April 19, 2006

    Hi everybody! I have been at site for 2 weeks now and what an experience it's been! I live in a small mud hut with a grass-thatched roof... I thought the PC plan was for me to live alone, but instead I am accompanied by termites, roaches, daddy long leg spiders (tons of them!), ticks (I've found 2 on my arm & 1 on my ankle so far), and lizards. So you're probably thinking, "poor girl! Well at least she doesn't have a bat this time." I am not so lucky... Last night I caught a bat flying around my rafters! Sometimes I feel like I live in a Zambian version of Noah's Arc.
    The good news is that I've been pretty successful at keeping all of the creepy crawlies out of my food and clothes. However, I did get up a few mornings ago to find a roach sitting in the bristles of my toothbrush (which was in its case, inside a ziplock bag!) Yuck. At least I noticed it before I shoved him in my mouth.
    Okay, this entry is going to be long, so here comes the category system. Read whatever interests you and enjoy!

My 1st Few Days

    An exerpt from my journal on April 6:

    "... I've experienced an array of emotions today: fear, anxiety, excitement, anticipation, worry, doubt, happiness, etc. At one point in the day, I told another Peace Corps Volunteer "Oh my God, I'm getting posted today - I can't wait!!! I hope I'm not miserable..." I didn't realize how ridiculous that sounded until I said it out loud to her and we had a good laugh...
    ... So getting dropped off at site wasn't the most terrifying experience of my life - nor was it some great epiphany like "this is it! Everything I've been dreaming about and preparing for is coming together today!" It just was what it was. Upon arrival we found that the roof of my insaka has collapsed and I still don't have a dishrack built yet. Also, there are trails of termite mud snaking their way up the walls of my hut. Oh, my front door didn't have a lock on it, even though we dropped one off over 2 weeks ago to be installed... Wow, I am sounding super-negative right now, which is ironic because this really wasn't a negative experience at all.
    Just after we arrived, while my stuff was being unloaded, I walked over to the Basic School and met the headmaster, Ba Musonda. He then walked back to my house with me and helped install a lock on my door (upside-down, very Zambian of him)... Ba Musonda also introduced me to a guy named Shadrack, who volunteered to deliver a bag of charcoal to my house for me. A few hours later, when he arrived at my house with the charcoal, the back tire of his bike was completely flat - In fact, the tube had ripped totally in 1/2 and he apparently biked the majority of the way with only 1 good tire. I felt a little guilty because the family he got the charcoal from was about 1 or 2K away and this guy was helping me out just to be nice.
    My 1st task (after getting charcoal) was putting up my mosquito net. Next, I tried to arrange my groceries and such so they won't get devoured by bugs tonight. Then I started a fire in my brazier and made my 1st meal (if you can really call it that) - coffee and toast."

    On April 7 I wrote:

    "It is just 10:00 and I feel like I have already been awake for days. I got up around 5:30 and started a fire. I made coffee, 2 eggs, & a piece of toast. Dealing with the brazier every day is going to get really old really fast, I know it! After that, I washed dishes, hand-dried them, and let them sit in a basin in the sun due to the lack of a dishrack... I reorganized my groceries/supplies again. It's difficult to keep track of things when everything is in Shoprite bags on the floor and there are no tables or shelves.
    Then, for my 1st major project of the day, I decided to start small & construct a toilet paper holder for my icumbusu (... I jammed a stick into a hole in the wall & stuck the roll of toilet paper on it. I'm considering applying for a patent, it was a stroke of genius.)
    Next, I put up my clothes line. I had a really difficult time deciding where to hang it because my mango/banana trees provide too much shade and there's a lack of trees where there's plenty of space and sunshine. So, I strung the wire from my icumbusu to my house. I think it works really well. Then I put up the "undergarment clothes line" inside my ulusasa.
    When I went back inside the hut I found several roaches crawling around on my mattress... Yuck. The mattress is on the floor and I have my mosquit net tucked in around the bottom, but they're still getting in....
    ... My dishrack was built today and I took some of the leftover branches and put them in my ulusasa so that I can stand on them while I bathe - sort of like a drainage system that keeps my feet from getting muddy (I like to imagine that my feet are clean for at least a few moments each day)...
    ... I got my 1st laceration today. I was trying to shape my toilet paper holder (a.k.a "stick") with my pocket knife so that the roll wouldn't slip off, and I got careless and made a nice slice across the palm of my hand. I'm just glad I didn't chop off a finger or something - Then I'd have to explain for the rest of my life that I "lost my finger in the Peace Corps when I was working on my toilet paper holder..."

    On April 8 I wrote:

    "... I was invited to my neighbor's house (her name is Chibamba) today and now I know the proper way to crack open imbalala (groundnuts - a.k.a. "peanuts"). I was made fun of for wearing trousers instead of a skirt or chitenge. She made some type of joke about how in America the only way you can tell the women apart from the men is because the men grow beards...
    She also got a good laugh from the "toilet paper dispenser" cut on my palm - which I told her was from cutting vegetables. Speaking of cuts, I was making a candlestick holder out of a small piece of wood today when I damn near jabbed my pocket knife straight through my hand! I only have a small knick on my knuckle to show for it, but I will consider my 2 years in Zambia a success if I return to the States with 10 fingers intact.
    I also made a dish towel holder that I am quite proud of. It is suspended from my ceiling with rope... I did my first real load of laundry today. My standards of cleanliness have been drastically reduced - I can't wait to see how filthy I am at the end of this whole thing!
    ... Finally, the village drunk stopped by for a "heart-to-heart" conversation this afternoon. He is an old, frail man and I've been told that he is not dangerous - just a drunk. He talked and talked about only God-knows-what for probably 10 minutes before I realized that he was speaking 1/2 English! Even though he was alternating between the 2 languages, he still made about as much sense as the next drunk..."

Palm Sunday Church Service

    I attended mass at the Catholic church nearby my house on Palm Sunday, and what a wonderful experience it was! The service lasted about 3 hours and began outdoors under 3 large trees, which everyone gathered under for shade. The men (wearing their Sunday best - I was amazed by the number of suits) clumped together, while the women and children filled up the rest of the space. There were 2 choirs - the 1st consisted of about a dozen girls between probably 10-15 years old. They all wore chitenge skirts & baby blue veils on their heads. The stood in 3 rows & when they began beating the drums, these girls could harmonize! They swayed, clapped, swung their hips - and there was no shame in really putting your head into it! It was awesome... I couldn't understand much of what they were singing, but I know God was receiving a good praising!
    The 2nd choir was a similar sized group of bamaayos (women), each wearing an icitambala (head scarf). They were beautiful and their singing was beautiful as well. At several points during the service they would walk outside and then dance and sing their way up the center aisle until they got to the alter, then they would turn around and lead the congregation... Both choirs were accompanied by 3 drummers - They wore cloth straps around their necks to support the drums while they played (similar to guitar straps). It was all amazing.
    So the service began outside - there was some singing and prayers, then they distributed palms and we went inside. The women and children filled the right side of the church and the men filled the left - no exceptions. (Okay, except fo the choirs, who took up the 1st few rows on both sides)... There were approximately 100-150 people there, and I must have shaken hands with at least 1/2 of them either before, during, or after the service.
    What stood out the most to me (even more than the music) was the simplicity of everything. The alter boys, the priest, and the 3 nuns that I saw all wore tattered, faded garments - no fancy stoles, no pressed shirts or dress shoes, and plastic rosaries around their necks. There were no pews in the building, just rows made out of mud brucks and smeared with the lyme from the walls. The tin roof was actually quite nice (by village standards), yet there were enough holes that I think you'd need to use your umbrella even indoors if it were raining. At the end of mass, a man approaced the podium in front and gave the announcements. I think I heard him say something about the church offering being 3,000 kwacha. I don't know if that was for the previous week or the previous month, but I am hoping it was for the previous week - just 3,000 kwacha! A coke costs that much in town!

Me, I Am FAT!

    The following quotes are real - they have not been altered in any way, and yes, they were said to my face and not jokingly:

    "You - you are fat. That is why you can wear trousers. They will stay on your hips. We can't wear trousers because we are thin and they'd fall off. We are not fat like you."

    "You don't eat nshima?! But you are so fat! It must be that you eat so much rice, bread, and potatoes! If you ate nshima you would not be so fat."

    "You are so fat, but I am thin. Do you know that you are this fat?" (arms making a bear hug & cheeks puffed full of air)... This one, believe it or not was a conversation starter after a new guest arrived and we had a few moments of silence... I couldn't help it, but my eyes watered and my throat clenched. It took everything I had not to burst into tears right then and there.

    These are a few examples of the "fat" comments I've been getting from my neighbor, Chibamba... I had heard stories from so many difference people about how Zambians will call you fat here, so I thought I was prepared for it - but Chibamba is so loud and outspoken, she practically makes a theatrical production each time she announces how fat I am. And there is this sincerity in her voice, like she just can't believe that she is actually looking at someone as grotesquely obese as myself!
    So, after choking back tears and trying to remember what a great time I had at church so I wouldn't focus on feeling like Gilbert Grape's mother who barely fits in her hut, I went for a nice, long bike ride... I considered exercising each time someone calls me fat, but if that's the case, then I may not get much Peace Corps work done (and I don't think my bike is up for the challenge!)
    *Cultural Note: I've come to the understanding (after consulting multiple Zambians & Peace Corps volunteers) that acknowledging that someone is fat is about equivalent to how Americans might acknowledge a red-head... There's not a lot of judgement behind it - it simply is what it is - but overweight (or even just average/not skinny) is a novelty here, so it oftentimes comes up in conversation... (Yay!)

Rhodah

    Like an answer to prayer, I have met a woman in my village whom I have already become close friends with. Her name is Rhodah. She is 25 and single and speaks fluent English and Bemba. She is a teacher at Mwelwa Basic School and lives close by. She is very excited about helping me learn the local language. She has a 1-month old baby boy named Mapalo (which is Bemba for "blessing"), and one day she opened up to me about how she came to be a single mother...
    She explained to me how she was deeply in love and even engaged to be married - "But my man, he disappointed me..." He had been pressuring her to have sex for some time and although she was insistent about waiting until they were married, it finally happened one night - and that's when she became pregnant. "We only had sex the one time and it gave me this baby. I didn't even enjoy it. Don't ask me what sex is because I couldn't tell you... It happened so fast and I was very confused and new to everything. It was very frustrating that I became pregnant."
    When she told her boyfriend about the pregnancy, he left her. He didn't communicate with her thoughout the entire pregnancy. "He disappointed me" she kept saying. However, now that the baby is born he wants back in her life and has asked her to marry him again. She has refused! "A good man does not do what he did. He disappointed me." It sounded to me like she actually still loves him and wants to eventually marry him, but she wants to teach him a lesson first - the "nobody does me wrong and gets me back that easy" lesson. (Okay, so I made that lesson up, but it gets the point across, right?)
    We then discussed our HIV status, which was a 1st for me. She was tested a few months ago (she's negative), and she said that if she ever does take her baby's father back, that they would have to go get tested together... Rhodah has such an independent, strong spirit about her - I really admire it.

From Statistics To... Well, Just Sticks

    Exerpt from my journal on April 12:

    "Today I thought back to what I was doing a year ago at this time - I was turning in the final draft of my Master's thesis... Today I made a broom out of sticks in my yard, swept around my house, and called it a victory."
    (Note: My broom fell apart by the time I was through and Chibamba brought me a broom that she made for me the following day. I must have looked quite pitiful!)

An Emotional Roller Coaster

    I can see already that the Peace Corps is going to be an extremely emotional time for me. I've been told that I will experience my highest highs and my lowest lows during the course of my service, and I am beginning to believe that. For example, on April 9 I wrote:

    "Just today I fluctuated between "I love Zambia!" and "Oh God, get me out of here!"... Several times I was on the verge of tears - from awe/amazement, from bruised ego, from "is this the right decision for me?", etc. I try to keep in mind that this is all part of the process of becoming integrated, but it's still tough. The Peace Corps is not the place for the emotionally unstable or the manic-depressed because it's a struggle to keep this all in perspective at times."

    April 16:
    "Today is Easter Sunday... This is my 1st real holiday in Africa, away from my family. It was sad, I was sad... So far this is my worst day in Zambia... I've never felt as lonely and homesick as I do today."

    April 18: In a letter to a friend I wrote the following:
    "I have been in my village for almost 2 weeks now. What a soul-searching 2 weeks it's been - I have never felt more alone, isolated, confused, stupid, abandoned, homesick, dirty, unwanted, uncomfortable, unappreciated, embarrassed, fat, lost, depressed, or frightened as I have since arriving at my site."
  
     I'll admit, these 1st 2 weeks have been challenging, but they've also been extremely rewarding. No one could have totally prepared me for life in the village, and I know that each struggle or mishap or roach on my toothbrush is at least helping me build character (& giving me plenty of stories to write home about!)
    Thanks for your continuous support! Until next time...

    Shalenipo,
             Erin

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