The Lewis & Ruby Blog Experience...

Kruger....the kids will like this post!

2012-01-25T23:36:00.000-08:00

As promised, pictures of Kruger, or rather the animals of Kruger. We spent one 10 hour day driving a tiny sliver of the park and were lucky enough to see twenty different animals and fourteen different species of birds. It was a pretty amazing place!
One of the first of the Big Five, as they call it, that we saw was the elephant. We saw quite a few of them, but this sighting pictured below was our first and most impressive. Such a HUGE creature!

- Zebras are fairly common in the park, here's a few of the closer ones we saw.

- Impala were absolutely everywhere! You couldn't go ten feet without seeing any number of impala. You start to get tired of them, but after a close look they are actually quite beautiful.

- Water buffalo are one of the Big Five. We were lucky to get a tip on where they were hiding and got to see them at a close range. Their strange "helmet" of horns was more unusual looking than I had pictured.

- On the smaller side of things, we had a chance encounter with two dung beetles that were pushing this ball of poop across the road. They were determined! At one point one fell off and landed on its back and couldn't right itself for some time.....I'm sure he eventually figured it out.

- We didn't get a whole lot of good bird pictures. However, this was a fun sighting of a Marabou Stork. They are funny looking things and probably over three feet tall! Animals are so strange......pretty cool what variety there is in the world.

- This is one of my favorite pictures. Lewis took it while briefly stopped at a picnic area. The little devil looks so pristine, but in reality he was pestering people at their tables and digging through the refuse left in trash barrels. We also had them all over the lodge that we stayed at in Hazyview. Lewis and I almost got attacked one evening while we were walking because they thought the light grey sweatshirt Lewis was holding in his hand was instead a fellow monkey that we had captured. That is, at least, what the grounds keeper told us who drove by right as we were being rushed by a monkey troop. Eeeek!

- This guy on the other hand was hilarious. We found him on the side of the road in Kruger. Once we stopped to stare at him, he plopped down, took stance and stared right back at us. Meanwhile, he was also not shy about relieving himself. We finally got bored and drove off, while he continued hanging out.

- These are mongoose. Tiny little things, but interesting to watch.

- The gnarly looking warthog. We saw a number of them, but this guy was the most rugged looking.

- Another chance encounter. We were told to turn down the next road to look for the tailless elephant and instead found hyenas! We saw a few different ones, but this mother and her baby were just laying in the ditch on the side of the road. She didn't seem very concerned that we were there. Hyenas are super funny looking when they are standing.

- Giraffe! It was definitely a favorite. We saw a ton of giraffe. They were easy to spot, no pun intended :) it was interesting to see them in herds. At one point we saw around 10 together. They were also unconcerned by our presence and continued their strange but gentle lumber-glide across the road in front of us. At one point we saw two at a watering hole drinking. In order to get their heads down such a distance they were forced to splay their front legs out WIDE while awkwardly bending their knees. It looked like it hurt.

- Giraffe, guinea fowl and impala.

- It was almost time to leave, the park gates close at 6:30, and we were anxious to see a rhino. It was common to see the grouping of cars, stopped in the middle of the road to stare at whatever is in the bush, before you see the animals themselves. We had 20 kilometers to go and had all but given up on the rhinos when we saw tail lights. Score! Just 30 feet to our right were a rhino and her baby feeding.

- We had seen a few other lions earlier in the day, but all at a distance or through a heavily obstructed view. Just as we were coming off our rhino high and about to leave the park we saw this guy! He was laying all but 10 feet to the side of the road. What is it with animals in Kruger just laying on the side of the road! Despite the annoyingly inconsiderate long line of cars that took their good old time to stop and take pictures, we finally got close enough to really see him, get a photo and rush for the gate to make it there by 6:30 before it locked us in.

- It was a successful day at the park. It's almost our backyard, so come visit!!!!! Once in a lifetime opportunity :)

And for a total list, I wrote them all down, of the animals and birds spotted, view below:

* Lions

* Giraffe

* Hippo

* Water Buffalo

* Baboon

* Impala

* Crocodile

* Elephant

* Monitor Lizard

* Common Duiker (a very tiny deer)

* Bushbuck

* Kudu (another type of deer)

* Leopard TORTOISE (we really hoped to see a real leopard)

* Spotted Hyena

* Waterbuck

* Wildebeest

* Warthog

* White Rhino

* Wild Dogs

* Mongoose

BIRDS - yes I had my bird book with me :)

* Marabou Stork

* African Fish Eagle

* Southern Ground Hornbill

* Magpie Shrike

* Blue Waxbill

* Red-billed Oxpecker

* Blacksmith Lapwing

* Egyptian Goose

* Brown Snke Eagle

* Red-billed Hornbill

* Guinea Fowl

* Crowned Lapwing

* Weavers

* Black-bellied Bustard

(Only my mom and dad will probably care about the bird list :)

Meeting Our Community...

2012-01-14T03:12:00.000-08:00

- After our time spent in South Africa we headed home to the Swaz to show off our strange but beautiful country. I was excited to show our family around. It's so nice talking about places and people to friends and family back home when they have actually been here and know what we're talking about. Hint hint.......you all should come visit!

We had a great time. The country is lush and green at this time of year due to the summer rains. It doesn't have to try hard to capture newcomers with it's sprawling beauty. But then you stick around a little while and realize this is a strange place :). It almost has you tricked with its seemingly developed facade right up until the point you meander far enough down the smoothly paved road and turn off into the land of loose cows and pitch black nights. It's strange how quickly it changes. One minute you are in the capital city of Mbabane, shopping at a grocery store that carries 10 different types of butter, then you are driving down a bumpy dirt road in the dark where only handful of people have electricity or running water. But that is what it means to be in the Peace Corps I guess. Trying to bridge the gap between the past and the future. It's a big job!

Below are a few pictures of things we do in our area of Swaziland.

- Our favorite restaurant just up the road (after you get back to the paved portion:). And by just up the road I mean: a thirty minute walk to the end of our dirt road where we catch a khumbi another 10miles. Proximity is relative depending on who you are talking to.

- The site of our favorite restaurant is also a site for some really good music. We have come here a number of times for shows over the last few months. It would also be a really cool place to have a wedding ;)

- Another shot of our restaurant and local music venue. We found this place the first few weeks we were at site. Sitting there with good food and a cold drink felt so much like home we could barely make ourselves leave.

- This is a fellow volunteers house and our local place of refuge. Kerry is one of our nearest and dearest volunteers. She takes care of us and we had to make sure she got to meet our parents!

- Our new bridge! It was finally completed a month or so ago. We put a lot of sweat into the construction of this thing the first two months we were at our site. It was the perfect way to get to know our community.

- Our primary school. We are working with a few of the teachers at this school and a program through PC to set up their very first library. We also want to paint a world map on the wall pictured below. We're hoping to start the map within the next few weeks.

- Our ever changing garden. We didn't get to lounge here quite enough while Kevin and Fiona were here....which means they should probably come back :)

- It was a lot of fun for Kevin & Fiona to meet all the people we spend time with. This is a family that lives just up the road from us. I have become good friends with the young girl shown below and she has also become our siSwati tutor. Our community was very welcoming and we came away from the day with a chicken in a bag and two grass mats giving in honor of our parents visiting.

- Below is a garden started by our tutor and her family. They were inspired by what we were growing and decided to give it a try. Pretty exciting stuff :)!

What We're Reading

Ruby is reading - The Sex Lives of Cannibals-Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific by J. Maarten Troost Courtesy of Jenny Boyd!

Lewis is reading - A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

Miss you all!

Rubes & Lew

Christmas Came Late to the Swaz!

2012-01-08T13:18:00.000-08:00

I don't know why the pictures came out like this, but they're there and that's what matters. December 30th we left our house at 5:15am and headed to Manzini to catch a bus to Johannasburg in order to meet up with Kevin and Fiona. We couldn't wait! We spent the afternoon kicking around Joburg and finding our way to the airport. We spent a night near the airport after picking them up. They came off the plan laden with bag after bag filled with amazing goodies for US! We were most excited to get our technology back: camera, computer and a brand new iPad! We're connected again. It feels good.

The next morning we headed off in our little rental car towards Hazyview. We were booked to stay at the Kruger Park Lodge for six nights, giving us ample time to explore Kruger and relax by the pool. And our week consisted of exactly that. It was perfect. I will have to make a separate post designated solely to Kruger. Yes, it was that awesome! We had such a successful day on our first try we decided to leave it at that and explore other things in the area instead of going back.

We explored Sabie Valley Coffee, Pilgrims Rest, a number of waterfalls, Blyde River Canyon, ate delicious food, relaxed at our timeshare, played golf, etc etc. It was the perfect week and we were only half way through our trip. Friday we headed back to Swaziland through the nearest border post. This decision seemed sensible. It turned into a rush to the border that turned out to be closing at 4:00pm, on a low gas tank, and rental papers that didn't match the car we were driving (that's another story!). We were nervous we wouldn't make it for one and that they would scrutinize our papers and not let us in. Those set backs turned out to be the least of our worries. We crossed the border with ease and headed off through a little remote village that used to be a asbestos mine. Within a kilometer we realized that we might not end up making it due to the condition of the road. We quickly discovered we were going to have to make it 20k's on a mountainous, rocky, dirt road with little signage and massive ditches across the road at every turn. But we made it! We made it in a KIA Cerato with 3inches of clearance. Eeek!

We made it home just before dark. We were all anxious to get out of the car and just BE in Swaziland. It felt good to be home.

The next day was filled with visiting our community, it's members, our host family and of course the garden! Kevin and I went running that morning. Everyone was excited to see that we were back and hadn't disappeared back to the states. If people don't see us for a week or so they all think we moved back to the USA. EEEK! Battery is running out. I am going to just post so you all can at least see the pics! Basically, they Kiker's love Swaziland. They have already received a chicken in a bag and two grass mats from our community. Everyone loved meeting our family!

Tonight we are staying at a beautiful place called Forester Arms Hotel. Delicious food, beautiful grounds and an amazingly serene setting. We will definitely have to come back.

We have two days left and a lot to see.

Enjoy the pics :) back again soon with more from our trip around South Africa and the Swaz!

A Few Things....

2011-12-09T09:02:00.000-08:00

The holidays are here. Although Christmas made an appearance here even before halloween, it definietly doesn't feel like that time of year. Everything is currently slow at site. Despite that fact we have been out n about with other volunteers, started tutoring lessons with our neighbor and are enjoying time spent in the garden. The weather has been relatively cold with scattered showers, often, in the evenings. This is our alleged summer no less :) but I have admittedly grown to appreciate the rain more with our growing facination with gardening. The garden is so happy when it rains and it also means we don't have to worry about it going dry when we are gone for a day or two.
We have been eating veggies like mad: spinach, swisschard, lettuce, green beans, beets, basil, radishes, arugula, oregano, dill, zucchini, crookneck squash and the list goes on. The sunflowers have also started to bloom which has brought a welcome arrival of bees. It's been a very fulfilling project. We have also had some small feedback among our community on how it has been an inspiration to a few.

This month will be full of non work related fun. We are headed to friends this weekend for a birthday. A couple is coming to visit our site the beginning of next week. We will be celebrating my birthday the following weekend with delicious food and horseback riding with our good friend and closest neighbor Kerry and a few others. The week before Christmas we are headed on a short camping trip to the Ngwempisi Gorge followed by a Christmas party at our country directors house on chrismas eve. And most exciting, shortly after our fun filled December we will be meeting the Kiker parents in South Africa!!! We often feel guilty leaving our site. Since school has been out there is literally nothing going on, so I guess this a good time to fo it.

Good news regarding our stolen stuff. The insurance came through and Kevin and Fiona will be able to bring replacements when they come at the end of this month.

I've been sewing curtains and pillow covers for our house. It's so nice to have my machine! Thanks mom for the birthday funds to buy it! Lewis is Aldo working on more projects. He built planter boxes for our porch so we can plant flowers. And now that I have a machine I need a work station . That will be next on the list.

That's all I can think of for now. I'm sad to have to blog without pictures:)
lots of love from the swaz.

Ruby is reading: just finshed The Star of the Sea by Joseph O'conner. Now reading Commited by Elizabeth Gilbert and The Invisible Cure by Helen Epstein
Lewis is reading: just finished Founding Father by Richard Brookhiser. Now reading The Compant We Keep by Robert & Dayna Baer

we've definitely been going through the books since our computers were stolen!

Let the Sewing Begin!

2011-11-29T00:24:00.000-08:00

In Manzini buying my very own Swazi Singer Sewing Machine! Can't wait to get home :)

Thanksgiving, Theft and IST

2011-11-26T23:04:00.000-08:00

Highlights:

- A week away from site in Mbabane with our fellow volunteers.
- Thanksgiving at the US Ambassadors house.
- The theft of our two computers and camera.
- Running for 'office' on PSN and VAC and winning! Lewis is now part of PSN (a Peer Support Network) and I am one of two VAC members. VAC is basically the liaison to PC Staff on the part of the rest of the volunteer community. Kind of cool eh!?
- A movie at Swaziland's only theater.
- BBQing at a backpackers with friends.
- Relaxing by the pool.

It was a good week, for the most part. Today we will be returning to site and will have to get back into the swing of things. We'll see how it goes :)

Thats all I got!
Communication will be very minimal over the next month due to our lack of computers.

Lots of love,
Ruby & Lewis

Swazi Running Club?

2011-11-14T22:45:00.000-08:00

It's been a little over five months since we arrived and just barely three since we were deposited at our site and I have finally started running! I decided, for motivational purposes, to follow a half marathon training guide that was given to us in our pile of Peace Corps manuals. I've never used a schedule before while training, relying primarily on my own ability to push my self when needed, however this wasn't working here and I needed some assistance. The schedule is 14 weeks long at 6 days a week. Four days are normal runs, one is sprinting and the other is cross-training. This is my second week. I am mostly using it to get me back into a routine, but it's been fun to change it up a bit and have days of just sprinting, etc.

Our neighbors weren't sure what to think of me running back and forth in front of their houses and never really going anywhere. I tried to explain to them that I was practicing speed.

Everyone comments on me running now and I have even had some requests from a few young girls to take them out for a run.

Yesterday evening, once it started to cool down, I headed off to find them and go for our first group run. It was hilarious. They were so excited that it took them 20 minutes to get dressed in, what looked like toddler clothes - just a little too tight around the bums and barely coming down far enough to cover their tummies - and find a handful of tattered shoes that they passed around until everyone was happy with how their pair fit. In the end, I had a good crew of four girls and two boys.

We hurried up the hill from their homestead to the main dirt road to begin our run. We had decided to run down the hill to say hello to 'Mandla' (lewis) and then back up the road to their house. It was probably only a mile +, but I was scared the really skinny ones might not make it. They loved it! They wanted to race me, they made sure we RAN back into the homestead so Gogo (grandma) could see them, I showed them how to stretch, we made a date to go again on Wednesday and when I was leaving they said "Ncobile, thank you for coming to exercise us". I think I might have started a new running club! Next time I'll have to have Lewis take a picture.

PS.....FORGOT TO ADD OUR READING LIST.

Ruby is reading: The Joys of Motherhood by Buchi Emecheta (not what it sounds like :)

Lewis is reading: Freedom by Jonathan Franzen

The End of Integration!

2011-11-10T05:23:00.000-08:00

- Our integration period (3 months) is officially over and all restrictions have been lifted! We were previously only allowed to be away from our site one night per month. It wasn't a huge issue, just minimally annoying at times when it proved to be highly inconvenient. We are happy to have 'graduated' from that stage and are now official volunteers!

In the next week and a half we will finish up assessing our community, write up our findings and be off to Mbabane on the 19th for a week worth of training. Although we are adjusting to life here in our community, we are looking forward to a week away with our fellow volunteers. IST (in service training) will also - hopefully - provide us with some valuable resources and information on opportunities we can bring to our community. The next stage begins! In other news....Lewis got a new hat :)

- The garden is GROWING! It had a rough start, but we are seeing growth from day to day. It's exciting to watch. The Squash patch, especially, has taken off. We have a row of yellow crookneck, a row of zucc's, a row of spaghetti squash and a row of melons which is still small. You can also see strings going up the fence. We are hoping that our beans will begin there vertical accent using them. It's all a process.

The squash flowers have just started to bloom in the last few day's
Can't wait to start eating them! We had fresh swiss chard with our burger patties last night. They were surprisingly tender. They are still slightly small, still young, that must be why. Yum!

- Yes I know....more pictures of radishes and pizza. I just think radishes are such a beautiful veggie and we're still having fun with our many pizza creations. The picture of me is mostly for my mom, so she can see my face :)

- See! They are so bright and cheery. The Swazi's have never seen them before and are a little turned off by their distinctive spicy flavor, but I think I have a few converts.
- Caramelized onions, zucchini and mustard green pizza with homemade garlic ranch and sriracha from home. Mmmmm.....
Miss you all,

Ruby & Lewis

PS....another couple here always lists what they each are currently reading. That's fun right?

Ruby is reading: A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

Lewis is reading: Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo

Garden Goods and Other Culinary Adventures......

2011-10-30T00:27:00.000-07:00

When life gives you radishes......eat a ton! Our radishes and mustard greens are going crazy in the garden. I planted the radishes in a few different plantings to space out the harvest. Glad I did; we can barely keep up with the first round as it is. I'll have to make some neighbor garden bags to give out to keep up with it.

- In the meantime they have booth made deliciously crunchy and spicy garnishes to 'ramen' style soups, cole slaw and stir fry's. There is nothing better than fresh veggies from our own labor.
- In other food news....sorry, I can't help my self.....I successfully made a 'pan' pizza. I didn't have high hopes for this pizza and its chances of coming out tasting like a real pizza. It exceeded my expectations by a long shot. I took a chunk of dough off one of the two loafs I was making for that day. I let it rise a little, while I made a tomato sauce from caramelized onions, fresh garlic, italian herbs, stewed tomatoes and a little tomato paste. When the sauce had simmered and reduced enough (wish I had had wine to add to this), I heated a pan with a small amount of olive oil and dusted it with corn meal to prevent sticking. The dough was now soft and airy. Instead of trying to roll it I just stretched it a bit to about the size of the pan (this wouldn't of worked as well with a bigger pizza) and plopped it in the hot pan. The bottom got crunchy, I added the sauce, thinly sliced fresh onion, mozzarella, and covered it with a lit to let the cheese melt. It was almost perfect! My only complaint was my inability to broil the cheese a bit and get the top of the crust nice and crunchy. Regardless, it was delicious. Ok...that was a little long to talk about food.
- We had a crazy rain/hail/wind/thunder and lightning storm on Friday. The rain drops were massive and the hail was the size of a quarter. Our garden would of been destroyed if the hail had kept up more than a few minutes. The clouds were amazing afterwords.

It was probably the biggest rain we've had. There are definitely a few leaks in our roof that will need some attention before the next one comes. I'm sure we fared exceedingly better than most houses in the area though. Yikes!

Our weeks of integration are coming to and end and they couldn't come any sooner. It will be so nice to be able to come and go when we want or need. So far we have been ok with the one night a month we have been allotted during this period, but it makes it frustrating on those few times when it would be nice to have the choice to stay an extra one.

Last week was pretty slow for us. I think we were experiencing another dip in our motivation, etc. We tried meeting with the primary school a few different times to work out the simple task of finding a teacher to work with on the library project. Regardless of the low amount of responsibility it will take, no one wants to commit. It's hard to keep going back to blank stares and the lack of progress when we have been promised week after week that the board will meet and make a decision, etc etc. Come on people!

We have been attempting to dig up a lot of information on grants and programs available in this country for various possible projects down the road. This at least makes us feel like we're not completely idle.

We also met with an organization who works with communities in developing permaculture practices among homesteads. We are excited to maybe get connected with them and learn a few things to bring back to our own community. They work with a few different communities for a year with 4 day/month, hands-on work shops. We are hoping to have the chance to volunteer at a few and get involved.

Saturday - yesterday - we met with a couple here in Swaziland that we made contact with via our time in Pasadena. My good friend Erika was good friends with Lisa who's in-laws live here in Swaziland. You know, the way things usually work, round-about. Lisa found out we had been posted here and got us in contact with them. We finally met yesterday in Mbabane and had a fun day exploring Swaziland by car! This is a treat when your life relies on public transportation and everything is harder than it should be. They treated us to coffee and lunch and a day exploring Malolotja, one of a handful of Swaziland's national parks. Swaziland is a small country and it's even smaller in a car. After Malolotja and its amazing array of wildflowers, baboons, blesbok and some crazy, long tailed bird doing some sort of mating ritual, we drove down to see the MaGugu dam just because we could. Turns out they also live a stones throw from the Peace Corps office. They drove us home at the end of the day, relaxed, happy and with a huge bag of avocados in hand. It's a small world and I love it.

Adirondack Style Chairs by Lewis Kennedy Kiker

2011-10-27T10:01:00.000-07:00

- After much time spent dreaming up designs, building strategies, possible structural issues and math equations, Lewis put his mind, muscles and math skills to work and.....snap! Pretty awesome, eh!? He had his doubts, a few minor setbacks and one blood blister. All in all they came out beautifully, especially since each cost about 10 US dollars. Not too shabby.

- They were originally made for the garden. We wanted to have a place to sit and watch our veggies grow with a cup of tea and a good book. Turns out they are pretty nice here too. I think Lew will make two more to have in our "front yard".

- We each have our own!

The Killing of a Pig......

2011-10-24T04:27:00.000-07:00

- The Jele family has been wonderful hosts to us. They are the same family who invited us to come milk their cow and have since had us over on numerous occasions. There are 11 kids on the homestead and they all love to be near us. Here are just a few. The girl in the back in brown speaks very good English and loves to ask questions about the US.

- It was a hot day, so we spent most of it sitting on the porch in the shade with the kids. They loves getting their photo taken.
- The girls are enamored with my hair and always touch it and tell me how beautiful it is. Some thought it was a hair piece. I let them have at it. They couldn't stop oooing and awwwing. Pretty funny.
- My little friend Sondiso. She is pretty funny and usually is walking around with out any pants on.
- Another little lady. Can't remember her name. Notice the two large knives in her hand!
- Killing a pig turned out to be a little more intense than our chicken killing experiences.

The task at hand......catching the squealing pig. The little girls would grab onto the tail through the fence long enough for the person inside to grab it by a back leg and hoist it over the fence by it's hind legs, all the while screaming and reeling to get free.

- Lewis helped 'wheelbarrow' the screeching animal across the yard into the shade of the Gogo hut. The location of the deed about to unfold.

- If you haven't picked up on this already, there was an intense amount of high pitched pig screaming going on. Due to the urgent need for me to plug my ears and the weird feeling I had about photographing such a horrific end to this pigs life, I only got a picture of the end shown below. They wanted Lewis to wield the knife, but he convinced them he would just help hold down the animal instead. This turned out to be traumatic enough. The pig was forced to the ground squealing and held there until it stopped wriggling. He knew what was coming for him. The person with the knife took hold of the head and made a few cuts into the neck to sever the esophagus and major arteries. I wanted to look away, but forced my self to watch. I felt bad that Lewis was being forced to be a part of it and I felt like I owed it to him to witness the same bloody show. The pig laid there, kicking for a few more minutes, as the remaining of it's breath was let out in warm, gurgling, spurts of air released from the gapping wound at it's throat. I was slightly traumatized.

- The pig was then deposited into a wheelbarrow and taken to rest by the outdoor kitchen where we would pour boiling water all over it in order to scrape the top layer of skin and hair from it's body.

- The majority of the work was done with dull knives, but at one point a shovel was used to scrape off big swaths of skin and hair.

- I had recovered from my post traumatic stress and jumped in to help with the processing. I had successfully blocked the previous events from my memory and could now focus on the animal as the source of our afternoon meal. The kids helped too. Most weren't wearing shoes and didn't seem to mind standing in piles of blood and hair.

- Make Jele. The matriarch of the family and the one who graciously invited us for a pig roast. I told her to smile (no one smiles for pictures)....she thought that was pretty funny and started laughing instead.

OUR GARDEN

- In other news......are garden is coming along. It's growing slowly, with the exception of the mustard spinach pictured near the blue barrel. We are hoping to get a few bags of chicken compost from the local chicken farm to tide us over until we can get our own chicken tractor integrated into the garden set up. Regardless of it's ability to actually FEED us, it has been a welcomed activity in our slow pace of life. I usually wake up at 6:30 every morning excited to go check on the garden.

- The baby chicks are hatching like crazy. It's sad when you notice there aren't as many as there used to be....not many survive to adult hood. They could if given a small amount of management. Currently they are just left to fend for themselves and get picked off by hawks and die in the trash pit cause they can't get out. They are pretty cute though.

Almost the Weekend.......

2011-10-20T23:00:00.000-07:00

That used to be so exciting back when it meant something.

Now everyday is pretty much like the last.

Or, everyday has the potential to be whatever you feel like making it.

It's not a bad thing, just a weird feeling.

The anxiety of being idle is starting to slowly slip away.

I don't think I'll ever loose it entirely.

I like to be busy.

I like to accomplish things.

I like to work hard.

Is it strange that I am experiencing more stress now amid my leisurely mornings and 'relaxed' life than I did back home while working three jobs?!

Maybe.

But it makes sense. We need a purpose.

It's hard to find tangible purpose.

I'm promising myself it will come.

Pretending to be productive.....

2011-10-17T06:42:00.000-07:00

- We are getting abnormally good at rationalizing productivity here in Swaziland. This is a good thing for our sanity and the subject of most of our humor. Hopefully it will all translate into something a little more quantitative somewhere down the road. When it comes down to it, Peace Corps is our job and our job requires us to first 'integrate' before any real 'work' is done. Thus, productivity now comes in the form of milking cows with our neighbors, going on long walks around our community where we run into random people and find out random yet pertinent facts about them or the happenings here. Attending wedding ceremonies or soccer games counts as serious 'work' points. Basically, we feel like it has been a good day when we've had the chance for at least one good encounter with someone outside of our homestead that teaches us something about our community. Our entire mindset is forced to change.

Community development is hard! It's hard because it takes an exorbitant amount of patience. It's hard because, if done well, it requires that you throw all your preconceived notions about how you could help someone and what they need out and focus on the almost impossible task of figuring out how to convince them to help themselves. It is one of the most difficult balancing acts between building their capacity without creating dependency. Swaziland's attitude on development was accurately quoted the other day by another PCV, through their actions, it seems like they are thinking "tell me what you have to offer and I'll tell you what I need". They will take anything they can get, even if it's not what they need. The answer to development doesn't lie in how much aid we can give out, it lies in fostering something in people that gives them drive, creativity, ownership, a willingness to invest in their own communities and countries. How are we supposed to teach people to care about those things? We have no idea. But maybe in two years we will be closer to figuring it out. I hope so. In the meantime we will continue sharing meals with them, milking their cows, baking bread for them (to convince them to be our friends :), learning their language, grieving their loss and celebrating their victories. Maybe that will all amount to something in the end.

- In other news.....the before mentioned baking of bread has been a good hobby and delicious.

- I have recently purchased some swazi swag. This skirt is what most of the married women wear except in the form of a dress. The dress version was a little too much for me :) The deep pockets are my favorite. Everyone thinks it's hilarious when I wear it around our community. Just trying to fit in!
Love from the Swaz,

Rubes and Lew

Aphiwe!

2011-10-12T11:12:00.001-07:00

- The perfect gift!

A little boy who DID make it into the world, despite the uncertainty of life here in Swaziland.

- I met Samu when we first came to Nhlulweni. Up until a week ago, she came every Monday and Friday to clean and do the washing at our host family's house. I baked bread today and randomly decided to take her a loaf. When we showed up at her ekhaya with bread in hand, we found her with her new baby boy! She had given birth yesterday afternoon. I was so surprised since she had told me her due date was still a month away and yet it was so perfect and just the encouragement needed after the loss of the week. Walking home we realized we would have the chance to see this little boy grow to be a toddler. I can't wait.

I Cried Today.....

2011-10-10T06:45:00.000-07:00

I was standing in the maternity ward looking at a suitcase packed with little clothes, diapers small enough for a doll, a soft blanket, all the items for a new baby boy.

I started to cry.

The items neatly packed inside would never be used. There was no baby snuggled into the arms of his young mother. She had nothing but a full suitcase, hospital bills and deep, empty eyes. I didn't know what to say.

I met Nonkhululeko a month ago. She was 7 months pregnant and only 18 or 19 years old. She lives with her parents and younger siblings just a stones throw away from us. I had been to her house a few times and would always inquire about her pregnant belly. Her due date was coming up and I joked with her that if she had a girl, she could name her Ruby. She had liked my 'American' name.

Lewis and I were on our way to Mankayane to celebrate another Volunteers birthday. Another next door neighbor was also waiting for the ikhumbi. I asked her what she was doing in Mankayane and she told us that Nonkhululeko had had her baby. A little boy they had named Mukalo. I was so excited and asked if I could go with her to see the baby for a few minutes before I headed to the party. She said it was no problem. Lewis went on to the party (he wasn't allowed in the maternity ward) and I walked with her to the hospital. I was so excited. I had my camera with me and was going to take pictures! Nonkhululeko's mother met us at the entrance. I greeted her and said how happy I was and comment on the fact that she was now a Gogo! She looked at me and said "My grand baby is dead". What!? What happened?!

I later found out that little Mukalo was breach and because there were no doctors on duty, because it was the weekend, the baby had died. This would of NEVER happened in the states. How is there NO DOCTOR all weekend? She was at the second biggest government hospital in Swaziland. This wasn't some rural health clinic. I didn't know what to do. I just stood there, while they talked amongst each other in siSwati, and cried.

Death is very present in every Swazi's life. It seems to be more accepted here due to its frequency, but I can't imagine a mother losing her child could ever be the least bit easy. I just kept thinking of all the expecting mothers I am close to back home. The bond that is created between mother and child from nine months of carrying them inside you is a miracle. To carry a healthy child for nine months and have it die from something so circumstantial, it's maddening.

How will Nonkhululeko ever be able to recover from such loss.

I cried for Mukalo, a little life that will never be lived and I cried for his mother who will never be able to experience the joys he would of brought her. It didn't seem fare.

In light of this loss I give thanks for all the scruffy, pudgy little kids that are running around our community and hope we can help to improve their little lives in some way.

Pictures....

2011-10-08T00:04:00.001-07:00

The highlight of our month (so far)! Two boxes from home made it to Swaziland just in time for our Bacon fix! Thanks Kiker parents and siblings.

We don't usually eat like this, but sometimes it just tastes so good.

- Hahaha.....cooked and packaged bacon. There has to be something wrong with that, but it was delicious :)

- Grilled cheese with bacon bits.

- I've been making tortillas. They're great.

- A few evenings this week we have ventured down to the soccor pitch to check out the happenings. There are three teams in our community and they all meet every evening around 5pm and play till it's dark. Pretty view eh!

- I caught these little guys, maybe three years old, fetching water from the river. They were all by them selves. This is normal. They were clever little guys, very careful to not fall in. Eish!

- The summer rains have begun! Just in time for our garden. We're hoping the hard rains don't wash our seeds away. Mulch for the garden is next on our list.

- And when it rains.....beautiful things happen. We spotted these cool flowers the other day while walking to our neighbors to milk their cow.

- Sondiso! She was adorable and loved sitting in my lap. Her Gogo (grandma) kept joking with her that I was going to take her home with me. I don't think her parents liked that idea. I was relieved :)

- Milking a cow. It's not so hard. A little slippery. They thought it was pretty funny when I told them I used to milk goats and make cheese. Swazi's don't like cheese.

- They have two cows they milk every morning in order to suppliment the diet of 12 children. There are 21 people living on this homestead.

- Lewis gave it a try. With us are Sipho and Sibusiso Jele.

- We ended up spending the whole day with them. They fed us lipalishi and emasi, and a boiled and fried corn snack (like corn nuts, but not as crunchy). It was the first time that someone had really invited us into their home, asked tons of questions and wanted to help us learn siSwati. It was refreshing. We hope to go back soon. They also sent us home with some of the milk and I made vanilla and nutmeg custard. It was amazing. I need to find my own cow to milk every morning and make delicious things.

- Sipho's wife Thembile and assorted children.

- It's been nice to finally make some meaningful connections with the people here.

Love from Swaziland.

Ruby & Lewis

Lewis' Article for the Sojo...

2011-10-03T07:21:00.001-07:00

We have a Peace Corps Swaziland newsletter that is put together monthly. It is called the Sojo and all volunteers are encouraged to submit articles about life in the Swaz. Lewis wrote one such article depicting our time as community bridge builders. Take a look.

Building Bridges with a Bridge
- or -
Independence is Hard Work

Ruby and I were fortunate enough to get dropped into a community that
was already working on some projects. Within our first week, they
started two bridges just down the road from our house. With little
else to do and an eagerness to jump in, we would meander down the road
most mornings to join the work crew. We thought this was a perfect
opportunity to meet many people in the community and show them that we
were serious about working hard and doing what needed to be done. This
is the perfect way to "integrate"...right?

This is a decent-sized project that has been in the works for some
time. It is two bridges that are both two-lane (in-theory) car
bridges. It's alot of work and the government was providing a couple
of "supervisors" and the occasional heavy machinery to help in the
effort. (Side note: for those of you thinking of building a bridge in
your community, not so fast...the MP representing our Inkhundla is the
Minister of Public Works. It pays to know people.)

Day One was "gathering rocks". This literally meant going up the hill
next to the stream, grabbing rocks of all sizes, and chucking them
down the hillside back toward the bridge. Not your typical first step
in building a bridge back home. Over the coming weeks, Ruby and I
would become cement-mixers, water-fetchers, earth-movers, and -
thousands more times than we had hoped to be - rock-movers. This
included rock extraction, loading, unloading, piling, re-piling,
re-re-piling, and occasionally sending them to their final resting
place.

Along the way, we met many people. Community members of all shapes and
sizes came out and pitched in. It was a great way to introduce
ourselves to the community. We had some great conversations with many
new friends and someone even asked me if I was "castrated". That was a
bit alarming until I realized he was asking about circumcision.

It ended up also being a great way for the community to introduce
itself to us. For better or worse, this was largely our introduction
to the Swazi work ethic. It gave us a glimpse into what we might
expect over the next two years as far as dedication, sweat equity, and
participation. Admittedly, there were many times we were left wanting.
Ruby and I both pride ourselves on being hard-working people, but
unfortunately there were more than a few times where we were literally
the only ones working. My own work style is something like a
'controlled-choas', which is basically throwing crap around and
getting shit done. Here, for some, the work style is at times more
like "I'll do it if its not too hard, otherwise maybe someone else
will do it".

Some days, it felt like the local turnout was just there for the free
lunch. My cynicism about their lack of participation often crept in,
which usually made me just work harder. Then they would see me working
hard and come over and say "Mandla, its time to rest, you are working
too hard." The response in my head was usually something like "Come
on, we just got here!" Ruby and I would keep at it, usually to no
avail, and voice our grumblings on the walk home. Trying not to get
too negative about it, we would focus our efforts on the few that were
working very hard. This included a few bobabe, bomake, bogogo,
bomkhulu, and the occasional person our own age.

Despite many frustrations, there were many bright spots as well and
the whole experience was encouraging. The dude in charge (who I
nick-named "The Professor" on account of his crazy hair and beard,
toothless smile, and his ever-present 'lab-coat') was a great leader.
He would often shout encouragements with English phrases like "start
strong and finish strong!" A couple days ago, during one of the many
lulls in the activity, he told everyone, "We must work hard if we want
to be independent! Independence is HARD WORK!" In my head, I was like
"Hell yea dude!!! It is hard work. Lets keep that in mind and get this
done!" Unfortunately the response to that comment from a
twenty-something worker was "I've never worked this hard in my life! I
am humiliated!"

Baby steps, I thought to myself. There are those here that truly
understand what it means to work hard and who care about themselves,
their situation and their country enough to do what it takes. Indeed,
many of us know Swazis exactly like that and are blessed with the
opportunity to work with them everyday. Unfortunately, there are also
those who feel overwhelmed with the hopelessness of their situation
and have resigned themselves to the sidelines to see how this thing
plays out. How are we to help those who really don't seem that
interested in helping themselves?

This is a question we will all be battling with for the next couple
years, and probably the rest of our lives. In this work, there will
sometimes be low turnouts, lukewarm receptions, and a lack of
interest. But there will be small victories as well.

In the end, we have two bridges that are nearly done, even if it is
three weeks past the deadline. Our community has accomplished
something. And we were able to help a little bit. Things just take
longer here. ALOT longer. We will identify those who will be the real
movers and shakers and our time here will not be in vain. Our purpose
will make itself more clear and those we will change will make
themselves known in time.

Also, when lifting some of the rocks that were probably 150 pounds, I
may or may not have pooped my pants a little bit. Peace

A Swazi Garden.....

2011-09-30T03:25:00.000-07:00

We got our garden going! One of the benefits of moving to the Southern Hemisphere is that we got to our site just in time to start a spring garden. This is something we had planned on for several months. We brought a bunch of seeds with us from home and even sought some consultation on whether or not it would work to plant them here or if they might interfere with the genetics of the local flora. We got the OK and much of it is in the ground.

We hope that we can build this up to be a successful project because we would love to use it as a teaching tool for the locals homsteads around here to expand their own gardens. Almost everyone has a decent understanding of farming and gardening here, but we're hoping to introduce a few new techniques and try to improve on their lack of diversity in produce. We're planning on building a chicken tractor and using it to improve the soil and get some compost going.
- This is a 'before' picture of our garden. Much of the soil was rock hard and had to be worked several times over the period of a couple weeks. Also notice the wheelborrow of cow dung! We worked hard gathering load after load to add to our new space.

- And here is an 'after' picture. It doesn't look like much but the rains are coming soon and everything will perk up. Lewis built the fence complete with a nice gate. There's a shade structure on the left for starts and for our future 'garden gazebo'. We are still in the process of building the beds and setting up the layout.

- The chickens are already scheming to try to find a way in...

- Our gate and shady sitting area.

- A few plants popping up already. Swazi versions of spinach and green peppers

-Some of Ruby's masterful creations. Even with the limited access to fruits, veggies, and pretty much everything, Ruby is still whipping up delicious cuisine!!!

- Our babe prepping the meat for our Saturday night Brai, a great tradition all over Southern Africa.

The meat on the barbie!

We miss you all. Keep us up on all the fun things you are doing :)

Love from swaziville.

Ruby & Lewis

Swazi Blogs

2011-09-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

In case you are interested in other people's Swazi adventures, I have added a list of some of our group 9's blogs to the right.

It's Raining....

2011-09-21T23:40:00.000-07:00

The weather has been finicky for the last few days. It sprinkles in the evenings and is partly cloudy during the day. Today it finally started to really rain. Not the torrential down pour we keep hearing about characteristic of Swazi summers, but definitely wet. I can't wait for the summer storms to start. I think I will be able to handle the rain here (I hate the rain in OR). From what we've heard, it pours for a day or two and then is hot and sunny again. There are also supposed to be serious bouts of lightning and thunder during these periods of crazy weather. I also loved it when it got really stormy back home. It's the persistent, cold, grey, drippy drizzle that's annoying.

The one thing that has the potential to get annoying is having a tin roof in such circumstances. We had a few rains last month during the night. They were so loud on our tin roof, that Lewis could barely here me yelling from a six inches away while laying in bed. It was hard to sleep even with earplugs. Waiting for unreliable public transportation in the rain may also turn into a problem :)

We are still working on our bridge. It was scheduled to be finished on Friday, but these things never finish on time. However, I think we may have seen the end of most of the grunt work yesterday. We have been collecting and moving stones for, I can't even count, how many weeks now. It's definitely getting old. Yesterday all the stones were more the size of boulders. Lewis and I and an 80 something year old Mkhulu (grandpa) moved probably four flat beds full of boulders yesterday by ourselves. For the most part we have a relatively hard working group of people, but sometimes they are really good at just standing there and watching you work. My favorite is when the person who isn't doing anything is telling the other people what to do, how and how fast. I got a little snappy yesterday when one of them started throwing a few rocks around, got bossy telling us ladies to get working, and then once we did, stopped working himself. Yikes, I'm getting all worked up again just thinking about it :)

Despite all that, it has been the perfect way to get to know people. We are there almost every day and people see that we are willing to work hard with them on something that has no benefit to us. I think they really appreciate our presence and it has hopefully laid a foundation of respect that will be beneficial in future projects with the community. Building bridges with a bridge :)

We also had the chance this week to meet and talk with the deputy teacher at our primary school. This came at the perfect time. We were feeling a little lost and discouraged about our purpose here. It's amazing how encouraging one person can be who has a little drive of their own and the desire to make change happen in their own environment. I think he will turn out to be a key counterpart. We have already talked about starting a library project, painting a world map on the school wall (like in Senegal) and the possibility of getting together with students once a week for sports or an English club. Can't wait to get started :)

Hmm....well. It's only 9:17am. I have already eaten breakfast, checked all my emails, facebook, posted a blog, had two cups of coffee and tea, finished my book, study some siSwati, thought about what to make for lunch.....now what?! We aren't working on the bridge today due to the weather. I REALLY wish I had a sewing machine.

Lots of love from the Swaz!

Rubes and Lew

Food!

2011-09-17T01:23:00.000-07:00

Don't worry, we're still eating well!
I've been enjoying the challenge of cooking with limited supplies and hardly any gadgets. We can get fresh things like lettuce, cabbage, spinach, carrots and some tomatoes in our community. Our local sitolo also sells bread, frozen chicken, salt, flour, sugar, eggs and a random assortment of other things. We try and frequent the local shop for little things. We do this mostly to have a reason to go on a walk, be seen and support a local business. Everything else we buy in town once a week.
- My failed hummus turned garbanzo, peanut, chicken soup over steamed broccoli.

- Beets are also readily available. I love them boiled and sliced on salads. Or dipped in homemade garlic dressing. My new favorite dressing: Mayo, rice vinegar, honey, fresh minced garlic, a dash of cayenne, chili flakes and S&P. Yum! It also works well on canned tuna.

Our family has an oven and I have a lot of time, so I have also been doing a bit of baking. It's surprisingly fun, especially since I have no measuring utensils or a beater :)

Lots of love

Ruby

House pictures...............

2011-09-17T00:54:00.001-07:00

I don't know if I will ever be able to upload pictures from home. They might have to be a every few weeks occurrence. Bummer.
I am in Manzini today after an evening at Malandela's House on Fire. We met up with a bunch of other PCV's for a night away. Good food and a dance party. I miss eating out!
This week was also the tail end of our bridge project. They were supposed to be finished on Friday, now it's Monday. Lots of pics of that too, but it's on our other computer that I don't have a cord for. Dang.
Not sure what we will do once the bridge is done. That has been keeping us busy. I am hoping to visit a clinic in the next community over and see if I can't volunteer there once a week. We also wanted to meet with the teachers and find out what we can do at the primary school. School started Monday after some uncertainty and almost weekly teacher strikes and was dismissed again on Tuesday until further notice. Our options are pretty slim, but I'm sure something will come up.
K....here are the pictures!

-Here is our kitchen. Lewis built it!

- We cook on a gas stove that PC gave us. The legs fell off so I had to prop it with empty coffee cans. Also displayed is the coffee grinder my mom sent! So delicious to have real coffee every morning :)

- We still don't have a fridge, so I store most veggies and other cold things on the floor. The cement stays pretty cool so far. We'll see how well that works once summer kicks in.

- My dresser. We used the benches we made to fold clothes on etc. It's simple, but I'm pretty happy with it's functionality and look.

- Our "closet"............just a stick hung from our rafters with string. And Lew's bench of clothes. The only probably we have right now is storage. There is no where to shove things we don't want to see every day. I think we will get some feet for the bed, so we can shove it under there.

That's it for now. Next on the list is a desk area in the main room and another little area in the kitchen to put our dish bins for washing. We're still washing dishes on our knees :)

Losing A Friend

2011-09-14T22:53:00.001-07:00

Peace Corps training is kind of like camp. Weeks of constant time spent with a lot of people you don't know. It's awkward at first (at least for me, since I'm not super outgoing). Everyone has their own strategies of broadcasting who they are. Clicks and drama are inevitable.

I tend to observe for a good part of the time and let things run their course before I insert, in any real way, into the web of connections. Or the opposite happens and I am pushed into a friendship by means of proximity.

This is how Lewis and I made friends with Nicole from New Jersey! We were all placed in the same village during training and her homestead was a short 2 minute walk down a grassy track from where we lived. It was meant to be.

Somehow I seem to get lucky like this. The process of making our new friend was accelerated and made easy by Nicole's own nack for making friends! We didn't really have to do much. She was funny, we were nice and we lived close to each other. We also happened to be in the same language group.

So it began. We spent many an evening eating popcorn and talking about peace corps life. We helped her kill a million earwigs in her hut after the rains came. We indulged in our mutual love for gluttony by eating King Pie and KFC in tandem and had push up contests in our hut out of shear boredom.

Training ended and we were sent to opposite sides of the country. Although unfortunate, Swaziland is so small it wouldn't be hard to see each other fairly often. A month at site passed, Peace Corps life settled in, a number of unfortunate circumstances took place with her site, family, etc and our special friend Nicole from Jersey decided it didn't feel right and made the decision to go home.

Noooooooo! My friend left! It makes me sad, but I'm glad she had the courage to make the tough decision and will be much happier pursuing other options.

We were lucky for the chance to get to know her and the story won't end here.

See you stateside Linde Mats. We're going to miss you here in the Swaz.

Lots of love,

Ruby & Lewis :)

Well this is frustrating!

2011-09-11T09:31:00.001-07:00

I'm not happy at all with the fact that I can't seem to get pictures to load from home, no matter how small I make them. I hate blogging without pictures! Nobody cares what you have to say if you can't provide some visuals, or at least it's way less interesting. I still haven't given up!

Today we started planning our garden! Our family gave us a plot of land, right near the water tap, that we have permission to utilize. The area has been measured, fence has been priced and we started turning the soil today. We don't REALLY know what we are doing, but we are excited to give it a go. We took the wheelbarrow and shovel out today to hunt for cow pies to use as fertilizer and work into the soil. We found 4 wheelbarrows full and were able to till almost half of our garden space. The chickens were loving all the bugs we brought in with the cow pies and started going nuts! Hopefully they will assist us in further fertilizing :) I think we will also get a few chickens for laying eggs and setup a chicken tractor type system in the garden. I am currently going through a book my mom sent me, called the Resilient Gardener, by Carol Depp. She happens to be from our very own CORVALLIS, OR. It's a wealth of information and should be very helpful. I think we can make some good things happen if we give it some time and attention. Can't wait!

We are still working hard with our community on their bridge. It is coming along amazingly well and is supposed to be completed by the 16th, this friday. That is when the government will pull out and stop funding the project. I think it will mostly be completed and what little is left will be continued even after the funding has stopped. We were very lucky to come into a project, like this, in our first month here. It has gone a long way in helping us meet people and start friendships.

I visited a woman last week that I met on the bridge project. She lives just two houses up from us and has five children. Her name is Khanyisile Simelane. I like her a lot.

On our way to town yesterday we walked by our neighbors. They had killed a goat and were having a "party"! Khanyisile was there and invited us in. It was actually the homestead of Mkhulu Jele, one of the inner counsel members. We had met him several times at umphakatsi meetings and worked with him on the bridge. He was excited to have us visit. We were given goat liver from the brai (BBQ) and goat intestine over lipalishi (maize meal porridge, kind of like polenta). Lewis had to excuse himself once to spit out some liver and it was all we could do not to gag after each bite of goat intestine broth over lipalishi. Eating the actual intestine would of definitely made us hurl. It tasted and smelled overwhelming like poop. Definitely a cultural experience! Despite the poop and porridge though, we loved being there with the people. Those are the times we actually feel like we are accomplishing something. It's slow going, but I think we will grow to love the people here in Nhlulweni.

But we miss you all everyday and it's been more difficult than expected to be so far away.

Ruby & Lewis

What about this one!?

2011-09-11T01:10:00.000-07:00

Did this photo take?

Photo Test!

2011-09-07T22:51:00.000-07:00

Testing! My first photo uploaded from our kitchen table. Did it work?!
If so, check out the awesome kitchen unit Lewis built. It was finally finished last Sunday and it makes everything so much better!

Mostly Pics....

2011-09-01T04:16:00.001-07:00

We are in Mbabane today. We came into town to attend a workshop on Microprojects. It's an EU organization with possible grant money for Farmer Co-ops, Women and Youth projects and Electricity Schemes. Since we were already here and always up for a hot shower, we headed to the Peace Corps Office to take advantage of the new lounge. Wireless, hot showers and a library. Not bad.
This week has been full of actvity. We spent Sunday night at Legends, a backpackers in Lobombo, attended the Reed Dance the next day, had amazing pizza and chinese and went home happy. Tuesday our first house guests, Nicole and Kayla, spent the night with us and Wednesday we got a package from home! Thanks Mom! The coffee grinder is awesome!

-The amazing pizza.....I wasn't expecting it!
-Shared with other PCV's

- Waiting for the Reed Dance to get going....

We met up with a number of other PCV's at the Reed Dance.

- There were 80,000 girls attending the Dance this year....from all over Southern Africa.

- Just a picture I wanted to throw in here.....a shot of our homestead from the closest hill. Ours is the grey house.

- And this is Nhlulweni...it's quite spread out.

- Thinking about you all...

Ruby and Lewis

Swazi Tech....

2011-08-29T11:27:00.000-07:00

Big news on the home front. We now have a connection to the world wide web that does not require us to take two khumbi rides to Manzini to spend an hour catching up on our internet duties! It is however a slow connection. I have yet to determine its ability to download photos and Skype. Yeah, Skype probably won't happen. BUT we will be able to respond to emails sooner than a week later and stay in touch by facebook. Very exciting :)

Ruby

Our New Home.........

2011-08-24T23:40:00.000-07:00

We have made a safe and relatively easy transition into our new community. We have been here for almost a week now (probably longer by the time I am able to post this) and it looks like it will be a good fit. However, it’s almost impossible to know what our experience will actually translate into in the months and years to come. We are optimistic!

There are so many unknowns during this early stage. What I can accurately share with you though, is our physical environment. We are positioned in the Manzini region about 45 minutes South West of the City of Manzini just south of the Lusutfu River. This puts us a few kilometers down a dirt road off the MR3 with Malkerns and Makayane a 15 minute drive each in either direction. I supposed this is only interesting if you have a map to reference.
We were excited as we drove south from Mbabane last Wednesday. Not having been able to go for OJT (where we would have been able to see our new home), we had not a clue what our area of the country would look like. One thing about Swaziland, which is easy to forget, nothing is very far from the other. It’s kind of like living on an island. We left early on Wednesday and arrived within the hour. We were the first of our transport group of four to be dropped off. We followed the little lorry (British terms for things are often used here in Swaziland, like lorry for truck and a queue for a line) that carried all our belongings, stuffed under a large blue tarp, beside the Mlilwane game park, past the fertile Malkerns Valley and along the beautiful Lusutfu River towards our destination. The land changed from dense shrubby trees and thick vegetation as we drove south, into rolling hills of sun tanned grass. The MR3 dipped low to cross the Lusutfu and we were quickly met with our nondescript turn off at the next crest of the hill. We turned right onto the red dirt road. There was nothing. Brown grass, lots of it, an intense blue sky and a few scattered homesteads sparsely dotted among the low hills. Which one would be ours? The little white bus jostled on, over the first few dips and crests. The homesteads continued in their spacious sprawl of the land and there didn’t appear to be any real “center” of town. We past a large newly built home of yellow with a smaller grey house on the side. I had a feeling it was the one, but we kept on driving. Our Swazi PC staff spoke rapidly into the phone to our new family on the other end for a few minutes and the little bus stopped and turned around back towards the large yellow house. It was the one…our new home…for the next TWO YEARS, such a strange thought. Our homestead was gated, new and open. It was positioned towards the base of one of the small hills near a little river. We had arrived. It took only a few minutes to unload. All our randomly packed items and loose buckets surprisingly made it the length of our many stops from Mashekesheni to Nhlulweni over the last five days. We piled it all into our empty, clean two room house, locked the door and took a walk. Our new Babe is in his late 40’s and his name is John. He is a quiet, thoughtful and kind person. He took us down our new dirt road, past the primary school, into the little sitolo (store) and up the hill to our new kaGogo center (community center). It was a beautiful view out over our small community. We sat a moment and stared. The anxious feelings of uncertainty in our abilities to accomplish something here, crept up as we scanned the expanse of homes; and along with it, the excitement of facing a new challenge was also there.

It is now day six and we have accomplished a good deal. We’ve taken a few walks into the community practicing our siSwati as often as possible. We met with our counterpart on his homestead, watched him milk a cow and prepare a shipment of honey (luju) for market. Saturday, we were introduced to the inner counsel during an official meeting. Twice I wondered over to our neighbor, who has a small garden (ingadze), and bought lettuce. We made a trip to Manzini where we purchased items for our new house, one being a new bed. And over the last two days we have constructed a table and two benches from wood lying around the home stead. A kitchen counter shelving unit is next on our construction list! Lewis is loving thinking up simple designs we can tackle ourselves. So far we have been successful.

Today (Monday, August 15th) we had planned on walking up the hill to the kaGogo center to meet with our counterpart, instead we are huddled in our house reading, writing and practicing siSwati due to the incessant rain. It is slow getting started. Good thing we have two years to make something happen :).

P.S. Turns out it’s harder than we had hoped to find internet close by. The week has passed and I am just now able to post from Monday. We had an “eventful” (eventful is a loose term in the context of our lives here.) week. Monday, as I mentioned, was horribly cold and wet and we barely made it outside the whole day. All of Nhlulweni seemed to come to a standstill.

Tuesday began to warm up, but the sun was still not bright. We ventured out to visit another volunteer stationed 20 minutes down the road from us in Mankayane. It would be our first site visit thus far. A couple from two groups before us (G7) was also meeting us there. They live a good hour’s walk north of us in a neighboring community and had been in Swaziland for the last two years. It was exciting to hear about their time here and successful projects they had help implement in their community. After sitting in our house all day Monday, with less than a week in our community and feeling slightly at a loss, it was encouraging to hear again what we knew, but is easy to forget….it all takes time! Our first three “integration” months will be SLOW. It is less about what we DO and all about WHO we start to make relationships with.
After a good afternoon of hanging out with fellow Americans and a quick jaunt into town for a few things, we found ourselves, at 4:15, waiting for a khumbi that wouldn’t be back by for another hour. Timing is difficult when your bus runs less than 4 times daily. It was cold, so we decided to walk and get the khumbi on its way back by, if we didn’t get home first. We made it….

The sun was finally out again Wednesday morning, but it was still cold. We spent the morning at ease, as our first task of the day wasn’t until 11. We were meeting our counterpart in order to find out more about our community. We made our way up the hill to the kaGogo center which takes a good 25 minutes. He showed at 11:45, which was expected and actually pretty good; it’s Africa! We set up a plan for the next week to start going from homestead to homestead to meet everyone and do a simple survey. There are 350 homesteads in Nhlulweni, so it will take some time! We also had the chance to find out more about the community and what was happening on a weekly basis, what NGO’s (like World Vision) had a presence here and what some of the projects are that have already made initiated. Basically they need: water, electricity, a bridge, a school and a clinic…just a few things :) We were happy to know that people were talking, scheming and wanting change. We also found out that our counterpart would later be cutting wood at the “mill”, later that day, with his brother. We had been wanting to buy some wood to start our kitchen project, so we walked home for lunch and headed over to see what “the mill” was. You never know here :). They were indeed cutting boards out of gum trees. They had two old pieces of saw mill equipment sitting on the side of a hill. There were 8 guys and a few logs, it was quite the production. There’s no doubt the ordeal broke every safety protocol. We ordered eleven, 2 meter planks of pine for our kitchen.

Thursday we picked up our wood on foot. My shoulder is still sore! Lewis built a shoe rack with free droppers and we dinked around. Friday our community development meeting got canceled, Lewis did a few errands with our Babe and I spent the day making beef broth, stew, cookies, helping Lewis start the kitchen counter and getting to know the 19 year old girl who works on our homestead. Today we are off to an inner council meeting that we won’t be able to understand and then into town for supplies for our Kitchen project and INTERNET.

P.P.S…once again...things didn’t go as planned. Our meeting Saturday started later than it should have and went longer than we had hoped.

We had our first dinner guest last Saturday after the umphakatsi meeting. I made a beef and yam stew that had been simmering all day, sauteed cabbage and lipalishi (the Swazi staple). Our guest turned out to be the only Swazi vegetarian in the whole country! Dang!

Sunday we spent the whole day hiking with a volunteer couple from the next community over. We left in the morning to meet them on highest point between our houses. Things were a little more confusing than had been explained on the phone and we nearly ended up missing them as we each headed for a different hill top. Luckily Lewis spotted them at a distance and we were able to catch up. They took us back over to their side of the hill, feed us delicious food and showed us their set up. It’s always fun to see how other volunteers live.

Our community is building a bridge. We helped most of Monday carry rocks from one side of a hill to the other. My body is sore. There were Gogo’s (grandmothers) that worked harder and longer than I did, without gloves, in the heat. It’s good to be humbled.

Yesterday, Wednesday, we finally started our homestead surveys. We left the house early, around 7:20 to stop by the bridge and help for a bit before we were supposed to meet Alex (our counterpart) at 9:00. We had been told people would be starting work at 7:00. No one was around, so we decided to explore. We hiked up the main hill above the primary school which provided a good view of Nhlulweni. A boy, around 13, befriended us along the way. He disappeared at one point and returned later on during our walk. He had retrieved his passport and wanted us to take a look. His name is Philani. I practiced my siSwati with him regardless of the fact that he spoke English very well.

We ended up visiting three homesteads. A slow start, but that was expected. We introduced our selves in siSwati. Told them why we were here and asked them a few questions like: “What is the head surname at the homestead”, “how many people live here”, “how many children”, “where do they go to school”, “where do you access water”, “do you have electricity”, “what do you like most about your community”, “what would you like to see change”, “what community activities are involved in”, etc etc. On a whole, the greater purpose of this exercise is to give us a chance to introduce our selves to as many people as possible and let them know why we are hear.

It’s Thursday and we have finally made it into Manzini where we can access internet. Today we are hoping to find a wireless USB connection that we can buy for our laptop. This will allow us to have access at HOME at ANYTIME. I can’t wait!
K…..that was a long update. Here are some pictures of our new home :)

- Our new house! It's a lot nicer than we expected. On the right is our Babe's Garage. The left side that protrudes is a single room not in use and we have the middle area plus a second room at the back of the left section.

- Another angle. The chicken coop is there on the right as well as our latrine.

- Our compound from the gate. You can see the main house here and the pig pens to the right. Our house is directly behind the main house.

- This is what our area looks like. Wide open.

- Lewis made an awesome bench for our bedroom. We each have one to put our folded clothes on.

- Here is our dining area. We decided to make a "lounge" area with a low table and pillows instead of buying chairs. We like it so far. And have become much more flexable having to get up and down to sit on the ground.

- This was also constructed by Lewis.....our multipurpose area by the door. It's been fun thinking up things to build!

- This is our current kitchen set up. The family let us borrow these two tables. Our new kitchen will be coming soon. We are waiting for some more wood. But here is where I cook for now, either kneeling or sitting on the ground :)

- A few nights ago, our Babe showed up at our door with THIS! A huge platter of beef. We have since been given a second platter. I have some marinating at home as we speak. Yum.

- Lewis had the chance to de-head his first chicken. It's harder than you would think cutting off a chicken's head with a dull knife.

Swearing In.....

2011-08-09T06:40:00.001-07:00

We are now in the capital of Mbabane (pronounced phonetically if you aren’t white), starting today (Sunday) until Wednesday, for our last section of PST (Pre-Service Training); the swearing in ceremony. These next couple of days, signifying our transition from PST to real PCV’s (Peace Corps Volunteers), will also be accompanied by the very real, physical transition from our temporary host site to our permanent home. We have already moved our things from hut to truck, truck to room at Ngwane College, room to truck/bus, truck to room in Mbabane, room to designated transport piles and on Wednesday, back into truck and then truck to hut. WOW! I’m surprised our things have made it this far, especially since moving boxes are NOT part of this picture. Buckets and tubs are quickly transformed into “boxes” with a little help from pillow cases, string and duct tape. Space efficiency is quickly lost when you are trying to pack round pots and pans in oval wash basins. BUT….we’ve done it.

Tomorrow we will be split into town groups for a tour of Mbabane. We are accompanied by one Group 8 (We’re G9) PCV who will take us on a tour of the Peace Corps Office, the Swazi Post, our new Bank, the bus terminal, etc. Tuesday will be our swearing in ceremony at the Mountain Inn in Mbabane (which is supposed to be swanky). This year is supposed to be an especially fancy year for the ceremony since we will also be celebrating PC’s 50 anniversary. Swaziland’s Prime Minister and the US Ambassador will be present. Tuesday night is the PCV’s night to celebrate our new found freedom, quickly, before we are shipped out to the last mile, early Wednesday morning. It’s going to go quick! We’re almost there J

Stepping back a few days, this last week has been a special time with our host family as we prepared to move on. They were sad to see us go and made us promise we would visit. Our Make told us “I am not very angry you are leaving, because you will not be far”. She also reminded us that we were “born” into Swaziland on their homestead and we were not allowed to change our names. We promised to stay Ncobile and Mandla until Swaziland was no longer our home. So it was with tokens of appreciation on both parts, a host family appreciation ceremony at Ngwane College, a mad scramble to load our buckets and tubs into a little Toyota truck as the rest of the trainees waited in the ikhumbi (taxi van) and a bag of avocadoes freshly picked from their tree, that we left Ekhaya ka Mngometulu yesterday afternoon. We were thankful they were so welcoming.

Last week also found us sick for a 24 hour period. It had to of been something we ate. I woke up around 1am with a wicked stomach ache that left me awake most of the night. I finally puked at 5:30am, with violent force, into our dirty dishes basin. Then subsequently lost grip on my bucket for a split second, which sent it sloshing onto the floor next to me. Lewis puked after our bumpy ride to the collage for one of our last days of training, and we felt pretty miserable the rest of the day. We were happy it passed quickly.

We have now officially been sworn in as Peace Corps Volunteers.

Here are the pics :)

- Lewis went traditional! You can't see it, but he also has an impala skin loin cloth thing tied around his waist.

- Our ceremony was held at the Mountain Inn in Mbabane with a beautiful view.
- Receiving our diplomas...we didn't get photos of us at this point.
- Our G9 representatives who gave speeches on our behalf. Tim and Kerry.
- G9

- Waiting for the ceremony to start. Due to the 50th PC anniversary coinsiding with our swearing in, there were video cameras, professional photographers etc.
- Nicole....my closest friend thus far.
- The MEN!
- Our group that was living in our village.

- The ladies of G9.- Newly sworn in G9 PCV's with the Prime Minister, US Ambassador and Peace Corps Country Director.
YIKES! We got dressed up in our Make and Babe's wedding garb....they thought it was pretty awesome. Lewis looks like a warrior (Caelan...I bet you wish you had a weapon like that!).
- I look ridiculous!!! I'm wearing a wig....at least I have a machete!
- Our host brother S'fiso.

- This is the winter kitchen where they have a wood burning stove. We would hang out in this room most evenings.
- Our family photo.
- Some cute cousins...
- I KILLED A CHICKEN!!!!!!! They were going to kill a rooster for our last dinner...I asked if I could try. It was a lot harder than it looked! The knife was DULL....it took some serious strength and sawing.
-They told me to go fast so the blood didn't spurt all over the place.
- I wasn't fast enough!
- Tomorrow we will be in our new village, settling into our new home. I still hope to keep the blog up to date, but we will have to see how far and how reliable our closest connection will be. So there may be a lull between posts to start off. I know you look forward to Saturday's, at least our families do :)
Miss you all,
Ruby and Lewis

2011-07-29T05:25:00.000-07:00

Since our last post….

We met our Swazi counterpart on Monday. His name is Alex, easy to pronounce!, and he is the one that we will begin our work with in our new community. He will help introduce us to the chief, local leaders, teachers, RHMs (Rural Health Motivators) and the general population. He will also be our liaison in traversing matters of siSwati, cultural norms, community events, inner council meetings, etc. We were excited to meet him, start to get to know him and find out what his aspirations for the future of the community were. Peace Corps set up two days, Monday and Tuesday, for counterpart workshops. Most of it was pretty general, like introductions, how to have a successful partnership, what we brought to the table vs. what the community is in need of, etc. There was only one problem…his first day on the job just happened to be the day he came to meet us! He wasn’t all too sure what his role was as a GCM (kaGogo Center Manager – basically a community center with emphasis on health awareness) or what our roles were as PCVs. We’re choosing to look on the positive side and hope that we can all learn together. As long as he is invested in community development, everything else will work out :) It’s also a good opportunity for us to possible have a positive role in his life and development as a community leader. It’s going to be interesting!

In other news regarding our site, we also found out that we will be living with a couple, in their 40’s, who have two kids at boarding school. The mother works as either a nurse or a teacher (not sure yet :) and the father is currently unemployed. They have 3 dogs, chickens and a car, which is a rarity here. We will be living in a two room house on the property that has electricity and is in close proximity to water! And we will be moving there in little over a week! OJT (on the job training), unfortunately did not happen this week, due to a teacher strike, so we will arrive at our site with no preview.

In place of OJT, we were scheduled to do language the rest of the week. This was good preparation for our final language test next week. And they ended up only being half days, with Saturday off! This has given us some much needed down time to take naps, watch movies and spend time with our host families. Today we sat with our host family and asked them about their daily routines. They are a HARD WORKING family. Everyone wakes up at 5am. They do their preliminary chores before school; the kids go to school at 6:45, come home at 3pm and keep working. Imagine if American children had that kind of work ethic!

Today we received an exciting letter in the mail from the Riley’s!!!!! Caelan drew both Lewis and I pictures. Mine was of Princess Ruby and Lewis’ was of Good Prince Warrior Lewis. He also dictated two awesome letters to each of us. He wanted to know what we did in Africa, if we really liked it, if we kissed animals and whether or not Lewis kissed me in Africa. He also told Lewis that he wished he could not move far away, because he loved him and his great big sword! Thanks Kari for taking the time to send them….such a fun update! We loved it! We’ll be sure to respond :)
That’s all for now.

Miss you all,
Ruby & Lewis

- Here are said drawings from our tiny friend Caelan!!

- We got to document Sakhile and S'Fiso slaughtering a chicken a few days ago. They were quick!

- Pouring boiling water over it to loosen the feathers.....it was delicious later that evening. I keep trying to get them to let me have a try next time ;)

-Hand washing laundry is always fun!

- Mexican night with our closest neighbor Nicole from Jersey! - Boredom sets in and you have to improvise....this was a push up contest.

- More house pics.....our little kitchen.

- Our dresser? There isn't anywhere to put anything!!!! So it's all spread out on that thing.

- Our bedroom....aka, the other side of the room.

Any picture requests?

Coming to the End........

2011-07-22T23:46:00.000-07:00

Hey…..
The second half of training is slipping away and we are coming down to the final few weeks here at PST. We are still waiting to find out whether or not we get to do OJT (on the job training) next week. This is a period of a few days set up for us to actually, travel to our new communities with our Swazi counterparts in order to get a feel of our site and be introduced to our new host family. There are a few extenuating circumstances that may not allow us to do so, but we are hoping for the best.

Our language is coming along. It’s overwhelming at times, often confusing and difficult to absorb, when you are taking so much in at once on a daily basis. There are more days than not, when I feel utterly drained. This makes it very unappealing to come home and practice what we’ve learned with our host families. But it’s always so rewarding when we can muster the energy to make conversation. They are very eager to help us practice. Lewis got a lot of laughs from our bosisi (sisters) when we started making up fake sentences with the vocabulary we had recently covered on sickness. One was “Sakhile uphatfwe ngumsheko namuhle” – “Sakhile is suffering from diarrhea today”. Later that evening while sitting by the wood burning stove, we made up fake conversations. Sakhile was an ikumbi (bus) driver (umshayela) and Lewis was a passenger (umghibeli) and another one where Sakhile was a shopkeeper and I was a customer at the market (emakheti). It makes such a big difference in our retention when we actually take the time to practice speaking with our family.

Today we had a medical session on Malaria and a practical application, where we had to prick our own finger and make two slides with our blood on it. If we come down with the symptoms of malaria we are expected to know how to do this in order to get it sent into the clinic for testing. I’m not sure why we have to do it ourselves, but it was a weird experience. Voluntarily puncturing a hole in your own finger is harder than it sounds. It took me a second to get over the overwhelming urge NOT to inflict pain on myself. A few people didn’t take it so well and started to get nauseous and mildly hyper ventilate.

We also were given an assignment today, with one other partner, where we will be going into a primary school to teach a 40min life skills class on the subject of our choice. We are responsible to come up with the topic, make up a lesson plan and lead the class in the activities. Teaching is not my strong point, so this should be interesting. I am paired up with our friend Nicole who lives right down the road from us and we are planning on doing a session on either role models or making goals. I hope the kids don’t get bored. Ha!

Not a whole lot more has happened in the last week. We had a long week of traveling into the training Hub every day, including today (Saturday), where we have been having language and training on learner centered education. Hence the primary school teaching assignment. It’s been tiring this week, but one upside was being able to take HOT SHOWERS at the training center. Bucket bathing just doesn’t do it for you :)

Miss you all tons……here are some more pictures!
Love,
Ru & Lew

- Jenny.....I still think about food all the time and wish you were here to collaborate with :) We've been eating well, somewhat different, but the basics are the same :) Here is a delicious strata I made a few nights ago. I had our Make try it and she LOVED It. - Spicy mac-n-cheese with butternut squash, lewis couldn't get enough. I'll have to say it might of been the best I've made, or maybe it's just that fact that we are hungry all the time :)

- We have some beautiful Agave plants in this area.

- Anele taking her evening bucket bath, no imagine Lewis trying this ;). It's much harder for us!

- Our Make grinding corn in the detached kitchen. She has been sitting in there every evening for the last month, grinding corn for their mealie meal which they use for EVERYTHING.

- Our water tank ran out a few weeks ago and we have been having to fetch water from the river, actually our 14yr old Bhuti gathers most of the water, but Lewis has gone a number of times. But this day, a tractor showed up with water and everyone scrambled to grab any bucket possible to fill.

- I've become the hairdresser of G9. So far have done three cuts :)

- Our grapefruit tree. We have three of them. They are a bit sour, but really good.

- Another of our pigs had babies a few days ago....did I already show this one? They are so cute!

- A beautiful sunrise over our latrine.

Early morning blogging today! Hope you enjoyed it.

Site Placement!!!!!!!

2011-07-16T03:39:00.000-07:00

Exciting NEWS!

Yesterday we FINALLY found out our permanent site placement for the next TWO years! Lewis and I will be the proud “owners” of a tiny two room brick hous e in Nhlulweni, a small rural community in the Manzini region of Swaziland. It’s in the middle-veld, meaning that it’s in the most temperate region of Swaziland. It won’t be the coldest or the hottest. We’ve also been told that it rains a lot in this region is very green and beautiful :) As long as it’s not a grey, dark, cold rain like Oregon, I will be fine ;) It will be somewhere “near” the MR4 which gives us a direct shot to Manzini, the biggest town in Swaziland with lots of amenities and the airport by which you all will be arriving to visit us! Our homestead has electricity AND water on site (not running water). We aren’t “close” to many other volunteers, but Swaziland is such a small country, someone is never too far away. It is also close to a game reserve, the Swazi royal estate and other historical sites. That’s about all the information we have about it for now. We can’t wait to see it! If everything goes according to plan, we will get a chance to make a site visit a week before we are scheduled to move.

Last week we were in the HhoHho region for a permaculture workshop. It was very inspiring. We learned about the fundamentals of permaculture and how to implement these strategies at our site and among our communities. We learned some great tips on soil health, composting/mulching, chicken tractors, organic gardening, companion planting, garden design strategies, etc. One of the books that was recommended to us was written by Carol Deppe of CORVALLIS, OR! So random. Her book is called “The Resilient Gardener”.

Today was a fun afternoon/evening with our bhuti and bosisi (brother and sisters). We made it home from “school” around 4:30 and were told they were down at the river washing clothes. The sun was out, we weren’t ready to retire to our hut and wanted to spend some time with them so we headed towards the river to see if they wanted help. Tyandza, 11 years, was ready to make her way back up the hill with a large basin of clothes on her head. I handed it to Lewis, took the 3 year old Anele on my back and we made our way back up the hill to our homestead. Tyandza was too short to hang the clothes on the line, so she handed me pegs while I hung them. Lewis meanwhile fed the pigs and cut the firewood. Tyandza and I gathered sweet potatoes, washed and started them boiling. It was quickly getting dark and Sakile, age 17, was still not back from the river with her load of clothes, so we headed back down to help her finish up. There were more than she could carry. Sifiso (brother, age 14), Lewis and I all took a basin for the walk back. Lew and I even attempted the head balance. It worked, although we couldn’t let go :) It was fun to accompany them on their everyday tasks. These kids work hard, ALL the time.

We have PHONES now! Pretty exciting! I’m not sure what it costs you to text, but it’s free for us to receive them and only about 25cents to send them. The coverage here is actually pretty reliable and we will hopefully be getting an internet phone at some point in order to have greater access to facebook etc. If you want out number…..ask our families or Jenna :)

Miss you all!
Ru & Lew

OUR NEW HOUSE! This is all they gave us....:)

- Our dinners in the hut get interesting some nights....Beet and apple salad ?!

- Our awesome hut we stayed in on our field trip to Mlilwane. We had an ostrich wandering around.

- A walk through the bush in search of Zebras.....we saw ONE....but it was pretty far away.

- Hippos....they were kind of dissapointing, it was more like a zoo. But still cool.

- A traditional swazi home.....no one lives in these anymore though.

- Our Babe's pig had 6 tiny piglets......SO CUTE. I woke up at 12:30am and 3:am last week to check out the birth.

- On our anniversary! We made nachos :)
So happy now that we are able to post pictures. Blogs are no fun without them :)

Five Years! In Swaziland!

2011-07-09T03:19:00.000-07:00

Hey!

This week marks our half way point in training. Thursday we had “midterms”. We were tested on siSwati, cultural relevant traditions, medical (like when to take PEP if you are exposed to the HIV), how to assemble a gas stove and water filter (that we happen to have already been using for the last three weeks), and we also had the chance to order our CELL PHONES!!! This was very exciting. Lewis and I went with the most basic. Each were 199 Emalangeni (currency - most people actually call it Rand because it is tied to the South African Rand). 199 Rand is about $30 dollars. All that to say, we will be getting our ordered cell phones this Monday and will be able to text and call etc. Exciting!

This Sunday is our first Fieldtrip. Everyone is excited about getting away, taking SHOWERS, being fed, the change of pace and the chance to see more of Swaziland. We get to visit the Mlilwane game park where we will be able to see zebras, hippos, antelope, warthogs, crocs and lots of birds.

Thursday (our testing day) July 7th, we also celebrated out FIFTH Anniversary! We celebrated by going into Nhlangano to eat at King Pie (meat and cheese wrapped in flaky pastries!) AND Kentucky Fried Chicken. Hahaha. I don’t think I had ever eaten at KFC before coming to Swaziland. We also made nachos (for Lewis)….it was a gluttonous afternoon. We also did a recap of our last five anniversaries….1. Two nights at the Canary Pier hotel in Astoria 2. Dinner at Café Bizou in down town Pasadena 3. Angels Camp, CA along the PCT 4. Surprise trip to Hawaii for 10 days and 5. As much fried food as possible in Swaziland, AFRICA. It hasn’t been a boring five years. Maybe next year we will have the chance to travel, Madagascar here we come!

We find out our site placement next week! We had interviews, Thursday, with some of the PC staff. They asked us what type of work we were interested in doing. And if we had any preferences on location, taking into consideration: water, electricity, transportation, weather, proximity to town...etc. I don’t know if it actually dictates where they will send us or if they just want us to feel like our preferences make a difference. Either way we aren’t too worried about it. Wherever we’re sent there will be pros and cons and we will adapt. I am excited to find out though. We will also get the chance to visit our site a few weeks before we are shipped out there. Can’t wait.
Well….here are some pictures…..that’s more fun anyway.

Love Ru & Lew

Some Pictures!

2011-07-09T02:58:00.001-07:00

This is me and my Swazi "Dad" boiling up some aloe and cactus to later feed the cows to get rid of their worms.

Ruby playing a string game with our sisis.

Some of our Peace Corps friends taking in the scene.

This is our homestead. That is our "mom" sitting with Ruby on the step.

This is our hut!

Hopefully we can do a bunch more soon!!!

A Typical Day.....

2011-07-02T03:36:00.000-07:00

Today started off so so cold with lots of wind. We just had our last day of fall and winter in beginning. We skipped summer this year . It’s hard to wake up in a cold room, dress in a cold room and bucket bathe in a cold room in a few inches of water you heated on the stove. But once you get walking, the sun is beautiful and the day quickly warms up to a pleasant temperature. Most days we walk to class at 7:40 to get there by 8:00am. It started to feel like we were little again. Make (mom, K’s sound like G’s) made us our first school breakfast and walked us to the bus (kumbi) stop on our first day of school with our lunches packed away in our little backpacks.
We have two hours of language class in the mornings, tea time (wish biscuits) 10-10:30 and cultural or more language until noon, when we take our lunch. The afternoons change. Sometimes we are taken to Khiza to join another group for technical training or cultural training. Most days we are home around 4:30 or 5:00.

This is usually when we hang out with our family in a little hut detached from the main house where they do their cooking in the winter. The wood fired cook stove keeps us warm until dinner is served in the living room under thick blankets while watching some South African programming like Jika ma Jika (pronounced Jiga), or the news. We normally retire to our gogo hut around 8 to study, read, or just unwind. This doesn’t last long though…..for some reason, we are ALWAYS tired. Most nights we are both out by at least 9:00, if not earlier. It’s a weird transition.

Our family just processed a HUGE amount of corn to be ground for Mealie Meal (corn meal) which they eat almost every night in the form of porridge or lipalishi, as they call it. We helped minimally. I got blisters on my thumbs and it made my palms raw, but it was kind of fun, mindless work. They are also expecting 20 to 30 new piglets (from two mothers) in July. They will sell them at six months of age. We’re hoping their might be a little bacon in our future  Our Babe (father) also has a mushroom growing hut. Dad you would love it. He wraps corn cobs, dirt and detritus in plastic with the ends exposed …… not sure how long it takes……but, at some point mushrooms grow out either end.

The food is good. They don’t have a lot of variety though. Corn, in the form of lipalishi, makes up close to 80% of their diet. Meat and veggies are very limited. We will be cooking for ourselves from here on out. It would be hard for me to live on corn 
Tonight we are watching a movie and making popcorn. This kind of simply activity has become quite a treat.
Wishing you all well Stateside. Let us know how you are doing.

Love
Ncobile & Mandla

(pictures won't upload on this wireless :(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Iron Chef Swaziland.....

2011-06-25T03:37:00.000-07:00

Hey All,
We're going on week three now. We are entering into the next phase of training. We will start cooking for ourselves tomorrow (our host families were supposed to "teach" us how to cook for the first two weeks), and we will be getting into more of the technical side of training; focusing on HIV/AIDS in Swaziland and what we can do to work to improve the current situation. We are happy to get into more of the meaningful stuff and also have some fun field trips coming up in the next couple of weeks. We have one where we will learn about permaculture and the second is a chance to go out to our permanent sites and check them out for a few days. We also get to go on a safari with our whole group.
TODAY we had a cooking competition. Everyone had a group and we were supposed to come up with a app, main dish and dessert. This was to demonstrate our ability to cook for ourselves and use local ingredients. My group made butternut squash soup with yogurt and green onion garnish, roast chicken in white wine and lemon and a rice pudding cooked in condensed milk with shaved pears, local honey and fresh grated nutmeg. Our food was the best ;), but Lewis' group won. They went over budget.....and should of been disqualified :)! Haha. But it was fun. I wish I could post pictures, but things are a little behind the times here. I need to bring our cord next time or put them on a jump drive.

We received a LETTER today from my mom! Thanks mom. It's so fun to get mail. And it only costs 98 cents to send one :)

Lewis had a pretty uneventful birthday last week. There aren't many ways to celebrate here in Mashekesheni. But we watched a movie....borrowed from another volunteer.

The language is coming along pretty slow. We are making flash cards and practicing most nights, but then we get another few pages of stuff to learn the next day and it's easy to get behind. We will have a proficiency test next week, but I think it's more to see where we are then to actually get a grade.

I just asked what else to share from a few other PCV's.....D's family choked their dog to death yesterday because it kept eating chickens! hahahahahahaha....yikes. Our dog is named SPORT (awesome) and looks like it might die any day.

K....next time I am going to write a blog ahead of time and bring it on a jump drive...that way I can plan out some awesome information for you all.

Miss you all 1,000,000,0000000000000000000000000000000000000dkfhsdkfhksdjhf

love,
Ruby & Lewis

We Made It!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-06-18T04:33:00.000-07:00

Hi!

So Swaziland is NICE :) We have been here for a week + now and are doing great. We moved in with our host family on Tuesday in a little village called Mashekesheni, which is about two hours from the capital of Mbabane. There are three different groups of Volunteers split up between three different villages (which is kind of a bummer). Our group has 8 people and is the smallest. There are 38 Volunteers total. We live in a round little house with electricity and a water tap on site, so nothing very challenging thus far. Language classes are almost every day and we are slowly picking things up. Our host family has two sisi (sisters, 16 and 11) and one bhuti (brother, 14) and a gogo (grandma). They are very sweet, helpful and fun to hang out with. They all speak English when necessary, (except for gogo) but really want to help us learn sisWati. We have sisWati names now. I am Ncobile (meaning "a winner"...awesome!) and Lewis is Mandla (strong, brave man) and our family surname is Mngometulu. Surnames are very important here and when people thank each other they use their surnames (if you know the person) instead of saying ngiabonga (thank you).

Peace Corps gave us a bunch of stuff to get started. We were given dishes, pots and pans, buckets (for gathering water and bucket bathing :) and bedding. They provided a stove, and food for the first two weeks with our host families. We will be getting cell phones during week 4, which will be really nice when it comes to getting in touch with other volunteers (and you will probably we able to TEXT us!!!!!). We have most of Saturdays and all of Sundays off to have a chance to get caught up on chores (like hand washing laundry) and go into town to get groceries and send emails. We are now in Inhlangano, which is about a 15 min Khumbi (van taxi thing) ride from our site.

I'm not really sure what else to say. We are having fun and are excited about what is to come.

Love you all, Hamba Kahle (go well)

Ruby & Lewis

Pig Roast Going Away.....

2011-05-31T15:41:00.001-07:00

Well....the day has come! We have finished our pre-training training in Philidalphia today and are ready to embark on a crazy journey to Swaziland. We are so thankful for every one of you, both family and friends, who have made our last days in the US so special and expressed so much love and support. We are encouraged by you and hope that you will keep in touch with us. We hope to stay connected as much as possible despite limited and unreliable internet coverage. We know these next two years will be hard and would love encouragment from home :) In case you were wondering, we are able to recieve snail mail in Swaziland at this address:

Lewis & Ruby Kiker PCV

PO Box 2797

Mbabane H100, Swaziland

AFRICA

Here are some pics from our awesome going away party. I wanted to post more, but it wasn't going very quickly and I have to wake up at 1:30 AM. It's almost midnight, so yes, it's more like a nap :)

Check it out!

- Everyone worked hard to get the party going and awesome!
- The pig was almost ready.....flipping.

- Chopping for the platter....

- The food was amazing! - Oh hey little brother....love you :)

- Mmmm....

- Fresh baked Cibatta....

- Grama Ferris....mom made your famous BEANS.....no one could get enough!

- Phil got in there.....the best part of the pig :)

- Watching kickball....

- There was an amazing game of kickball.....it lasted about two seconds before Riley (the dog) got ahold of it. Glue and duct tape pulled us through, even though it had to be applied after every few kicks :)

- Trampoline !

- Some lovely ladies....

- We had a fire....

- The night ended with a dance party....followed by another round of eating.

- Thank YOU! Everyone who helped put on the party. And a special thanks to Grahm for spending three days of prepping, preparing and cooking the delicious pig. It was AMAZING! We love you all ... don't forget to check up on us :)

A Day with a Few Special Kiddies.....

2011-05-24T17:18:00.000-07:00

- Lewis and I wanted to take some of our special, tiny friends on a date before we left for two years to Swaziland. They will be SO BIG when we get back. We will miss them very much :(

- Our first stop was La Patisserie for sweet danishes to share.....they were VERY excited. Sorry Abby and Kari for feeding your kids LOTS of sugar :)

- Stop two was mini golf at Golf City!

- Caelan and Betsy made a whole in ONE on the first hole! - And it was mostly chaos after hole one......

- Despite their very serious faces, I think they had a lot of fun.

- Especially when it came to climbing on things....

- And battling things.....

- Everyone was pretty tired out from golf, so we decided to refuel at American Dream. There was a unanimous vote to have BACON pizza, Lewis was fine with the :)

- We were the only ones on the rooftop, which allowed them to run around and around with out disturbing other patrons.

- This was a game of "steal Lewis' hat"

- After lunch we went to wildcat park ..... and ended the day at the toy factory, where they all got to pick out a prize for being so fun!

Thanks parents for letting us steal them for an afternoon....they are pretty special :)

Yoppie on the Farm....

2011-05-20T17:00:00.000-07:00

- Ayeresam and I hung out today. I decided to take him to explore my family farm. He got to ride the four wheeler and hang out with the cows :)
- Riding the tractor, sun was too bright for a good picture.

- We did a little gardening with my mom.....

- This is how I knew he was ready for his nap :)

- All tired out.....a cozy nap in the recliner.

- Thanks for hanging out with me tiny Yops.

Gotta take advantage of friends and the great weather!

2011-05-19T22:28:00.001-07:00

We won't have too many more chances to sit in the beautiful sun with our favorite people. Thanks Denny and Abby for throwing together a backyard BBQ. It was the perfect thing.

- Lewis, Ruby, Jenna and Phil.....soon to be off on very different adventures.

- Betsy set up her own face painting station.....

- Mo knew what to do....

- Ayeresam lost his pants!

- Emma and Adelaide got after the icecream cake....mixed in with their face paint.

- We're going to miss you all!

Mary Jane.

2011-05-18T15:37:00.000-07:00

Hi Grandma!
Thanks for letting me and mom come visit you in SD. I love you and think you are pretty great. Don't forget to water your flowers ;)

Selling the Volvo.....

2011-05-01T20:11:00.000-07:00

- It's a sad day for me.....for some reason, I've become very attached to our little volvo and I don't want to sell it. BUT....two years in the Peace Corps has made it necessary. So if anyone is interested, here are the specs:
2001 Volvo wagon v70
2.4L 5 cylinder
~28 MPGs
All leather interior
Alloy wheels
Heated seats/mirrors
Power windows/seats/mirrors
Integrated booster seats (awesome for kids!)
All important safety features
Clean title
Well maintained
173,000 miles
$5,499

Check it out!

Unexpected news............

2011-04-07T15:23:00.000-07:00

NO....we are not having a baby!

What country has Hippopotamus

....people living in grass huts.

.....a flag that looks like this!

.....has the highest rate of HIV/AIDS and one of the lowest life expectancy rates.

....Has a king with 300 wives

.....and boarders South Africa & Mozambique.............

SWAZILAND!!!!!!!!!!!

And we are moving there on June 7th....via the Peace Corps!

We are a little shocked and very excited.

More Puerto Rico Pics.....

2011-04-02T22:12:00.000-07:00

- They are kind of mixed up.... - Lots of fun nights out for dinner! - The boys went fishing one day....so the girls got out our trusty map and explored Rincon. We started at our new favorit coffee shop called Banana Dang that had amazing smoothies.

- Our first dinner out we got lucky at this place called Happy Burger, who had really good tacos!

- Our first few hours at the house.....everyone was so excited to be on vacation. Jenn and Jenna jumped in the pool with their clothes on.

- Our weird TINY hot tub (that wasn't hot) waterfall thing.

- The house was so great....we enjoyed relaxing at home alot

- Anything funny about this picture :)

- Grilled chicken and steak tacos at the house.....

- Matching!?

- Dinner out at the tapas bar.....such good food!

- TINY hot tub....that wasn't hot.....but very nice.

- Sandy beach.....smart name......just down the hill from our house.

- Friends....

- The boys gave surfing a try on our last day......

- Sunset on our last night.........

- Late night pizza out of a truck.....so good!

- One of the best vacations ever............it's confusing now when we wake up and all our friends aren't there ready to eat breakfast with us :(

Thanks for making it the best everyone!

We're all back from the PR!

2011-03-29T20:12:00.000-07:00

- We're going to miss THIS..........

- It was beautiful and relaxing :)

Enjoying Puerto Rico!

2011-03-25T05:51:00.000-07:00

- The perfect vacation.....we're having so much fun :)

Puerto Rico!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-03-22T12:01:00.000-07:00

- Three days home from Senegal....and back on the plane for Puerto Rico!!!
Good to be back to the sun. The rest of the gang will be here SOON....hurry up Jenna, Phil, Pete, Jenn, Kayla and Brandon!!!!

The Island of Goree....

2011-03-17T13:56:00.000-07:00

Goree is a small island off the coast of Senegal that was once a small port for the Atlantic slave trade, and is now just a tourist trap. But if you can wade through the throngs of people pushing you to buy their cheap souvenirs, the buildings are beautiful and the few museums they have are interesting.

- One of the rooms in the slave house. It is very weird to stand there and think of the people who once were locked in those tiny rooms.

- Another tourist site we had to check out was Senegal's new statue. It's HUGE. It is meant to signify peace within Africa given to Senegal by North Korea. It's a ironic spectacle.

- Our day of tourism with my mom.

Dinner at Ami's.....

2011-03-04T08:22:00.000-08:00

- While we were in Kuer Soce painting the mural, instead of having dinner at the hotel, we went to our friend Ami's house every night. She prepared delicious Senegalese food for us three nights in a row. It was fun to spend time with her and her family, use our Wolof and experience a little part of their culture. We also got to hold Ami and Boubou's three week old baby :)
- We ate outside with a flashlight.

- Yassa poulet on noodles. Ami is a very good cook.

-Ibrahima usually nursed while we ate....Ami was amazingly good at multitasking.

- My mom fell in love with Usman....a nephew at the house. Most families live in some sort of family compound. Each son and their family has a room and they share the common space.

- Tiny Ibrahima at 3 weeks.

- We are headed back to Kuer Soce this Friday with Fiona and her team that gets here on Tuesday. We will get another chance to spend our evening meals with Ami, BouBou and Ibrahima. There is something special about sharing a meal with someone. I think it is definitely a bonding expierence.

The World on a Wall..........

2011-02-26T05:36:00.000-08:00

(more of a description at the bottom of the post...blogger was being weird)

- It's always an adventure just getting to Keur Soce. It was fun for my mom to see a lot of the country side, wandering cows, broken down cars in the middle of the road and peanut trucks with loads twice their size.

- Someone is always selling something along the road. I found this....hoping it was a delicious melon and not a squash....and it was :)

- We left Tuesday morning after breakfast and arrived in Kuer Soce around 3:30. We spent the rest of that afternoon and evening painting the wall white.

- The next day we made a grid and outlined the continents in chalk. We had a crayola box of chalk (good thing you threw it in Fiona!) and it ended up that you could really only see one of the colors very well, but we made due.

- The ladders were rather sketchy!

- The late afternoon was the most pleasant time to be working, but it was still very hot.

-We wanted to be able to outline every country. Since time didn't allow, we were sure to at least do Africa.

- Barbie worked on the detailed map of Senegal. She was very good at getting things PERFECT :)

- The "finished" product. We spent an hour Friday morning, before driving home, touching up drips and finishing the outline. There was always a crowd watching.

- It didn't end up exactly how we had invisioned, but not bad with everything we had to work with.

- We spent the last four days in Kuer Soce painting a mural! And no, we didn't really know what we were doing....but those are the best kinds of projects. We had visited the site a month before with Fiona and Boubou (our Senegalese contact) to check out the wall and see what we had to work with. This time we were 0n our own, with no translator, unsure if anyone knew we were coming, and skeptical of our supplies. Obsticals like that can't keep you from attempting new endeaver, or nothing would get accomplished here.

So after rickety ladders, OLD watery paint, adequate tools, water stained maps, intense heat and throngs of little kids watching our every move, we somehow produced something we were all pretty proud of. We couldn't of done it without each one of us :)

3 More Weeks....

2011-02-25T15:29:00.001-08:00

- We're home from our four day trip to Kuer Soce, tired, dirty and a little sun burned. The trip was a success and we loved being in that tiny village for a few days! Pictures and more of the story to come.

- Here's a good one of Djibi. He found us a Cameleon :)

-PS....can you believe we only have 3 more weeks here!!!!

Always something to paint............

2011-02-19T10:43:00.000-08:00

- Lewis and I painted the front gate last week. Things get rusty fast being close to the beach, and Herma was tired of the color.
- Now it's BLUE (her favorite color) and yellow. Just don't look too close and it looks pretty good ;)

Couch Remodel.......

2011-02-18T02:37:00.000-08:00

My attempted dingy couch remodel is done! You can't tell very well, but the fabric was really dirty and faded.

Before...

After...

- Not too bad. It wasn't perfect and there were a few weak spots in the fabric where I had to put little patches, but it turned out a whole lot brighter and it was free.

-The next project is to make Herma new car seat covers....as you can see, they were pretty tattered :)

My mom is here.....

2011-02-17T08:38:00.000-08:00

...and she brought goodies :)!

Valentine's Day in Malika.....

2011-02-16T08:40:00.000-08:00

- We decided to try a night out in Kuer Massar (the next town over) on Valentines Day. We ended up at a little place that Herma described as "kinky" (sounded scary to me :) called Paris Dakar. Awesome name, but was candle lit. However, that might of been because the electricity had been cut. We weren't sure what to get, so we ordered four different things off the menu that was all in french.....2 out of the four were really good. It all cost about 10 dollars. Not bad for a date :). We came home to watch a movie out of the decidedly old collection ...Patriot Games....not much of a selection here at Herma's :)

- Oooo....candles, so romantic.

At the market....

2011-02-15T11:47:00.000-08:00

Lewis and I ventured out to the market today for some veggies.

We got all this for around 70 cents!

Air Malika...

2011-02-13T11:47:00.000-08:00

- The boys have been rebuilding a "car" over the past few months and have dubbed it Air Malika. Lewis had the honor of giving it its paint job last week and it was taken out to the beach for its maiden voyage. Everyone loaded up....8 of the boys in Air Malika and the rest of us in Herma's truck. We made it to the beach (about a mile away) with two very LOW tires, out onto the sand, down the beach a few hundred yards...and Air Malika died. Turns out it ran out of gas! Of course! No one seemed to have remembered to check the gas level, or it may have been because the gas gauge doesn't work and checking the gas means putting a stick in the gas tank to assess the level. I guess this method isn't very accurate. So the boys had to push it back through the deep sand and we towed it back home :)

- Assessing Air Malika's route to the beach.

- And she's dead....

- Things going "wrong" is now the norm....you just learn to laugh!

Keur Soce Part II....

2011-02-13T09:04:00.000-08:00

- Another reason we took a trip to Kuer Soce was to check out their school, where we will be painting a mural on one of their school's walls. These small schools often don't have a lot of access to simple things like maps, and don't have a good idea how their country fits into the world as a whole. So giving them a mural with a depiction of Senegal, Africa and the world will give them a simple concept of their geography. Lewis and I, along with my mom who is coming in four days, will head back to Kuer Soce in a week or so to start painting. Yikes....we haven't exactly done this before. Hope it works out :)

- Another project we encountered while at the school was the need for new latrines. This one as you can see is in pretty bad shape....

- So instead kids are using this whole in the ground, or as we saw first hand, just peeing along the wall behind thier class room. Not very sanitary.

- Here are some of the ladies who recieved Andando loan, which have all been paid back 100%. The women were very encouraged by their opportunity to support their families.

- The kids here are amazingly beautiful.

-Another outlying village we visited as a possible project. They were partitioning for a micro loan that would help them build a fence around their existing market garden. Each village we visited would gather every plastic chair they had throughout the village and motion for us to sit and then would bring out mats where everyone else would sit.

Cooking with Naya

2011-02-11T15:57:00.000-08:00

- This time I learned to make Cebbu Yap...rice and beef. It's usually the favorite of most people. Turns out it has a lot of OIL and a lot of MSG. Oh well. It's Africa :)

- I've really enjoyed taking the afternoon once in a while to just sit with Naya. It's learning to cook traditional food, but also a chance to make a connection with someone. We can't really talk, but I think we are friends now :) She teaches me the wolof words for whatever ingredients we are using and I smile a lot. It's a good exchange.

Kids Club....

2011-02-09T02:29:00.000-08:00

- It's WEDNESDAY....that means Kids Club. They usually start arriving around 4:30 (8:30 PST). Here are some pictures of our adventure last week. It was a relatively subduded group last week, we'll have to wait and see what we get this week :)

- Storytime with Herma/Djibi

- The girls sit in one section and the boys sit in another...

- Jumping rope....

- Double dutch...is that what it's called when two people jump? :) I gave it a try. Ha!

- Tiny lady....a lot of the older (and by older I mean like 7 or 8) kids brings their tiny siblings.

- The tough boys...

- Wednesdays are always an adventure. I'm slowly getting a little better at communicating with them, but they still talk WAY TOO FAST.

Swiss Fondue in Senegal....

2011-02-08T08:52:00.000-08:00

-It has been interesting to meet the many people who pass through Malika. Some come for the afternoon, others stay for a few nights.
We just had a Swiss German family visiting for five days. Their daughter is living in Dakar and they all come out to Herma's for a little relaxation...and they brought FONDUE!

- Fondue Senegalese style, over a propane burner.

Baby Bou Bou....

2011-02-08T03:27:00.000-08:00

AKA: Ibrahima Bou Bou Sy!
- There you go Fiona! He is a tiny little guy. From what I could gather, everything went well and all are happy and healthy :)

Kuer Soce Part I...

2011-02-07T12:00:00.000-08:00

-This blog is giving me problems....so I will have to write it in two parts. -

- Fiona was here two weeks ago (was it two weeks already?) for a quick visit. She had already been in transit through Liberia and Sierra Leone and only had a few days to spend with us before heading back to Oregon. Her already limited time was then cut short by airline issues (Senegal wasn't allowing flights in or out from Delta and other airlines). Instead of arriving Friday night she arrived Sunday afternoon. With time slipping by and lots to see, she picked us up in Malika with Bou Bou and we made our way that evening to Kuer Soce. We would be spending the night there and coming back the next evening. It was some 4+ hours away with a few sketchy sections of road. It's not always an easy task to travel here in Senegal.
The the trip was a success. What we had planned on seeing in two days we squeezed into one! Everything fell into place, people were happy, relatively on time and all in all it was a successful trip.
We made our way through Keur Soce and about 6 or 7 other outlying villages. The stops either consisted of projects The Andando Foundation, along with other supporters such as Doxology and Journey, had already completed and was checking up on or prospective projects and needs to be meet in the future.

- Below is a completed well we visited. One of three that has been founded by various churches and Andando. This well was the most recent and we brought a plaque, made by one of the Malika Monkeys, for its dedication.

- It might of been one of the most exciting things that had happened all year in this small village of Thiarene ....school was dismissed and all the kids came to see what was going on :)
- Cute friends
- Andando has given a number of micro loans to women in Keur Soce and has also supported the building of a market garden. Here the women are showing us their progress with the garden and sharing with Andando how the loans, the garden and the well has benefited their famlies lives and that of the community. When we showed up they all started to dance and sing!

- This was a row of bissap. They had also planted cashew trees and had starts going for a variety of other vegetables.

- I believe this was the first well that was built.

So that is part one of our trip to Keur Soce, hopefully I can get the remainder of the photos uploaded. And Fiona, please correct me if I have any of the facts wrong here :)

Love From Home....

2011-02-05T08:52:00.000-08:00

- Jenna sent me a post card soon after we left (right?) and I recieved it the day before yesterday!!! So exciting to get mail in Malika!

Thanks Jenny!

Internet has been down....

2011-01-31T05:10:00.000-08:00

So far we have had pretty good luck with the internet, but the last few days have been SLOW and patchy. Who know's why....we have learned to chalk it all up to "It's Africa". Ha.

I was feeling kinda sick Saturday. Something distrupted my system friday night and the bathroom was not my friend. But after a relaxing weekend in the sun, reading by the pool, I think I am good to go. My tummy is still a little gurggly, but it's working hard to kick it.

Lewis is still trying to solve our water problem as of Saturday. Our faucet in the kitchen has been leaking since we got here. Something needed to be done about it, seeing as when you turned the water on, you couldn't really turn it off. The handle just continued to turn for eternity and left a constant stream of water. It's Africa!
Lewis tried to tackle the job Saturday and things just got worse. The water to our kitchen and Herma's has been off for two and half days now, but we are getting somewhere. I think there have been three faulty repairs done so far and he's working on the forth. But each one, although doesn't hold, is getting a little better. This process is due in large part to the LACK of proper plumping supplies, so it's a learning process. And it doesn't help that the plumping is NOT under the sink, but rather comes directly out of a cement wall. It's Africa! :) Hopefully it will be resolved today and we won't have to rip part of the wall out.

In other news:

- There's something you can get here called Dibi, it is chopped bits of meat cooked over a fire with onions. As long as you aren't too worried about meat sitting in the heat with flies all over it, it's actually REALLY good. And no, this is not why I got sick :)

- You can also get this same sort of thing, but made with intestines. We stuck with the regular Dibi :)

Wine to Water...

2011-01-27T09:53:00.000-08:00

- Making wine bottles into water glasses, not water to wine as Ryan pointed out. You are so clever Ryan :)
Lewis' brother TK and dad Kevin did it in Paraguay, so we decided to give it a try. You need duct tape (couldn't find it in Malika, so used masking tape instead), a corrigated wire, two sticks to wrap the wire around and a cold bucket of water. Wrap the bottle once with wire between two predetermined strips of tape and pull back and forth on the sticks. This creates friction, smoke and a horrible burning smell. We usually waited till the bottle started to smoke, counted to 15 and quickly immersed the bottle in the cold water....and snap....it breaks almost perfectly along the line. You sand the edges a bit and you have a GLASS!

- We decided not to try and make them all exactly the same size...it's fun to have some variety.

- You can even make a vase...

- And the tops can be used for whatever a creative mind can come up with. Thought these might be a fun candle display?

- Lewis and Djibi also did some screen printing today....they actually turned out pretty good with only having a screen and a board to press it on. Adapting to the lack of availability to things we are used to having is a fun, sometimes annoying and always an eventful experience :)

Lewis and the Camel

2011-01-26T04:38:00.000-08:00

- We took a little day trip to Lake Rose on Sunday with Herma, her son Danny and a few of his friend who are here for a couple of weeks working on an engine project.
Turns out you can ride camels there. They are such weird animals.

- I bet you really want to fly to Africa now Caelen, so you can ride a camel with Mr. Lewis!

- Herma and I weren't terribly interested in the camel riding, so we sat here by the lake instead. It was a beautiful spot and very peaceful.

- I have a video, we'll see if i can get it uploaded tomorrow.

Things around the house....

2011-01-25T05:58:00.000-08:00

- We have some serious sand and dust around here....sweeping has become a daily duty.
- We are working on making a few sets of glasses out of wine bottles...more to come on that. Below, Lewis is prepping the bottles for surgery. It's going to be awesome!

- Our newly painted wall....

- I started a new project...attempting to re-upholster this couch and another like it. The fabric is faded and dirty, but I can take it apart, flip it and sew it back together and it should be bright and shiny again!

- We have lots of good pictures waiting their turn....too bad this thing is SO SLOW.

Good night!

A few things

2011-01-21T11:22:00.000-08:00

- I was trying for a longer post, but these pictures are taking forever to load.
We had a nice walk to the beach a few days ago....it's about a mile away.

- Malika is on the north side of Senegal's penisula, so it has all the waves and strong current.

- Volleyball! lots of fun with the boys. The little guy below really wanted to play too!

- Herma is supervising on the left and Jugena (Sp?) is keeping score.

- We won all three times! - Maybe I will be able to upload more pictures when we get back from Ker Soce.

We are meeting Fiona today, arriving from Sierra Leone and heading out to Ker Soce for a night to check on a well project.

Lots of pics to come....including a camel ride:)

Ceebu Jen

2011-01-19T07:11:00.000-08:00

- Today I spent much of the afternoon sitting with Naya as she cooked lunch for the crew. There are usually around 18 people that show up for lunch during the week and anyone and everyone is invited to eat. We have eaten a weeks worth of Senegalese food now and Ceebu Jen is definitely their staple. We've had it for lunch five out of eight days and, so far, it's still good.

- They normally cook over a propane burner in the outdoor kitchen. This meal was for a much larger group. Since the big pot didn't fit on the burner they used wood heat.

- Naya adding water to the rice....everything is cooked into the simmering sauce, taken out when done and the sauce is then used to cook the rice,

Lewis, Herma and Kemo. We always sit in the same places at lunch.
- Ceebu (pronounced Chebu) Jen

- I love fresh flowers, so it has been a pleasent surprise to have so many on the grounds to pick from.

- More senegalese painting. This stuff was oil based, sticky and a pain in the a**!

But the once rusty pool side furniture is now a shiney, new, bright blue!

Wednesdays are also "kids camp". A swarm of neighborhood kids show up around 5:30. We play with them for an hour or so and then sing songs and tell a story. I was looking forward to this, thinking it would be a fun chance to interact with lots of nice kids from Malika. Turns out, they are MEAN! Especially the girls. Most of our play time is spent jumping rope and it is crazy. There is always a fight about who goes first and who went last and she jumped longer than me...etc etc. I've caught them slyly sticking their hands out to catch the rope and make the girl jumping trip, which means she is out and it's their turn. They are ruthless. I definitely was not prepared for it. And it doesn't help that I can't really talk to them. Sometimes they all stand in a circle around me and ask the same question 1o times in french and wolof. Turns out no matter how many times they ask me the same thing, by the end I still don't know what they are saying :)

Tomorrow Herma's son Danny and three other people are showing up from Colorado....it's always an adventure here.

Until tomorrow.

A Day of Rest....

2011-01-16T11:51:00.000-08:00

- Sunday is low key around here. We had breakfast with Herma and a few of the boys and hung by the pool most of the day. I did a run to the beach and back, only about 2 miles, very aware of everyone staring at me. But they are used to seeing crazy white people coming out of Herma's house, so I think it was ok. I was sure not to ware my short shorts.

- Djibi has a room in our house where he does all of his sewing, so we have gotten to know him the most....these are diaper cloths for andando.

- We have lots of candles around the house for when the electricity goes kaput (Herma lingo). It's actually quite nice.

- Sunday is also a day often spent playing sports. We played some volleyball matches today, a few of which were very heated :) We are slowly becoming friends with the boys....volleyball helped.

That's all today.....

Painting in Senegal....

2011-01-15T09:03:00.001-08:00

- It's a different story here, regarding most things, but most recently in our attempt at painting. There is no primer, the paint is thick and gooy and goes on chunky. We had to quickly change our standards for the job before we went a little crazy.

- The front of our house -

- Oh...and you have to mix your own colors. Yellow and red make orange!! :)

- Although it is not the wet season and mosquitos aren't a problem for the most part, we sleep with a net anyway....
- Breakfast: soft boiled eggs, french bread and cheese. Everyone eats A LOT of french bread.

- Wolof is still coming along. I try to carry my notebook and dictionary everywhere I go. Buga na ty bos (I like your shirt), daffa raphet (it's beautiful). Kaay ndekki (come eat breakfast), buga nga tea (would you like some tea).

A Day in Dakar.....

2011-01-13T10:15:00.000-08:00

- Today we were up at 7:00, to Herma's for breakfast of soft boiled eggs and french bread at 7:25 and off to Dakar soon after. It was an adventure to get there on mostly sandy streets, past piles of burning trash and broken down trucks in the middle of the street that looked like they had been rotting there since the 1980's.
We had lots of errands, as a trip to Dakar only happens but once a week. First was the super market for supplies not found in Malika. Lewis and I were sure to grab candles for Malika's nightly power outage and a few other tasty looking goodies. Second was the post office, the brown bread store (can only get fluffy french bagettes here in Malika), a book store and an array of different organizations Herma knows people at to drop off products made by the Malika Monkeys.
Doesn't seem too bad, but everything takes longer in Senegal and you always have to stay for a quick chat and a cup of coffee. It was a great way to learn some Wolof vocabulary. Djibs (our new Senegalese friend) came along as well and was always helping us with our Wolof. It's amazing how much you can communicate without knowing much of eachothers language.
Naca suba ce (good morning), Nangadeff (how are you), daffa tonga (it't hot), waaw (yes!), mayma ndox jayraijayf (give me water please) - :)
We didn't take our camera to Dakar this time, but here are a few pictures of when we got home. It was so nice to jump in the pool and rinse off all the dirt we had collected in dusty Dakar.

- There is quite the array of animals here....the pelican (forgot its name),

- Chaco the monkey....he says HI Scott and Cry,

- And of course Henry the tortoise.

Until tomorrow :)

My Little Brother Turns 21!

2011-01-12T23:00:00.000-08:00

- I'm doing a little blog catch up, obviously. There has been a lot left out. I know it's just jet lag, but if I keep waking up at 6am, I can definitely catch up while in Senegal :)
Walker turned 21 on Christmas! He was very excited to enter into the priveledge class of legal drinkers along with the rest of his family.
Walker LOVES to eat....wait, we (aka, the Trasks) all LOVE to eat....and he especially LOVES to eat burgers. We took it up a notch and made him burgers we dubbed, Walkers Bomb Diggidy Ass Burgers. Blue cheese stuffed patties with garlic aioli, sauteed criminis (cause they are his favorite), BACON, garlic and oil toasted buns from Big River and every other topping you might want. They were amazing and increadibly messy to eat.

- Oh hey cousin Louis.

- We weren't sure the burgers would satisfy his insatiable appitite, so we also made a Caprese type bread salad thing, yam fritts and, of course, chocolate coffee birthday cake.

- Tiny crispy potatoes....fried petite....some delicious I picked up at FireWorks :)

- Yep!

- After cake, some wine and a few naps, Lewis and I, Laura (his girlfriend) and Walker's friend Josh all took him to the Peacock at midnight. Nothing too crazy, but karoake did happen :)

- The whole family was in on a pretty big birthday surprise that we revealed the next day. Grahm and Char couldn't make it till then and we wanted everyone to be there. Walker was nervous even though he had no clue what we were up to.

- Still a little confused....

- He's going to AUSTRAILIA! My parents purchased him a round trip 10 month long ticket to Austrailia starting the end of January! We weren't sure if he was more excited to petrified for the first few hours after he found out. He started to sweat, get really red and itchy and had to go lay down. Haha....wasn't quite the response we were expecting!

- It was a fun birthday and this year is going to be pretty amazing for him. We love you Walkie Doodle :)

Jet Lag....

2011-01-12T00:20:00.001-08:00

- We were up at 6am this morning. I woke up to the smell of something burning and then was kept awake by the call to prayer coming from the Mosque. It started getting light around 7. It's 8:30 now and time for breakfast with Herma. We will probably see a tortoise, a pelican and a monkey on our walk over to the house. We are in a different world here and it's good :)

Below...another picture of our living room.
Naca Suba Ce - GOOD MORNING!

Senegal Accepted Us!

2011-01-11T08:02:00.000-08:00

- We made it! Our plane arrived at 5:45 Senegalese time, just about the time we might be going to bed back in the states. Herma and Djiby were there to pick us up and take us home to Malika. It's beautiful here. I think this is going to be one amazing stay. Thank you to everyone who is a part of what we hope to accomplish here :)
We slept till about 1 in the afternoon, just in time for a traditional Senegalese lunch of chebu jen : fish, veggies and was it millet. Today will be a lazy day. Tomorrow is "Kids Camp". Sounds like an adventure and after tomorrow...who knows? That's the fun part :)

- The picture below is a bit of our new house. Crys and Scott....we love the house. Thanks for the mattress :) Everyone is asking of you and we're telling them you send your love!
There's a bit of an ant colony in the bathroom....maybe it's normal? The roof may need a little help, and we've been seeing lots of your creations: table, iron candle wall thing, etc. So fun.

Senegal.....we're on our way!!!!!

2011-01-10T05:56:00.000-08:00