Lesson One: You Will Fail

6.26.09



One stolen Nikon Cool Pix 180 brand new camera later… We are in Africa.

Peace Corps Swaziland.


We are introduced to our staff, our financial assistant, our teachers, our cooks, our drivers. When introduced they say, “Welcome home.”

Our training site- full of beds, electricity, teachers, hot showers, a flushing toilet, and a drunken confused rooster who is up at midnight every night – wandering the streets shouting obsceneties- the village drunk.

But soon it wont be a hot meal and a shower everyday. Wednesday we move out of our training site into our first host family. We’ll spend our time there until we are done with training August 26th. From there we are sworn in as actual volunteers- shedding our trainee skin. We go on to live with our second and final host family.

As a volunteer in the peace corps, our job is not clearly defined “HIV prevention and impact mitigation”. We must learn before we can do. Peace Corps takes assessment and integration seriously. This is what makes us different from other NGOs. We are the feet on the ground- in order for our work to be sustainable- it must start with 3 months of integration and assessment before we can even began our work- our projects. I must focus on what they feel they need- not what I think they need.

In six weeks Peace Corps will be dropping me off at my permanent site- a village away from any other volunteer. I will watch them drive away with only the resources on my back. With little guidance I will have to be patient for the next three months- then seek out local NGO’s, schools, chiefs, RHM’s, Caregivers, clinics, NCP’s, and kogogo centers.

We are debriefed on the umphakatsi meetings- the chief’s homestead where many local meetings are held. Women are expected to sit on the ground, long skirts and if I am to speak- I must kneel as a sign of respect. Respect is something I am constantly aware of here. I can just hear my father now, slapping me over the head shouting, “Think you twit!” Everytime I forget to properly address an elder.

This is why they have hidden us from the Swazi public until we have grown into proper Swazis. We are away from Africa- a reservation of training. My routine keeps me going. Wake up with the roosters- 5:45- I run around an old soccer field accompanied by a few grazing cows. The African sun begins to rise behind the mountains separating us from South Africa. I hear giggling behind me – a little boy trying to keep up, spinning an old bicycle wheel laughing as I run laps around him. Breakfast at 7- in line at 6:55. Always the first in line. Then cultural analysis, a vaccination here a vaccination there, safety and security, transport, NGO’s, spitting cobras, black mambas, guinea worms, first aid, cooking, project analysis, a video, another lecture about diarrhea. You WILL GET IT. We are taught how to filter how to boil how to bleach our water. 2 years of malaria drugs and bleached water.

We are told horror story after horror story of those who did not listen to these agonizing lectures. Acronyms are flying out of pages- LCF, OCT, CBT, LFTC, COTE, PCV, OJC, RPCV, acronyms of every NGO in the area. My head is about to explode when finally it is time for dinner 6 PM. 5:55 first in line.

We are finally allowed to visit town. We head for the internet café. Two very slow moving computers and 32 volunteers. We wait.

The next day I ask our PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer) why it didn’t seem like half the population in this country was living with AIDS. I saw no one with sunken in faces- the bloches on their skin-wasting away. She says, “Right now- you are in one of the nicest parts of this region. You’ve been off this homestead once and into a very small town. You are not going to find the sick in town- ok? This isn’t like the U.S. where those living with HIV are still working and walking around- grocery shopping amongst us. HIV in Africa hits hard. You’ll find the sick hiding in their homes- dying- unable to leave. They’re all there- awaiting death.’ She points to two volunteers who have been here a year. “Ask these girls what they’ve seen. Because that’s where you’re going to be soon.” One stands up, “I go to a funeral every week. It’s what people do on their Saturdays here. But I normally stay away while they’re dying. It’s my choice to stay away. It’s too much to handle for two years. But you can do homecare if you’d like.”

I feel so far away from all of this. Peace Corps has kept us trainees hidden.

But we are leaving our reservation. We are being adopted soon and soon I’ll have a different routine. Nomfunda warns us about are new families coming to collect us. “They will treat you like children- they will think you cannot do anything for yourself. But you need to do it yourself- because soon you will be cooking for yourself with your own gas stove. They will feed you Swazi food- and you may not like it. This is why in your med kit- we supply you with peanut butter and cornflakes.” She warns us dogs on the homestead are not pets (everyone looks my direction). “They do not feed them- they eat scraps and they would be offended if you gave the dog the food they prepared YOU. You can give the dog your scraps and if there are no scraps he will not eat that night.”

And don’t worry- the dog knows there are starving children in Africa.”