I hope Peace Corps pays for therapy.

As I was sitting in my bucket today, bathing, I couldn’t help but reflect on these last five months in Africa.

On close inspection of my body, I see that I’ve remained pretty intact. Though some of my friends have acquired new and strange Africa-induced disorders and complexes, I’ve remained, though a little more hairy than my real American self, pretty much the same. No significant weight loss or weight gain despite my co-workers telling me every week that I’m either getting fat (which South Africans say with no sugar coating, simply a “You’re getting fat!” is deemed appropriate here, something I thoroughly hate) or losing weight and should wear tighter skirts. It makes no sense to me; one comment or the other is never consistent enough to create a real complex, luckily. Although, I will admit, when my co-workers at school tell me I’ve gained weight, I do say, “I was just thinking the same about you.” Smile.

It’s the worst I can do, and God forgive me, I do feel guilty because as a Western woman, I think that being told your fat is good cause to find the nearest cliff and hurl yourself off it, and would never encourage such behavior but my, these strong African women! Geez. Even when I come back with a comment that my high school teachers would deem “full of attitude” I only get a laugh and a, “Oh Dineo…” and then the woman that I’ve just told that to continues to stuff her mouth with white bread, pap or another equally as bad-for-you food item that is so popular around here. I, on the other hand, usually lose my appetite for at least an hour before I completely rebound and remember that my jeans still fit the same.

Now, as for the state of my mental health, that’s a different discussion. Depending on whom you ask, some might have deemed me a little “different” before embarking on my Peace Corps adventure, but now, there may be more that may deem me so. Sometimes I wonder why my friends are always saying, “You’re crazy.” I thought they were just playing around, but when a lot of people from different circles begin to tell you that, you have to begin to wonder the truth behind it. It’s a strange phenomenon. Perhaps trying to help others makes one crazy? Hmm, I wonder if there’s been any research in the field…

Whilst in training, I was given this graph to plot my overall feeling for the week. It ranges from 0 (completely crappy, suicide watch necessary) to 10 (orgasmic week of smiles and rainbows). I pretty much ignored charting my feelings during training. I figured that consistent 2’s or 3’s would make me doubt my commitment to this project, even though I know that I’m just a really bad trainer. And culture shock. When in doubt, blame culture shock. Works every time.

But recently when looking through all the crap (I mean, resources) I was given during training, I found the chart and ceremoniously posted it on my fridge for future pondering. I had graphed the first few weeks at site between a 4-6 on the scale. Wow, I’m thinking to myself now, how optimistic I once was! I’m proud of myself and now want to keep the chart as-is to remind myself that at one point things weren’t so ­­­­_____ (well let’s just keep that blank for sake of the Peace Corps watchdogs).

So now, as I sit in my bucket, I ponder my life in Africa. I’ve met people that I’ve liked and have met people that I’ve disliked. I’ve done things that have been enjoyable and things that have been not so enjoyable. Such as life, right? I’ve discovered that life in the Peace Corps is, in a lot of ways, indescribable to outsiders (sorry to classify you as such, but stick with me here). There are many words that I can use to describe The Peace Corps Experience, but those would be my words and not the words of the whole and besides, nobody pre-Africa would have classified me necessarily as an optimist. So you should probably take my comments in stride.

However, judging The Experience on what I consider a “normal” scale would be unfair. There are so many new and different factors that you have to consider, the infamous culture shock being one of them. I can’t rate my life here on the same scale as I could have this time last year. I can’t say to myself, “Self, this time last year you (I) would rate satisfaction at a 7.85 but this year I can only rate it at a 3.” I can’t (shouldn’t) think my life is in shambles and that I’m on a downward spiral leading to a deep and dark depression, but think, “Well, self, last year you were in America surrounded by a culture you understood, making real money that your friends didn’t laugh at, and had a dog, apartment (with a shower!) and boyfriend (read: independence).” And this year? Well, this is the year where I literally run away from strangers proposing marriage to me, consider TB/parasites to be a real threat, often have no idea what anybody is talking about because they talk in some weird alien language that I just barely realized even existed let alone began learning, oh! And, have no dog or boyfriend within 10,000 miles. So yeah, things shouldn’t be compared.

To combat my downward spiral inevitably leading to depression, lots of alcohol and woeful emails to friends and family about the suckiness of my current African life (which may or may not have already commenced), I’ve begun to try to think of my life on a new “Peace Corps-rrific” scale where every week is relative to the week preceding it. Instead of thinking, “Last year I was happier,” I simply think, “Hey, this week was better than last week!” And alas, I feel a bit more ready to move on to the next week. I guess this could eventually lead to issues if I have a series of bad weeks, but I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.

Also, I’ve begun thinking about things that I’ve gained….hmm, ok, maybe I shouldn’t think about that.

I’ve decided what is not good for my African self. Alcohol for one, I found out on the plane leaving New York, makes me depressed and therefore should try to be avoided. Check. That’s an easy one since alcohol consumption is basically not recommended in the village. Two, Facebook should be limit to a certain time frame and images should always be off. I don’t know when all my friends decided to start getting engaged and married, but I hate that it happened when I’m in Africa. Seriously, ya’ll, couldn’t you have waited a year or two? Now that I know that these “happy” (ok, so I’m a little bitter, whatev) moments won’t cease till I’m about 40, I guess I have to learn to deal with it. Or at least find a better way to fight the urge to de-friend someone simply because they put up engagement photos or updated their relationship status. Right? It’s a work in progress.

And finally, three, Peace Corps propaganda (yes, it’s propaganda) should be avoided. I’ve realized that though at one point seeing those nifty posters in airport terminals or commercials on TV telling you that “Life is Calling” were once inspiring and motivated me to continue my application process, they now anger me and force me to spew a series of not-so-nice words that my grandmother probably would not be pleased to hear. I wonder if army soldiers feel the same way about those heartfelt “Army of One” (or whatever the tagline for that is now) commercials. I know the government does a lot more brainwashing (I mean, training) of soldiers than we get, so maybe they’re numb. But, alas, I am not. And now have realized these posters, news stores, and websites should be avoided.

I have to be grateful about some things too. My boyfriend has stuck with me (he’s obviously equally as crazy) and my parents and friends have been a constant support for me on my good and bad days. They try to understand my new African life and my ever-changing emotions.

My life has slowed down so much since I’ve been in my itty-bitty village. I actually have time to read books (I average about one a week) and learn to cook. Since I have no real social life in the village, I end up spending a lot of time thinking, which may or may not be a good thing, but it’s gotten me to ponder some more serious things about life like love and religion.

So that’s where I stand now. The one thing I have realized is true that I read previously in Peace Corps literature is that this is a hard job. It’s not always fun and not always as rewarding as the propaganda says it should be, but at the very least, I’ll know a little more about what I can and cannot handle.

I guess we’ll just have to find out together how my Peace Corps story ends…

Current Book: The Shopenhauer Cure; Irvin D. Yalom

Current Song: Taller, Stronger, Better; Guy Sebastian

The day the numbers stopped being just numbers

Today someone really close to me was diagnosed with HIV.

It was a day like any other off day. I’d spent the day seeking solace from the weather in my room and was nursing a cup of tea and thinking of resigning to my bed when I hear a knock on my door. On the other side was the person that I will call Spencer. “Give me a hug, Dineo,” Spencer says as she walks into my room. I give her a hug and we sit down on my bed. This happens at least every other night, so when she begins speaking, I have no idea what she’s about to say.

“I was in Pretoria today,” Spencer begins. She tells me of taking tests in order to join the military. She says she had to take an aptitude test, a urine test, and many other tests. She says it in her normal Spencer way and I laugh along with her at all the right spots. And then she says something else:

Spencer: And I had to take an HIV test…

Me: Oh, really? I guess that’s logical considering every other test they made you take.

Spencer: Yeah, the last time I was tested was in September and I’ve been with the same guy since then so I thought it was a mistake when they told me I was positive.

Me: …..

What can I say? She didn’t say it in alarm. She even laughed a little while she said it. I was confused. I waited for a punch line for a moment but none came. She went on after a moment when I couldn’t think anything to say. Surely, it was a mistake and it was cleared up, given the way she announced it. So I continued to wait for the mistake that would unfold, everyone would laugh, Spencer would be relieved, then she would come home to Pankop and tell me this story of how she was HIV positive for a few minutes.

But when she continued, that was not the story she told.

Instead, she told me that the nurse who had taken the test sat her down and asked her about her love life. She said that she had only been with two men and that she used protection. She said the nurse gave her some papers and advised her to have a lab test to be certain. Spencer was confused and in a state of denial when she walked out of the nurses office.

A girl about her age, who had been before her in the line waiting for the nurse, had told her of her promiscuous ways. She said she had slept with many men and never had used protection. “Ah, I don’t really care. I make the men I’m with withdraw (the African term for pulling out) so I won’t get infected,” she had told Spencer less than fifteen minutes before. When she left the office before Spencer went in, she bragged about being negative.

And now Spencer sat beside her, a minute after being told that she’s positive, and endured more sex stories from this girl. “I couldn’t take it, Dineo!” she tells me now. She says the girl asked for her results and Spencer told her. A brave move, I think. The girl stayed quiet for a moment, Spencer tells me, but then she made up her mind that Spencer was lying and told Spencer that she should be on Generations. “You’re such an actor!” the girl proclaimed and though Spencer says she tried repeatedly to tell her the truth, Spencer failed to get through to her.

I try to ask her what the nurse said to her; I asked her how she feels now, what she did when she left the office. I didn’t want to pry, but I was confused and concerned at how unemotional she seemed by everything. But she told me she cried. She told me she ended up yelling at the sex-driven girl and when she was hit on later at the taxi rank by a stranger on her way home, she had gone off on him, “I’m positive! Do you still think I’m beautiful?” She says she felt like it was written all over her, like a bright neon arrow was following her around atop her head stating her status, “HIV Positive. Stay Away.”

I begin to find my words when I realize the truth myself. I tell her I’m sorry. I say that she’s young and that there are so many things to help her cope with this. I tell her that she can still do all the things she wanted to do in life, before she knew. She can live still.

I’m saying all this, yet, I’m scared for her. She’s 19 and the closest South African to me, literally and figuratively. She hasn’t even lived yet. She hasn’t been to college; she hasn’t traveled outside the immediate area. And she’s still so pretty and full of life. I’m scared by the facts that I know all too well. I don’t want to scare her. I think back to the conversation we had on Sunday when we were talking about marriage and the future. She wants kids, she wants to get married. And, she’s been telling me since March, when I met her, that she wants to study in America.

“I can’t go to America anymore,” she says as her eyes well up with tears.

I know why she says this and though I try to ignore the image in my head of that immigration form that you have to fill out when you enter the country with its seemingly innocent question, “Do you have an illness of significant public health concern?” I remember the Soul City (a night time drama dealing with HIV) episode where a high school senior gets diagnosed with HIV and is therefore denied a student visa into the U.S. I know that things are changing in America, and that now HIV-positive people are able to get a 30-day visitor visa, but student visas? Maybe that would be stretching it. Even now, all the information I see online says that student visas aren’t granted to those living with HIV.

(Get more information about different countries’ HIV restrictions here: http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/104722)

Despite everything, she amazes me. I wonder how she got so much courage so quickly. I know that I would be a ball in my bed if I were told such news. I wouldn’t see the light of day for a week and would not speak to anyone until I have mourned and would definitely not be brave enough to tell the sex-driven ignorant stranger next to me the truth. I would probably kick her instead. Of course, this is coming from me, a person who can make something trivial seem tragic.

But not Spencer. It’s been less than 6 hours since she found out and she’s already told her friends, her boyfriend (who still won’t admit to cheating), her mother, and me. She worries about what her sister who will say. “She’ll yell at me,” Spencer says. “All she’ll talk to me about is sex. She’ll want to know why I’ve been sleeping around.” She says her boyfriend doesn’t want to get tested. She thinks he already knows and just never told her.

Undeterred by her crap-ass boyfriend, and even more amazingly, she tells me she wants to continue talking about it to people. She says she wants to help me develop my life skills program I’m presenting to the local schools and speak to the students about HIV. She wants to show them that it happens to people like them. She says she never listened to the people that talked to her when she was still in school. She says the severity of the epidemic didn’t register to her coming from an old woman, an outsider, but she says, it might if she is able to go and show them that it happens to pretty, young, smart girls too. I agree. I can tell these teens all the facts, and though I’m a little bit of a celebrity in my Itty-Bitty Village, I’m not infected; I’m an outsider. But, maybe they’ll listen to her. I hope they listen to her. She may be the best tool in my tool box, if she’s ready and willing.

Despite everything, she’s still upbeat whilst talking to me. She looks in the mirror a couple of times during our talk and says, “I don’t look any different….” I know it’s still hitting her, slowly. Her CD4 count is high still and she’s healthy, but how long will that last?

Throughout it all, I stay optimistic and try to assure her that there’s so much more hope than there was ten years ago. Optimism is a new trend for the African me who has been a perpetual party pooper since landing in South Africa, but what other option is there? Before she leaves she tells me that from now on, she’ll count her years: One year with HIV, two years with HIV…and as I begin to lose my brief visit with optimism, she smiles and says, “Maybe they will find a cure.”

“I hope so,” I tell her. I hope so.

The problem with obedience

“Ubuntu” is a big word around here. Everyone is always complaining about how nobody abides by Ubuntu anymore and thus, South Africa is going down into the pits. I’m trying to think of the easiest way to explain Ubuntu, but I’ve come across many different definitions. At first I thought it was a pretty cool concept when I was first introduced to Ubuntu; I was told that it was about culture/tradition, unity, courtesy and respect, among other terms. I was like, hot damn. Now this is a cool word. In English we don’t have such a word that can bring all these terms into one concise concept: Ubuntu. I think the group that I trained with was all so excited with this term that we even put it on our group shirts. Ubuntu: I am because you are. Ahh, cue the sentimental music.

However, as I struggled through training and now at my site, I’m learning that this idealistic definition isn’t really what Ubuntu is about. It’s about obedience and at times, ignorance. I remember thinking when I first heard this “new” definition was at a Ndebele tribal meeting/church gathering thing that my training group was sent to in order to meet the Ndebele king. It was an outside gathering of about 150 people. The women and men sat divided and some women sat on mats. Some men had cane like sticks and women were supposed to cover their heads with scarves or hats. And, the men sat under the good tree.

After the “ceremony,” which turned out to be nothing more than a queue of people individually going up to the mic and saying how many people from their area were going to attend this big Ndebele celebration in the next couple of weeks, we were put into a circle and was told that we would get to ask the Ndebele prince (the king never showed up) questions. So, we asked. I don’t remember what question was, but the prince answered at one point that Ubuntu was about tradition, obedience and not asking any questions. He was worried about the children and teenagers not following along with the Ndebele traditions and instead falling prey to Western ways.

Alas, I thought, this explains a lot. It explains why the women never questioned the fact that they were not to sit on chairs for so many years and only given mats. It explains why women have no rights when it comes to her husband, or basically anything. Being a woman from America, if something doesn’t make sense to me, I ask why. In South Africa, a woman quietly accepts and moves on.

The examples are all over South Africa. One doesn’t have to look hard to see that this definition of Ubuntu stands firm. Perhaps some may say that I’m selling the concept short and perhaps this “don’t question, just accept” philosophy isn’t Ubuntu at all, but instead just tradition. Plain and simple.

It makes me wonder if this is the reason why HIV is rampant in South Africa. The principal at the middle school that I was prisoner to today told me that many women know that their husbands aren’t coming home at night to sleep with them and they say nothing to their husbands. If you ignore it, it’s not a problem right? I was shocked. If my husband didn’t come home one night and he wasn’t freakin’ Santa Claus, I would for sure ask that little (insert bad word here) where he was. When I say this, in a PG way, to her, she laughs at me and says, “Oh Dineo, you can’t tell an African man what to do. It’s different.” I’m like, wait. So this is why only 6% percent of relationships are faithful in South Africa (a statistic I read about in a national SA magazine)? Is this why over 20% of adults are projected to have HIV? Freakin’ Ubuntu? Because a woman isn’t supposed to ask questions? Because it’s always been that way? Because a woman doesn’t know what she’d do without her husband? Because her father cheated on her mother and therefore it’s acceptable for her husband to cheat on her?

Excuse me, but fuck that.

I try really hard to remember that the people I meet here have not had the kind of education that I was lucky to have and have lived in a very different environment than I. I get it. I’m lucky. God bless America. But what am I supposed to do in these situations? Accept that this is just how it is and allow South Africa to continue? Until what? When is it going to be time to let “tradition” go and just accept that things are going to have to change?

I try to explain to her the theory of how promiscuity, especially in South Africa, has led to the spread of HIV. I say it in simple terms so she can understand and go on to brainstorm with her ideas why teenagers are still spreading the disease despite all the “good” information out there. She says the kids are so naughty. They have too much “attitude” and it’s hard to teach them. She motions to the noise in one of the classrooms and says, “See? They won’t just listen. They always have questions and are always talking to you about something. I just want them to be quiet and let me teach them.” Yes, the principal said this to me. So, I say, “So? Shouldn’t they have questions? Shouldn’t you want them to throw ideas off of you so you can help them process things better?” And she says she just can’t handle the new methods that the province is trying to make them use to teach the students. So then she tells me about the “road system” of teaching. It goes something like this:

To start a vegetable garden you need to first put the seeds in the ground. Wait for it to rain or water them. Then pick the vegetables.

So she explains this to me and though I don’t know (or because I don’t know) a lot about gardening I wonder how useful this information will be to me if I were to start a garden of my own. How do you know if the vegetables are ready? What about bugs? What time of the year do you plant different vegetables? Surely, if taught this way, students will have questions. But, in this method of teaching, there aren’t questions. It is what it is. I will tell you this, and you will take it and be happy that I have taught it to you because I am your teacher and you will respect me. Ok? And this is where all the students will say, in unison, “Yesssss, Ma’am.”

But that’s the way it works. I will tell you the way and you will follow it and that’ll be the way you get there. Like a road. Hence the name, “road system.” She says it’s the best way to teach, the only way she ever taught whilst a teacher. Oh, I pity her students.

So she takes me around to all the classes to introduce me to the students. Before we walk into a classroom, she tells me that we’re about to enter a classroom with the “naughtiest” children. When we walk in, all the students stand and greet her, “Helllllo, Missssss. How are you?” And she says, “Good, how are you?” And they say, “I’m good. How are you?” Which makes no sense, but I laugh and she reprimands them for not addressing me directly. So they do it again, “Hellloooo Missss Mashaba (my African last name) How are you?” And on it goes. I figure with them saying, “How are you” at the end, I could turn this into a fun game (for my own amusement because they obviously don’t quite understand), but decide to let it drop with a slight giggle.

After they sit, she tells me that these are the ninth graders and that there are the naughtiest class at the school. I say, “Wow, the naughtiest? That’s quite an honor. Did you guys get a plaque?” And they stare at me. Tough crowd. She says something about them not being ready for high school because they don’t know enough. The kids continue to stare at her with no word. We leave and continue to the next classes and it’s all the same. Have you ever seen that Pink Floyd music video for Another Brick in the Wall? The one where all the kids are put through a little machine and all come out the same on the other side of the conveyor belt. Alas, this is the perfect example of South Africa.

All in all you’re just another brick in the wall.
All in all you’re just another brick in the wall.

And that’s all it is. You’re an obedient child worthy of teaching, or you’re a naughty child. It’s not easier to be categorized either way. If you’re deemed good (aka obedient) you become a servant to the teachers. Today a teacher I was sitting with needed a cup to make some tea. She yells for a student to come from across the yard to get her a cup that was sitting on a table across the room from her. A total distance there and back of maybe 6 yards.

It’s almost disgusting how these children are used. I would wonder why they don’t say “No, fat (insert bad word here). Get it yourself.” But then I remember Ubuntu-taught obedience and it makes sense. It’s the cruelest caste system I’ve ever experienced. So I don’t wonder why the kids at my special school always beat up on the blind kid. If the men control the women and the women control the children and the children control the special kids then the special kids control the….blind kid? And perhaps if the blind kid could, he would be kicking the chickens around.

Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.

"Wrong, Do it again!"
"If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding. How can you
have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat?"
"You! Yes, you behind the bike sheds, stand still laddy!"