Chic Afrique

It’s been far too long since I last posted. I am sorry. I’ve been far busier in the past few months than I have in the rest of my time here. It’s not an excuse for my lack of updates, but it has been a change and while very welcome, has of course also taken some adjusting. So what the heck have I been doing that’s been keeping me so busy?? I’m glad you asked :)

1. I have switched organizations! Just before leaving on a two-week break at the end of March to go camping, run the Longtom half-marathon and go to my Mid-Service Training (MST) for Peace Corps, I had a meeting with my Peace Corps supervisor and my supervisor at my (now old) organization. Without getting into too much detail here, things had been difficult at my organization for a long time, and the organization was and is facing a number of challenges and had never really had the understanding or the resources to support a Volunteer, nor do I have the skills or power to give them what they need. This was all confirmed during the meeting, and it was decided that it was best to have me officially transferred to an organization in my shopping town, Mtubatuba. I had reached out the org in the past and had started to do more work for them recently. The transfer and my departure from my old org was difficult for a number of reasons, and while there had been some initial hope that I could still be involved with them and available as a resource, it seems as though the best thing for me has been to make more of a clean break. So, I am now officially placed at Mpilonhle (“A Good Life”), a higher-functioning org based in Mtubatuba and operating at high schools and communities around the whole district of Umkhanyakude. I believe I mentioned them in an earlier post as it is also the org where Jess and Tim (and newer editions Lorrie and Jason) also work. If you have some time, take a look at the website (website?!) at http://www.mpilonhle.org/ to learn more about what we do (check out the blog page, too, for a recent article by me on the training we held a few weeks ago). My work mainly involves helping to run a program establishing food gardens in the 12 high schools we work with; providing education on permaculture and organic gardening techniques for sustainability and water conservation, and providing nutritional support to vulnerable learners. So far things are going really well- I enjoy working with the staff their and at the schools, and after organizing a training for school employees on permaculture and organic gardening techniques a few weeks ago, we helped start (or rather build up) a garden at one of the schools this past week. We had a lot of fun, took some amazing pictures, and I think managed to pass on some knowledge, too :) So it’s clearly been a big change and admittedly not the kind of organization or work I thought I would be involved with when I came, but it’s a great opportunity to get a different kind of experience and as with everything else I do here, I am learning a lot!

2. I have started a girls and boys club at one of the local high schools! I am working together with Mark, the other PCV in my village to run a club for about 40 learners from the high school where Mark is also teaching. Mark and I wrote a VAST grant to get some money through Peace Corps to pay for supplies and snacks for the weekly meetings, which are held for an hour and a half during sports time. We use this time to talk with the learners about a number of different health and life skills topics. This past week we had our seventh meeting, where we discussed the biology and ways of transmitting HIV. Some of the other topics we have covered include gender, self-esteem, love and healthy relationships and rape and abuse. Because Mark and I are both there to facilitate, we have the opportunity to sometimes work with the girls and boys on their own and sometimes to bring them together for the different sessions. Having a girls club was something I had been interested in even before I got to South Africa, and it’s so far been a fantastic experience and one of the main highlights of my time here. It’s amazing to work with these young people and provide them with the opportunity to express themselves and provide information and support on a number of issues that they deal with as youth, especially in South Africa. Pictures and more updates to come as the club continues. We have 13 more lessons before the end of the year, and will hopefully also be running a camp for them and the other learners at the end of the year.

3. I went to Swaziland! Always anxious to cross borders and experience a new country, I had an all-too-easy excuse to head to this tiny kingdom embedded in the northeast corner of South Africa: the 5th annual Bush Fire Festival, featuring music, art and crafts (including a fair trade market!) from South Africa and Swaziland and several other countries. I headed up with Jess, my partner in crime and Southern African travel and met some of my other favorite Volunteer friends there. I had an incredible time in the general festival atmosphere, which of course included listening to some amazing music and dancing for hours on end. Friday night was by far the best, with two groups from S to the A absolutely tearing up the stage. Goldfish is an awesome dance/electronica group that I think is pretty well-known internationally, and Gazelle is a much more local, but absolutely crazy and funky group that became an instant favorite in my book. Check out a video for Goldfish here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-tNUur2YoU and one for Gazelle here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DnZ36BxDeM. If either of these groups is ever in the States, GO. And after March 2012, I’ll come right along with you :) I was also happy to support the festival as all of the proceeds go to an NGO is Swaziland, Young Heroes, which was started by a Peace Corps Volunteer and helps provide support to children who have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS by allowing people to sponsor their education and other expenses. Swaziland has the highest rate of HIV infection in the world. They are also a very poor nation that is struggling for greater social, political and economic freedom than they have under their current leadership. It is also, much like South Africa, a beautiful country, and I am lucky to have gotten even a short experience with it in my time here.

So, there’s been a lot going on! I also continue to help sort and distribute books to the schools thanks to the amazing work of Mrs. Santos, my wonderful parents, and the St. Joseph High School community. In the rest of my time, I continue to do a lot of reading; have taken a couple of trips to St. Lucia and one to Pretoria for a Peace Corps committee meeting; spend time with my host family- playing cards with one host nephew and hoisting, twirling and trying to decipher the babble of the massive 2 year-old that is my other nephew, and enjoying daily chats with my feisty host mom; run and do yoga when I can and have numerous dance parties in my rondo, often solo but some time with the host nephews, too :) As always, I love hearing from friends and family at home and around the world, and have had some great emails and conversations lately. Keep them coming!

Before I go, some numbers: a mere 25 days until I meet up with the beloved parental units in the land of cheese and wine, aka France! It may seem like just yesterday that they were here, but it will have been 6 months since their time here in SA. Which means, also, that I now have just over 9 months left of my time here in Mzansi, which is absolutely unreal. One can’t help but marvel at the passage of time, and while I do and will look forward to the end of my service and movement on to the next adventure, at present, I am here and more involved and happy than I have ever been and am living, learning, growing and flowing in a way that I am in no way ready to let go of yet. Who knows what will come up in the rest of my time here, but I’m definitely not going to worry about it now. Instead, I’m going to have a one-woman dance party in my rondo.