Swaziland!

I hadn’t planned to dedicate a separate post to describing my weekend in Swaziland but as it turns out, I’ve spent most of my other weekends in St Lucia bumming around and not doing anything particularly exciting or new so the Swazi weekend was as much adventure as I’ve afforded myself in the last month (excluding the run-in with the wave that claimed my camera’s life, of course). Hope you find it at least somewhat entertaining. Apologies in advance for not being able to provide photos from the trip; it was the week after the demise of my camera, when I still harboured a delusional version of hope that it could be fixed

First, the geography lesson: Swaziland is one of 2 countries located within South Africa [the other being Lesotho, located farther south]. It also borders Mozambique to the North East. Swaziland is actually a kingdom and [I cringe a little as I say this but still think it a fair comparison] bears a lot of similarity to the kingdom depicted in the movie: “Coming to America”. The trip was Miss M’s idea and since she lives in Jo’burg, a good 5 -6 hours drive away from me, arranging the logistics of getting there worked out to be a tad tricky. After juggling a few options, it was decided the best solution was for me to rent a car from St Lucia and drive to a town midway to Swazi for both of us (she and her boyfriend (BF henceforth) would be driving down from Jo’burg) and we’d journey on to Swazi from there. Now, for those of you that don’t know me well, I’m hardly the most experienced driver out there. In fact I only passed my UK driving test in April this year so agreeing to this was a rather bold [read: risqué] move on my part. I was fairly confident that I could pull it off though, so that Friday afternoon, I got into my rented car, tuned in to a radio station with decent music, laid out my map on the passenger seat next to me, and with my heart thumping at full speed, I embarked on my journey. I drove for 5 hours to get to Piet Retief, the town I referenced earlier and for the most part it was long stretches of clear road. I built up my confidence and even overtook a few cars along the way. The trickiest part was when I came to a rather long stretch of road where there were some road works going on and it seemed like all of a sudden, 6- 8 foot long commercial trucks surfaced out of no where. Driving around them was pretty damn scary, to put it mildly. I ordered myself a large burger to congratulate myself on my achievement of getting [myself and the car] there unscathed and to kill time while waiting for Miss M and BF to arrive. By the time they did arrive, we were running seriously late for making it to the border before it was closed for the night. Miss M, a far more experienced driver than me, took over the wheels and drove like a deranged lunatic to get us there… BF in tow. We made it just in time, quite literally having to run through immigration, road tax, etc. We drove for another hour or so to get to the Ezulweni Valley in Swazi where our hotel was located. It was late at this stage, pitch black outside and hours of driving and chatting had left us all spent and ready for bed!

We were up bright and early the next morning as we’d booked ourselves in for half a day of white water rafting on the Usutu river. Breakfast was a hurried affair and we soon made our way to the office of the rafting company, which was located nearby from the hotel, thankfully. We had to then get driven from the office for an hour or so to somewhere near Mbabane (Swazi’s capital) where we’d then hop onto the river. Our fellow rafting chums were on the bus with us. It was a morning of fun! Though it has to be said that nothing beats white water rafting on the Nile. The rapids were on Usutu a lot tamer in comparison. The banks of the river were, in some parts, lined with the most extraordinary looking rocks I’ve ever seen. They looked like they’d be sculpted but there were actually natural and came in all colours and shapes. The scariest part of the rafting session was when we came to a damn and had to go down a steep slope about 4 metres deep. We felt that in the pit of our bellies! Miss M and BF shared a raft while I shared one with one of the guides. My raft never tipped over whilst theirs tipped over quite a few times! Fun! The morning zapped by quickly and we soon had to make our way back to our hotel to relax and organize ourselves for the rest of the day

We had a gander through a Swazi newspaper [well it was more like a brochure] to glean ideas of things to do. We found an interesting-looking restaurant and thought we’d check it out. It turned out to be way more than we expected. The restaurant was in a resort – the Hawane (pronounced: Hawanee) Resort, it was called. And the chef there had an array of African dishes on menu; boy did we eat our hearts out! And every single morsel of food was divine. Put 3 food lovers in front of food that good and expect them to have a field day! Nothing went to waste! The view from the resort was a stunning one: it was on a hill so we could see rows of mountains and valleys ahead, all covered in green. It was breathtaking and we were so sad we hadn’t booked ourselves into that resort, as the price was similar to what we were paying at our hotel, but with all this on offer! After dinner, we chilled with glasses of wine in the lounge area and had a rather intense conversation that took us into the wee hours of the morning; religion, marriage, African cultures, family, banking (an odd one to add to the mix but being an ex banker and with Miss M and BF still in the banking world, we were bound to touch on the subject at some point), just to name a few. It was a great conversation; one I’m bound to remember for a while to come. We almost got kicked out of Hawane, so we took our fun to another hotel, where we ordered cups of tea and tried to wind down. We finally made it home, very sad that it was our final night in Swazi

We woke up reasonably early the next morning as we wanted to do some more sightseeing and were keen to avoid leaving too late as we all had work early the next day. We went to see the Phophoyane (pronounced: poponyanee) water falls, which wasn’t much it turned out, but was recommended as a must-see by a friend of Miss M. On the way out to the border, we passed by a dam (can’t recall the name now) but boy was it beautiful. We drove to the top of the dam and marveled at the beauty of the river down below. Its banks were covered with a mixture of lush green vegetation and rocks, similar to the ones we saw on the Usutu river. Overall, driving through Swazi showed that its landscape was stunning: mountains, valleys, rivers, all surrounded by lush, lush green. There were lots of gum trees as well, which were pretty but BF gave me a little history lesson which revealed that these trees are grown to feed the paper production efforts of one of the largest paper producers in the world. These trees are not indigenous to the habitat but were there solely for commercial purposes. They are cut down and new ones planted every 30 years or so. The effects of these efforts have been far reaching; its affected rainfall patterns, wild life movement and habitation, amongst other things. Parts of South Africa have also been subjected to such changes and in some cases complete eco systems have been eroded or replaced as a result. I was quite sad to hear this cause I felt it sort of took away from the beauty of it all. Swazi is a very sparsely populated country and sometimes we’d drive for miles before seeing houses or signs of human life

Sad and reluctant to end our weekend of fun, Miss M, BF and I parted ways at Piet Retief, after grabbing some hot wings from the nearest Chicken Licken! It just had to be done! We were met with very heavy rain during part of our journey to Piet Retief and I hoped that I wouldn’t meet this sort of weather on my way to St Lucia. My luck was not shining that day as half way to St Lucia a massive thunderstorm began. I drove as carefully as I could and after what felt like a whole day, I finally arrived at the house safe and sound

TIA demystified

Taking a slight departure from regular travel and work updates, I want to talk about a subject that has been bugging me for a while now. TIA is a term that most Africans are well versed with and probably use on a regular basis. For those of you not in the know, TIA is an acronym, which means: This Is Africa! Within moments of setting foot on African soil, one is bound to encounter and/or experience a TIA moment and hence be introduced to the term. Admittedly, it is usually used in jest but it actually highlights fundamental problems with life in Africa. But before I delve into my rant, allow me to site some examples of TIA moments
• You are in transit in an African airport and en route to your next flight, your hand luggage [which happens to include some alcohol that you bought in the duty free shopping area in the airport of the country you just left] is scanned. The officer says you have to pay an amount to the authorities, but if you pay him half that amount [yes, as in bribe him], he’ll let you through with no hassle – TIA
• Blackouts [as in no power/electricity], water rationing, very clogged drainage systems – TIA. The water source is at low levels or dried up and there is no backup plan!
• Heaps of rubbish in random spots in cities and townships. This rubbish will often be seen being burnt in various parts…meanwhile a few metres away a youngling is squatting, doing a No. 2 – TIA
• Public bus drivers taking liberties on the road and driving around like maniacs; like they own the town – TIA
• Dirt roads or tarred ones with massive potholes, women practically need sports bras to come anywhere close to comfortable while sat in a car driving on said roads – TIA. The government built half the road then realized part of the road was private property so they tarred half of it and left the rest. In some cases, the government didn’t even plan a road, the residents just created one!
• Formal functions and events commence 2 – 3 hours later than the scheduled time with no apologies or advance notice – TIA, in fact we are working on African time here, hello? What world do YOU live in? Have you not heard of African time? No? Well, now you know…TIA!
• You walk into a restaurant and order food which only arrives 3 hours later – TIA, it could be worse you know!
• Children get flogged in schools for disobeying rules or doing badly in tests – TIA
The list is potentially very long but you should now have a sense of what TIA moments are all about

What I find most disturbing about TIA is the ease with which we all accept it, and in fact, laugh over it. I say “we” because I am very guilty of this charge too. But being back here and working alongside Africans and non-Africans alike, while witnessing TIA in action, I have had to question the sense in doing so. If a function starts later than scheduled without apologies, why don’t we protest or hold someone accountable? Why do we accept it or laugh it off as just a TIA thing? It’s ironic, because tardiness is very disrespectful (being late just screams: “I don’t respect your time”) but from our early days we are taught to show respect for our elders and society at large [but maybe that is the problem: we “show” respect without necessarily “having” it]. When the police stop us for no apparent reason and we soon find out that they want a bribe, why don’t we make that individual accountable for their actions? Understandably, sometimes there are extenuating circumstances surrounding these scenarios I’ve just laid out and we can see what is driving people’s behaviour, but even that fails to make it right. These situations are understandable BUT NOT justifiable. The truth of the matter is that by not saying anything to reprimand friends, family, work colleagues, people we meet on a daily basis for acting ignorant; by laughing at and with them and dismissing these situations as TIA moments, we are compounding an already formidable heap of problems

I also wonder why we can perpetuate [and applaud, I dare say] such negative aspects of the African way of life but don’t tout the positive aspects of it with the same enthusiasm. I mean things like:
• Africa is a beautiful continent and each country has its unique [and outstanding] features to offer. They don’t even tell us that at school!
• Its children, though victims of poor leadership, war, poverty, abuse, deprivation, still find the courage to smile and stay positive about life
• That while most of our cultures may seem archaic and extinct, they teach the essence of humanity - to love and care for one another and look for the interests of communities rather than individuals
• That quintessential African hospitality stands the test of time. Most Africans are very happy to welcome strangers into their homes and treat them like family. I always thought this was true only in Ghana and Liberia but my travels have proved it to be a pretty pervasive phenomenon
• That art has always and continues to be a hallmark of our identity. That in the depths of the dirtiest slum, a ragged-looking chum is hard at work on his canvas producing a masterpiece, inspired by God-knows-what. That even though it is not widely known, some of the best artists through history e.g. Picasso, were inspired by such works of art, hopefully produced under less morbid conditions
• That a zillion pounds cannot buy the feeling one gets when somebody beats the drum well and another bells out a tune simultaneously and we all join in dancing and enjoy that feeling of togetherness; we all know that singing, drumming and dancing is an important part of the African way of life but how often do we acknowledge or applaud it?
I just want to know why we don’t talk about some of these things when we consider piping out TIA

By suggesting this, I am not saying we should ignore the negative things that happen around us, brush them under the carpet and focus only on the positives. Africa’s problems are mammoth by any measure and simply cannot and should not be ignored; certainly not by its own. What I am saying is that we should try to fix the negative things around us by starting with the little things that we CAN change – turn up on time for events; organize ourselves in our communities to deal with environmental pollution and appropriate disposal of waste; educate ourselves about issues that affect people in our villages, towns, cities, countries. And while we are at it, let us promote and/or educate others about the positive aspects of our way of life. I see no reason why we can’t turn TIA on its head and make it something that has positive connotations. I long to see the day that happens! But then again, it might not happen in my lifetime, after all…TIA!!!

The St Lucia stint

Life in St Lucia is moving on smoothly, for the most part, and I’ve pretty much fallen into the swing of things. The main dent in my time here is the demise of my camera during a chill-out session at the beach in my first weekend. I was actually dozing off whilst reading a book when a huge wave suddenly came and washed my stuff away, including my camera. It’s not working as I speak, though I’m working on getting it fixed and, fingers crossed, it gets resuscitated. That obviously means no pictures for most of my activities in St Lucia. Anyway, it’s now time to give you guys an update on my work out here

The St Lucia project is AI’s second biggest (Zambia was the biggest) and a lot of the projects out here bear a strong resemblance to those in Zambia. I won’t bore you by repeating what these entail but will rather focus on the more unique projects

There are 3 projects on offer to volunteers: community, medical and photography. The community project entails teaching/education as well as HIV/AIDS education and helping with various initiatives in the community. The medical project mainly involves providing home-based care in much the same format as that done in Livingstone. The medical volunteers also get involved in HIV education. The photographers typically go on game drives to take photos of animals and the landscape and also spend time editing these photos for the AI database and help with some of the nature conservation efforts in the community. St Lucia is well known for being one of the larger nature conservation sites in South Africa

I signed up for the community project and for the teaching aspect of it, we spend our mornings teaching at 2 local crèches in the Kuhla village. The children there are not necessarily disadvantaged; the crèche, like any other, simply provides a place for parents to leave their kids while they take care of their job responsibilities during the day. That said, you may have surmised from my previous post that folk in Kuhla are not exactly rolling in cash, certainly not in comparison to those in St Lucia. Life in the village can certainly be improved in many regards. The age range of the children is 4 months to 5 years. The setup at each of the crèches is very different with one having far less children who are well attended to and is very well organized. The other crèche is more chaotic in comparison with a large number of children, seemingly incompetent/laid back staff and is rather unorganized. The children are all beautiful though and while I get involved in teaching the older ones, I prefer to and have spent far more time with the younger ones. Teaching the older kids is similar to the work I did in Zanzibar, Kenya and Mozambique, so thought I’d give myself a different challenge this time round. Working with the babies involves more diaper changing, feeding, putting to sleep, wiping snot and tears, playing games and general hangout time than working with the older ones affords. I’m really enjoying it and may well be taking a couple of them home with me

My afternoons are spent working on one of several projects:
Reading club
Quite different to that in Zambia in the sense that there is less of a focus on getting the kids to read but rather a focus on getting them to pick up the skills that will enable them take an interest in reading. This approach was developed based on what the school we work with identified as a weak area for the kids [note, they are aged 12 – 14]. We teach them using a lot of word games [anagrams, word searches, forming sentences with new words, spelling games, hangman, etc] to expand their vocabulary. Some of them have quite weak grammar so some of the sessions turn into English lessons. That said, a few of them are also very bright. (During my first session I was subjected to some form of interrogation, the most poignant question being: “what are your life achievements?” I never do well in answering these sorts of questions and the look on the young lady’s face told me she wasn’t exactly impressed with my answer. I was highly amused and struggled to keep a straight face throughout the whole scenario) The sessions are usually fun and very relaxed but sometimes we make them competitive; we sit on the grass in the shade [under large trees] and catch some cool breeze while we are at it

Gardening
We have a couple of small gardens that we tend to with the aim of providing vegetables and small crops to the people we visit on our home-based care runs. We’ve recently done a revamp of the main gardens and planting season should soon commence. We are currently worried about things like keeping the soil fertile (it’s mostly sand in the area) and maintaining a functional compost heap

Orphanage work
AI is affiliated with a school in one of the nearby villages, which has a number of orphans in attendance and we go over once a week or so to play with and help feed them. There are about 40 orphans or so aged about 6 to 15. They are lovely, very energetic kids and usually good fun. Most of the orphans live with relations in the village. Currently, a set of rooms is being built for a few of the orphans on the school premises, as they have to travel quite far to get there. AI is spearheading this initiative and we work on the project several times a week. The building is now at the furnishing stage so we are spending time constructing beds and putting some finishing touches on it. The kids should be able to move in, in a month or so

HIV education
This is probably the most important aspect of the work being done out here. It is estimated that the infection rate in the region/province is about 80%; note that a sixth of the world’s HIV/AIDS patients are South African. Estimates also suggest that 1000 people die each day from AIDS in South Africa. A lot of work is being done to remove the myths and ignorance around the subject. Apparently one of Bill Gates’ charities has been heavily involved in HIV education and research in South Africa. Nelson Mandela has also been very vocal on the subject especially since his son died of the disease some years ago. Although some of these efforts are often negated by very ignorant comments made by equally prominent people like SA’s current president: Jacob Zuma. Our work in the Kuhla village is with the schools, teaching 12 – 14 year olds about the subject and concurrently with adults in the neighbourhood (the sessions with the kids are actually held in the mornings whilst those with the adults are held in the afternoons). The good news is that they all seem to take it seriously and usually ask questions and want to know more about the subject. Like Zambia, however, there are some cultural issues that may limit the extent of all this good work e.g. it is not uncommon to hear about very young girls getting raped for no apparent reason (turns out 1 in 100 children contract HIV via rape [as in penetrative sex] in South Africa) and women saying no to sex also appears to be a tricky issue while promiscuity in men is the norm rather than a taboo. We tested some of our students’ knowledge the other day and the question at hand was: “what will you do if your partner wants to have unprotected sex and you are uncomfortable doing so?” One answer we got [from a girl] said something along the lines of: “say no but if they persist and threaten to kill you, then acquiesce and get tested as soon as possible thereafter”…need I say more? It has to be said that given some of the shocking statistics around HIV/AIDS in SA (if you are keen to know more on the subject, I highly recommend reading the book titled “28 stories of AIDS in Africa”), it is equally shocking the it’s government has done relatively little to alleviate the problem given the wealth of resources available to them, certainly in comparison to other African countries. A substantial part of the HIV/AIDS work being done here is by charities and NGOs…a disgrace really…yet there seems to be enough money to improve infrastructure in the run-up to hosting the World Cup next year!

10 families
AI has put heads together with the chief in a nearby village to identify the top 10 families in need of help. This help may range from educational needs of children to helping to provide shelter, food and nourishment to these families. I’ve not personally been exposed to this side of the project but from what I’m told, the efforts being exerted are far reaching. AI has helped some of these families set up gardens to provide food; built houses where current accommodation is deemed unsuitable; volunteers go along to help children with homework and other educational needs. The aim is to basically help these families get on their feet and be able to fend for themselves. It’s proved very successful thus far and the families that have benefited from the programme in the past are currently doing well

Once again, I find the work I’m doing very rewarding and am in awe of everyone I work with. My fellow volunteers are all enthusiastic and the people we work with are usually humble, receptive and grateful for our efforts. I find myself getting attached to this way of life, yet again, and will be very sad to leave in a week or so. One month is just not enough time to spend on any one project, it turns out! Oh well, will just have to make the most of my remaining time here, I guess