A Year in Retrospect: Beginnings

One year. A landmark time frame. The scale often used to muse over the happenings and experiences of the past.

I now stand one year into my service in Lesotho, and it truly makes me reflect deeply on my time here so far. I can say with certainty that this year was the most adventurous one of my life, overflowing with new experiences. It wasn’t without challenges, of course. I still remember clearly when I first arrived in my village, ripe as a green tomato, stumbling about the strange land. It makes me chuckle when I think about the immense contrast between my comfort level then and now. The strangers’ foreign faces and the incomprehensible sounds coming out of their mouths gradually transformed into friendly, familiar faces speaking words that no longer went over my head.

As I wipe the spider webs and dust off of this blog, I’d like to finally talk about some of the things that I’ve been experiencing throughout the year. Let’s start where we left off -- in the warm, rainy summer of January.

Being greeted by sunflowers on the way to town

Jan. 26, 2015: The Beginning of School

My village from above the adjacent mountain

Fast facts:

Number of students: ~450

Number of teachers: 20

Religious Affiliation: Lesotho Evangelical Church

Secondary school (grades 8-10) established in 1992, and high school (grades 11-12) established in 2007

Annual school fees per student: M1350 (~$90)

Corporal punishment used? Yes

Subjects taught: Math, English, Science, Sesotho, Bible, Accounting, Economics, Agriculture, and Developmental Studies (Social Studies)

Teachers and the school board celebrating last year's results

“Sir! When are we getting a female teacher?” an older boy hollered during break time. A teacher promptly waved a stick at him, and he instantly vanished back into the classroom. Being the third, male, and last volunteer at the school, I laughed internally at the student’s dismay. It was the first day of school. There were a myriad of questions floating above my head. Will I be able to teach these students successfully? What can I do to improve this school? How can I control these students without corporal punishment? Will I be able to fill in the shoes of the previous volunteers?

Surely enough, I encountered challenges on the first day. For my younger Form A (grade 8) students, I tried using a math icebreaker as an introductory activity. I told them to rearrange themselves and sit from youngest to oldest. To do this, the students had to communicate with each other their birthdays and correctly order themselves. The problem I hadn’t considered was that the age range of rural Lesotho classes is expansive due to students starting school late or repeating grades; this class in particular had students between the ages of 13 and 19. The older students, unwilling and ashamed to share their age, sat glued to their desks. The intimidated, younger students were hesitant to go on with the activity truthfully and seemed to sit in a random order. Finding that my encouragement had little effect, I gave in and told the students to return to their seats. They immediately responded by sitting in the exact same seats they were in before the activity, as if to rub in how unsuccessful the activity was.

Me sitting at my desk in informal attire (it was a holiday!)

I realized very early how important it is to keep an open mind and accept mistakes head-on in order to learn from them, especially since I was teaching for the first time in a classroom setting. It’s easy to overlook factors that can make or break an activity. In this case, I found that I need to be sensitive to things that students may find uncomfortable such as their age. This was just one of several lessons I learned from plans and ideas that didn’t fall through, each one molding me slightly into a better teacher. Even now, I still feel that I have an ocean to cross before being able to be satisfied with my teaching. Only through more raw experience can this be achieved.

Having been a student myself for so long, I really gained a different perspective by being on the teaching end of a classroom. It’s essential to try to put yourself in the shoes of the students to ask questions such as: Would I understand this if I were learning English as a second language? Would this lesson bore me to no end? I often look back at the teachers I had during my own stint as a student and mimic and avoid certain attributes that I found in great teachers and dreaded teachers, respectively.

Posing boys

Regarding the school rules, all students must wear maroon uniforms. In addition, students must have their heads shaved clean, including girls. Virtually all the men in Lesotho normally shave their hair anyway, so it’s nothing new for the boys. But why do the girls have to shave their heads? This is to prevent more well-off girls from showing off extravagant hair and consequently making the poverty-stricken girls feel inferior.

Girls, or "banana" in Sesotho

Here’s what a day in the life of school looks like:

7:00 AM: Morning study -- Students arrive at school to study. Those that are excessively late are punished (usually a lash to the hand). Some students who live at distant villages walk for up to two hours just to get to school.

7:45 AM: Morning assembly -- Every morning before classes, the school comes together for an assembly for the national anthem, the Lord’s Prayer, a hymn, and announcements.

The daily morning assembly

8:15 AM: Classes begin -- Each period is 40 minutes, and there are single and double periods (80 minutes) for each subject.

10:55 AM: Break time -- Students have 20 minutes to get some fresh air or buy some snacks at one of the nearby shops.

Students receiving tuition scholarships through the Tuition Assistance Program

1:10 PM: Lunchtime -- The students and teachers are provided a Basotho lunch.

2:00 PM: Afternoon assembly -- Another, albeit shorter, assembly is carried out where only the national anthem is sung, and further announcements are made.

2:10 PM: Classes resume -- These afternoon classes are often the most difficult to teach because students are mentally drained and undergoing food coma from lunch. Toss in the heat of a hot summer day and you have an easy recipe for sleazy, sleepy students.

3:40 PM: Afternoon study – Students are given one hour to study and complete assignments. Contrary to most developed countries, “homework” is not a prevalent practice here and it’s understandable. Once students get home in the rural villages, they have to do household chores or take care of animals. There’s also the problem of textbooks not being available for every student. Consequently, math scores are consistently the lowest out of all subjects. Regular practice is essential for developing and retaining mathematical ability, and thus the lack of practice has a chokehold on math results. Students at least get some practice in the form of assignments, but these are usually short due to the limited amount of study time (which is used to study all subjects, not just math).

4:40 PM: School out! And on that note, blog out!

One of my New Year’s Resolutions is to breathe life back into this blog and to record my thoughts and experiences more often. The problem for me is that I write at a snail’s pace, so many blog attempts have ended in half-finished jumbles of disorganized thoughts. I’ll tell myself: Just write, write, and write. The speed will come naturally.

Here’s to another adventurous, fulfilling year. Happy New Year!

Up Next: Cultural Day!

The chief showing her approval during a cultural performance

Illness, a Gecko, Lemonade, and School

Corn fields. Corn fields everywhere. It’s the time of the year in Lesotho where the crops stretch high into the air and Basotho are hard at work keeping the fields free of weeds.

Endless corn fields. A-maize-ing. Sorry, was that too corny?

Come to think of it, I never shared my Sesotho name. My name is Rethabile Tumo (pronounced reh-tah-bee-leh too-mo). Almost all Sesotho names have a generally positive meaning such as happiness, pride, or gift. Rethabile means “we are happy,” and Tumo is simply the name of the village I am residing in. 

Let’s jump right in. This post will have various topics regarding some events of the past month.

Illness

After going through training without encountering any illness or digestive problems, I was pretty confident that my body was well-adjusted to the new environment. Little did I know what lied ahead once I came to my site.  After the holidays, I was served the whole menu from Lesotho’s Digestive Demolition. Vomiting, diarrhea, headache, fever, a side dish of incredible amounts of gas, and also the fine musical accompaniment from my groaning stomach. Five stars, assuredly. It lasted for about three days, and those three days were truly the most miserable so far in this country. I talked with the Medical Officer, who guided me on what to do and what medicine to consume from our handy Medical Kit. 

We became friends really fast

The culprit for the illness still remains a mystery since a copious amount of food was consumed as a result of the holiday celebrations. About a week later, I became sick yet again, but nowhere close to as eventful as the first. Partly because of these battles, I ended up losing some weight as I now have to tighten my belt buckle a notch. Now, I’m much more conscious about the food I eat, and have been eating more to get my pounds back. As a Mosotho man once told me regarding diarrhea, “Your insides have been cleansed.”

Gecko

One day, I was about to wash the dishes and was greeted by a small, orange gecko. This two-inch-long critter was relaxing in one of my dish basins and slowly turned its head towards me. Being the paranoid person I am when it comes to creatures, I initially jolted back before realizing the thing was harmless. I grabbed the dish basin and gently set the visitor down in a patch of grass outside away from the house. The following day, I was about to wash myself and was sorting through my toiletries on my makeshift shelf, which was a chair at the moment. I picked up my bar of soap and in its place stood the orange gecko once again. After my instinctual body jerk, I carefully looked at the gecko and determined it was the exact same once from yesterday. I was actually impressed that this little guy managed to get back into my house, and even climb a chair to give me a surprise.

The persistent little rascal

I thought about what to do with the gecko this time. Then I realized, “Hmm, maybe I should just keep it.” During training, I concluded that I wouldn’t adopt a cat or a dog because of the responsibility and potential hygiene problems involved. But a gecko seemed rather low maintenance, and I’d be able to have a tiny companion to grow with in Lesotho. Thus, a gecko, who I have named Sticky, is now taking shelter in a glass jar in my home, and is fed unfortunate flies and insects that enter my home.

Host Family

Though I have a host family who lives next door, my lifestyle is largely independent. The family consists of a mother, grandmother, and two little boys. The mother is a pastor and leaves occasionally to partake in church-related activities. My two host brothers are adopted and, I am assuming, orphaned. Sadly, there are several orphans in this country with one of the major reasons being the alarming incidence of HIV/AIDS throughout the population. The older brother named Thabelo (pronounced Tah-bell-oh; writing this reminded me of Taco Bell and now I am seriously craving it..) is six years old and it seems he has taken a liking into me. He often comes over to my house and keenly observes whatever I’m doing. Lately, he’s taken an interest into peeling carrots and helping me cook. Whenever he helps, he gets a little compensation in food from me. The younger brother, Naleli (pronounced Nah-leh-di), is probably around two years old. So I actually thought this little boy was a girl for about a week. However, I have recently concluded that there’s approximately a 50% chance that the child will be roaming about without pants on. So, one day I was greeted by the child’s void of pants and went, “Oh.” This brings us to another story.

Partners in Crime. Naleli on one of his "free" days.

About a week ago, I was working on something with my counterpart in my home. As we were busily discussing, Naleli casually strolled in with his usual curious, google-eyed expression and stood by the door. Of course, he was without pants. Our words were graciously interrupted by the sound of liquid splattering on the ground. I looked over at the source of the sound with growing panic and found a very relieved, almost satisfied, expression from the pants-less Naleli. My counterpart and I cringed in unison and rushed to the scene to redirect the still-continuing stream outside. Following this event, I established that any baby children without pants on are banned from entering my home. 

The entirety of Naleli’s day consists of constantly (and I mean constantly) calling for his mother, who is usually weeding the gardens nearby our houses. The funny thing is, he basically only knows one word, ‘M’e (prounounced mm-meh), which means Mrs./Mother. His chants for his mother are often followed by repeated, nonsense “thi-tha-the” sounds. A few days ago, as I was leaving to use the toilet, I think I heard the little child say “ntate” (pronounced n-ta-teh) to me, which means mister. I was pleasantly surprised that he had learned a new word! He’s also been directing more of his gibberish sounds toward me lately..

School Begins

School officially began last Monday and things have become significantly busier. I didn’t actually begin teaching until Wednesday though because students still continue to register into this week and trickle into the classrooms. I am teaching four different math classes to Forms A, B, and D (coincide with grades 8, 9, and 11), but the number of periods I teach is equivalent to that of three classes since I am sharing two of the classes with another teacher. Because of the historical British influence in Lesotho, the teachers are called “Sir” or “Madam.” Speaking English in the classrooms is mandatory throughout the country (which surely helps me). The students seem to get a kick out of my American accent; Basotho say the letter “r” differently – actually they don’t say it at all if the word doesn’t start with it. For example, they pronounce “birds” as “bids” and “car” as “cah.” 

Three days ago, the scores of the LGCSE national exams for the Form E students last year (graduating class) were released. This exam is similar to the SAT, but is heavily weighted for college admissions. Basically, if you do well on this single exam, you’re going to college. My school ended up ranking 20^th in the country out of over 200 schools, which is an impressive feat. The news was so moving that school was cancelled halfway throughout the day and the rest of the day was spent celebrating.

A thought occurred to me as I took in this news: “Maybe I should be teaching at one of the academically struggling schools. Does this upper-ranked school really need me?” But the reality is, this school can still improve in so many ways. There’s no laboratory for the science classes (yet there are still A’s for science); the library still needs a lot of work; there is a lack of classrooms; and math scores are the lowest out of all the subjects. Why not change my vision to a more ambitious one and help the school become an even better school so that it can build leaders for the country? I’m the third and last Peace Corps volunteer at my school (three is the limit), and I know the previous two volunteers contributed to the continuous progress of this school over the past four years. Being the last volunteer, I need to make my service count and help propel the school to greater heights.  

Livin' the Basotho Lifestyle

The Christmas season sure has a different atmosphere when you’re wearing shorts and a t-shirt. And “White Christmas” doesn’t have quite the same ring it with sweat dripping down your face. Anyway, I’m sure many of you are curious exactly what rural life in Lesotho is like, so let’s talk about a few of the aspects that make up the Basotho (people of Lesotho) lifestyle.

Diet

The typical diet among the Basotho is quite simple. For breakfast, Basotho often eat bread or a porridge called lesheleshele (always fun to pronounce). An extremely common meal that can be eaten for lunch and dinner consists of papa (cornmeal) and moroho (microscopically chopped leafy greens). Papa can be white or yellow depending on the corn used, and looks somewhat similar to hardened mashed potatoes, but it lacks much taste. This is because it is meant to be eaten with other things like moroho, which is usually heavily salted and seasoned to complement the papa. Basotho eat this meal with their hands, using the papa as a spoon to scoop up other food on the plate. I have yet to become capable with this method of eating, and all of my previous attempts have resulted in laughter from my host family.

Lesheleshele (and Corn Flakes)

Papa (yellow), moroho (green), and veggie/egg mix

In rural areas, meat, especially beef, is consumed infrequently and usually eaten for special occasions due to lack of refrigeration. However, chicken is the one of the more common meats available. And fresh chicken, boy, is it delicious! My host grandparents who lived next door gave me a live chicken as a gift. My host mother did the honor of slaughtering the chicken (details I will exclude), and I helped feather the chicken after it was placed in boiling water to loosen the feathers. After my host mother did her magic with cooking the gift, we gorged on literally every part of the chicken that was edible. I passed on the head and feet, but I definitely ate many parts of the chicken I had never encountered before, namely some organs. Watching my little host brother gnawing vigorously on a chicken foot protruding from his mouth was quite amusing. Needless to say, no meat was left behind that day.

In the nearby camp towns, however, I can purchase a large variety of foods like rice, canned foods, and an array of fruits and vegetables. Refrigerated food like cheese and meat are also available if I’m feeling spoiled.

Laundry

Laundry. Oh, laundry. This chore truly makes you appreciate the invention of the washing machine. So here, the whole process of laundering clothes is performed by hand. It’s very straightforward but it uses up a lot of water, time, and energy. After filling three basins with water, the first basin is filled with powdered detergent. This is where most of the exhausting work is done as you scrub every part of the clothing article against itself and become satisfied with the amount of dirt you just extracted (it can get very dusty here). When finished with this step, you wring out the soapy water out from the cloth and toss it into the second basin which is full of clean water. Basically, now you try to remove as much soap from fabric as you can by soaking it in the water then squeezing it out repeatedly. The third basin serves the same purpose and you wring out the last remains of soap (some Basotho exclude this step). Now it’s time to dry!

Having a blast

Drying is performed the old fashioned way with a clothesline and clips. The sun is your best friend. Having clothes still wet by evening means you’ll have to take the clothes down and put them back up the next day. As weird as it sounds, on sunny days I might find myself thinking, “Great day for laundry,” before remembering how much I dislike it. You also have to keep a sharp eye on the weather. Obviously, rain is counterproductive to what you want so that warrants an exodus of damp clothes from the line. Excessive wind and dust are also your enemies. I often forgot that I had clothes still on the line whenever such conditions presented themselves. Luckily, my host mother during training was always aware. Her Basotho sense would be tingling whenever an ominous cloud approached, so my clothes haven’t suffered any abandonment. As I am writing about this, my laundry bag continues to grow in size…

Fruits of labor

Trash to ash (we burn our trash)

Outlet towers we built whenever the electricity generator was available

End of Training

So after a roller coaster training period of 10 weeks, we finally shed our label of “Trainee” and were officially sworn in as Peace Corps Volunteers last week. The ceremony was held in our training village, so many delighted, familiar faces were present. The U.S. Ambassador for Lesotho, who also served in the Peace Corps, swore us in, and the Basotho danced and sang for us. Apparently, we our swearing-in ceremony was televised on national television, which really shows the appreciation this country has its long ties with Peace Corps, whose roots have been established in Lesotho since 1967. We said our goodbyes with our training host families and exchanged hugs before departing the following morning. For me, parting with my host family was difficult because of the close relationship we had built over the past few months, but I’m comforted by the fact that we will be able to visit each other.

We made it!

Now, I’m in my site that I will remain in for the rest of my service. Moving in was a bit of an adventure; I swear I’ve never killed so many spiders in my life, which I think helped relieve my fear of them just slightly. I’m still in the process of being able to feel “at home” and am trying to personalize the place. Because school is on break and I live by the school, things have been very quiet. It appears it will remain peaceful until school resumes near the end of January and I begin my teaching escapades. For now, I’ll patiently work on integrating into my new village, the place where I will eventually call home.

My new school in hibernation mode

Tracing My Footsteps

Here I am, after surviving the blazing Arizona summer to cross the equator and enjoy a second serving of summer.

After wanting to start a blog for a while now, I’ve finally rooted in my first post a month and a half after arriving in Lesotho. There are so many observations and miscellaneous things that I want to talk about, but I’ll try to keep it concise in order to avoid exhausting the reader. Because of the belated start of this blog, some details may be missing, but I have the opportunity to look back at my experience so far holistically. From my initial interest in joining the Peace Corps in February, to Googling the country of Lesotho to find out where the heck it is after being nominated to it, and to the excitement of being invited to serve in Lesotho, the process of me setting foot in Africa took a span of about 7 and a half months. However, this was done under the old, slower application process, so you can shave off a few months now.

Arrival after 20+ hour travel time

Welcoming celebration from the training village women

Support from friends and family have been extremely encouraging prior to my departure, and helped me to solidify my decision. I have also been able to learn more about people close to me and even strangers based on their input regarding my decision, especially with respect to outlooks on life and long term goals. So even before leaving, new avenues of conversation and knowledge became visible.

To briefly explain my current situation, Peace Corps volunteers go through two and a half months of training in order to learn as much as we can about the language (Sesotho), culture, safety, how to survive here, and, importantly, how to teach in this foreign education system. All the new volunteers are huddled in a training village lacking electricity and running water in order to condition us to the rural life many of us will have at our sites after training. After completing training, we are dispersed to our sites throughout the country for the next two years.

The house I'm being hosted in during training

Toilet/latrine which is a seat over a large hole

So we each live with a host family, who have been teaching us the ways of the Basotho (people of Lesotho) lifestyle, including how to bucket bathe, how to cook Basotho food, and how to speak Sesotho. Needless to say, I adore my host family. They are probably the youngest host family in the village, so we can definitely relate more. In fact, I’m older than my host mother by one month (I found out a solid month after meeting her, to which my jaw dropped). I have a 3-year-old host brother who has really gotten comfortable in my presence. Initially, he would be found staring at me with his round eyes, unresponsive to any verbal communication, but now, he’s a jubilant ball of energy who enjoys playing with me. My host father is very laid-back and easy to talk to, and he enjoys teaching me things such as Sesotho, gardening, and taking care of animals. An important detail is that my host parents speak English very well, so we can converse with only a few speed bumps due to the language barrier.

Host family!

The transition to living without first world amenities was surprisingly smooth. The most difficult aspect to get used to was the lack of running water, where, instead, villagers have to fetch water from water taps (usually with the assistance of donkeys and cows) and scoop water out of buckets to use. Though this makes tasks more time consuming, I can really tell I’m using just a tiny fraction of water compared to what I used in the States. Electricity, on the other hand, is much easier to work around. You can simply use minimal electronics, or use alternative methods of charging like solar power. Phone and 3G data work country-wide and each camp towns has at least one internet café, so you can’t completely escape the reach of the Cloud. For lighting, Basotho use kerosene lanterns and candles, but once darkness falls, the country falls asleep at around 8 PM.

I’m constantly reminded I’m in Lesotho every morning at around 5 AM when the roosters chant their cock-a-doodle-doos. After stepping outside the house, you can find donkeys, horses, and cows (herded by shepherds) roaming about. Each house usually owns a dog simply to act as security, and cats are used to catch rats. Essentially, each animal serves a practical function and the idea of owning pets in Lesotho is largely foreign. Consequently and understandably, animals aren’t looked at through the lenses of affection and companionship.

The room I’m staying in looks like this:

One side of my room

The other side

As you can see, everything is done in the room except toilet business, in which we do own a pee bucket for late night urges (also for pooping for extreme emergencies). The kitchen consists of two stoves that are gas powered, and bucket baths are just done in the middle of the room. I use water from the green buckets by the kitchen for bathing and cooking, and we use rain water collected in the green tank at the front of the house for washing clothes and dishes. So using water conservatively is incentivized by our limited amount of water as well as the effort needed to fetch water at the tap.

We’re a little more than halfway through the onslaught of information from training, and just last week, we all visited our respective sites we will be living in next month! I have been placed in the Leribe district, and I’ll be teaching mathematics at Fobane High School. My area is considered to be in the lowlands, so winters will (hopefully) be bearable for my desert-conditioned skin. My anxiety was relieved after visiting my future site, and I’m very satisfied with the placement. Though visiting for only four days might be too short for assessing my site, the people in the village were the defining quality of the visit.

My future home with door replaced

Looking back now, I think about one of my reasons for coming here in the first place: to learn more about myself through completely new experiences. Already I have experienced so many things, and I have high hopes for the sights and emotions that I’ll experience in the days and months to come. There are so many details that I haven't mentioned, but I figured I should at least get a blog started and provide a little insight into my life in Lesotho. 

Visitors are common, including the uninvited