Zen and the Art of Animal Hunting

I'm pretty sure I've encountered the best stereotype: "Oh, you're from America, you spell "center" C-E-N-T-E-R and you say "water" "wah-ter".
Yes. Yes we do.

I'm not even going to attempt to explain Halloween to my family here. I'll just bring candy for the kids. Ah, America.

I still get a little upset when children stop and stare at me on the street of Shorobe. I had a brilliant conversation with Leah (North Carolina, Vassar College, demi-Jew, dancer) about the natural inability to ignore an instinctive reaction. I'm different from them. Very different. They've never seen a lekgoa. I know I"ve had less-than-rational thoughts of my own lately, i.e.
-One day I thought I had Malaria.
-Mokogi woke coughing the other night and I convinced myself he had TB and HIV and I was worried I might catch it from sleeping in the same room as him
-Spiders.

"Gumption is the psychic gasoline that keeps the whole thing going. If you haven't got it there's no way the motorcycle can possibly be fixed. But if you have got it and know how to keep it there's absolutely no way in this whole world that motorcycle can keep from getting fixed. It's bound to happen. Therefore the thing that must be monitored at all times and preserved before anything else is the gumption."

I'm gonna do this ISP, no matter who says I can't. Just try and stop me.

Leah and I were also discussing what it's gonna be like to "settle down" in life. I know that life never ceases to be new, exciting, challenging (at least according to Waking Life). No matter how hard I tryu to deny it, one day I'm probably going to decide to get married, move to Long Island, and raise children. I can't imagine it now. I still have nightmares about Roslyn High School and don't have the attention span to marry anybody and I think children are too sticky and muddy for me. I think I'll play in the great sandboxes of the world (Kalahari, Serengeti, etc.) for now and figure out the rest another time.

I've been amused to discover how accurate the Lion King is in describing traditional African culture (ancestor worship, family loyalty) as well as intraspecific lion interactions (competition, effects of drought, etc.). Hakuna Matata.

I was told the other day that I'm beautiful because I'm white like Jesus Christ. I find it interesting that there's no Jesus-is-black/white debate here. Maybe they've never seen Avenue Q.

Monday we received a lecture on hunting. This lecture was given so defensively, it was clear that it has been given to animal rights activists before. Fortunately, I've already learned the reality of the hunting situation here. The lecture was at this place that handles all hunting trophies that come from Botswana. They measure the animals, to make sure the level of hunting is sustainable. (If the trophies keep getting smaller, it means there isn't enough time for the animal to grow, so it must be hunted less.)

One point that was repeatedly made is that one can personally dislike hunting, but doesn't have to hinder the hunting industry. Though it hurts a little to say, the hunting industry in Botswana seems to be a win-win for all. Animal populations are controlled or unaffected, except elephats, which will be explained later. The community that sells hunting rights on its land is given an alternate source of income so it doesn't need to unsustainably raise cattle. The Botswana government can easily regulate hunting with quotas. Americans/Europeans can prove their masculinity by shooting big things. The only things I didn't like about the hunting lecture were the kudu, buffalo, and gemsbok that were staring at me from the trophies on the wall.

As of today, Botswana has enacted a lion hunting ban, I think as a response to international pressures. Last time they did this, in 2000, the results were disastrous. When too many lions need food, they turn to cattle. Lions eat cows, people poison lions, everyone loses. Yay politics.

Elephants. The elephant population in the Kalahari cycles over time, like the climate and levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and is therefore a heated topic of debate. Though other places on the African continent are elephant-deficient, Botswana has too many elephants. They are destroying trees, ruining crops, and grazing/browsing at the expense of many other herbivorous species. It's also really cool to watch a herd of several hundred elephants.

Since, according to Americans, Africa is only a country, not 54 countries, elephants are just plain endangered. Therefore, elephant hunting and ivory importing is bad, very bad. U.S. animal rights groups constantly fight the use of hunting as a method of controlling elephant populations in the country of Africa, possibly at the expense of other species. Let's see who's laughing when elephants take over the world. (Planet of the Apes 2: Empire of Elephants)

Then we had a lecture about the San bushmen, the stereotypical lioncloth-wearing, clicking, hunting, gathering indigenous peoples of Southern Africa. I found the lecture very condescending, both to us and to the San. That seems to be the general attitude around here: "You know nothing about these people, I'm going to study them and convince them to preserve their culture for our own interest."

What I found most interesting was the video about San hunting. It's amazing. They are so adept at tracking wildlife and taking them down with spears and bows-and-arrows. If anyone deserves to hunt wildlife, it's them. It makes me realize how silly America is with the cattle farms that are all about quantity. I don't really need to eat meat, so I'm not gonna.

Deformed Donuts for Dinner: A Weekend of Reflection

Zen Motorcycle says, "Sometimes it's a little better to travel than to arrive." Interesting, but is arrival ever that? I am now travelling. Would I say I arrived when I landed at Sir Seretse Khama International Airport? No! That was the very beginning of my travels. My calendar for the semester starts on that day, the tenth of September, 2007. Since then, I've travelled to Mokolodi Lodge, back to Gabs, to Otse, back to Gabs, to Francistown, to Kasane, to Maun, and most recently to Shorobe. From here, I will travel, at the very least, back to Maun, to the Okavango Delta, back to Maun, then back to Gabs. My travels don't even end there. Am I finished when I arrive at JFK? I don't think so; there's still the anxious anticipation/dread/excitement of stepping out of the airport into the cold winter of New York, of sleeping in my bed at home for the first time in 100 days, of stuffing my face with all the foods I've missed. Mmmm sushi.

Zen (we're on a first name basis now) also has an existential crisis about the scientific method that perfectly coincided with my unnecessary ISP stress. The more science is studied, the more hypotheses are developed, the shorter-lived these ideas are. The "truth" moves farther away the more we pursue it. The more we learn, the more we realize how much we don't know.

My problem is that I've only recently discovered that the scientific method is asking questions like, "What effect does tourism have on biodiversity in the Okavango Delta?", not questions like, "How can Robin get into a national park to watch animals and call it research?" Maybe two weeks of field research time is not long enough to make brilliant discoveries in the area of animal behavior. Maybe I should ifnd real research to do. All I really wanted was to identify animal poop anyway. (See late Sept./early Oct. entry photo of me holding zebra poop.)

In Shorobe, salad means coleslaw with sliced tomatoes on top.

Friday night must be family time everywhere. This weekend we were visited by the great-grandparets. Fortunately, the older generation was not affectedby the recent 30-year decline of the average life expectancy.

Something that makes the academic aspect of this semester much less stressful is Simba's grading curve, which is pretty much Everyone Gets an A. Not too bad.

Now I know why sliced bread is so exciting: apparently, people were invented before forks. There has to be some way to eat vegetable soup without silverware.

Saturday I helped build a house out of mud and empty beer cans. Now I know what to do with all the garbage after Spring Weekend. But still, who ever thought a tin roof was a good idea?

Then I learned to weave bracelets out of palm leaves. I knew all those hours of figuring out crocheting designs would have at least one other practical application.

One day I'm going to wake up and crave fries for breakfast and not know why. Then I'll remember: Shorobe. Ahhhh.

I think I finally understand the purpose of homestay. While watching elephants is awesome, I can't say I've lived in Botswana until I've woven something and build a house out of mud.

Who's awesome at laundry?
Monthusi, my friend Megan...definitely not me. I never thought I'd miss the King House washing machine.

...and then the neighbor's cows got loose in our yard. We had to chase them out. Only, you have to leave the gate open when you chase them out, but the other ones don't understand that they can't come back in. There was lots of running and yelling with arms waving. I'mactually pretty good at herding cows.

I needed a break after reading about 100 pages of Zen on Sunday, so I picked up The Panda's Thumb by Stephen Jay Gould. The essay I was up to was called "Darwin's Middle Road." It discussed the middle ground between "conductivism", the belief that scientific knowledge is derived from orderly, objective observation, and "eurekaism", the belief that there is only an inexplicable spark that ignites the minds of geniuses to develop science. Wait a second...this is exactly what Zen was talking about. My brain hurts.

I instead choose to regress to a memory of the first time I heard the "Eureka!" story. It was in Omni in 4th grade, a time when I had only first begun to discover that a person's worth (at least through schooling) is determined by standardized tests. It was also when I was allowed to learn through exploration, an opportunity that was taken away a few years later so I could pursue the rigidity known as high school.

You know, in all of high school, I never found the time to write for my own pleasure. It wasn't until I got to college that I was able to tap into the same flow of inspiration that caused me to sneak out of class in elementary school and hide under a table to write. Gosh, I was so mischievous.

I threw down Gould and hurriedly fished through my duffel looking for some good old science fiction that I bought from a used book table at an over-priced bookstore in Gabs. Must...read...junk. Fortunately, I picked up a book who's cover depicts a bear in a military uniform, while in the background a spaceship is passing in front of two moons. Whew.

I was watching Mokogi and Katega and trying to remember four and five. I remember the explosive curiousity and the inexplicable tears. I am only sorry they don't have unlimited access to books. I can't imagine marking my life with anything other than Clifford the Big Red Dog or Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, followed by first chapter books, My Father's Dragon, Babysitter's Club, The Giver, and then somehow ending up with Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Ender's Game. (I think the large gap in the middle was characterized by Stuff I Have to Read for School. Clearly nothing too memorable.)

Next time I live with a family in a village in Africa, I'm bringing children's books as gifts. (That wasn't a hypothetical; to quote an unlikely governor, "I'll be back.")

I've also been reminded of Starlab- the stars here are so plentiful it's like I'm sitting in an inflatable dome with a star projector.

I think the Batswana are aware of how peaceful they are compared to the rest of Africa. I received an interesting question yesterday. I was saying that next year, George Bush's presidency is over (yay!) and there will be a new president. I was asked: Will there be a war to change presidents? How do you know he will leave?

I can't decide whether those questions are a result of typical African politics, or of America's international reputation of aggressiveness.

I have a traditional dress and matching head scarf; now I'm a Motswana. I also bought baskets. I looked into the mirror this morning and was slightly surprised to discover that I'm white. I keep forgetting.

I think I'm done eating meat now.

Bits and Pieces of Shorobe

I'm pleased to announce that I am accompanied on this trip by the once top SET player for her age group in all of Michigan. We all have our skills; I'm pretty sure I made a few enemies during our last game of Speed Scrabble.

If Mapquest covered Shorobe, directions to my house would look like this:
Directions from Bus Rank (Shorobe) to Ntlo ya Monthusi (Monthuse's house)

1. Head South on The Road
2. Pass the Blue Store on your left. <.1 km
3. Pass the kgotla on your left. .2 km
4. Pass the Shorobe Primary School on your right. <.1 km
5. Pass the big pink house with the satellite dish on your left. .3 km
6. After the cement bricks on the side of the road stop (.1 km), continue another .2 km.
7. At the big white patch of dirt, turn right. <.1 km
8. Follow the tire tracks perpendicular to the road. .1 km
9. Enter the gate. House first building on left, with bright blue door. <.1 km.

Total Distance = 1.5 km Est. Time (walking) = 15 min.

The worst part of living in a village is seeing all the half-starved dogs; counting ribs is not idea of a good time. Fortunately, they had already removed the ribs from the cow-insides hanging on the wall by the fire in one of the huts.

I'm getting good exercise walking on loose sand all the time. Also by carrying buckets full of water. I get well-washed by doing both at the same time.

When we were in Otse, a few girls had skirts made for them by their host-mothers. One girl now has a skirt with images of Nelson Mandela on it. Being the wonderfully covetous girl that I am, I was thrilled to arrive at my Shorobe homestay and see my host-grandmother sewing clothes. I began plotting. My efforts paid off when, Wednesday night, I complimented my host-grandmother on her dress, and she announced she was going to make me one. Sweet.

That night I couldn't find the smaller washbasin for bathing. I asked where it was, and Monthusi reached into the half-built mud house on our property and pulled it out. It was muddy. I asked why it was there. The answer: Mokogi. Of course. Four-year-old boys are the same everywhere.

Thursday we had a lecture on snake handling. We learned some horribly inaccurate snake treatment techniques: suck the venom out, use a tourniquet and then remove it after a short time, etc. I found the discussion on cytotoxins fascinating. Snakes are so lazy, they make their prey digest themselves.

I'm having a difficult time finding an ISP advisor who will let me work with them in a national park. Telling me it's impossible only makes me try harder. Anyone looking for a research assistant in the Okavango Delta region?
Possible topics:
Using the age composition of blue wildebeest herds in the Moremi Game Reserve to predict the future success of the population.
Assessing the effects on biodiversity of different types of tourism in the Okavango Delta.

This morning I "dumela-mma"-ed a "rra". How embarrasing.

Aha! I've discovered that irons were invented before electricity; my host-grandmother had an iron-shaped metal box with a hinged top and was filling it with hot embers from the fire. Ohhhhhhhhhh.

Pula on the tin roof at night, and the heat is forgotten.

Now the children run to greet me when I come home from school. All it took was an afternoon blowing bubbles. Now they follow me around shouting tyhe only Setswana word they know I know: Tau! (Lion!) Tau! Tau!

I've borrowed my friend's copy of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I'm about 80 pages into it, so I'll think I'll take a moment to philosophize.

Being in a whole new place, in Africa, is making me look at the world all over again, like a fresh start. The differences; the lack of electricity, the hand-washed clothes, the tin roofs; seem so mall. When I look back on this experience, that's not what I will remember.

I'll remember to stand upwind of the fire when cooking, how to dump the used bathwater on the ground and not on me, how to wash my clothes; but most of all I'll remember the things that are the same.

I can only really understand things in terms of dichotomy: same or different, America or Africa, modern or old, old or you. The important samenesses are not the things that are modern, rich, or America; they're the things that are human. The shouts of four-year-old children, the villagers playing soccer, the self-consciousness of my 16-year-old sister in Otse, looking at the stars, the feeling of family.

Okay, I'm done now.

No, wait...one more thing. Cow's liver is pretty much the grossest thing in the world. And this is coming from someone who can sit at the dinner table and play "Look at the Cool Pictures in my EMT Textbook!"

Generalizations for Simplicity's Sake

My family here really goes out of their way to make me feel comfortable. For example, last night, they were low on paraffin, so rather than light the lamp, we all sat around the fire where dinner was being cooked. This was also where everyone was taking their evening bath. When it was my turn to bath, (they use "bath" as a verb, not "bathe") they lit the lamp, brought it and the bathtub into my house/room, and left me alone. Privacy is one of those things that is different in American culture; we were warned and so were our host families. I was flattered that they were so considerate.

O a opela?
Ga ke itse. Ke a opela?
Ee mma.

(You are singing?
I don't know. Am I singing?
Yes.)

That's how I know I'm happy, when I'm looking at the stars and someone accuses me of singing.

Race is a whole other ballgame in the north. (On an unrelated note: "If ethnic diversity were a contest, Africa would win.") Most white people here are tourists, and tourists don't take any care to learn the local language or culture. They come to see lions and to be pampered. At the campsites where we stayed, the white tourists shouted at and ordered around the local staff. Each time someone in my group busted forth with a "dumela-rra" or "dumela-mma", we were met with smiles and surprise. I dumela'ed a cashier at a local grocery store and she was so shocked, she even bagged my groceries for me, which I haven't seen yet at all. And more white people yelled and criticized for their own mistakes.

Also, some white South Africans migrated to northern Botswana to escape non-apartheid. They opened lodges and safari companies in a lovely place free from any anti-apartheid taboos. Simba told us a story of an SIT group a few years ago that was on safari at a particular lodge on excursion. The white guide/owner refused to talk to Simba, and would only communicate with him through the students, until one of the students angrily pointed this out. Insincere apologies ensued.

For this reason, Batswana don't strike up conversations with us on the street. They often don't even make eye contact, a complete turnaround from the Gabs/Otse region. The two young children at my homestay are terrified of me. (Although I think I've begun to change that, with the help of two lonesome Beanie Babies, Koko (chicken) and Tau (lion.)) Last night, my host-grandmother was explaining to the children: her name is Robin, not lekgoa (white person). I was amused to pick up bits of that Setswana conversation.

Here's a shoutout to all the people, to my delight, I've discovered are reading this. Hi!

Time Machine

Whoa. Homestay #3: Shorobe. This is the African village I pictured in my head. Thatched- and tin-roofed huts, no electricity, cooking over an open fire, gas lanterns...and I'm lucky that my house even has a pit latrine. I live on a dusty property with several houses. I'm sharing one with my twenty-something host-mom, Monthusi. One room, two beds. And her four-year-old son, Makogi. (His father is dead.) I think my luggage takes up half the house. Other houses on the property belong to her mother, sister, brother, and others. There are chickens. Dinner was standard Setswana fare: maize meal and beef. My "shower" was a bucket of bioled water and a tin bathtub, both evening and morning.

Fortunately, class is in Maun, at the Botswana Wildlife Training Institute, so I can sve my serious bathroom business for then.

Bedtime: 9 PM. The house is way too hot, and a candle burns through most of the night. When I awake at night, I have to take my headlamp to the pit latrine, terrified. Wake up is at first light, around 5:30, at the beckoning of the roosters. The house has no floor, just dirt covered by rugs. I helped cook breakfast: fresh baked bread, beans.

This family has very nice people, although Makogi is frightened of me. He has never seen a white person before. Shorobe is really interesting, but exhausting! They're not poor. This is just how life is in Shorobe. In fact, they're pretty well-off. They don't long for electricity or television or cars; I think they secretly think less of my because I can't cook over an open fire like they can or boil my own bathwater, just like I unconsciously think less of them for not having these things. (I can't help it, twenty years in America leaves its mark.) It's a very quiet, content life.

Otherwise, I've come to terms with my vegetarianism, or the end of it. Meat is okay. Sometimes it's good. But it's not necessary. It takes unnecessary time, money, and effort. I have no problem eating meat. I have no problem not eating meat. But, if I have the choice, I'd much prefer a nice chunk of tofu.

It's lunchtime; I have a nice pile of indulgence waiting for me, in the form of chocolate, fresh fruit, and granola.

Take Only Memories, Leave Only Footprints

Wednesday began with an early morning game drive starting at sunrise. Again, I'll let the pictures tell the story.

Sunrise:












Guinea fowl are pretty much the funniest birds in Botswana:












An impala. The antelope, not the car:












Zazu:












Happy me and the Chobe River:












There's a lion there, I promise:












A pack of tourists:













We also went to a snake park and a crocodile farm. We got to know what the deadly snakes look like. It was a good reminder to wear closed-toed shoes at night. Most snakebites are treatable, though poisonous ones require a chartered flight to Jo'burg. Except the black mamba. If one of those bites you, well, at least you only suffer for a few minutes. Fortunately, they only attach when threatened, and they will try to run (slither?) away first. Bites are really, really uncommon. I'm kind of curious to see what a puff adder bite looks like. The result of a cytotoxin is supposedly really cool. But don't worry, I'm too afraid of snakes to actually get bitten. I learned this when the caged cobra at the snake park lunged at me and I spent the rest of the visit on the other side of the building.


Where's Waldo? A chameleon at the snake park:












At the croc park, they breed Nile crocodiles for the croc hide trade. Crocs are beautiful. They look hand-painted. Adult male crocs look like islands. And they can mate with eight different females in a day.

Pile o' crocs:
















That's not an island, it' a crocodile:










I'm so happy that our group has become friendly enough to make fun of each others' tan lines and passport pictures.

The African Jacama's head looks like the flag of Botswana. However, the national bird is the lilac-breasted roller (see bird in Oct. 15 entry). Good choice, Bots.












Class time on Friday was spent doing an informal observational study on the behavior patterns of a tribe of humans aged 19-23. Most commonly observed activities were sleeping, reading, "playing cards", swimming, and drinking. Up to two behaviors were observed simultaneously (i.e. "playing cards" and drinking, drinking and reading, etc.).












This is the campsite/resort where most students stay for ISP, because it's cheap. Sweet.

I Was Frightened by a Waterfall as a Child

See, the Lion King was a true story:













Vervet monkey and child:















Victoria Falls:














And then we discovered that Zambia was first in habited by Buggers. Actually, that's natural chemical erosion:














Group photo at Vic Falls:














If you thought my room was only messy at home or school, I bring you: My Summer House, or Matchbox's Revenge:

When Was the Last Time You Used Dial-Up?

This entry will be TEXT-ONLY. It took ten minutes to load this page. I'm not taking any chances. I should get to a faster computer tomorrow or Monday or later. The next entry will have lots of pictures

Apparently cell phones are stolen pretty often in Gabs. Mine wasn't, but my host-sister had hers stolen, and her response was, "Yep, that's why I have a cheap phone. It's good I only had a 200p one instead of 2000p."

My host sister and I got along great. We were watching a bad movie, and a character shouted, "It smells like methane gas." My sister and I responded with the following:
"Methane. CH4."
"High energy."
"Not very reactive."
"Because it's a saturated hydrocarbon."
"So you can't really do anything with it."
"Except blow stuff up."

Mmm. Scienc and blowing stuff up. When I grow up, I want to work for Mythbusters. Or the Vogon Construction Fleet. But only blowing up uninhabited planets. Now that I think about it, many of my favorite books involve blowing stuff up. Especially planets. In the book I'm reading now, they blow up people on a molecular level. (Diamond Age by Neal Stephensen. Way better than Snow Crash; in this book, people blow up and there are fairytales.) I'm also reading a book on the history of Africa since the age of independence, but I won't go there.

One year ago, I was probably studying for an orgo midterm. This year after our (one) midterm, we're on vacation for a week. Oh, it'll be tough getting back to school.

Zambia Zambia Zambia. Tuesday morning, after being picked up by an air-conditioned bus, we took a boat to Zambia. I saw a vervet monkey and her baby. It kind of validated my life goals.

Then Victoria Falls, named by Dr. David Livingstone (I presume), the first white man to see the falls. Before that, they were known by some Bantu translation of "Smoke that Thunders." Since it's been the dry season, the falls were pretty dry. We saw a sheer face of rock, 1.5 km long, that is covered by a falling sheet of water for half the year.

There were so many souveneir stalls, it was even overwhelming to me. And they were all selling the same things, and using the same marketing script. Accepted currency: US dollars, pula, pens, hair ties, bandanas, apples...they'd trade anything. I think they sold the same mass-produced "Arica" goods as on the New York City Streets. I'd rather save my money for real hand-made stuff, if that even exists anymore.

This place looks a lot like Disneyworld.

Then we went to a restaurant called Tourists Eat Here! (Not really, I don't actually remember the name, but that's what I would've called it.) The food was incredible. I had bread with olive oil and so thoroughly enjoyed it I almost didn't order lunch. Side orders shared included rosemary roasted butternut squash and ginger-honey carrots. The conversion between Zambian currency and US dollars is about 1:3,900, so the bill for sixteen of us ws over half a million in their currency.

Then there was the David Livingstone museum. Very interesting, a bit of natural history and colonial history and local history. They had an "Our Village" exhibit and a "Their Town" exhibit, and did a very good job of explaining why big buildings and money are not synonymous with happiness, and how nice everything was before the Europeans showed up. Then there was a natural history room, Hall of African Mammals style. And a room dedicated to the history of Dr. Livingstone, the first big missionary to explore Southern Africa. Last was an exhibit describing the history of Zambia. The museum has a collection of seemingly contradictory exhibits, but I guess that makes sense in a country of starving people, internet cafes, locals begging tourists, and Subway (Eat Fresh!). Zambia is fun. I'd like to go back sometimes.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

We had our (one) midterm, so now it's vacation for a week. I'm not kidding. This place is beautiful. And touristy. But let's start at the very beginning (a very good place to start).

Saturday morning was an Olympic qualifying match between the Botswana Zebras (pronounced "zeh-bras") and the Guinea somethings. We only hung around for the first half of the game, but it was really a great game. Bots won 2-1 in overtime (we heard later). And I noticed how good the Zebras were or, rather, how much American soccer isn't. No wonder it's not very popular in the states.

















The entrance of the Zebras at Botswana's National Stadium.

Then we had a party to say good-bye to the Gabs homestay families. And then we were off to Kasane. Via Francistown. It was a long trip. There was an 8-hour overnight train ride followed by a 6-hour combi ride. The train compartment was small and way too hot:















I did manage to achieve one of my life goals on the journey: I learned how to beat Rubik's Cube. Yay.

We arrived in Kasane on Sunday around lunchtime and pitched our tents. My tent is as wonderful as I remember it, although it smells less like feet than I remember.

Our tent city:

















This is like a resort; the blues and greens are especially vivid and perfect shady spots are everywhere. There was even a swimming pool. Of course, the pool was dirty and slimy, but I think it was cleaner than me.

Here's my thousand-word picture:

May the worst frustration in your life be that it is impossible to write and see the stars at the same time because your headlamp is too bright.

This picture is so amazing because I accidentally scared a bird away while photographing it, which I didn't realize until I looked at the picture:

Then there was a boat tour on the Chobe River in Chobe National Park. I'll let the pictures tell the story. There were so many animals, it was like I was playing a game of Pokemon Snap! in real life.

Water buffalo are so funny-looking. I know, I know, don't judge by your own cultural standards.

Luckily, there is an internet cafe in Kasane. We are staying about 10 km from Kasane. I don't know when I'll see internet again. And it's expensive here.

I'll leave you with one final thought before I go out for a walk in the sunny 40-degree-C weather and try not to melt. Due to a fortuitous typograpical error, I discovered a new species of antelope: the facebok. Though it has never been seen in the wild, pictures of it have appeared all over the internet.

My Purpose in Life

Once again, black and white ceases to be so.

I've discovered that tourism is not, in fact, the most detrimental industry to wildlife conservation. Nope; it's agriculture. I this here country, people have been subsisting on cattle for the last several hundred years. Once the colonists (protectoratists) came in and all these wide open spaces, they decided to pay premium prices to stimulate the agriculture industry. They thought they were helping.

I don't remember if I explained the protectorate/colony thing. If I did already, disregard this paragraph. Botswana was never formally colonized. In the late 1800s, the leader of the Tswana, Khama the Great, appealed to the British to protect his people from the colonizing of the British, Dutch, and I think Germans. In return for "protection", Botswana would allow the British to rule indirectly (i.e. not really at all), build missionary schools, indoctrinate the country with Christianity, and pass freely to Rhodesia (now Zim). Thus was created the Protectorate of Bechuanaland. That's why they don't hate white people or English people (which are essentially the same thing here).

Well, as it turns out, the land is not that good for feeding cattle, and overgrazing has caused that to be even more true. Agriculture, the way it is done now, is not a sustainable industry. The land will run out of water/nutrients/grass. This has encroached on the wildlife's land, and now giant fences have been erected to prevent the spread of disease from wildlife to cattle, causing near-extinction of migrating species such as wildebeest and hartebeest. And the people can't necessarily do anything about it; the major industry in Botswana, the diamond industry, does everything by machinery. If people want jobs, they have to raise cattle.

Also, when there's no grass, thornbushes take over. Water sinks lower in the ground. My skirt gets caught on thorns.

There has to be an alternative, right? Yep. Tourism. Tourism can be more sustainable, except that the industry is currently monopolized by foreigners. Batswana don't have the money to invest in fancy-schmancy safari agencies that will make American tourists happy. But South Africans do. And Europeans. Sure, they employ locals to do their cooking and cleaning. Great. In many cases, a tourist will pay a safari company in their own currency, say US dollars, and the Botswana government never sees a single pula. On average, Botswana receives 8% of the profits from the tourism industry. The rest is kept by foreigners. Okay, we need a better solution than that. Hopefully, by watching cool animals for a while, I can figure out the answer.

What would the Lion King have been like if it had taken place more recently, when the grasslands are nearly destroyed from overgrazing? Here's a guess:

Simba would return from his Hakuna Matata jaunt with Rosencrantz and Gildenstern to defeat Scar. Only, when he gets back to Pride Rock, Scar is already dead. He starved to death after eating all his hyenas. There are no more ungulates to hunt. Good, thinks Simba. He can now have Nala all to himself. But no, he discovers that Nala has also starved to death. In his grief, Simba stabs himself with one of Nala's ribs. ("O happy dagger! this is thy sheath; there rust, and let me die.")

Gosh, that's sad. It's not really like that. Actually, the fences have made it easier for predators to catch animals, so until the ungulate population disappears completely, lions are not too upset.

Today is our midterm. That means classes are half over. That means the semester is 1/3 over. Whoa.

Yesterday, we had a pretty cool lecture about science and the scientific method. Only in Botswana would a lecture like this quote the Bible several times. Here I'll reproduce some of the lecture which I found interesting:

"Scientists are responsible for truth, knowledge, wisdom, and understanding.

The truth is out there; truth is what it is, the underlying reality of all existence.

Knowledge is what we think we know about the truth. Knowledge is subject to revision and improvement.

Wisdom is realization that there are discrepancies and weaknesses in knowledge. Wisdom leads to the process, called the philosophy of sciece, through which knowledge is better modified to fit the truth.

Understanding as defined by Job (28:28) is the effort to avoid evil. Understadig is what we use in order to adequately apply our wisdom and knowledge in guiding our actions.

Philosophy means, literally, the love of wisdom.

While applied scientists seek understanding, basic scientists seek knowledge; you can't do everything."

Cool. Perhaps I've found my purpose in life. I think I'll seek knowledge so other people can find applications of it.

Each day, I compile a list of things to check on Wikipedia. They should make a portable Wikipedia. That's constantly updated via satellite. And they should call it...The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Oh wait, that's already been done.

I've discovered that I'm much more comfortable discussing racial issues here. It's much easier to say "black people..." or "white people" when I'm a minority. Last night, I was talking to my host-sister about the differences between black-people hair and white-people hair. We were then talking about other stereotypes, like that white people have lots of money and black people will steal from you. I don't think I'd feel comfortable talking about that if I were in America. I wouldn't want to get misunderstood.

Yesterday we visited Otse for Clean Up the Environment Day. We got to sit at a ceremony for four hours. It was a lot like the Botswana Day celebration, but longer. And, other than two speeches, completely in Setswana. I had almost forgotten that feeling of not understanding anything and feeling like I don't belong, a feeling I had had a lot of in Otse. But then they fed us. There were brownies.

Oh, and it was COLD. Of course, it was really only about 65 degrees F, but for someone who has adjusted to the relentless heat and was not wearing long pants, it was cold. All of us were shivering all morning and some people's lips were blue. Hypothermia is a bonding activity.

Oooh oooh! They're making a move of No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. Actually, I think the movie is made already. I think it's coming out in December. They filmed it near one of my friends' host-house.

This weekend we go north. Saturday, we take a train to Francistown. It's a 10-hour overnight train ride. Then there's an 8-hour combi ride. Yep, that's 15 people crammed into a van for 8 hours. Then a week of excursions! Animals and animals and animals and some plants and bugs and animals. I've got my bug repellent all ready. And, we are expected to look like tourists, so I can wear shorts and a tank top. And, I get to sleep in my tent. And, they have an elephant pest problem there. And, we get to go to Zambia. Yay.

Seasons Turn, Turn, Turn...

I've discovered that the ability to like a picture of onesself has nothing to do with the way one looks. I like this picture:

Last Friday, we also had a class on traditional Setswana music. A popular tradiitonal musician played a couple of songs for us on his guitar-minus-two-strings. It was incredible. He used three strings to play the melody and one to strum the bass line. He also played upside-down. (Overhanded? See picture:)

The following bit is inspired by the woman to whom I owe my life and my grammar skills...Hi Mom!

There are many things that make me aware of the passage of time, the changing of seasons.

Let me tell you, it is so weird not having a lot of those things here! Though the violent rains remind me of Autumn in Providence, there are more things here signaling the start of Spring. (I need to see which way the toilet flushes...yay Southern Hemisphere.) The leaves are not changing colors; instead, the trees are turning green and flowers are blooming. The nights are cold, because this is a desert(-like climate), but daytime temperatures are creeping upwards. When we go up north, (here, north means closer to the equator) the temperature will hover in the high thirties, even reaching forty or higher. (times 9 divided by 5 plus 32 equals...) I'm missing the entire baseball post-season here (Go D-backs) and I have no idea what's going on in the NFL (Go Jets?).

Botswana has hidden from me all Autumn things and replaced them with Spring things. This sounds good, perhaps idyllic, but it feels so strange. The seasons seem to be moving backwards, but I'm also aware of the forward movement of time. I'm still "back to school", grasping memories of the summer while trying to learn in classes. The calendar still says October (!). My summertime bruises and scrapes have all healed, but my skin is still darkening from the sun. I'm confused! The external clues contradict my internal ones. I keep expecting it to get colder. It's like someone turned the clock backwards, but I still know what time it is. It's like jetlag, but seasonally.

And you know what else reminds me of the passage of time? Yesterday I was walking to class at UB (I can finally get to class without walking in circles) and I noticed a familiar smell. Whatever was being used to clean the floors is the same thing used to clean the bathrooms in my elementary school. I realized it had been a long time since I'd been to school at Harbor Hill, when we had a bathroom in the classroom, and when I was still shocked by all the bad words carved into the tiles next to the toilet.

I've found Degrassi on TV. All is well.

Last night I had a discussion with my host-sister about Panda Express. We talked about the merits of really cheap Chinese food as well as really good Chinese food. It's amazing the things that connect people from all over the world.

I also decided to raid the spice rack and make myself some pasta with tomato sauce, (not ketchup, which everyone here puts on their pasta. with mayonnaise.) oregano, garlic, and salt. My tastebuds were spronking.

On Saturday we'll be off to Kasane, and I'm SO EXCITED!

I may get to the internet to post on Saturday morning (before the Olympic qualifying soccer/football match). I may get to the internet in Kasane. I'll probably have internet access in Maun the following week. Fear not, I've plenty more to say, but today's been a long day and I must get home and have a cup of tea.

Just Because I Have Time To Blog

We got this afternoon off, so I thought I'd go blog s'more.

I've enjoyed having the opportunity to see the stereotypes they have about us. First, as a white person, or lekgoa, it is assumed that I am rich. Less so in Gabs, but elsewhere, everyone asks me for money. Or for my digital watch.

Then, coming from a place that is so often portrayed in TV, movies, etc., I've gotten many wonderful responses to "I'm from New York".
"What celebrities do you know?"
"Do you know Beyonce?"
"Do you know Kevin?" (asked while watching Home Alone 2)
"Do you know Clark?" (asked while watching Smallville)
"Is high school really like that?" (same as above)
"Did you have a Sweet 16 party?" (MTV)

Remember that next time you catch yourself thinking "It's just Africa".

When I first got to Gabs, I htought that if I wasn't carrying around a backpack all day, I wouldn't be so conspicuous. I soon realized that even in the middle of the night, my white skin shows. Whoever said we're all the same when we turn out the light never went to Africa. I think inconspicuous is unrealistic.

On Friday, we had a class on religion in Botswana. The most fascinating part was not what was taught, but how it was taught. Christianity is so entwined in Setswana culture that they don't realize it's there. We were discussing the three major religions in Botswana (Christianity, Islam, and Traditional African Religion) and the lecturer was explaining Traditional African Religion to us. He said that it is monotheistic, includes ancestor worship, is obsessed with impurity, and has important purification rituals. The question I had was: Wait a second; other than the ancestor thing, why does that sound so much like Christianity? The explaination I received was: They used to have initiation ceremonies that involved animal sacrifice and circumcision, but when missionaries came here they convinced the Africans that these practices were "wrong" and that the purification ritual is much better.

Ohhhhhh. So by "Traditional African Religion", you mean "the bastard child of Christianity and Traditional African Religion". Fascinating.

(I don't mean to be offensive, I just tend to be a bit...sarcastic...sometimes.)

This weekend was a comfort food/activity weekend. I went shopping. (Everything here is cheaper than in America. Well, everything except for books. Ouch.) I bought some cheap underwear. (Take that, laundry by hand!) I saw a movie. (Are We Done Yet? starring Ice Cube. It was terrible.) I ate fried things. I watched a lot of TV. (They have Discovery Channel!)

Friday night we had a chill-out party at the SIT office. Delicious things were cooked, like pancakes, cookies, baked apples, and bacon. (Don't worry, I didn't eat the bacon. I didn't eat the feta cheese either.) There may have been wine. (South African reds are fantastic.) We put our feet on tables. We didn't cross our legs. We wore shirts that revealed our shoulders. We complained. We sang. We danced. It was wonderful.

Then my family watched more Big Brother.

I thought a little bit about trash. Really, it's interesting. In America, we pour chemicals into the air and water, but get all upset about a napkin thrown on the ground. In Botswana, they haven't destroyed the environment yet, but they throw trash on the ground. And it makes me crazy. What do I do with this can? Throw it on the ground. I...can't...do it. It hurts me inside. But I have no problem hopping in the SUV and driving a mile to the store.

I miss sushi. And human contact. Somewhere in Rhode Island there is a couch full of people with my name on it.

To anyone reading this:
Leave comments! Say hi, share opinions, ask questions. Wait at my stage door with Sharpie in hand and tell me what you think. I'll try to respond in a timely Setswana fashion.

Eating Peace

The Batswana are peace-loving people. They have a saying, "Ntwa-kgolo ke ya moloma", which means something along the lines of "Peace comes from the mouth." In other words, peace comes from talking and negotiating, not bombing the shit out of people. There are so few shootings because guns are illegal here. Even the police don't carry them. (Gosh, but how can we feel safe if there aren't guns everywhere?)

In fact, when the BDF (Botswana Defense Force? Maybe? Something like that.) goes and liberates places like Somalia and Lesotho, they don't carry weapons. And the liberated are always so grateful to Botswana in particular because of this. Imagine that. Liberating people without causing destruction. (The only time BDF will use force is if they come across a poacher hunting illegal game. That's worth shooting on the spot, before they shoot an endangered animal.)

Today I had a discussion with my host-sister, Mphelo, that really opened my eyes. We were discussing the war in Iraq. She agreed that Sadam needed to be removed from power, but not by bombing the shit out of the country. And the killing hasn't stopped. The terrorists aren't the ones who are suffering; it is the women and children and sick and hungry and blown to bits.

First, I was reminded of so many stereotypes that, though I keep telling myself that they're wrong, I still seem to believe deep down. I mean, this is a girl in sub-Saharan Africa criticizing the Americans. Whoa. Mind-blowing. If she thinks the American military is exhibiting cruel and unusual behavior (or being ordered to), then it must be bad.

This then led to a discussion of other horrible things happening in the world, and then horrible things that have happened in the world. And, because we were watching a documentary on eugenics, the discussion turned to Hitler and the Holocaust. And then we started hypothesizing why bad things happen to good people. She thinks things are "meant to be" and "planned by God". I disagree; I told her (adding some religious stuff of my own) that I think God just sort of set the universe in motion, and people have the ability to make their own decisions. And they just tend to screw up. A lot.

There's something so wonderful/interesting/cool/weird about having a deep philosophical/political/theological conversation with someone from a completely different culture. And I don't mean different culture like Western European, I mean actually different. (Though not so different by Otse host-uncle's standards. See Yom Kippur post.)

And now I'm going to change the topic before I start rambling on about free will and such.

In Gabs, it seems that wealth is measured in Zim. As in, "we have a Zim(babwean maid)" or "tonight our Zim cooked pasta" or "our Zim offered to do my laundry". Our Zim is a really cool lady who works here so she can send bread home to her family. You can't get bread in Zim. That's how bad inflation is. They're planning on making a new currency; that should be interesting.

Next week we go up north to Kasane. We do cool things like have a boat tour on the Okavango and go to Victoria Falls in Zambia.

I'm in Africa. Heh heh heh. (That was my best impression of Jon Stewart's George W. Bush laugh.)

The Hair on My Legs is Longer Than the Hair on My Head

Before we left Otse, there was a goodbye party. our host families were all invited and there was food. I sat quietly and praised the inventors of Cipro.

Our host mothers presented a traditional song for us, which involved clapping, dancing, and perfect three-part harmony. Seriously, I think they're genetically engineered to sing well over here. It's amazing. We responded with the Star-Spangled Banner (which, embarrassingly, most of our group didn't know), followed by a traditional American song (I Will Survive. Everyone knew this song.).

Then off to Gabs...

Whoa, this homestay is so completely different from Otse, it's like un-culture shock culture shock. I've got a 2-story house with all the modern conveniences, including a computer (without internet, unfortunately), satellite TV (with more channels than at home), a shower, and a spice rack. My host-mother is a sweetheart of 60 years and I have a 21-year old sister who's pre-med at UB. (That's the University of Botswana, not the University of Buffalo.) I have my own bedroom and free reign of the house. I can cook whenever I want or eat the food that's prepared for me. My host-mom has three other daughters, one of whom lives in Canada and graduated from Johnston and Wales, and a stepson who lives in "that place in New York, what's it called, I think Long Island." It's a small, small world...

My host-mother gave me a Setswana name: Lerato. It means love. It's also the name of a woman on Big Brother Africa: 2, which we were watching at the time. I love this family.

I finally took the combi all by myself. I totally sort of almost looked like I knew what I was doing.

How old are you?
20.
That's too young to be so far from home...but it is also good to be doing something for your future.

We've begun environmental science and social science classes at UB. Here are some highlights:

A professor asked us: "How can the US be a world leader when most of its citizens know nothing about so much of the world?" Gosh, that's embarrassaing.

As of its independence in 1966, Botswana was one of the 20 poorest countries in the world. It was so poor, (how poor was it?) it was so poor that Great Britain still had to pay the salaries of the new government officials. Fortunately, diamonds were discovered in Botswana, and now it is considered a middle-class wage country. Even more fortunately, they didn't find the diamonds earlier, or Great Britain never would've let 'em go. And our lecturer from UB's Department of Economics can't believe that the US doesn't provide free health care to its citizens.

The poverty rate is 30.1% and unemployment is 25%, but officially no one has died of starvation in Botswana.

Many Batswana don't know what ecology is, but they all know what anti-retrovirals are. Unfortunately, awareness doesn't always equal knowledge. Botswana's further development is slowed considerably because the government is currently providing ARV's to 56,000 people. 7.7% of Botswana's GDP is spent on health care. Also, though 80% of Botswana's HIV/AIDS budget comes from within, they receive a lot of help from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Currently, the HIV infection rate has been decreased to 17.1% of the total population, but in the 15-49 age group it is over 33%.

Waste management, a.k.a. shit, is a problem. "They tell us to fill every pocket with condoms, in case of an emergency, but what do we do with them when we're done?"

"Not-in-my-backyard doesn't really work. There's no such thing as 'far away'. If New Yorkers dumped their trash 'far away', it would end up in...what state is near New York?...New Jersey." Our lecturer actually said that. Without laughing.

It was recently discovered that HIV is most virulent within the first 2 weeks of infection.

Phane worms, which are actually caterpillars, are a delicacy here. Supposedly they taste like prawns. And they can't believe Americans actually eat prawns.

23% of Batswana are unmarried. 67% of unmarried people have at least one child. Though co-habitation is become popular, divorce is even more popular.

HIV/AIDS is such a big problem because the culture has failed to keep up with economic development. The economy expanded so quickly, traditional behavior has not had time to catch up.

Botswana is dry. Droughts always. Dry. Not enough water.

If you scramble the letters in WMD, you get WDM, which stands for Water Demand Management.

THough lions are still endangered, the lion hunting ban was lifted several years ago as a result of pressure from certain Americans who had investments in the lion hunting industry. (For example, George Bush, Sr.)

The woman who gave us a lecture on the effects of divorce on children in Botswana believes that, though violence is one of the main reasons for divorce, no one listens to the husband's story. Nobody would ever beat his wife for no reason at all. She must've done something.

My goodness. Culture, catch up!

An addendum to my earlier discussion of gender dynamics:

You want to know a good way to avoid unwanted harrassment from creepy men on the street? Shave your head. It also helps with keeping cool despite the relentless heat. Don't believe I would do such a thing?:

Hint: I'm the one on the end who's not Asian.

Also, today I heard the expression "teeming with giraffes" for the first time. That will be my new favorite expression.

And now, for the first time, my blog is current.

Happy Birthday Botswana

This entry pretty much follows my stream of consciousness, as opposed to following traditional coherent order.

Preparations for the Botswana Day celebration began Thursday, though the holiday was not until Sunday. I helped peel and chop carrots, potatoes, and pineapples. The pineapples were added to a large plastic garbage can (like "take the garbage out to the curb" big) full of liquid, to become a "drink" for the party here this Saturday. Mmmmm exciting.

Last week in class we tried to learn how to click. Though there's no clicking in Setswana, there is in Sesarwa (language of the Basarwa bushmen, which are Botswana's equivalent of the Native Americans, as in they were here first but we were here stronger.) I think I can pronounce Xhosa well enough to impress an American, but not well enough to be coherent to a local. Luckily, I haven't learned enough to know whether Starvin Marvin is speaking a real language.

(Editor's Note: If you want to understand all the literary-ish references I make, I suggest watching the first eight seasons of South Park, reading everything written by Douglas Adams, reading mostly everything written by Orson Scott Card, and listening to pretty much all Broadway soundtracks. I think that should cover it. Beyond that it's really random. Oh, and join a co-ed literary fraternity.)

Friday evening, my classmate's host brother was celebrating his 2nd birthday and we all attended the party. We played with a frisbee the whole time. We're thinking of starting Otse's first Ultimate Frisbee league.

Saturday, the party was at my house. We already had some cousins over (young children, crawling all over me, it's like they've never seen a white person...but they live in Gabs, and I'm sure I've seen some white people there...I think...at restaurants, at least). I may never know what it's like to be black in America, but I sure as hell know what it's like to be white in Botswana. Everyone stares. Little kids are amazed when we talk; they look at me as if to say, "It speaks!" And everyone asks for money. Or my hand in marriage. If I had a pula for every time someone asked me for a pula, then I'd have a lot of pula...and the world would be pretty damn ironic.

I'm in the process of putting together a mini English-Setswana dictionary. Fortunately, I don't have to worry about the Setswana-to-English part because I don't understand Setswana well enough to decipher individual words from a slew of native speech.

Mefloquine dreams are fun. I recently dreamed I was out to dinner in Botswana with my classmates and I was eating a bowl of half-sour pickles from Ben's. I also had a dream where I kept saying, "I know I'm dreaming, I keep expecting to wake up," but I didn't believe myself enough to try flying or anything cool like that. Am I dreaming or am I awake? Sometimes I'm not too sure. Some of this trip is so surreal; I can't believe this is really happening, let alone believe that this is supposed to be school.

They listen to music so loudly here! They'll turn on the CD player, then turn the volume up all the way so they can hear it in the backyard. Even hiding in my room with the door closed, I could still feel the bass of a very interesting remix of Josh Groban's You Raise Me Up. I'm not making that up. And the music usually starts at 6 AM.

Saturday morning, we climbed the tallest mountain in Botswana. It's not that high, but I'm in such terrible shape, I had to stop every once in a while and refill with peanut butter and the last of my tofu jerkey. It was a beautiful hike, though, even if I was the back of the line always. And all trees and bushes in Botswana have thorns. My legs look like they were mauled by a cheetah. It's okay though; to hike, we wore shorts (instead of a skirt, which I kept in my backpack and put on before walking back in the house) for the first time since arriving in Otse. Skin heals, but a torn skirt is forever.

The tallest point in Botswana, briefly:















I don't think I'll ever learn to not anticipate things. Here, it's always different than I expect.

I returned from the hike just in time to help chop the vegetables for the pary, which I didn't learn until the end was Babae's Confirmation party (I was to embarrassed to ask earlier. Picture a long table surrounded by women chopping everything from beets to peppers to carrots. Or rather, look at my picture of it:














Double double toil and trouble...and so much food:















Some cousins:
















More cousins:















Some of the food:














I learned that my chopping and peeling skills are inferior, which makes me less of a woman, apparently. I kept asking what I could do to help because I didn't know what to do, and I felt bad just sitting there, which reminded me of an excerpt from a piece we had to read a couple of weeks ago, that's taken from an information packet given to people who move to America:
"Americans routinely plan and schedule an extremely active day. Any relaxation must be limited in time, pre-planned, and aimed at 'recreating' their ability to work harder and more productively once the recreation is over. Americans believe leisure activities should assume a relatively small portion of one's total life. People think that it is 'sinful' to 'waste one's time', 'to sit around doing nothing', or just to 'daydream'."

Those silly Americans.

The party started with, surprise, a prayer service. The priest had come to the party to lead the service. Religion is interesting here; it's not that they are unaccepting of non-Christians, but they assume everyone is Christian. Religion is woven into their lives so seamlessly that I'm often taken off guard. For example, this (awkward) conversation between me and one of Babae's (male) friends involved a combination of lying, acting, and confession on my part:

(Following a discussion of school)
Do you believe in God?
Uh, yes.
Do you want to go to Heaven?
I guess, sure.
So you believe in Heaven?
I don't know, but it can't hurt to believe in it.
But the Bible says there's a Heaven.
It's not very clear on it.
But you believe in God, so you should believe everything the Bible says.
The Bible has often been misinterpreted.
Do you go to church a lot?
Uh, no?
Why not?
I, um, don't like praying in front of people.
So you talk to God on your own.
Yes.
Will you always be like that?
I don't know. My parents go to church a lot [sort of], so maybe when I'm their age...
What do you think about abstinence?
What?
I hear Americans like to have sex with lots of people outside of marriage and it doesn't mean anything.
[I'm not repeating my answer here, I just wanted you to appreciate the awkwardness. Hi Mom and Dad.]
What age do you want to be married by?
I don't know, when I find the right person.
What do you think about homosexuality?
Uh,um, I, erm, [oh, shit]
You know, like gays and lesbians.
Yeah, uh, I think that we were all made in God's image, so he wouldn't have made people like that if he didn't approve of it. (Whew.) I'm going to go get a drink.

I had some less uncomfortable conversations as well. I spent a lot of time discussing astronomy with a 12 year-old boy. He explained to me how the sun doesn't actually move, but the Earth moves around it. I then tried to explain that the sun does, in fact, move, within a big disc-like collection of stars. It was kind of like when someone tried to explain to me the different degrees of infinity. (There are an infinite number of integers. There are also an infinite number of real numbers. If all the real numbers were put into a hat, the probability of pulling out an integer is zero. Therefore, the sets of integers and real nhumbers are described by different degrees of infinity. I would like to know where to get a hat that big.)

Most of my classmates came to the party for a little bit, which was very nice of them. I got to share with them some of the best drink ever. (Put lots of ground ginger, sugar, and sliced pineapple into a garbage can full of water. Let it sit for two days. Then mix it with sweet red brandywine, unless you're a woman; it's not nice for women to drink.) It's pretty delicious. I'm going to have to make some at home/school. Without alcohol, of course. After that, there was dancing.







Sunday: Independence Day! All the white people met at the kgotla (town hall) to help set up. While there, we met a really cool guy from Francistown who went Florida State University to study forensic science and is not teaching criminal law at the Botswana Police Academy. He got to spend time with the CIA learning how they work.







The ceremony was pretty boring, especially because it was all in Setswana. The president of Botswana sends a copy of his speech to each village chief to read on Independence Day, which is an interesting alternative to a television broadcast. Fortunately, a man summarized the speech in English for us. I learned that Botswana's literacy rate is now 90%. Pula!







Then there was so much food, and a traditional dance. A bunch of boys stamped around with what is clearly the precursor to rhythm tap. They wore dozens of little sacks of beans tied to their ankles. Kind of like taps, but cooler.




Dancers:















This is Botswana's 41st birthday. That's young. It's younger than my parents. Botswana gained its independence after the Beatles came to America. Botswana makes Israel look old. But for 41 years, it's a pretty nice place.







Following the celebration was another meeting of Otse's Ultimate Frisbee team. Now, I can catch a frisbee almost consistently and sort of throw it in the general direction of another person. Fortunately, I don't think we'll find another frisbee team to compete against in Botswana any time soon.







Oh, and I did laundry well this time! Ah, the sweet smell of success, not sweat.







Last though: everyone who knows me well should be amused to discover that the first phrases in Setswana I mastered are: Ke lapile (I'm tired) and Ke Robala (I'm going to sleep). Old habits die hard.

Pula! Pula! Pula! + Cheetah! Cheetah! Cheetah!

Some of the pictures and spacing is messed up here, but this is Africa. Deal with it.

The yellow house near the railroad tracks (aka Casa Moseki):



















Sunrise over Otse:
































Otse from the mountaintop:

































The other night I taught Babae how to play Freecell. With real cards. Not on the computer. Definitely more tedious, but at least I know I won't accidentally get distracted from my work for several hours at a time. It's really good that I didn't bring a SET deck. I also enjoyed trying to explain Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.


Life here is covered in a fine layer of red dust. Literally. And I thought it was just a tan. I do not envy those who have to meet me at the airport in three months. Maybe I'll learn how to do laundry by then. Or find a laundromat.
We went back to Mokolodi for a day. We were split into groups and given a 10x10 m area to study. We had to determine which animals and plants and insects live there. I know nothing about plants. There was a thorn bush and a thorn tree and another thorn bush that was somehow different from the first. Thorns + flowy skirt = AAARRRRRGH!



And then we tried to identify animal poop. (That's from a zebra, that's ostrich, eland, warthog. That's too small for eland, too big for springbok, maybe kudu.) It's like a logic puzzle. I could do this for a living. Me and zebra poop:



























Two of my classmates, Leah and Ahni, identifying a thornbush:





















Another classmate, Wes, identifying yet another species of thornbush. Or maybe a bug.






















There were also footprints (spoors) to identify, but it took us too long to realize we should check spoors first, before walking all over the plot.

Cheers to Botswana's ecology. Nothing personal, Rhode Island, but this is way cooler.

Then I pet a cheetah. His name is Numa. He and one other were rescued as orphaned infants and became too accustomed to people to be released. So they were trained to get pet on the head by tourists. Not such a horrible life; the fences with barbed wire aren't so bad...

Whoa...cheetah:























that's tame:






I want one:

























That'd be me, petting a cheetah:

If anyone wants a postcard, email your home address to me. Unless your last name is Zelman or Resnik, in which case it's in the mail.

"Pula! Pula! Pula!"is a cry that can be heard throughout Botswana. All speeches that I've heard have ended with this call for rain. It is also the name of Botswana's currency; I have often heard young boys begging for pula.

Otse itself practically begged for water, as every step kicked up a cloud of dry rust-colored sand that coated the surfaces of the village, roofs and dresses and cows and mucous membranes.

One night it almost rained. Clouds appeared late-afternoon and clustered by a nearby mountain. The clouds darkened as the sky did and turned the sunset a brilliant purple:

Streaks of lightning brightened the sky and thunder followed too many seconds after for the storm to reach Otse. Rain could be heard in the distance and the air was humid for the first time since I'd been there. I anxiously awaited the melody of rain falling on the tin roof, but it never came. The next morning was as hot and dry as the one before.

So continued the drought.

Then one day it finally rained. From the first light, the sky was a menacing grey. The Botswana name for this month means "sick clouds":

It was cold and windy. (Well, probably not colder than about 23 degrees C, but still not the 40 degrees it was the week before.) It was dark and gloomy. The cows and chickens and donkeys were hiding. But the earth was happy. The electricity in the air showed that. The dust was counting down to the moment the sky opened.

By lunchtime, thunder. Not long after, raindrops started pounding the ground. The rain only lasted a half hour, but the sky didn't look done yet. And all the disadvantages of a tin roof (i.e. the HEAT) are all forgotten with the heavenly tap-tap of the rain.

Then at night the thunder started again. I fell asleep to the rain. Flash. Tap-tap-tap. Boom. Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap. Sleep. [I suddenly have the urge to tap dance. Hey, I wonder if it's possibly to tap dance on the tin roof...maybe that's not such a good idea.]

When is the Kalahari Desert not a desert? When I'm there, of course. I bring rain with me wherever I go, from Providence to the Gunks to Phoenix to Otse. Botswana's covered by, officially, the Kalahari semi-arid ecosystem, because it gets 25 cm of rain a year. I don't know what the cutoff for desert is, but this place is pretty damn dry.

It's amazing what things make me feel like I'm home: as it was raining the hardest, the electricity went out. Ah, the familiar.

Once the rain stopped, all of Otse was outside, drinking and partying. What a way to begin a weekend of festivities for Botswana Day. (A weekend that lasts through Tuesday, according to the government.)

A muddy, poopy river ran through town, and damp cows drank happily from it. Donkeys still looked sad, but all the goats were out being chased by their goatlets.

And then it rained again.