time flies

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31.01.2012

Happy feast!

That was the theme of this day. I woke up rather late and then hurried for the breakfast. On the table I found unexpected surprise; as it was the feast day I had on my plate couple of sweets, crisps (salt and vinegar), picture of Don Bosco and handkerchief. After finishing breakfast, we cleaned up and I decided that I will stay with them to help. So up to 4pm I was in the convent! And what is the better way to celebrate theDon Bosco feast than by working hard. Until lunch time, the girls cooked for employees of the Laura centre and I washed the dishes. At 2pm we had buffet style lunch with the people working here and after eating there was loads and loads of dancing. It was the first time for me to see traditional Zambian dances. It was amazing to witness how older people danced beautifully to the tune of this exotic music in complete harmony. It was such a great time. They know how to celebrate every single occasion. After lunch we cleaned up again and started preparing for the evening, again there were guests invited for dinner; priests and sisters from nearby. At this point, sisters send me to rest. I came for the mass at 5.30pm, which was nice and joyful and after the dinner there was more singing. I spent my evening in conversations with Bernadette, a German volunteer who lives with the Sisters of the Child Jesus just across the road. We exchanged our views on Kasama and the community.

After the dinner, I asked sisters how they can manage to be working the whole day with hardly a minute to rest. They said they are used to it and I just needed time to get used to it too. I am very curious if I ever will be able to work half as hard as they do. We shall see in the near future. For now, I am glad I am here and learning something new every day. Although I follow homogenous timetable every day, days here are never the same and each morning presents new challenges while every evening brings new kinds of satisfaction about the work completed.



04/02/12



Time flies in Zambia… Today was my day off, so I spend it all by spending moneyJ I met Bernadette at 10am and we went to the town together.

It was a nice day; Kasama is a really small town. There are shops like big supermarkets, Shoprite is the most popular, Budget store, both pretty expensive with some items even more costly than in London. So we went to Location Market outside the town centre, it is 3km away and 3000 kwacha taxi ride with nice scenery as all countryside is green now after/during the raining season. This season is characteristic by hot climate interrupted by thunder storms and quick ascendancy of cold weather. I love the storms when I am inside, but when I am out it is a bit of nightmare. I always come back dirty and red since the soil here is red not brown like in Europe.

Now I am talking about serious things so let me continue with food. As I found out it is mango season-lucky me! :) The mangoes that we have here are small and extremely sweet or bigger green ones that are not as. On the other hand it is a bit of hassle to eat the small ones. There are guavas also, but no bananas yet, their time is coming soon, after the mango season… they eat maize as their staple food and rice is typically on daily menu too. Maize is made into nshima, the most traditional food here eaten especially for lunch. It is made of maize flour and water, cooked for 15 minutes or so. It lacks any flavour and it reminds me of very thick porridge. Since it is very filling and usually eaten by hands, I do enjoy eating it, the meat is also eaten regularly and fish, small and tiny one too. I already mentioned they have local speciality-caterpillars that are usually deep fried and apart from tiny legs, that can scratch throat a little, they taste like crisps. One of the sisters likes baking, so I enjoy nice cakes once a week.

The water and electricity cause some problems in the centre. Water is cold and sometimes stops running, so we have to fetch it from outside; this does not happen too often though. Electricity is out 3 days a week, but returns in the evening, the current is not regularly distributed and this is clearly visible in the evening, when light goes off and on. Even though it sounds a bit complicated, the life is not disrupted by the irregular electricity at all. I am already used to it after 2 weeks.



Now it is evening already, drops of rain are gently washing away the window behind which there are celebratory vuvuzela and singing of Zambia football team supporters (meaning everybody!!). The team won today against Sudan!!! Everybody was tense and exciting the whole day and it was number one conversation topic with street vendors and taxi drivers, Zambia is living football and it is great to be witnessing that here and now. I am so happy for them. Each day when there is Oratory programme here in the centre I watch in amazement small boys with the football ball. The way they play/dance with the ball makes me thing they were given the ball at the birth; it is symmetry and synchronized movement. I shall record it soon for all of you to see



05/02/12

What a nice Sunday this was!

I spend my day with the girls at boarding by being with them during preparation time and when they watched the movies. This time we got caught by Nigerian movies (which are not of high quality). As we watched the movies, Kanda and other girls were plaiting my hair for hours. This process involved an excruciating pain on my side and lots of patience on their side but the result was very satisfactory for both sidesJ I couldn’t believe it looked so nice and trendy especially when I put on the iskebe, the traditional dress. Then we had a dinner and now studying hard again for tomorrow. I read some of the history textbook for Grade 9 to keep up with the African history- loads of fights, slave trade and Portuguese were the main topics in this side of the world during many centuries up to 1900. It is still unbelievable for me how I plunged into this culture superfast, with no obvious culture shock.

Oh, and we ate with our hands, the nshima is usually eaten with hands, then rolled into little ball; dipped into the sauce and voila! the tasty bite is ready.

I forgot to mention how local people perceive me when I am walking on the street. Most of the men naturally chat to me- muzungu, as they call Westerners. Some children greet me, but most of them just stare in silence, without smiles. Adults look somehow suspiciously at me, there are never smiles present, and I miss them considerably after being in Asia and seeing ‘happy’ people. That is not to say these people are not happy, but one must earn the smiles here whereas in Asia they were given for free in great quantities…



06/02/2012

This is the day without water (no running water the whole day here at the boarding, plus in the evening during our prep time the electricity went down, so feeling a bit uneasy not romantic



08/02/2012

Waw, or should I say Booo (in Zambian way?:) such an eventful day it was!! First the most important- ZAMBIA BEAT GHANA in an incredible match, I couldn’t believe I saw so many yellow cards and so much tension, but thanks God they won and the expression of happiness I witness was just incredible. The sisters danced so much and just stayed in front of TV and gave thanks to God. Even during the match I heard many funny comments, “St Bernadette is with them”, “God is there with them” I enjoyed watching the match with them…

Then when the final blow of whistle sounded, everyone run outside and just danced, all of us and all the girls from the boarding just run and hugged and were so happy, just unbelievable. Then they screamed and shouted for a long time, as people outside did and in fact still do (at 11pm). I can’t wait for the finals! :)

The match and the aftermath was a great way to complete this day with the power holding on and water now running again, back to normal

Plus: oratory time I got my first dance lesson, the girl whom I talk during the breaks is not very patient with me though. I shall ask girls here in the barding to teach me a bit during the coming weekend

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