Back to School...

Another interesting turn of events occurred the day before school began on the 8^th. Brad and I were asked to teach at the Global Revival Mission School (primary school from Kdg. to 7^th grade). Brad would continue teaching Math and Science the 6^th and 7^th graders and I would teach English to some of the grades. Though quite exciting, this stirred a strong nervousness in me for many reasons. First of all, I am not trained as a teacher (I don’t think playing childhood “school” in my barn was quite enough), secondly, I don’t know how to teach English as a second language, thirdly, I don’t speak Siswati, and lastly, this is a big job!!! However, I went with it and Wednesday was our first day of school. After participating in a rousing assembly complete with group songs with hand motions, a sermon message, special choir numbers including “I Will Call Upon the Lord,” and a specific thank you to us for painting the desks, we began our first day of school. After speaking with the teachers, we determined what our schedule would be and Thursday we began working with the students.

The first class I taught was the first grade class and it was pretty much a disaster. The students could hardly understand me and they were a rowdy bunch. Their elderly teacher seemed very eager for me to teach for her and she left! I spent most of the class time trying to read the kids’ names on their workbooks and pass them out (too many letters and clicks!), trying to teach “in, beside, behind, under, and on,” and trying to play “Siphiwe Says” (Swazi version of Simon Says).

Today, it went a little better. I wasn’t supposed to teach today, I was just going to assist the teacher. However, when I arrived, the teacher was gone and the kids were chaotic! She had written some things on the board, so I just jumped in. We worked on action words, which was easy to convey and something I could act out. I was walking, winking, jumping, crying, sitting, holding, and eating all over the classroom! We had fun having the children come up in groups to act out the words as well. The difficulty came when we began the workbook page. As we were counting and identifying positions, I asked them to, “Write a 2 beside the two balls.” I received many blank stares and even the most accomplished English speaker in the class said he could not understand. I repeated myself several times, paused for many seconds, and wracked my brain. Finally I said, “Rrrrite a too by tha 2 boals.” “Oooohhhh,” they said and starting writing (this had a feeling quite similar to the story of We call her Leenda. J). Therefore, the rest of the hour consisted of Grace speaking in some sort of Swazi-British-American accent to communicate the instructions. Though, still not a wholly successful venture, hopefully, I can continue to assist the first grade teacher in English class.

I was supposed to teach my first lesson to the sixth graders today. I prepared diligently and was geared up to go; however, somehow, when it came time to teach, all the children were outside playing, eating, or getting ready to finish for the day. Since I have been genuinely confused by their class schedules already, I approached the teacher to figure out what was happening. He said that the day was over and they were skipping the last period. Apparently, on Fridays they start a ½ hour early to let out early. No one bothered to tell Brad or me until the day was finished. (That’s why I seemed to be late to every class today!) So, obviously, there is a lot I need to learn about Swazi schools, communication, and timing. What I can figure is that, 11:00 means 10:30 on Fridays, and 12:00 on special days or days with delays, and 11:30 or 11:35-ish on normal days. I will never understand. Anyway…after observing the teachers in the 5^th-7^th grades over the last two days, I am very excited about teaching those classes. They understand English much better and I feel like I have a grasp on the content. I’ll keep you updated on how my first lessons go next week and we’ll see what happens with the first graders!!

-Grace

Tutoring and Swazi culture lessons

Well, a lot has transpired since the last time I blogged. Sorry for the delay! I will try to fill you in on much that has happened in the last week or so. I have been meeting with two female high school students (ages 18 and 20) to work on English. Though I had little curriculum to use and little idea of how to proceed effectively, I tried to be creative. We had several conversations about Swazi and American culture including things such as weddings, daily life, and hair. I really enjoyed learning about them and their way of life in such a fun way…I hoped that just having conversation couldn’t hurt their English. We also read Swazi guidebooks (I have little appropriately leveled literature here!) and looked up words in the dictionary to learn new vocabulary.
One of my favorite interactions was when I was pronouncing “circle.” For some reason the girls could just not figure out what I meant. (I thought, “Oh, no, they don’t even know the word ‘circle’!” However, after several attempts and laughs, the girls said, “Oh, seer-clee!” (Apparently, the Swazis struggle with the silent ‘e’.) Anyway, we had another interesting conversation about hair. One day I wore my hair curly. This was new as I had had it straight the days before. The girls were very interested in how my hair was like that, so I talked about air-drying and blow dryers (at that point, I think I lost them) and white people’s hair. They both figured that because my hair was so long I had never cut it since I was a baby. Most of the women and girls here have shaven heads or very short hair. These interactions were all innocent, fun, and interesting and helped me learn a lot.
The girls also needed assistance in Algebra and, thanks to Brad, all three of us received some lessons in factorization and the quadratic formula. It definitely hearkened back to yester-year for me and, thankfully, Brad was able to explain it so that I understood at least that one concept so I could help the girls with it later.
Also on Tuesday, I had my first bout of stomach sickness. I don’t know exactly what did it, but I think I ate some bad fish!! I had made tuna salad and it was a day old and, apparently, it did not receive adequate refrigeration in the cooler. I vomited all afternoon. By the next day, though still somewhat squeamish and weak, I had recovered. I just may avoid the tuna salad for a little while!

-Grace

New Photos!

Check out our new photos in the slideshow on the left!

-Brad

My Routine

It's probably time to break my silence, as several have asked about my typical routine.

Monday- Surgery either in Siteki (where we are living), or Manzini (largest city in Swaziland, 45 minute drive from Siteki).

Tuesday- Clinic in Manzini

Wednesday- Clinic in Siteki

Thursday- Surgery in Siteki

Friday- Post-ops, short clinic, and administrative details in Siteki

Clinics can be quite busy and full of pathology. Efficiency is paramount. Patients line up on a bench, and at the end of the bench sits me and a slit lamp on wheels. Once the patient on the end of the bench is seen, he stands to leave and all the other patients slide down one slot on the nicely oiled bench (sort of like the reload of a revolver). The list of medicines has been pared down to only the necessities, and glaucoma is a surgical disease, as people cannot afford the many trips for follow-ups and medicine re-fills. The clinic sees about 75 patients on a typical day, but most of these are "doctor" cases, as the nurses have already pre-screened and treated the easy problems (red eye, corneal foreign body, chalazion, etc).

If surgery is indicated, the patient is admitted to the hospital for surgery the following day. Many patients cannot afford to go home and come back again, so the hospital is essentially used as lodging to ensure the patient gets the surgery they need. No patient is turned away for lack of resources, but all are asked to pay what they are able. A typical surgery day might include 2 cataract phacoemulsifications, 22 Non-phaco cataract surgeries, 2 trabeculectomies (glaucoma surgery), and 3 conjunctival cancer removals.

The clinic also has the capabilities for YAG and argon laser (to treat diabetic patients).

Overall, I feel the clinic provides excellent eye care. My mentor is fully capable, and a wonderful instructor. This experience has already greatly augmented my ophthalmic knowledge, and I will undoubtedly gain more confidence as my time here progresses.

-Eric

August 30th, 2010

(Please excuse our lack of posts over the last couple weeks; the internet feed throughout the whole country has been very tenuous. Welcome to a third world country! At any rate, these are the blogs that I have written over the last couple weeks that we are now able to upload)

Montezuma’s Revenge strikes with undue cruelty! Yes, I know this is not South America and I am not attempting to steal any gold, but I (Ben) was the first to succumb to sickness presumably from a water source. The bed and breakfast where we are staying has three springs that provides clean “earth filtered” water, which has been such a blessing. However, my first experiment with the city-provided water at the local school where we have been working went very badly! As you might imagine, my “constitution” has been pretty shaky for the last three days, which lead to some pretty bad dehydration. This whole experience coincided with our first trip to Bulembu, in the mountainous region of the North Country (where we will be going to serve for the last month of our time here). I felt very feeble on our way up the bumpy dirt roads that led to the mountain town and got a bit worse once at Bulembu due to the dehydration. (Brad, I believe will be writing about our time in Bulembu so check into his post for more info.) By the last day of our time there, I began feeling better and it was no hour too soon! After getting back from getting pizza, Brad, Eric, and I went down to the soccer field only to find a field that had good short grass, no wind, perfect temps… A wonderful Frisbee night! You might find it weird that I judge a night on how well a Frisbee flies, but this was one of the finest Frisbee nights (#2 on my best Frisbee nights list) I’ve ever had!

Feeling much better and looking forward to the Reed Dance and the coming week!

September 3rd, 2010

A Secret Garden to Create, Counseling to begin, students to tutor… It’s turning into a very busy month! Oh yeah… We bought a car too!

A few weeks ago, we heard about a secret garden that had been left many years ago to become the wild once more. Due to many things on our plate, extra travelling, and the “secret” nature of the garden we had yet to find it until three days ago. Brad and I had a bit of extra time so we decided to find this garden though we had only a vague direction to follow… on a 2500-acre farm; this is much easier said than done! Well after a bit of time and a lot of bushwhacking we finally stumbled upon an area that looked to be something of an overgrown garden scape. After twenty minutes of envisioning and “mental mapping” of the location, we decide to leave by a slightly different direction. After another couple minutes we stumbled upon a large rock with a small plaque on it. Long story short, we were in the totally wrong area and then had to start our envisioning once more.

Yesterday, Brad and I were sitting by the Pons’ pool when Jono Pons came out with Coca-Cola in hand and decided to have a bit of a chat. We excitedly discussed our findings and envisioning experience with Jono who excitedly replied that our discovery was most fortuitous. He has wanted to do something with that location for years, but just hasn’t had the time or the vision to make the old garden a reality again. Jono told us that he would give us a team of workers with all the tools one would need, his connection to the countries indigenous horticulturist (with whom he is friends) and his account to the local indigenous nursery if we would provide some oversight of the project and our ‘landscaper’s eye’. For someone who loves nature and creating in nature, how can you turn that offer down?! Needless to say, I’ll have something to occupy my time for a while.

On the counseling front, Grace and I found out that many of the government agencies have been without telephone and computer access for the same amount of time we have been without, about 1 ½ weeks; so our paperwork is still waiting to be finalized, but we have been assured that our skills and time will be needed. So we wait! I think God wanted to teach me some more patience, so that’s why He sent me to Swaziland!

To keep you up to date with Brad and Grace’s work with some of the students at the school; Grace has taken on two teenagers to tutor in English while Brad still has the class of 7^th graders (which ranges from ages 12 to 21… yeah, weird I know) that he will continue to teach math and science to into the school season.

At the last, we bought a Volkswagen Golf Wagon on Tuesday and should be receiving that on Tuesday the 7^th around 3pm. That will be really handy as we have been walking about 10km (6.6 miles) roundtrip each day to go to the school, internet, and grocery store and back to the B&B.

We hope you are all well as we have been feeling the pangs of not hearing your voices and seeing your faces for nearly 1 ½ months now, but we are healthy, happy, and full of purpose during these days.

Ben

Two Weeks In: Our First Road Trip

In three short days this past weekend we were both overwhelmed with the cutting-edge as well as intrigued by the age-old. Monday was a national holiday celebrating “Umhlanga” so we took the opportunity to set out on a road trip to visit Bulembu, Swaziland, our next volunteer location as well as get a glimpse (more than a glimpse, though, as you’ll see as you read on…) of traditional Swazi culture at the Umhlanga Reed Dance.

We packed up the Pajero (our SUV on loan from the Pons’s) early Saturday morning and set out on what would be a beautiful (and very bumpy) 3.5-hour drive through northern Swaziland on our way to Bulembu. For those of you who do not yet know, Bulembu was an asbestos mining town that shut down (for obvious reasons) in the 90’s and by 2001 had decreased in population from more than 10,000 residents to less than 50. A group of social entrepreneurs with a very big vision bought this ghost town to rejuvenate it to a self-sustaining entity that combines sustainable, innovative enterprises with orphan care for 2,000 of Swaziland’s most vulnerable children.

What should have been a 2-hour drive (according to Google Maps) quickly doubled when we turned off the paved road (no, this is not a Jeff Foxworthy joke) onto “roads” that heavily resembled logging paths. Safe to say, having an SUV made our trip to Bulembu not only more comfortable but also just plain possible! But the drive into the Bulembu valley was well worth it! It is completely surrounded by the tallest mountains in the country and sits in this bowl hidden from most of the outside world. Besides the fact that it sits on a huge asbestos mine, it is difficult to imagine a more idyllic location, let alone a more exciting vision.

After a tour around the town to get our bearings and to hear about the history and future plans, we dropped our luggage at our house and set out in search of cool sights and mountain air. We found an impressive set of waterfalls in what seemed to be a rainforest (not what you usually expect from southern Africa) as well as an incredible indigenous forest. We then started heading back to town only to get sidetracked by another interesting trail that took us to the very nearby border with South Africa. And, being us, we then commenced with making a funny movie about sneaking across the border to the freedom awaiting us in the developed world. It was tacky, but the source of a lot of laughs! From South Africa we got to see the sunset over some incredible mountains prior to heading back to town at 5:30 (remember, it is winter here now). We finished the night off with sitting around a fire in the fireplace laughing at our most recent photos and videos and just hanging out prior to going to bed at our normal 8:30 pm….

Sunday we were graced with another perfect morning for hiking followed by an interesting church service that more resembled what you would find in the West than what you would expect out of Africa. We got a chance to meet with some of the staff about the details of our impending involvement at Bulembu and then we quickly head out for another adventure that involved a last minute jaunt to another country for the sole purpose of buying pizza…. Looking back at it now, I don’t know how we convinced ourselves that this was a bright idea; we left 2 hours before the border gate was to close for a 45-minute drive each way through treacherous mountain roads to Barberton and we didn’t even have a clue where a pizza restaurant would be. Thankfully, we had the luckiest person we know with us (Eric) and we quickly happened on a great pizza restaurant that rushed our order so we could make it back in time. Nonetheless, I don’t think we could have cut it any more closely getting back to Swaziland before the border gates closed: All of the staff at both the Swaziland and SA border gates were amazed that we made it in time (which happened to be within 5 minutes of closing), but we made it and had enough time to find a really cool place for our long-awaited dinner (which happened to be on top of a “mountain” made out of asbestos slag—yet another decision that could have used more foresight).

We finished off a perfect day with barefoot Frisbee, idyllic mountain weather, and unmatched views. Safe to say, it was difficult to leave Monday morning. But leave we must; we droved down through the mountains to Mbabane, the capitol, and on to the Ezulwini valley to experience something that could only take place in Africa: 20,000 bare-chested maidens doing a Swazi cancan in celebration of the Queen Mother. As with everything here, the Reed Dance began on “African time”, which translates to “whenever it is convenient”. Two hours after it was supposed to start we were graced by the presence of the King and Queen Mother as well as the U.S.’s best pal, Robert Mugabe (the president of Zimbabwe), and the leaders of many African countries that happened to be in Swaziland for a trade convention, and we were ready to start! Over the next 1.5 hours, enough almost naked women poured into the stadium to fill the entire field even though they seemed to be packed in like sardines. I can safely say that I will never again have such an innocent mental picture of somersaults….

Well, there was our weekend in a not-so-small nutshell. We are continuing to have a great time with great people here in Swaziland. Be checking for new photos up soon as well as some videos. Thanks again for following along with us as we live and learn in Africa.

- Brad