Tag Archives: Peace Corps Lesotho

Counterpart

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This was published in the Capital Journal in July.

Around the six-month mark of my service in June, I attended a program design and management training. From nearly the day I was sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer in December 2011, I fretted about this particular conference – the counterpart workshop.

Volunteers around the world are assigned counterparts, someone in the community that assists volunteers in creating and implementing projects. The volunteer offers technical support while the counterpart utilizes knowledge of the community and culture to make sure the project is completed and sustained once the volunteer has returned to the United States.

The idea of a counterpart unnerved me. In Lesotho, we are allowed to choose our own colleague for community development work in addition to our teaching responsibilities. Yet, how was I supposed to find a counterpart – the perfect person – to work with? What if no one wanted to work with me or I didn’t feel comfortable around anyone to consider a close ally? What if that highly motivated, highly skilled person did not exist in my village?

Immediately upon moving to the village, I began scouting for a possible counterpart. I tried to gage motivation and community development interest in a few people, but I hadn’t found that golden person I was hoping would arrive at my door. Just three days before the June workshop, someone finally agreed to go with me – Eric.

Eric is the pastor of the village’s Lesotho Evangelical Church, which oversees my school. He is the school board president and has organized an agriculture group to teach villagers development through farming. He is a kind man, with great English, so I took a chance and invited him to come with me.

Prior to the conference, I didn’t know much about Eric, other than he seemed to have an interest in improving the community. As we devised plans and sorted through Ideas, his passion for improving our village broke through. He’s attempted development projects in the past, but nothing stuck.  Yet, he didn’t give up. The more we discussed, the more it was apparent that we were on the same page in our efforts to help the village better itself. By the week’s end, we had pages of ideas and a solid friendship.

Since the conference, Eric and I meet nearly daily to discuss our projects and mine the community for other motivated villagers. We have big ideas and some will be met with serious challenges, but we both understand that.

More importantly, we’ve both come to realize we are not alone. I am willing to put in the work because I know he is, and vice versa. We constantly remind each other that things are better now, now that there is a ‘we.’ There is an amazing sense of reassurance when you know you have someone – someone who you trust – right along side you to fight the good fight. I have that in Eric and, because I do, I feel like anything is possible. We both do.

Taxi Tales – Tsotsi

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Taxi fare in Lesotho is fairly standard, compared to Niger where one could bargain a price. Most Basotho know the cost it takes to get from one place to the next without the fear that the conductor – the person who handles money and door operation – is trying to get a little extra.

However, as a white person, there are a few times when a conductor tries to squeeze a few extra Maluti out of me. It helps that there is a chart of the prices posted in each car so I can point to that, but I can also use my little bit of Sesotho to explain that I am not just some lahuoa. I know these ropes. Once a conductor tried to tell me I needed to pay more because it was a holiday, but I knew better. I argued and argued with him until I finally agreed to pay one extra rand. When I told my host sister this, she told me to just get out of the car the next time.

On my way back from vacation, I was faced with another greedy conductor. I had my large backpack – overstuffed with items I must have for holiday – but it was sitting between the driver bench and the first row on a small ledge designated for bigger items. I didn’t think much about it because I often toss my bag there and have no problems. I was sitting in the front between the driver and one of my students, zoned out to my music and the made-up world in my head. When it was time to give the conductor money, I handed him a 50 note and he quickly gave me back 20. It is common for the conductor to not give exact change right away. He may not have it and is collecting the fares of other passengers, but he will usually hand it over without me having to say anything.

But, the closer we got to my stop, I started to panic about the inevitable confrontation. I could see the bills in his hand; he was trying to cheat me.

“Ke kopa change.” I demanded he hand over the rest of my change.

“No. Bag. Too big.”

He had decided that my bag took up too much room and he should charge me for it. Nope.

“Uhuhuhuh.” I screamed at him. “Tsotsi, Ntate. Tsotsi.” I called him a thief.

He said he was not a thief and that my bag deserved a charge, but I wasn’t going to let him win. “Uhuhuhuh. Tsotsi. Tsotsi.”

The rest of the 15-passenger van joined in. “Tsotsi! Tsotsi!” I had won their respect and they were going to help me get my money back. Even the driver giggled and repeated the Sesotho word for thief.

Eventually, he relented and handed me 10 rand, one less than I deserved but I decided to end my victory there. And it was a victory.

If I was in America, I would have called that extra 10 rand a loss and shrugged it off. Here, though, I wasn’t going to be taken advantage of because of stereotypes associated with the color my skin. I take the same transportation as the Basotho, eat the same food and speak the same language so I am going to pay the same price.

From the outside it seems like I was the greedy white person, but the other passengers appreciated that I stood up for myself. That I fought the conductor the way they would. For all intense and purposes, I was a Masotho.

As the car let me out, I thanked the driver and turned to the conductor, “Ke tseba. Ke Masotho.”

I know. I am a Masotho.

An African Safari

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For somewhere around 30 hours, my friend Hannah and I zoomed around the highways South Africa in a rented Polo. Hannah handled the driving – as I am an ashamed 27 year old who can’t drive stick – and I scanned maps and road signs to direct us to our next landing spot. We stopped for roadside attractions and picnics along the freeway. We played nearly every song on each of our iPods and gawked and the “real African” scenery.

It was all-American road trip without the America.

The idea for the holiday came a few months prior. We discussed a large group trip to Mozambique and then a smaller one to Botswana. Because of my school’s early start and Hannah’s personal commitment, we had only five days to squeeze in some type of vacation before the end of the winter break so we decided to do a Big 5 game park.

Weeks went by as Hannah and I agreed that we need to make plans for the vacation, but none actually formed. We eventually had to submit our leave requests to Peace Corps (just like any job, we accrue vacation days and are only allotted so many each month) and left most of blank because all we had was dates – no lodging. We emailed friends and supervisors and finally agreed on Hluhluwe/iMfolozi Game Park near the upper east coast. Less that a week before leaving, we haphazardly decided to spin a few days in the nearby costal town of St. Lucia. That was our plan, no real plan at all but a couple of spots on a map. It felt vaganbond-ish and rouged. It felt so unlike me, and that felt good.

We set out on the open road with a heap of Google Maps, some junk food and iPods stocked of dance music and This American Life episodes. Hannah quickly picked up the left-hand driving and weaved in and out of traffic like a pro by the end of the first day. It was freeing to be in the open road and we giggled each time we passed a packed taxi, thankful for the roomy Polo and luxury to stop and go as we please.

Our first stop was at Hluhluwe Backpackers, literally two kilometers from the park’s main gate. Because each of our half of the car – not including petrol and the unforgiving tolls – cost about what we make in a month, we decided to reserve camping spots, sleep in the car and do all of our own cooking. Dave, the owner of the backpacker, wouldn’t have it and gave us a room for the two nights we stayed there. He also made sure we had plenty of beer to drink and offered up a delicious braai with a few other guests on our last night. Dave makes me want to abandon all other life ambitions and open a backpacker somewhere warm and hospitable. He had great stories of wondering travelers and wildcats; his life seemed at ease and full of adventure. We were so grateful for his hospitability that we promised to recommend him to all other volunteers wanting to visit a Big 5 park.

Our main reason for this trip was to cross “African Safari” off our bucket lists. We lingered on the idea of Kruger National Park – the largest in South Africa – but feared the park’s touristy prices. Another volunteer recommended Hluhluwe – the oldest park in the country – so we decided to give it a try. We looked into tours, but our volunteer salaries can’t handle those prices so we decided to splurge for a map and do it on our own. Hannah had read that the game are most visible at dawn and dusk, so we woke up very early Friday morning, ate some eggs and toast and were on the hunt.

The Big 5, if you are not familiar, are lions, cheetahs, buffalo, rhinos and elephants and Hluhluwe claimed to have them all. For 12 hours, our Polo took us up and down trails of the park as Hannah and I scoured for animals. A safari is like gambling: you lose and lose but, when you hit big, the jackpot seems possible. We saw wildebeests, several types of antelope, zebras, warthogs, wild dogs, distant giraffes, the back of a rhino and monkeys. While stopped for lunch at a picnic area, a baboon greeted us, like we were old friends and it was not at all ridiculous that he was chilling with us.

The best part of the day came in our final loop before returning back to the main gate. We hadn’t seen anything for hours and knew that 6:00 p.m., the park’s closing time, was fast approaching. We made our way around the bend and there were two giant rhinos about 400 meters from us. They were huge and majestic. They didn’t mind our gawking as they chewed some grass and we couldn’t take our eyes off these gigantic creatures. We were so thrilled and felt like it was a great ending to our day, when we met another friend. Less than 100 meters from our car, we saw a giraffe casually chomping on leaves and keeping an eye on us. It was the closest we had gotten to an animal and he was so incredibly beautiful. We wanted him to be our friend, he wanted us to leave him and his dinner alone, but whatever.

We were finally heading back to the main gate and pretty thrilled about our scoping loot. We had hoped for lions and elephants, but were so satisfied with the last half hour of our hunt that it didn’t matter.

As we sped through the path to get back in time, we noticed the car ahead of us stopped. We pulled over too and there were two thuggish hyenas. They grimly stared in our direction and turned their bodies to face off. Both cars turned off the lights and they continued on their way, off to do the bad things we all know hyenas as accurately documented in “The Lion King.” The other car was still, but we moved past and got next to the hyenas. Hannah was literally inches from one, but I screamed at her to step on the gas, nervous they would whip out some gangsta hyena move.

The next day, after a deep sleep, we made breakfast and sipped coffee in the warm African light. We planned to make it to St. Lucia that day but were in no hurry, so after our bellies were full, we continued on. We decided that if we saw anything interesting along the road, we would stop. We weren’t even on the highway when we stopped at a pineapple shack. On the way to the park, we saw signs for the region’s delicious pineapples and decided we must try one and picked up one at the shack along with a few other gifts. Back on the road, we saw several women selling them along with bags of green something. Again, we stopped and were delighted to find the biggest avocados we’ve ever seen. Of course, we needed one.

Back at the hostel, Hannah had found a poster for a cheese farm and was nearly giddy that we might run across it. Sure enough, half way to St. Lucia, we saw signs and pulled over. It was an adorable shop with samples and we ate the most delectable cheese I’ve ever had, lemon pepper goat cheese.

Eventually, we made it to St. Lucia and had one thing on our mind: beach. We bought a six-pack and grabbed our picnic items – including the fresh pineapple and avocado – and suits for a leisurely afternoon. It was too cold to swim, but we enjoyed the ambiance of the ocean and sand. We told deep stories and revealed in the break from the mountain cold we’ve endured for the previous three months.

That night, we made our own dinner in the hostel and had a drink on the town. We were hoping to meet some people from Dave’s at a bar but it was dark when we approached it. We decided an early rest was better and prepared for another day.

That morning, with the advice from our country director, we decided to explore iSimangaliso Wetlands Park before beginning the journey back. The park seems smaller as the animals were quite concentrated. We ran into antelope, wildebeests, zebras, warthogs and buffalo. We even spotted a few hippo treading in a swamp. It was the perfect end to our animal adventure.

The trip back was stressful as we struggled to find a place to stay and weave through road construction. I also go in a crabby mood that I couldn’t explain and felt like the world’s worst co pilot. We did stop for McDonalds because it seemed like the appropriate thing for two Americans on a road trip to do and it was the best McFlurry I’ve ever had. It also brightened our spirits a bit.

By dusk, we still didn’t have a place to stay and used limited airtime and service to find the name of a backpacker in a town along our 10-hour drive home. We had a street name, but took the wrong exit. We were so lost and Hannah decided to pull into a driveway to check the number and we suddenly realized that was it – the backpacker. Naturally, we were the only customers on a Sunday night and the couple, whose house is attached to the hostel, set us up. We were even allowed to use their kitchen, which had a glass-top stove, dishwasher, washer and a battery operated can opener. Hannah and I kept changing expressions of, “Where are we?” as we made mashed potatoes and beans.

The next day, we arrived at the border town where we rented the car and enjoyed some pizza before hitting the border. On the other side, cold, new school terms and harshness of village life awaited us and it was hard to cross. But we did and Hannah and I both ran errands in Maseru before returning to our respective villages.

On the taxi ride home, I thought about this vacation and the different emotions I possessed throughout it. I wasn’t always a fun camper to be in a car with and I struggled with some internal issues that I thought I was making real progress on but learned still need quite a bit of work. I thought about the beauty of a road trip and how it feels like you are in constant transition like the airport or the week between the end of frustrating job and the beginning of an exciting one. In some ways, these two years are just transition between an old life and a new one. I also realized that this dark, hard spot on my heart that I held for someone was now gone, after years of trying to let it go. Some how, on this trip, I realized that I no longer have hate for this person, just lots of well wishes.

My vacation was over and school was starting in two days, but I wasn’t sad or depressed. I was content. I am happy with my life here and am not filled with anxiety as I return to it after great a holiday the way I cried on return flights to Idaho during my short time there.

Although I wasn’t always at my best, this vacation reminded me of the person I believe I can be, that I am (yeah, that’s a line from TAL). I am not perfect, but I am not sure what that is. What I do know is that a new person took over, one who loves adventure and can handle not having every minute planned out. That is refreshing, almost as much as a hot shower after three months without.

Slowly, I am teaching myself that life without a plan is OK, even great. This vacation stressed me up until the moment we left because it wasn’t planned, but it turned out great. Sometimes, I need to remember to let go and just enjoy the open dirt road. It has so much more to offer than the mapped one.

 

So I bet you are saying, “Pictures would be really great,” and you are right, they would. But, my camera is completely dead and I can’t find my charger at the moment. When I do, or have another sent, I will make sure to post a few photos. I’ve got some good ones. 

Ntate John

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Reds, pinks, blues and yellows mix together, moving shades so slightly you don’t recognize the change in hue. Below, the rolling landscape is still and scattered lights pop up as villagers make the change from day to night.

I am standing around a fire with seven others. Our little camp is nestled halfway up a mountain on a stretch of flat land. We are so high that patches of ice attached to rock are visible. An assortment of meats is being browned and we are taking swigs of beer from brown quart bottles and passing them to any open hand. Both Sesotho and English float through the air, but laughter is the main language. We stop for pictures or to readjust our blankets that are hugging our shoulders to keep in the warmth.

I’ve never been so in love with Lesotho.

A few days earlier, I was in Maseru and ran into my host sister at the grocery story.

“Ntate John is there,” she informed me.

There being the village and Ntate John, or just John, is the volunteer I replaced. He lived in the village and taught at the school from 2008 to 2010. He is a legend, in the village and in Peace Corps. Without ever meeting him, I knew what foods his liked and disliked, what he did in his spare time and some interesting situations he found himself in.  

A few months prior, I reached out to him on Facebook, hoping to get some perspective and maybe give him some updates on the village. We shared a few messages and he mentioned that he may be coming to Lesotho during his school break. He gave me a possible time frame. That was it.

And then, one day, he showed up, kind of like I expected him to.

He was in Africa for a school-related trip and decided to visit his former home before returning to the U.S. for the new academic year. He came a few days and was nice enough to offer some advice and share stories. He took me to waterfall near the village that I had no idea existed. He even allowed me to tag along to the mountain top braai at dusk with a few others from the village.

Even a year removed and headed a stable path in America, John’s love for his former village is still very evident. It’s also infectious.

It’s easy for volunteers to fall into negative thinking. Projects are disrupted by unforeseen, very solvable problems or there isn’t enough motivation to get that group going. When we PCVs get together, we share war stories from the village and sometimes we forget about the good stuff, the small things that make each day here worth it. We become more focused on the end date rather than the actual experience.

But seeing it from John’s perspective – two quick years now a memory – I saw my time here as something else – a blessing.

During his visit, I had some of the most amazing nights in Lesotho just being with friends and family and absorbing each beautiful moment. I grew closer to my family and to other villagers. I realized my village had a waterfall and I climbed high into the mountains near my home. I went to bed each night, smiling at the opportunity I’ve been given to be here.

The night before he left, I told John that being around him has been good for me. It’s allowed me to really see the beauty of this village and how amazing life is here.

“Those were the two best years of my life,” he said. “I would hate to know that you didn’t enjoy them the way I did.”

Sometimes we don’t understand how great our life is unless we can step back and see it from someone else’s eyes. John and I are different people and will utilize our time here in different ways, but it is both of our homes and we can love it in similar ways.

I love it here, and maybe I’ve always have. I just needed someone to show me that in a blink of an eye it will be over. It’s better to feel and live that love now than to channel it through memories in 17 months.

Wedding Week

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This morning I walked out of my house to see a group of merry bo-me huddled around two large barrels boiling over a fire. It’s wedding week.

Last October, my brother, younger by fourteen months and one day, married the love of his life. It happened to fall in between my Peace Corps stints and I was able to partake in all the wedding activities. I threw my sister-to-be a garden-themed wedding shower, threw back shots at her bachelorette party, helped her pick a dress for the shower, joined the wedding flower making party, designed the programs, spent the Saturday before assembling the programs and helped decorate the reception area after the rehearsal dinner. I was so happy to be in the mix of it all.

This week, another sibling gets married.

My host sister in Lesotho, Masieng, weds on Saturday. It will be my first wedding in this country.

Masieng, who lives at home with our family because she teaches at a nearby school, traveled to Maseru nearly every weekend. She said she visited her aunt there, but I knew a boy was involved. Then when she asked me if I had a boyfriend, I turned the gun on her. All I got was a giggle.

One Sunday I heard her come home from a weekend in Maseru.

“Kennuoe, do you want to meet my boyfriend?”

“YESSSSSS!!!” I screamed and sprinted out of my house. A very nice young man was sitting in a white pickup and greeted me shyly. He was cute and seemed successful. I immediately approved.

Then one day, watching our nightly soap opera, she announced: “I am engaged.”

Over the next two months wedding preparations began, but different from what I know in America. Each room in the family’s house received fresh coats of paint and the living rooms earned new furniture. My ‘me came home with boxes of spices and drink mixes, including bags of samp (similar to cream corn) and Styrofoam serving dishes for the feast. Two cows and six sheep were named as sacrifices. White flags, announcing the wedding to the village, were raised four weeks prior to the big day. My ‘me brought a small, but sharp, suit for the orphan herd boy who lives with us. And, today, the bo-‘me started preparing the joala, or homemade Basotho beer, for the big day.

It will be a busy week as the family prepares for the wedding of its eldest child. For me, I am a bit sad. Masieng is my best friend in village and her marriage means moving to Maseru. She’ll have to come back for the next school term, but I am going to miss our daily soap opera time and teasing each other. I am going to miss hearing her voice when I return home after a long day. I am going to miss dancing with her to the radio. I am going to miss her constant teasing. I am going to miss her.

But that part comes next week. This week it’s time to celebrate and be happy because someone I love is marry the love of her life.