Angithanda ukugijima eskuseni and other endeavours

[translation: i hate running in the morning]

well, i don't really hate it...

so lately i have this joke in my head where imagine that i am on a peace corps survivor type show and somehow am unaware.

i think this is because this week i started my new summer ritual where me and my host sister wake up at 5:15 to go running for about 4-5KM. Considering I haven't moved my body almost at all since I had access to the gym at Clark, this has been very difficult for m.e i kind of feel like I have somehow strained/sprained/wrenched every single muscle in my body. hopefully my running prospects will improve with time, although at this date the moment that happens seems very far away. my running really hasn't been helped by the fact that in the middle of the night yesterday I stepped on a brick (the one that holds my door close--it doesn't really close without constant force) and gashed my foot open, making it painful even to walk across the house. whatever, no excuses, i still ran this morning.

i have this crazy motivation to keep this running thing up. this is a motivation that i have never really experienced before (i hate just running...). i think it is because of host family guilt. if i don't go running, maybe my host sister will get mad, thereby making home and work more difficult (however, since she is one of the nicest people i've ever met, i severely doubt this would happen..). it could be that i just want to do something for her. i don't want her to run alone. she does so much for me every day (translating zulu, giving me rides, explaining things--zulu/rural life related that i do not get, helping maneuver work dramas). yesterday she was talking about how she had to start saving money to go to the past peace corps volunteer's graduation from her master's program in 2010. i told her if i went to school she wouldn't have to come to mine--too much $$ (since I do not put much emphasis on ceremony). she scoffed at this--she said that since we are family we have to be there for each other in every way. how nice!

bhekuzulu youth club

so, if you are a loyal reader of this blog you would remember that i recently was funded for my after school program. i am counting down the days until this starts. So far we are slated for an October 20th starting date. This late starting date will accomadate school holidays, random weeks my team isn't at work, as well as the day we are handing out bikes to our community (see down for more of an explanation). It looks like women at my work are getting more and more interested/excited about this club! This means that I have had 2 people join in the planning and implementation of the club. This means that instead of 3 people (including myself) we now have 5! It looks like the school outreach group will also be aiding in the teaching of the life skills. The plan is Monday and Wednesday--craft!, Tuesday--life skills. You have to go to the life skills session in order to be able to participate in the craft. suckers! you've got to learn something! i am kind of anticipating more interest once the club from the employees when it actually starts running. i'msure the kids will enjoy it, since they don't really have that much to do. anyways, exciting, exciting!

bikes bikes bikes

we recently have gotten a sweet hookup from one of our funders. BikeTown Africa (through Kona Bikes) is coming to my organization to donate bikes! We are splitting the bikes with our mother organization but will be getting a total of 70 just for our area! These bikes will be given primarily to our health workers so that they can get around to see patients. This is awesome because they have to walk so far. And seeing that in the spring temperatures are hovering around 100 degrees, these bikes will do wonders when summer actually hits. I think that the most exciting part of this project is that I am actually getting to see one of those nice, international efforts coming to fruition. you know when you hear about donations abroad in large scale--bikes, computers, playpumps, etc. well we are actually reaping the rewards! (this is an example, above, of the exact bikes we will be getting. Once the date of October 15th roles around, I will post actual pictures of us getting them!!)

another thing recently in the news on this scale is the one laptop for every child program. while i was a bit skeptical of this program, recently my lothe high school in my village (which has 0 computers in use for students) received two through my organization. awesome. again, we got these donated though the same, amazing donors who connected us to the bike program. one thing i can see about donations like these is that communities that don't have sweet NGOs like mine who have international (American in both cases) donors don't really have access to these programs. whatever, i guess everything has a fault somewhere.

visitors

it looks like i will have my first American visitor in December. I am simply writing this to make all of you people reading this jealous. my ulterior motive is to make you envious of him and so you will come here too! my visitor schedule is wide open for both 2009 and 2010! hahaha. come and see me. do it. i dare you.

friends

i would like to say, that for the record, i have some friends who live in my village. besides my host family, it has been somewhat hard to make friends. the peace corps always prepares you for this--it is pretty hard to break that cultural barrier. i mean the people in your village may love and respect you, but when you can't speak their language or understand what they like to do in their spare time (i, unfortunately do not like to watch Nigerian movies or clean 24/7), it is difficult to make that meaningful friendship. this weekend, instead of running to nearby PCVs I will be around the village, just relaxing. I have started to do this about 3/4 of my weekends. this makes me feel very accomplished. the village can be soooo boring, but, somehow, i am making it work. this weekend i get to meet my friend, Thandeka's daughter. Thandeka is 21 and her daughter is 4. her daughter (her name is londeka, cute, yes?)lives with thandeka's mother in town so she doesn't get to see her all to often. this is considered pretty common. if a mother has a job alot of the time her baby will do her toddling under the watchful eye of her grandmother.

On the topic of children, i would say that 99% of the women at my work have them (one who works here does not). in general they usually started having them when they are in their late teens/early twenties (i would say this is true in almost every case at my work). i have stopped asking my coworkers if they have children, but instead how many. when one of the women who is working on my after school club came to work with her newborn i asked her if this was her first child. she looked at me like i was the stupidest person on the planet and replied that she had 2 others. there, i learned my lesson. i find that this birth age is pretty common in my village, which totally scares me. i could not imagine having a 7 year old right now...eeeek. there is a large number of students who drop out of school in our local high school every year. yesterday i saw two very pregnant high schoolers walking down the street in their uniforms. teen pregnancy is something my center has been doing awareness campaigns about, but it doesn't really seem to be working...it does help, however, that when our center does these awareness campaigns at local high schools my coworkers speak from personal experience.

work
work in general seems to be getting better. it may seem that i don't have much to do today, especially since I am at work while writing this and it is such a long entry. however, this is far from the truth. instead i am just at the computer all day today doing work on that bike event. me being at the computer all day is a pretty rare occurrence. it is true that on some days i am bored to tears. whatever, i am trying to not worry too much about it. if i did, i would be in america by now.

i leave you with some sweet pictures of a recent outing of our luncheon club for the eldery. it was fun, they had a great day. yes, in these pictures they are playing soccer and dancing. eldery people here are awesome.

playing soccer...

dancing up a storm...

<3<3