Random Conversation

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<em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A primer on my host family: In the house or outbuildings live: Martha Simelane (73); her youngest daughter, Zanele, and her youngest son, Samuel (who works in Pretoria and has a girlfriend in KwaMhlanga, so he is not here every night), and Zanele’s daughter Thandeke, who is in Gr 1. Others have stayed here for 1-2 month visits.

<em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Another of Martha’s daughters, Ouma, and her husband Edison, live down the street with 3 of their 4 daughters. Their youngest daughter, Queen, is one of my Gr 10 learners, and she has been staying at Martha’s house most of the time for the past month. She helps with housework, and helps Martha, because Zanele just got a job at Shop-Rite, the grocery store in KwaMhlanga.



I am finishing up a two week holiday between Terms 1 and 2. There are four terms, each averaging 50 school days)with the longest holiday at the end of the school year in December (early summer). I really needed this break. I slept and read (discovered Anthony Trollope novels which I had loaded on my Kindle). The hot, hot summer of Jan and Feb is over; now the nights are cooler and I can get through a school day without becoming exhausted from the heat. Though this region of Mpumalanga (near Pretoria) doesn’t get the extreme heat or humidity found in other parts of the country, it was in the mid 30’s C most days for at least a month. (Upper 90’s and 100’s) The other thing I hated about summer was the bugs. (moths, mosquitoes, and all kinds of insects I’ve never seen before.) Sitting with a blanket around me on this exceptionally cool April night, I find I can’t describe the discomfort of the heat and bugs, now that the worst is over. But I can relate an observation (one I’ve seen shared by other PCV’s on Facebook). I’ve become accustomed to insects floating in my dish water, my tea, etc. I think nothing about just picking them out. My bar of oatmeal soap sits close enough to the light on my table to get bits of insects stuck to it. (even though I try to keep it covered) One night I just said to myself, it’s just a little more grit to clean myself. Serious!! (I know I’ve told some of you that I like to say “Serious!!” the way South Africans say it. Eva, a PCV who teaches English to Gr 9 is determined to teach her learners the grammatically correct “Seriously.” But I think “Serious” is so cute! Besides, my job is to teach the times tables not grammar.)

During Term 1, I didn’t socialize much. First, it was so hot, I couldn’t wait to get in my room, turn on the fan, and lay on my bed and cool off. I had class prep every night, and most of the weekend too. Every afternoon I would stagger into the yard, greet my host family (Martha and her friend, Sophie, are always to be found sitting in the shade of a tree), and then go to my room for the rest of the day. My language skills are slipping terribly...Martha always speaks to me in isiNdebele and I try to recall the vocabulary I learned last July and August. The young woman, another Zanele, who was tutoring me for a few weeks, was sick for a while, and then I got so busy, I let the lessons drop. So, here I am, thinking I might as well be working in the US, for all the cultural interaction I am getting. A little disheartening, but also expected in the Peace Corps. They call it “the hardest job you’ll ever love.” I am glad that I didn’t plan much time away from site this holiday; I could restore my energy and just get back into life in Kameelpoort.

So, I will recount a conversation in Martha’s kitchen which touched on lots of little details you might find interesting. Zanele was at the table putting nail polish on and Martha was folding laundry. (Even though Martha gets around very slowly with her cane, she always has some work set up to do wherever she puts her chair, she’ll be scrubbing clothes, ironing clothes, or folding clothes) I brought some peanut butter bars I’d baked and R200 (about $25) for electricity and water for the month. My monthly stipend from the Peace Corps includes this expense. R500 monthly rent to my host family is <em style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">supposed to be paid by the Mpumalanga Provincial Dept. of Ed. Provinces agree that since Peace Corps provides them with free teachers for 2 years, they pay the rent and provide us with furniture. They are notoriously slow. I guess they get around to it, after a year, so I may get a wardrobe, desk, bed and 2 chairs yet. My host family and school lent me a bed and other items until then.

I also asked my family about having a 3 day visit from this year’s batch of PCV’s in August. When our group, SA26, was in training, my language group of 5 went to visit an SA 24 PCV at his site. (The 26 means we are the 26^th group in SA. At this time, there are two programs running, the even #’s are the education service and the odd #’s are the health service. SA 27 (health) arrived this spring and SA 28 (education) will arrive this July.) So, hard as it is to believe, I will appear to them as a seasoned experienced PCV. Zanele and Martha graciously offered extra chairs and a bed to squeeze into my room when these “newbies” visit. When we visited our host PCV last year, his host family was very hospitable, bringing us a heater because it snowed during our time there!!

That day while walking to the tuck shop (the little store in my village), I met Peter Mahlangu on the street. He was pushing a wheelbarrow of sugar cane, and he broke off a piece and gave it to me. I had to ask Zanele how to eat it. Just chew on the cane and spit out the pulp. Peter is the only teacher in the primary or secondary schools who lives in Kameelpoort. There are 11 teachers at Sele (including me and the principal who teaches 3 classes) and 14 teachers at Ndayi. Some live in KwaMhlanga (30 minutes away) and others live farther away. One teacher lives in Pretoria, but stays with her sister in KwaMhlanga on weekdays. Her sons stay in Pretoria with another aunt or uncle. Another teacher lives in Pretoria but rents a room here in Kameelpoort for weekdays. He has a wife who lives and works in Pretoria. There are kitchen workers, maintenance people (two women), and administration assistants at each school, and all but one of them live in Kameelpoort. I don’t know what kind of pay they get, but I do know that the kitchen worker job is rotated every 6 months among 4 different women. I am sure it’s a bonus for people here to have a job where you don’t have to take transport to KwaMhlanga or Pretoria (over two hours away!!) every day.

Another topic of conversation with my host family is always the water. Do I need to fill my water containers from their storage containers? (large blue jugs which look like they were used to store some chemicals, pesticides, whatever...but by now they should not be contaminated) Water is now off more days than it’s on, and no one can account for it. I don’t ask any more either. Once I was told a big water pipe in Siyabuswa had burst, but all my PCV friends in the area had water at that time, so I don’t believe that. What ever story you hear for why something happens is likely to be the most convenient thing to say at the time....This is my idea for much of what I experience that is SO VERY South Africa. (or as PCV’s say “TIA” for “This is Africa”) One plausible reason is that the village water is shut off because so many people don’t pay their bills. If each household fills their containers when the water comes back on, they don’t run out, but maybe they conserve a little more. I wait until the water comes back to do my laundry so that I don’t have to use up my host family’s stored water for rinsing. But large families still do their laundry when we go over 5 days without water, so they must use less water. I don’t know. Just shake my head...and I know I will not be dealing with this kind of thing all my life. There are two things I consider contributing factors to the way things are here and to how people live with the way things are here. The history of South Africa and the poverty. The oppression of a whole race of people (actually every race of people but the whites) in South Africa in the last century and heavily populated areas of uneducated unemployed people are things I can learn about, and yes, live as the people do here, crowding on to the taxis, standing in lines the length of the store, waiting for the water to come back on. What is unique to South Africa because of its history, and what are the general consequences of poverty in this? ....the water is turned off and no one knows why; it has been this way for years.

And here’s the last thing we talked about. (No, I don’t get into philosophical discussions like the above with my host family...There is one teacher at the school who sometimes asks about things...He listens to world news all the time and is much more informed than I am. I have to buy myself a radio!!) Zanele was asking about a girl who is not going to school any more. I have 27 learners in Gr 10 Maths Lits, 28 learners inGr 11 Maths Lits, 20 learners in Gr 12 Maths Lits and 14 learners in Gr 12 Pure Maths, so pretty much all of Gr 10 - 12 except for the Pure Maths in Gr 10 and 11. So I’m thinking about the start of school in January,when I lost 3 or 4 learners and gained 7 or 8 the first two weeks. I always wondered about Tshepiso who had seemed so bright in Gr 10. I had asked another girl whether Tshepiso was coming back to school. She and her neighbor looked at each other and said they didn’t think so...there was something with the family. I figured there was more that they weren’t telling me. Anyway, Zanele says the word is out that Tshepiso left school because she’s “running with the men.” Who knows, maybe Tshepiso was so quick to answer questions in my classroom because she was convincing herself that she was smart enough already and didn’t need to go to school. I never got to know her; Zanele is scandalized, but I also think it’s a common occurrence. Reminds me of a Gr 11 girl in Algebra II at Quincy who dropped out of school the second semester because she needed to get a job to help her Mom have enough money for the family. But here in the little village of Kameelpoort, everybody knows your business.

So I guess this blog is about Peace Corps living at site, getting to know life in your village. I visited a church in Moloto. Mem Kwakwa, a Sele teacher, lives in Moloto but comes every Sunday morning to teach Sunday School and help with the three hour worship. (There is also prayer meeting one afternoon a week) She organizes transport (two taxi vans) to take people to the Moloto church once a month. So I went along one of the Sundays that I was not teaching my extra sessions for Gr 12. (I will write a blog about the church service later) When I told a man there that I taught at Sele with Mem Kwakwa, he said that was good. Did I live in Pretoria and drive there every day? He couldn’t believe that I was actually living in Kameelpoort as well. I think this facet of Peace Corps service, volunteers living in the same conditions as the people they are serving, is what distinguishes what we accomplish.

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Comments

[Susi Freed]

No Radio
I think you should remain oblivious to what is going on around the world so don't get a radio....Serious! Take these two years off, this week has been kind of a bad one here in the states. Also, I'm going to be putting a package in the mail on Mon. 4/22, hope the mail service there is up and working by now. It's just calendars and such. Loving your blog. Susi