Musina, Musina

Back in December, when it seems that Zimbabwe was at the height of the Cholera outbreak, a good number of aid agencies and organizations from South Africa and the world set up information/aid stations and tables at the showgrounds on the edge of town. Fast forward to a few months later when the South African government kicked them all out citing unsafe conditions. When Keri and I drove by the showgrounds, I only saw one tent up.. the one belonging to Doctors Without Borders. According to some friends I've made who have come to South Africa from Zim, things are starting to look up there... even if it's just a little bit. When we were in Musina, we didn't have to look hard to find evidence of what was going on.
There are still big trucks driving the N1 and delivering needed supplies into the country.
People near the border crossing (we didn't get that close), selling water.
And a billboard we passed asking people to think about their neighbors.
*Keri and I also visited the IOM (International Office of Migration) office in Musina.... we just wanted to check the place out since we had heard a lot of good things about it from Abby who was networking closely with them. We stayed only a few minutes, but that was enough time for the woman we talked to mention she was heading to Tzaneen within the next week to check places that were capable of building pit latrines. Turns out they needed toilets for a lot of the farms in the area that were employing migrants from Zimbabwe. I quickly handed over the card in my wallet that I had for Tsogang, John and Mary's organization. One week later, over tea in Tzaneen, John thanked me, told me that they had written up a proposal for the job with IOM and they were in the final stages of closing the deal. NETWORKING! It WORKS!

Oh Baobab, Baobab, Where You Be?

We had no set plans for the day we were spending in the Makhado area. Since we had a car and were so close to Musina and the border of South Africa and Zimbabwe, we decided to drive north and see where the day took us. All along the N1 (the toll road between the two towns) we counted baobab trees and tried to find our favorites. Oh the Baobab. They're beautiful. Stunning, actually, and, along with the Acacia Tree, many people associate them with Africa. According to an African legend, after creation each animal was given a tree to plant and the hyena planted the Baobab upside down. And then Rafiki, from The Lion King, made his home in a Baobab. Limpopo Province (what, what!) is home to one of the largest Baobabs on record... with it's average diameter being a whopping 50ft. (Thank you Wikipedia). And one more little fact, Baobabs store water (thousands and thousands of gallons) in their trunks to survive drought like conditions where they tend to be found.

Here's a Baobab about 45 minutes from Metz. See how much bigger it is in comparison to the tree on its right?

And here I am with My Schilling Stallions' shirt showing just how wide one of the bigger Baobabs we saw on our way to Musina was.

Buzzard Mountain What What

One thing that's always fun about traveling with other volunteers is the way your days turn out. There's never really a set plan that runs parallel to set expectations... you wing it. Seeing new things is fun, adventurous, and exciting, but the most fun, adventurous, and exciting part about each day is being free, being able to decide where you go, what you will see, how long it will take you to get there, how you will get there, and what food you can eat along the way. After driving through the Enchanted/Sacred/Holy Forest and having such a good time with Patrick and his family, Keri and I drove onto Makhado (aka Louis Trichardt) to spend the night in a cottage on the side of a mountain. One thing about using the internet or guidebooks to make your reservations and help you find lodging in your price range, is that you never know what you're going to get. The Buzzard Mountain Retreat was a functioning farm that also had multiple cottages for rental all up the side of the mountain. Since we were driving a Chico (no powering steering, and most certainly no 4w drive!), we stayed in the cottage closest to the main road... and that cottage was still 2km up the mountain.
The road leading up to the ol homestead.
On our first night, we showed up after dark and tapped into our provisions when it came to supper.
Our cute, little, REMOTE, cottage. All the electricity was run on the power of a car battery, the water heater was heated by a pile of wood, and although it was big enough for us to each have our own room and bed, we ended up sleeping in the same bed night two after being spooked.
Our second night, after driving all the way up to Musina and checking out baobabs along the road during the day, was quite a vacation fun time. We built up a fire in the braai pit... roasted marshmallows, made s'mores, and drank ciders/beer while the sun settled behind the Soutpansbergs for the night.

Happy Freedom Day!

Freedom Day is the South African public holiday that commemorates the first post-apartheid elections held on 27 April 1994; a day in which every person of voting age (18 and older) and from any race group could cast a ballot for their choice of candidate.
I spent the morning hanging out with my family, playing with the kids, and trying on one of the traditional skirts MmaDiapo is making me (beautiful!!!). In the afternoon, Nick came over and hung out. We talked, walked to the post office, and sat with everyone outside, in the shade, ate grapefruits, and learned how to pop kernels off of mealie cobs so that the kernels can, eventually, be taken to the grinder at Kodumela.
Then, for supper, I made myself some pancakes... they turned out really well and I'll get to eat some for breakfast in the morning.

That Fine Weekend in April

I love hanging out with Jaceson and Jenny... we always have adventures. After Keri and I visited a couple volunteers at their sites over holiday, I realized that I was,very much, due for a visit to Nkowankowa and Jaceson and Jenny's site. On Friday morning I set out to town to meet up with Christy and Zana for coffee, stopped by John and Mary's office for a visit, and then, after a lunch of pizza, I ran into Jaceson at the taxi heading out to their place. Lots of talking, some music swapping, a lovely hike in the mountains, chips and salsa, macaroni and cheese, laughing, and even an episode of Cold Case on TV... a very relaxing weekend all around.

One of the many forests we walked through. Jaceson and Jenny my trail guides.

Our destination was Bob's River, all the way down the side of the mountain we were on. Bob's River was pretty cold, but felt so good. We spent a couple hours sitting on some rocks taking in the waterfalls, eating sandwiches, and watching Jaceson swim.

The view from the top of the mountain and where the trail started. Isn't it beautiful? You can see farms that stretch for miles.

It Makes the World Smaller

I got an SMS from Nick last night that said he was glad I was working with new people and will leave with good memories and experiences. How right he is. After all those months and months and months of trying and working to come to some sort of resolution within myself and within the organization I worked with, it really was time for me to leave. Time for me to leave and it was the right time, for me, to leave. Since I've separated myself and have had to deal with the political and emotional backlash, it's been nice "recovering" in a place where I feel totally accepted, free, loved, heard, and of use. I put up with certain things for a looooong time. With all that being said, there are definitely times where I wonder what good I'm doing here, or really what they could need me for. It's silly, it is. I know. This is a job and clearly that's thinking a lot about the experience. It's just there are times I feel as though I've learned WAY more than I've given back to the people I've come into contact with, people I've worked with and strangers alike. Then days like yesterday happen and I'm sent reeling... things become very clear and focused. It's emotional for sure... on so many levels.
For the last few days, a group of visitors from the UK has been touring around the area checking out some of the projects Kodumela has done in local villages. All these visitors are connected to two organizations.... WorldVision UK that partially funds Kodumela's activities (have you seen the sponsor a child commercials? Yep, they're one international organization that has such a program) and CHOKO (people from the village of Chosley in the UK who have started a "community linking" project with Kodumela. CHO=Chosley, KO=Kodumela). It's been a fun few days and I'm glad I've gotten to tag along and see everything. CHOKO has raised some money in their community and sent it to Kodumela to help build up the community here, communities helping communities... what a beautiful concept. We visited the site of a disabled center that is in the process of being built with CHOKO money and saw the new football kits (soccer uniforms) that a team in Enable just received with some of the funds. Then yesterday morning, after some people had gone to vote and although it was a national holiday, a small group of us met up at Kodumela. Some of the CHOKO/WorldVision representatives were going on home visits to meet kids (and their families) they have been sponsoring through the WorldVision program. This is where the emotional stuff comes in. What an experience! I was in a group that Maite (she oversees the sponsorship program at Kodumela) and Solomon (he's a development worker who works in the Turkey villages, he knows the kids and families we were going to see) were taking into Turkey 4, 3, and 2. We were visiting 3 families and had 3 sets of sponsors with us. I watched as sponsors got excited, nervous, and "wobbly" right before they were going to meet up with the children they had written to and seen pictures of. I watched one woman comment on how much the children had grown since her last visit a little over a year ago. I saw the families' eyes grow big when boxes of provisions (mealie meal, sugar, salt, pilchards, baked beans, macaroni) were brought in their yards and presented to them. I saw kids be shy at first and then open up a little the longer they sat with their friends. I saw their eyes light up when they received gifts. I watched as the sponsors asked questions and greeted everyone formally and with respect, standing up and shaking hands, thanking the families for allowing them to visit. It was pretty incredible. According to Maite, the Kodumela office oversees the sponsorships of 4,391 children...3,065 of those are sponsored by people in the UK, 1,326 are from here in South Africa. Those 4,391 children are from Metz, Turkey 1, Turkey 2, Turkey 3, Turkey 4, Enable, Worcester, Butswana, Moshate, Sofaya, and Madeira villages.
This is Anjie from CHOKO with her sponsor child, Saul, and his family. Maite played translator. Saul was really shy and reserved when we first met up with him. A couple hours after we had left their house, we needed to go back for some forgotten things, and Anjie said he smiled when he saw her and showed her how he could play with the yo-yo she had brought him.
This is Tony and Celia's visit with Dennis and his family. They presented him with his very own football and kit! (He looks very smart doesn't he?)
When we got back to Kodumela, I overheard a woman thanking Ledile for such an experience. She said she wasn't sure how to find the words, but that it was such a special experience for her to see the child she's been writing to for awhile now. She kept waving in the air and gesturing, trying to find the words to describe all the feelings she was having... and then she just smiled and said, "It just makes the world smaller, you know?" I was sitting under the Acacia tree watching their conversation and I nodded in agreement. I do know. Two parts of the world were brought together... people supporting each other, caring about each other, and becoming a sort of family.... and I was lucky to be there to see it.

The Election This Side

When you have cast your ballot you get a mark on your thumbnail with a permanent marker.
The last few days have been crazy here in the village. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights the shebeen was blasting traditional music on repeat with car hooters (horns) hooting (honking) to the beat.... all in celebration of different political parties' closing rallies. Yesterday, while we were delivering mealie meal to some drop in centers, Letebele (the driver for Kodumela) honked the horn and he and Rejoice rolled down their windows and hollered out of the bakkie. Whooping it up for their party. Then today... a national holiday and, the oh so important, Election Day... when I emerged from my room to walk to Kodumela, there was silence. No one was out, there was no whooping, there were hardly any people out and about. Where was everyone? Everyone was voting! Yes. Voting stations are open until 9 and I think it might take a little while before all the votes are counted... so we'll have to wait for a results. It was pretty cool to be in South Africa during the 4th democratic elections.

It's (maybe) Really Time for the Hot Chocolate!

It's chilly! For the past couple weeks it has been getting lighter and lighter, earlier and earlier...the sun has set by 6:15 the last week or so. This morning I wore a scarf, short sleeved shirt, jeans, and shoes, not flip flops, to work and was cold all day... should have brought my jacket. It's a nice 70 degrees in my room right now and I think tonight I'm going to use an extra blanket while I sleep.
Besides busting out extra clothes, people in Metz have been busy preparing for Winter for a couple of months now. Mealies have been harvested, morogo has been cooked and then dried, and all the blankets and duvets in the house have been washed.
MmaDiapo has been cooking up a storm in order to have some food ready for the upcoming months. She picks the morogo (leaves of various vegetable plants... pumpkin, green beans, etc.) at her farm, packs it in a bag to carry home, and then spends a few hours every afternoon cooking in a 3 legged pot over the fire. People prepare it all different ways... it's all a matter of taste... MmaDiapo prefers a simple recipe of onions and some spices. Once the leaves have been cooked down and are the consistency of steamed spinach, they are scooped out of the pot onto a big piece of tin (the same kind used for my roof!) to dry in the sun. When it's all dry, it's stored in big mealie meal bags to use when Winter comes. In order to cook the dried version, you just add water to it and cook until it's back to what it looked like when you first cooked it down.
Woo! Then there are the mealies. Here they are drying in the sun in the yard. Once dried they will be used for chicken feed and ground into mealie meal for the coming months... until it's time for mealies to grow again in the Summer.
Here's the grindstone my family used to use when it was time to make meal. They'd sit under the guava tree and grind the mealies into a fine powder. But, like a lot of things, some people in the village are moving away from (some) traditional ways. A few months ago Kodumela was able to purchase a new grinding machine, bigger and faster, with money they had made with their old one.
And here's Danny working the machine. All the mealie kernels he's pushing through are going to become samp (sort of like hominy ), the bag directly underneath him is catching all the kernels, the bag to the left and in front is to catch all the chaff. The other side of the machine grinds the kernels even finer, into meal, and the chaff is collected in the same place. On any given day, this guy is covered from head to toe in white dust.... just yesterday they started wearing masks. When I hang around them long enough, the dust and smell very much bring me back to working rice harvest in Gueydan (What, What Gueydan, LA!). Hard work for sure... but there's something to be said for having a part in your meal and where it's all coming from.

This is What Makes Work Fun

I'm really tired so posting about the grand ol vacation will have to resume tomorrow after work. I got home a little while ago after spending 10 hours trying to get some fruit and vegetables in town for all the drop in centers. It was quite the fiasco. This morning, after getting checks signed and turning in a check request, we got a ride to town from a woman who was visiting Kodumela. When we got to the bank to cash the check, the check wasn't filled out correctly, so we couldn't get any money (one thing that's hard about relying on public transport and living an hour from town). We hiked up the hill to John and Mary's office to pick up some receipts that I had asked for, picked up some popcorn and two ice cream bars along the way, then hiked back down to the taxi rank to catch a taxi going to Metz. We got back to the office, got a new check filled out, and then headed back out to the road to find a ride (hoping it wouldn't be too hard considering it was after 2). With the help of Aubrey (a taxi driver) and Rufus (a teacher leaving the high school he works at in Lorraine and heading home to Lenyenye) we made it back to the bank with a few minutes to spare and were able to cash the check before they closed. We met up with Polivia and another woman from the office and walked to pick up some Jik Bleach (used by carers for water treatment at patients' homes). The four of us carried 5 boxes from the pharmacy across town to the Fruit&Veg. Rejoice and I carrying our boxes in our hands, Polivia and the other woman walking with them on their heads. At Fruit&Veg we managed to buy enough butternut, cabbage, potatoes, and onions for the 7 drop in centers to serve one veggie a meal to the kids for the rest of this month. We piled all of the food into the back and Selo (who seems to be our regular driver for food purchasing) drove us to each center to drop everything off. Here is what we looked like in the Fruit&Veg parking lot... the parking attendant guy even wanted to jump in.

And now it's time for Rooibos, my book, and my bed. This is Metz Village signing off.

You Come Here to Cleanse Your Eyes in the Beauty

That's what our new friend Patrick said when he was giving us a tour of the tea estate he works on... man was he right.
{The posting extravaganza plan is still on... we just had a slight hiccup yesterday when the electricity was out from 10-3:30. Man, was it hot. The sun usually does all its good baking right around then. So, I didn't get to put up posts (Crispin, the ol Apple, has a dead battery and must be plugged in in order to run}
After leaving the all you can eat breakfast we drove West towards the Soutpansberg Mountains and Makhado (Louis Trichardt) where we were staying the night. Beautiful winding roads, red, red dirt, and just a feeling of being a little more rural and remote than in other places I've traveled to. We turned on to the wrong road in town and ended up seeing a good section of said road, repeatedly, while we tried to find which dirt road off to the side would connect us to the other tar road to the north that we wanted to use. After driving through a village and hoping we wouldn't run out of petrol, we made it to the tar road, and just around the corner, to a petrol station as well. Because we were on an adventure, after filling up, we turned up a tar road by the station that seemed to lead right into a huge tea estate. We thought maybe we could get a tour, at the very least, an amazing view from up high, of the valley below. So we drove. We had only gone 2km before we passed a man, a woman, and a small girl walking up the hill with grocery bags, a big jug of cooking oil, and huge bags of flour (that the woman was carrying on her head). We offered them a ride up to the top.
Meet Patrick, his wife Koni, and their daughter, Winfrey. This is a true story of how you're never quite sure what you will see and what will happen in your day. How some people are truly kind.
It turns out that they were a family living and working on the tea estate. Patrick used to pick out in the fields, but was promoted to an office/administrative position, Winfrey goes to creche on site, and Koni wakes up every morning at 3 to start cooking fat cakes (fried dough, like a funnel cake or beignet) to sell to people as they head to work in the fields. They were just coming back from buying fat cake supplies for the coming week. We drove them to the top of the mountain and then back into the staff area so they could drop off their stuff. After snapping a family photo, Patrick offered to take us around and show us some of the local sites. We spent the next couple of hours driving through the estate hearing all about the tea production process and all about his life. In one breath he would talk about what leaves are to be picked off of a tea plant and then shift into stories about his childhood, growing up half coloured and half Venda, never feeling like he was accepted anywhere. He hasn't seen his mother since he was very young and Koni's family always treated him as a son. His hope is to save enough money to one day build a house for Koni and Winfrey and have a place for his mother to come stay when she decides to come back to him. He also kept mentioning that we were the first white people Winfrey didn't seem to be scared of. She was fascinated by our hair and spent a good amount of the time we were with them taking us all in.
We drove down the tar road to Phiphidi Falls and took Winfrey on her first tour of the waterfall. There was a "bridge" made of several smallish logs that you had to cross in order to get a good view. Patrick told Winfrey to sit on a rock and wait for us while we, shakily, crossed over the river to get to another piece of land. After we had taken photos and soaked up the view, I started waving at Winfrey... jumped up and down a few times.. and yelled "Hi Winfrey! We're coming!". She started to cry. "In our culture, Mmapula, when you wave in such a way, it means you are saying goodbye, you are leaving." Oh, Winfrey, Winfrey, we're coming! I'm sorry! And she cried and howled until we crossed, shakily, over the "bridge" once again and her dad was able to pick her up. (in the photo, all the way to the left, is a pink dot otherwise known as Winfrey)
In all the guidebooks two things are mentioned as must sees.. Lake Fundudzi and the Sacred/Holy/Enchanted Forest (it has a few names). So we went. We, of course, passed the turn off the first time, but found it when we back tracked (which really has now just become a rule for me when driving in SA). The road up to the lake view and to drive through the forest was about 30km long, one way, potholey, covered in ruts because of recent rains, and lined with huge patches of clearcut forest... cause all the land seems to be owned by logging and paper companies. (The only people we saw on the road were workers heading back to work after the weekend).
The Sacred Forest is a little bit of land that has been preserved in the area.. nothing can be cut or tampered with, it is protected. So after many kilometers of driving through ravaged land, all the sudden (but not really, cause you take a few wrong turns along the way and it's one big maze) you find yourself at the entrance of a jungley looking forest that has been saved from all this clear cutting because of its importance to the ancestors and spirits of a local tribe. From one side to the other the drive through takes less than 10 minutes. It was a nice break before we were plunged back into the sun and fairly barren landscape.
Then it was off to the view of Lake Fundudzi. The lake is considered a sacred site, as it is believed that its water came from the great sea that once covered the earth before land was created. It's also one of the only natural, freshwater lakes in South Africa. Since guests aren't allowed to visit the lake without permission from the Netshiavha tribe, we figured it was best to just see it from above. According to tradition, when seeing the lake you must view it with proper respect... which means turning your back to it, bending over, and viewing it from between your legs. So throwing all feelings of looking silly out the window, that's what we did.

On our way back down to the main road to Makhado we met a couple obstacles along the way... cows standing in the middle of the road and getting our car stuck, going downhill, in two ruts. Luckily, things were on our side... right after we got stuck, a man in his truck came around the corner. Within 15 minutes, after we had been pulled out, we were back on our way... heading to our cottage at the Buzzard Mountain Retreat.

Oh Limpopo, Limpopo!

After staying with John and Mary, the best hosts ever, we went to the Pick'n Pay and Woolworth's before leaving Tzaneen to head north into Venda and other areas we hadn't seen. That night's stop? The Vivisa Lodge (cheapest nightly rate we could find in Lonely Planet) in Thohoyandou.
Along the way, just outside of Modjadji (home of the rain queen), we stopped at Sunland Nursery and saw the Sunland Baobab. It's huge! Carbon dated at plus or minus 6,000 years old, this puppy measures almost 47 meters across (a little over 51 yards). A few years back, when some farmworkers were trying to rid the tree of a snake infestation, they ended up burning the inside and ultimately hollowing it out. The owners of Sunland decided to turn such an accident into something more positive and built a bar within the trunk of the tree. When we were there it seemed to be quite the happening place with chalets, a pool and deck, and even a quads track, but the bar wasn't open for business.
We kept driving north to the town of Thohoyandou and, although, as usual, there were a few wrong turns, we made it in good time... just in time to find the taxi rank and see about finding some traditional Venda material. We parked and went into a PEP store (cheap clothes and other miscellaneous things) to ask if anyone knew where a fabric store was and if we could find some traditional crafts. After an hour of walking around with two guys showing us the way, the fabric shop being closed, and the taxi rank being too busy for me to make any decisions about buying traditional beading from a woman, we headed back to the car and called the Arts and Culture Center. Yep. Thohoyandou is like a lot of towns... has it's share of cheap clothing stores, cash and carry's, a ShopRite, and a huge taxi rank, but it's different when it comes to this building, most towns don't have such a place. The building was full of arts and crafts and Keri and I showed our support by buying a full Venda traditional outfit... she has the skirt and I have the matching top wrap. Beautiful red, white, blue, black, yellow, and green striped material with accents of embroidery in black and white thread and light blue and yellow polka dotted material on the edges. Truly a find.
As we were leaving the Arts and Culture Center, as soon as we turned right, there on the side of the road was the Vivisa Lodge. It looked to be under construction and, in my opinion, sketchy, so I suggested we head back to the taxi rank to check out the big casino across the street. Aw yeah. We sprung for a room and spent the night watching satellite television and eating grapes, hummus, crackers, cheese, and carrots for supper. In the morning we enjoyed a full breakfast buffet with unlimited coffee drinks. Yes!(You don't have to twist my arm!)
Like many things in South Africa, it was pretty extreme. On one side of the road you had the taxi rank, on the other you had this pretty nice hotel with a casino, 24 hour security, beds with top sheets, and breakfast included. The view of the Eastern tips of the Soutpansberg Mountains was beautiful and were calling us West.

Fast Car and Take Away Coffee

Ok a Chico isn't really a fast car... but we had Tracy Chapman in the CD player and first stop, after picking up the car, before hitting the open road, was for take away coffee.
Second stop? The Hoedspruit Endangered Species Center. The center is a place that has become a safe haven for a variety of endangered/vulnerable animals, as well as a conservation facility that focuses on breeding/boosting species' numbers, and doing anti-poaching work. We spent an hour in a safari truck driving around the property checking out cheetahs, a tiger (that had been rescued from mistreatment while working for a circus in Portugal), a lion (who had been sick), packs of wild dogs (which are wild here in South Africa, but are a threat to farms and, in turn, farmers are a threat to them), a Sable Antelope, wild cats, vultures, cranes, and a variety of other types of birds. The center is only about 45 minutes from Metz, yet with public transport being the only option, no one in the village has really heard of it.
The center gives fresh meat, on the bone, to follow strict diet rules for all the animals. When it's time to feed, the animals are brought into smaller and cleaner enclosures where they eat and then are observed for an hour or so afterwards, so staff can be aware of any changes in their stools, behavior, etc. When the bones have been cleaned by the first round of animals, they're gathered up and brought to the "bone yard" for vultures to pick clean. Here is a vulture sitting on the wall above all the bones. When the bone yard gets to be full, the center sells them to a man in town who grinds them down to bone meal.
An orphaned zebra and a sheep are the best of friends. Sheep are very good surrogate mothers, they can teach their foster children what's needed when it comes to survival... where to find food and what to eat.

And Grandma, they eat parts of the chicken I've never seen before!

Back in the day, when I was living in America, I didn't eat much meat. Because of the taste, red meat was not an option (and it's been that way since I was 11 or so), chicken was on occasion, and I'd eat fish when I was craving protein or a seafood platter. If given the choice I would have chosen vegetables, tofu, beans, etc. for any given meal. Like a lot of things, choices, conveniences, and options, when I got to South Africa that all changed. I had decided that if I found myself in a situation where something was being offered to me and it would be culturally insensitive or rude to not try it.. I would try it. At the very least I would try it. I'll try something once. The first week of training when I was at the teacher's college with all the other volunteers, I could get away with eating all the sides, but when I got to Gopane it was a different story. Mma Mable's family didn't have much in the way of money, but they were a little better off than some people in the village. Every night we would have a decent size meal made of two things.... macaroni and tomato sauce, pilchards and rice, pap and chicken. I remember one night in particular sitting on the porch with Thato waiting for Mma Mable to finish up the cooking (it was her night). We were watching the stars coming out, giggling about the wishes we were making, and because of the dark we couldn't see very far in front of us. When supper was served, Mma Mable handed me a plate and I dug in with my right hand. I put a huge bite of morogo (greens) in my mouth, instantly started to gag and gagged quietly, trying to recover from the shock of chewing a large glob of a greens and chicken livers. I tried to feel around on my plate to pick out the livers, but they were cut up into small pieces and it was a lost cause. I eventually ended up going the passive route and just stopped eating. I didn't say anything, I just sat there with my plate on my lap and mulled over what the best way to handle the situation was. When it was time to take all the dishes in the kitchen Mma Mable glanced at all my uneaten food and, like a good mother, took it from me, put it in a leftovers bowl, and told me to make myself a bowl of Corn Flakes. In Metz, I haven't had many awkward interactions when it's come to food. MmaDiapo can't eat red meat cause it makes her sick and usually there are enough sides at traditional meals for me to avoid the meat. And then there was that time when I managed to eat everything but the chicken on my plate and the woman next to me was so exasperated with how slow I was, she just grabbed my chicken and ate it for me. Now, whenever I'm given chicken at a catered function, I just hand it off to my neighbor. I'm not going to eat it, but I know someone else will and there's no need to waste.
I've eaten my share of "different" things here... mopane worms (caterpillars), termites, grasshoppers, a ton of different kinds of morogo, pumpkins, roots, fruits... but there are three things I can think of, off the top of my head, that I'm not sure I can try: chicken heads, chicken feet, and tripe or intestines. That's just not my bag. I understand not wasting anything, using all the parts. I understand why people here eat everything. I get it. I just don't think I can do it.
Chicken feet takeaway lunch.

Maite preparing supper for the Phokungwanes.

All those heads and feet.

I'm now a close friend of Megan, we eat chocolates, popcorns, apples together

Maite (from Kodumela) wrote that in an email today. Cracks me up!
I look at this and it makes me feel better. The last night of our holiday, right before Keri went back to work, we made this huge bowl of popcorn "Rich Hodge" style, and I made tea in my new teapot. Isn't it great? I found it at a coffeeshop/pottery place in Pilgrim's Rest, Mpumalanga. I couldn't stop thinking about it and eventually decided to buy it, throwing all worries of how I'm going to get it home in one piece out the window. I'm using it to have some Rooibos right now. Yes, yes the spout is an elephant's trunk!
Today wasn't necessarily a bad day, not at all, but crying fits and bouts of loneliness don't always come on awful days. I think today is just that special time when some of the things I've been sittin' on for the last few days, weeks, oh 21 months, burst forth and I'm once again faced with a lot of stuff I thought I was OK with. It's fine. I say that cause that's how I'm going to move on and keep going and 'cause in a lot of ways it is fine. I mean crying, feeling lonely, it's all part of the experience and those are all natural reactions. Some "little" things floating around:
Yesterday marked exactly 5 months until I COS (close of service). 5 months. Yikes. That's still so far away, yet it's not enough to start a lot of new projects and work.
I know I'm going to have to say goodbye to even more volunteers in my group, I just know it.
The other shoe has dropped and some issues have come up in regards to me turning in my "resignation". This is going to be fun. Not really.
I am antsy and trying with all the energy I can muster to be present and not think too much about September.
I'm missing Dominique and Jack's wedding in one month and that hurts. Hurts a lot.
And that's all I got... well, all that I can write on here. I'm going to enjoy my teapot and try to get some sleep... tomorrow, because work is going to be light at the office the next few days, I'm going to start a posting extravaganza!

All Over The Map

A map drawn by a carer working for one of the organizations I'm working with in Metz. The Department of Social Development wanted some record of all the houses that were visited and where they are located in the community.

(Thanks for your comment Andrea! I just put my email up so if you have any questions or want to write back and forth about Peace Corps, I'm all about it!)

With the Sun Just RIght, Those Big Mountains Cast Shadows on Themselves

I'm back! It was one of those traveling days where you're tired, things are fuzzy, and you know you're suffering from withdrawal... coffee consumption and movie watching has come to a swift halt. Keri and I had a great vacation up north and once I get all the photos in order you better believe I'm going to post some... probably several. We got back to White River this past weekend and I spent a few days just hanging out on Keri's couch watching more than my share of TV show and movie DVD's someone connected to her organization let her borrow. This morning it was hard to face the fact that I was heading back to site... multiple taxi rides sounded exhausting and leaving meant actually admitting that the holiday was over. I love that I've gotten to see so many things and have managed to see so much of Southern Africa, but always living in transition, things always changing, living out of a bag, always moving and staying in different places is starting to really take its toll on me. After getting a ride and skipping over having to take one of my many taxis, the traveling of the day went pretty smoothly. I took a taxi from Hazyview (Mpumalanga)to Bushbuckridge (Mpumalanga) and then one from Bush to Acornhoek (A-cun-hook). When I was dropped off at the Bush taxi rank I got a taxi that took just minutes to fill. I got to Acornhoek by noon (I left Keri's at 8:30) and waited there for an hour... the taxi to Hoedspruit/The Oaks needed to fill. After an hour of waiting we were on our way... and I was home, in my room, by 2:15. As soon as I stepped off the taxi and got my change from the driver, I heard "Mmapula!" and was excited and relieved to see Phenyo walking to the bakery to buy some airtime and bread. She helped me haul one of my 3 bags home and hung out for a little while before I went to tell my family across the road I was home. Once I was back in the village, I was fine... it's so good to see everyone.
A few highlights:
My first taxi was so old and rickety, I'm surprised we made it from Hazy to Bush.
*we went about 60km the whole time
*it started to rain pretty hard and the wipers were as slow as molasses
*at one point, the driver got out to put some oil under the hood and didn't put the emergency brake on... we rolled backwards for a little ways until the middle front seat passenger leaned over to jerk it up.
*our soundtrack was a mix of Celine Dion, R. Kelly, DJ's from South Africa, and Milli Vanilli
*I sat next to two young girls who were traveling by themselves and everyone was looking out for them
My last taxi was a special ride that included:
*Culture Spears ( a traditional singing group from Botswana) on the stereo
*I had the front passenger seat and there was a guy sitting on a cooler in between the driver and myself. When we passed the traffic police it was his job to hold my seatbelt so it would look like it was buckled.
*Our front seats were reclined so much I was practically in the lap of the woman behind me
*The woman behind me had a gorgeous smile and was holding two live chickens
*about 10 minutes into our ride we got a flat, that was changed in a record 5 minutes, we then drove 65km per hour because we were driving on the spare
*All the people we dropped off were heading back to the farms they work on after Easter break

A few weeks ago I was in a taxi driving through the middle of Metz when "Holiday" by Madonna came on the CD the driver was listening to. I got so excited and said, "Hey! This is Madonna!!" and he turned around with his passenger friend and smiled... "Yes it is! Do you know her?! You have heard her music?" Um, yeah mister, I only grew up listening to her and can't help dancing every time I hear her on the radio. "Of course! She's my homegirl!"

Maponya and Marula Wine

In June 2008 I went to a funeral in the township of Lenyenye (Lynn-yain-yay)with my family from Metz. It was a pretty interesting day... starting about an hour before the sun rose and lasting until mid-afternoon when I found myself trying to stay awake the whole taxi ride back home. The Phokungwanes from Metz had hired a taxi for the trip and the plan was to meet it on the main road around 5am. Yes. I remember standing on the side of the road for a good hour or so, shivering from the cold, and feeling more and more awake as the sun rose over the mountains in front of us. Finally the taxi showed up around 6 and after stopping for petrol we were on our way. MmaDiapo and I managed to find ourselves in the last two seats in the very back and pretty much slept the whole ride to the church. When we got to Lenyenye and parked, everyone shuffled out of the taxi, but MmaDiapo stated that the church looked too full and she wasn't interested in standing and being smushed with a ton of people throughout the whole service (a woman after my own heart!)... so we stayed in that back seat of the taxi for a good two hours and had a nice conversation about politics, America, South Africa, funeral customs in the different cultures, and the grieving process, with our taxi driver. After the funeral we went to the family's house for lunch and I talked to a few different people before going into hiding on a side porch with some cold drink and my family. When we headed home that afternoon the taxi driver asked me if I had any questions about South African culture. I told him I had a lot and my latest interest was trying to figure out what the colors of the flag represented. Fast forward a month or two later when I came home from work and found a piece of cardboard stuck inside my door. Yep, a breakdown of the colors of the flag and what they all meant. Now, fast forward a little more to 2009 when I was walking home after work one afternoon. A taxi slowed next to me and there was the same driver again... asking if I had any other questions about South Africa. I told him once again that there was a lot I wanted to know, but at the time I was really interested in the making of Marula Wine. He said he would get on the answer. I saw him by the taxi rank in town a week later and he said he would deliver my answer soon. The next week I walked into Kodumela and Rejoice handed over a two page description of how Marula wine is made.... and there was a recipe for Pineapple Beer as an added bonus. That day, by coincidence, I walked to the post office and ran into him coming out of the shop next door. He asked if I had the recipes with me because he wanted to explain things, wasn't sure his English was good enough for me to understand. We stood at the bus stop for 15 minutes as he went through the pages he had written explaining, and sometimes acting out, every step in the Marula Wine making process. I told him I would share all this information with you... and report back if anyone at home tried the Pineapple Beer recipe. So here you go.. the recipes and some pictures of Marula season in Metz.... if you can think of anything I should ask him for his next assignment, I'm all eyes.

Here's my pal Maponya.

How to Make/Prepare Marula Beer by Maponya
*No picking from the tree, the Marula will fall on the ground by itself to show that they are ripen
*The color will be light green but some yellowish.
Day One
1. Collect Marula from the tree as many as you can
2. Put Marula together until they change the colour to yellow that shows that you can prepare to make Marula Beer
3. Use big bucket or bowl to prick/squeese the seeds and the juice. The juice is sweet. Use a table fork.
4. Throw the outer layer/skin and leave the seeds, juice, and pulp in the bucket or bowl.
5. Separate the seeds and the juice. Juice in one bucket, seeds in the other.
6. Add water in the bucket with the seeds and mix by clean hands until the sweetness are removed from the seeds and then throw away the seeds. Add 9kg of water bit by bit in the bucket. Stay busy mixing and taste by mouth if it is sweet, if it is, stop.
7. Mix the first juice with the second juice mixed with water in a big bucket and close tide (tight).
Day Two
1. Open and remove the top layer by hand or anything that will remove the top layer without taking any beer.
2. Close tide (tight) again.
Day Three
1.Open and taste the Marula Beer.
Some people drink Marula Beer while sweet (it's juice at that point), but many need to drink sour.

Pineapple Beer
1. Boil 25Lt of water in a tin or anything
2. Add 2kg of brown sugar in boiling water
3. Stir until sugar is dissolved in water
4. Cool down the water (lukewarm)
5. Mix pineapple chunks from 1 or 2 pineapples and two pieces brown bread
6. Close the bucket or tin after mixing.
Day Two
Open the lid you will see the pineapple beer boiling as if there is fire or something burning from the bottom. Some enjoy when sweet but majority of people like it when it is sour. Use a tea sift to sift beer.
This is what the Marulas look like on the tree. When they're ripe they turn a soft yellow color and fall off the tree.. this year I didn't see any ripe ones because they were all picked and taken to ripen for the wine.

From January to March the shortcut path from the Taposa Bakery parking lot to Kodumela ADP is full of people. If you're brave enough or have the patience to deal with people who are pretty drunk... you can walk that way... most people choose to walk on the tar road. Last year, when I was a rookie, I walked through there and actually ended up participating in the cultural exchange. I bought a mayonnaise jar full of wine for r3 (about 30 cents) and shared it with a gogo who happened to be sitting next to me. I think I drank about half and when I stood up, I was good and drunk. Nothing like having such a cultural exchange at 1 in the afternoon and then heading back to the office. People found it pretty amusing.


Some women make wine all throughout the season and set up shop under the trees to make their money. It's rare that you see women drinking in public. Here I am drinking some of the wine out of a traditional ladle... it's made out of a hollowed out squash/pumpkin.

And here's a business woman makin' her money for the day.
A couple of tidbits about the Marula tree:
*Elephants are big fans of Marulas, they ram into the tree to knock the fruit to the ground, this is why the Marula was nicknamed the "Elephant Tree".
*Amarula cream liqueur is well known all over the country (and according to their website it can be found in 70 countries worldwide). To make Amarula the fruit is fermented , distilled, and then matured for two years in oak casks for about 2 years. It is then mixed with cream and bottled. In my opinion, it is best served over ice.

That fun trip to town

A few months ago, Rejoice wrote a grant proposal asking ABSA Bank, here in South Africa, to fund a great idea she had. She had envisioned getting enough funding to cover monthly trips to town for groceries for a group of about 15 orphans (most being heads of their households and looking after their brothers and sisters as well as themselves). The ABSA people liked what she was trying to do, liked the idea that not only would OVC's (orphans and vulnerable children) be receiving needed food, but they would also have a role in the actual purchasing of the food. Two weeks ago marked the second trip to Tzaneen with this new plan and I got to go along for the ride. It was a really good day, all the kids stocked up on their food for the month, they got to experience a rare trip out of the village, Rejoice and I were able to talk to the managers at the Pick 'n Pay and gave them a rundown of the work we're trying to do and where all of our drop in centers are located, they provided us with free cold drink (!!!!), asked us to type up a project profile to deliver back to them, and said they were interested in visiting the office (!!!!), we all got a lunch from the hot food section, Rejoice bought Simba's for everyone to share, and I took care of our dessert with a bag of little chocolate bars. It was an adventure to town... and one of the best trips I've had.
To make things easier we lined up all the shopping trolleys in an out of the way place and then went off to find the items we needed. Man, we sure did get a lot of attention! People kept stopping and asking what we were doing, why there were so many kids and so many carts.

This picture shows some of the food and other stuff that was bought: Soya Mince (meat substitute), Sunlight dishwashing soap, deodorant, baked beans, eggs, mealie meal, corned beef, oil, suger, salt, and toothpaste, etc. My job was to help unload the carts when everyone was checking out. When I got up to the front of the line to help out one kid, the woman checking us out told me that she wasn't going to be able to ring up my items, she had a long line of kids she was ringing up for a project. It took her awhile to realize that I was with all the kids. It was sort of awkward, but we all got a good laugh out of it in the end. I tell ya, no matter how long I stay here and how much I try to get used to being "different" from most of the people I work with, it always knocks me back a little when someone is shocked that I live in the village, I am working with an organization where all the workers are black, I am friends with people who are a different color than me....
Each kid checked out separately so when we got to the taxi to load up they sat with all their bags. The kids going the farthest sat all the way in the back, the kids getting dropped off first sat in the front.

The trip home. Everyone is chowin' down on lunch and singing along to the CD the driver put in for us to listen to.