Blogs from Swaziland, Africa - page 7

So I am coming off my best weekend in Swaziland yet. It started with an important Friday at the old Family Life Association of Swaziland in Manzini. We were anxiously awaiting a visit from someone from PEPFAR/USAID to visit our clinic. Low and behold the American Ambassador rocks up, as does the Minister of Health, along with some extra important people from additional NGOs. I was the official photographer for the event, roaming around like an annoying person snapping photos left right and centre. Highlight was a tour through the new Male Circumcision Theatre (operating room for us Canadians) and we got to wear booties and put sexy wraps on our heads. Everyone looked ridiculous; I loved it. Funny moment when I was gossiping at the back and the Ambassador says “Sharman, come take a picture ... read more

Work life has been crazy busy since I last wrote, but my social life has been... well just crazy. When I last left you I was in jeopardy of spending my weekend without electricity and worried about eviction as my roommates organization failed to pay rent on time. With Stephen out of the country I was totally freaking, but got things sorted on Friday and thankfully I came home to our beautiful apartment which still had electricity. His colleague who I called said “oh, I meant to pay that on Monday.” Please note that still would have been 11 days late. Saturday I got to put in some OT when my intern Ace called me to tell me we needed life stories for a report on the male circumcision project. I interviewed him on his circumcision ... read more

Well everyone, it has been awhile since I have updated the old blog so let me get you up to date. I came back to Canadia in March, feeling pretty gross. Fast forward to the end of May and I had the most devastating news to date - I have celiac disease. The girl who loves to eat can no longer have bread, cookies, cakes, or anything containing gluten. In the meantime I applied for a CIDA internship with Canadian Crossroads International, was slightly delayed as I was diagnosed with another auto-immune disease called Graves, but the doctors ok’d me and bang... here I find myself with a six-month communications internship in the Kingdom of Swaziland. After a fun bbq send off on the August long weekend... my mom dropped me off at the airport on ... read more

Early on, I felt awkward taking photos of these women. But they insisted “Hello! Photo of me!” they would say. After a while with 15000 women singing and dancing passionately to traditional songs, my initial shyness would subside. I was at one of Southern Africa’s great festivals and my right index finger was getting a workout. Snapping up some photos to confirm my bragging rights - I had just seen the Umhlanga (Reed) Festival… And it has nothing to do with the fact that most of the women were topless. I don’t care what you say. The Umhlanga Festival is an ancient festival that generally gets coverage by western media for its obvious assets to get our attention. Half naked women roaming around is one. As well as that the King sometimes chooses a wife at ... read more

Swaziland is a 6 hour drive North West of Durban, the border is a totally different experience to Lesotho. There are no shacks in site, just monstrous new buidlings and lots of officials and police. Hawkins manages to annoy three of them, so I worry we may not be allowed in. First he decides to stop 500m from the junction so a police man tells him it's an offence to park in the middle of the road, they don't know that Hawkins has some weird phobia of stopping close to cars, traffic lights, junctions... Next he pulls up next to another police man, and uses his multi tasking skills to close the window in his face rather than open it wider, this has already been a problem at all toll booths where he can't open the ... read more