sitting in anchored boats, looking at a bobbing boat from shore, and especially smelling engine exhaust. This last one is particularly unfortunate because the smallest people have to sit closest to the engine to balance the weight. The first boat dive, I willed my digestive tract to work with gravity until I got to the surface where I emptied my breakfast into the lake. One of my classmates got to practice our recently learned “rescue skills” by inflating my life jacket and dragging me to the boat.
The instructor insisted that the route we took was particularly rough, and convinced me to give it another go in the afternoon. She prescribed ginger biscuits and watered down coke as a stomach cure-all. She insisted that if I need to, I should just vomit underwater into my breathing regulator, the thought of which struck me as unnecessarily unpleasant. When the opportunity to see presented itself, I ditched the group, headed for the surface and swam to shore. In the company of a family of tumor encrusted ducks I proceeded to spew the ginger and coke cocktail. A Rastafarian woodcarver wandered to the shore to keep me company. We had the following conversation:
Rastafarian: Are you diving?
Me: No, I’m vomiting.
Rastafarian: Diving is cool.
Me: [vomit]
Rastafarian: Diving is sooo nice.
Me: [vomit]
Rastafarian: Good luck on your exam.
Carissa tried to convince me that I have some sort of parasite, rather than really comprehensive seasickness. One of our classmates, an enormous, androgynous looking, Finnish music therapist who plays heavy metal gigs with his schizophrenic clients, was down with some sort of bug. And we did share breathing mouthpieces during safety drills before he dropped out of the class to puke in private. I rejected this piece of logic though and informed Carissa of my B-list superpower of vomiting in response to dislike. Therefore, vomiting is caused by my hatred for self contained underwater breathing apparatus, and not the funky lake water I may have been drinking or eating in the restaurant where the cooks don’t wash their hands.
I didn’t attempt the last couple dives, because all I wanted to do was lie in the fetal position clutching a vile of Dramamine, not contort myself into a wetsuit, let alone get in a moving vehicle. So I didn’t end up getting certified. But I did pass the exam, perhaps courtesy of my Rasta friend’s well wishes. And maybe, I’ll finish my certification some other time, in some other country.
From the first morning of class, I was definitely the special kid in scuba class. I was uncoordinated at snorkeling, but adding a wet suit, oxygen tank and weights to my tendency to flail in water did not help the situation. The first time we dove from shore, I was so heavily weighted that I was basically crawling along the bottom of the lake. Despite the fact that I was hands and knees in fish crap, breathing underwater is perhaps the coolest sensation I’ve ever experienced. Lake Malawi has some really beautiful fish, including one type in which the mothers scoop their babies in their mouths when you swim near, and another species that feeds on the plant life growing on the underside of rocks, and thus spend their entire lives upside down. My instructor thinks it’s really fun to go through rock tunnels. I was not nearly stealthy enough to navigate them without crashing, but although we communicate under water with hand signals, there is no sign for, “if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll just go around.”
The second half of the course involved diving from the boat. Unfortunately, as it turns out, I get sea sickness, including but not limited to sitting in moving boats, sitting in anchored boats, looking at a bobbing boat from shore, and especially smelling engine exhaust. This last one is particularly unfortunate because the smallest people have to sit closest to the engine to balance the weight. The first boat dive, I willed my digestive tract to work with gravity until I got to the surface where I emptied my breakfast into the lake. One of my classmates got to practice our recently learned “rescue skills” by inflating my life jacket and dragging me to the boat.
The instructor insisted that the route we took was particularly rough, and convinced me to give it another go in the afternoon. She prescribed ginger biscuits and watered down coke as a stomach cure-all. She insisted that if I need to, I should just vomit underwater into my breathing regulator, the thought of which struck me as unnecessarily unpleasant. When the opportunity to see presented itself, I ditched the group, headed for the surface and swam to shore. In the company of a family of tumor encrusted ducks I proceeded to spew the ginger and coke cocktail. A Rastafarian woodcarver wandered to the shore to keep me company. We had the following conversation:
Rastafarian: Are you diving?
Me: No, I’m vomiting.
Rastafarian: Diving is cool.
Me: [vomit]
Rastafarian: Diving is sooo nice.
Me: [vomit]
Rastafarian: Good luck on your exam.
Carissa tried to convince me that I have some sort of parasite, rather than really comprehensive seasickness. One of our classmates, an enormous, androgynous looking, Finnish music therapist who plays heavy metal gigs with his schizophrenic clients, was down with some sort of bug. And we did share breathing mouthpieces during safety drills before he dropped out of the class to puke in private. I rejected this piece of logic though and informed Carissa of my B-list superpower of vomiting in response to dislike. Therefore, vomiting is caused by my hatred for self contained underwater breathing apparatus, and not the funky lake water I may have been drinking or eating in the restaurant where the cooks don’t wash their hands.
I didn’t attempt the last couple dives, because all I wanted to do was lie in the fetal position clutching a vile of Dramamine, not contort myself into a wetsuit, let alone get in a moving vehicle. So I didn’t end up getting certified. But I did pass the exam, perhaps courtesy of my Rasta friend’s well wishes. And maybe, I’ll finish my certification some other time, in some other country.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
From the Top
By the time my ama and I arrived in Malawi, we were sharing a serious case of bus lag. The happy exhaustion of village reunions made us even loopier, but it was the two solid days of pouring rain that really unraveled us. On top of that, we had to adjust to the lack of electricity, and the other particulars of rural life. It wasn’t that I missed light bulbs and wall outlets, but the two of us fumbled around for the non-existent light switch in our chalet every night, and I consistently try to charge my head torch batteries using solar power, when the sun hadn’t shone for days. One of my favorite moments in Malawi was sitting around the blazing fire at night with the watchmen. One night, ama passed around her pack of cigarettes and when she offered her lighter, Tidrey, one of the watchmen, shook his head at us, pulled a flaming log out of the fire, and said, “Africa match.”
The first day of the downpours, we shut ourselves indoors building a fort that I was ridiculously proud of. We used chairs, tent poles, chitenges (cloth Malawian women use as a wrap skirt or baby sling), yoga mats, sleeping bags, and the architectural genius of Carissa, a grad school friend. We lit some paraffin inside, told stories, ate Smarties (inferior, British M&Ms) through the mouth hole of a wooden mask and generally made ourselves stir crazy. I’m pretty sure I could have stayed in there all day, but I emerged to bake a chocolate cake in the wood burning stove in the kitchen. The sound of water on the tin roof made the rain all the more spectacular and I was quite jealous of the family of cats sleeping underneath the warm stove. When I grow up I’m going to have a little rain shack with a tin roof and a stove inside big enough for me to curl up under.
My friend George, another former volunteer in the neighborhood for a visit, arrived in time for cake consumption and added Amarula to the festivities. She is a sarcastic, intelligent and well-spoken med student traveling with her cousin, who seems to thrive on feigning misery and got engaged a few weeks ago as a joke. They were not particularly amused by the fort, although that didn’t stop us from spending most of the next day in it. When the paraffin fumes started to make me lightheaded, I tried to organize the largest game of cat’s cradle ever (this too, I was ridiculously proud of). I’m not really traveling with enough clothes (or a towel) to get wet, and I was perfectly happy to wait out the rain. I left the chalet so little, that the village “Heloises” (peanut butter pounders, laundry virtuosos and all around domestic goddesses) laughed and babbled every time they saw me. The only words I understood were “vuwa” and “nyomba” which mean “rain” and “house,” so I gather they were laughing at how I was staying inside because of the rain. Then I dragged them over to see the fort. They kept saying over and over again, “What is it?” “Nyomba,” I told them. They seemed both appalled and amazed, and laughed so hard they clutched each other gasping for breath.
When the rain finally trickled to a stop, I headed to the library, my favorite place in the whole village, and one of my favorite places on earth. Mr. Longwe, the librarian and his two assistants use and love the Dewey Decimal system. Drunk people are not allowed to check out books and there is a sign demanding that all shirts be tucked in. Although the whole thing is the size of a tool shed, I get the grand tour every time I go, and it’s a seriously long tour. I took an absurd short cut to get to the library, and not only did it take longer than the usual way, I got soaked in waist high grass and ended up having to climb over a slippery fence. When I thudded to the ground on the other side I noticed a nice fat snake speared on one of the fence posts. Perhaps it was a warning to other snakes, or perhaps a warning to fools like me, as I’m sure I was trodding on its poisonous cousins.
When the rain finally stopped, we headed to Mzuzu on a marshmallow quest. After scouring the city we found a single dirty bag in an Indian shop. Armed with our precious grimy bag of white and pink processed quasi food, we headed north to one of my favorite spots in the whole country. On the vertical road from Chitimba to Livingstonia is Mushroom Farm, a beautiful little lodge on the edge of a dramatic cliff. When I tried staying here a year ago, Ewan McGregor left me stranded and wet on the rainy mountainside. Really. Check out the documentary The Long Way Down. Except don’t, because he booked the whole place and didn’t even end up staying there. Jerk.
The lodge is walking distance to Livingstonia. This old mission town is a namesake of David Livingstone, of “Dr. Livingstone, I presume” fame. One of the best hospitals in the country is here, but its location at the top of a mountain is not ideal for anyone who actually needs a hospital. There is also a pro-colonialism museum with a staunch, “thank god (literally) for missionaries” message. It houses the most disorganized bunch of crap ever to grace the insides of glass cases. There are ancient ether masks next to a photo of Patrice Lumumba next to a painting of Booker T. Washington. I wouldn’t recommend this museum to someone interested in learning about Malawi in an organized, logical and relatively unbiased manner, but for someone who wants to see what a Malawian museum is like, this is probably a good prototype.
At the lodge, the five of us crowded in a pretty, little, mud and straw hut decorated with colored glass. Also sharing this accommodation was an attractive bunch of skittish lizards. Carissa mistook one for a hook and tried to hang her jacket on it. There was plenty of hiking to do, but this place is also perfect for just sitting. And eating. This lodge has one of the best vegetarian restaurants I’ve ever come across. Oddly, the bar sells squirrel biltong (aka squirrel jerky).
I think that people generally fail miserably when trying to describe mountain scenery. But as I spent most of my time on the mountain looking out over the cliffs, I’ll try to describe what it looked like below. For one thing, the sky and lake blend together obscuring the horizon like a curtain. When you stare ahead trying to see where one ends and the other begins, like a Magic Eye optical illusion, the blue edge of Tanaznia emerges. At sunrise, light glints off hundreds of tin roofs of the miniature villages below. At night, as many tiny fires blaze like tiny orange glowing dots, and they are as spectacular as the stars. I love Malawi and stars and the edges of cliffs, and you too.
The first day of the downpours, we shut ourselves indoors building a fort that I was ridiculously proud of. We used chairs, tent poles, chitenges (cloth Malawian women use as a wrap skirt or baby sling), yoga mats, sleeping bags, and the architectural genius of Carissa, a grad school friend. We lit some paraffin inside, told stories, ate Smarties (inferior, British M&Ms) through the mouth hole of a wooden mask and generally made ourselves stir crazy. I’m pretty sure I could have stayed in there all day, but I emerged to bake a chocolate cake in the wood burning stove in the kitchen. The sound of water on the tin roof made the rain all the more spectacular and I was quite jealous of the family of cats sleeping underneath the warm stove. When I grow up I’m going to have a little rain shack with a tin roof and a stove inside big enough for me to curl up under.
My friend George, another former volunteer in the neighborhood for a visit, arrived in time for cake consumption and added Amarula to the festivities. She is a sarcastic, intelligent and well-spoken med student traveling with her cousin, who seems to thrive on feigning misery and got engaged a few weeks ago as a joke. They were not particularly amused by the fort, although that didn’t stop us from spending most of the next day in it. When the paraffin fumes started to make me lightheaded, I tried to organize the largest game of cat’s cradle ever (this too, I was ridiculously proud of). I’m not really traveling with enough clothes (or a towel) to get wet, and I was perfectly happy to wait out the rain. I left the chalet so little, that the village “Heloises” (peanut butter pounders, laundry virtuosos and all around domestic goddesses) laughed and babbled every time they saw me. The only words I understood were “vuwa” and “nyomba” which mean “rain” and “house,” so I gather they were laughing at how I was staying inside because of the rain. Then I dragged them over to see the fort. They kept saying over and over again, “What is it?” “Nyomba,” I told them. They seemed both appalled and amazed, and laughed so hard they clutched each other gasping for breath.
When the rain finally trickled to a stop, I headed to the library, my favorite place in the whole village, and one of my favorite places on earth. Mr. Longwe, the librarian and his two assistants use and love the Dewey Decimal system. Drunk people are not allowed to check out books and there is a sign demanding that all shirts be tucked in. Although the whole thing is the size of a tool shed, I get the grand tour every time I go, and it’s a seriously long tour. I took an absurd short cut to get to the library, and not only did it take longer than the usual way, I got soaked in waist high grass and ended up having to climb over a slippery fence. When I thudded to the ground on the other side I noticed a nice fat snake speared on one of the fence posts. Perhaps it was a warning to other snakes, or perhaps a warning to fools like me, as I’m sure I was trodding on its poisonous cousins.
When the rain finally stopped, we headed to Mzuzu on a marshmallow quest. After scouring the city we found a single dirty bag in an Indian shop. Armed with our precious grimy bag of white and pink processed quasi food, we headed north to one of my favorite spots in the whole country. On the vertical road from Chitimba to Livingstonia is Mushroom Farm, a beautiful little lodge on the edge of a dramatic cliff. When I tried staying here a year ago, Ewan McGregor left me stranded and wet on the rainy mountainside. Really. Check out the documentary The Long Way Down. Except don’t, because he booked the whole place and didn’t even end up staying there. Jerk.
The lodge is walking distance to Livingstonia. This old mission town is a namesake of David Livingstone, of “Dr. Livingstone, I presume” fame. One of the best hospitals in the country is here, but its location at the top of a mountain is not ideal for anyone who actually needs a hospital. There is also a pro-colonialism museum with a staunch, “thank god (literally) for missionaries” message. It houses the most disorganized bunch of crap ever to grace the insides of glass cases. There are ancient ether masks next to a photo of Patrice Lumumba next to a painting of Booker T. Washington. I wouldn’t recommend this museum to someone interested in learning about Malawi in an organized, logical and relatively unbiased manner, but for someone who wants to see what a Malawian museum is like, this is probably a good prototype.
At the lodge, the five of us crowded in a pretty, little, mud and straw hut decorated with colored glass. Also sharing this accommodation was an attractive bunch of skittish lizards. Carissa mistook one for a hook and tried to hang her jacket on it. There was plenty of hiking to do, but this place is also perfect for just sitting. And eating. This lodge has one of the best vegetarian restaurants I’ve ever come across. Oddly, the bar sells squirrel biltong (aka squirrel jerky).
I think that people generally fail miserably when trying to describe mountain scenery. But as I spent most of my time on the mountain looking out over the cliffs, I’ll try to describe what it looked like below. For one thing, the sky and lake blend together obscuring the horizon like a curtain. When you stare ahead trying to see where one ends and the other begins, like a Magic Eye optical illusion, the blue edge of Tanaznia emerges. At sunrise, light glints off hundreds of tin roofs of the miniature villages below. At night, as many tiny fires blaze like tiny orange glowing dots, and they are as spectacular as the stars. I love Malawi and stars and the edges of cliffs, and you too.
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