Sustainability is the key
Sorry for the long time in between emails…sometimes when we get into routine it’s hard to know what to write about considering nothing “exciting” has been happening lately. I started writing a couple of blog entries about the weather and the fact that our house turned briefly into a hospital for Kabala expats but we realized that if we have to resort to talking about the weather, we probably shouldn’t have a blog. As it turns out, a couple of exciting things have happened in our lives lately (we’ll get to those later), but we decided to dedicate this entry and the upcoming one more to describing what we have been doing all this time within our respective workplaces, so that we can better answer the question: “so…what have you guys been doing anyway besides killing goats and learning how to carry things on your head?”
For me as a teacher, the majority of my time is spent with my students, which I have actually become very close to. I’m not a real emotional person, but I know that it will be hard saying goodbye to them. In fact, the other day when I was teaching them how to write letters, I accidentally made the fact that I am leaving in 6 months and most likely never coming back a little bit too clear. Half the class started crying, and my prefect was a wreck for about an hour (they knew I was leaving, but for some reason talking about it bluntly was too much for them). It was a sad, touching, and funny moment, actually. The best part about it is that when in the future when my FVC kids are choked at me for some reason (which is often), I can legitimately pull out the line: “hey, there are students in Africa who would LOVE to have me as a teacher, so suck it up!” We think often of those last weeks and moments here, and we know more and more that it’s going to be really hard for us to say goodbye to my students (which we both have grown close to) and our friends and colleagues. We’ve tossed around the idea of staying for another year, but there are just too many reasons why it’s not a possibility.
At CRC I have been working towards promoting effective teaching of reading to the students through starting a reading club and other ways developing games and sports, and teaching computer skills to the staff. It’s interesting coming from mostly a high school PE background, I never thought I would be such a champion for cause of phonics, but the impact of well-taught language and reading skills is so evident here. I wish often that I had some training in primary literacy or education, because I have relied mostly on common sense and what I remember from how I learned to read.
Partly because we have been supported so abundantly financially and through prayer by friends and family back home, and also for our own reasons, both Adrienne and I have felt a certain pressure to “do” something while we are here. Because of this, we started out with some vast ideas as to what our “impact” might be. We have really had to learn to be patient, and that it is much better to make one minuscule change that is sustained than it is to, say, eradicate poverty in Kabala for only one day. This slow shift in thinking has led us to do some things differently. For example, CRC received a laptop and a printer recently, which I could train the whole staff to use. After a while, it was very clear that training 1 teacher well would be a much more sustainable option. Also, I am not going to start any programs which other teachers are not going to pick up again next fall – I still hope to get a solid reading program set up before I leave.
Adrienne has made a couple of really great things happen in the clinic (and the school), but I will let her write about those.
Exciting (sort of) things: I lent out my bicycle on the 2nd of January to a friend so that he can go to the village and pick up his son. He guaranteed that he would return on the 3rd with my bike, but....the weeks passed without any word or sign of him or my bike. We (my colleagues at CRC and I) received word that he was residing (with a nice red bicycle “given” to him by a white man) in a village 20 miles away. So this morning the class IV teacher and I went on a motorbike ride (gorgeous scenery, btw), to collect the bicycle. We met his wife in the village, who let us know he left last night to go to a different village. Immediately after this small fib, the man came riding up on my bike smiling, as if we were meeting under normal circumstances. He gladly helped pack my bicycle on my Honda, and sent me back on the way. Long story short: I went to the village and collected my bicycle.
FYI: our living situation is a little tricky currently. CES higher – ups are visiting who take priority in the guest house, so we had to move out. We were panicking a couple of days ago when we were told we had to pack and leave the house by that evening, but we are now settled nicely into our temporary (6 weeks) living space, which is a large room in the downstairs portion of the CES office.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Pictures
Adrienne with a couple of friends watching the sports day in Yagala...it is impossible to get locals to smile in pictures - trust us, they are much more friendly than they look
Red house.
We walked to a nearby village recently to watch their sports day. SUCH huge and cool event to witness. It made me realize: A. there are so many amazing athletes here (ie. the girl below high jumping), B. I have a ton of work to do before CRC's sports day which is March 20 and 21
Strange thing that happens here during dry season: People always set the bush on fire uncontrollably. This is right behind our house.
Attempting to cook the chicken given to us: it turned out to be a complete disaster.
Another food chain reminder: Mariama's (the child who Adrienne has helped out significantly and we've grown a soft spot for) father brought us a chicken as a thank you.
On the way back from the village: part of the bicycle was on Bockarie's bike, and part on mine.
On the way to the village to collect my stolen (I think?) bicycle.
Motel "Sicks"
For the last couple of weeks, Adrienne’s nursing expertise, and our spare bedroom, have been working overtime with a steady flow of sick expats. Leah, our friend and fellow CITA volunteer lives with a local family and recently her little sister, Crystal, came to Kabala for a visit. After a short stay (a couple of days) in a village, they came back with Crystal experiencing some pretty intense sickness. Since our house has a toilet and an extra bed, they stayed with us for a couple of nights, until Crystal was OK again. The next night starting at around 4 AM, I had about 12 hours of the exact same thing, and Leah the following night. Two nights later, Charmaine, a short term CITA volunteer, was over with the same thing. So 4 out of the last 5 nights we have had a different person spending many unpleasant hours in our bathroom. Ugh. Good thing it was all separate nights….all are OK now, though. Amazningly, Adrienne didn’t get sick at all which leads us to believe it actually wasn’t contagious: everyone just happened to digest something that their bodies hated at almost the same time.
Blame the Weather
Now that our entry is a little more legitimate, we decided to put the weather info in anyways, seems how there might be 1 or 2 of you who might be interested.
I remember wondering before we arrived here “will there ever be a time during the next year during which I will feel cold.” I found out early on that the answer was yes, but as I am sitting here wearing a sweater and track pants after a night of shivering under a couple of blankets, I decided to write a little bit about Kabala weather. (Also, nothing really significant has happened lately as we are settling back into routine, so we might be developing writer’s block).
One huge benefit to staying here a full calendar year is the opportunity to see all the seasonal changes that happen within that time. Rainy season lasts from late April until late October, and the rest of year, obviously, is dry season. When we arrived to Kabala on September 2, it was overcast and rainy for almost a full week, much like the lower mainland but much warmer. From then until the end of rainy season, it was very hot during the day, but almost every evening would bring a thunderstorm, which would cool things down nicely and settle any dust. We were constantly warned about December and January being very cold. Other than the fact that the roads are terrible, rainy season was quite a nice time weather – wise, and it is amazing how completely green and lush everything is.
Dry season, on the other hand, is just that – extremely dry. It hasn’t rained once since October 31, and whereas before we were wondering why in the world we brought things like lotion and chap stick to such a humid and damp place, now we can’t apply the stuff fast enough. November was very hot, but certainly not so hot that we had trouble sleeping or anything. December and January has been awesome weather. A cool (although extremely dry) wind constantly blows, which makes it quite cold at night, but during the day it is hot – very much like a summer day back home. For the last week, however, the weather has actually gotten legitimately cold. It has been overcast and very windy, and we walk around in the middle of the afternoon with coats or sweaters on. This has been totally surprising and quite nice actually. We even have sipped hot cocoa on our veranda in sweaters with our hands wrapped around the mug for warmth praising. I only mention this fact because we never would have thought it would happen. The reaction of the locals to the cold has been hilarious. They build fires to keep warm, and absolutely everything that goes wrong is blamed on “the cold,” “the dust,” or “the breeze.”
Things just keep getting dryer and dryer, and dustier and dustier. February we hear is very hot – no clouds hardly at all. March is the last month before rainy season and the hottest of the year. Supposedly the clouds come, but no rain yet bringing stifling humidity. April will be an awesome month: the thousands of mango trees will bear fruit, and the first rains will come, which will be a cool thing to witness.
Sorry to write about the weather, but it has actually been quite surprising and interesting.
I remember wondering before we arrived here “will there ever be a time during the next year during which I will feel cold.” I found out early on that the answer was yes, but as I am sitting here wearing a sweater and track pants after a night of shivering under a couple of blankets, I decided to write a little bit about Kabala weather. (Also, nothing really significant has happened lately as we are settling back into routine, so we might be developing writer’s block).
One huge benefit to staying here a full calendar year is the opportunity to see all the seasonal changes that happen within that time. Rainy season lasts from late April until late October, and the rest of year, obviously, is dry season. When we arrived to Kabala on September 2, it was overcast and rainy for almost a full week, much like the lower mainland but much warmer. From then until the end of rainy season, it was very hot during the day, but almost every evening would bring a thunderstorm, which would cool things down nicely and settle any dust. We were constantly warned about December and January being very cold. Other than the fact that the roads are terrible, rainy season was quite a nice time weather – wise, and it is amazing how completely green and lush everything is.
Dry season, on the other hand, is just that – extremely dry. It hasn’t rained once since October 31, and whereas before we were wondering why in the world we brought things like lotion and chap stick to such a humid and damp place, now we can’t apply the stuff fast enough. November was very hot, but certainly not so hot that we had trouble sleeping or anything. December and January has been awesome weather. A cool (although extremely dry) wind constantly blows, which makes it quite cold at night, but during the day it is hot – very much like a summer day back home. For the last week, however, the weather has actually gotten legitimately cold. It has been overcast and very windy, and we walk around in the middle of the afternoon with coats or sweaters on. This has been totally surprising and quite nice actually. We even have sipped hot cocoa on our veranda in sweaters with our hands wrapped around the mug for warmth praising. I only mention this fact because we never would have thought it would happen. The reaction of the locals to the cold has been hilarious. They build fires to keep warm, and absolutely everything that goes wrong is blamed on “the cold,” “the dust,” or “the breeze.”
Things just keep getting dryer and dryer, and dustier and dustier. February we hear is very hot – no clouds hardly at all. March is the last month before rainy season and the hottest of the year. Supposedly the clouds come, but no rain yet bringing stifling humidity. April will be an awesome month: the thousands of mango trees will bear fruit, and the first rains will come, which will be a cool thing to witness.
Sorry to write about the weather, but it has actually been quite surprising and interesting.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
A Memorable New Years Day
Happy New Year everyone,
Since the day we arrived in Kabala last September, the local New Years Day festivities had been hyped more than all three High School Musical movies put together. Kabala is situated within the Wara Wara mountains, and we were told (often) that many people come visit during the holidays, and climb the hill on the 1st of January.
Although we casually told probably hundreds of people that we would go with them up the hill, Adrienne and I had been officially invited up with the CRC staff a couple of months ago. At that time, we officially (double-use of “officially” intentional) volunteered our contributions for the festivities (how many cups of rice, how many soft drinks, etc. etc.). Adrienne and I committed to contributing the meat, which would be one goat.
After we returned from our holidays on the 30th, we thought we had to settle on beef or chicken because there were no more goats left, but, just like Abraham and Isaac (as JT put it), God provided a goat at the last minute on the 31st. Doomed as it was, he was a cute little thing, however I tried not to get to emotionally attached since we were quickly made aware that I would be the one with the honor of slaughtering the goat. ummmm…thank you?
Sure enough, the population in Kabala for New Years was at least double what it normally is – packed with people. There was cultural dancing, music blaring all day and night, and the markets were overcrowded (I got 15000 Le pickpocketed) and overpriced.
We arrived at our colleague Finah’s house at 7 AM to cook the food make all the preparations needed to go up the mountain. Of course, the first thing that had to happen was the slaughtering of the goat. After an ironically sad attempt on the goat’s behalf at escape, we soon had him pinned and ready. Putting aside a sudden urge to become a vegetarian I summoned up the courage to make the kill. I won’t go into details (pictures are below for you braver blog readers), but the blood splattered far enough to get on my face (….okay so I got into one detail).
Once the slaughtering was finished, Adrienne assisted in the cooking process, which took around 5 hours. Once that was finished, we walked up the hill (around 40 min. to 1 hour walk depending on the route taken), with enough food and drinks to feed around 50 people. (On a side note, it is remarkable how sure-footed, strong, and energetic the locals are when it comes to climbing that hill. At the top, all us white folks were sweaty, tired, and incredibly dirty from hiking through a wall of dust in 30 degree heat. Meanwhile, the locals, most of whom carried extremely heavy loads on their heads such as a 5 gallon bucket of water or a generator, reach the top, unabashedly change into their party clothes, and are looking instantly clean and fabulous).
It’s really hard to describe the atmosphere on top of the hill. Imagine a mix between Woodstock and a family picnic – only at the top of a mountain and with more brush fires. We tried to guess a total number of people up there and came up with anywhere between 5 and 10 thousand. On top were cultural dances, a night club-style dance area, a motorbike driving around which someone somehow drove/carried to the top, and a lot of general good natured partying (and of course some fisticuffs). And just in case by this time we weren’t sure of A. our place in the food chain, or B. whether or not we are in Africa, I was given the heart of the goat to eat during dinner.
The “walk” down was one of the craziest and most memorable experiences we’ve had since we’ve been here. Hundreds of people running/sliding down a narrow and extremely steep and dusty trail.
In short, we’re pretty sure we are never going to have a new years day quite like that one, and just like High School Musical III (wink), yes, it lived up to the hype.
Work begins for us again on Monday the 5th. We’ve had a fun and relaxing holiday, but it will be nice to get back to work and into routine life once again.
Since the day we arrived in Kabala last September, the local New Years Day festivities had been hyped more than all three High School Musical movies put together. Kabala is situated within the Wara Wara mountains, and we were told (often) that many people come visit during the holidays, and climb the hill on the 1st of January.
Although we casually told probably hundreds of people that we would go with them up the hill, Adrienne and I had been officially invited up with the CRC staff a couple of months ago. At that time, we officially (double-use of “officially” intentional) volunteered our contributions for the festivities (how many cups of rice, how many soft drinks, etc. etc.). Adrienne and I committed to contributing the meat, which would be one goat.
After we returned from our holidays on the 30th, we thought we had to settle on beef or chicken because there were no more goats left, but, just like Abraham and Isaac (as JT put it), God provided a goat at the last minute on the 31st. Doomed as it was, he was a cute little thing, however I tried not to get to emotionally attached since we were quickly made aware that I would be the one with the honor of slaughtering the goat. ummmm…thank you?
Sure enough, the population in Kabala for New Years was at least double what it normally is – packed with people. There was cultural dancing, music blaring all day and night, and the markets were overcrowded (I got 15000 Le pickpocketed) and overpriced.
We arrived at our colleague Finah’s house at 7 AM to cook the food make all the preparations needed to go up the mountain. Of course, the first thing that had to happen was the slaughtering of the goat. After an ironically sad attempt on the goat’s behalf at escape, we soon had him pinned and ready. Putting aside a sudden urge to become a vegetarian I summoned up the courage to make the kill. I won’t go into details (pictures are below for you braver blog readers), but the blood splattered far enough to get on my face (….okay so I got into one detail).
Once the slaughtering was finished, Adrienne assisted in the cooking process, which took around 5 hours. Once that was finished, we walked up the hill (around 40 min. to 1 hour walk depending on the route taken), with enough food and drinks to feed around 50 people. (On a side note, it is remarkable how sure-footed, strong, and energetic the locals are when it comes to climbing that hill. At the top, all us white folks were sweaty, tired, and incredibly dirty from hiking through a wall of dust in 30 degree heat. Meanwhile, the locals, most of whom carried extremely heavy loads on their heads such as a 5 gallon bucket of water or a generator, reach the top, unabashedly change into their party clothes, and are looking instantly clean and fabulous).
It’s really hard to describe the atmosphere on top of the hill. Imagine a mix between Woodstock and a family picnic – only at the top of a mountain and with more brush fires. We tried to guess a total number of people up there and came up with anywhere between 5 and 10 thousand. On top were cultural dances, a night club-style dance area, a motorbike driving around which someone somehow drove/carried to the top, and a lot of general good natured partying (and of course some fisticuffs). And just in case by this time we weren’t sure of A. our place in the food chain, or B. whether or not we are in Africa, I was given the heart of the goat to eat during dinner.
The “walk” down was one of the craziest and most memorable experiences we’ve had since we’ve been here. Hundreds of people running/sliding down a narrow and extremely steep and dusty trail.
In short, we’re pretty sure we are never going to have a new years day quite like that one, and just like High School Musical III (wink), yes, it lived up to the hype.
Work begins for us again on Monday the 5th. We’ve had a fun and relaxing holiday, but it will be nice to get back to work and into routine life once again.
Happy New Year (and a belated Merry Christmas)
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone,
First of all, we want to say that we hope all of you had a happy and healthy holiday season. Hopefully it was a time to relax and reflect for everyone - we have heard that the snow in the lower mainland and other parts of Canada has been pretty crazy.
I had 3 weeks off from school for Christmas break, and we really wanted to do some traveling to other West African countries while we were here, so we decided to travel to Ghana for Christmas. It is a more developed country, and one of our friends was traveling there with her mom and sister. They invited us to spend Christmas Eve and Day with them there, so it seemed like a good fit.
Traveling to Ghana was a fantastic experience, and we are so glad we decided to spend to time there, even if it was only 12 days. It was so interesting traveling from one West African country to another – each in a different stage of development. We spent one night in Accra, the capital city, before traveling West across the coast for about 5 hours to the small beach town of Busua. We spent 3 nights there, and travelled slowly back across the coast to Elmina, Cape Coast, Kokrobite, and then back in Accra for the last 3 nights. (Travel itinerary and city names included just in case anyone cares)
Highlights:
1. The experience of traveling to Ghana after being in Sierra Leone. Ghana has paved roads and electricity running throughout the country, and the infrastructure in totally incomparable. In the city, traffic lights are fully obeyed and there are large paved highways. We had reverse culture shock the first day traveling on the public transit because everything was so clean and organized from buying a computerized ticket to sitting on an air conditioned bus. A week later, we visited the fully modern Accra mall, complete with a Silver City-style movie theater, food court, etc.
2. Being a tourist. It was great to relax on some beaches, and stay in a variety of places – from budget backpacker types to medium to high – end places. One really interesting thing about Ghana is the fact that there are number of castles and forts built centuries ago by various European countries while in competition for slaves. We also did a lot of swimming, relaxing on the beach, surfing, eating, and even some mountain biking.
3. Coming back Kabala after arriving in Freetown. We are infinitely glad to be living in Kabala rather than in Freetown for a million reasons.
Lowlights:
1. Even though much more developed, Ghana is still a 3rd world country. Once out of the major cities, people live much like they do in Sierra Leone. For example, most places that we stayed were quite nice, but we were surrounded by stark poverty. This was hard to deal with emotionally while vacationing.
2. Christmas Eve. It was rather strange celebrating Christmas with the absence of everything that normally goes along with it, but especially family. On Christmas Eve we stayed at a low budget place ($20 per night), with our friend Megan and her mom and sister. The combination of a musty, hot, mosquito – infested room, frequent toilet visits after eating too many meat skewers (we’re basically vegetarians in Kabala), and phone calls from family made us come down with serious home – sickness, so we escaped early from that place back to an air conditioned hotel and spent Christmas day there. In a way were almost glad just to have Christmas over with.
3. Being in Ghana made us realize just how far Sierra Leone has to go in terms of development. General infrastructure differences was perhaps the most obvious example, but one other noticeable one had to do with currency. For example, in Ghana, there are bank machines everywhere (almost as many as back home), you can pay with Credit Cards at a lot of places, and they recently revamped their currency so that one “Cedi” is equal (almost) to one American Dollar. By contrast, there is not one bank machine in all of SL, and all money transfers, regardless of how large, are done with cash. Before the war, the exchange rate in SL was 300 “Leones” to 1 US dollar. Currently, it is 3,050 for every dollar and climbing (it was 2900 when we arrived 4 months ago).
First of all, we want to say that we hope all of you had a happy and healthy holiday season. Hopefully it was a time to relax and reflect for everyone - we have heard that the snow in the lower mainland and other parts of Canada has been pretty crazy.
I had 3 weeks off from school for Christmas break, and we really wanted to do some traveling to other West African countries while we were here, so we decided to travel to Ghana for Christmas. It is a more developed country, and one of our friends was traveling there with her mom and sister. They invited us to spend Christmas Eve and Day with them there, so it seemed like a good fit.
Traveling to Ghana was a fantastic experience, and we are so glad we decided to spend to time there, even if it was only 12 days. It was so interesting traveling from one West African country to another – each in a different stage of development. We spent one night in Accra, the capital city, before traveling West across the coast for about 5 hours to the small beach town of Busua. We spent 3 nights there, and travelled slowly back across the coast to Elmina, Cape Coast, Kokrobite, and then back in Accra for the last 3 nights. (Travel itinerary and city names included just in case anyone cares)
Highlights:
1. The experience of traveling to Ghana after being in Sierra Leone. Ghana has paved roads and electricity running throughout the country, and the infrastructure in totally incomparable. In the city, traffic lights are fully obeyed and there are large paved highways. We had reverse culture shock the first day traveling on the public transit because everything was so clean and organized from buying a computerized ticket to sitting on an air conditioned bus. A week later, we visited the fully modern Accra mall, complete with a Silver City-style movie theater, food court, etc.
2. Being a tourist. It was great to relax on some beaches, and stay in a variety of places – from budget backpacker types to medium to high – end places. One really interesting thing about Ghana is the fact that there are number of castles and forts built centuries ago by various European countries while in competition for slaves. We also did a lot of swimming, relaxing on the beach, surfing, eating, and even some mountain biking.
3. Coming back Kabala after arriving in Freetown. We are infinitely glad to be living in Kabala rather than in Freetown for a million reasons.
Lowlights:
1. Even though much more developed, Ghana is still a 3rd world country. Once out of the major cities, people live much like they do in Sierra Leone. For example, most places that we stayed were quite nice, but we were surrounded by stark poverty. This was hard to deal with emotionally while vacationing.
2. Christmas Eve. It was rather strange celebrating Christmas with the absence of everything that normally goes along with it, but especially family. On Christmas Eve we stayed at a low budget place ($20 per night), with our friend Megan and her mom and sister. The combination of a musty, hot, mosquito – infested room, frequent toilet visits after eating too many meat skewers (we’re basically vegetarians in Kabala), and phone calls from family made us come down with serious home – sickness, so we escaped early from that place back to an air conditioned hotel and spent Christmas day there. In a way were almost glad just to have Christmas over with.
3. Being in Ghana made us realize just how far Sierra Leone has to go in terms of development. General infrastructure differences was perhaps the most obvious example, but one other noticeable one had to do with currency. For example, in Ghana, there are bank machines everywhere (almost as many as back home), you can pay with Credit Cards at a lot of places, and they recently revamped their currency so that one “Cedi” is equal (almost) to one American Dollar. By contrast, there is not one bank machine in all of SL, and all money transfers, regardless of how large, are done with cash. Before the war, the exchange rate in SL was 300 “Leones” to 1 US dollar. Currently, it is 3,050 for every dollar and climbing (it was 2900 when we arrived 4 months ago).
Pictures of our trip to Ghana
Considering we are basically vegetarians in Kabala, one can see why this Christmas dinner in Ghana, although tasty, ended up not agreeing with our stomachs.
This is a shot about 1 hour after we and our guide got lost, and were basically bushwacking through the jungle while carrying/dragging our mtn. bikes. Notice the "trail" behind Adrienne that we had to "bike" on.
This is an early shot of our guided mountain bike tour…notice the cheery smiles and positive attitudes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
