Safari and Mchezi... what a life!

Safari was a blast. We saw lions, a leopard, so many hyena, too many genets, hares, new birds, hippos, buffalo, zebras, giraffes, and elephants. Now it’s off to Mchezi for 4 days in one of my favorite villages.

Again, check worldcampforkids.blogspot.com to see an intern’s posts from last week!

Safari

Just got back yesterday from a short 4 day trip to Zambia. We stayed at Wildlife again, which was nice as always. I still think it has by far the best sunset view. The sun goes down beyond the tree line on the opposite side of the slowly flowing but massive river, filled with hippos. Unfortunately it was too cloudy Friday night, our first night, to see a sunset. But we had a yummy, yummy dinner. I went on the night drive Saturday and saw the sunset from the top of a hill in the park, standing next to impala and overlooking buffalo bathing in a small pond. Epic much? We also saw giraffes, elephants, zebras, impala, bush and water buck, hundreds of beautiful birds, lots of rodents, plus a leopard.

I did get to watch the sunset Sunday night from the restaurant. It was small but incredible. I couldn’t see the sun itself but it streaked that side of the sky pink and orange. The clouds were in horizontal lines that reflected in the river. It was only Jaren, Nick, Catherine and I who had stayed back that night. The other four volunteers found a pride of lions munching on a zebra they had killed 5 minutes before. Then they drove five minutes down the road and found a hyena eating an impala it had just stolen from the leopard they saw walking away from its kill.

We drove back Monday and had John’s incredible enchiladas and fruit salad for dinner. Today I’m staying back from camp to get some work done. This week’s homestay!

Things I'll Miss about Botswana

Since I leave Botswana today, I figured I'd post a list of the things I will and won't miss mo Botswana. More stories to come about my last few days.... too many adventures and great insights into the workings of the US embassy!

Things I won't miss about Botswana:
Seeing donkeys with their front legs tied together so they can’t walk very fast or go very far
Being honked at by every taxi that passes
Silent TV dinners
Mosquitoes
Throwing my trash on the ground because there’s nowhere else to put it
People who assume I can’t speak Setswana
Foreigners watching the progress of their Batswana construction crew for hours from their air conditioned cars
Slow internet
Not really knowing how to cook anything I’ve eaten here
Kagisong
Food poisioning… Thanks program house leftovers
Being asked where my husband is by every taxi driver. Don’t have one? Then where’s your boyfriend?
Sticking out like a sore thumb
“Sori mma, ga ke je nama.”
Writing papers
Boys peeing everywhere
Passports
Prepaid phone units
Switches where off is up and on is down

Things I’ll miss about Botswana:
Boitumelo, Bonolo, Dimpho, Kabo, Kagiso, Katlhego, Lefika, Lesego, Leungo, Mpho, Naledi, Neo, Tabo
Long good byes outside Bull and Bush with flickering lights and massive audiences
The skies
Letsatsi
Mickey tags
April
Dirt roads
Riding in the back of pickups
Gabs, Kasane, Manyana, Maun, Mochudi
My host families
Maun Homeopathy Project
P10 lunches
Parks
Chibuku cartons everywhere
Dirt roads
Rain storms when the sky seems to rip right open
Rummy 500
Bush breakfasts/lunches/dinners
Brian
My hubby
Department of Wildlife and National Parks
Walking by the State House every morning and afternoon
Wild dogs
Wonderful conversations with strangers
Pap pap
The efficiency of the US embassy
Safari drives
Land Cruisers and Range Rovers
Sunset
Favors
Thunder that booms, crashes and rattles your ribs for thirty seconds
Ame
Diphologolo
Motogo
Sour fruit
Crunchy YumYum
The molapo
Having an MP dad
Random dance parties
Linga Langa
Forked lightening
Football
Thari Daycare Center
Kudu
Liver-looking banana-smelling fruits
Pula
Amarula
Walking by Embassies
LBRs
Weddings
BOFWA
Oranges and peaches right off the tree
Birds
The air-conditioned rock
Quiet picnics under a huge tree
Choppies
Webby
The cool side of Manyana’s river
The Botswana soundtrack
Mokoros
Throwing wine on Lesh
Free internet in the best places; Maun airport, Barcelos, Linga Langa, Equitorial
Trees everywhere
Elephants
My wonderful eating buddy
So many kids
Night time walks
Dinaledi
Mmadua
Monkey Gland Burgers
Backpackers’
Walking
Milky Lane
Being a tourist
Khombis
Bull and Bush
Ditonki, Dikgomo, Dipudi, Dikatsi, Dintsa, Dikoko
Comfy beds
Bucket baths
Booze cruise
Dula
History
Setswana
Backpackers
Beef juice
Amarula
My Birthswana
Namibian women wearing beautiful hats and dresses
Meeting Atlha
My four new families in a beautiful and wonderful country
BOITUMELO, BONOLO, DIMPHO, KABO, KAGISO, KATLEGO, LEFIKA, LESEGO, LEUNGO, MPHO, NALEDI, NEO, TABO

Malawi Wrap Up

It’s been a ridiculous amount of time since I last posted. But know that it’s only because I’ve been so busy with incredible tasks. Since my last post, we went to the lake, went on safari, went to three more schools, did a one day camp at Dzaleka Refugee Camp (where we went last session too), sent all the volunteers home, finished up the session, and flew to South Africa! Well, the intent was to fly to Botswana but I missed my connection in Joburg and am now spending the night. But that means some unexpected free time to write up a blog! Since so much has happened, I guess I’ll write a few memorable moments.

I went to a meeting at the Ministry of Education with Jesse, one of the founders of World Camp. We met with a few different people, just checking in on what they expect from WC and what direction we can go in the future. I was disgusted at the piles of old computers in the hallways of the Ministry. They were no longer being used in the building and were being saved to be sent to schools. But they weren’t stacked neatly; they were literally thrown on top of each other. It’s amazing none of the screens had broken, or maybe the broken ones had been thrown out. Tires were piled up to the ceiling in another hallway on a lower floor.

Another surprise at the MOE: there’s a new school calendar being implemented in 2011 with a break that spans the three months we’re in country. On first thought, a nationwide break would make it hard to teach classes. But, a new idea is to just run “summer camp” like classes. That way, we have free reign to teach how we want. It might be a little more difficult to get students to come in though. A plus? The new calendar takes farming and religious holidays into account. The harvest season is a break, and days are off if there is a popular religious holiday (both Christian and Muslim).

Safari was, of course, wonderful. We saw elephants, hippos, monkeys galore, giraffes, cervils, hares, lions, and 2 leopards together, which is incredibly rare since they’re normally solitary animals. I was completely frustrated and literally had to bite my tongue when some of the volunteers asked to leave as we were watching the leopards. They were bored and only wanted to see lions. Our guide said we had to stay until another car came and was able to pick up the cats. Once we found the lions, we watched for a few minutes and the volunteers were ready to go again. Why not sit and enjoy looking at such incredible animals for a few minutes? Sunset was incredible. By far one of the best ones I’ve seen. But, since the guide had been pestered so much that we just wanted to see lions, we had our sundowner drinks on the go as we drove on to find the big cats. Then the volunteers complained they hadn’t been able to enjoy the sunset. ARGGG. I just wanted to scream.

The next morning, the six volunteers were going to go on a drive on their own. The plan was for them to make their own breakfasts from the food we’d brought before their drive left at 6. Turns out there was an elephant in front of the room with our food and they couldn’t eat. I would’ve been excited… how many people can say an elephant stood between them and their food? But no, these guys complained. Then they complained because their drive started at 6:30. But that complains legit and completely my fault.

Don’t get me wrong, I loved my volunteers. Sometimes I just forget they’re in high school. I certainly hope I was never bored when my parents took us on safari a few years ago!!

Since I was with Y2Y, I only spent one night at the lake this time. That was probably a good thing, because their attention spans are sometimes a little short. I just wanted to relax for the weekend, but they wanted to do stuff. Since they can’t go anywhere without a coordinator, I walked down the beach in both directions. Of course, it was with two different groups because they can never decide to do anything at the same time so it’s only one trip for the coordinators. I also took a small group into the trading center. That was fun, since it’s certainly different than the villages that aren’t close to Lake Malawi. I also went banana boating with three of the girls. Originally, they were going to go on the banana and I was going to ride in the real boat and take pictures, but when one of them was happy after two rides, I happily stepped up. The first night, we preordered a vegetarian meal for all. It was a full loaf of bread. The middle had been cut out and it was stuffed with a delicious bean and vegetable stew. Only one person finished.

And now it’s on to Botswana! I’m still not very sure what to expect. We were all supposed to arrive Aug. 10, but I’m obviously a day late now. I should get in around 7:30 am though, so I don’t think I’ll ruin plans too much. I think we have a few days of orientation in Gaborone (the capital city, pronounced Hab-or-o-nee) before heading out to the village for our first homestay. I think I’ll have internet the first few days while we’re doing orientation, but then don’t expect to be online for at least 5 or 6 weeks. I’ll be getting credit for four classes total: Setswana language intensive, Contemporary Socio-Cultural Issues in Botswana, Field Work Methodology in Botswana, and a final research project.

There’s a Levine family reunion going on in Tahoe this weekend.... Hi to all my family! I know you’ll all have a wonderful time!! Make sure an extra hand of bridge is played for me!

And Grandpa, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Tionana!!!
Karen

Things have been beyond crazy at the WC house. I stayed home from camp today to get work done, and end up writing a blog post! But it’s a great chance to take a quick break from logistics and do something else. I’ll work backwards…. Today’s Day 4 of our third camp. That means presentations and solar ovens – definitely some of my favorite things, and I wish I could be there. I also stayed home yesterday to work on a packet for Field Staff orientation that I’m putting together. I got a lot of work done on that, plus learned how to do some accounting.

Today, I’m planning tomorrow’s outreach project. We’re going to Dzaleka Refugee Camp in Dowa District. There are ten nationalities represented at the camp, but the group we’ll be working with is primarily Congolese (which means they speak Swahili, not Chichewa like the Malawians we typically work with!). So the organization is providing their own interpreters. In the morning, we’re going to work with a group of 45 adults. 10 are staff members, 15 are members of an HIV/AIDS awareness club, and 20 are HIV+ people. They asked for basic education because the camp is really far behind in terms of awareness and information. Malawi as a whole has been doing really well recently in raising awareness and increasing education, but the camp is about 15 years behind the rest of the country. While HIV rates are lower than they are in the rest of the country, the camp is considered high risk because it’s closed.

In the afternoon, we’re going to work with 85 kids who were either orphaned by AIDS or are HIV or AIDS positive themselves. They’re ages 7-15. I’m trying to figure out what to do with them right now, and can’t decide if games and teambuilding activities would be more beneficial than education because of the age variance, or if teaching basic information would be better. I’ll definitely post about the day tomorrow or Sunday.

Last weekend we went on safari in Zambia. It was wonderful. We stayed at a place called Flatdogs that I hadn’t been to before (and that has delicious food!!). We camped in tents and had to be escorted to bed each night by guards because hippos walked through every night. We were really close to the river, so they’d come out at night and keep the grass short. Elephants walked through all the time too, so we had to make sure there was enough space between our tents for an elephant to fit. It was crazy to wake up in the middle of the night and hear hippos chomping on grass. They’re incredibly loud eaters. There were also a number of monkeys that would grab any food or items left lying around. When I was sitting by the pool one day, I left my watch on a table. I got up for awhile to throw a football and when I got back it was gone. Luckily, someone found it in the grass, but I’m pretty sure it was the monkeys. I also saw a HUGE monitor lizard in the middle of the camp ground. I was by myself and didn’t have a camera. It was 3-4 feet and I was pretty scared, it watched me walk by.

I went on one night drive and saw some amazing animals. We saw a herd of buffalo, a single male lion, tons of impala, giraffes, hippos, water buck, elephants, zebras, kudu, lots of birds, baboons, velvet monkeys, crocodiles… it was great. With 14 WC people on drives, we took two cars. We met up for sundowners and took tons of pictures while we watched the African sunset. It was great.

The week before I went to camp every day. We were at a great school that was really excited to have us and the students were all wonderful. I do miss being in the classroom though. Now, I get to sit in on classes and watch the volunteer teachers and Field Staff interact with the kids. Plus I get to sit in on teacher meetings, which is incredibly interesting and informative. They’re always so open and willing to discuss the issues.

On the third day of camp during Empowerment (where we split up male and female students), one of the classes heard that a girl at the school had been impregnated by the head teacher and had left. I’m not sure what to believe – the head teacher was a wonderful man who asked us to come and teach at his school. All he talked about was change and education. I know that stuff like that happens throughout Malawi, but I’m not sure it happened at this school. It was kind of a reminder of why we’re – to help the kids learn about HIV and environmental degradation, and what they can do to stop the issues, protect themselves, and raise awareness.

Working with the teachers is supposed to increase the sustainability of our programs – if the teachers know the information, they can continue to teach it. I only hope a man who requests WC comes to teach his students really does have their best interests at heart.

So that’s about it for now. Pictures from the session are up on WC’s facebook page, plus I think a volunteer is going to post about safari tonight on the WC blog, so check that out too. If the internet was any faster, I’d put pictures up myself.

Elena’s newest discovery: right now, the four Clark family members are on 3 different continents!