insomniac

PS.

2008-01-18T05:24:00.000-08:00

PS. On the ferry, there were also chickens and goats. Some guy brought a chicken and Megan tried to take a picture of it--when the guy said hey, thats my chicken! She responded, "what, is it a famous chicken?" hahaha.

We also camped on the deck through two thunderstorms. eeek.

Luuveellyy Jahbellyyy Journey through Zambia/Malawi

2008-01-18T05:16:00.000-08:00

Zambia

Lusaka- After being in land of few people and large open spaces, it was incredibly overwhelming just to cross the streets of Lusaka, the capital of Zamibia, forget exploring the city. Basically, the it was the entire population of Namibia squeezed into one crazy, real, bustling city. After adjusting to the number of people around me though, I loved Lusaka—complete with a Subway, hideaway Indian places where the aunty just put whatever came to her that day in a thali, and very few tourists, it seemed like a great place to live. The first day, we simply walked around trying to find some local food and markets—in addition to mangoes, there were all kinds of vegetables and crazy orange mushrooms. It was also kind of hard to adjust to the currency. 6000 Zambian kwacha is one US dollar. AHHH! Its impossible to think in thousands all the time—2000 kwacha is really not a lot of money but it sure felt like a lot. Fortunately it got progressively more manageable as we passed through Southern Africa.

Also, because there weren't a lot of tourists around, we got a lot of interesting comments—it was five girls and one guy with a big cowboy hat walking around, so it was pretty much impossible to blend in.

Some great comments in Lusaka:

“Five (girls) to one (guy) --you are overloading!” (Overloading=commonly used to describe when taxis and combis stuff too many people. This happens in namibia all the time.)

Shayna: “Can we all ride in your taxi?” (5 people)
Taxi Driver: “You are fat. Taxi is small.”
Shayna: “is that a no?”

We also saw an awesome modern art museum in lusaka and after searching for a long time, found the local food restaurant that we were looking for—it wasn't that much different than caprivian food, but they did use a lot more vegetables and every table had hot sauce on it, so it was definitely enjoyable!

From Lusaka we travelled to the border town of Chipata. We got on a bus leaving at 4 am, but it broke down in a random village just outside of Lusaka. It was kind of fun to walk around the village, and mango trees were everywhere, but toilets were hard to find. ACK. We did meet a guy from namibia who was on our bus!

Once we got to Chipata, we were pretty much lost—it was really late and we needed to find a place to stay. There were bike taxis of disputable reliability offering to take us around—actually i don't think the bikes themselves were unreliable, but it was raining, muddy, hilly, and we all had huge backpacks on, so we opted to walk rather than kill any unsuspecting bike taxi drivers. We ended up staying in this guesthouse and finding an awesome local food place that had really good vegetables. It was interesting to see that the town had such a large muslim population though—the mosque was about the nicest thing in chipata. Anyways, it was just a temporary stopover (later we discovered a pcv resthouse was there and we missed it :-()and the next day we set out to find a taxi to take us to the border—we ended up finding an awesome guy who loaded us ALL in one taxi with all our bags. He had to go find rope to tie up the trunk and then played hip hop music all the way to the border—on the way we saw people holding up canisters of black market gas, which is apparently much cheaper in malawi.

Once we got to the border, there were tons of people trying to exchange money for us—little did we realize this was our only chance to do this, since no one in malawi would exchange the inferior zamibian kwacha for the malawian kwacha (not that much better, but at least we were using 100s instead of of 1000s. 150=1 US dollar). Our taxi driver, having become friends with us since we were in such close quarters with him in the overloaded taxi, fervently defended our right to a fair bargain and we got a pretty decent rate for the remainder of our zamibian kwacha, before we walked across our second border to malawi.

Malawi

We got to the capital of Malawi, Lilongwe in pretty decent time. Lilongwe is a much more manageable city—it was quiet and small, and seemed pretty cosmopolitan since we could find Indian and chinese food :-). We stayed at a nice backpackers where we met a volunteer from Mozambique who just finished her service, Kara. She was going to the same place and ended up joining us for a part of our trip! It was a relaxing night before we set of for our first exotic desitation, Nkhata Bay on Lake Malawi. We were initially informed that we were taking an express bus that would be much nicer than the other options, despite being the same price. The bus itself was definitely nicer, and since we got there on time, we got our own seats. However, by nine o'clock (our starting time being 8 o'clock), we realized that this bus, despite its appearance, was definitely local transport. We had people standing in the aisles (for the entire trip), music blasting, and off course, a couple of chickens. Every time we stopped people sold their wares, including corn, bread, and peanuts—by the end we were starving but when we tried to buy food, our newfound malawian friends yelled at the local sellers trying to overcharge us. By the end, we got slightly delirious and megan started talking about wood nymphs and sprites. Fortunately, our bus driver was speeding through the mountainous road along Lake Malawi, so along with getting to our destination quickly, I was constantly entertained by Megan falling on me seductively (accidentally).

We did eventually get to Nkhata bay, where random men found us and took us to one of the local backpackers/lodges. Nkhata bay pretty much can be described as paradise. Lake Malawi is completely clear blue and the beaches are sandy, but the sand is not so fine that it stuck to you all the time. To top it off, there were mango trees on the beach and you could see fisherman in the tiny boats riding out at sunset.

We spent a couple days just vegging out after hard travel—the lodge that we were staying at also had the most hilarious staff. First was simon, the four foot tall little old man who spoke with a really high voice. He didn't really do anything funny until he noticed that megan could not stop laughing every time he walked by. Then, once he started dancing in front of her (leaving her, i think, at the brink of hysterics) and when we left, he gave her a bunch of air kisses. It was pretty fantastic—but my favorite was Dixon, the main waiter. Every time you asked him for food, he said “whyyyy not, ahahahahahah.” Once he convinced us to buy a meal just because he said it would be “yaaummyy yaummmy yaummyyy.” When we said we enjoyed it, he just said “ahahaha, loaavelly jabelly.” Clearly, he was amazing.

Anyways, we decided to leave this paradise for the ferry that travels across lake Malawi (we were misguided by the deceitful and unreliable lonely planet, which told us that not only was their tons of food available on the ferry, but that we could possibly meet our soulmates on this ferry. After going on the ferry for two days, i can assure you that this is pretty much impossible.) We got on the ferry, deciding to take 1st class, which was the cheapest option above deck. 1st class meant we camped on the deck of the ferry—possibly scenic, when its not the rainy season. The sights were beautiful at times, but frustrating because it was raining mostly and because the boat stopped for hours because someone wanted to transport a car on to the ferry. IF the ferry was normal, as in it docked at all of its stops, this wouldn't have taken long. But no, the car was transported via smaller boat onto the ferry. Needless to say it took forever. We spent Christmas on the ferry and made each other some rather exciting gifts—including a massage, a bottle cap necklace, beer goggles made from cardboard and bottle caps, and a paper rose. It was a little sad, but nothing compared to our initial shock at discovering that we were definitely NOT meeting our soulmates on the ferry.

Anyways, we chose to get off at a smaller stop, Chipoka. We unloaded onto a small, suspicious looking wooden motorboat, but our elation at getting of the ferry was too strong to be overshadowed by this. Until we found out how we were getting off the small boat. One of the older (Malawian) ladies on the boat almost fainted when she saw it—we were to climb up a 5 foot high cement wall using the rusty metal (often broken) beams attached to that wall. We climbed up with our backpacks and watched incredulously as babies were lifted over the wall by one arm. They didn't seem shocked though.

Anyways. We made it!! And got to the road where we parted ways with two members of our group, kara (stayed on the ferry) and simon (went back to namibia), and set to wait for a hike to the next town, or possibly mozambique. Originally we had planned to get all the way there, but our ferry was eight hours late and no one was stopping to take us anywhere. Combis rejected us because we were too many people—this would never happen in Namibia and cause me to missed overloading here desperately. Anyways, finally, a flat-bed truck pulled up and a white guy speaking Chichewa (the local language), started helping us out because, i'm pretty sure, we appeared just as desperate as we were. Anyways, he turned out to be Peacecorps and offered to host us for the night (and has been to Richmond). We ended up riding on bike taxis the 2-3 km to his site—since we all had our huge backpacks on, i'm pretty sure the drivers were exhausted by the end. At one point, we saw a herd of cows in our way and I was sure we were going to fall until the driver started yelling at the person herding the cows and the cows to move. I tried to communicate this to the driver, but his english was limited to "yes, madam", "thank you madam", pointing and a thumbs up. The cows listened to the driver, but since the person herding them was about four years old, i'm pretty sure he had no control. Well, i guess he didn't look like he cared much either. Anyways, we got to the site—it was beautiful and set in a valley with small farms all around it. It was fun to play volunteer there—we played with the kids that congregated to stare at us and Danny, the volunteer cooked us delicious food on woodfire/stove. He had only been at his site a week and was soo happy and excited to be there so that was also nice and we tried not to infect him with our occasionally pessimistic perspective on volunteer life.

Anyways, the next day, after another wonderful meal (we really hadn't had much to eat on the ferry), we set off for mozambique. We got to the border town pretty quickly (By noon) and had some more good local food while we waited around for the rain to stop. We wanted to change money, since there was a bank and an exchange place, but we were deceived by the signs. The atm was not working, the exchange place was closed, the bank wouldn't exchange anything or provide any services of the atm, and we were simply told that nothing could be done. Ack. I'm not really sure why the bank was even there or why those people were being needlessly employed. Anyways, it all worked out b/c one person's card work and everyone accepts dollars and rand everywhere. We learned our lesson from the previous border and exchanged the rest of our malawian money with the sketchy men at the border—this time they had calculators which were mysteriously programmed and didn't work properly. Fortunately we also learned to work out the rate in our head ahead of time, so i think we got a decent deal. Anyways, it was the end of the kwacha (sadly) and the beggining of the mozambiquan currency, meticais. Much less fun, obviously, but much more managable as it was 25 meticais to 1 us dollar. After haggling for the last time in english (not understanding how wonderful this is, compared to haggling in, say, Portuguese), we once again walked across the border, blissfully unaware of the exhausting journey that lay ahead of us in Mozambique.

next edition—mozambique.

Zambia/vic falls

2007-12-16T10:25:00.000-08:00

Today we are in Livingstone Zambia! We went to vicotira falls… I thought this would be uneventful, you know just looking at the falls, but we ended up hiking to the bottom of the falls in this thing called the boiling pit, whih I thought would just be stairs, but not really—we waded through two streams and climbed over a series of rocks to get to the bottom (after the stairs). When we got to the bottom there were tons of little Zambian boys from a soccer team already down there who were apparently really excited to see us and started taking pictures with us. Then they helped us to find limes since there are tons of lime trees at the base of Victoria falls!! After we climbed back up (much easier), we decided to buy some food from local vendors—which was nice, except baboons grabbed our food. The first time, we didn’t know it was coming and it just grabbed a bag of fruit. But the second time we were trying to run away from it and it chased me and grabbed my peanuts!!! Then it did a victory jump/dance while the Zambians around laughed at us. It was pretty funny, but that’s the second time a baboon has stolen my food. Next time, I will throw a rock at it. Grrr. Anyways, after that we got rained on again—friends where supposed to bungie jump but it wasn’t a good idea in the rain. We ended up coming back to town... Its amazing here! There are mango trees everywhere. No one even sells them, we just pick them off the trees! They are delicious—plus at the open market we saw mushrooms and eggplant and bellpeppers and avacadoes. Really though I’m excited to eat anything we can get off the tree. That’s all for now!

One Year in Namibia!

2007-11-29T01:28:00.000-08:00

So it has been a long time since i have updated—and it will probably be a long time until i do afterwards, so don't worry that its so long!

I can't believe I have been back from the states for two months. The time has flown by—it wasn't hard to readjust to life here. I think that I just can't think of both home and here at one time because they are so different! Except for maybe walking in the sand, my host sisters were just cracking up when I got back and one of the teachers started calling me oshilumbu again (literally translates to: thing white) again. And, I had just convinced her to call me oshibrowna right before I left.

This last trimester has been a bit different—its the end of the year, so people are starting to check out a bit. Grade 10 learners were finished back in october and the rest of them just finished yesterday! Its made getting things done at school a bit difficult, so i have spent most of this trimester thinking about and planning for the projects I want next year. I'm still looking for something big that will take me a whole year but my time is running out.

So, I have been here one whole year and am approaching my halfway point for the end of my service—there are a lot of things that I have grown used to, but in their place, new, and probably more serious things have popped up. Peace Corps staff and ex volunteers always warned us that after a year, we would feel like we knew nothing about our society. I don't feel entirely like that—I know some people pretty well and feel comfortable where I am. But I have learned that there are a lot of things that I have never understood, even from my experiences with culture at home.

New Volunteers!!!!!!

Its strange to realize that I am no longer new here, and this feeling is reinforced by the new volunteers who have just arrived. I met them when I arrived at training—they had only arrived five days before and were just as wide-eyed and scared as I was last year. While I was sort of nostalgic for training, I don't envy them at all! Just knowing where we were and how to interact with people gave us so much freedom, as opposed to last year when we were confined to our training center and really couldn't imagine anything beyond it.

I now have two trainees shadowing me for a week—the prospect of having them here was really exciting, but now that they're here I'm kind of stressed out. They're excited and eager to be here and also excited about their sites. I don't want to ruin that. Also, coming to my site is kind of a step down for them in terms of creature comforts though since both of their sites have running water and electricity in the forms we expect in the states. Its also difficult because I don't want them to judge me as a volunteer, especially when I have days when I doubt myself. (They're not actually judgemental fortunately) I found myself justifying to them why I decided to stay here, in Omuthiya, when I had the option of being at another site with more basic comforts, and it was hard to explain! I have thought about the idea of changing sites or even moving somewhere nicer at my site (there are some flats here that are pretty nice), and I can't bring myself to make it happen. I can't think of any concrete reasons, except for that I am happy where i am, and that's not something to underestimate.

Old Hat

One major thing that marks this one year anniversary is simply the fact that I am used to things were once ridiculous. This is probably what has made my blog entries less frequent—the fact that i have spent several mornings chasing goats out of my homestead (simply because I left the gate open) has sort of seemed normal. In fact goats and chickens have become standard—except for the day that it rained and I found a bunch of goats in the outhouse. That was frightening.

Another thing that has become standard is how no one is going to be on time. Now, since most of you know me pretty well, you know that I am not on time unless I absolutely need to be. Here, no matter how hard I try, I always seem to be early. Usually this is because I have decided to actually show up for an appointment. I guess this is ok, since I might as well enjoy it while it lasts. I should clarify, not everyone is like this here, but when working with the community in Omuthiya, this is how it generally goes. I am currently waiting for a group of people that was supposed to meet at 8 to give me a list of children that should receive teddy bears. One is here, but is leaving. We have 200 bears to donate. She gave us our first five names. AHHHHHHHH!

There are some things that I pretend I'm used to. Like transportation—I am still not used to getting in a taxi, waiting an hour to pile in about 8 people, and then taking an hour and a half to go 70 km. Ahhhh. But, now, at least people know me. Back in the day, they used to not believe me when I said I was going to Omuthiya (Gauri and Stephanie wrote “Omuthiya” down as their destination when they first arrived in Namibia. The guy at the passport desk said to them what everyone says about Omuthiya--”are you sure? why would you want to go there?”) Now, if I'm trying to get a hike anywhere, like, Windhoek, three people stop and ask if I need a hike to Omuthiya. I don't know who you are, how do you know who I am? Its not just me either, for example, those volunteers living in towns find that taxi drivers will know where their house is. In the states, this might be scary, but here it is kind of nice. It feels like people know you, and when people know you, they help you out. Or so i think.

New perspective

There are also a lot of issues that made me really angry. For example, people asking me for ridiculous things. I got blankets donated for Orphans and Vulnerable Children in June, and some teachers continuously asked me for the blankets. Complete taboo to me—you are making a regular salary, why would you want this blanket, which is going to keep some poor child warm for the winter?! I know you already have a blanket. Even now I struggle with reconciling myself with this idea and would never do it myself. However, as I've gotten to know the people in question a bit better, I've gotten a better idea of why something like this might be ok—All of these teachers support children that are not their own (in addition to their own). They don't do this grudgingly, but simply because they are making money. Those who have are simply expected to share. You find people here regularly paying for schooling up to the university level for nieces, nephews and cousins. So if there are blankets sitting there, they should simply be available.

Also, another volunteer gave me some more insight into people asking for something—for people here, asking can be a way to initiate friendship. This is really unusual for me since both of the cultures I come from frown upon asking for things—if you want to be friends with someone, you give them something (information, invite them somewhere, etc). Here, asking can mean you trust the person to give you something quality (i.e. That won't kill you). That doesn't mean I always give something to everyone, but it does mean I ask for a lot more! Aha.

Another thing that I have found difficult is the generalizations people make here—about each other, themselves, and Americans. In general, I don't like generalizations (ahaaha, i just made one), but in my first three months here, I found myself making them.. about Ovambos, Namibians, Southern Africans, Americans, and on and on. It took a heated discussion with another volunteer who had been here much longer to realize what pattern I was getting myself into—when people here say things like “Oh, us Africans, we cannot do this...” and nothing is getting done, sometimes its easy to think, yeah maybe you're right. Of course, it helps that I know many Africans who accomplish a lot and ultimately it just becomes frustrating because people use these generalizations to make excuses for themselves. Its even more frustrating because they often truly believe them.

The only way I can think of to avoid these is to remember that I really only know about the north of Namibia, and that there are always exceptions to every generalization. It also helps that people here constantly make generalizations about Americans, based on none other than, tv and movies. Oh yes, and their interactions with Peace corps volunteers who are obviously very typical in US society.

Self-Imposed Boundaries

Ultimately, I have found that its easy here to find things acceptable that you wouldn't think are ok in the states. In some ways this a good thing, like when I am riding in a taxi, or when I don't want to kill my Meme for waking me up at 5 in the morning to borrow some salt. In other ways, I have decided that I need to draw a line even when Namibians don't understand it. Basically, I've decided that I'm not a cultural relativist. This is kind of a strong statement because it means that I don't think all things are ok because a certain culture decides that it is acceptable. Well ok, i am a cultural relativist to a certain extent, but there are certain issues where I draw the line—like sexual harassment, abuse, murder, theft, etc. etc. It seems like these are easy boundaries, but here, I find that when it comes to gender relations they are not. Our definition of sexual harassment would get a lot of men arrested here—and it would not be accepted by some women also. When I first arrived here, it seemed to me that most women were content to be with men who dated other women regularly (even to the extent that they would have several live in girlfriends) or even beat them. There have been situations where I found myself conforming to this and feeling bad that I was “overreacting” to situations that were normal here in Namibia. However, upon closer inspection, it seems to be a situation that they simply accept b/c they don't see another option. This doesn't mean that all women are unhappy, but it does mean that a lot of them are living with situations that they would change if they felt like they could. Ultimately, to react negatively to these situations however, is pretty much looked down upon. After a lot of thought and talking to some other volunteers, this is one situation where I have decided that I will not conform with the culture here. Fortunately, there are at least a few people that agree with my perspective and some others who never thought about it before and don't exactly hate it. I hope that by maintaining my perspective I will be able to change at least a few minds here!

Ultimately, I've accomplished a few things in this year, both personally and professionally. I've had to constantly remind myself of such accomplishments the days, like this one, that I am just sort of sitting around waiting for someone I made an appointment with to show up. I think the one thing that I am most proud of that I've managed to stay reasonably optimistic most of the time— both about people in general, and that these women might just show up in the next few hours.

Random Observations

2007-07-19T08:27:00.000-07:00

Once again, I have been lax on updating—partially because work has been a bit busier, but also because a lot of things that I have observed in the past seem sort of normal to me, so I think i don't notice them anymore. For example, the other day I was riding in one of my principals' bakkie, and he was filling up the gas and suddenly the car starts moving up and down. To me, this is now standard—at filling stations people will pump their entire truck up and down to fill it up with more gas. The first time it happened though, I thought they were trying to get me out of the car.

So maybe today will just be series of random observations:

1.Today, as I was walking from an office, I saw an entirely naked baby wearing only white tennis shoes. It was bent over and screaming aaha haha. I think it was happy.

2.A teacher warned me earlier that some kids were messing up my class room. I went in, told them to get up, clean up, and get out. It was the strictest I've ever been (they had left old corn and candy wrappers on the floor, PLUS dumped all my things on the floor!). My karma it seems, came to get me, when I tried to lock the door. The lock sticks, but usually it works ok. Today however, I try to open it and suddenly the key moves smoothly—why? b/c the key broke in the lock.

3.Also, today, I went to visit a school in my cluster, about five kM from the road. There were three classrooms constructed from the normal cement, and then five zinc shack classrooms for 200 students. Its a new school, which in Namibia, means that the Ministry might not have gotten around to it? We went to two classrooms. In the first one we found some older learners who stood up when we walked in (standard). Then we went into the next class room, where there were sixty small kids in one, rather large, but not large enough, classroom. When we left that one, I looked back into the first classroom only to find the kids still standing.

4.I got bored and taught Grade 8A how to use the Internet. They were fascinated most by the pictures of lions, giraffes and elephants that they have never seen before, even though there is a game park only 17 km from Omuthiya, my site!

5.Recently attended a meeting under a tree. Quite possibly the most efficient meeting I have been to since arriving in Namibia. The group, saving to buy a tractor and use it to raise money to fund affordable housing, has collected N$41,000. The meeting took thirty minutes, and had absolutely no written or discussed agenda. This does not mean that nothing happened at the meeting, just that we didn't really spend much time talking about what was going to happen at the meeting.

6.This week, I attended a staff meeting for the school closest to my house. The teachers have taken the initiative to build a second water pipe for our school, in addition to planting a diverse variety of fruit trees all over the school, clearing and creating a new soccer field, planning a school trip to Grootfontein, organizing a HIV/AIDS awareness week march and drama competition, and painting a new school emblem over our old one.

7.Last week, I shadowed a woman who works with the World Food Programme to understand the feeding scheme and maybe talk to some of the people who do the distributing. All the people who appeared at the Feeding points were mostly old women, but they were talking and laughing as they picked up the heavy bags of maize meal. I realized that these old women weren't picking up the food for themselves, but for the Orphans and/or Vulnerable Children they had taken in. I also met a woman working for the UN. She was a Namibian who only passed Grade 12, but had found herself in a successful position as an AID worker. We visited the small village center near one of my cluster schools and ate some really good chicken that only cost $2. Not only was it covered, but it also had pepper in it! Way nicer than Omuthiya Location market. Also saw a really really hairy brown baby donkey.

8.Visited the village of a friend with no electricity and no water except a tap, but was very nice. Even though only about an hour and a half from my site, this village had an entirely different landscape. Vast savannahs (as in the Namibian national anthem) and open spaces, while here we have a lot of trees. Met two small kids with my favorite names: Ndafa (means: I am happy) and Boyki (a combination of afrikaans and english, which just means, “small boy”). Ndafa, who is also named Ndiddymeche (I think may be her real name), can compete for the prize for cutest small girl in Namibia. Also saw some really tiny baby goats, but have a feeling they won't be cute for much longer.

9.SchoolNet installed OpenLab4 on our computers. Now, we have SEVEN functional computers in our lab! (this is what allowed me to teach grade 8A, i guess). Only disadvantage is that it makes my Internet REALLY slow. Still, Ndafa!
10.Before that attended peacecorps wkshp at Red and Yellow hotel in Ongwediva. Got to see everyone, very exciting, and met our new peacecorps director, who prefers to be called Hannah. She knows one of my French teachers, Professor Drame from her time as a peace corps volunteer in Senegal!!!!!

11.Had a huge HIV/AIDS awareness day march and then drama competition later in the week. Notable Incidents:
1.A poster which said, “safe sex safes lives.”

2.Riding in my counterpart's really nice car while hundreds of kids ran behind us singing songs about HIV. I felt a little bad, but not nearly as much as I would have when i first got here. After all, I am “Miss Ami”, sometimes Oshilumbu, sometimes Oshibrowna.

3.The Police Officer chasing back Waa Pandula P.S. Learners (basically small kids), back with a stick. No one sees this as out of the ordinary. Fortunately, no one gets beaten. The police officer wants the picture I took to memorialize the event.

4.Got donations of prizes from a local grocery store. The owner had to verify that the prizes were for kids to make sure not to include alcohol.

5.During the drama, there were at least four plays about sugar daddies. One of them was named “Mr. Cash” and was on a vendetta to infect people with HIV/AIDS.

6.To simulate having HIV/AIDS in the Drama, my host sister, who was the star, borrowed my jeans (which were too big and falling off). In addition to promoting an incorrect stigma of AIDS, it made me feel kinda fat.

Sooohooooooo

2007-05-30T03:55:00.000-07:00

So, I promised a blog entry a week, and I shall deliver. I have chosen Wednesday because a) I'm feeling awake today and have accomplished almost everything on my list of things to do today and b) b/c today is the day I take my mefloquine aka malaria prophylaxis, which often leads to interesting dreams and mood swings, so I thought it might make this entry more exciting. If any of you are still reading this. This week is starting to pick up, although as predicted my June 1st OVC meeting is postponed. No problem, as now i've learned to go with the postponements, but its also goign to be bigger than i expected b/c the RACE office from Ondangwa is planning to attend the meeting. Will we really accomplish anything? What do they want to talk about? Will anyone understand me while I am speaking. The suspense is unbearable, but I will have bear it until next wednesday.

There are some other things I am working on though. In the Namibian (or maybe world tradition) of having holidays for diseases (or maybe more PC, infections), AIDS Awareness week is the third week of June, so we're having an event and a local store has already agreed to donate some prizes for our contest. The contest will be basically a cultural show, where people can read poems, do dances, peform dramas, or read stories about or related to HIV/AIDS for both the school and community members. It should be exciting, and I think PEP may also be donating some things. The Area manager is calling me tommorow, and he seems to have had a great relationship with the previous volunteers so things are looking up. I've also started my OVC database as two schools in the cluster and the local OVC coordinator have given me lists of local OVCs.

The current project which does not seem to be working out is the school newspaper I am trying to start. Everyone seems to want a newspaper to instantly appear, but no one wants to do anything. I am going to have a meeting today with my kastaff (meaning, in namlish, small staff) and in addition to playing musical chairs with them, i plan to have them write something, anything really, down on a piece of paper and then have their neighbors rate what they have written. Just to get them started. Its going to work! And, everyone is going to want to be on the paper when it is finally done. In my ideal world, this will all happen (and I will also figure out a way to take hot showers every morning instead of boiling a really big pot of water and bucket bathing... winter has finally arrived, although that just means its freezing at night and warm during the day. on the bright side, i dont feel like i need to take a shower during lunch and can spend it attempting to work, or at least sitting in the tuck shop with the teachers).

Speaking of sitting in tuck shops with teachers, I don't know if I have mentioned about the Namibian (and from what i studied in college, west african) tendancy to speak in proverbs and use metaphors constantly in conversation. I'm not sure if its used so frequently in english simply because of tradition or also because people don't know the words for things in english, but unless someone is directly addressing me, I often have no idea what people are talking about. (this happens to me frequently in the tuck shop... kind of a canteen i guess). For example, a conversation will go "He is going to the bank with the officer." "oohhhhhhh, soooooohoooooo. they ahve gone as two and will come back with one loan." everyone bursts into laughter. Ok so maybe this one wasn't that hard to catch (on to, but if i added these two words, my namlish would not be complete), but it took me a while. One that I've heard used frequently in reference to the namibian man's tendancy towards multiple girlfriends is, "he is not serious, he just wants dessert after dinner." eeeeeeek, I guess I got that one the first time. The problem is, I can't relay to you the conversations that I dont understand b/c I can never remember what they are saying. I think today some teachers had an argument about a paper in a book and taking it out, but i'm really not sure. hmmm. but, I've decided to retaliate by referring to everything as " that thing." Its frustrating because no one ever knows what "that thing" is even though I am usually refering to something we just talked about, although they seem to always know what each other are referring to. Assimilation is definitely not as easy as it looks on the surface. So, If I come home refering to everyplace as that side of Washington DC and everything as that thing, please forgive me and congratulate me b/c I may have finally achieved integration into Omuthiya.

Mweeeeeh

2007-05-21T03:18:00.000-07:00

As we were sitting at a campsite in northern Kunene, we heard a voice of disdain... maybe it wasn't as strong an emotion as disdain, but rather just laziness. Mweeeeeeeh, mweeeeeeeh. It was like someone was summing up my emotional state of the moment (and ok, possibly of every moment since I graduated a year ago)... I had to meet this person who so clearly understood me. Unfortunately, my attempts to find my soulmate were thwarted by the fact that it was a bird and afraid of all of us. It flew away from the tree right above me when we attempted to move closer. I have no idea what kind of bird, but i've started hearing it everywhere in Namibia (and not just from my own mouth, since I can't make the sound nearly as well as some of my fellow volunteers can).

From following the mweh bird all over north western namibia to playing german monopoly (where I lost spectacularly. As if the fact that I'm broke wasn't enough to indicate to me that I am terrible with money), I have to say I've had an exciting month without any time for updates... including two sort of vacations. Well the first one was a full blown vacation, largely due to the fact that it was entirely planned by group 25ers (aka the people who came here last year). They rented a car and two of us from 26 came along for the ride. It was all in Kunene, but Kunene is ginormous (is that a word?), so we did a lot of traveling and saw a lot of different landscapes. We spent the first four days on the kunene river.

At the first place we went, the staff was really nice to us b/c they're not used to getting younger people coming to see them (its usually older europeans), and we went on this river boat cruise thing, which was nice but we didn't see any crocodiles. This may have been fortunate since most of us (including our tour guide, who lives there, so I trust his judgment) ended up swimming in the river, but I was still disapointed. And don't worry, it moves too fast for schisto... or so they told us.

At Epupa Falls, which was even harder to get to but definitely worth the bumpy travels... we were just driving and driving and suddenly, you look down the hill and see palm trees and water falls in the middle of the desert. I thought i was seeing a mirage. (Once you climb up a bit higher than we were you can see that the falls are actually huge and the angolan side of the border is much greener, but that moment was pretty shocking, especially after miles of desert). Our campsite was right infront of one of the smaller falls, and right next to it was a small delta with little water falls that was safe from both schisto and crocodiles so we could swim there also... it was amazing. There was a huge baobab tree right in the middle and tons of little himba (you're gonna have to look this up) kids playing in the water. A bunch of them braided my hair, but my favorite was a little girl named wendy... i didn't keep it in for long b/c it really hurt, but apparently it looked allright and someone has a picture of me and wendy after I got my hair braided. I tried to give her a bunch of cookies, but a bunch of kids swarmed me, so I settled for just giving her two instead of one. (One of the 25ers found a bag of them at a store on our way there. I think he said they said “South West Africa” on them. Well, he might have been joking? Either way, delicious. Oh how my standards for food have gone down.) Ok so maybe my favorite was also happy boy, this fat fat little baby who was sitting in the water giggling while we splashed (or uh... rolled) water on him. How did they name him so appropriately?

Anyways, after epupa, we went on to some desert campsites where we were supposed to spot elephants and rhinos. We didn't see any rhinos (unfortunately, since someone just told me i look like one...mweeeh), but we saw an elephant and tons and tons of zebra, giraffes (we got a momma and baby crossing the road), oryx, kudu, and even a few warthogs. And off course the standard cows, goats and donkeys that you get everywhere in namibia (today i saw a goat wandering around by it self bleating... it was so depressing... i never realized that goats can't be alone, but i had no idea how to make it feel better. somehow petting it didn't seem like the right thing to do.) PLus, the campsites we went to were all nicer than my homestead. Some how most of them had electricity and ALL of them have hot water. I am so gonna figure out how to set up a woodburning waterheater at my site.

Second vacation was to Grootfontien, Rundu, and Divundu (the latter two being in the kavango). We mostly hung out with other volunteers, but it was cool to see what life is like in the kavango. We saw rundu beach on the kavango river, although we stayed out of this river since it was pretty still and obviously could have shisto, although apparently no crocs b/c little kids were swimming in it. On the other hand, volunteers east of Rundu in kavango have mentioned that they lose 5-6 learners a year to crocodiles when small boys/girls are sent to fetch water. Maybe corporal punishment is the kinder alternative in some places, eeek. Anyways, we hiked out to divundu which is right on the edge of caprivi strip, and stayed with the volunteer there who lives in this amazing amazing youth center. we're apparently supposed to get one like that out here, but uhh.. who knows when that will happen. we spent most of our time cooking and watching sex in the city, but we did make it out on a river cruise, which was really cool, we saw a lot of hippos!!!!!, water monitors (huge lizards), baby crocs and cool birds. The guide must have had like 20/0 vision b/c he could see everything and kept on pointing out stuff to us that we would have never noticed. Everything was great in dividu until we had to hike back... we waited for FIVE hours to get a ride to Rundu and had to split up. Its a nice place, but i dont know if i could handle the difficulty in traveling.

So I am back at my site after many travels! I plan on spending time at my site, but imma rolling stone (ahaha, i jsut wanted to stay that), and I can't say that I am ever just happy sitting still in one place. But now that I'm back, I've decided to get to work at getting work now that I am here, but its still slow coming. We were supposed to have a meeting on June 1 for this new job description that Mr. Matengu helped me to create for myself, where I will be working with OVCs (Orphans and Vulnerable Children) within our six cluster schools. I'd say maybe 60% of our kids are OVC, so I'm not gonna be working with all of them, but just what the OVC coordinators at each school decide are the cases in need of attention. I'll be monitoring their weekly progress and school, applying for food and blankets from the government and local businesses, and hopefully doing some activities with them, which I am still trying to work out, b/c I want them to be fun and some how also confidence building. Any ideas anyone?

Unfortunately though, the ministry recently decided that school should be postponed another week, so I have a feeling this meeting will not go as planned. It makes sense that it is postponed, b/c it was supposed to start this week, but we get friday off for africa day, but its weird that they decided that this should happen last week. well it will be figured out next week.

So that is whats goign on... I am also continuing to work on my peer counseling thing/ school newspaper/income generating projects/legal assistance and looking forward to GAURI visiting meeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!! For now, it is weird b/c I feel like I am doing a lot and its tough to keep it organised, but at the same time, I feel like I am doing nothing.

Mweeeeeeeh.

5 cent

2007-04-05T01:16:00.000-07:00

So... finally updating! I think I am going to stick to weekly updates, b/c honestly, now that you guys know my daily routine, life is relatively unexciting on a daily basis. Well, its still exciting for me, but to hear that I ate beans and corn from the field again today could get boring, and I want to keep you guys coming!

Miss Ami

So yesterday, my three dedicated PHEs actually practiced a presentation in front of my future is my choice and I was scared to DEATH. Like to the point that I didn't want to watch them b/c I was so scared. But, fortunately, they did an excellent job. They were confident, loud, and knew when to improvise and speak in oshiwambo! I am totally throwing them a party next week after I get back from windhoek. I told them that, and they didnt really understand...but they will if I find cookies in windhoek. Cookies always make a good party. Actually... I think I might make them! Anyways, I was very excited, plus 5 more kids signed up.

Beans and Maize

So this week, I've basically been hanging out with my family for dinner everyday b/c I love the beans and corn... they were eating mahangu one day, but it was with beef, so they got me more corn and maize so I could eat with them... it was really exciting. *i know it doesn't sound that exciting... but really, it was* Then, I promised to show them Indian dancing if they showed me how to do oshiwambo dancing, which is basically feels a lot like step. They like sing and clap and basically stomp to the rhythm in the middle of a circle of people... As opposed to my abysmal attempts at step though, I think i actually got this, and then I showed them some garba/a little bhangra (they loved it, but somehow could not do the steps without falling down. made me feel pretty skilled). Somehow though, the night ended in us attempting to do ballet and the splits in the middle of our homestead... i was in pain for at least a day after that. The next night we did the same thing... except we decided to play this game where someone listed different things after someone picked a category. We decided on musical artists and after we got through all the namibian artists, my host sister decides to try an american one... specifically, "5 cent." hahahahahaa. try making a dollar out of 5 cent. ok just kidding.

Fried Chicken

So, I stayed in Omuthiya for the weekend and went with my host sister to this... well they ahve this tradition where the girl goes to the guys homestead to meet the guys family, so me, my host sister, her sister, and some of her friends headed up north in my host sister's little red city car. (think VW bug with like 7 people in it... yesssss). It took us forever to get there... my host sister stopped at their cuka shop to do her hair, and made me go home and change into indian clothes (probably should have grabbed a snack). Then we finally left for Ondangwa, but once we got there, we stopped at pick and pay to go shopping... and then... some how my host sis got the newsflash that I got all the way back in Omuthiya that something might be wrong with her car so we stopped at a mechanic who basically told us it was no big deal. I guess it wasn't, but the car did stall out in the middle of ondangwa, lol. But once we got to the homestead, about 5 km outside of Ondangwa, it was pretty nice. They had like full out building in the homestead, but they had arranged this area outside for us to sit in with snacks and drinks and stuff. It was cool, but then they took forever to come. First, the meme came and greeted each and everyone of us and left us some Oshikundu (this oshiwambo drink with, shocking, mahangu in it). Then a few people would come every couple of minutes and introduce themselves. Finally after an hour or so, everyone in the family came and greeted us each individually. Then... we all introduced ourselves (I did in oshiwambo! I only said like two lines, but they got so excited that they clapped for me... then the guy next to me said the exact same two lines, and they thought it was funny and clapped for him too)... and then they gave speeches, and then FINALLY we ate, but it was worth the wait. It was like fully stocked southern meal... with mayonnaise in it. We had fried chicken, macaroni salad, mashed potatoes, carrots, spinach... oh my god, it was delicious, especially after a week of corn and beans. I mean I love corn and beans, but, i forgot how much loved real food.

So thats pretty much for this week... next week will be more exciting. My friends are coming up tiommorow! THen were going to ruacana falls and then I go to windhoek!!!!! yessssss.

Serious Business .....and cookies.

2007-03-28T07:03:00.000-07:00

So, today, I once again wished I was a teacher, but apparently my job just involves all the fun parts of teaching, aka playing games with learners after school. Not exactly what I am doing, but still, a good time.

Monday, I had my PHE class, where I only have four kids, but they have made a noticeable improvement. When they first got to my class, they didn't look at me when they talked, they didn't talk loud enough, didn't make eye contact, and were basically incredibly shy. On Monday they did a condom demonstration for me (with a wooden penis fresh from the RACE (Regional AIDS Council on Education I think?) office, thank god they give me so many materials), and they looked at me, spoke loudly, and two of them didn't even need to look at the book to remember all the steps. And they weren't embarrassed!!!!!! It was very exciting, and I am so proud of them... even if I feel like there is too much HIV/AIDS education going on at Iipundi, I realize I can't really stop these kids from what I've started. Although I am thinking about starting a debate club... they could definitely use the skills they have learned there.

Tuesday, I actually presented again in a workshop at Okankolo, north of Ondangwa. Despite knowing nothing about needs assessment before I came here, I think the second time around I actually managed to convey something useful. I did this activity where I did a bad interview and a good interview without telling them what I was doing, and I think I kind of scared the guy I did a bad interview with... I was yelling at him and asking questions like "does your mother have a job." it was kind of funny, b/c he really did look scared but right before my session, Helena did a session on gender and the guys were like there shouldn't be a woman president and they had split themselves off by gender, so it was a little bit fun to scare one of the guys. I also got to go to a friend's site which is pretty close to mine to help with the workshop there, although since I had already presented on needs assessment i just helped with the gender presentation... except we have a more expanded concept of gender than they do here, I guess simply because people are a bit more experimental in the states. I was trying to explain to them about how gender can be how someone sees themselves as opposed to sex, but really, the idea of seeing yourself as a woman when you are biologically a man just confused them. I dont think very many people talk about the 13 different genders in Namibia.

Today I basically had my school newspaper club, which has been a bit difficult to get started b/c not all of the learners are really motivated or really ready to unleash their creativity (cheesy, but i know its there). When they first got into the room, and I started talking, it was pretty clear that none of them were paying attention, so after 5 minutes of blank stares, I decided to play fruit salad, which is this fantastic game which I can't really explain here. After that things were a bit easier and I finally got them to come up with story ideas... granted, they were like "a story about a wrong boy", "introduce our new school newspaper" and "the environment at our school," but really, its their paper, so they can write about what they want. at least this is what i am trying to impress upon them! I know I sounded really cheesy when I was talking to them about why it is important to be fair and accurate... i think i said something like "everyone will be a critic, so this is serious business!"... and then i started cracking up. Not sure i gave them the right impression, but I'm working on that.

Oh yes and my Tuesday Legal Clinics are finally starting!!!!!!!! Here is a draft of the AD in English that is going to be translated and put on Oshiwambo radio.
------
The AIDS Law Unit of the Legal Assistance Centre is a project dealing with HIV/AIDS from human rights based approach. The project believes that the protection and promotion of human rights is neccessry to empower people to respond effectively to HIV/AIDS and to reduce their vulnerability.

It is therefore against this background that the Unit is extending its servirces across the country. The Unit is pleased to anounce that it will provide legal aid clinic at Omuthiya. The community around Omuthiya is invited to make use of this free service. Any members of the community with any legal problem are encouraged to visit our office. The legal problem should and not necessarily limited to:

* Discrimination or stigmatisation because of your HIV status,
* Dismissal from employment because of your HIV status,
* House/land eviction because of your HIV status,
* Disinheritance as sanction for causing spouse death,
* Refusal of treatment at public health facilities because of inability to pay consulation fee,
* Refused or delayed treatment without reasonable justification,
* Refusal of social grants,
* Refusal of OVC school admission because of inability to pay school development fund,
* Assistance with will writing,

That last one worries me a little bit, but after not really knowing anything before I came here about what I'm doing and figuring it out, I am confident that I'll figure this one out too. Or tell them to go to the office with a real lawyer in Ongwediva.
---------

Sorry this entry is so long, but I also went to Walvis Bay and hung out with some of my favorite PCVs there. Its beautiful, and quite possibly the most unique landscape I've ever seen. On one side, there is a desert (technically not a desert, actually) filled with sand dunes which stretch for miles and look kind of like the waves of the ocean, and on the other, there is an actual ocean. Its such a contradiction. Swakop is really developed, so from the beach you can really only see a boardwalk, but the beach is also, contrary to what we had been told, very clear and perfect to swim in, although a little cold. We also saw seals really close to the beach on these rocks that were serving as a barrier between the ocean and the water near the beach. We decided to kind of climb the rocks (they weren't incredibly high), and off course I was terrified b/c I am always terrified of heights, but I climbed them anyways to the part looking over the ocean... everyone else made it safely, but off course once I got up there I got SOAKED by a wave. Fortunately, I saw it coming and sat down, so it didn't knock me off the rocks, but off course, it was just my luck. and off course, my friends took pictures, so they will eventually be posted.

We also ate a lot of food... I FINALLY got sushi, thank god! no spicy tuna, but it hit the spot. And garlic mussels. And we found black beans at the grocery and made mexican food, and coconut milk and made thai food. I must have gained some weight, which I will undoubtedly lose this week b/c a) I am broke and b) we have been eating beans and maize from the field everyday. (yes, the same beans that I earlier sowed in the fields... its a good feeling). mmmmmmmmmmmm. i'm getting hungry now (notice how many of these entries center around food... what can i say... people respond. My mom is sending me soft baked cookies. clearly, while i didn't think there was a way for me to love her more than I already do, it has somehow happened).

Read Kate in Namibia

2007-03-20T00:48:00.000-07:00

Read kate's blog. she got into an accident, but I am jealous, b/c its hilarious.

Always a First Time for Everything

2007-03-19T06:42:00.000-07:00

So today, I took my first ride on an open bakkie. Think me, helena, saki and 25 community members in the back of a truck driving pretty fast. It was actually really cool because we were riding with the youth that we organised to the fish breeding project withsome guy from the ministry of fisheries. They have a dam full of fish already, but it may not be as easy to start because the fish are old and tough, so they may have to breed new fish and also get funding for good food although the fish can eat anything. It definitely seems like its gonna work really well, especially since the regional council has taken credit for the program we've organised! Next, Chicken breeding project and feedback meeting for those who are not a part of these two projects! I don't really care as long as it works, i just need to feel like i'm doing something.

Apparently, I am school secretary, they have my type assignments for them constantly. Today a teacher at my school gave me this like 10 page assignment she had and asked me to please type it so I did, except i was like ok, you want this in a couple days right? apparently not, she said it was due today, so i was like ok, no problem. But, i found out when i came back at 2 with it halfway typed that the assignment was due before then. Clearly I've created some myths about my typing abilities here, but i dont know how they got started.

probably from all this blog writing.

Oh yes, my family finally likes me! I think? I had dinner with them the other day (some kinda fish, was pretty good) and spent the evening stirring oshikundu, and my meme and I actually had a conversation sort of which was pretty amazing considering she could not even understand my greeting in oshiwambo before. Then I fed her cookies, which obviously the classic way to anyone's heart regardless of culture. If the milk in namibia was any good, probably wouldn't have broke that out too. They don't have those big soft baked cookies here though... mmmm........ i miss those. lately I've been having food cravings for east asian food. Hopefully thats gonnna happen soon, one of the volunteers found coconut milk in the store, that was pretty amazing.

I am off to Walvis Bay/Swakop for the independance holiday... where I will eat sushi. Will let you know how that goes. Also, lucy, the vol there might be getting high speed so will attempt to post many many pictures. yeayy!

Finally!!!!!

2007-03-01T02:58:00.000-08:00

Finally have a P.O. Box of my own, so no excuse to avoid mailing me nowwww!

Send your professions of love to:

Ami Shah
P.O. Box 19042
Omuthiya
Namibia

Rights of Passage

2007-02-23T02:48:00.000-08:00

So, I have had some pretty insane experiences with public transportation in namibia... but today, I honestly think that the comvee driver I had won some kind of prize for worst driver ever. I mean... so a couple of other pcv's and myself decided to meet down south for just the weekend. Its a pretty long trip for me, so I left at 6 am this morning to get a hike from Ondangwa, which was one of my Namibian friend's idea. Clearly, she had never done this before, b/c we end up getting there at 7:30, which is fine. Then, the taxi driver takes our luggage out before we knew it and puts it on a comvee... we thought he was joking so helena asks him to open the trunk and our luggage has been deloaded on to this bus. Meanwhile, there is a police man trying to get us on this minibus, which apparently is going to leave first. Clearly, this man is confused b/c, as we found out later, none of those buses were gonna leave any time soon. So I am getting irritated and we decide to go to Shoprite and get some food for the trip, and we find another comvee driver who tells us he is leave now and isnt going to wait to fill up the entire bus... instead he promises to fill up along the way. After waiting at our comvee for about a half an hour, we decide to finally go over to the other comvee that said it was leaving soon. The guy puts down our names, and asks us to pay, and I decide, from previous experience not to pay the guy until the bus starts moving...he's like no we are leaving now! And I am like ok, I believe you, I will show you my 100, but I will not give it to you, and seriously, the man is starting me down. But at this point, I am still believing that I am gonna go this weekend, but by 9:30, i know it is going to be too late, but probably will still go anyways. Still, we have not left, so I start yelling at the guy about how he has lied to me and how this is a serious problem and we need to leave, so the comvee starts moving! yesssss! noo... wait, we are pulling up to the gas station. However, we are not filling up, we are just standing there, picking up more fares. The police man shows up and randomly shuts the door about every 15 minutes to say that no one else gets on the comvee, but clearly, he's officially proved himself to be worthless b/c no one in any of the comvees is listening to him and besides, the comvees not exactly overloaded. So i wait another half an hour...clearly at this point I am livid and literally start yelling at the driver b/c i know he's gonna stop all the time on the way. I ask him to give me my bag so I can go to OMuthiya, b/c I"ll just take a taxi back, but he says no... at some point I threatened to not pay him anything, and by the end, I was like you should just give me my bag b/c i swear you will not get a dime from me. I doubt he understood what i was talking about, but he knew what I meant when i said "no money." but back to the saga... So we move again... to the gas pump. Then, we're leaving again... getting excited! but no... we pull up to the hike point again. And 20 minutes later, we're leaving again... and no... we go back to the gas station. We do this about 3 more times until I am at the point of hysterical tears, but then, randomly, this guy on the bus starts getting pissed too, except he sounds like oscar the grouch..maybe something scarier. Everytime he talks, I can't concentrate on what is going on because its hilarious. Unfortunately, his voice does not intimidate the driver into leaving, but finally at around 11:15, we do leave, and find ourselves stopping about 5 more times on the way to omuthiya. Somewhere in there, someone on the bus gets a phone call, and starts saying in very very loud oshiwambo something about how the driver is completely dishonest and cheated them out of their money. Thank god I wasn't the only one. When I got off at Omuthiya, they were still trying to convince me to go to Windhoek and were liek I will give you a discount, but not really that much of one. Clearly, they did not realize how close they came to me biting their heads off. They were like, ah man, you are not good. I was liek did you really think you were gonna screw me over like that and still make money of me. I swear I know they're just trying to make a living, but I need some service please? Off course my morning ended with a bunch of little kids from the primary school following me and laughing. I still don't know whats behind my back, but this evokes sad memories of the 5th grade and I dont want to relive them so I leave. Ah... clearly, we had no rights of passage, but helena thought of the title, and it seemed appropriate. I hope you all have a good weekend... and that I do too :( now that the comvee driver ruined my plans.

Water Shortages motivate me to organize.

2007-02-20T01:38:00.000-08:00

Basically, I have decided that my blog needs to make more sense. I have lots of time to do this, so I don't know why it hasn't happened yet. Honestly, I've never had this much time in my life, and until very recently, didn't exactly know what to do with myself. I'm not really sure that I do now, but I am working on it. Its kind of exciting actually, because one of the reasons why I wanted to come to the peacecorps is to do the things I've never had time to do. And help people, off course.

PHE Class

Anyways, yesterday, I had my second PHE class, it was much better than the last. 4 out of 5 of the learners seemed to understand me, and we played musical chairs, so that was great. Also, I think I am getting better a gearing the activities towards learners here—obviously, i still have a lot to learn, but I can relate to the teachers. Things you would normally expect to go wonderfully (or things that have gone really well for me before) can fall flat here... well honestly, i can't even tell if they're going well or not because the kids are so quiet. I know its cultural that the kids are so shy, but I also feel like despite culture, I don't want them to be shy around me. I don't have to deal with the same discipline issues that teachers do, because fortunately, I already have good learners.

Discipline

Speaking of discipline issues I had a conversation with some teachers on saturday about methods of punishment and not using verbally abusive language to punish learners, but i was kind of caught in my own inexperience. I guess it was obvious that I was speaking to them from the perspective of a student, just having finished being a student myself. Basically though, they had a valid complaint... people are always saying they should do things differently, but they never suggest how. I can understand that, but still have nothing to offer them. Any suggestions? I am thinking about it and realize i should ask fozia, since she is the only person i know with real training to be a teacher. If you're reading this... yeah, let me know.

Dirty Details

Outside of work, Omuthiya is fine, except there is no water for the second week in a row. Well, to be fair we had a small intermission between pipe breakings last week, but then someone accidentally hit the water pipe again saturday and the water has been out since then. Fortunately, my homestead has an outdoor tap that I can fetch water from, but I really am not enjoying doing it for extended periods of time. Plus, it does put a damper on my avoiding the pit latrine scheme, b/c a pit latrine is really the cleanest option during a water outage. I am sure you all wanted to know about that... haha, but you wanted the dirty details on Namibia, so there you go.

Chickens and Cats

So, I've grown pretty accustomed to seeing animals everywhere. Its just how it is, people let their animals roam around, and I can't really think of a problem with it, its just weird at times. For example, yesterday, I was sitting in the computer room, and a chicken walked it, and just chilled out in here for a good 15 minutes. For some reason, the contrast of me sitting online reading CNN and typing up my PHE syllabus for the afternoon while a chicken clucked around me seemed hilarious. Unfortunately, I had no camera, but one day, it will happen, and I will display it for all to see forever when I return to the states. Yesssssssssss.

Also my cat, which i am starting to hate, has started doing this creepy thing where it jumps through my window at night and tries to jump on my bed. Eeeeeeek. This morning, i seriously freaked out. It also has the effect of ruining my screens. Well, that is all for today. I realize that is more understandable, but probably more boring. Like I said, I'm working on it, I have time.

Packages are wonderful.

2007-02-14T23:38:00.000-08:00

I got my first package from my birthday this weekend, from my parents! Did anyone else send packages? if so... I will eventually get them, PC just takes forever to got them to me. For now...I have to figure out my P.O. Box situation in Omuthiya. I had a box from the previous vol, but then, she had left all these fines on it and I thought I could just open up a new one on Feb 1st, but then there was a delay and now its March 1st. I hope that date doesn't change... if it does, i'll just give you the schools P.O. Box, b/c my friend whose box i was thinking about using actually has a bocx in Ongwediva, which is a bit far. I mean not really, but I dont wanna go up there every weekend to check my mail.

Anyways, so the last week or so has been kind of eventful... I started my peer health education program. Think kids staring at me blindly while most likely having no idea what I'm talking about. It was ok though, i think i will warm them up soon enough. We played this game where you spell your names with your hips b/c they really weren't talking. I think the next time I will have to be enthusiastic enough for all of us...they willllll talk to me! Next week, i'm going to do what some of the education volunteers did with their PE classes... play duck duck goose. ALthough, there is a fine line between enthusiastic and scary that I might cross if I'm not careful... I dont know why I feel like games will make them open up, but it seems like a good icebreaker, which we clearly needed. I also think I was aiming my curriculum for town kids... kids in Tsumeb were far more responsive to the types of activities I came up with, maybe just because they were able to express themselves better in english. Plus they've been through workshops and stuff before. Maybe it will be good... i can work out a curriculum that can be used universally for village kids. or maybe its just the fact that I dont know any Oshiwambo. AHHHHHH!.

Also, I went up to Ongwediva with Amon from the LAC on Monday, and on Tuesday we spend a couple hours going over what they want me to do, and it seems pretty exciting! They want me to hold these legal clinics where i just do intake for them... which worries me a little bit, but they said they would get someone to help me with the oshiwambo for a while so that will be nice, and I dont really have to dish out any legal advice. Although they have all these trainings they want to give to people, and I went to this meeting for community AIDS volunteers and it seems like they would be really open to it. Everyone basically wants to figure out how to make money, so information on grants and income generating projects seems like the best way to go and the LAC has some trainings on that! I mean, they need lots of things, but I can understand why their primary concern is finding employment...People have information, they just need a reason to put it into action...aka a real life with food on the table.

Well, we'll see... Gis might actually come up this weekend... a combination of things from parents meetings to broken water pipes in omuthiya have kept it from happening, but we are determined! Or at least I am. haha... ok that is all for now. Commentt pleaseee, it makes me feel good to know that ppl are still reading my blog, plus I wanna know what you think.

Pictures

2007-02-07T03:04:00.001-08:00

Some pictures up on webshots... takes forever to load, so not really alot of them!

French Fry Sandwiches

2007-02-05T02:31:00.000-08:00

As you may be able to tell from this heading, I discovered a new namibian delicacy this weekend. The French Fry Sandwich. Basically, you buy chips (aka fries) and you put them in bread... sometimes with vinegar or mayonnaise (the ultimate namibian condiment). Just had to write about this, b/c it reminded me of a) the atkins diet, ahahaha...... and b) sharita b/c it seems like her ideal sandwich. Anyways, thats all I have for now. just thought i'd put it in!

Meetings Meetings Meetings

2007-02-01T01:42:00.000-08:00

So, yesterday was kind of a low point for me, b/c i came to school b/c we had a staff meeting and realized I have no real job here yet. It kind of sucks. Also, it is hard not being near to people who you can be close to. It was easier in Okahanja b/c everyone was going through the same thign so we all needed to hang out, but here everyone else has a life, so while I have made friends, its still a bit lonely. I did go over to a friends house Tuesday to watch the season finale of Paloma When you are mine, aka the namibian national obbession... she was totally into it... it was interesting in the same way a good bollywood movie is... aka bollywood could be huge here and they need to bring it here to make money except there are not really movie theaters that i know of in the north. Well apparently there used to be one in ondangwa, but now its gone. Anyways, back to the job, But i do have a job at the community center and we met the regional councilor today and apparently some of our income generating projects are possible except he didn't really give us concrete details. Hopefully that will work itself out...i mean he wont mind us bugging him b/c we definitely will! The school is even willing to share a soccer field with the community so that is also excellent. Today I have more of a job, b/c i have to write some letters and convince people to donate some stuff. Apparently ppl at the school are already doing this (asking people to donate)... another reason why I feel superfluous here, but who knows. The resources are here, whether they would be used or not I dont know. I hope so! So I totally didn't realize that my blog is amusing... or that people are reading it, so thats exciting. since people are will post more regularly!

Meeting!

2007-01-30T03:24:00.000-08:00

Yessssssss... today Helena (the Comm Development Coordinator) and I held a youth meeting and I even introduced myself in OShiwambo and they understood me. At first no one was there, but then like 60 ppl showed up and once they came they wouldn't stop talkign! Apparently, although there is a youth officer for Oshikoto region, he's really not meeting their needs. CRAP, we have a lot of work to do, but I am super excited about it. Anyways, another highlight to my week... also I am loading pictures on my webshots. clearly, these are really old pictures b/c i kind of stopped taking pictures when i realized i couldn't load them. but i am going to steal other people's pictures when i go visit them and soon I will post everything! it will just take time...

YESSSSSSSSSS!

2007-01-29T01:16:00.000-08:00

Oh my god, I am so excited, I am going to be working with the Legal Assistance Centre's Aids Law Unit... It will be awesome! They sent me an agreement and everything and they're gonna pick me up and take me to Ongwediva to meet the lawyers... so so excited. I will mostly be doing awareness programs and client outreach and intake. Basically what I would have been doing for the Washington Lawyer's Committee except for HIV/AIDS. I was really determined to work with them so this is like the highlight of my life. So I spent the whole weekend here this weekend. I know why PC volunteers don't lose weight now. I cooked everything. I made lasagna, chicken, saag something and parathas, brownies for Helenas birthday, potatoes, bread. And I ate cucumbers. besides that my weekend was pretty boring. I hung out with maria, who is one of Jennifer, the old PCV's friends. She is really cool, but unfortunately is pregnant, so we really can't do much. But i brought her some lasagna and she liked it... ok yes, i live a really boring life. but... besides that... Work is picking up, we're having a youth needs assesment meeting tommorow, plus we should have a cluster (group of 6 schools) meeting on thursday, so I will start having things to do, b/c I am supposed to work with OVCs from the cluster (Orphans and Vulnerable Children). Really I am just wondering when the staff meeting for the school I am at will be. Who knows? guess I will find out! Allright... thats all for today... probably for a while unless the youth meeting is particularly eventful

Tandi Kunu omakunde

2007-01-23T23:47:00.000-08:00

So basically, yesterday, i started working on this Peer Health Education program... it is kind of a lot of work? I also met the OVC coordinator from the primary school near by which was cool, b/c he told me that they needed help. Ahh, then again this is what everyone says, but with what, is still pretty amibiguous. He did talk about Windows of Hope, so my UNICEF obbsession will be allowed to continue, yess! Anyways, after a day of accomplishing nothing conclusive I still went home exhausted for some reason, and decided to take a nap until my host sister, Donnacky knocked on my door and asked me if i wanted to sow beans. Unsure of what this meant, but having little else to do, i decided to check it out... basically what she meant was digging a little hole with your bare feet and throwing two beans in. It was cool yesterday so it actually turned out to be a lot of fun, and was also great because it reminded me of why I wanted to be in a more rural area at the end of the day. I also sort of bonded with my sisters and learned how to say... my family loves me b/c i sowed beans today in oshiwambo. YESS. On my way to fluency. Just kidding... but really I am working on it. I am starting to love the greeting stuff b/c it makes people really feel like i know what i'm doing. Anyways, after that I was going to cook dinner, but realized I was seriously craving mahangu and whatever they were cooking (fish!) and ate with my family... i dunno whats happening to me, but i even liked the sandy texture. Although, I have to admit, i loved the way they cooked meat from the beginning b/c they make it spicy. It was just the oshithima, which is the mahangu porridge which I had to get used to... guess i'm there. Allright, lets see who will actually read this blog so often now that I have regular internet access! Haha...

ps. took a shower outside and discovered that we actually have hot water! Oh my god... it kind of cancels out the pit latrine. Which i still avoid like the plague, but still.

A Cool Day in Omuthiya

2007-01-23T02:06:00.000-08:00

By cool, i mean literally cool, its fabulous outside today. Apparently this season is really not supposed to be as scorching hot as it is outside here, and today we got the weather we're supposed to have yess! so sorry i have not updated in a while, but I have been settling in to my permanent site in omuthiya. our new years was kind of anti-climactic, but we did have brunch on the day of made by some of the ladies in our group. It was nice...but anyways, we swore in on January 7 and then most of the health volunteers (excluding myself) left right after the ceremony, which was pretty depressing for me as I am very close to them. We were also on national television! Apparently they had a shot of me, but only people who were looking for me saw it. I looked pretty different anyways, as I was wearing indian clothes and looked nice. Other people took pictures which I am going to try to steal and put up... its just that most ppl dont' have the same internet access i do, so they can't exactly update it on a regular basis. Another vol, chris, put some pictures up, but none of them are of me, although you can look if you want at www.sundaymorningblues.com. Well he doesn't know that i am giving out that link or anything, so don't link it anywhere.

Anyways, i got to site and after some obsessive cleaning, my place is fairly nice. I have electricty and sort of running water... no faucets in my part of the house but an outdoor shower and a sink in the kitchen on the other side of the house.

Oh my god it started raining... so exciting. Clearly i am turning into a Namibian, but we've been waiting for the rain forever, and I am pretty sure all their crops depend on it. Anyways, I can't leave so this entry may be a little longer, yess. So Omuthiya is an interesting little place. I realized last night when hanging out with one of my friends here that there are little "town", "location", and village sections of Omuthiya. Its supposed to expand to become the center of the Oshikoto region, but currently much of the stuff that is the center of the Oshikoto region is located in Tsumeb, so i'm pretty sure officials there must be dragging their feet to get it started b/c Tsumeb is so beautiful i doubt anyone wants to leave it. Omuthiya is pretty nice too though, its just neither as green nor as developed (which is the thing i think really gets people). Its located really close to a spring and Etosha National Park, both of which I am going to try to see this week when Gisella arrives (she is visiting me for the weekend!), should be very exciting. Anyways, I am still trying to figure out my job although now I am working to start a peer health education program b/c my future is my choice, the existing UNICEF program, does not have the funding to provide more trainings. I am using it as a basic template though, and hopefully getting in touch with planned parenthood of namibia b/c they fund some PHEs up in the Ohangwena region. There used to be a volunteer there, but she got into a car accident! I think she wants to come back, but she's in the US/South Africa (not sure which) in physical therapy. aaaaaaah. It sucks to lose members of the group! Anyways, I am also working with the Community Development Coordinator to organise a youth meeting and possibly a work shop based on youth needs. We'll see what happens. Apparently in a few months I will have more work than I can handle, and I can't wait! I have so much downtime here its ridiculous. If only i could hook up my comp to the internet i would respond to all emails, but... yeah. I'm working on it. Anyways, keep me posted!

Tsumeb Final Update + beggining of last two weeks

2006-12-27T12:06:00.000-08:00

ok so this first part is a couple days old, i just couldn't post it until now, from Tsumeb, which i miss dearly:

so to update my blog, it has been an interesting couple of days. my host sister left and now rika, my host sisters best friend is staying with me and she is hilarious, but also really honest with me so i end up having semi serious conversations with her about stuff i should know about all the time. also i've started watching this hilarious mexican soap opera that everyone is obbsessed with here.... Paloma when you are mine. its melodramatic and possibly has more close up face shots than your average 90s bollywood film. The story line is about Diego and Paloma and their love, except diego is dumb and gentle and has been framed by his cousin fabien who wants to own the family business at the expense of everything. diego makes me want to get some tp. (side note on toilet paper... people here reference everything to it, but mostly they talk abuot hanging themselves with tp. not serious, its like when i say shoot me now. but i think it has more serious undertones b/c pppl have a more fatalistic attitude here, but its hilarious when rika says it, so now i say it all the time now). back to paloma, people are always crying in hilarious scenes where they also look like they are constipated... apparently the two stars came to namibia last year (they are more famous here than in mexico i am so sure) but they couldn't speak english except to say "I love Namibia." oh yes, and after paloma yest, i was brushing my teach and heard a loud, waterfall like gushing sound in the kitchen... it was in fact my tap exploding and water was pretty much shooting up like a geyser all over the kitchen floor. it was pretty funny and there was nothing that the three of us (me, my host mom, and rika) could do, so we pretty much just started cracking up. then this morning just when i wanted to take a shower there was no running water, so i took a sketchy sketchy bucket bath. fun stuff... but also the highlight of my day. my friend megan has the best host family ever... well no mine is better... just kidding. haha. but anyways, they are hilarious also... all of the host families here have been trying to make us get fatter, b/c apparently thats a good thing here, and megan was wearing tight jeans or something and her oma (afrikaans for grandmother) was like "yayyy! you are getting fatter!" and her host aunt goes, "oooo... no more sexy body." hahahaha. ok sorry it was really funny while i was sitting there.
the music here is also interesting... have i already written about gazza and the dogg? they are the two msot famous mucisians in namibia, and i didn't realize how big a deal it was until i started hearing ppl yelling gnp and mshashu being yelled by random bored kids. really they don't sound all that different to me but ppl seem to know them. i have to get their cds for my host siblings, fun fun.
sorry... trying to address everything... oh yes so, in work news, this week as i said earlier, we planned a youth work shop for the kids, which actually was GREAT. 62 kids showed, and we got great feedback, and i was actually pretty proud of what we put together... i think most of the kids left learning something, even though i was definitely in the least technical sessions (condom negotiation, stigma, at risk groups/risk factors)and we didn't actually change behavior , but i think they turned out well. ok, cbt is coming to an end so i will probably have less internet access, but that is no excuse to stop emailing me. dddddddddddooooooooooo it. i miss you alll! amiiii
oh yeah... HAPPY BIRTHDAY MALA! (no clue if you will ever read this... but its the best i can do)

soo.. it is dec. 27, now and unfortunately i found out that manoj kaka died, so that was pretty terrible. I am glad everyone was together and was really sad that I couldn't make it for anything...

Christmas was not bad here they had a braai/barbecue for us which basically kept us occupied and its nice to see all the people from education that we were seperated from during community based training, but i miss the intimacy of CBT. now that we are back in okahanja, we're planning an HIV/AIDS workshop for the education volunteers... it is a little weird b/c we have to make it relevant to their lesson plans and sometimes i feel like i know more about what they need to know than they do when in fact i probably don't. we'll see... its starting tommorow and i'm doing the session on stigma and gender. I hope they like it! We also have our language assessments so I have been frantically studying for those even though i dont feel like i dont know anything... it'll be fun. also my language instructor teaches me one new destructive phrase everyday... today it was otandi kuu dhipaga (sp?) which means I will kill you, now. i love saying it to people, i guess i've developed a morbid sense of humor here, but my lang trainer also finds it to be hilarious, so at least i've bonded with a namibian (well i have bonded with other namibians, rika sends me texts and i love her! new goal in life, to make sure she goes to college, which she probably will b/c she's pretty smart). Besides that I'm mentally prepping myself for permanent site and becoming increasingly attached to the people i know and love here, so I will be visiting them often, especially since most of my site work initially may be needs assesment. who knows. ok, well people are waiting for the internet, so sorry for the short update but once again, little is happening here. inda po nawa!

...still here

2006-12-18T07:41:00.000-08:00

.... still here.

wow, it feels like we've been in Tsumeb foreeeeeeeeeeever ever. it is really nice here as i said, and my host family is pretty sweet too. I have also gotten the chance to get close some people in my group and to miss people properly, but the training here is... interesting. I'm not entirely sure we're getting everything we need here, but we have had some interesting speakers from the legal assistance centre, windows of hope (of unicef), nawalife (the johns hopkins program in namibia), and now we're planning a workshop for the youth in Tsumeb. we initially went out into the community to interview people for needs assessment since we could'nt do the proper 3 month long integrating into the community required for needs assessment... people were pretty interested. its always refreshing to know how much people want to know here... not just about general things but like hte specifics of the biology of HIV/AIDS... something i didn't know at all before i came here (and to be honest don't really know all that much about now). some heads butted when we were trying to plan it, apparently they were annoyed at the inefficiency... but today the workshop turned out allright. tommorow i'm doing the condom demonstration from PHE where we make the kids turn in a circle so they're dizzy while putting a condom on, b/c apparently alcohol is a big problem here. it'll be fun!!! besides that, i'm really really glad i will not have to work with 20 others on site even though i will miss (most of) them. we've been learning oshiwambo daily too, althouhg i don't know ANYTHING except ee-e, and greetings, (ee-e means yes, its pronounced eayyeeeeee, yes drag it out). i had a small crisis the other day when i realized my host family communicates with me even less than i thouhgt b/c of the oshiwambo tendancy to say ee-e to everything. i mean everything, so, they respond to everything they don't understand in english as yes. well my host sister deos even though she does know some english to her credit. the other day we had a picnic for our host families and it was cute. i hitnk my host mom likes me, but honestly i won't know b/c she doesn't speak english. or afrikaans, not that i really know how to speak that at all. so yeahh.. my life at their house.. we pretty much eat mahangu + chicken everyday, but it tastes allright so i can't say that i mind... often i find myself waiting for the dinner b/c i am starving all the time here. the other day i made them chicken curry (i tried making it for one of my trainers, gisella first, although it may have turned out better the first time.), and i think they like it but once again will never know. they did say they were gonna save up and make it, although i had tried to make something that had cheaper ingredients incase they liked it! they are pretty damn good cooks. anyways., sorry this is once again a pretty boring blog entry. the only thing worth writing about that is happening besides the stifling heat and bugs everywhere (EVERYWHERE AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH) is the sunset here. the sensets are GORGEOUS, everyday. i have like 500 pictures of them, will send them home on a cd. anyways, reposting windhoek address, b/c some ppl could'nt find it! let me know how things are going with you all.

ps. have no idea who the guy who transferred is.

Tsumeb

2006-12-03T07:16:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone! I'm in Tsumeb, which is definitely the most beautiful city I have seen in Namibia so far (granted my total is only like 4 towns). Its supposed to be the copper center of Namibia, but really it is known for being green all year round, which is refreshing after Omuthiya, which has greenery, but it comes up later in the year. We are doing our community based training here which means that we are staying with a local family who will practice our language with us. I have a really cool family, and a great combination of running water, electricity and tradition (yess... i love running water and electricity, i have realized). So far we have just been walking around town, but its cool b/c all 22 health vols are in town so we see each other all the time. The only thing that is weird here is that ppl are really shocked by the fact that I am indian... in a good way, sometimes too good. I mean at least everyone thinks I am beautiful, but um... i dont know. But anyways, we stayed at this hotel the first night the hotel malakani which was really nice and then we went to this never ending world aids day parade in a neighboring town, which literally took forever. I was in a really bad mood until I got to my CBT house. We went grocery shopping together... I feel like I finally have a permanent place after being in transit for like 3 weeks. I unpacked... bought cereal and sandwich stuff (as yo ucan see food is a dominant theme in all my entries, but I am totally gonna lose weight b/c I walk everywhere). It was nice, and alos my host mom cooks me food which is also great b/c for three days in omuthiya i was a bit lost... even thouhg I could cook here b/c i have elec! But i think I will be able to post pictures from here, so I will try to post as many as possible. Oh yes, list of things to send me: burn mp3s (not wav files) on cds and send to me. Also pictures! Yesssssss. Althouhg the last couple days have also been a little bit crazy b/c people are eting (early termination), and sadly its three people I'm very close to. Its kind of upsetting and it made me make sure I want to be here too, but i didn't have to think much to realize that this is really where I want to be. really really want to be. I can't explain it b/c there are plenty of uncomfortable moments and also plenty of ppl that I miss very much, but there's something that feels right about my experience here. Maybe better next time. Ok, well I better go now, but here is a pic of Tsumeb (not one of mine). oh yeah ps. can you guys post the pictures from that saturday when you guys had the dinner party for me?! Thankssss! AMI

Thanksgiving and Most Amazing Dance Party Ever + P.S.

2006-11-28T03:34:00.000-08:00

Soo... this is out of order but I feel like I should write it b/c we did have a thanksgiving dinner... it was huge and good....and I just realized that I have to pay for this icafe, so i better go. but I will talk about dance party + thanksgiving later!

P.S. A few things I learned: if you want to send me something here (address I can email you), put it in a package that is hard to open, aka, wrapped multiple times. also DO NOT write something that someone else would want on the customs slip. Also, address it to sister ami shah, and put multiple pics of jesus on it. DO IT, and send me things yayyyy! jk. althouhg if you guys have extra floppy disks that you would like to donate to my school, you should actually send them, b/c they use them here, and i'm pretty sure most comps there don't even have floppy disk drives. Also any ideas about peer health edu programs, public health, aids, or anything that will make me qualified to do the HUGE job I am setting out to do!

Hello from Omuthiya

2006-11-28T02:10:00.000-08:00

Hiii! So, I am now visiting my permanent site in Omuthiya. I am lucky to be in a small town that has internet access and also basic amenities. I'm also about an hour outside of two major cities in each direction. It is really funny, b/c everyone gets really confused when when i say ami is my name b/c to add to the collection of things my name means, here it also means 'oh me'? I'm sure that will amuse those of you who have been telling ppl to pronounce my name "ah-me" for years, hahaha. They also take the greeting thing really seriously. Like, you greet each person (mostly older ppl) in turn, with the same long greeting (walala po, eee, nawa tu, eee nawa). Its cool b/c I can participate without having to say much, but i think they all think i am funny, which is probably true, lol. but yeah, so I am an HIV/AIDS coordinator, and I think my job is basically whatever I want it to be b/c they created the program to get a peacecorps vol. Just kidding... well not completely, but what they want me to do is to develop a Peer Education program for people that is not limited to HIV, but behavior change, stigma, alcholism, etc. Also, they want me to develop their computer skills and internet capabilities, but as there have been three vols here in the last 6 years, it seems like a lot of people are pretty well versed in computers. Also, they want me to particpate in income generating activities and help them to get funds for these activities, and on top of that, I should be incorporating OVC (orphans and vulnerable children) into this. and start a school newspaper and if possible other confidence building activities. Sprinkle in a little community development, and its gonna be a packed two years. I am a little worried b/c i'm not sure if they are just giving me info b/c they wanetd a pcv or they really need help. I'm also worried that there are already other organizations doing what i am supposed to be doing, aka unicef, (aka it would be amazing if i could actually work with unicef). If I can pull it off, it seems like it will really exciting, especially b/c there are ppl here who will help me out, as opposed to other jobs that I've heard about, but it also does seem like it will be slow going. Other ppl have much swankier jobs working for non-profits in major cities with much more structure, which kind of worried me at first, but I think that I am actually best suited to this position, where I can kind of make my own way. Besides, it seems like sitting in an office is just not my destiny...as you can probably guess if you know the other things I can do. I did freak out when I first got here, b/c I am staying at a homestead, and I guess I just wasn't prepared for it. It is very pretty in this traditional sense--at night, when they all sit around the fire and cook and eat dinner and play their battery powered radio, and I can't see the bugs, it is amazing. BY the way, as you probably could have guessed, my fear of bugs is a constant source of amusement. I dont know if this was the exp I was originally thinking of, but you have to hand it to the peacecorps, they did listen when i told them what i wanted to do, and i think that I can really make a tangible impact here, which is more than we're taught to hope for ("its the little things you will remember") which I am sure is true, but itd be nice to have a big thing to cherish too. we'll see. THanks for all your commments... if you have a user name, that doesn't say your name (or if i dont know what it is) pls leave your name at the end of the comment! thanks!

Hello from Okahanja!

2006-11-22T07:54:00.000-08:00

Hey guys, sorry it has taken a while to write from here, but internet access is a little bit limited. There’s one internet café in town, and the guy pretty much just opens up for the peacecorps volunteers… he’s extended his hours for us! So basically, here are the facts: we’re in Okahanja, which is a town about an hour outside of Windhoek (pronounced Vindhok). Apparently I can’t be too specific on this blog, but I guess if you want more details you can email me. Namibia is really beautiful… pretty much like all the pictures with dust. There are 67 of us training to be volunteers in Namibia, 45 education and 22 Health volunteers. Last week, we spent an entire week over viewing all the things we are going to start doing later on… apparently making lists of our goals and objectives on flip chart paper is a Namibian tradition. Besides that, everything has been great. Our training staff is really nice, and many of them are very close to our age. We start each day by singing the Namibian and American National Anthems, and two other songs (although now that we are in our technical week, we took of the two songs, which were actually really awesome). Then we have sessions… broken up by two very awesome tea times, lunch, and dinner. Unsurprisingly, it only took me a day to adjust to tea time—now I am hungry at 10:30 on the dot everyday. Maybe I always hungry then and didn’t know for what… tea time where have you been all my life? Unfortunately, the other food eaten here is mostly meat… a lot of meat. Ah well. Anyways moving on to more serious things, our technical week has been amazing! We’ve met with really prominent gov’t officials, doctors, and also seen two hospitals, a traditional healer, and a home based care center for HIV/AIDS in the location (here the word “location” means what traditionally were black townships/slums… they’re not necc slums, b/c some are nicer than others, but they are usually poorer areas). Namibia is a really exciting place to be in terms of HIV/AIDS work because of the combination of the high rate of infection and co-infection with TB and also the government’s willingness and helpfulness in attacking the program. Everyone in Namibia can get free ARVs and counseling if they qualify and free testing. That is amazing for a country with a budget of like $2 mill. But I’ve also realized that I have a lot to learn and my job could be really really frustrating b/c of cultural differences. I had this great convo with one of my favorite trainers, and basically she told me that in Namibia, it is not only socially acceptable, but expected for a man to date more than one woman at once (one of the problems leading to AIDS I guess). I mean, its not necc a bad thing (I am working on being culturally open…but it doesn’t mean I am gonna be ok with it in my own life!), if women know and protect themselves, but if they don’t it’s a problem. Also there’s not really a concept of time, but that is better for me as I am always late everywhere. The language I am learning, the Oshindonga dialect of Oshiwambo, is primarily spoken in the north, so I am guessing that’s where I am. All the health volunteers will have running water and electricity… although everyone is trying to scare me by telling me about very long and thick millipedes. UGHHH. I had a larium (the malaria propalaxis (sp?) we’re taking, which gives us vivid dreams and hallucinations, among other side effects) about bugs last night which I will spare all of you. But really I have been very good about bugs… they’re kind of everywhere and I’ve dealt with it! I haven’t screamed once. Amazing if you’ve ever seen me around a bug. But anyways, back to Oshiwambo, all I know is greetings, so Walala Po! (good morning, sort of, but that is not a literal translation). What is amusing is really the Nomlish, or Namibian English… an example is… I am coming means, I’ll be back in 20 minutes. just now means some time soon, and now now means now. It seems like what a lot of ppl speak, although the universal language is really still Afrikaans among ppl that don’t speak the same dialect. Although a lot of the black Africans say they will not speak it to a white person no matter what. I guess they are still dealing with the legacy of apartheid here but, things are getting better it seems, and the Namibian government is doing a decent job even though there are problems like unemployment and alcoholism. One example of something they are doing right is the clean water that the majority of the country can safely drink from a tap! Ok sorry that is a ton of information… its so much, I didn’t know where to start, and now it was kind of coming out all in one breath. Or that is what it must seem like, but I honestly don’t even know how to edit it, so sorry guys! Next blog may or may not be more organized… be flexible… (aka the motto of the peacecorps!). kala po nawa!

Reassuring Ideas

2006-11-06T20:40:00.000-08:00

Hey guys!
Thank you once again for all the support, I'm gonna miss everyone so much. Today I had my first day of staging--I finally became a peacecorps trainee! I will not lie, I was scared out of my mind until I walked in, but the process was pretty reassuring. The Namibian ambassador introduced us to our staging! Very exciting... he was eloquent and pretty honest about the situation in Namibia. He also gave us some more details on Namibia, which I am sure many of you have been waiting for also! All in all the staging is not bad... people seem all right, they gave us monayyy to feed ourselves well, and they are sort of answering our questions about Namibia. I kind of started dozing off after the 4th or so ice breaker/morale prepping activity, but i'll chalk it up to a lack of sleep from the weekend. Its a little weird b/c they are assuming that we did not read any of the info they gave us. Maybe that is a good thing b/c it was a lot of stuff, and I am sure that I ended up glossing over some of it. For example, they introduced their safety plan, which is a five point action plan called VSSS (Volunteer Safety Support System), which was in the initial workbook. For the benefit of those of you worried for my life, the five points are

Information Sharing- providing accurate information about Volunteer service to interested individuals
Volunteer Training- equips volunteers with cultural, language, and health and safety issues
Site Assessment- the Peace corps strictly regulates where Volunteers will live and work to make sure they are safe and secure
Emergency and Communications Planning - Maintains contact with the peace corps office, also requires all volunteers to learn an EAP or emergency action plan to ensure that volunteers can be contacted in case of emergency.
Incident Reporting and Response- volunteers are encouraged to report safety and security violations and the peace corps responds swiftly

Yayy! Safety. Girls, send it to those boyfriends who think i am a goner. I may still be, but probably b/c I'll trip and fall or something.

What was really fantastic about the staging is their approach to development:

"any process that promotes the dignity of a people and their
capacity to improve their own lives."

Best definition ever. I love it, even though it contradicts what development means to a lot of other people. I am definitely seduced by the idealism of it all... Something that became clear to me is that peace corps volunteers are very rarely people who are just excited about a cause. Instead, they are people who not only want to help, but who also want to understand how best to help. There's a huge difference in my mind, I only hope I can live up to it. Now I sound like one of those cheesy people, but all the goodbyes have been affecting me I guess. Anyways, I'll complete the wheel with a quote that sums up how I feel (most) of the time:

"Our Peace Corps is not designed as an instrument of diplomacy or propaganda or ideological conflict. It is designed to permit our people to exercise more fully their responsibility in the great common cause of world development."

John F. Kennedy

March 1, 1961

pS. During pre-service training, I will use the Peace Corps office address:

“Ami Shah,” PCT
Peace Corps
PO Box 6862
Ausspannplatz,
Windhoek, Namibia

The postal system is reliable, but service to the more remote villages is often slow. Mail from the United States to Windhoek, the capital, can take up to two weeks. From there, it could take two more weeks for mail to reach my village.

My mail will be forwarded periodically to my training site. Once I move to my permanent site, I will use the school’s address or get a private post office box.

Namibia + What I will be doing

2006-11-06T19:12:00.000-08:00

So, most people haven't heard of Namibia--here is some background info. Its long so unless you're really interested you can just skim now and keep it as a reference, but I wanted to post it!

Skeleton Coast, Namibia

Namibia

Pre-colonial Namibia saw migrations of peoples from the south, central, and northeastern parts of Africa. At the time of the German conquest of Namibia in 1885, several groups of indigenous Africans were well-established throughout this vast land. Several important historical developments influenced modern Namibia:

Germany’s occupation of Namibia and indigenous resistance, notably by the Ovaherero and Nama;
League of Nations and United Nations mandates for the administration of Namibia after World Wars I and II and the United Nation’s subsequent role in rejecting Namibia’s incorporation into South Africa and promoting its full independence;
South Africa’s defiance of the mandates in administering Namibia as a province and imposing apartheid on it;
Organized resistance to South African rule (beginning in the early 1950s), including diplomatic initiatives abroad, internal political initiatives, and eventually an armed struggle, launched first from Zambia and later from Angola;
The U.N. General Assembly’s recognition of the South-West Africa People’s Organization (SWAPO) as legitimate and the role of the U.N. and the Western Contact Group in working toward a peace settlement;
Angola’s independence from Portugal in 1975 and the Popular Liberation Movement of Angola’s assumption of power in Luanda, which enabled SWAPO to move its bases to southern Angola;
Cuba’s military support of the MPLA government and subsequent alliances among Angolan, Namibian, and South African political parties.

The peace plan that was finally ratified in December 1988 paved the way for a cease-fire in April 1989, elections in November 1989, and independence on March 21, 1990. In the years since independence, Namibia has made social, political, and economic gains, promoting national unity, improving equitable access to social services, and maintaining an upward trend in economic growth. In 2005, Namibia held national elections that resulted in the democratic and orderly transfer of power to its current government of President Hifikepunye Pohamba. Government Namibia’s Constitution has been hailed as a model for other countries. It provides for undamental freedoms, environmental protection, and a two-thirds majority to amend the Constitution.

Economy

Namibia’s economy is mixed, allowing for several forms of ownership of capital. Although Namibia’s per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of more than $4,000 is high relative to that in much of sub-Saharan Africa, it is unequally distributed. Five percent of the population earns more than 70 percent of the national income. Those in the bottom 55 percent of income, overwhelmingly from the majority black population, are primarily rural and share 3 percent of the GDP, with per capita income of less than $100 per year.

The apartheid system of job allocation and education continues to influence employment in these sectors.

The overall unemployment rate in Namibia is in excess of 30 percent, and the highest unemployment rates are among the least educated and skilled.

HIV/AIDS has become the new emergency in southern Africa, threatening not only the lives of Namibia’s citizens but also the progress achieved since independence in developing Namibia’s human and natural resources.

Since 2002, Peace Corps/Namibia has supported the government of Namibia’s efforts to stem the spread of HIV/AIDS through more effective educational programming and youth outreach and community-based activities. In the future, the Peace Corps may expand to other critical development areas such as youth development, the promotion of healthy lifestyles through sports and support for expanded employment opportunities.

People and Culture

Namibia’s people have a rich variety of linguistic and ethnic origins. The principal indigenous ethnic groups are the Aawambo, Vakavango, Caprivian, Ovaherero (including Ovahimba), Colored, Baster, Damara, Nama, San, and Tswana. The white population is of Afrikaans, English, and German descent. The people who live in the Owambo, Kavango, and East Caprivi areas, occupying the relatively well-watered and wooded northeastern part of the country, are settled farmers and herders.

Urbanization, industrialization, and the demand for labor have led to peaceful interaction among these groups in recent decades. Most Namibians converted to Christianity as a result of missionary activity beginning in the 1800s and comprising several denominations, including Lutheran, Roman Catholic, Methodist, Anglican, and Dutch Reformed. Most Namibian Christians are Lutherans.

Environment

Namibia is located on the southwest coast of Africa. It borders Angola and Zambia in the north, Botswana in the east, South Africa in the southeast and south, and the Atlantic Ocean in the west. The total land area is 317,500 square miles (about 825,000 square kilometers), almost twice the size of California.

Most of Namibia consists of a high plateau, a continuation of the main South African plateau. Its average altitude is 3,600 feet above sea level. The strip along the coast consists of the Namib Desert, extending from the Orange River in the south to the Kunene River in the north. About 60 miles wide, this area is mostly uninhabited. The eastern part of the country, which forms part of the Kalahari Desert, consists mainly of sandy stretches but provides some grazing ground. The Etosha Pan in the north is the focal point of an important national park and game reserve. Namibia boasts clear skies for more than 300 days of the year, providing brilliant days and star-filled nights. The varied landscape provides opportunities for hiking, camping, birdwatching, and game viewing.

Geography and Climate

It covers some 317,5000 square miles and has a population of about 1.8 million. Namibia’s generally hot and dry climate ranges from true desert to subtropical. As in other parts of southern Africa, temperatures are closely related to wind systems, ocean currents, and altitude. Except for the highest mountain areas, the lowest temperatures occur in the Namib Desert region and are affected greatly by the cold Benguela current from the South Atlantic. Daytime summer temperatures in the desert frequently exceed 120 degrees Fahrenheit, and nighttime
winter temperatures can drop below 32 degrees. Rain falls mostly during the summer (October through March), and the winter (July through September) is very dry. The most pleasant months are April, May, and June. Windhoek is the seat of the national government and the business and cultural center. Keetmanshoop is the center of the karakul (sheepskin) industry, Tsumeb is the headquarters of copper-mining operations, and Otjiwarongo is the center of the cattle farming area. Swakopmund is a coastal tourist center, Oranjemund is a diamond-mining town, and Arandis is the home of the Rossing uranium mine. Walvis Bay is an important port and fishing center west of Windhoek.

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So sorry for the very long description, but you don't have to read it unless you have specific questions! The next question alot of people have is what are you doing? I am a health extention volunteer mostly handling HIV/AIDS education. Basically neither I nor anyone else I have spoken to here has any idea what that really means. But here is the short description they gave:

Health sector Volunteers assist individuals and communities in the prevention of HIV/AIDS and in mitigating its effects. They work with either the government or nongovernmental organizations to do this type of work.

So, we'll know when we know I guess!

Preparing for Namibia

2006-10-10T10:39:00.000-07:00

Hi!

So basically, I am not great at blogging, but as many of you know by now, I have finally received my departure date for the Peacecorps, Nov. 10! I'll be leaving for staging on Nov. 6 and leaving for Namibia on Nov. 10 to be a Health Extension volunteer. I wanted to thank all of you who have supported me and hopefully, will continue to support me. I realize that the incredible support that I have received from all of you is a luxury that most people don't enjoy and I don't take it for granted! I can't express how much it has meant to me to be able to really follow my dreams and simultaneously have the support of those I love and admire. Well, enough cheesiness.

I know that most of you who are reading this are doing equally new and exciting stuff, so keep me up to date, and feel free to ask me any questions or give me any suggestions you like.

In the future, I'll probably be posting my pictures on flckr.com, or webshots.com, although right now there are not really any Namibia pictures on there.

http://community.webshots.com/user/sahrenn
http://www.flickr.com/photos/68989409@N00/

There it is!