Just Another Hump Day

My mother has been asking me what a typical day is like for me in the village. I do not really feel like I have typical days, as each one seems to be different from those that came before. So, to appease her, I decided to share a specific day. This past Wednesday seemed perfect as it was internally dramatic and had moments of great frustration, entertainment, and gratefulness.

I first woke around 3:30am, which is pretty unusual for me. My entire side was covered in new bug bites—I am not sure what bugs are biting me, but it is a new problem. Since my house is anything but airtight, they could be mosquitos flying in through the gaps in the windows and doors or it could be something more nefarious like bed bugs. I am praying fervently it is mosquitoes. I am hot, itchy, and uncomfortable. I am reminded of my nights sailing on Harvey Gamage in the Caribbean when I would have to go on deck to cool off before falling back asleep. I sit up and open the window near my bed and grab my Kindle for an hour or so. Finally I fall back asleep as the sun and my host family rise.

With flies buzzing my face, I reawaken close to seven, the latest I have ever slept in my hut. It is not hot, but the humidity is oppressive. I'm grateful I managed to fall back asleep, but feel overwhelmed by grumpiness. As a morning person and optimist, this is an unusual sensation for me. Grumbling to myself, I slather my large bug bites in hydrocortisone cream and make my bed. I grab the bucket that holds late night bladder breaks and head out to my latrine. Despite my attempts to decrease the fly population there, I have to grab my latrine broom and chase them out before using the latrine or dumping my bucket.

When I return to my hut, I start reheating my bread and boiling water. I usually have instant coffee on weekdays, saving the real stuff for the weekends when I can savor it. Because I'm grumpy and need the pick-me-up, I decide to splurge on the real stuff. I grab my iPod and speaker and start my favorite mellow playlist. Still feeling really unsettled, I pull out my journal and start grumbling while eating my bread and peanut butter breakfast.

After breakfast, I tidy up the kitchen, sweep my hut, and pack my backpack for the day. Soon it is time to head to my organization's community hall. As I walk, I mentally curse the humidity while smiling and greeting everyone I see. Greetings are a critical part of Basotho culture and it is very important to do them, regardless of grumpiness.

When I get to the hall twenty minutes later, I am unsurprised to see I am the only one there. I am about five minutes late, which is still considered early. I pull out my solar charger and set it in the sun. Then, I grab my phone and start sending emails and messages to a number of people back home. I feel my mood starting to lift. After about thirty minutes, my supervisor and another woman from my organization arrive. I greet them and learn that the other woman is headed to the fields for the day. She and my supervisor talk for a while and then she leaves.

My supervisor and I chat about work for a while and she asks if I still have reports to write for Peace Corps. Since I do, she suggests I head home and work there for the day. She is headed out to visit some sick people in the village. I agree and we walk together to a nearby shop before splitting up. I walk in and chat with the shopkeeper. It is my first conversation in English for the day. She is Indian and I apologize profusely for not stopping by last Thursday during their holiday. I meant to, but it was a long day and I did not remember until after I was back at home and making dinner.

Soon I am on my way again, this time walking to another shop on the other side of the village. This shop has the mail from the post office box for the village. I have been waiting almost two months for a letter I know my sister sent on August 30^th. I have not gotten very far before a man driving a government truck pulls up and offers me a lift. I hop in and we chat in a mixture of English and Sesotho. He asks about my work, life in Lesotho, and the usual things Basotho ask me when we first meet. I too ask about his work and the ministry he works for. He is involved in helping villagers plant trees to decrease soil erosion. We approach the other end of the village and I point out where I will hop out. As the truck stops, he looks at me and asks if I am a Me (Mrs.) or an Ausi (Miss). I smile and confess to being an Ausi. He then beams back at me and replies, “And me, I am an Abuti!!” After a few months here, I know that he is hoping we will be more than simply acquaintances or friends. I laugh and let him know that I have worked very hard to stay an ausi. His face falls as I hop out and thank him for the ride.

I turn towards the shop, and my face falls, as it is closed. I turn around and walk the ten minutes back to the house. I start planning out which Peace Corps homework assignments I will work on first. I get home and dig into my backpack to pull out my solar charger.

“Oh crap!” I realize that for the first time, I have abandoned it at the hall, in plain site of the main road where dozens of people pass in an hour. I grab my keys and sunglasses again and hightail it out of the house. I speekwalk, ignoring my sweat and praying materialistic prayers the entire walk, which takes only 2/3 of the time it had taken earlier. Thankfully, I only pass my host brother, so I do not have to stop and talk to people as I plow on. As I approach the hall, I see it still sitting where I left it. My pace slows and I am filled with an immense relief and gratefulness that my community left it sitting there. Before I duck into the fence, I greet my counterpart's mother, who is headed to the fields. She tells me my counterpart (and closest friend) is returning from South Africa this week.

I return home, set out the solar charger, start hot water for a second cup of real coffee and sit down to write assignments in Sesotho. This continues for four hours, with a brief break for lunch. I finish for the day and throw on some workout clothes. I am on day 27 of the 30-day HipHop Abs program. An hour later, I am covered in more sweat than during my race to recover my solar charger. I bath with a basin and about two cups of water. I then undo the goodness of my workout by eating the last four no-bake cookies I had made the other day.

Like everyday, I do my dishes and start thinking about dinner. My brother swings through to fetch water for me. I think again about how grateful I am for such an amazing host family. I hear thunder and the wind picking up. I cross my fingers for some rain to relieve the humidity as I lay on my bed to read for a bit. For dinner I make a lentil dish with papa. The day before, I rediscovered the incredible LED Luci light a friend gave me before I moved here. For some reason it was unwilling to charge when I tried it during training so I had put it away. Tuesday I had set it out in the sun for a while and was delighted to find it once again worked, so my cooking and eating is accompanied by LED light instead of my usual paraffin lamp. Given the heat that the lamp puts out, using the LUCI is a nice change.

By 7:30, I am back in bed, my light out. I play on my phone again-reading messages from friends, losing at chess to another PCV, and catching up with news on Twitter and Facebook. I eventually turn off the phone for the night and pull out the Kindle, once again appreciating self-lit electronics. I read for a short time before going to sleep by nine. As I fall asleep, I pray that I will wake up in a better mood and that I won't get bitten tonight.

And I do wake up happy!

          And I do not have new bug bites!

My first conversation of the morning is with my brother, who tells me I have a letter waiting at the shop, but when I go to get it Thursday afternoon, the shop is closed because the shopkeeper went to town. I hope he is getting more letters for me!

Rediscovery of Me

One of the things I have struggled with since we returned (now over a month ago!) from our consolidation in South Africa has been patience. This has been an exclusively internal struggle as outwardly I have expressed only a happy zen-like persona, mostly because I know the struggle is exclusively my own. It also, apparently, is a completely normal aspect of the integration phase of being a PCV.

Right now, I have a number of “homework” assignments from the Peace Corps office to help me get to know my community better. Two weeks ago, I found myself expressing frustration in my journal. I did not understand how I knew so few people in my village, why I was having so much trouble finding the answers to my questions about different aspects of village life, and how I was going to “work” everyday but doing almost nothing while there. It literally felt like nothing had happened since I visited South Africa, like I was less a part of the community than I had been before I left.

Over the past two weeks, I have forced myself to become more outgoing, to speak more often and to more people. My friends and family back home will laugh at the idea of me having to force myself to speak more often, as I have always been known as a chatty one, however, here I have found myself more reticent. Living in a new culture with a new language is hard.

I regularly speak English with only three people in my entire village: the chief, the oldest of my brothers living at home, and my counterpart. While I love learning and being able to speak Sesotho, it is exhausting to think so hard to communicate effectively. As a result, I find myself doing a huge amount of something I have always struggled with in the English speaking world: listening.

In English, I have the ability to multitask, being aware of multiple conversations occurring around me at the same time, while also participating like an intelligent person in at least one of those conversations. In Sesotho, I cannot listen and think at the same time. In order to speak in a way people understand, I have to think. Therefore, I mostly listen. And, generally, I mostly understand albeit not completely.

Lately, however, I have forced myself to ask more questions and to engage with more people. I have carried on conversations with people while walking to and from work at both the community building and other villages. I have been more aggressive about asking people to help me spell their names and taking notes during conversations, simply explaining that I have to write things down to remember them because Sesotho is new to me. I have learned more names in the last two weeks than the previous two months! If you think remembering names is hard in your native tongue, imagine learning names when they sound like nothing you have ever heard before!

Last Friday was the mother and child outreach clinic in a neighboring village. Although I have stopped by clinic days the last two months, this time, I arrived and immediately told one of the women I wanted to help. As a result, I spent the entire morning weighing children and making notes in the medical books. When intakes were done, I was left with nothing to do. Uncertain and Quiet Beth reappeared briefly as I stood idly in the shade wondering how else I could help but not seeing any of the leadership I knew. She did not stay long, however, and I was soon chatting away with one of the immunization nurses, learning more about medical services throughout Butha Buthe, and promising to help again next month.

I have been going to the local church here for over a month now. I work to learn the songs and try to understand bits of the messages, but a huge part of my attendance is an attempt to be part of the community here. Most weeks, I have walked home with either my counterpart or alone. This Sunday, however, my counterpart was out of town. As I prepared to walk home alone, some of the teenage girls came over and asked me to walk with them. Despite it being out of my way, I agreed and had a lovely time chatting with them in a mix of English and Sesotho as we strolled.

At work, I have been speaking up more often. I have asked for specific information and the opportunity to meet with specific members of the community. And the response has been tremendously positive. I was really concerned about how the days would go for most of last week and this week because my counterpart has been out of town. I was worried that even less would get done and that I would be biting my nails from boredom at work. Instead, I have successfully led a meeting with some of the members of my organization and gotten to know people much more than I had over the previous two months.

Perhaps, having to go it alone for ten days, with my greatest support out of town, has been the catalyst I needed to take these steps on my own. My counterpart is a wonderful young woman and incredibly helpful in every way. I was dreading impending loneliness with her heading out of town. Instead, having her gone has forced me to find connection with other people and in other places. I have had to test my language skills and find ways to explain myself when people do not understand.

I feel like I have rediscovered the open and friendly Beth that so many people in America know, but this time in a new country and a new language.