I’ve only a few distros available in country, and am seeking to add several more flavors. Does anyone have the time or ability to download a bunch of Linux distributions and send them on a DVD this way?

Currently installed here is Linux Mint v11. We have both 32 and 64 bit versions here. We also have older Suse circa 2005, and Ubuntu 10.4 32 bit. Anything anyone wants to offer will be great.

Work continues as it always does, two steps forward one step back. I’m becoming increasingly aware of the impending departure from this lovely country within the next year. This means all my time and effort needs to be driven into making my projects sustainable. I’m trying desperately to get the teachers at the primary school more confident in their abilities, so this way the XO laptops continue to be used to their maximum capacity. I’m also pulling more and more IT savvy Swazis into the “Swaziland Computer Society.” This is the organization my counterpart and I have been trying to create just to network with more people in-country that are interested in computers. So far so good we have connected with about 6 people so far. Sounds small but considering every IT technician here is an island unto themselves, it’s a big step.

Other work is being done to move forward with a survey on acceptance or interest in Linux. This will likely end up being a more formalized survey than I originally anticipated but it may be good to get a feel for the current penetration, and the basic knowledge regarding an alternative to Windows.

Once results of that and other projects become available I will remember to share them here. In the meantime if you are interested in computers please check out the group either on Facebook or on GoogleGroups.

Swazi.Computers@groups.facebook.com

or

Swaziland-Computer-Society@googlegroups.com

Now my TV loving I think feel is only temporary, as I’ve been able to peel myself away at least a few times a week (and once for an amazing two-day hike!). You see; even without electricity, I am somehow managing to watch at least two or three movies a week. And at the end of the day I can’t quite ignore the chorus of relief chanting inside my head “OH! Let’s watch a movie!” I blame this entirely on having an interesting life. More specifically on having such an interesting life that I come home at the end of the day utterly exhausted. It doesn’t matter if I spend my day in a workshop intently listening to every syllable of siSwati being spoken, or spend my day talking about computers and reading Dilbert. Lately these mornings I am blown away by how quickly I fell asleep the night before. I put my head under the blanket and pull it up by my teeth (Swazi phrase), and *BAM!* it’s time to make the emafethis. (hint pronounced ema-.fatties)

Don’t know the emafethi’s yet? Delicious fried dough, incredibly scandalous. And our family has brought me a few plates for breakfast in the last two weeks, and my saturated-goodness index pegs out for a few days afterward. Just when I think the day can’t get any better, I step out of the hut and the radiant African sun winks a small hello over the horizon of Mozambique. I put out my solar lights, and come back into sip my coffee and read some more Dilbert. Occasionally I look up and remember that I’m incredibly lucky to be experiencing everything around me.

After my coffee I lock the door, and the rest of the day couldn’t play itself any better. Sometimes it rains on my painstakingly washed by hand, and line drying clothes. I just laugh and take comfort in having at least two pairs of pants. (You win again Nature!) I shake off the laughter and hear the sound of water dumping from our rain gutters into our water tank. “Water in the tank is like money in the bank!” It’s kinda a theme song for Krista and I. There is something beautiful and relieving to know that whatever else happens, you know you’re going to be able to drink water for the next several months. And with rainy season coming, whenever I think about the water level a content smile can be felt on my face. Oh water… how I love you. It’s the simple things in life right?

I continually recognize how fortunate I am, and how life is less stressful here. There’s stress but it doesn’t have the same bitter taste in the mouth, it’s more of a sensed urgency than stress really. Maybe something like biting into your first piece of really tart lemon meringue pie. You know the pie has a reputation for jabbing your taste buds on the initial encounter, but you unhesitatingly accept the fate of sharpness. It’s like that kind of stress. I had an email conversation with Ryan recently. I say conversation meaning that more than 3 emails were exchanged in less than 48 hours. I think that is my new Peace Corps record.

Anyway the conversation has been an attempt to reconcile the two worlds that I have come to know. As per our usual maturity, at least one of the emails had a serious note to it. I simply can’t understand the world I came from anymore, in the same way that I did before I left. As Americans we have life so incredibly good, and if you were to conduct a poll, most Americans would probably say yes. But I want to know how many Americans actually know first-hand how good we have it. The old phrase you can’t see the keyboard for the keys (I mean trees…) feels like it applies. When I’m calm (and before the movie starts) I think about America and what I loved, what I wanted to change, what the BBC says about it everyday, and what I view it as now. And all I can think of is the mindless hours we spend in front of the television. I think it’s obvious:

We as Americans are exhausted.

We need more vacations.

I talk a lot about the cultural side of Peace Corps. How we sing with our family, play with kids, and try to speak SiSwati. What I don’t really talk or write about is the incredible opportunity for personal growth that Peace Corps has given me. When I wake up in the morning, I have stopped believing I know what any single day will hold. I can of course have lose plans, and I still enjoy my morning routine (thanks for all the coffee Ryan, Karen, and Pop!) There is no plan, no schedule, and nothing for certain once I get outside of the hut.

One thing I have often said to my dad on the phone is “day’s are long, weeks are short.” It is incredibly difficult to convey even in words how true that is.I do not work 9 to 5, I work sunup to sundown. Today’s early morning started relatively normal. The only routine I have really is in the early morning. My first chore is to take down the solar lights and put them out to charge. The second task is to make coffee. After a bit of time, usually 8 or 9 am I usually make my way to either the KaGogo center, or to the primary school.

Although this sounds like it could be routine, it really isn’t. The locations are the same, but sometimes the teachers will be there, sometimes they won’t. Sometimes they will all be in a room together buying Tupperware or planning a cooking party. Sometimes the Gogo Center Manager is there, sometimes he is already at a meeting. Sometimes I see the goats sleeping by his door and I know I could just turn around and go home.

Today was Sunday and therefore it was a little bit different. Occasionally I will go to church, but I usually find my interest more in tune with personal development. A few weeks ago I told myself that Sunday would be my “reading, writing, and reflection” day. It would be reserved for me to correspond with friends and family, and catch up on reading. Reorganize also sounded good, so I lumped it in for good measure. To my surprise I have actually been able to do these things on Sundays now. It is a quiet day where I can reorganize my head.

The Peace Corps experience starts with travel to a remote country, but that is only the beginning. I laughed at a phrase from a PCV friend the other day. Reid said “Now we are going to explore space; now close your eyes.” Regardless of the original context of the phrase, it strikes me as relevant to the exploring of my interests and passions. I am finding more and more that my lofty ideas of what the world were are being honed into a sense of purpose. It isn’t good enough for me anymore to expect someone else to change with world. I have been watching as many episodes of TED as I possible. I am continually renewed that I am not alone when I feel that the world can be a better place. I am reminded that it is up to me to make a difference, and I can’t wait for government, businesses, or other people to do make a difference for me.

I feel positive right now and stronger in my convictions that joining Peace Corps was the right thing to do. I have seen first a completely different way of life than I was raised with. I have experienced a culture that is incredibly unique. I am living with people that do not say ‘hello’ when passing you, they say "I am seeing you.” The intimacy of the greeting, and good nature of my company speak to me of a better place for humanity. In our digital and fast-paced age something as simple as real human contact has been overlooked. It’s not that you can talk to a person through an infinite number of methods, it is what you actually say to that person that has meaning and substance.

Substance is a trait that I find lacking when I look back at many of the relationships I had at home. Most people I know are mysteries to me. I may know them from a single context, at a club or from my childhood. But what substance do I have with these people? What am I contributing to their lives by being their friend on Facebook? What value am I contributing to people that don’t read what I write, and what value can I bring to someone that is shut-off from conscious and rational thought.

Peace Corps is a growing experience. I am growing further apart from people that I was never close with in the first place. My substance with my greatest friends and family is what is most dear to me. I can’t reply to every email Ryan writes me, but I read and reread them. I can’t explain to my dad how much his phone calls mean, but I will continue to try. I appreciate Karen tagging me in photos on Facebook, at the end of the month I have something else to look forward to.

We are coming upon the one year mark of being away. Just two weeks to go before our first Peace Corps anniversary. I have learned so much about myself, humanity, and the world that I understand my inner substance will never be the same again. If you are reading this I hope maybe you will set aside some time for yourself. Maybe you can use Sundays as you reorganization day. There are some many phrases in Americana that tell us what to do.

Stop and smell the roses.

You only live once.

Tomorrow may never come.

It is important to remember that while passengers on spaceship earth, hurtling through the cosmos of our lives, we are truly the masters and commanders of our destiny.

“What happens in a meadow at dusk?” : Everything.

Babe wetfu was a gentle man who I yearn to have known better. When we first arrived at site my unease of what my next two years would be like was palpable. Within days it was clear that Babe’s company would make me happy for the homestead to which we have been delivered. One day early in integration, Babe looked up at me and said, “Majaha, why did people stop going to the moon?” I was excited that one day I might be able to show off pictures of the moon, distant galaxies and all points in between.

Regrettably, I was never afforded my chance to satisfy his curiosity about so many things. Our babe suffered daily from a stroke he had a few years before we came. This left him in a much weakened condition and he wasn’t able to get around much. At the age of 72 he was fighting the good fight against time, but was unable to fend off his physical ailments.

When we awoke to the new of Babe’s passing, our entire service was frozen in time. What should we do? Do we go hug our make? Do we give money? Our immediate thoughts were to find out from our incredibly patient Swazi staff what our next step should be. I asked babe Musa 20 questions before I ran out of breath and paused long enough to let him respond. Very succinctly he asked, “Is it difficult for you right now?” We had called looking for some help with Swazi tradition, and what we received was warmth and understanding that helped bring our world a little closer to “normal.”

Peace Corps didn’t waste any time taking action. The day was April 19^th and was a Swaziland national holiday. Within a few hours of the phone call we were being picked up from our home and were taken to Mbabane. The car ride provided enough time to reflect a bit and try to start the difficult process of understanding what comes next. I’m sure by the end of the drive back home I asked the same questions five more times. Although we could have stayed put if we had insisted, they let us know that the family would be making incredibly difficult decisions for a few days, and that our time away would let the family concentrate without having to make sure we were doing ok. Thanks again to Day, babe Musa, and babe Mfanafuthi for their incredible patience and understanding.

After two days in the capital and a basic understanding of what was to come, Krista and I agreed that I would come back to site and she would come in time for the memorial service. I was briefed during this time that Peace Corps would come out and pay their respects to my family. The morning I was to return home babe Vilikati, babe Malaza, babe Ndzabandzaba, and make Mkhabela all jumped in the car! It was an honor to have so many of the PC family bring me back. They explained to me what I could expect over the next several hours, and the following days leading to the service. And when we arrived, the staff and I went into indlu yagogo and prayed. My host family sang and my Peace Corps family joined them. They passed condolences onto the family and thanked them for everything they did for us. I am still unable to convey completely my sincere thanks to the staff for their coming.

All during the time we were in the gogo hut, the household was a flurry of activity. Bomake and bosisi were cooking and cleaning mass amounts of food. Bobhuti were helping clean the homestead to prepare for company. After I exited the hut and Peace Corps departed, I immediately found myself absorbed into the work at hand. I put a door on the maize shelter, cleaned the yard, helped paint, and learned how to glaze windows. I was told the hardest work would be on Saturday as the tent needed to be erected, and the grave needed to be dug.

Since I’ve talked about my experience over the last month, I have heard other people’s experiences when a member of their family has passed. My experience has been vastly different from every account I have heard. As we build our relationships with our friends and family here, each of our experiences are personal, and will be different from other PCVs. At the end of the day each of Peace Corps experiences is our own, and we will all come away with incredibly different stories of living the both good times and the bad.

Our babe had been suffering for many years, and was particularly bad over the last several weeks. Although the family was necessarily sad, there was an air of relief around the end of his suffering. There was more laughing and smiling than I anticipated. We played cards and told jokes. The children danced and sung loudly. I met many new family members and strengthened existing relationships.

While we were digging, the process was to grab a digging tool and prepare to be made fun of. Although I speak SiSwati fairly well, I could not follow the insults and teasing coming from the gallery of onlookers. The task was to poke as much fun as possible at the person digging, until they broke out in laughter and couldn’t dig any further. It seemed the direct opposite of being teka’d. Standing under the starry dark sky with 20 bobhuti and only a Nokia phone as a flashlight, we dug. Staring at the stars, I closed my eyes and focused on the laughter, spirit and camaraderie of the men around me. It was in this moment that I felt the closest to my family and community.

The night vigil and subsequent funeral in the morning was as anticipated. The tent became a habitat for bogogo and bomkhulu from as near as next door, to as far as Zimbabwe. It served well through the windy Lomahasha night, and only partially crashed down the next morning. People prayed and sang throughout the evening, interrupted only by full meals, followed by tea breaks. In an effort to discourage this potentially health-affecting practice, Krista and I did the night vigil in shifts. I was up until midnight; she awoke at 3am.

After the entirety of the previous week, I was told that our make was not to leave the house for 30 days and 30 nights, all the while cloaked in black. It is culturally appropriate for women to see and talk with a mourning wife, and inappropriate for men to do the same. It was during this time that I was not to see her or speak to her, as I was not “family.” I was later told the origin of the 30 days in the hut was born out of necessity. Before motorized transportation, it would take days or weeks for the news of a death to reach distant family. It would then take days or weeks for the family to come visit. Having the widow stay in one place guaranteed those traveling would find the person upon arrival. Although mobile communication and better transport have bridged this gulf with time, the tradition of staying in the hut is still alive.

As time went on, Make began joking with Krista about how “Majaha is afraid of me.” I would run around the homestead shielding my eyes and screaming loudly so she could know my location at all times. On day 29 make told I shouldn’t have avoiding her as I am her son. We had our reunion during a prayer service and she told me how my avoidance made her sadder than anything else that happened since Babe passed away. Sometimes I find myself struggling to articulate the warmth I receive from our host family. The only way to understand Ubuntu seems to be through a direct encounter with the serene beauty that humanity can emanate.

Although our make is not a traditional woman, she has said she will follow the rules and wear black for the next six months or more. When we asked her how she felt on the first official day outside, she chuckled as her eyes shined. She responded to her confinement by saying, “It was killing me.” Our make has survived for 70+ years and seen countless things that I will never know. Life has returned to what it was, and up at dawn I can see make tending to the chickens, and wandering the fields, satisfied at a life well lived.

We have received a trinity of magical gift delight. Three boxes in one trip to get our mail. Multiple bags of cookies. As well as 15 kg of sweet, sweet candy from the States. I hope I won’t ever be guilty of taking consumerism for granted again. For all the angst I have towards our mindless consumer-driven first decade of the century, I am truly in awe of the supply-chain that has been created to serve our needs. Candy is such a part of the foundation of America, that we have rituals surrounding it. I’m not just referring to the obligatory pre-movie Walgreen’s stop, as candy is much more a part of our society than just that.

The celebration of Jesus’s rebirth gives Christians a reason to reflect on their religion. Since I was a child there was one tradition on Easter that surpassed the influence of Christianity on my life. This tradition can easily be defined through an iconic fat white rabbit and a marshmallow baby chicken. . Yes the Cadbury Bunny and its Peep acolytes are more symbolic of Easter than any symbol of Christian worship.

For lo, thy Bunny of Cadbury visits the known world with ambrosia for all!

The traditions I associate with Easter revolve around Chickens and Rabbits! And with the exception of hard-boiled eggs, all the chickens and rabbits are made entirely of candy. Delicious dark chocolate, malted milk balls, candy coatings. Holiday culture in America is synonymous with candy, regardless of the original holidays origins. Which is why we have Halloween; an entire holiday which was once steeped in Celtic mythology, has now become dedicated to tasty treats.

And beyond all the candy that has been lavished upon us, we are the recipient of an even greater truly American tradition. Homemade cookies sent halfway across the globe. Four zip lock bags nearly overflowing with love and warm wishes found their way to Mbabane recently. Whether it is the Marine Corps or Peace Corps, nothing sounds more American than sending cookies in the mail. I have been deeply touched by what may be one of the simplest yet most endearing American traditions. Thank you so much for providing delicious treats for my inner Cookie Monster.

These traditions haven’t influenced the culture here in significant ways. We can buy candy at the shops, and we can sometimes buy familiar candy in the capital.  A few weeks ago there were half a dozen bags of mini Twix bars. Last week we found peanut M&M’s at the expensive ex-Pat store Pick N Pay. Look up that store if you find yourself with time to spend surfing. It is a large chain grocery store headquartered in South Africa. Each store lives up to the expectations someone from the US would have of a grocery store. It is a beautiful, yet pricey addition to life in Swaziland.

As a volunteer we could spend our entire food-stipend there and likely walk away with no more than a cartful or two of groceries. This puts the store out of our reach for trivial shopping expenditures, but worse is it puts most of the population out of reach as well. Our volunteer food stipend is economically equivalent to the average income here. I say equivalent, as most people do survive on less than $2 per day, but most also have large plots on which to grow their food throughout the year. So by virtue of no land we make our $2 per day stipend plus enough left over to buy soap.

The lifestyle of spending little due to a lack of disposable income is nothing new to me. I was raised to make something last until you had exhausted every possible way of maintaining an item. If there was one chain of atoms that came from the original product, it didn’t matter how much glue you smeared on, or how many sticks you laced together, it was still a usable descendant of the original. These skills transfer directly to, and greatly enhance our life in the Peace Corps. Recycling as we know it in American is not an option here, but reuse is part of the culture. Everything we use can be dual-purposed into someting else. I will be honest, not everything gets reused. I recycled for years (to build up karma I think) but we’re burning enough stuff here that we are definitely reversing any positive impact we had on the planet. I don’t think those “carbon footprint” calculators available online actually account for how much trash is burned in the developing world.

Aside from the occasional fire, everything is dual or triple-purposed. Strangely most items are just left floating in the yard, sneakily camouflaged as trash. This is just an illusion as the majority of garden fence we have is made from this fake-trash that lays around everywhere. Our homestead Babe was a farmer and welder. He was always making things, and if you could weld it, it was likely welded (I think he may have welded some trees together). His professions and our homestead Make’s craftiness have led to a large assortment of useful things we can scavenge from the yard. Even with all the wire and strange gear, it was obvious months ago that there was an extreme lack of America’s #1 fixit: duct tape. After looking in country we started to wonder if it was true, there was no duct tape. Fortunately for us a wonderful package from Krista’s mom came with a bounty of supplies. It contained in this order: a 3-inch piece of string, a shred of paper, and the last few inches of a roll of duct tape.

Delicately placed under the “mock” gift package was indeed the real thing. An entire roll of duct tape. We received the Duck Brand duct tape several months ago, possibly near November. The roll is nearing its halfway point, and we have no intention of discontinuing its usage in our lifetime. The litany of household articles healed by tape are vast, including pedals on a bike, a speedometer cable, shower curtain, expensive electronics, water bottles and patching a 5000 liter water tank from the inside. Additional uses that aren’t fixing something include assembling a solar cooker with duct tape, and using strips of it in the never-ending War on Ants

America is currently fighting the War on Drugs, the War on Terror, and the War on Poverty. In rural Swaziland we are engaged in a seemingly daily life-and-death struggle with invasive ants. These ants have proven a most resilient foe, and have thwarted our outer perimeter on multiple occasions. Our battles were passively predictable for many months, they would chew through our concrete walls, we would give them Blue Death and patch the new tunnels. Our defenses were taken by surprise last month when they came through the interior door jam separating our two rooms. It was in the battle of the door frame that duct tape has proven its functionality on the battle field. It is still holding the frontline as it sticks to the metal door frame that has been chewed through. It has even been employed to thwart the latest advance by the ants. In a move reminiscent of medieval castle warfare, the ants have tunneled beneath us and came up in the middle of the floor in several spots. I only hope that the rest of the concrete floor holds, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we have a wall-to-wall duct tape carpet by the time we depart. There is no hope, they will overrun us at some point. I can only hope that we can escape before “the big one.”

There have definitely been additional uses for the tape, and I’m sure this won’t be the last time I will praise it.

All things considered, Krista and I are pretty lucky. We have a lot of friends and family back at home who are supporting us in tremendous ways. I may not get to write emails or post as often as I want, but please know that reading emails and Facebook messages can help make our week a great one. Cookies are great too. Thanks everyone for your continuing support!

I have been teaching computers at the Primary School for a few weeks now.  At the end of last term I pushed several teachers through an intense crash course on everything the XO computers could do.  In case you aren’t familiar with what the XO is, I can tell you a bit of what it is.

The One-Laptop-Per-Child program (www.laptop.org) was started by Nicholas Negroponte about a decade ago.  Nicholas Negroponte was the director for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab for many years.  The Media Lab is one of the most prominent and advanced technology centers in the world. MIT’s Media Lab could be considered a rocket-powered space station on an intergalactic voyage.  The mission of this voyage is to create new ideas and new technologies, and then applying these ideas and technology.  I’ve been a fan of Nicholas Negroponte for a number of years, particularly after reading his book Living Digital.  After Professor Negroponte left MIT he started working on the OLPC project, whose aim was to enable all children of the globe to have access to information technology.  Focusing on economically poor countries and students, the OLPC foundation created the XO.  The XO was designed to be a low-cost computer, low enough to be put in the hands of every small child in the developing world.

It’s not a great computer by the standards we expect today.  It wouldn’t have been an icon of powerful computing 5 years ago either.  It has a 266 Mhz processor, which is slower than most of our phones.  It has 1GB of memory which actually is the short-end of what many new netbooks are coming with.  It has roughly a gigabyte of storage.  These all might be seen as shortcomings in a computer for us.  If we saw it on the shelves at Best Buy most of us would walk away, or at least the sales guy would try to get you to move on.  These features are only describable to the children using one word.  A word that is continually overused in modern society, just ask Bill Engvall.  These computers are Awesome. I can share with you a glimpse of the joy children experience with these computers, only because it has been captured in a few photograph  An unrelated survey was given to a 5th grade class this week.  In the survey it asked the children what is their favorite class.  So many of them answered computers, I’m honored.

The first class was fun.  It consisted of trying to get children to point out the various part of the XO.  What are the speakers, where is the camera.  Almost everyone has played with a cellphone here, so it became “the camera that is just like the one in the cellphone.”  And the speakers were “just like the ones on the really loud buses.” Most children memorized the parts of the computer pretty fast, but lacked mastery in approaching the mouse.  The mouse in the case of XOs a touchpad.  I still feel obligated to call it a mouse, because 30 years after its creation, the mouse is no longer a pointing device.  It is a concept.  And it is a concept that I took as granted.  I somehow lured myself into believing that mouse usage was universal, and had somehow already established itself in the collective unconscious of children all over the globe.  The lesson learned by me was not to skip anything with these children.  Any knowledge I have is completely new and foreign to them, including the simple word “click.”

At the end of the first lesson, after getting the children to turn on and immediately turn off their computer, I asked them an interesting question. One of the more popular questions asked by Peace Corps volunteers to their students is “what do you want to be when you grow up?” Because the question has been asked here by plenty of volunteers before I got here, I was prepared for the answers.  Almost all students answered one of a few things.  Police, soldiers, teachers, and nurses.  One student wanted to be a banker, and the other an accountant.  It is true that children want to grow-up to be the occupations they are exposed to.  The children are ready and ripe for something as intense and powerful as computer and the internet.  I feel there is a critical mass of curiosity building in these students, and computers are the perfect relief valve.  Not to be caught in a trap of dismissing the children’s interest as ‘status quo’ or ‘to be expected,’ I asked them an additional question.  “How do you think computers would be used in the job.”  A few kids muttered some answers, but one hopeful policeman said “it would help me catch thugs.”  These kids were ready for computers and I was ready to get them working.

The first class was an introduction to me as to what my service could actually look like.  It wasn’t until my second class though that I felt my own awe at what I was experiencing.  Our second class consisted of a review from the first class, including “phone cameras” and “bus speakers.” My main focus was trying to get the students acclimated to moving a ball through a maze in a very simple game.  It is literally a maze, such as the ones we find on the back of cereal boxes.  The object is simple, get the ball to the end of the maze.  Movement requires the use of the arrow keys.  Up, down, left, right.  Simple concepts once you have been exposed to them, and had time to experience just what “left vs. right” might mean.

And it was in that moment when I was looking at the different faces in the room that I realized I was engulfed in the “help” I had so incredibly wanted to bring.  I was aware of the physical presence the silence of the students had on me.  I heard nothing bu intensity from the students. I immediately went to the front of the room, something told me I needed to see this from a beter perspective.  The silence of the students was they key for me to recognize that something was happening.  The students were entranced by the glow of the screen, and completely absorbed in the decision of going “left vs. right.”

Knowing that I was there and I helped these students engage a part of their brain that up until that moment was untouched, gave me the incredible satisfaction of helping.  And it gave me my first real Peace Corps experience.

A few days after the initial trip we were able to go back to Mozambique, but this time we were led by our Make (host mom) who played Mozambique tour guide. Led by a lack of Portuguese, and limited knowledge of Meticais the local currency, we were ready to be pushed into a small adventure.

Overall Portuguese is similar enough to Spanish that it is easy enough to read it. It is easy enough to speak if you are given enough time to recite the words in your head prior to vocalization. I felt pretty lucky last week when I was asking “Donde esta el banyo?” and the waiter at the restaurant knew what I was asking for, even though you ask “onde esta casa de banho” in Portuguese. “Un mas cervejich” is pretty similar to a Spanish phrase in common use. There are definitely other differences, such as “Ciao” for goodbye, and “obrigado” for thank you. One of the border agents corrected me on that one time I uttered “gracias.”

Linguistic interests fulfilled by our Mozambique trips aside, I am also feeling my inner numismatist satisfied over handling three different currencies all in one day trip. Our second breakfast consisted of some Mozambican bread stuffed with bajiya, a spicy falafel like bean patty. I gladly paid the vendor using Swaziland Emalangeni. As we proceeded across the border I transacted with a money changer to move my South African Rand into Mozambique Meticais. I then proceeded to pay with Meticais as much as possible, as I stumbled upon a little known monetary issue between cultures, educations, and currencies.

Our Make decided to spend Emalangeni and Rand today while I stuck with meticais. Due to the differences in exchange rate, I thought it would be best to pay attention to what implication that might have on my financial future. The exchange rate today was 4.5 Meticais to everyone 1 Rand or 1 Emalangeni. To gain admittance to the market you must first pay a fee. Make paid 5 rand and I paid 5 meticais. And no one tried to stop her. By the time I figured out what was happening, she had already paid and was inside. A second incidence occurred during a confusing purchase for a coconut. The coconut was being sold for 5 rand when I asked the vendor. I let her know that I only had meticais and the price became 15 meticais, or just over 3 rand. My initial reaction is the vendors are trying to make more money off of Swazis. Then after a while of pondering the discrepancies I thought back to two previous conversations with my Make. Before we went to Mozambique, Make said she didn’t understand Meticais enough to be comfortable spending them. Yesterday our Mozambican bhuti (brother) was getting his money from Make, and he wasn’t able to count the Emalangeni, because he didn’t understand it. The inconsistencies I spotted have nothing to do with scams, it’s an issue with the math necessary to keep the exchange rate always in your head, and be able to do on the fly monetary conversions.

The exchange issue and my extreme unease about changing Emalangeni or Rand for Meticais are good first lessons on travel to Mozambique prior to my vacation that started on Monday. Almost every other volunteer in country has been to Mozambique, but we have been dragging our heels so we could go somewhere nice for my birthday.

And you ask what of our fabulous Mozambican vacation?  You guessed right… it was fabulous!  As a distinct contrast to Swaziland, Maputo is a real city.  Millions of people, dozens of bars, restaurants, shops, megastores, traffic congestion, museums, and seafood!

On a sad note, my bandwidth is so terrible (306 bytes per second!) that all pictures of my vacation will come later this month.  Next time I write I will work on describing things in more robust detail.

The entire vacation was not really planned at all.  We met a Canadian VSO volunteer while hanging around at the Mozambique embassy in Mbabane.  Cam stayed at the backpackers in Mbabane that night, and I got to know a bit about him.  He’s a pretty big tech geek as well.  We talked for a few hours about the good old days of servers with dozens of gigs of ram, and moving VM’s around using VMware or Hyper-V.  I am in a good place to find a geeky friend, so I’m pretty excited about meeting him.  Beyond cool… Cam invited us to stay with him at his house in Xai Xai when we visited Mozambique a few weeks from that time.

I was able to finally contact him briefly a few days prior to departure.  Turns out his house wasn’t ready and we had no where to stay if we went on to Xai Xai.  So the three of us that were going decided to be spontaneous (abrivitar[sp] in Portuguese?).  Our destination waffled between Tofo,Xai Xai, and the unknown.  Craftiness upon the part of my newfound VSO friend saved the day and got us to Inhaca island.

But first… lets rewind a bit.  Pulp Fiction it if you will.  The decision to go to Maptuo and Mozambique wasn’t set in stone, but it has been in motion for many months.  We’ve been seeking permission (see temporary asylum) to go to Mozambique from the Peace Corps.  Due to the proximity of our site we should be able to travel there on a daily basis.  Maputo is actually closer than the biggest town in Swaziland.  Digressing.  Without any real plans we left site to cross the border.  Having practiced surfing with the local transports, it was a comfortable ride from the border gate to the bus rank on the Mozambique side of the border.  There may have been only 15 people in the ride.  Terrifically spacious! They really know how to pack them in on the Mozambique side.  We missed the first khumbi (chappas in Moz) to Maputo because bomake were jumping from the transport as if the enemy was spotted and there was incoming artillery fire and the sarge was just taken out by a sniper.  They ran.  They pushed.  Even when the next ride came and we were in a distinct line, pushing and physical confrontation became necessary when there were only 2 spots left on the chappas.  Seat acquired the three of us moved onto Maputo.

Now most of the readers know Thandiwe and myself.  Our friend and fellow PCV Rekha (ligama lakhe nge siSwati Nosipho) came along with us to Maputo.  Rekha was born in Indian and has since become an American citizen.  She has been a PCV in Morocco and the Philippines.  She is friendly, crafty, sweet, and incredibly patient.  She also speaks Guajarati.  On a continent that has an enormous Pakistan and Indian population, it was suddenly impossible for us to be lost.  You see… very few people speak any English in Maputo.  Most people have as much English as many Americans have of any other language.  When Rekha wasn’t immediately present we were armed with Spanish (and legged with French).  As I alluded to above the misguided belief that I could speak Spanish and be understood was still better than nothing.

With her friendly nature and native tongue, we had secured a Maputo tour guide within minutes of arrival.  Don’t underestimate just going up and talking to someone!  Our initial guides charge was to lead us to another guide.  This encounter was the equivalent of training wheels, for me getting used to paying for EVERYTHING while in Mozambique.  It wanted to give the guy about M20 (20 meticais), but needed change.  So I bought a bunch of postcards.  Damn… no change given.  Bought some bread… got the guy change.  It took longer to find him change (while he’s leading me to a gift shop, a phone store, a bank, and the bread stand), than it did to find our other tour guide.  Our Permanent guide…. Eric we call him.  I think his mom probably calls him that too.  Eric was great… showed us a few important buildings in downtown Maputo, fended off a drunk, and came to hang out at the fish market with us.  Particularly great was he knew all the right chappas routes (called local transports when in city), and we saved a fortune on cabs.  Sadly I started realizing the longer he hung out… the more it cost.

While the tour was in progress we did get to see the historic Maputo train station that is still in use to this day.  They are currently exhibiting a train from 1895, the first from Maputo to Pretoria.  It turns out Maputo used to be called Lourenco de Marques.  I’m not sure who it was named after, but if I had Google I would tell you.  If you have Google… and I know you do, let me know!  The train station had a small tourist shop with expensive postcards being the only good thing available.  Immediately outside of the train station is an enormous statue of what appears to be a Valkyrie.  The statue is a local myth about the first founding of the city.  A long time ago the area of Maputo was inhabited by a great snake that ate all who dared to come near the area.  The hungry serpent would wait for trespassers to come underneath it, and then it would bite their heads off.  One woman was able to outsmart the wicked creature by carrying a large pot of incredibly hot oil on her head.  When the snake attacked he swallowed the scalding oil instead.  The woman in the statue is remembered as the first protector of the city.

We left downtown Maputo for Costa Del Sol and its famous fish market.  Right about now we started realizing a tour guide wasn’t necessary anymore and we donated M150 to Eric and parted ways.  It was good timing since I wasn’t planning on buying him lunch.  I felt my hunter instincts titter when I noticed that my lunch of crabs was trying to escape from their crate when I showed up.  Unless I caught it myself it would be hard to get any fresher seafood.  Thandiwe snagged 2kg of prawns for a few hundred mets.  Sadly they were not quite as alive as the crabs, they probably hadn’t seen water for at least a few hours.  Rekha is a vegetarian, but thankfully at this point in the trip she was digging on eating french fries.  So after selecting our meals we were sent to sit at a table and wait for guys to prepare our food.  I bought a wood and bead necklace from one of the half dozen pushy vendors.  The necklace is ebony wood, and seems to be a famous medium for Mozambican art. We paid for our meals, caught another chappella and we went to Fatimas.

While trying to plan our next move, Rekha led the party to the Maputo Brahma Komari center.  I have never been to a Brahma Komari center, so I was really interested to see what an experience it could be.  Sadly no one was home when we stopped by.  Plans were made for a second visit on our return trip from whatever was next.  Later that night we went to a Mozambican hotspot named Nova Milano. We met Cameron and a few other VSO volunteers here.  I haven’t filled anyone in on the number of foreigners we are meeting, but an Australian volunteer named Jeff proposed an interesting challenge.  Now all my life I’ve wanted to get a beer with an Australian.  It’s impossible to explain really, just understand that I’ve checked off something on my list of things to do before I die.  Here’s one great thing to understand for all the Americans reading this:  beware of accents!  Jeff let me know how sad it is that us “yanks” can’t figure out one accent from another.  Aussie was my second guess, but it wasn’t before I threw an insult at him by thinking he’s from the UK.  And I found out something valuable from this; he’s right.  I have not been paying enough attention to accents and I am now on a quest to hear and understand the differences.  Throwing down our plight of no plans with the VSO volunteers, Canadian, Finland, Aussie, and the Argentinian couple, we asked for suggestions on what to do.  After a round table of fascinating discussion it was highly recommended that we go to Inhaca island in order to maximize our enjoyment. And minimize the amount of transit time to get there.

We found out later that night that the ferry left the next morning, and we should be at the dock no later than 6:30.  This meant that Thandiwe was kind enough to wake us up around 4:30.  We did make it to the dock early enough to.get in line to during the mad rush to get tickets.  People in Swaziland generally aren’t great about queuing in lines, and if you blink someone will cut.  Here it was dirty streetfighting and all elbows to get to the front of the line.  We successfully bought 3 tickets for only M5 each.  Standing in line for the ferry we recognize that this is significantly cheaper than the M200 we were told the night before.  Oh Cathembe island we will never know your beauty, but we have tickets to!  After being at the dock for 2.5 hours we finally are able to buy tickets with little fuss, and not so much as a push.  It probably helps that most people getting tickets were foreigners.

Sit right back and I’ll tell a tale

A tale of a fateful trip

That started onthis voyage upon this fateful ship…

A three hour tour

So three hours later the large boat pulls up to the island and docks about a mile off shore.  It turns out that you can walk about half a mile out at low tide and be up to your waist.  But this wasn’t low tide.  It was important that a small boat (local transport?) come pick us up.  The importance of this wasn’t immediately apparent to me, but I thought it had to do with the shallow water.  Probably had a little to do with it, but the fact that I wasn’t allowed to get on the dock until I paid M20 per person showed me that it was important for the residents to squeeze the Mets out of us.  It’s not just the residents though, because after getting off the dock we were approached by a member of Mozambiques finest, and told we must pay a M200 island usage fee.  An M200 per person usage fee.  That being done we were afforded the luxury of local boys bombarding us with details about how their rooms are cheaper than the next guys.  Luckily Cameron armed us with a guys name and we were soon taken to the right place.  Thankful for it to as the backpackers has a room with a single bed and a double bed.  All three of us crashed for M800 a night.  Excellent!

Seafood anyone?  Everything that might be purchased by regular tourists was incredibly expensive on the island.  Even the pineapple was overpriced.  The goods at the market that were geared to locals however were right in our price range.  Bajiya (bean patties) and emabawu (french bread) were less expensive than they even are in Lomahasha.  We still managed to eat like kings, and Thandiwe and I ate up the seafood.  Nosipho by this point was getting a little sick of french fries and was exploring new territory with bread and local veggies.  The food and beverage were perfect regardless of the price when I consider where I was at.  A beautiful island paradise with the most fantastic beaches I’ve ever seen.  I’ve been to Hawaii, California, Mexico, Jamaica and now here.  It is possible that whatever beach I’ve been on most recently is the best beach.  There was truly little trash compared to everywhere else I’ve been in Africa, and practically no people.  The low tide aspect of the island was apparent the next day as we strolled on the beach.  There were people walking at least a mile off shore, and they were only up to their mid chest in water.  At one point I was out a few hundred feet and suddenly I was in water up to my shins!  The low tide, low depth and water clarity really helped my hone my crab hunting skills.  If you ever need a small shellfish hunter, or pictures of small shellfish let me know. 

The island experience was inevitably too short, as is any vacation.  We made friends with a couple from Germany; and also a man named Grant ,a South African who is opening his own lodge on the island.  It’s pretty nice that he was there, he gave us a bit of rundown on the island, he’s practically adopted a local boy, and he shared his dinner with us.  It was also kind of him to share that the ferry has a tendency to breakdown so it is important to have a Plan B.  It seems that everyone we have talked to since our feet touched African soil have insisted to us the importance of having a Plan B.  Someday I will take the time to figure out what my Plan B is, just as soon as I figure out what my Plan A is. 

There were a few other tourists on the island, but overall it was simply a tranquil place to kick our feet up and take in life.  I hope to visit again and take advantage of snorkeling or scuba there.  We only walked one side of the island, and apparently we missed the truly gorgeous beaches, the lighthouse, the other two villages and the island museum.  We also found the best restaurant two hours before we left.  Now we know for the next time, hopefully soon.

Heading back to Maputo was a treat, and added credibility to Grants stories when the alarms rang on the ferry and the burly engineers charged below deck with 50 pound wrenches.  We never did quite get back up to full speed, but the 3 hours on the ferry passed uneventfully anyway.  We stayed the night at Fatimas again, sad to feel the adventure closing in on the final act.  As adventures go however it was far from over.  Friday morning we woke up, packed and left for the Brahma Komari center.  Luck!  Someone was home.  We were greeted by Sister Estrella and led to the mediation room.  We only had a 15 minute sit but meditating is a beautiful experience.  I only mediate about twice a month it seems, but this was unique.  It turns out that many of the Brahma Komari beliefs fit pretty succinctly with my own.  They believe that Buddha, Abraham, Jesus, and Mohammed are all expressions of the same divine qualities we should all seek in our own lives.  Likewise they accept all faiths as having value and purpose, and don’t believe in much of the negativity found in many religions.  As proof in the pudding, a couple of Jehovah’s Witnesses came by to talk about their new publication with Sister Estrella.  She was open about it and they had a good dialogue.  While there I found a fantastic new practice they call “Traffic Control.”  Traffic control occurs I believe every three and a half hours.  It is only a 5 or 10 minute period of meditation where you just stop talking.  That’s it… pretty simple.  Although it will take a few months or years to fit this into my life, It is going to be the first practice I am consciously choosing to bring into my life.

Wrapping up our trip from Maputo and still a bit enlightened from our experience with Brahma Komari, I wanted to visit an old fort turned into a museum.  The fort was built when the Portuguese first arrived, and was used as the beachhead  to establish the Portuguese traders in Mozambique.  Sadly the museum didn’t come with a tour guide, and it didn’t come in English.  Perhaps someday I can view the pictures I took and translate the meaning.  Not knowing the language however made the visual presentation of some art that much more impactful.  Two large bronze reliefs depicted the slaughtering of the natives at the canons of the Portuguese.  The fort housed dozens of canons, both large and small.  There was a Portuguese machine gun, and some other antipersonnel weaponry.  The fort was good for a few minutes, but wasn’t able to captivate us into staying a long time.

Not long after we left the fort we made a great deal with a street vendor to buy some batiks, and after that I got a good deal on music and cashews.  A trip to the bus rank found us on our way home.  The chappa wasn’t packed tightly this time, and it kindly drove us all the way to the border post.  It was a fantastic trip and packed with fantastic people, beaches, and food.  My original Plan B in life was to become a pirate, but now I think a house in Mozambique will have to come first.

Oh what I would give to eat at Alice’s Restaurant right now.  We didn’t get to listen to it for Thanksgiving as we somehow don’t have a copy.  Rather sad and it will need to be remedied before next year.  Thanksgiving was a feast that couldn’t be beat however as there was more food than anyone could eat.  There was so much food that there was desert still left when we had to depart.  Thanksgiving was held at the US Ambassadors residence.  Neat right?  Not only is he a politician but he’s also likeable and hosts a nice dinner for Peace Corps volunteers and any other expatriate Americans running around the country.  Plus he has a pool.  Our taxes are being well spent in another country, have no doubt.  Sadly even with the exchange rate at E7 to $1 it still likely costs a few million dollars to get that place.   It was probably bought 30 years ago when the exchange rate was a zillion to one, so it really cost not much more than dry-cleaned pocket lint.  In spite of those thoughts, I was proud to be an American that day and it was really an incredible experience being so far from home, yet finding new people to celebrate one of my favorite holidays with.  Even got to speak to one of the financial gurus working with the government here and the International Monetary Fund.  I don’t think Swaziland makes the newspapers much in the US, but there is some interesting reading these days about the IMF and the African Trade Union.

Thanksgiving came while we were in the capital for our second round of intense training.  Basically training consists of three meals and two tea breaks separated out by the occasionally engaging PowerPoint and making animals out of bostick (think silly putty).  We had very little opportunity to work with the Language teachers as most class time was reserved for learning nifty things like raising money.  Between raising money and trying to teach rural residents what a “profit” is we also heard more info about HIV and male circumcision (MC).  MC is going to be big this year.  The plan is being joked about as just “the tip of the spear” in the ongoing war against HIV  Actually it’s not being called that, I’m trying to start that as the head of my comic tour through the country.  I’m going to head off on a real tour just after I collect enough tips to make money.

Reading this you must be thinking my jokes aren’t that great.  You would be correct.  Although a sense of humor is required to be a volunteer, I don’t think puns count.  The reason I feel that MC needs jokes is that there is a huge push for it here.  Apparently men who get the snip are estimated to be 60% less likely to get HIV.  This being scientifically backed up data the move is on to cut as many men into the program as possible.  The goal is 152,000 men by next year, which is about 1/6th the entire population of the country.  It will be a busy year.

Beyond my bad jokes I do appreciate the opportunity to write, regardless of how little I’ve been doing it lately.  The inability to post details of site really does bother me.  It is kind of difficult to think that due to security concerns I can’t say where I’m at, but people could see my pictures, and pretty much figure out it’s me.  The URL for my site is probably a dead giveaway also.  So with my inability to write whatever I want on here without resorting to private posts and what not does not mean I am accepting defeat!  I am actually teaming up with another occasional cynic working within the system to write for the post newspaper!  You can do more damage to the system while working from inside the system.  In truth I’m really excited as there were three committees I was nominated to, but this post will be the best blend of all three.  The newspaper was a great source of information when our group first reached post, as I’m sure it has been for the groups before us.

It also serves as a great mechanism to get to know our colleagues better.  In spite of the physical dimensions of the country, logistics of travel make seeing people a challenge.  The closest neighbor is a 3 hour walk, and we have been approved for bikes.  I know what you’re thinking… that should make travel easier… right?  Since it’s downhill most of the way on dirt roads with khumbis losing pieces and passengers as they fly by, and goats ready to sleep in the road seconds before you get there, I’ll stick to walking.  Back to the newspaper.  It is called Sojo.  I am really looking forward to it.  It is appropriate for republishing so if anyone wants it emailed let me know.

The other committees I was nominated to are PSN which is peer-support-network.  It is primarily to support the next group of volunteers who hit country and go through the same stress we did and endure the same barrages of now seemingly silly questions that our group had.  Rumor has it PSN is trained on other side of the country, which amounts to a one-way 6 or 7 hour bus ride each month.  This means several trips when the new volunteers arrive.  Not so good for me.  The other position was for Volunteer Action Committee (VAC) which is all about bringing issues the PCVs have to the staff and trying to resolve things for everyone.  I took myself off of this list as there were other people I thought were equal and superior to my usefulness in this position.  I am still flattered that everyone wanted me for something, but I’m really getting more and more excited about writing the newspaper.  The skills I pick up will be immediately transferrable to Elderhaven’s newsletter.  I also get 3 days in the capital which means I will actually see the staff and other PCVs instead of staying at site all the time.  I also get carte-blanche to write terrifically bad and poor taste jokes.  We don’t tape people’s eyes open like in Clockwork Orange and make them view it.  But we should.

Spending time at the office will be good for other reasons.  The IT guy on staff seems reasonably knowledgeable…. and I’ll leave it at that.  There is a large project where all the PCV resources are being moved to Google Docs from a SharePoint server.  I have no official confirmation about the location of the server, but I’m really sure it is under the IT guys desk.  When I asked about the backup for all the PCV resources I also received a sheepish grin and a change of subject.  So hopefully I can at least act as a consultant on IT matters, as there was a near CF over the SharePoint server when I first showed up.  A few more consultant visits and I’ll earn my useless-but-knowledgeable merit badge.

I’m going to join the Scouts.  The Scouts are associated with the Boy Scouts, but girls can join too… thus the different name.  They go on camping trips and have lots of nature lectures and have the same sustainable philosophy of development that PC has.  Sadly I’m too old for merit badges but they will accept me as a Scout Leader. 

Before I go I thought I would share more interesting updates.  These could all be generated into a story of their own, but I’ve started using bullet points in email, so I will do it here also.  Bullet points mean I am not done hearing myself speak (reading myself write?)

• We have three puppies.  Not “we” but the family.  Umngani (aka Doggy-Doggy to the 12 year old), Tiger aka Tiger to the adults), and Zanele (means enough in siSwati). Pictures are in the above order. 
• 

• Found bot fly larvae on doggy doggy.  Supposedly they taste like milk.  Not interested though.

• Pay in advance electricity is actually ok.  Kind of sad that if you are forgetful the lights go out.
• The community still wants us to bring water.  For E100 I get approximately 1333 hours to be on the computer.  I can run the laptop with all USB ports filled charging stuff and only feel guilty that my lightning and thunderous typing skills wake Babe every time I get inspiration to write.
• I am working with the teachers at the primary school, teaching them how to use the XO’s from the One-Laptop-Per-Child program.  The school here has 200 of them.  There are unknown quantities in country, and no educational curriculum for them.  Shame.
• Shame is the slang equivalent way of saying “sad,”  “my bad,” “you’re bad,” “I’m sorry,” “you are embarrassing me,” and “check yourself.”
• I am on doxycycline for malaria meds now.  Malaria is everwhere!  At least the billboards say so.
• We have squash, carrots, dill, green & red peppers, weeds, and one beet root growing.  And a bunch fo pretty plants.
• Snails here get over 6 inches.  I hold firm to my conclusion that we should forget Texas, everything is bigger in Africa.
• I actually miss hearing Shakira and the World Cup theme song every day.
• There is more rainfall here than in Tucson.
• Another PCV here is from Tucson.  He thinks he used to serve me coffee at Raging Sage.  Small world.
• Ryan says he is sending coffee.  He is merely torturing us.
• I will be writing more often with the pay-per-juice electricity.  I will also be writing private entries, which means to read those you will have to create a login if you don’t have one.
• My new laptop will enable me to rule the world.  To buy it through the local dealer would have cost E22,000.  That is equivalent to over $3k.  I paid half that online.
• The backpacks Matt gave us for wedding gifts are awesome.  Can not stress that enough.  He’s cool… got a job at Microsoft.  Needs to get me one when I get back. (that’s a hint Matt)
• Will be creating a database for an NGO here.  They have something like 14 years worth of household data, GPS coordinates and photos that they have sitting in cardboard boxes.  Good times.
• CEH.
• I made chimichangas!!!  Delicious.  I also burned my foot that day.  Coincidence?

 Ok… so that’s it these days.  Thanks to everyone for well wishes, cookies for support, and really awesome random things that show up in the mail.  Miss you!

We have been exceedingly busy lately, occasionally taking a day off to do nothing but sit on the floor and wish it was cleaner.  It is quite difficult to keep things clean, and we have had a several hour conversation about just how far do we lower the bar on what “clean” means.  It has been decided that “unfilthy” is the new clean.  After a few weeks of work on our new ceiling insulation, the feed bags are up in the living room.  We are the proud owners of 50 used chicken feed bags, 14 of which now hang from the tin roof above my head.  The idea is to create a space beneath the tin roof to trap the heat.  It so far seems to be working as the room was considerably cooler today.  The unfortunate part of this process has been the amount of chicken dust kicked into the air.  Regardless of how much Thandiwe has tried to prepare the bags, they still are sprinkling minute particles of magic chicken feed dust on our heads.  The bags have been cleaned, stapled together, and cleaned some more.  They were even left outside for a few hours, but there has been a fine layer of dust on most surfaces after working on them.  I have given up on the idea of hiring a traditional healer to cleanse the place, as it likely involves more unpleasant smells.  Thankfully now they are hanging, the dust should be an absolute minimum.

(insert sounds of donkeys, crickets, and drunk bomake (mothers) clapping and dancing)

Where was I?  Oh yes… dust.  Something has been affecting my sinuses, and I had to go into the Medical Office last week, as I have been suffering from moderate dizziness and irritated sinuses.  I have been given a steroidal spray for the rhinitis, and taken off Mefloquin, in case that is the cause.  I was unhappy about being on Mefloquin due to the side effects, but now I must say I miss it.  I have to take doxycyclin now once a day, and I receive none of the fun side effects of Mefloquin.  My dreams have mellowed out, and my daydreams are gone with them.  Goodbye hallucinations, goodbye out of control sleep patterns.

Some of the good things to come out of the office visit included picking up mail, and getting to see one of our good friends from training.  The PC office is so far from we we live that in a car it might take 90 minutes.  When taking the public transportation here, it is 2 buses and a khumbi (minivan) for a total of 3-4 hours.  Just long enough that we will be required to spend the night in town when we want to get our mail.  Thankfully Mfonzile (Joe) lives about 90 minutes from the PC office, and had enough floorspace to have me over.  And he happens to be a fantastic cook.  I was served $40 equivalent worth of appetizers in the form of radish, butter, and tarragon.  I say $40 as that is what it would cost in the US, here is was closer to $10.  Then I was spoiled with a E60 bottle of 2008 Pinotage, and some home made Indian dish.  That was followed by great conversation, catching up, and getting lost on our morning hike.  We were supposed to only go down to the river, so it was acceptable to me that I left my phone, wallet, and water at his place.  I am pleased at the result however, I was able to see untarnished and uninhabited Africa.  No people it seemed for miles, no trash anywhere, running water, green trees, and absolutely minimal signs that humanity had ever touched the ground around my feet.   And then it started to rain.  We likely doubled-back 3 times before we gave up and cut through someone’s cabbage patch.  In the end it turned out exceedingly well, as Mfonzile made friends with the son of the cabbage-patch owner, and they will likely be working on a few projects together over the next few years.  Just three kids hanging around in the cabbage patch.  <insert joke here>

Our own work has come a long way over the last several weeks, yet we are still up-in-the-air as to what is the best approach.  Peace Corps stresses “capacity building” as the definition for development, as opposed to the traditionally thought of “build it, give them money, and the will come” approach.  This puts us in a position of trying to motivate the people around us to do things that require no money and obviously this idea meets with a lot of blank stares.  Occasionally I can pick up on someone’s eyes glazing over when I say we “bring no money”.  (more donkeys)  In spite of no-money approach, we have been repeatedly introduced to how desperately our community desires is water.  Even the pastor said water is most important.  There is one NGO in our area, and the Govt itself working on a water project, so that puts us out of the running for what everyone is looking for.  It is a good thing however since sustainable water projects cost millions, and still don’t always work out.  The quick fix small borehole may cost a few thousand Emalengani, but when that 60 meter borehole dries up, people are going to be really upset. 

The best news out of the water crisis is that the second most desired thing we can do is work with the youth on empowering leaders for tomorrow.  If you are a boy and you don’t play soccer, there is very little for you to do here.  There is supposedly a boxing club of 4 people.  If you are a girl you are lucky to have free time.  There is a youth center here which is in bad need for restoration, as it has been mangled through neglect and lack of funding.  The pool table has a 45° slant to it, and the foosball table is a few players short of a full team.  The burglar door has been pulled off by either an overweight kid, or an overweight kid riding a bull.  The keys were lost and all the interior doors now have a doggy-door hastily installed in case Lassie needs to help kids on the other side.  The grass is green.  It is also waist high.  It is quite funny with all of this, how all I can see is an incredible stroke of luck for us, and all the potential this place can be.  Now we just need to figure out how to spread our vision.  Step 1 : Fix Youth Center.  Step 3: Profit.

We are exceptionally lucky to live in a community which so far seems quite versed on HIV and we haven’t confronted much stigma around it.  People are sick and dying, but people aren’t afraid to talk about it.  Condoms are passed out frequently, and the male circumcision program is strong here (ask me sometime what circumcision can do for you). All this does bode well for our role in actually feeling like we are accomplishing something.  I believe we are riding on the wave created by the Group 6 volunteers who left the site better than they found it.  Thanks to Dumsane and Lindelwa!  I rarely get mistaken for Dumsane, but Thandiwe corrects at least two people a week that she is not Lindelwa.  Happened yesterday actually.  “Not Lindelwa” had a good day of staying inside and reading the Darwin Awards today.  Ahh reading… what a great past time.  Reading is entirely underrated in the US, and I am pleased to need more than one hand to count the number of books I have read in the last 4 months.

ACK!  4 months!  I saw some video of Chicago on TV today while I was interviewing a local business owner.  It seems like time has just blown by at an astronomical speed.  There was much talk during training about the Lifecycle and moods of the volunteer, and it resembles a roller-coaster.  Now that Thandiwe nami (Krista and I) are out of training, speaking siSwati more often, and integrating, we are supposed to be slowing down considerably and adjusting to “Swazi time.”  So far it hasn’t been happening in obvious wa ys, but I will look up from my gardening and 5 hours have passed.  We are now growing carrots, chives, tomatoes,  green onions, basil, hybrid green peppers, organic peppers, dill, and oregano.  The two types of peppers are kind of an experiment to see which grows better, tastes better, etc.  They are planted side by side and will get the same treatment.  The organic peppers will likely be able to have their seeds harvested and planted next year.   Mfonzile was telling me that the big seed company here was bought by an American company, and Walmart bought Shoprite.  This means even more of the money spent in Swaziland will go to US companies who pay taxes, which then get given to Swaziland as foreign aid.  What a world right? 

(take a breath… changing subjects)

I am also growing cactus, iboza and wild something-tree (name censored!).   As much as I talk about the climate and scenery being like southern Arizona, nothing drives it home more than realizing I am growing cactus.  The kind we have looks just like ocotillo, but is terrifically short like a shrub.  The point in planting it is to keep the tinkhukhu (chickens) out of the garden.  I came all the way to Africa to cultivate cactus, and what a good job I am doing.  But here is something I can bring to Africa.  Prickly pear jelly is something that will be widespread and marketable by the time I am done.  My book says it grows here, now I just have to find some.    Of all the plants however, nothing I have seen is quite as beautiful as a Jacaranda.  If you haven’t seen how gorgeous that tree is, Google it and look for pictures of it in bloom.  If it isn’t invasive I am bringing some back home with me.  If it is invasive I will take up painting so I can at least bring that back. 

Speaking of paintings the art available at the big tourist market is incredible.  Goods from all over Africa are traded as this market.  The market itself is likely the size of Tucson Mall, and all outdoor.  Some areas are two stories, but it is all wood planks and wood stairs.  It is precisely what your mind would picture a market in Africa being like.  Drums, jewelry, and paintings are available.  Some for as little as $1 US.  My plan is to buy a drum and several of pieces of wall art next time we are there.  Right now we are actually feeling the squeeze of living on a PC budget, and recognize that my $2 a day juice habit may need to go.  The juice habit is incredibly satisfying though.  I can buy a liter of 100% fruit juice for $2, and it is the most delicious thing I have ever drank.  The price may be lowering in the next few weeks also, so the juice habit won’t go quite yet.  Sadly the Mozambican bread habit is already on its way out.  The bread is only good with the spicy bean patties they make, and we just bought a 2 pound sack of chilies for less than $1.  Just not sure what we are going to do with all those chilies.

One thing I am sure of is we will be eating under lighted circumstances now, thanks to the solar lights Pop sent us.  Pop… those things are great!  I put together a small outdoor charging rack so they are less likely to be trampled by goats while outside.  We can now truly stay up until 9pm again and not bump into walls doing it.  The same time as the solar lights came, Powertraveler fulfilled its promise and delivered free of charge a solar-powered battery that will recharge the laptop.  The battery takes about 8 days to fully charge in the sun, but can charge the laptop 5-6 times on a full charge, so I should be able to type on a real keyboard like I’m doing now more often.  This is a good thing, because as great as I have been about keeping a journal, it is devolving into a series of bullet points on what has been happening, and doesn’t include any personal interpretation or substance to it.  It is nice that I ate cornflakes.  Again.  (more donkeys… they really are dumb asses).  I don’t need to look back on my journaling 50 years from now and say “yup.  I was regular in those days.”  Hopefully when inspiration for writing something of quality is on my mind, I will enshrine it here.  In the meantime I am still trying to learn how to juggle and do magic.

It is also true that black mambas are super fast!  Growing up in Arizona it was normal to see snakes whenever you went looking.  The snakes I grew up with had fast strikes, but generally moved at the speed you would expect a snake to move at.  The puff adders in Swaziland apparently move slow also, and constantly get stepped on.  The black mamba I saw yesterday moved fast enough to make me shudder, and fast enough for all the bomake(mothers) in the village to sprint after it while the chucked rocks and tried whacking it with sticks.  In the end it was bomake 1 snake 0.  We have been told that when you have a snake just tell the women of the village, and the snake problem will be taken care of.  In the case of it being a living animal, it is sad to see an animal meet its demise due to humans, and then not get eaten or made into boots.  Knowing that at 6 feet it was a small mamba, but potentially a man killer (or cows, donkeys, goats, or puppies, they were all there) made me feel slightly better.  I do regret not taking the body and doing something with it. 

4 meters is the length the black mamba will get up to according to the “Wild Swaziland” nature book I bought a few weeks ago.  I got the book at a bookstore here, but it is likely available on amazon for $10 or so.  Speaking of Amazon I have started a “wish list” both there and on www.thinkgeek.com Also.  They are under my email address. Karen (my sister) mentioned that a small flat-rate box from USPS is only $13 to here. (hint hint)  It turns out that the only things that aren’t available here is technology and delicious candy.  They have solar panels at most shops, but they are really expensive compared to their bought online counterparts.  Fixed solar panel installs are apparently a common target for theft, so the portable solar that we brought is turning out great.

One of the best things so far that I brought were the small $2 solar lights taht are intended for your driveway.  Without electricity, those things are great!  I have one in the kitchen and one in the bedroom.  We had an electrician out to the homestead a few days ago to quote prices on getting juice, and it is extremely expensive, coming in just under $1000 US.  So we are sticking woth solar.  I have been in an email fight with this company that sells solar laptop chargers, since it is not charging my laptop.  The customer service rep says she will send me some additional equipment to remedy the situation, so I will not disparage the company’s name yet.  Being a techie for the group is paying off as I can say things like I have 15 orders I need to place, and I am govt, etc etc.

Once the solar/tech issues are fixed, it seems the largest issue is getting a candy fix.  They have some candy here, including kit kats.  What they don’t have is root beer barrels and m&m’s.  I had the luck of running across both of these before I left, but supplies are running thin.  We may be able to run across to South Africa and find them there.  We haven’t yet crossed into Mozambique either, but that is coming soon.

Even without candy and power, we are getting an amazing amount done.  I am finishing one book a week.  The last book I finished was Jason Carter’s “Power Lines.”  It is a story of the Peace Corps volunteers life living on the border of South Africa and Swaziland.  It is very interesting, and pretty accurate to our own life here.  We are making progress on work, our 3 month assessment of our community is going well.  We made it to the outskirts of the community yesterday and saw the second high school.  They also have a really nice computer lab, so I am really excited about that.  Sadly the transport back from there is difficult, and even with a partial ride, we walked about 5 or 6 miles in the 105 degree heat, going about 1000 feet uphill to.  From the bottom of the plateau to the top.  I will remember to bring more water.

The walk wasn’t all bad, we did see a squished puff adder that moved to slow.