Quick Update

I have to start off with a big thank you to everyone that has sent me emails.  As always they are lovely to receive.  I really appreciate the updates from home and enjoy hearing what you are up to.  This will be a quick update just to tell you a few things about my site and what I’ve been up to.  I have a couple of posts from training and the first weeks here drafted that I need to finish up.  I will share them over the course of the next few weeks with hopefully shorter more frequent posts.  I’ll do my best.

Please note the changes to my side bar... I've added what I think are some interesting links and updated my address.  At the moment I don't have any special requests for packages (other than for cheez-its :) ), but will be thinking about it over the next few days.  I will add a wishlist to my side bar when I think of some more things that are not available here.

I’m currently in what PC calls ‘Phase II,’ which is the first three months at site.  They say this is a difficult part of our service because things can go very slow while you’re getting to know your community, what your job will be, and transitioning to speaking a new language.  I’m impressed with how well PC knows these things, but they have been doing this for a while.  It has been a bit rough moving away from the friends I got to know in training and essentially starting all over again, but things are going well and I’m learning a lot about my village, the culture, and myself.

Aroab is located on the outskirts of the Kalahari desert and was originally home to the Nama and San people.  It’s located on a dirt road 170 Km from the nearest town in Namibia, Keetmanshoop, and 40 Km from the South African border.  There is a river that runs through the village that is dry most of the year and that is where part of the name Aroab comes from.  The Nama people call a dry river bed an ‘ab’ and the thorn bushes from the area ‘aro.’  Nama is a click language so the technical writing for the name is !!Aro!ab with the symbols representing clicks.

The village council’s main role is to provide the basic services to the community.  These services include water, power, sewage, waste removal or refuse, and to ensure that the village’s rates and vats (taxes) are paid.  The council has several IGAs (Income Generating Activities) set up to generate income for the council to cover the costs of these services when community members are not able to pay their individual bills.  Aroab is the only village in the Karas region that has not lost power or water due to lack of payment.  The councilors are appointed by the community.  They are in charge of listening to the ideas and wants of the community then deciding which ones to go forward with.  It is the responsibility of the councilors to decide what will be done and the village council office to make it happen.

I believe my primary role will be to work with the council to help improve their IGAs that they currently have in place.  These include the swimming pool, SME park, brick making project, campsite, and self-catering accommodations.  My secondary role will be to work with community members to help with SME development, financial literacy training, and/or youth entrepreneurship development.  The secondary project will be based off of community interest and I hope to get started on it soon.  At the moment the council doesn’t have a specific plan for me so I have been doing a lot of reading and studying of Afrikaans.  I’ve read a number of PC books and materials as well as village development plans.  It’s pretty interesting to see this side of village management.

My Afrikaans is slowly but surely coming along.  The official language is Afrikaans with some Nama speaking people, but I’m pretty sure everyone at least knows Afrikaans.  One of my goals is to become fluent by the end of my first year.  I think it will be very important for communication with the people.  Everyone in my office can speak English, but a lot of the older people in the community don’t.

Another goal I have is to run the Swakop marathon next September.  We have a lot of runners in our group and they are all planning on doing it… so I figured why not.  It’s something to look forward to, work towards, keep me healthy, and I know I would never have done it in the states.  I’ll be shooting for the full, but will be happy with a half seeing as how I’ve never run before.  We’ll see how it goes!

I’ll end this post with a bit of news.  I’m very excited to announce that I am now the proud owner of a very cute little kitten.  Her name is Lottie and I got her last Thursday (Oct 18).  I’m not sure how old she is, but she is still very small.  She was living outside for a bit and I’m amazed at how smart she is.  She has gotten used to my house very quickly and - BIG PLUS - knew how to use a litter box right away!  I have made two toys for her from those collected items I shared in my house tour but need more ideas.  If you have any good homemade cat toy ideas send them my way.  I can see that scratching might become a problem in the future so I’ll be making a scratching post of some sort very soon.  Materials I have are paper, floss (I’m amazed at the many things you can use this for), cardboard and cardboard boxes, toilet paper rolls, 1 Liter milk cartons, cans (my can opener doesn’t leave the sharp edge), bottle caps, and I can find wood on the outskirts of the village.  Any tips and tricks for training are welcome too :)

Here are some pictures of Lottie for you :)

 (Picking her up from Mrs. Losbar’s place at the hostel)

 (Starting to explore)

(What seems to be her sleeping spot of choice :) )

We Saw Giraffes!

The title is just an attention getter (can’t remember the official word/saying for that).  Even though it was the coolest part of my day there isn’t much to tell, but if you are anxious to find out about the giraffe sighting right away you can jump to paragraphs 1 and 6.

 

The official post will start here.  There is so much to share!

I woke up at 6 AM and got ready for the day.  We were picked up at the normal time to go to the town hall and hop on a big bus to go to Windhoek.  I sat in the window seat with Laurel and Sam was across the aisle.  I had to rewrite my SEED homework in my SEED notebook so I didn’t talk too much on the way there just enough to decide that I’ll be joining Laurel to hike Kilimanjaro at some point during our service.

On the ride there we went by a reserve.  It was really neat b/c we saw some animals!  A giraffe was about 200 feet from the road and a group (don’t know what a group of them are called) of baboons right by the road.  I, unfortunately, couldn’t get any pictures b/c we were going too fast and I didn’t spot them right away.  The trip to Windhoek was to see sights as well as get phones.  We started at Hero’s Acre.  It was built to honor those who died protecting the land from the foreigners and had a lot of steps.  We went to the top and had a great view over the city… that’s also where the group picture on Facebook was taken and we sang a song (I got a video… will see if I can post it on Fb or something sometime after I get caught up on my posts!).  After that we hopped back on the bus and went to the mall.  I wasn’t getting a phone since I came with one, so just walked around with people and got all their numbers right away as they got sim cards.  Sachi and I saw a sushi place on the way in and decided that’s where we were going for lunch.  Once a group of them got their phones we went down to the restaurant.  I ordered a roll with spicy salmon and avocado.  It was very expensive, but extremely good!  Apparently a bunch of current PCVs were in town, so we got to meet several, but only for like a 5 min introduction.  There was a married couple 2 girls and 2 guys.  There was a SEED volunteer among them (there aren’t many of us since the program is only about 2 yrs old in Nam) who will be presenting and participating in our SEED specific meetings during the week.  On the way back to the bus I got some chocolate fudge.  I had to splurge while I could… I don’t know when the next time will be for me to get sushi!

After the mall we went to a cemetery then a market.  The market was very interesting.  They told us not to take anything valuable b/c pickpocketing is very common.  They even told us to leave our camera’s on the bus, but some people took theirs… I think Elisabeth took a picture of me with one of the worms (I need to get that from her!).  A group of us went around with Angelina (one of the trainers).  We had some kind of drink that was beige in color and had wheat or something in it.  I have no idea what it was, but they paid for a cup, and by cup I mean the measuring cup that was used to ladle the stuff out of a cooler into other cups, but I don’t know if the lady had enough.  After that Angelina brought over the caterpillars!  There was a group of us that tried them all together… Lindsey, Tim, Sachi, Christina, Adam, Mariah, and Kelsey.  I had a hard time when the thing was put in my hand then I had a hard time when I ate it!  It did NOT taste good and is not worth another try for me.  I’m pretty sure we were all really grossed out by it.  Mayank got a bag, came over with it, and said who wants to try the caterpillars?!  We were all like “we did and we don’t want another” so he proceeded to try one and said “Oh it’s not that bad at all.” Also at this market was meat… HUGE pieces of meat… like the entire animal was there at the beginning of the day and when we got there there were only pieces left.  I guess the thing to do is to go to the market and gather around a grill and buy little bite sized pieces of meat cooked right there.  It was an experience for me and really an experience for the pre PC vegetarians (a lot of them gave it up to join PC b/c they knew it would be difficult to maintain that diet here…  Namibians eat a lot of meat).  The group had split up a little after the caterpillar tasting, but Sachi, Christina, and I were together… we saw another group over by the grills and Remsey (he’s a language trainer with PC).  His sister was at the market working with one of the guys on a grill so they got us some meat to try… it was amazing!... Oh!... before trying it on the way over to them I got totally grossed out!  The three of us were walking down the walkway and on our right were the tables with a ton of raw meat sitting on them and guys chopping it up with hatchets, so I was paying attention to that and not really what was on the ground… finally I looked ahead and saw something from the corner of my eye… it was the head and hooves of an animal!  I’m not sure which b/c I didn’t want to have that long of a look (and I don’t think I would have known) but it made me jump a couple feet away into Christina.  I just was NOT expecting to see that less than a foot from my foot!  All in all… the meat was delicious!

The next stop was another market… it wasn’t that interesting, but we met some boys who chatted with us for the whole time then right as we were leaving one of the boys said to Celme “Before you go can you give me your wallet?”

The last stop we got off at was a different kind of market… it’s very interesting… It consisted of a bunch of small shed like structures built from metal siding material.  These were pretty much all bars and car washing/repair places…  We had a great time there b/c we went into one of the bars (completely filled it with our 35 volunteers and I don’t know how many trainers) to dance.  I was impressed…  A lot of the PCTs actually danced :)

After that we piled back on to the bus and went to a not so good place… someone around me on the bus defined it as what she expected to see when coming to Africa.  Namibia has a lot of problems with alcohol and this was a good display of that.  It’s basically the worst part of the capital city.  The houses are the same as the bar I described above… only metal siding nailed together.  The houses have no sanitation, electricity, or running water… it’s very bad.  The streets are lined with bars (called Shebeens in Afrikaans) and are visited by people all the time.  You could see through the windows on the bus so the people knew there was a big bus going through town full of white people.  A lot of times they would wave but one guy in this area waved and when I waved back he flicked me off.  There were mixed reactions from the people there.  It was very sad to see hundreds of little homes with dogs and children running around.

To get back to a lighter subject… that was the end of our day, so we headed back to Okahandja… and we saw a lot more giraffes!  It was so cool.  Even though we were going way to fast to really see them it was still really really cool.  We saw them in two groups.  Total I think we saw 8 or 9 just having some dinner.  Then I saw a wild boar.  A group of us decided to walk back so Ruth, Lindsey, Tim, Laurel, Luke, and I all walked back together.  We were totally walking in the dark b/c once it starts to get dark it gets dark really fast.  I wasn’t worried with such a big group but will not be making that a common occurrence.  We missed a turn and I think added about a third of the trip to our walk.  It took us 45 mins to get home.  That was pretty much the day… I had some dinner with my family when I got back but don’t remember what it was… b/c I was really tired and my mom told me to read my book instead of helping her prepare.  I have had a lot of homework so it was nice to have the night to do my own thing before and after dinner even if it was homework.

Hike Hikes, Home Stays, and Languages!

*** This post was written a week or so ago... Finally got a chance to post it! ***

Saturday I came to the Café, as did a lot of people from PC.  I spent the entire morning there doing email and Facebook and when the internet wouldn’t work on my netbook I downloaded a bunch of books to my kindle.  It was great.  I got a lot of good books.  I saw some Christmas ones and went ahead and downloaded them for the Xmas season… not sure if I will see much Xmas stuff around.  After the café everyone went back to get lunch.  In the afternoon we had a session on homestays and then we were back to the Kukuri Center (where we stayed for the 1^st five days).

The center was like a camp.  They had one large main room in the center with a kitchen attached, a hall on the left side with classrooms, and a hall on the right side with bed rooms (and bathrooms too) that fit on average 6 people.  The bed rooms were split in half.  You go through one door and are in one section with 3 beds and then through another door with 3 beds.  The rooms were small for 3 people with so much stuff and it was difficult to live out of our suitcases, but I really enjoyed the opportunity to get to know my roommates better (Sachi and Daphne).  

Sunday we went on a hike hike (Throughout the course of this blog you will learn the great language known as Namlish.  First word – Hike.  In English the word means “a long walk or walking tour,” in Namlish it means hitchhiking which is a very common practice here.  So now when I say hike hike I mean the English word for hike and when I say hike I will be referring to the Namlish meaning.)  We had no idea where we were going and there was a group of about 20 of us.  Laurel, Sachi, and I also went the wrong way down and had to walk through a lot of brush, so I got a couple little splinters in my feet.  Anyways, the hike hike was fun and an eye opener… I am super out of shape!  I have since started doing yoga at home and am walking more!  Back to the hike… we didn’t know where we were going and got lost right in the beginning.  Two stragglers from the group caught up with us and told us we were going the wrong way so we back tracked a bit, found 2 boys, and asked them.  They said they would show us then they came on the entire hike with us and one was barefoot!  We were hiking up Pride Rock.  It was a very nice view from the top.  We could see all of Okahandja.  That’s pretty much it for the hike.

It is 8:00PM and I am currently in my bed with a nice hot water bottle warming my feet and a kerosene lamp for light. Stomach is making a lot of noise and Marvelous is sick.  Washing hands is not that common here so I am hoping I don’t get sick!

Nothing really notable happened during the day on Monday…  Other than me being EXTREMELY sore.  We were supposed to find out what language we would be learning on Tuesday but b/c they base our homestays off of your language they surprised us and told us on Monday before we met our host families.  I was assigned Afrikaans.  It is very similar to German, but it’s not good to say that.  Some Namibians really don’t like the Germans b/c of the fighting that occurred between them.  The Germans wanted to take over the land of the Herero people, but the Herero people wouldn’t leave so the Germans were ordered to kill every Herero.  In their attempt they did very bad things to the people and I think some Namibians are still very mad about it. That evening I met Mona, my host mom, and I found out she has three children one of whome goes to school in the south.  She was sitting right behind me during the whole session.  Before we found out who our families were we went over a list of anxieties that had been previously discussed.  There were some that the host families came up with and some that we (the volunteers) came up with.  Once that was done they passed out the names to us and we had to find our families.  In the evening we had to pack our stuff up for the following day when we would go to our host family houses.  Sachi played some music while we packed and later that evening I got a bunch of music from her.  I have yet to really listen to music and I have not watched anything since I arrived.  I’m reading a little, but slowly b/c I am usually tired by 9:00 and am in bed or ready for bed by 10:00PM.  What a difference!

Tuesday we had our first language exposure which included learning the formal greetings for six different languages (5 of which are being taught).  It was very hard and I don’t really remember all of them, but am surprised at how much I do still remember.  We got another shot that day for typhoid.  That was the worst shot by far for a lot of people.  Our arms were really sore by the end of the day.

The first night at my home stay was fun.  My host mom had to come to the Kukuri Center to pick me up, but the people whose families didn’t have cars went in the combi (van).  We had to wait for the combi to come again after taking one group.  My stuff went in last so they dropped us off first.  She showed me around the house.  My room is pretty big.  I have a twin size bed, a little bedside table and a tall cabinet with five shelves and two little drawers.  I went ahead and unpacked while the mom went to the store to buy some groceries.  When I was done I joined the kids coloring.  They didn’t talk too much.  Just answered my questions when asked.  The TV was on so I asked a couple things about what was going on there.  Miro is the oldest (in the house).  She is 12 and is in grade 6.  Marvelous is 6 and in grade 1.  He didn’t really talk much at all my first night wh/ was unexpected b/c Mona said the little one would ask me lots of questions.  Mona got back around 8 and we started cooking.  She said we were making spaghetti.  It was funny b/c it was definitely not the spaghetti I was thinking of.  When you say spaghetti you are referring to the noodles and not spaghetti with tomato sauce.  She cooked spaghetti noodles, potatoes, and ground beef.  The ground beef was cooked with onion, garlic powder, and chili powder.  It was all served together with some grated cheese on top.  I was in charge of making the salad.  I went to bed relatively soon after dinner.

Wednesday I got up and met her boyfriend.  His name is Elvis and he was helping get the kids ready for school.  They get picked up in a van around 5 to 7.  Elvis walked me to the end of the road where I was to be picked up and waited with me since I would have been alone.  He works at the Pick n’ Pay (a grocery store) and is into recording.  His friend has a studio and Elvis is interested in making a gospel record with him.  I was with Elvis b/c Mona has to leave for work by 6:30.  Our training day started off with a quick show of hands for people that didn’t have locks on their door or didn’t get breakfast or didn’t know where to go to get picked up.  It was very brief, but those are the things the families are supposed to do so they wanted to know.  After that we started our language learning.  I’m in a group with all SEED people (Daphne, Steve, Adam, and Amanda).  It’s a small group, but I really like it.  The other 2 Afrikaans groups were combined in the beginning, so there were like 12 ppl in the group.  I think we’ll be able to set the pace for ourselves better.  Richard is our teacher and he’s pretty funny.  He kept saying “don’t worry by the end of 3 wks you will know it!”  None of us were worried we just had a lot of questions for him on day one.  Class was held outside.  We had two other sessions before lunch but nothing really noteworthy.  After lunch we split into our sectors and SEED discussed the economics of Namibia and household economics.  It was pretty neat.  Our group is great b/c we ask a lot of questions, but it does cause us to go over on time.

That evening with my family was great.  I got home and the mom was still at work.  I decided to try the bucket bath and had Miro show me where the bucket goes.  I think in total it took me 30 mins to do.  That included boiling the water.  They have a bath tub and sink in one room and a toilet in another.  To take a bucket bath you put cold water and add boiled water into a bucket until it is the right temperature.  Then you stand in the tub (the bucket is sitting on the corner of the tub) or in the bathroom area where ever you plan to have the bath with a washcloth and bar of soap.  I was going to wash my hair too so I had a cup with me.  You use the same bucket for everything so I thought it best to do my hair first when the water would be the cleanest.  To wash your body you get wet, lather the soap in the washcloth, wash, and rinse.  It’s pretty simple and doesn’t take too long if you are not washing your hair.  Then you dump your bucket and you’re done.  It is not a fun thing to do in the morning’s b/c it is so cold.  Even if the water is hot you are cold.

After my bath I took my language books to the living room and Miro helped me with several words.  Mona didn’t get back until 6:30 so we started cooking around then.  We had veggie sandwiches.  I had a great time that evening b/c while we prepared the food and during dinner I asked a bunch of language questions.  After dinner I watched some of the Olympics.

Yesterday we were supposed to have our language class for 2 hrs then open bank accounts but the latter was cancelled so we did 4 hrs of language.  The banking one was cancelled b/c it was the end of the month and the banks are really busy b/c it is customary for Namibians to spend all their salary when they get paid (wh/ is at the end of the month).  They are so busy too b/c they charge for EVERYTHING here.  You withdraw money, there is a charge.  You use your card to purchase something, there is a charge.  You deposit money, there is a charge!  So I guess everyone is depositing and withdrawing and making purchases so they have a lot of work and I will limit my banking transactions.  Having 4 hrs of language was tough though.  After lunch we had a session on HIV/AIDS awareness and what to do if you come in contact with AIDS.  Apparently there is a medicine (PEP) that can help prevent you from getting the disease if taken within the first 72 hrs of infection.  Honestly, it was kind of comforting to see that a very low percentage of PCVs come into contact with the disease and the ones that have reported that it was due to consensual unsafe sex and/or alcohol was involved.  After that session we had a break and then discussed harassment and sexual assault briefly (we’ll have another session on this next week I think).  Somehow I ended up getting home later than usual.  I was so tired from the day that my mom told me to sit in the living room while she cooked dinner.  It was a good dinner, but there were no veggies!  I can’t believe how much meat and potatoes/rice/noodles they eat.  I had a ton of rice on my plate (I want to say about 2 handfuls), half of a large potato, and chicken.

My mom didn’t have to work this morning so she made porridge for us…  I hate that I didn’t like it, but I’m a texture girl and this was really not a good one for me.  The tea is also super sweet.  They add so much sugar to it!  We had three sessions today.  I think most of my cultural experiences during these first 2 months will strictly be from training b/c I don’t have much time to go out on my own.  The SEED people had to do an assignment that required a visit to the open air market so we went at 10:30AM.  Some of the trainers came with us to tell the shop owners what we were there for and why we might ask them questions.  The first market (a number of sheds in a row) we went to had a lot of touristy type “hand crafted” things from sellers, but also some real handmade stuff created by the shop owners.  The second was more like what you see on the streets of NYC.  People reselling cheap products made in China.  I will definitely go back to the first to get a piece of jewelry for myself.  I saw a lot that I liked, but will only get one thing here so that I can support my upcoming community getting something from there.  I went to Spar to get something for lunch and there I saw my host brother and mom.  I got home at 7:30PM and the kids had not eaten and didn’t know when/if their mom was going to come back tonight.  They didn’t know what to make for dinner, so I figured we could make sandwiches again b/c I didn’t know if the veggies were planned for another meal.  I hung out until 10:00PM then came to my room.  Mona got back around 9:00PM.  I tried to read some of the book that we are supposed to finish this weekend, but I was not able to concentrate with the TV on.  So I came to my room in an attempt to get the first chapter done.  That wasn’t happening so I stopped to finish writing this post.  I’m going to have a long and boring Sunday of reading…

Hello from Namibia!

Hello from Namibia!

I’m writing this up as I watch the opening ceremony for the Olympics with a couple Namibians and some other volunteers!  This is pretty cool b/c I never thought I’d get to see any of the Olympics this year!

Staging happened in Philly on Monday afternoon.  There I got to meet all the volunteers that will be here in Namibia with me (they are all great!) and we did a couple briefings on Peace Corps (PC) Core Expectations, a history of PC, and a little more.   We finished at 7:00PM and were free to do whatever.

Now the story of the seriously long trip over…  I arrived safely in Namibia on July 25^th after taking a bus from Philly (at 2:00AM) to JFK (at 5:00AM), a flight to Johannesburg (from 11:15AM EST to 8:30AM GTM +1), another flight to Namibia (from 1:20PM GTM +1 to 2:30PM GTM), and finally the last bus to our training site in Okahandja (at 6:30PM GMT).

It was a long and tiring journey and I was very glad to finally get to sleep in a bed for more than 2 hours.

Pre Service Training (PST) started on the 26^th with introductions to the staff, a lovely rabies shot, and our first meeting with our sector directors.  Our group (I’m group 36) is made up of Education and Business volunteers.  I am a business volunteer and will be a part of the SEED (Small Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Development) program.  The three areas that the SEED program focuses on are youth entrepreneurship, Small/Mid Enterprise (SME) Development, and Commercial Planning Management.  My main job will be to work in one of the first two (youth or SMEs) with secondary projects involving the commercial planning management.

After the day of training we headed back to where we are staying to have a traditional meal of meat, porridge, and sauce on the side.  The interesting part is… you eat with your hands!  The porridge tastes a little like grits but is very thick so you can pick it up.  You pick up a little porridge with one hand and make it into a ball.  Then you dip the porridge in the sauce and eat.  The meat is eaten with two hands.  It was very fun!

Today we had medical interviews, sector interviews, and got another shot.  I had the afternoon off, so I went to get a sim card for my phone, a 3G USB antenna, and some stamps for postcards.  I also found this very cool café run by an American couple.  They serve American food and have free wifi (VERY UNCOMMON IN NAM!), so I took advantage of that to read and send some emails.

On Monday we will find out what language we will learn and Tuesday we will move in with our host families.  We will stay with them for the rest of our time in PST.

The weather is surprisingly FREEZING at night and in the morning, but gets nice during the day.  I was warned that it would/could be cold but did not expect it to be this cold.  I’m very glad I packed a lot of long sleeves, sweaters, jackets, and socks!

That’s all I can think of for now!  Hope everyone is doing well back in the states!  I’ll post again as soon as I can J