Back from CBT

(written 12/23/09)
I just got back to Maseru from CBT. The goodbye was nice – my family gave me some gifts and cards, and made a nice dinner for me and a couple other trainees. It was kind of sad to leave but presently I’m happy to be relaxing on a couch watching TV shows off someone’s computer.

There was another story I meant to write about the other day, which took place about 1.5 weeks ago. I had just gotten home from a long day and the sun was about to set. We never go anywhere after dark (because that’s when bad things happen, I’m told), but that day some of the girls who live with me, as well as Ntate Spice and my tiny brother and sister, told me we were going for a walk. After walking for about 10 minutes we reached an open area where there were tons of local children (ages prob 7-15) lined up in rows, with a few guys in front. Ntate Spice joined the guys in front, and they began to play some makeshift drums and a pretty beat up accordian (accordian music is strangely popular here). The kids broke into a pretty nice step dance – as it turns out this is a nightly ritual they have this time of year in preparation for some X-mas dances.

I was very entertained by the show, but they were more entertained by my presence. When the song ended, with the sun setting, they called me over to the front group. Everyone immediately surrounded me in a circle 3-4 people deep. Ntate Spice started rapping in Sesotho, and everyone suddenly shouted at me to dance. I have no idea what Spice was rapping about but presumably it had something to do with me. I had no interest in dancing but I also had no excuse, so… I indulged them a bit and they were ecstatic. It’s a funny dynamic of being revered on one hand and seen as a clown on the other.

So, that was a fun time. Now, here are a couple pictures from CBT I’ll hopefully be able to upload:

- View from my house at CBT

- Me and Tota, one of the best students in my science class

- Wow, look, it’s a lekhooa (white foreigner), and he’s drinking water!

- A very famous mountain, viewed from the top of another historical mountain called Thaba Bosiu. The first and 2nd kings of Lesotho are buried on Thaba Bosiu, and the mountain seen here (whose name no one here can remember, oops) is the inspiration for Basotho hat (google search Basotho hat to see what I mean)

- One of my little brothers, Bataung, enjoying the camera

- My 4 year old sister, Refiloe (coolest 4 year old ever), and I

- Hordes of bana (kids) from my hood. Girl with facepaint is my nextdoor neighbor Relebohile (coolest 10 year old ever. Seems to do everything exceptionally well. For example can throw a rock farther/more accurately than any American here), carrying my 2 year old brother Morapeli.

OK I have all the pictures loaded on, I really hope they show up... here we go.

CBT – Bye bye!

(actually written 12/21/09)
WARNING – THIS IS A LONG ENTRY. IF YOU GET BORED READING LONG ENTRIES, READ A LITTLE BIT NOW, AND COME BACK ANOTHER TIME FOR MORE. IT’S MOSTLY A SERIES OF SHORT STORIES ANYWAY SO YOU DON’T REALLY NEED THE CONTINUITY.
I’m in my bed right now, up much later than usual, and it feels like a good time to write. It’s very dark here, but I can hear a mosquito buzzing around my ear. I already have one bite on my foot from the past 15 minutes – I hope I can find it before I fall asleep, or I might be in for a long night of getting feasted on. Though I think there would be far more than one mosquito in any other African country, and I’d be worried about malaria, so I shouldn’t complain.
I have just 2 days left in Maqhaka, before going back to the training center in Maseru. Overall this is a good thing, but while I’m eager to get on with Peace Corps, it will be pretty sad to say goodbye to my host family. They have all been wonderful. My host mother won’t stop making me food and doing my laundry by hand, even though I’m supposed to be learning to do these things on my own. The other day I told her she didn’t have to to my laundry because I’d soon be back in Maseru where I could use a washing machine. She looked so genuinely sad that I finally said “Well, if you REALLY WANT to wash my clothes, you can.” She very quickly said “Yes! I want to,” and so now I’ll be the only trainee going back to Maseru with all clean clothes (and a still unopened box of laundry detergent to boot). I will miss all the kids, too, especially my little 4 year old sister Refiloe. She is nuts, in the greatest possible sense of the word. Most days I’ll come home after training, exhausted and dripping sweat. She’ll run from the house down the hill halfway to meet me, screaming and shouting with excitement. Sometimes there’s a little jig involved. When I say hello, she’ll turn around and run away from me back up to the house, screaming even more. I just laugh, and when I get to the house, we talk in our common tongue, 4 year old Sesotho. I’m going to try to post a photo, we’ll see if it works.
I’m also going to really miss the top of the mountain where I live. If I walk about 20 minutes uphill from my house, I reach a beautiful view and some really nice breeze. Then, there is a little cave that is absolutely perfect - in the shade, strong breeze, hanging high above the entire village. It’s proven a great spot for other trainees and me to get together, but I also spent this past Sunday laying there by myself, drawing, and overall just unwinding in a way I haven’t found since I left America.
So, here’s a few quick anecdotes from CBT.
- One of my favorite people here is a guy probably around my age, who played a big role in the welcome ceremony when we first arrived in Maqhaka. He danced around a lot and wore a wizard hat. We all assumed he was drunk, and maybe he was. Anyway, for whatever reason, he has dubbed himself Ntate (Mister/Sir) Spice, or, he also will respond to the name “Barbecue” (pronounced ba-ba-CUE). Among all the jolly Basotho we meet every day, he stands out as one of the jolliest. He has a weird quirk in which, when we walk around through the village and pass by people, he frequently yells his name at them. Along the lines of, “Hello, how are you? I am good! Babacue!” This is all in Sesotho - his English is virtually non-existent. Strangely enough, I also met a guy the other day who goes by the name Ntate Carrots, and shares the same name-shouting compulsion.
- Somehow a lot of Basotho got the idea that “bye bye” means “hello.” I’m not sure where this came from. Almost every day, Adam, Shanthi (two other trainees) and I walk by certain houses, and whole groups of kids stop us by name, and shout “Abuti Mpho [that’s my name]! Bye bye!” Some adults do it too.
- Another confusing language story – on many nights when I’ve headed to my house to go to bed, the kids have said something to me that has made me stop in my tracks. They speak their child Sesotho, and they say something that sounds like “Barack Obama Not.” On multiple occasions, I’ve just burst out laughing, and struggled unsuccessfully to figure out what he has to do with anything. I ask them why Barack Obama, they look confused, and I go to bed. Then this past week in Sesotho class we learned a bit about pronoun classes, and I put it together to figure out they’re actually saying – boroko bomonate, which means sleep well. This is now my favorite phrase in Sesotho.
- This evening we had a pot luck dinner at a trainer’s house. Adam, Shanthi and I brought homemade gnocchi with a tomato/cheese sauce, which was swell. We walked home afterwards with leftovers in a big blue pot, which drew a lot of attention (not that my white skin isn’t already a huge neon sign, but this is beside the point). A group of bo-ntate (grown men) sitting on some steps asked us what it was. We said food, they asked to see, we showed them, they asked to try it. We didn’t want to give them any, lest they get greedy and want the whole thing, so I tried to quickly come up with some plausible excuse. Without thinking, I told them in Sesotho, “Uhhh, sorry, we have to bring this food to our mothers.” The funny thing is, this worked perfectly. This got me thinking what a different world I’m living in, that you get approached on the street at twilight by a group of men who want your [leftovers], and the best defense is to [say you’re giving it to your mom]. Feels like a Mad Libs to me.
Oh, also, I found out where I’ll be living and working the next two years! I’m in the Maseru district (didn’t see this coming at all, pretty cool), about 30 km from the capital, in a small village called Masite Nek. I’ll be teaching at Thuto Ke Leseli Secondary School, which is a new, government-run school, just opened in 2007. I spoke with a teacher there who told me her classes were 120 students last year, which is frightening, but I have a couple reasons to think this year they’ll be smaller. We’ll see!
Finally, Merry Christmas/Happy New Year everyone

darn

quick update - apparently the uploading of pictures is not working very well. ill try again as soon as i can. sorry everyone. at least you can see one picture. bah.

CBT – My heart break and tears caescad down my cheeks.

(written 12/11/09)




So, I forgot to upload those pictures last time. Oops. Here they are.



Today was the last day of our practice teaching at Berea High School. It was a very productive and very memorable experience. The students were fantastic. First off, their willingness to come to school during the summer, to get a jump start on next year’s material and to help us PC trainees get some practice – that was impressive (though possibly only for lack of anything better to do). But also, their genuine interest in the material, their energy, their discipline, their general good nature – it made teaching a blast. I had students come find me after school to ask extra questions about biology that were on their mind. I had students ask to stay late at the end of the day to finish our statistics activity. They showed up to take 6 exams in one day on Wednesday, came back Thursday to see how they did and review, then came in today for goodbyes, pictures, and an assembly which featured giving of prizes to the top scorers and some songs/speeches. I gave closing remarks at the assembly on behalf of the PC folks. I told the kids how great they were and how much we would miss them. I’ll be totally shocked if my permanent school has such great students.



So with that in mind, here are 2 pictures of me and some of my favorite students. The girl in the picture, Tsepang, was particularly fun. Interesting story, though – one day she had her head down on her desk in the middle of class. I walked up to her desk to wake her up. Her friend next to her frantically got her up first. I reached her desk, pointed a finger at her, and said something to the effect of “Hey – no sleeping.” As soon as I raised my hand, though, she leapt back in her chair with a horrified look on her face. I realized she thought I was going to hit her. Corporal punishment is brutal in Lesotho, and it is everywhere. She’s been ingrained to think that when a teacher approaches to discipline her with a hand in the air, she’s about to feel a lot of pain (case in point, in my other class, which had just 9 kids, 2 have previously had their hands broken from corporal punishment). I felt bad for freaking her out, and apologized to her later in the day. By then she didn’t seem too concerned, and from that point she actually blossomed to be one of the more active students I had. And she asked me to take that picture with her, today, so, I guess it’s alright.



Another funny story about teaching. A lot of us asked our students on the last day to write things they liked and didn’t like about our classes. One kid named Simon, a really bright senior, wrote the following: “…Anyway, wherever you go, May you stil remember us, The more I say the more My heart break and tears caescad down my cheeks. Stil love you and Thank you for doing your work excellently!” Of course, I felt great after reading this. But a short while later I had a conversation with my friend Kimiko, another volunteer. This is what she said: “Eric, I was just talking to Simon, you know what he said? He told me he loves me, and when he thinks of me leaving his heart breaks, and tears cascade down his cheeks!” My eyes were wide. I was astonished, amused, slightly betrayed. I thought his heart only broke for me. But hey, what could I do… I showed her what he wrote me, and we had a good laugh. THEN, at the assembly today, another student from that class, Tanki, gave a speech. In his speech, he said “We love you, and when we think of you leaving, our hearts break more and more.” Again, I laughed, and rolled my eyes. Perhaps it was all totally sincere, but it was pretty silly, to say the least. In any case… really great kids, I’m very glad to have met them.

Food Blog Within a Blog – CBT

So… if you aren't interested in hearing about the food here, just skip this post.

 

But hopefully you are.

 

Overall, the food has been decent. Some very good, some very bad.

 

The thanksgiving feast the other day was awesome, and those 2 bites of zebra I got were pretty special. Very tender, and the way it was prepared, the whole thing ended up tasting a lot like Jewish brisket. (Story: The guy who brought the zebra says he shot it at a legal game reserve in South Africa a few months ago. He donated 700 pounds of it to an orphanage, and kept the tenderloin in a freezer for a few months, before using it for thanksgiving. Pretty noble use of a zebra carcass.)

 

Makoeneas (Ma-QUEN-yahz) – Street/junk food. Deep fried "fat cakes," which is almost exactly like a giant munchkin, but served hot. Very tasty.

 

Papa – The #1 staple of the Basotho diet. Here's how you make it. Boil water. Add corn meal until it turns very thick. Stir it with a big wooden stick. Add a shitload more corn meal. The whole thing is now like a very thick dough. Cover, heat, and let the bottom almost burn. Stir some more – this now requires a lot of elbow grease. That's papa. It's about as exciting as white rice.

 

Samp – Another corn-based starch, but it's totally superior to papa. I love it. I'm not sure how it's made, but I think it is full of cream. Probably my favorite Basotho food.

 

Lesheleshele (Li-SHELL-ay-SHELL-ay) – A pretty common breakfast food. Hot porridge, made from sorghum. Nothing special, but very edible. I've started adding instant coffee to it just to give it some flavor. I don't think this is how the Basotho do it, but I eat it alone in my room so no one knows.

 

Bohobe (Bow-HOE-bee) – Basotho bread. Not totally sure how it's made, but I know it takes a lot of work, and it is steamed in a kettle. It is very dense, doughy, and served in thick slices. Pretty delicious when fresh, but merely edible thereafter.

 

Moroho – cooked vegetables – a pretty broad term. At our training facility, it's a mix of cabbage and onions and carrots, which tastes way better than I'd ever expect. At my CBT house, it is some sort of steamed and chopped greens. I don't know what it is that my 'Me ('Me = mother) adds to this to make it taste so awful, but it is pretty harsh. I think it might be sulfuric acid (only half-kidding).

 

Dessert – A common dessert this sort of layered dish, which has pudding, jello, pudding, jello, fruit, pudding, and graham cracker. Looks nasty, sounds nasty, tastes surpsingly good.

 

When you are sitting on a bus/taxi/kombi at the taxirank (taxi depot) waiting for it to fill up before departing (which can take a LONG time), you are continually offered to buy things by street vendors who walk around the area. The other day I bought a 4-pack of what is basically a sweet English muffin, for 3 rand (~$0.40). Delicious carbs.

 

Yesterday, by the way, my 'Me served me a lunch that was that H2SO4 moroho, papa, and some kind of sardine stew. My feeling of obligation forced me to swallow three bites of sardine stew, but after that I gave up. It is with full confidence that I say it was the most offensive food I've ever eaten. Sorry, 'Me Ilina. Anyway, afterwards I gave her a blanket "I don't eat fish," so I think I'm good from here on out.

 

Also, mutton is very common here. I've had it in chops, in cubes, and in a sausage. The sausage is the best. It tastes very much like lamb, only less good.

 

Aside from the above foods, I do eat a good amount of apples, bananas, salad, some pasta, chicken… "normal" things like that. Right now, the things I miss the most are pizza, buffalo wings, and bacon. I think pizza is #1. Oh, except for ice cubes.

Live from CBT (part 2)!

So, now you know a little about what life is like during CBT. But I have not discussed at all how super awesome it is living here. Maqhaka is a pretty spread out village. I live about 2/3 of the way up a mountain. Other trainees living here are about a 30-35 minute walk away, down the mountain, through the village center, past the chief's house, and then down another hill. I've seen where everyone else lives, and I honestly think I have the best housing situation of the bunch.

 

My family's property is pretty large (maybe ½ an acre?). On the property you will find donkeys, cows, pigs, dogs, cats, chickens (+ baby chicks), and ducks. The larger animals are penned in irregular brick rectangles, which somehow make it all feel classy. The birds/dogs/cats just wander around. The property is on a slope, and as you look down the angle of the mountain, the view of the valley below, and the chain of mountains beyond, is stunning (see picture below, taken from the side of my house).

 

My house, which I love, is detached from my host family's. It's surprisingly spacious, and it has a cone-shaped, thatched roof. The thatched roof is pretty highly sought after, both for its aesthetics and for the way it keeps the house cooler in the summer (tin roof = oven). I have a queen sized bed. Another trainees said his host parents literally gave him their bed, and are sleeping on the floor where their bed had been previously. I have not checked whether my host parents still have a bed, but it wouldn't surprise me… they treat me very well.

 

So, that's all well and good, but really the best part about living here is the Basotho kids. The stoop outside my door is one of the main hangouts for the little kids around the area. I have a few "brothers and sisters" of my own (somewhere between 3-7, not sure which ones actually live here, and which are just neighbors… it's hard to tell, just trust me). They are all completely in awe of me, they love to just stand and stare (see below). When I come home from the school or Sesotho class with my friend Adam (another trainee who lives next door), the kids flock to us, with huge grins on their faces. Some of the older ones like to try to speak to us in English, but it's very limited. We speak very basic Sesotho, roughly equivalent to that of the 5 year olds we meet. We try to find ways to play with them, by tossing a ball, or drawing pictures of common things and them teaching us the Sesotho words. Oh, and these kids LOVE my camera. They flip out every time I take their pictures. Man… the kids are so damn cute (see below – their names are Lerato, Refiloe, and Batiung). I'll definitely miss them when CBT ends.

Live from CBT!

(Entry actually written 12/1/09)

 

Lumelang (Good morning). It's Tuesday morning, 7 am, and I have a few minutes before I have to go to my first day practice teaching with real students. I am at Community-Based Training right now, which means I am living with a host family in my own detached house, in a small village, for 3 weeks. There's no electricity here, so what I've decided to do is to write quick entries on my computer, transfer them to a flash drive, then upload them whenever I find the chance to go to an internet café.

 

So, it's really nice finally getting outside the training facility for a while. I am in a village called Maqhaka (the "qh" is pronounced as a click, by the way), in the Berea district. My new name, so I'm told, is Mpho Moqasane (the q is a click here, too).

 

…

 

… OK it is now 7 pm. I had to run this morning, but now I'm able to write more, after a pretty long but very enjoyable day. As you probably know, I was brought into PC as a Math teacher (or Maths teacher, as they say here). As part of training, we spend 1.5 weeks practice teaching, with real live high school students as our audience (we pay them in cookies or chips). I'm now being groomed to teach both math and science. This is good news to me - I think teaching science will be a lot of fun. Today was our first day practice teaching. I had two classes today, one where I taught stats, and one the circulatory system. I was pretty excited for both of these, and both went quite well, especially for a first day. In the stats class, we compiled a data set by throwing a crumpled piece of paper at a target on the wall, and documenting how accurate students were. They had a lot of fun doing it. Unfortunately for them, the fun is over, and tomorrow we use the results to actually do math (evil laugh). They'll still get cookies though, so that's good.

 

So, a quick rundown of what today was like: Wake up at 5:30. Bucket bathe. Eat breakfast. Leave for school at 7:10. Teach, watch other PC trainees teach, come home at 1:30. Eat lunch. Go to Sesotho class, 2-3:30. Come home, play a Basotho game called moraba raba (something like Tic-tac-toe meets Chess meets Othello). Goof around with all the little kids who love to stare at me and laugh and play simplistic games. Plan lessons for a few hours…. And now I'm here. All that's left is some dinner, made by my host mother, and some reading in bed until I fall asleep.

 

It has come to my attention recently that long posts intimidate blog readers, so I'm going to cut this off here. I'll write more "later" in a separate post.

Lumela bo-me le bo-ntate!

Hello Ladies and Men! I am alive and well in Lesotho. I've spent almost the entire time so far at the Peace Corps Training Facility in Maseru. The group of trainees is great, and it has so far been a fantastic (though at times overwhelming) experience. We attend class each day from 8am-5pm, on average – topics range from safety, to culture, to how to teach, to how to speak Sesotho. Learning Sesotho is a lot of fun, but it's pretty tough. I am getting a little better at clicking.
 
Tomorrow morning I'll be moving to the Berea district for 3 weeks of Community Based Training (CBT). There I'll be living in my own small house, under the supervision of a host family. I'll spend the marjority of the time there practice teaching, continuing to attend classes, and getting to know my family and my village. I am told I will attract huge amounts of attention, particularly from local children.
 
I don't have much time now to recount many stories of my first 2.5 weeks of PC service, but I can say that I ate slow roasted zebra tenderloin last night at a thanksgiving feast/party. It was delicious. In other news, this country is beautiful, the Basotho people are exceedingly jolly, and they sing to us on a daily basis. Nothing makes a Mosotho happier than when you speak to them (usually poorly) in Sesotho. The HIV/AIDS problems in Lesotho are staggering – the 24% statistic you will read is a major understatement. The cultural views on AIDS are at times disorienting – I've heard that it is sometimes regarded as a conspiracy, and called "American Idea Discouraging Sex." I've also heard that one of the medications given to infected people has become very popular for recreational use. It is so popular that uninfected people borrow infected people's blood samples to fake having HIV, just to get the drugs. Or, even worse – they just infect themselves on purpose.
 
Sorry for that downer, I am really enjoying this country, and I can't wait till the training wheels start to come off. I gotta run, lots to do tonight getting ready for CBT and all. Hope to write again soon, and one day get to sit down and read my emails. Not sure when that will be… Hope y'all are doing well back home.
 
Also, if Dustin's mother is reading this, you've raised a very nice young boy, and he sends you his love.

 

Salang hantle (Be well)!

My blogspot brings all the boys (and girls) to the blog...

...Damn right, it's better than yours.

Just kidding, it probably isn't, since I'm brand new at this. But whatever. Hi everyone. I'm sitting here on a quiet Wednesday evening in NYC, setting up my blog in hopes that I can keep it going when once I join Peace Corps. I leave in a little less than one month, and needless to say, I'm pretty darn excited.

On November 11, I'll be flying to Maseru, Lesotho, to begin a few months of PC training. Following that training, I'll begin teaching secondary level math somewhere in the tiny mountain kingdom, as it's called. Not sure where exactly, but I'll know soon enough.

Some Lesotho fun facts, which I might have told you already:

- Lesotho established independence from Britain in 1966.
- Lesotho is approximately 30,000 sq km, or roughly the size of my home state of Maryland.
- Lesotho is bordered to the South by South Africa. To the north, it is bordered by South Africa. It is bordered to the East by South Africa, and to the West by South Africa (Only 2 other countries in the world are landlocked within a single country - Vatican City and San Marino).
- Lesotho has the highest female literacy rate in Africa, but also one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS in the world.
- Lesotho is the only country in the world to exist entirely over 1000 m elevation. It has the highest low point of any country, and is home to two of Africa's four ski resorts.
- The name Lesotho (pronounced Leh-SOO-too) translates roughly to "The Land of the People Who Speak Sesotho." It's people are known as Mosotho (singular) or Basotho (plural).

So, I might make another post or two before I leave, or maybe not. Over the next couple years, I hope this page will be a fun and useful way to keep in contact with everyone back home, or wherever else. And for you to stay in contact with me! Note the comments section below every post. That's for you, dear family member, or vague acquaintance who I haven't spoken to in a while, or fortunate person who reached this page in error! 

If you're still reading, here's to hoping I have access to electricity and internet in Lesotho, at least sometimes. I'll do my best to keep everyone updated about my adventures. Thanks for reading, don't be afraid to leave a comment!