Community Integration

Tuesday will be two months here at site, which is the same amount of time that I spent in training in Mpumalanga. Looking back, the time definitely seems to have gone by faster here. I heard someone describe Peace Corps as “long days, short weeks”, and I am not sure if that is true of Peace Corps everywhere, but is absolutely true here in SA.

How have I spent this time, you may ask? Well, for these first three months at site, all of us new Volunteers have an assigned role/project from Peace Corps, which is to concentrate on community integration and getting to know the people and systems of our communities and organizations, so that we can build trust and be comfortable enough to live and work successfully here for the coming months. We have to compile a formal “Community Needs Assessment” report of these efforts, and present the strengths and weaknesses of our communities, and possible projects for us to work on. So, with the help of some of my coworkers (and a LOT of patience and persistence/gentle prodding), I have been trying to and sometimes succeeding in meeting with various community members and institutions, including schools, clinics, other NGOs, and the local government. Rarely in these meetings do I get the exact information I am looking for, but they are always very instructive and do provide valuable insights into the people and workings of my community. I have also been trying to seize any opportunity presented to me to interact with community members on a more informal level. This can sometimes be a little difficult for various reasons, including the fact that my host family is very protective and watches me somewhat hawk-like (they mean very well of course!), but I try and partner myself with people and lately have begun to make small ventures on my own. Yesterday I walked several hundred yards to a small store at a neighbor’s house to buy airtime- by myself! It was a huge victory, and I even had a nice conversation in Zulu with some neighboring women who were curious about my ability and preferences in cooking, and who may have (this is where my Zulu breaks down) invited themselves over to eat with me… Today I am going with a co-worker and friend to speak to an umkhulu (grandfather), who is one of the oldest community members and knows a lot about the history of the community.

These efforts at community integration have also included my daily runs (now with some older kids/teens), traditional Zulu dance lessons with a young girl that lives down the road and her family, and on one occasion, going with a coworker on Freedom Day to a huge community celebration at a neighboring induna’s house (induna being like the mini-chief for the area), where I found myself on a stage addressing about, oh, 500 people with a little impromptu speech in Zulu about what I am doing here and how much I love the beautiful people and the food of South Africa (the second one definitely being a bit more of a stretch. Keep in mind, also, that my Zulu-speaking skills are still about those of a 4-year-old). Situations like these are the ones in which my growing ability to not take myself too seriously has saved me from an almost certain death-by-embarrassment. Again, though, while these interpersonal/cross-cultural experiences are often a source of a certain degree of embarrassment or stress, they are often the most fulfilling and happy ones that I have here. As an avid student of people and society, these events and the many smaller moments of culture interaction and confusion provide a lot of food for thought, and opportunity to explore myself and my own culture in a way that I never have and indeed never could have before. Extremely helpful in helping me process and navigate these interactions has been a book by a former Peace Corps Volunteer, Craig Sorti, called The Art of Crossing Cultures. I recommend it highly.

Through all of these experiences, I am happy to report (and am most likely able to do so because of my current relatively good mood) that, ever so slowly, little pieces of understanding and comfort with regard to my community and role here are becoming more known to me. I still feel completely overwhelmed and lost about 90-something percent of the time, but even that is an improvement from the 100% that I started with. Baby steps, baby steps :). In my next post I will try and talk more about my work specifically with my organization, and some of the challenges there. Until then, I am going to try and not sweat to death in the heat of this coastal KZN “fall”, hang in there in this last month of lock-down, I mean, uhh, “Community Integration Period”, and watch and listen as the World Cup fever escalates in these next two weeks before the opening ceremonies. I will not be attending a game, for lack of funds and other reasons which I am happy to discuss with anyone interested, but I will be heading to Durban around the 4th of July for a weekend so will probably get a taste of some of the craziness.

I hope you all are well and in good health! I am still missing you all very much, and look forward to talking with you soon. Uthando olukhulu, nisale kahle (Lots of love, stay well)!

Claire