This post serves as a sort of summary of some of my overall experiences during my first 2.5 months in South Africa
This post is quite long and serves as a sort of summary of some of my overall experiences during my first 2.5 months in South Africa. I wrote it at the beginning of October so undoubtedly it will date rather quickly. This was actually a letter that I mailed home to some friends and family so it may not be new to you. If you are in South Africa reading this, this should be pretty boring. If you are not in South Africa reading this, it may be pretty boring as well 
. I think it serves the purpose of providing a summary though.
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Hello! I hope this letter finds you all well. I decided to write a general letter just to share a brief history of what has ensued since I left Cincinnati back in mid-July. Now that I have been living in my permanent village for about 3 weeks, I wanted to write to give an update on what has been going on. I apologize for the somewhat impersonal nature of this letter, but I also assure you that I am sending it to you because you have written me or because I feel that you may somehow be interested in what is going on here in my life. For that, I am greatly appreciative and thanks for taking the time to read this. These first two months in South Africa have been incredible and bewildering. A bit of insanity, some new emotions, and a whole lot of hectic days have occurred since I left back in July. Also, please excuse me if the letter seems to jump around a bit. I found it a bit difficult to convey everything in a flowing manner J
After spending three nights in Washington DC (near Georgetown) in a nice hotel and getting to know the other volunteers in our group, we headed out on our 18 hour flight. Luckily, I was able to sleep through almost the entire flight. We spent the first two months of our time in South Africa in a small village called Marapyane which is in the Mpumalanga Province. The village was about a 2 hour drive north of Pretoria (the ‘official’ capital city of South Africa) or nearly 3 hours north of Johannesburg. For the first week, we stayed in a dormitory setting at a “College of Education.” This was essentially an old educational center where teachers go for a week or two of workshops and seminars to improve their teaching skills. The facility has fallen into quite a bit of disrepair and decay over the years as it is no longer commonly used. The dormitories were definitely modest by American standards but it was a good way to ease into our lives here as they did have running water (though it was mostly cold) and flushing toilets (though no toilet paper). It was during this week that we met our language instructors and got to know each other a bit better (there are, well were, 44 volunteers in our group; 39 are still here).
After one week, we were each assigned to a host family in the surrounding village of Marapyane. I lived with a couple who did not have any children in the house. This is rare in South Africa as most families live with their children even after the children have aged into early adulthood. I was happy about this because the home was rather calm and that is what I needed to help settle into the new living condition. The couple that I lived with in Marapyane was named the Mahkafolas. They were extremely nice to me and a lot of fun as they didn’t take things too seriously and they laughed frequently (both at me and with me). Their home was somewhat primitive without running water or ‘modern’ appliances such as a fridge but they were very welcoming to me which more than made up for the shift in my surroundings.
During these first two months we had daily sessions of training for language, cultural, medical, and safety matters. We were broken into 8 language groups learning 5 different languages (South Africa has 11 official languages). I was assigned to one of three groups learning Northern Sutu which is commonly referred to as “Sepedi.” My language teacher was a native speaker from Limpopo Province (where Sepedi is the dominant language). Her name was Thato. She was a young woman who had not previously taught with Peace Corps (a lot of the teachers had prior teaching experience through the Peace Corps) so she was definitely amused by the group of Americans!
These two months of training involved a good deal of getting used to the culture and lifestyle changes as well as a lot of intense language studying. Most of the families did not have transport means but one of my friends’ families did have a car and spoke English rather well. They wanted us to enjoy ourselves in South Africa so they took it upon themselves to take us to several places during the weekends including a carnival in Pretoria and a casino in the Northwest Province. Indeed, I felt very lucky to know them as I had some unique experiences that I would otherwise have not had. The village where I lived for the first two months was rather densely populated but there was only one paved road (the main road through town). The rest of the roads were dirt roads and the shops were small “sephazas” which are basically shack-like buildings on people’s own property that sell small items such as fruits, veggies, bread, eggs, etc. There was a sephaza less than a block from my house that sold avocados for 2 rand which is about 30 cents. They were fresh and delicious. I became a regular customer for all of the other trainees (since avocados were only sold at select sephazas) and the owner of this sephaza started giving me free avocados because of the regular business.
About halfway through the training, the Peace Corps staff decided to treat us to a fun day to break up the work. We took a Saturday and went to a game reserve. It was great fun as we got to ride on a safari vehicle through the brush and saw zebras, impalas, and even a giraffe.
During the last week of training, we had an oral language assessment with certified language testers. If we ‘failed’ the test, we would be required to have a tutor and re-take the test again during our next formal training week which occurs in mid-January. To pass the test, you had to score Intermediate Low or better. I did well and scored Advanced Low. As a result I was nominated to write and read a speech in Sepedi during the formal “swearing-in” ceremony. This was quite an honor as all of the South African Peace Corps staff was present as well as all of the language instructors and our future school supervisors. The US ambassador from the embassy in Pretoria even came! There was a reporter for a newspaper present and he met with me following the speech to obtain a copy of the speech and get approval from the Peace Corps Director to publish a story about the Peace Corps in the newspaper.
Immediately following this swearing-in ceremony, we were all shipped to our respective permanent sites where we will be living for two years. I was sent to Limpopo Province which is the northernmost province in South Africa. I am about 45 miles southeast of the city of Polokwane which apparently is the fastest growing city in South Africa. Officially the city has around 350,000 residents but the surrounding areas are not counted so the realistic number is quite a bit larger. There are no buildings over 4 stories tall and the city is not too scenic from what I’ve seen thus far but it does have most of what I would need as far as shopping so that is definitely convenient. They are also in the process of building a rather large stadium in the city to host some of the World Cup soccer matches in 2010. There is an airport in Polokwane as well but currently planes only fly to Johannesburg. The city sits just south of the Tropic of Capricorn so as you can imagine it is rather warm.
Although this city is relatively nearby, I was assigned to work in the rural sections that seem like another world (all volunteers work in the impoverished areas of South Africa and not in the cities). Hence the paradoxical nature of South Africa is ever-present. The proximity of first-world conditions and third-world conditions is rather stunning. The villages where I have been assigned are quite rural, remote, and poor. One of the villages where I was assigned to work is called Phoshiri. It is a village of about 400 people and has a 95% unemployment rate. There are no tarred roads in the town or even on the way to town. The only public vehicle that comes to the village is a bus that comes and leaves the town twice a day during the week, once a day on Saturday, and not at all on Sunday. This is rather rare as most of the villages (even the remote ones) are serviced by taxis. I use the term ‘taxi’ loosely though as the taxis are referred to as kumbi’s here and are vans that seat 16 people and only leave from ‘taxi ranks.’ You can’t really hail a taxi on the side of the road (it’s difficult if you are able) and you can’t request a taxi to take you somewhere specific. They follow prescribed paths or routes and only leave the ranks once they are full (I have sat on these kumbis for well over an hour waiting for it to fill with people). Although Polokwane is relatively close, I generally have to allow myself at least two hours to get to town because of the kumbi situation.
One thing that did surprise me (pleasantly) is the widespread availability of electricity throughout South Africa. The village of Phoshiri where I live just received electrical service last year. The fact that Phoshiri did not receive electricity until 2007 is often met with surprise when it is told to other South Africans (even throughout rural villages). Since electricity is so ‘new’ in Phoshiri though, a good number of the houses are not equipped for electrical service yet. Luckily my home stay in Phoshiri does have electricity (to my knowledge only one Peace Corps volunteer in South Africa is without electricity at all) though blackouts are very common as I have come to realize. There is no running water in the homes of Phoshiri. There is a reservoir and a communal tap for the neighborhood so the residents go (often on donkey carts) to fill up large drums of water for use around the house.
Another pleasant surprise is the widespread reception of cell phone service. Reception occurs everywhere throughout South Africa! I have not had one dropped call. There are very few phone lines in rural South Africa, but cell phone towers are ever-present. It is interesting, but the technology of phone lines never reached the homes in rural South Africa (there are public phone ‘buildings’ in some of the villages where residents could go to make calls – like a large phone booth) and now adding land-lines is an afterthought. Resultantly, most residents moved from having no phone service at all to having cell phone reception everywhere.
I have the rather unique situation of having two ‘home’ sites. As far as I am aware (and as I have been told), I am the only Peace Corps volunteer in South Africa who has been assigned two different living sites. This is because of the distance between the two schools where I work and the difficulty of transportation to and from the village of Phoshiri. My two supervisors (the principals of the two schools to which I have been assigned) arranged a home stay for me in both of the villages where I will be working. One of the villages is the aforementioned Phoshiri, the other village is called Seleteng. The two homestays happen to be quite different. In Phoshiri, I stay in a room that is not attached to the home of my ‘host’ family. It is small room with corrugated sheet iron for a roof (very common here) that sits on the side of a mountain. It gets very hot in the room as the roof is very low and the iron soaks up the sun without any shade to block the heat. Daily it has been over 93 degrees in my room (I have a thermometer) and there is, of course, no air conditioning here (if I had to pick one thing I miss most about life in the US, it would be air conditioning – and yes – I’m serious). My host parents in Phoshiri speak very little English and have had very little formal education. They are very kind to me and make me feel welcome but communication is difficult most of the time thus far (though I am working on it daily:)). Most of the village of Phoshiri speaks very little English and the remoteness of the village is ever-present.
The village of Seleteng is similar in some ways (no tarred roads, rural setting, etc), but there is a taxi rank there and several small stores. The family with whom I stay in Seleteng, however, is quite different than the family with whom I stay in Phoshiri. The family in Seleteng speaks English rather fluently. All of the members have a university education and all are employed. The house is also different as there is running water (cold only), a driveway with cars, tile ceilings, and a computer inside the house (extremely rare for rural South Africa). The mother of the house, Gillian, is very well known in the village. She manages 5 drop-in centers including the main branch in Seleteng (the other 4 branch centers are satellite locations). The drop-in center supports orphaned and vulnerable children in Seleteng and the nearby areas. She used to be both a teacher as well as the Deputy Principal at the school where I have been assigned in Seleteng. Her husband died in an accident about 15 years ago and she has never remarried. She has 5 children aged 25-37. (One daughter and 4 sons). Her 2nd youngest son, Mamakgeme, lives at home with his wife and their 2-year old son. The other children live nearby though one is a lawyer who stays in Johannesburg during the week. She also has hired a family friend from Mpumalanga to help with the dishes, cooking, and cleaning in return for a place to stay and food. Gillian made it clear to me from the first day that I should refer to her as Mmae which means “Mom.” She refers to me as her son and is extremely welcoming to me. She wakes at 5AM everyday and is active all day with community events and organizing fund-raisers and proposals for the Drop-in center. She loves to garden and the yard actually has green grass (again – extremely rare for rural South Africa) as well as guava, mango, orange, lemon, palm, and papaya trees in her yard. When I stay at her house, I eat and interact with the family regularly. Although I have to live out of a suitcase when I am in Seleteng (I stay in a ‘guest room’ that is not attached to the main house and I do not have the key when I am away in Phoshiri), I love the opportunity to live in two different villages and two very different situations. One is very rural, remote, and impoverished whereas one is relatively more modern with more amenities.
Work-wise, I will be working with two different primary schools – one in Phoshiri and one in Seleteng. My principals are very hard-working and very kind. I apparently got very lucky with my supervisors as some of the other volunteers have less-than-accommodating supervisors. Additionally, my supervisors have had previous experience with Peace Corps as there was a volunteer who lived in Phoshiri and worked with them from 2006-2008. She just completed her service in July and left me a bunch of nice food and good notes about life in the village. In the schools, I will be helping the teachers with English lessons and helping with computer skills (the small school in Phoshiri just bought their first computer after I arrived). Our Peace Corps group is focused on helping the teachers continue to adjust to Outcome-based education which was first instituted in the rural schools following the demise of apartheid. Most of the teachers in the rural schools attended schooling under the apartheid system and are not as familiar with skills such as critical thinking or imaginative creativity. Thus – we are there to help in the transition of different teaching methods.
I also will be working in the community. There is a poultry project in Phoshiri that the last Peace Corps volunteer helped start. Since the people of Phoshiri have nowhere to buy fruits, veggies, meat, or dairy, my supervisor had an idea to start a poultry project. The last volunteer did some research and applied for grants. After the grants came through, the Dept of Agriculture came to Phoshiri in 2007 and helped construct a building that houses 100 chickens on the school property. The building was constructed to standards most conducive to egg-laying and the chickens have been laying eggs regularly since the project began. These eggs are then sold to the members of the community very cheaply. Previously, all of the residents had to wait for (and pay for) the infrequent bus to go to town to buy eggs and other fresh foods. The money that has been made from the egg project thus far has gone to start a small vegetable garden at the school as well. These fresh vegetables are then sold to the members of the community as well. My supervisor has expressed an interest in having me help expand the project. One area where he thinks that we should focus is on the feed. Since commercial feed is very expensive, he has suggested that I research different ways to feed the chickens. One idea is starting a wormery (the worms would be fed to the chickens). The community is very much behind this project and a group of women actually sleep at the school on the weekends to help with security.
In addition to the school work and the poultry project – I will likely be working with Gillian at the Drop-In Center in Seleteng. I anticipate helping with writing grant applications as well as helping the children with their homework after school.
For the next ~3 months, I am actually still completing training. The Peace Corps has given all of the volunteers weekly assignments to complete in an effort to help us get acclimated to the workings of our villages. We are not supposed to be working directly on our projects until this last leg of training has been completed. In mid January of 2009, all of the volunteers will reconvene at the educational center in Marapyane again for 2 weeks at which time we will have more sessions and review what we have learned. We also have to turn in a portfolio of our assignment work during the first three months at site. After that training program, I hope (and expect) to have a much better understanding of what it is that I will actually be doing on a daily basis as it is still quite nebulous. The projects and activities that I mentioned above are all just tentative at this point as I am still in training but hopefully some ideas will continue to coalesce as the months move forward.
Animals are everywhere though they are not usually the exciting ones that you may think of when you conjure up Africa in your mind. A lot of donkeys, goats, sheep, cows, and chickens mostly. They roam freely everywhere. In fact, my family in Phoshiri owns all of the animals listed above except the donkeys. I have seen baboons within a kilometer of my house and monkeys on the side of the road but otherwise there are not too many ‘exotic’ animals roaming freely near me. There are however, insects. Roaches, spiders, mosquitos, fruit flies, regular flies, and scorpions are some of the more common ones. As far as food – I eat pretty boring stuff when I am in Phoshiri since I have to cook for myself. A lot of peanut butter, bread, oatmeal, and canned veggies. I have, however, eaten more oranges since arriving in South Africa then I think I had cumulatively in my life in the US. While in Seleteng, we eat a lot of pap which is a South African staple food and is basically a bland corn-meal type porridge thing. There is also a lot of beet roots and spinach served. I have experimented with foods since being here and have tried chicken feet (they are adored here), fresh goat meat (I went to a goat-slaughtering ceremony), fresh goat intestines (won’t do that again), mopani worms (apparently they are healthy) and fresh aloe straight from the plant. Oh and I think that guavas picked from the tree are my new favorite fruit. I took a walk today into the middle of nowhere and did not see any sign of human life for over an hour. It was wonderful to get out into the wilderness out here!
As the cliché goes, ‘so far so good.’ I have to say that things have been, for the most part, pretty wonderful thus far. The change in accommodations has been challenging at times but nothing to which I have not been able to adjust. I have been enjoying the more laid back and less stressful living environment of South Africa and I have had a lot of time to reflect and enjoy myself. The experience has definitely been unique thus far and rather difficult at times. Daily life is much different than the life I was used to in the US.
Anyway I hope to be productive and happy for the next two years here and I will try my best to see that both of those goals are met. However, I am accepting that things happen rather unexpectedly here. So much so that I have learned to embrace the unexpected and really take things day by day. Thanks to all of you for your support and love and thanks for reading this!
More Soon. With Love,
-A
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