Village Life Highlights

(Top 10 List)

10. Termites falling from the ceiling on to my head all day

9. Fresh, roasted maize

8. Impashi swarming my yard

7. Teaching numbers to kids

6. Trying to find a cell signal

5. Pooping over a hole (no really…it’s quite comfortable)

4. Not understanding about half of the people I encounter every day

3. Learning how to carry things on my head

2. The connection I have with nature.

And the number one best thing about living in the village is……………………………………..

1.Nshima, nshima, nshima…every day.

This is what I do.....

It's hard to believe another month has passed already. As you already know, my AT workshop is coming up in a couple weeks. I'm really excited and have been busy preparing. Just this past week we built a stove, that works with methylated spirits, to demonstrate at the workshop. I learned a lot about AT during the Choma workshop, but I still have a lot to learn about the actual building of things. So I have to admit, I think I was helped more during this experience than I was actually helping. I learned a lot and am pretty proud of what we accomplished. During the workshop I am in charge of the logistics, money, and teaching in the classroom. I'll also be doing a few of the demonstrations. Britain is in charge of a lot of the hands on building aspects. So, I also finished the grant (on-line) version and turned it into Dorothy. The program was actually really hard to work and it took a long time to do the grant, even though I had all of the information from the grant that I already turned in. I e-mailed Dorothy with my problems, so she is aware. Then I wrote letters for the counterparts and made reservations for them as well.   Logistically speaking, I feel pretty prepared so far (I hope!!).

In the village things have been pretty quiet. I have been working with my G.L.O.W. Club. One of our first activities is to do a fund raiser. We are going to make those chitenge floor mats and sell them. Then the girls will have money for notebooks or other things they want for the club. We thought about making fritters, but the profit margin is very small. With this I will also be teaching about budgeting. The club is still new, but the girls are very excited. We have only had a few meetings so far, but its nice to see them coming out of their shells and taking charge of THEIR club. My counterpart and I get along very well and are both committed to this club.

I did two health talks at Chitwe Basic School. One was on malaria. We played a tag game to demonstrate how malaria is spread. It was a hit. The second one was on the importance of hydration. We talked about how water affects the body and we made an ORS. They are about 5K from the RHC. So they can start hydrating right away when they are sick. Especially since a 5k walk is sure to dehydrate them even more. I really like working with this school. The students always ask questions and are very involved. I heard from the teacher that on days that I come the attendance is always the highest of the week. I only did one health talk at Misengo Basic School this month. I showed them how to make chlorine. After this I had a few kids come to my house to try to make it on their own.

I did a cooking demonstration for a few individuals (3) who had access to milk and we able to make cheese. We talked about the nutritional benefits of milk and cheese, a balanced diet, and childhood nutrition.

I am still doing my tutoring sessions at my house. I realized that I am not a very good English teacher, but am a great math teacher. A small child, who comes to my house all the time, has learned how to count and is learning to count by twos now. He is at my house a lot. He would be there 24/7 if I let him. So we have lots of time to practice. And we count literally everything that can be counted. He is also learning his ABCs. He knows up to "I". 

Bottoms Up

The rains have been falling every day for months now. My garden is growing, slowly, and I have been enjoying lots of time to read books. My house leaks, but nowhere important. And I can light a brazier or put on a blanket to keep me warm. I enjoy the rain and the growth. It is almost a different landscape than it was a few months ago. The farmers here burn their fields after every harvest. So instead of seeing black and brown, the singe of grasses that once were. I see vibrant green everywhere. Crops are growing and people are looking forward to their share of crops and money that will come almost all at once. Hunger season will end. Unfortunately, with the great influx of money that comes in there will also be a big influx in drinking. Money management is difficult for the villagers (many have never even been taught). So all the money they make will be blown on alcohol and solar panels and new chitenges. In a few months they will be hungry again.

Alcoholism is common in rural Zambia. Because of this life is more difficult for themselves and their families. Precious money is being wasted away. As well as time and energy. To those of us that don't have a problem or are not in their situations the answer is blatantly simple. Stop drinking. But, like for many people. alcohol is a powerful coping mechanism. It gives people a few hours of freedom from their problems. That is precious to them. That feeling is precious to everyone. When you are looking at your 7 malnourished children, you started having at 15; when you have never been anywhere other than your village; when you drop out of school in the 7th grade because your parents couldn't pay for school fees; when you watched your parents drinking daily your whole life. Would you want to escape? Would you be able to handle your problems head on? Unfortunately, that answer is no for many people. It is a common and sadly socially acceptable activity for many in the village. 

G.L.O.W.

Today (Tuesday) was my first meeting of Misengo Basic School's G.L.O.W. Club. Things went pretty well. Next week's meeting will be better.

The club is supposed to meet every Thursday. I found out about the Tuesday-Thursday switch 2 hours before the meeting was supposed to take place. After finishing my work at the clinic I rushed home and prepared in an hour. Just in time for the rain to start pouring. I showed up wet and disheveled, but excited none-the-less.  

My co-facilitator stayed a few minutes then had to teach another class. I was not expecting not to have a translator. I fumbled through my lesson in broken Bemba then I resorted to singing songs. I think the girls had fun. They were really shy. Even to sing songs. I can't wait until we all feel comfortable and start to have fun. 

It's Munada time again!

On Saturday 25th of January I finally made my first trip to Munada, the traveling market, that makes a monthly visit to my area. Actually, this was my second time to Munada, the first being in my friend's village. I was armed with 200 condoms to be passed out. They were gone in a matter of minutes. Next month I'll be better prepared. I'm thinking about a mandatory condom demo they have to watch before receiving condoms.

It was fun looking at all the wares for sale. Most "booths" sold almost the same things. This is common in Zambia. I sense that product diversity had never been a strong point of this country. Never-the-less they had different things than I could find in my village, and that was exciting for me. I bought some pens and pencils for my kids to use at school and a new chitenge for me. A successful venture I'd say. 

I even ran into a few people that I knew there. I saw a few of my neighbors shopping together and spent most of my time with them. There was just one big downside to my day...

The words muzungu! Muzungu! Marry me! Are still ringing in my ears. I was everybody's favorite attraction at the traveling market. In America we consider it wrong to point out someone by the color of their skin. But, here in Zambia, they think it's just ok. Being a white woman I get a lot of harassment outside of my village. Being an American it's easy to take offense to all of this unwanted attention.

Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas everyone! This year I biked to some waterfalls by my site and spent the day with a few friends. It was beautiful there and really nice being around all that nature. It wasn't Christmas like we have in the states, but definitely a great way to spend the holiday. Then it was back to the village until the beginning of January when I started my vacation. We were going to Livingstone, on the other end of the country. The first day I traveled to Mpika (took about 6 hours). Then the next day we traveled from Mpika to Lusaka (about 8 hours) and stayed the night. The 3rd day we finally reached Livingstone! After another short 8 hour drive.

We were there for about a week and had a blast! We went on safari and saw all kinds of animals. We saw hippos, lions, red lechwe, dung beetles, the fish eagle, lions, elephants, giraffes, and much much more. One of the most exciting things that I saw was an elephant chase after some lion cubs.

We spent a day at Victoria Falls, went to the market a few times, and went to High Tea at the Royal Livingstone. High tea is a really fancy hotel and at high tea they serve all kinds of fancy pastries, cakes, tea sandwiches, quiches, and puddings. I couldn't get enough good food!

The week was over way too fast and then we began the long trip back up north. On the way back we spent a few days in Lusaka (the capital) and I finally got new glasses and my work permit.

G.L.O.W. Girls

A couple weeks ago I attended my first G.L.O.W. Camp. Its an event that's put on by Peace Corps every years for girls 13 to 18 to teach them women's empowerment. Each volunteer brings two girls and a teacher from their respective villages. Then everyone spends one week at the camp while the volunteers talk about HIV awareness, family planning, sugar daddies, boyfriends, and planning for the future. Its only a start to what these girls need to learn, but in just one week you could see these things making a difference in the girl's lives and attitudes at camp. It wasn't all just sitting there learning. We also played sports and games, did arts and crafts, and danced. I helped another volunteer do her health talks. We made a great team I would say. Since we are both health volunteers we did health talks on: puberty, the male and female anatomy, family planning, and quickly discussed pregnancy. This next term we are supposed to go back and create a G.L.O.W. Club in our schools. A lot of these tend to fail, but I have high hopes for my school. The teacher I brought was the most active in the sessions and I could tell that these topics were also very important to her. The girl I brought, Matilda, doesn't speak much English and I think that was part of the reason why she was so shy in the beginning. But it was great to see her come out of her shell and start interacting with the other girls. She came alive when it was time to play sports. It was really a fantastic thing to watch.

The Whole Glow Camp!

Megan and I doing our health talk.

The girls playing sports. Matilda is the girl in the skirt running (front right)