The Love and the Land

When I actually stop to think about it, it makes me feel quite overwhelmed. Last year this time I was on the other side of the country in the sandy sweltering bowl of the Kalahari living a life so different from what I’m living now that I can scarcely believe I am still in the same country. When I close my eyes I can still see it…still feel it…the low rusting tin roof of my crumbling brick house…the dingy rug covering the cracked and uneven foundation…the heat of the early summer sun…the glare of the sand …my host mothers sweet round face smiling up at me…the fiery sunsets burning from one end of the horizon to the other…that familiar glow of the pale earth at dusk. It was my home…my whole life. It was a simple life, but at the same time a challenging life…the blistering heat and freezing cold of my un-insulated home, the scarcity of water and constant hauling to and fro of buckets, the constant treating of water and constant battle with pests. I can say, however, that both despite and because all of this I love my life there. I loved the place and the people and the land. I felt like I was one of them, among them, living their life the way they lived it. I couldn’t help but take pride in the humility of it all. I couldn’t help but be thankful every day for the experience. For, there is nothing more odious to my mind than being privileged, ungrateful, and blind to the plight of the “two-thirds world”—as it is often called in international political literature. Learning to understand this way of living and breaking free of any sense of entitlement or callousness to those who live in such, or even much worse circumstances was one of the greatest motivating factors for joining the Peace Corps at all. The struggle of life there was my motivation and inspiration every day. 

…But one day in late September I woke to find myself in this brave new world. It’s been a full two months, but I fear it hasn’t yet sunk in yet. I was there when it all happened…the displacement, the waiting, the anticipation and disappointments of the search for a new home, yet it still feels like a dream. A dream that passed in such a blur…a dream from which I have not yet woken. On the day Charlie brought me to Lorraine I remember feeling numb on the inside. The war within between feelings excitement and sadness was too much—and as is typical for me in such cases—they were forced back into some deep chasm of the heart from which they may, or may not ever emerge. It’s where all my dark feelings go. There, left untended, they haunt me from time to time, casting shadows on my heart at the oddest of moments. I just stared out the window the whole drive watching the scenery go by. It was so enormous and majestic. Everything lush and green, with mountains and valleys swelling and dipping as far the eye could see. This was a land of plenty. Endless acres of fruit trees lined the roads leading through Tzaneen and all along the stretch to the village the rocky mountain faces loomed large above the land scape. By now it has become a familiar sight. Just as the familiar rumble of tires on the bumpy gravel road to Bona Bona became the comforting sign that home was near, so too have the mountains of central Limpopo. I have learned to love those mountains. When the shadow of our local mountain appears on the horizon I have started to feel a similar sense of relief as I did when heading for my home in the desert. Yet there is still a long way to go. It is such a different world from what I’ve known. 

When I open my eyes in the radiance of the 5:30 am sun I still sometimes feel surprised by how high the ceiling is in my new home. More shocking is the fact that I’m sprawled diagonally across a bed from which my feet do NOT protrude. When I crawl out from under the mosquito net my feet touch a carpeted floor, and across from the bed I see my school things piled on a two person sofa. My tired feet shuffle out of the door and over to the bathroom…a REAL bathroom. It isn’t pretty: narrow with black tiles and toilet, basin, and bath in an ugly 70’s pea green. When I sit on the toilet I can easily rest my head on the sink—something my American and German friends would surely find obnoxious—but the remarkable thing is that there is a toilet at all—and indoors at that! Not to mention a basin and bath with running water! Gone are the days of bathing in buckets and storing water. Two months in it still feels like a miracle. I never imagined I’d feel that way about what, by American standards, is the ugliest most impractical bathroom imaginable, but life in the Kalahari has changed me. It is needless to say that my new family is rather well off. I live in 1 ½ rooms of their old 3 room house, adjacent to the main house. Yet it is almost the size of my old host mother Ma T’s, main house. This families main house is far more luxurious…it feels like any home in America, complete to coffee maker, treadmill, and flat screen TV. I almost cried when Mel first took me to see the house. Not only it the house itself remarkably comfortable but also the yard that surrounds it. The courtyard is beautifully paved and is swept and scrubbed daily by the cleaning lady. The lawn surrounding the courtyard is beautifully landscaped, with vibrant green hedges trimmed and shaped to perfection, throngs of palms, cycads, rose bushes and other assorted tropical plants. To the back is a vegetable garden and throngs of mango and banana trees. It is like a small paradise in every way. Just outside of the compound walls the local mountain seems close enough to touch. I could hardly imagine a more beautiful place to live. Added to this is the amazingness of my new family. A husband and wife in their 40’s with 4 children. Both are employed as teachers and are caring and ambitious people who run multiple small businesses in addition to their teaching careers. They are well educated, as are their four children ages 7 to 23. They have shown me such kindness and hospitality. Already I feel very close to them. 

Amidst all of the beauty and my growing affection for this new place and its people, however, I still sometimes feel a pinch of guilt; a small bit of pain at the thought that once again I am living among the privileged.  When I see the large, succulent dark green leaves of the spinach growing in our garden, I remember how Ma T struggled and scratched in the Kalahari sands for months just to coax out a few considerably less impressive heads of spinach.  When I turn on the pipe to fill my bath tub I think of all the children of Bona Bona carting buckets of salty water from the tap to their homes across the village. And I can’t help but wonder what my neighbors think of me. I am already apt to be seen as the “rich American” by those around me, but to live with a well-to-do-family only furthers that image and may give the impression that I only associate with such people…that I think myself above them. Whenever I drive past the kids walking barefoot to school in one or the other of my mom’s cars, I feel the pinch. Of course this could all be hyperactive American cultural sensitivity at work, but it worries me none the less. Guilt of this kind is a common part of the Peace Corps experience and I suppose it will never go away. In Bona Bona at least, it was less acute than now. Yet I also realize that even people here who are struggling have things much easier than the people of Bona Bona; They can grow food for one, they are also close to town and transport is readily available and most importantly there are businesses and an opportunities to make some sort of living. In truth Lorraine is more of a town than a village. It is at least 20 times the size of Bona Bona and far less rural. It is remarkable what a difference location can make. It is remarkable that two so drastically different ways of life coexist…but this is the defining reality of life in South Africa.  

Given the circumstances, starting over in Lorraine hasn’t been all too difficult compared to adjusting to life in Bona Bona. I am in a much more comfortable living situation and much better prepared for the challenges of village and school life. Furthermore, I can admit that despite the pain of separation, I have always secretly wanted to live in the Limpopo province. It is what I desired most at the beginning. And it is all rather incredible that, through a unfortunate turn of fate that fancy of mine has now become a solid reality. It is strange how things work out sometimes. Sometimes at the morning assembly I just stand outside of the principal’s office and take in the sight…the learners all huddled in the middle of the school yard—a swarm of blue and grey; the rows of rusty colored brick classrooms neatly aligned on a balding patch of earth; above, the dark shapes of the mountain peaks to the west. It is a particularly impressive sight on partly cloudy days, when patches of sun accent the greenery on the mountain side and the cumulus clouds in an electric blue sky lay on the summits like a blanket. Added to the scene are the voices of children singing their morning choruses and saying their prayers before heading to class. Morning assembly is a scene that has become so normal to me it hardly strikes me as unusual anymore, though it is something that would never happen in an American school—particularly not the praying part. Here it is standard and sometimes, if I close my eyes I can imagine I’m at assembly at my old elementary school in Bona Bona, with all of my old students. I can still see their faces in my mind. 

 

It has been decided that I will work almost exclusively in the primary school for the remainder of my time in country. As was the case last year, I have begun my work here in the fourth school term. It is always a rather chaotic time of year in which schedules and structures maintained throughout the year seem to speedily disintegrate. I’ve earned enough by now, however, to know how to cope with the chaos. I’ve devoted myself to teaching grade 6 and grade 3 English. I’ve been taking full advantage of the extra class time created by preoccupied and overburdened teachers who cut class periods in order to catch up on marking and paperwork. It has given me much needed “quality time” with the students, getting to know them and what they need the most help with. Making the shift from an elementary school with 200 learners to one with 800+ learners has required some serious adjustment on my part. With grade 6 being a class of almost 100 learners we got off to a rough start, but by the 3^rd week of teaching I really felt I was getting the hang of it. I feel optimistic about the coming year. I feel optimistic about the plans now coming together in my mind and the relationships I’ve been forming with my family and colleagues. I feel optimistic about the potential of this place and its people. One thing is certain in this life: sometimes we lose things we love. But it is equally true that sometimes, we must let go of what we love to receive what we need…or an even greater love that what we’ve known.

The Lady of Limpopo

The story of how that “pivotal moment” finally came goes back to the previously mentioned evening in Pretoria...sometime in the middle of the two weeks I spent sitting around there. It was one of those days on which there was a mixed bag of volunteers staying at the guest house (PCVs generally tend to frequent the same accommodations throughout their service. A note to my South African friends running hospitality businesses: win over a few PCVs to your establishment and you’ve given yourself a gift that just keeps giving. Once it catches on, more PVCs from that group will start coming, as well as subsequent groups that find out via word of mouth…it’s not a bad business strategy…continuing…) On said night a group of us went out to one of our favorite local establishments to have a few drinks and chat it up. Amongst the group was a wonderful young lady id only just met…ill call her Mel. Mel was of one of those “older generation” PCVs who was just about to finish her service and head back to the US. She’d been going through all those “close of service” (COS) motions and it was an emotional time for her and the others of her generation. As we sat over our wine she began to tell me about her village and the worked she’d done…as well as the work she’d started and hadn’t finished. As she was talking I started having a really strange sort of feeling…I suppose it was like a premonition or some kind of divine hint that this was more than just another great PCV story. I listened with great interest as she went on about how she’d started organizing a library at the high school there. Funds had been raised and payments made for a shipment of books from a donor organization in the US. They were poised to receive enough books to make for a respectable collection. Yet here she sat, suddenly in the middle of her COS. The clock had run out on her. The books were to arrive sometime in the near future, but who could manage their delivery now?  What would happen with them? It was like watching a dream die…all her hard work and planning gone to waste. I could see the pain in her face as she explained.

 It was at that point that something clicked inside me. I became certain…this was not just a chance meet like any other—neither was it just another evening out for drinks. No indeed! This was none other than providence at work. How else could it be that the two of our paths had crossed at that particular juncture? And how indeed did it come to be that in so large a crowd I happened to sit across from her at the table? One may never know. All I know is that it fit like a glove. Me, there with my sorrow at being ripped away from my old community and all the preparatory work I’d done—including preparations for a library at the high school, which lay a ruinous ash heap at that very moment (just like all my aspirations for that village)—and she, with all her regret over the very same work that now would be left desolate. I looked at her over my wine glass, my eyes widening with amazement. She caught my gaze and instantly knew what I was thinking. “Hey! Maybe you should come work at my site when I leave!” I agreed heartily “Absolutely!” The rush of excitement between us was palpable. We both vowed to contact our supervisor about it and see whether or not it was a real possibility. I had no idea what her site was like. I knew only that it was in Limpopo province somewhere near Tzaneen, but my heart had instantly latched on to the idea. Somehow I just knew it was right. We wasted no time in contacting our Peace Corps supervisor about the prospect the very next day. I’m not sure how long I would have been stuck in limbo otherwise. Perhaps two more months would have gone by before a new placement was found for me. But as it was, God intervened to do the work the Peace Corps was too preoccupied to do.  

Over the next few weeks my supervisor as well as Mel herself worked together over the next few weeks to seal the deal. Naturally there were a lot of organizational details that had to be sorted out before I could actually move in. Housing with a family had to be arranged and approved of…the school(s) had to agree to have me, the Department of Education in Limpopo had to agree to host me…and of course, as is common here in South Africa, every person in that department with a shred of say on the matter had to say their piece twice over before anything could happen. This latter detail inevitably led to some being jerked around emotionally for me. There were a few days of tension in which the department tried to insist on putting me at a location of their choice, rather than in Lorraine ga Sekororo, where Mel had been serving—even though all the preliminary details had already been worked out.  This provided a good dose of frustration for all of us on the Peace Corps side. In the end, however, providence reigned and on a sunny day of late September I was on my way from the capital to the Kalahari to get my things and move clear across the country to the heart of Limpopo…the country’s fruit capital…in every way the opposite of everything I’d known in Bona Bona.

Saying good bye to my family and friends there was a painful ordeal. It was hasty and sloppy. The Peace Corps driver tasked with chauffeuring me (who I’ll call Charlie) did his best to entertain me on the hours long drive from the capital. He was great company indeed. On the way, we stopped to pick up another volunteer (Kay, as I will call him) who had been my closest neighbor. He’d offered to help me with the move. It was time to rip off the band aid. We had set out around 6am and arrived at Bona Bona around one. It was such a strange feeling being back after such a long absence. The familiar faces of my neighbors and students could be seen milling about the school yard and down the sandy road towards my old home. My chest tightened when we drove through the gate into my Host family’s yard. I had seen my mama in two whole months and hadn’t been able to speak to her at well. I nearly cried when I saw her sweet round face looking up at me from her petite frame. She was so glad to see me. She asked me what was happening and if I was going to stay. I tried in very broken Setswana to explain that I couldn’t…that I had to leave. I was sure she was very confused. Charlie tried to explain more fully in Setswana. She simply nodded and didn’t say much. I could tell, however, that she was disappointed. I unlocked the door to my small brick house and Charlie, Kay and I entered. I had to be fast. Lingering would only make it worse—beside which, time was of the essence. We had to drive back down to Vryburg before it got too late. I rushed to pack clothes and other essential belongings and speedily rake through the other items for anything thing that might be of secondary importance. 

It was a great help and comfort to have Kay along. He was quick and smart about packing and kept me moving when I inclined towards emotional paralysis. I no more than an hour the deed was done, the truck was loaded, and I had a few minutes to exhale. I have never been good with long good byes. So after presenting some small gifts to my host mom and her daughter in law and grandchild; and after taking a few more pictures with my family I quickly said goodbye and was whisked away. I felt numb inside. I managed to stop briefly at the primary school to say goodbye to the teachers there. When I arrived some of the high school students were there taking and exam so I peeked in to say goodbye…somehow that goodbye hurt the most…to see their excited faces when I came in followed by the pain and confusion as I explained that I wouldn’t be coming back. My last stop in the village was to see what was left of the high school. It was really eerie….the school yard almost seemed post-apocalyptic. All that remained were hollow shells of the buildings; strewn inside were corroded and caved in slabs of metal that once were the roof, atop the ashy carcasses of tables, chairs and metal filing cabinets. It looked very much the way I felt at that point in time. All the way back down that bumpy 25k of gravel road (which was at fault for all this mess) I couldn’t stop thinking about that scene.