Experiential learning continued....

4.     Words only matter sometimes, and fail often.

Communication’s challenge: Code switching is the norm. Things get lost in translation so easily and so quickly when there is not a common language. There are often miscommunications between me and my friends at home, but generally they are resolved quickly and don’t cost anyone too much time or money- maybe a few extra chai tea lattes in my life, but nothing serious. Here in Limpopo and at the University of Venda, common language skills don’t exist and there are constantly places in which language literally cannot be translated. Language is incredibly complex and you only realize it when you are forced to speak at the level of a 3 year old. Hi, How are you, I want this, I like that, My name is Kate… the list goes on but never gets too detailed.

South Africa has 11 official languages, and in the past the language that was used in schools was not English. Now it is. There are so many people that speak many languages, but for many these changes in language provide only a place for mistakes, misunderstandings, and poor usage of direct translation. While I think language is critical to expressing humanity’s intricacy, it also creates a space for these intricacies to morph into far greater levels of detail and complexity. It opens doors for misunderstanding between peoples, and alienates people by limiting who they are able to connect with.

I have been taught the importance of language since my first study abroad trip, but this time has proved particularly applicable. Since people are constantly miscommunicating, people purposefully withholding the translation of previous statements is just frustrating. While it is very much my own fault (and that of the programs which brought me to this point) that I speak zero Venda and or Tsonga, it is truly isolating to know people who are capable translating will not do so in order to let you into their conversation. I won’t say that I even slightly became knowledgeable enough in Xhosa, I did begin to learn some of it. I could pick (understand) a decent amount of words, and was dutifully attempting to broaden my vocabulary. With the experience (from Acacia), language was ignored on account of the partners wanting the training sessions in English. While our student assistants from Univen did not all speak the same language , they knew what each other meant, and how to react.

This leads directly into non-verbal communication. Exuberance, love, friendliness, apologies, etc. Most things can and have had real, physical representations. While these are often cultural, anger is clear, love is clear, and other more universal notions do exist as well. Dance is a fabulous form of expression and the women at our certificate ceremony on Wednesday were ecstatic with the possibilities this mere piece of paper had to offer them. The smiles, the laughter, the bravery, and the connections that were found through heavy skirts, necklaces, and the DJ’s music were incredible. The shy danced and the loud maintained their air for the dramatic! The costuming is traditionally reserved for celebrations or funerals- this was in a way their graduation. The certificates for the two days were well deserved in some ways- skills were learned, practice, and in their work many lessons were already being woven into their own lives. The energy around the ‘event’ was immense, and I felt very lucky to have had the opportunity to celebrate with these women. At one celebration, one woman told my team mate, “I thought I would only ever earn one certificate, but it would be my death certificate.” So much pride in one place.

Certificates seem trivial to those in the US unless they are from an accredited institution, but these mere pieces of paper were truly important. They will help people to get better jobs, to feel empowered to do their work well, and to have a deeper knowledge of the patients they already treat. In many ways, this piece of paper that represents nothing of how much information was absorbed means a lot for the progress of the individuals and the specific patients that they will go back and speak to about their diet.

5.     Humans are animals and vice versa.

Something else I have noticed beyond the language barriers are the commonalities between humans and animals – even if I cannot understand what animals say or the reasons behind their actions- something is common. Songs of birds and their fights. They fight over theft and over badgering of one another. They sing in hopes of finding friends and warn their friends of dangers even if it puts themselves at risk.

For the zebras we saw this past weekend, they prance with each other, follow the leader in their travels (we’ve been caravanning all over the country), are so curious and wary of strangers. In some ways these are just survival tactics, but in other ways perhaps it is a desire to understand that which is different. Curiosity of babies (zebras and humans alike) is slowly dissolved through the experiences of life.

Now monkeys are brilliant. While this seems to be over stated, seeing the way monkeys have learned to get the foods they want – rather than those they would eat in nature. They are clever, rather than trying to lift up a garbage can lid off of the can, they merely know shoving it over will spill the contents out or that if the lid gets shoved off (or forgotten) they can quickly dart in and grab food. Even when visiting Kruger, the picnic area was a risky spot to take out food! One of my colleagues brought out her peanut butter, apples, avocadoes and bread. Within moments of having thing set out, a monkey darted in and grabbed her entire loaf of bread! As we all hollered out and watched him carry the loaf off, the park staff came running over as my friend ran after the bread (and monkey). The monkey had already torn open the bag for a few nibbles by the time he dropped it. He ran off with both of the two people running after him, but the rest of the monkeys had begun to gather around our table, in the trees or elsewhere. In Cape Town, there was talk of baboon patrols trying to keep the monkeys out of homes. Who knew they would learn the break open windows by throwing rocks, but it is true! The rest of lunch was far more guarded. Each person’s food stayed in a bag unless it was being eaten at that very moment! While the monkeys were not stealing food, they were sitting in pairs or little families watching out for each other. Grooming or playing in the tree branches kept the little ones occupied, and the adults seemed to keep an eye out for us (just in case an opportunity to dine and dash arose).

6.     Natural wonders are not so wonderful to everyone. 

While this would apply to many of the sights we’ve been lucky enough to visit, it is interesting to take a step back and recognize the immense challenges that nature is providing people. I have mostly focused on the beautiful surroundings (the animal life, mountains, lakes, plains, peninsulas etc), but often these things are also very deadly.

Hippos may be the most dangerous to those living near water, but the dams that create gorgeous lakes also bring about the flooding of what would have been the homes of many people and sometimes entire villages who once lived by streams or riverbeds. The mountains form a natural barrier preventing easy access to other spaces, and national parks require admission fees. As a tourist, this is of course something you budget in, but in many ways, this prevents the very people who come from these regions from actually enjoying them. There is so much work to be done in conservation, but sometimes by limiting the animals’ movement, you inadvertently prevent natural migrations to watering holes or grazing pastures. While I had not particularly thought about these elements, it is because the animals are being protected in these more controlled environments.

Even in Rwanda, there were friends of mine who had never seen safari animals (zebras, impalas etc) - let alone elephants or rhinos. To me it seems incredibly strange and almost unfair for the human element to be removed from the places of their ancestors and then socio-economically barred from visiting these places. It is of course not that simple. The animals are destructive. Elephants knock over entire trees in less than 2 minutes, so imagine the devastation they could create in a nicely tilled farm!

More still to come!

10 Unexpected Findings

10 findings from this trip- may or may not be unexpected, but the manner in which I came to each realization (or affirmation) definitely were surprising. This will clearly take more than one post to get through!

1.     Food unites or divides.

When you think about specific foods, you generally think about a time of year or people that you tend to eat or drink it with. When I think ice cream, I think of a pier, the pool in summer time or just before bed sharing a spoon with Scott. When I see plantain, I think of Uganda and my home-stay family where I ate Matooke many nights and gaining my Senior 15 during undergraduate. When I think martinis, summer break with the Arizona lovelies comes to mind. Spaghetti sauce- Hannah; bagels- Charlottesville; cast iron grilled cheese sandwiches, Dad; Turkey, Thanksgiving, and for here in Vhembe, pap. Maize meal porridge- nearly tasteless and yet is unimaginably common. Mopani worms? You guessed it- Vhembe.

The past 2 weeks have flown by with some Indian food, Pakistani food, interesting takes on cheese burgers, the neighbor’s fabulous from scratch challah and of course the traditional braai foods (anything you’d grill). Here in Limpopo, braai’s are common. Charcoal grilling is one of the easiest ways to cook, so we do it often! We’ve eaten with our University of Venda counterparts only once, but it was quite an experience, an all-day roller coaster. Beginning with making the shopping list in the morning (and killing the two chickens that our guests had brought), everything was much like a negotiation of what is normal, what is expected, and what was affordable. Quite a juggling match when you don’t know how many people you are truly expecting and fabulously complicated, but by the end of the night as things wound down things had turned out alright. We’d all tried Mopani worms, pap, cooked-down spinach, potatoes, mac-n-cheese, chicken feet and goodness knows many other dishes including a peanut sauce by Meg (an American nursing student with my group) whose recipe came from the Congo. It was quite the multicultural experience, and everyone had a fabulous time! Singing, dancing and grilling were the most common of activities, but cooking fresh ginger tea in a large vat over the still fresh coals was the last step to winding down the night. 
 

  

 

Our dinner experiences here at Acacia have all been self-prepared and from Sid’s delicious and spicy dishes to Hannah’s brave ones like coal cooked pizzas, falafel and her beautiful braided challah bread, it’s been such a fun food experience! Every meal has brought people closer together, and the preparation periods have kept everyone working together. Milk and sugar goes into tea, and in the end this metaphor for life is that life and energy can be found in everyone, and in this crowd, the excitement was clearly visible.

2.     People may surprise you. 

It’s not that people do not hold surprise parties for family and friends, but here everything is a surprise (your schedule, tire pressure, wake-up call, new friends, rain, shine, and even monkey’s plotting to take over the chalet kitchens). You did not want to bother with a car wash- surprise we will wash it while your gas tank fills up! You wanted to just go to the fabric market, 30 minutes later, you will have tried eating the largest variety of insects you could see, bought a scarf and be on your way to finish vegetable shopping as the experience comes to a close, or maybe just begins.

Plans for work have been in constant flux, and so flexibility has been critical yet again in my travels. In some ways, this has been one of the most challenging of dynamics to juggle. Working with the ministry of health, the University of Venda, and my UVA counterparts has meant negotiating many different personalities. The quietness of individuals is misleading from time to time – one minute you are practically begging people to participate in a workshop or to give you feedback on a project, and the next moment you hear their voice alone above the crowd. Passion rings out, but only when and where it is culturally appropriate.

Since coming to Venda, the only days that have gone as planned are those in which the plan was understood as not an actual plan for the day, but a hypothetical one. This of course provides a plethora of challenges, but in some ways, the surprises have been good: in making friends, in hearing the frankness of new acquaintances, and in the warmest of welcomes by complete strangers (American and Africans alike). Even our first day of orientation led us from an empty meeting room to an auditorium lined with more than 150 nursing students singing us a welcome song. Hard to believe it, but in many ways, this exemplifies the surprises along the way.

Not all the surprises have been good. There is a lot of false health information being propagated, and many people who are unable to reach their potential because of knowledge gaps or bureaucracy. We have been lucky to hear some of the surprising information about causes of mental illnesses, home remedies for serious chronic diseases, and seeing the community health workers and nursing students in the field doing work. Keeps me wanting to stay as far away from a hospital as possible, but then again, this is the slowness of growing these systems- it cannot happen overnight and yet without the home-based care model, there would be little way to reach most of the people in the region.

3. Polka Dots are universal.

Patterns can be found everywhere, and not just in the fabrics used by people across the globe, but also in the way they act and they rhythms by which they function. Today, I ordered a traditional skirt (I guess slightly modified, but still lovely). I had the striped fabric and was totally ready to go have the seamstress the fabric, but then she goes, “OH! We must get the dots!” and runs off back to the counter getting pink fabric with white polka dots (totally killing the more mild vibe of the darker fabric I had purchased to make this wearable back home…). I was able to switch her mind from pink to green, but I am think she thought I was crazy haha! All I could think was…not polka dots, but we will see how it comes out! One thing I am fairly certain won’t happen is that I will need “satellites” (a necklace of plastic colored beads and white satellite looking things out the back, they represent one’s youthfulness at any age. 

This week, I saw the celebration of Mandela’s Birthday. Our team went to celebrate our 67 minutes of volunteering by driving to rural areas to give lessons in health, hygiene, substance abuse, teen pregnancy, and attempting to motivate each student toward futures outside of their current box of possibilities. The charge was that Mandela spent the first 67 years of his life fighting for others, so each year spending 67 minutes volunteering should be done. The idea of celebrating the life of a great person through community service is not unique to South Africa. While MLK day has become “a day on, not a day off” in the USA, there are other places with similar traditions globally. This pattern of encouraging service to others is one that I hope spreads like wild fire and yet, I hope that it does not also result in the destructive outcomes of false information spreading.

I’ve also come to see patterns in behaviors and conversations. Have you ever wished you could just change languages in order to make sure only one person in the room could understand you? I’d say everyone’s probably wished that at some point, but though the time here, it’s been entirely available to our Venda partners. The code-switching is incredibly common. By having such drastically different levels of language skills locally, there is an understanding that speaking in native tongue is effective at keeping the foreigner out of the conversation. This method is an old one, but still stings when I see it occurring. I always want to hear what is being said, but this trip there has been more deliberate lack of filling in than I have experienced before. A desire to be “in” on conversation versus being left without understanding of anything more than the basic idea of what the hand motions might have implicated is incredibly isolating, and makes me give even more kudos to those who have come here to do work long term.

Lastly, the commonalities in awe-filled moments have been immensely beautiful! The natural surroundings, the animals, the waterfalls, savannas, trees, pools, the calmness: all of them have just brought peace to my relatively chaotic experience. They have brought me home and comfort for a few moments, and to other places I have seen or experienced.

Getting oriented a few days in...

After a brief worrying about my team not arriving when they had guessed they would, a quick call with our Charlottesville contact, and a restless night’s sleep, the next morning brought me to breakfast with my team. They had decided to stay at the casino’s hotel in town- quite nice having walked up to the rooms after breakfast. The breakfast was a full and warm one, which was a nice change since I had put-off buying eggs until after the group decided on more finalized living spaces. We chatted about what we might expect for the day of orientation and what would- maybe- be required of us.

Upon arrival at University of Venda, we went to the new Life Sciences Building (since the orientation pamphlet suggested that was where the day’s events were going to be held). Upon arrival we made our way to an empty conference room full of chairs. It was a few more minutes before someone ran into the room slightly out of breath and led us to the place morning events would be occurring. The Senate Room is about 200 seats of blue high backed chairs in an auditorium style, but to get into the room, we pass through a cheering, singing crowd of students from the health sciences department (probably mostly nursing students since they are the only ones not on their winter holiday at the moment). They clapped and waved like we were a band of celebrities walking into the building, and it was an interesting and mildly strange dynamic for such an academic setting. Then, after we had all entered the students came in to perform a welcome song for all of the guests. This included us, some district managers (government people), university professors and surely more that were not introduced or whom I missed the introduction for. The scene and the noise was definitely overwhelming after being in the villages and sitting in Acacia’s tranquil porch listening to chirping birds and cars passing by on the road a bit away.

The day’s orientation included quick descriptions of University of Venda (UniVen), of the Water and Health in Limpopo Project, of South Africa’s Limpopo Province and then there was a Culture/Language crash course after lunch. The different sessions were broken-up by riddles that we UVA students were then put on the spot to answer then and there. They were so easy that you felt guilty about answering them, because if you were wrong you’d look really foolish, but either way it was a funny way to put people in the hotseat. They also sang to us which was fun and we did catch on fast enough to sing it back at them, which was cute and clever, but it all just felt so socially necessary. So what do I mean by socially necessary? Scripted, required, acted out, and yet so very different than our traditional orientations in the states- so we were of course just following seeming pressure and assumed expectation.

The lectures were helpful indeed, and by the end of the day my head was full of things that I had learned from the lectures, from traveling into a village the day before my team arrived, and just talking with Sid. Our team is going to be doing more of a training manual/training session than I had realized coming into the project. I am glad that we have a few people who know a bit more than me about chronic disease around now, but it will be very interesting to see how my public health brain works in the context of the individual health and practitioner views. In some ways, I have been doing stuff like this from a 20000 ft view already in different issues, and so the same theories and practices should apply.

The day also included lunch which was delicious and included the most local of dishes, Pap, chakalakya, chicken, sausage, veggies and rice. We had a mingling session just before lunch, and after getting our food first and heading downstairs to eat it, the group of 4^th years we had been talking with mostly dispersed. It was nice to meet them all- very friendly people, yet it was strange to me we didn’t spend the time getting to know the 3^rd year students we will be working alongside in the field. Many photos, lectures, smiles and introductions later, we were on our way back to Acacia for our 4^th of July braai (bbq)- hosted by Sid and I (momma bear as I am getting a name for).

While the night involved no fireworks that didn’t come straight off the charcoal being pushed around with a stick, the food was fabulous! Sid’s friends from South Africa made pap and the chakalakya, I worked on some pasta and then guacamole with Chris (my newest roommate), and then others brought over rice, chickpea salad, and corn so much other food I can’t even think of it all! The wine and beer lasted and by the end of the night everyone was exhausted and happy. It was good to see so many smiles around and even as a crowd headed to the casino, I knew it was definitely time for me to get some sleep after the fullest day of my time here yet! 

Snippets and Snapshots: 10 Highlights from Uganda so far

Snippets and Snapshots: 10 Highlights from Uganda so far: My time in Uganda is flying by. I can't believe it's been five weeks already. Here are ten great things about my experience that I h...

This blog makes me homesick for Uganda.... missing the cuties, the family, and the freedom to roam around!

North of the South's Wild Side

Limpopo, Venda, South Africa….where are you going? So the best way to describe where I am at is that I am in the more northeastern district of South Africa. Now in that province is pretty large, but I am in a town called Thohoyandou if you really want to map it. The place isn’t too rural, though is clearly near places that are quite rural. We have a Shoprite and an Oasis grocery store nearby ask well as a post office and phone store, but technically I am not supposed to go walking around alone. Shame. One of my favorite things to do is get to know a city by walking. Kampala, Paris, Musanze, Kigali, you name it, I walk it – generally. Guess not here.

This town (which I haven’t seen too much of due to my advised inability to walk) there is a university, a ton of NGOs and clearly a lot of UVA students. Our lodge alone will be hosting more than ten (who are accompanied by other university students from the States). There is a mosque from which the call to prayer broadcast over loud speakers each day and evening in its beautiful melodies.

Monkeys. Now the monkeys of our lodge are EVERYWHERE, and the little bandits ran in and out with a loaf of bread yesterday from one of the other student’s cabins. While bad, what was worse was that once the spoiled loaf had been recovered, it was fed to the monkeys reinforcing the “steal food, get food” mentality that these monkeys. Having said that, they are adorable! Having been spending the majority of my time at the house, these crazy little monkeys and their less devious black tip ferrets have been providing me quite the array of amusement.

Luckily, it has not all be about the monkeys. Since I have been getting to know the other students lodging at the same place as me, the weekend was filled with making those friendships. Not only did we have a braai or cookout on Saturday (including a croc and bird watching experience), but we spent Sunday doing a day safari! Of course the rest will be describing these fun little trips rather than actually describing the villages of Limpopo, but that will come with my research team!

The day safari involved a bit of a drive to the Punda Maria gate to Kruger National Park. We paid for our admission (200R) and then after using the pretty nice toilette, we headed back to the car and into the park. It was about that time that we all jokingly said, “so where are the animals?” Within seconds, 3 VERY large elephants came into view directly in front of the car on the tarmac! The first reaction was clearly to hit the break and the second was to pull out cameras and stick them through windows! It was an incredible entrance, but was met by a few other elephant encounters that even put these one’s (lazily crossing the road) to shame.

Our second fabulous elephant encounter (there were other encounters between our entrance and this one) was at the watering hole. We pull up to a y-shaped intersection not quite sure where to go. Seeing another car doing the same we assumed it was for the purpose of being lost as well. On the other side of the jeep across from us, another elephant was splashing water at himself and quite happily drinking from his own trunk! This was incredible, but shortly after we snapped out photos he headed off along the water’s edge. Little did we know that over the next hill, he was meeting about another 8 elephants who were mud-slinging and fighting each other shoulder deep in the waterhole! It was amazing to hear the tusks hitting one another and the force of them moving the water literally out of their way as they roughhoused. It was of course silent without the car engine on, and so all you heard were the elephants and then later the bucking of the zebras that snuck-up behind us!

Overall, the day featured a black back jackal, warthogs, ostriches, giraffes, zebras, impala, wildebeests, baboons, vervet monkeys and goodness knows some beautiful birds! Strange to be a tourist before a local this time around, but without a reason to be in the villages each day, it is hard to get to know one’s surroundings! But the monkeys of our chalets are the vervets we met in the park, and they were equally mischievous! They managed to steal an entire loaf of bread off of our picnic table!!

After lunch, our drive continued and the elephant sightings did, too! We not only saw a stand-off between a Civic sized car and an elephant, but also so the cars behind back-up slowly and get as far away as they possibly could. The elephant was likely trying to make sure that her/his baby could cross the road safely, but what could have been just a crossing guard moment turned into a 15 minute (at least) stand-off with our cars moving slowly backward and the elephant sizing us up. It walked straight toward the car ahead of us, but we managed to continue backing-up to give the one in front safe distance to slam into reverse if they needed to (aka if the elephant decided to charge). Luckily, it did not and moved on.

In Lion King Style the encore involved most everyone- the warthogs, zebras, wildebeests, and of course the elephants- but this time, there was a trick-up its trunk. This elephant managed to knock over a tree in less than 2 minutes. He’d been eating from its lower leaves and decided that the upper ones were just too high up. SO when you weigh a few tons, you just think let me knock this tree over right? Well, apparently for the big old elephant, the answer is yes! The elephant lined up his tusks on either side of the tree and just started to move slowly forward. The cracking of the tree led to an adjustment and a continued moving forward of massive animal against the tree. So with the closing of the gate came dinner time for this hungry elephant…shame that it got dirty in the small poof of dust that flew-up as it fell!