On the homestead

Last night I asked my Gogo (host grandmother) to tell me a traditional Swazi story that she grew up hearing.  The tale that went like this:

King Shaka of Zululand wanted to invade Swaziland.  He took his great armies to the edge of a river, where they rested for the night.  At that time, all of the cows in Swaziland were white, white.  They went and went and went to the edge of the river.  Instead of crossing to attack the Zulus, the cows stood at the edge of the river and cried.  Then, the cows turned around and went and went and went right back to the King of Swaziland.  Seeing this, the Zulus became terrified that the Swazis possessed magic.  They ran away in fear.

Gogo laughed, and this was the end of the story.  I am incredibly blessed to have such a caring and welcoming host family for the two months of training.  A little bit about the homestead:

We live in a village in the mountains and it is the dry season, so the shoes my Gogo insists I polish before leaving for school each day are dirty before my 15 minute walk down the mountain to the main village road.  Whoever put on the packing list that we needed to bring our winter coats and wool socks clearly was from Florida and had never felt a cool breeze before.  The mountains are beautiful, and there are sacred waterfalls and the royal tombs nearby.   

My homestead is a flat area carved out of the mountain.  Yards in Swaziland are dirt (see snake run), and the Gogos are constantly sweeping, sweeping, sweeping them clean.  Right in front of our homestead and a slight drop down is my family’s maize field, spanning about the length of the homestead.  The latrine, sugarcane field, and two ancient avocado trees are to my left when I stand at the door of my hut, looking out onto the valley and more mountains in the distance.  Behind my hut are two houses for sleeping, a round hovel in disuse, and the kitchen hut. 

My host family consists of an ever-rotating cast of characters.  Gogo is the matriarch, and she thoroughly enjoys the presence of her many grandchildren.  Of her eight children, only four are living.  I’ve met all of them, and one daughter sometimes also stays on the homestead with her children.  It is normal and acceptable in Swaziland to send children to live with relatives.  The mothers of Gogo’s grandchildren work long hours in the city, and prefer that their children be cared for by their loving Gogo.  Gogo speaks to me only in SiSwati, and she reminds me very much of my own grandmother.   

I have an older host bhuti (brother) who I’ve rarely seen, but he smiles and nods when he sees me.  His girlfriend and baby were staying with us, but were recently called back to her family’s homestead in another village.  The baby was quite the popular attraction on the homestead, but she couldn’t seem to warm up to me until the day she left.  I won her mother over several days before with sweets and my valiant/hilarious attempts at Swazi housework. 

My near constant companion and champion is my thirteen year old host bhuti.  He speaks amazing English and was probably assigned the task of helping me out.  What a kid!  He is quick to smile, quick to help, and eager to learn.  He is extremely proud of being a boy scout, and his laugh puts all who meet him at ease.  Despite weeks of ongoing teacher strikes, he still carefully puts on his school uniform each morning and makes the 45 minute walk to school just in case the strike is called off.  He respects his elders and has an emotional intelligence that is almost uncanny for any age.  (Am I singing his praises enough?)  Seriously though, I’ve never met another kid like him.  My heart wants this kid to have a happy life and to grow into a wonderful young man so badly. 

The younger children on the homestead don’t always spend the night here, but are sweet and silly like most kids everywhere.  They take great pleasure in quizzing me on my SiSwati, and they get so excited that they shout out the answers before I have time to respond. 

The one time a man ever came up to the homestead to bug me, bhuti and I were having fun pulling avocados down.  The man was clearly talking about me in SiSwati, and bhuti just gave him the most scornful, disgusted glare I have ever seen a child give an adult.  “She is older than you!”  He chastised.  My bhuti’s got my back.  Gogo then came out and gently guided the man away.  Another bhuti, this one a loping 18 year old, tells me to come and wake him if I need to use the latrine at night.  That way, he can escort me and keep dogs/other night dangers away.  They are protective of me, and I can already feel how hard it will be to leave them in a few short months.  Gogo asks me if I will come back and visit, and I promise that I will. 

They have named me Ntombenhle (in-tom-bent-hhlay), meaning “beautiful girl” in SiSwati.  They introduce me as Ntombenhle with their surname, although they haven’t forgotten my given name, either.       

I am one of the few trainees placed in a host family without electricity, but the absence of electricity doesn’t seem to matter anyway.  In fact, it’s done wonders for my sleep schedule.  I am more rested than I have been in years, as I’m usually asleep by 8 or 9 pm.  The deafening chorus of cows, chickens, and dogs wakes me around 4 each morning, and I doze until 5 or 6.  (Yes, Mom and Dad, I get up before 6 each day and I don’t even feel like a zombie!)  Bucket bathing is proving more of an adjustment than electricity.  In the US, I was a 5 minute shower girl- get in, get clean, get out.  Now, boiling water, waiting for it to cool down enough, washing hair, etc., takes me a solid chunk of time. 

Evenings are spent sitting inside the smoky kitchen, chatting and listening to the news/music on the radio.  It feels a bit surreal listening to a mix of Dolly Parton (on the South African country station), inspirational, and rap.  Gogo sings and sways to the beat of all music.  It’s a time of laughter and eating and family.  When the fire and candle burns out, it’s bedtime. 

Gogo has gotten used to giving me smaller portion sizes than what she would like to feed me.  In our traditional homestead, portion sizes are given according to family rank, and oh lord it felt rude handing back plates that were still half full those first few days!  Gogo has gotten used to my bizarre American stomach though, and she now doles out (slightly) smaller portions with only about 5 minutes of muttering when I hand off my half-finished plate to my grateful bhutis. 

While I’m enjoying Swazi food, my stomach has been having some problems with it.  I had the lucky distinction of being the first trainee to need Oral Rehydration Solution (multiple times).  Puking until 2 am in your hut is not fun.  Granted, I should have been more careful on the several occasions I’ve been sick.  (What part of the chicken am I eating, again?) 

My Gogo serves very well-balanced, nutritious meals.  There is usually some kind of vitamin-rich vegetable, as well as a bean or a meat with rice or Lipalishi (a fluffy white, tasteless carbohydrate derived from maize).  Tonight for dinner, we just had sweet potatoes.  I was given 4, and I promised to take the remaining (bigger) 3 for my lunch tomorrow.  Meat is culturally significant, and its prevalence is greater in wealthier families. 

Last Sunday, I made breakfast for all 8 members of my host family, making the best French toast I’d ever made!  I also gave everyone scrambled eggs, half an orange, some banana, and tomato slices.  While I won over Sisi, Gogo was skeptical that this qualified as a meal, and she promptly made incwacwa in addition to my breakfast.  Incwacwa (the cwacwa is clicked!), is a fermented Swazi breakfast staple which has the texture and roughly the taste of malt-o-meal, but a bit more sour.  You add brown sugar, and it’s quite nummy.  My dinner that night was more successful, and I made a vegetable curry with rice.  I added a can of beans for the side, as I wanted to offer a solid protein as well.

I have had some moments of doubt insofar as my ability to bring something to the table as a development worker.  Every night the radio blasts correct public service announcements about HIV transmission and news about different development projects.  When I became ill, my bhuti immediately asked if I was “taking the ORS”.  When I tell my host family I am training to work on HIV prevention, my teenage bhutis can list off all the ways HIV is transmitted.  The family garden is diverse, and bhuti knows that the soil is too basic for the peppers they are trying to grow.  There are billboards covering every major road boasting development projects and HIV prevention billboards, too.  The information is there.  Is there message fatigue?  I somehow doubt this, but I’ve hardly been here long enough to accurately judge that…So why am I here?  I had long ago accepted the Peace Corps’ definition of development- I just must have thought on some subconscious level that I would truly be imparting some medical wisdom unbeknownst to my community.  But local knowledge and local resources are here already.  It’s just a matter of working within the community framework and creating linkages, following a Peace Corps-esque approach to development.   Here’s to hoping I succeed! 

PS- A bat totally flew out of my hut earlier today and it didn’t even phase me.  I do battle with a mouse every night.  It makes some noise, I throw a shoe at it, it runs away....The battle continues.  Phase one of Hard Corps has commenced!                                 

First Impressions, First Days

June 27^th: 2 AM

All 41 of us are loaded onto buses outside of our hotel in Philadelphia.  We arrive at JFK about 5 hours before we can even check in at the gates.  I am too tired to interact with the other volunteers.  Thus begins the grueling two day journey to Swaziland.

June 28^th: 9 AM

We touch down in Jo-burg after a 16 hour flight.  We are met promptly at the gates by current volunteers and Peace Corps staff and exchange some money into Rand, which is accepted in Swaziland.  We hop on a bus and leave for Swaziland.  We stop at a South African McDonald’s type franchise called Steers along the way.  What a hilarious culture shock that is!  I’m not surprised at the difference, but rather at the similarities the restaurant shared with fast food chains in the U.S.  The region is a mining one, but if you squint, it does not look much different from the flatlands of Illinois.  Back on the bus. Zzzzz…

June 28th-Present

Next thing I know, there are mountains and we are crossing the border and getting our passports stamped.  All of the unease I felt in South Africa dissipates as I see a chicken cross the road.  Why did it cross the road?  (Haha).  I also get a thrill out of the bus yielding for cattle.  The mountains are beautiful.  The earth is red.  The birds make me want to pick up binoculars and a field guide, despite the fact that I’ve never cared about birds before.  (Swaziland’s supposed to be one of the best countries for bird watching in Africa, too!)  First impressions, you know…

But another thing strikes me.  The infrastructure is fantastic.  The highway is smooth, clean, and better lit than most highways I’ve driven on in the US.  The toilet facilities everywhere are neat and toilet paper is not scarce.  I tried to leave with no expectations of Swaziland, but it turns out I had some after all.  I expected to be overwhelmed by poverty and a lack of infrastructural development.  Everything glints of newness in this region.  Converters and every amenity you could want can be found at reasonable prices.   

I am told by current volunteers that this is not representative of the whole country, as this is the tourist region (between Mbabane and Manzini).  It is also the industrial heartland.  The highway system apparently also benefits from the nearness of South Africa and belonging to the South African Customs Union.  There are volunteers who live down dusty roads, use latrines, don’t have electricity, and need to travel overnight to get here.  I think it’s important to record first impressions, however, and this is definitely one that struck me.

We are staying at a conference center with dorm-style rooms.  It’s even bigger than my dorm in college, and the water in the shower is hotter, too!  We are living in what volunteers and staff dub as “Soft Corps” at the moment.  We do have to boil, filter, and bleach our water, but we have been spoiled with delicious Swazi food up until this point.  Pap, or thick porridge, tastes a lot like an uncooked matzo ball.  I have yet to try the Incwacwa, which is sour porridge, as I didn’t know it was being served at one point.  (By the way, the c in Incwacwa is a click!)  Meat in sauces is served over rice, and is sometimes served with bones.  Providing guests with meat apparently has some sort of cultural significance.

Speaking of cultural significance…  We have had little interaction with Swazis so far, but those we have met have been intelligent, kind, and quite friendly.  My siSwati is pretty limited still, so when I blank on the response to the question “How are you?” (Unjani?), I simply give the nice group of Swazi men a thumbs-up.  They laugh.  I later find out that thumbs-up means that you are *ahem*…open for business.  Oh the perils of cross-cultural communication!

Every Swazi here addresses me as Sisi (sister).  Married and older men and women are all Babe (father) and mother (Mage).  It feels warm and welcoming when strangers call me Sisi.  My host family will apparently give me a Swazi name when I meet them.  I’m thrilled, but also hoping I don’t get the name “Another girl” –this is the translation of a common girl name, I’m told. 

So far, our classes have been about safety, health, and language.  Today, we have a two hour lecture on diarrhea.  Who knew?  We start technical training soon.  We move in with our host families on Monday, and they live in villages near our training center.  I feel like nervous, 16 year-old me about to meet my host family for the first time.  I’m sure it will work out fine, with some thumbs-up-style gaffes along the way.         

The internet is shoddy and rare at best, and we don’t get our cell phones for another several days.  PLEASE don’t worry about me if I don’t contact each of you personally- I can tell I’m in good hands and loving this beautiful place already. 

 

In less than 48 hours....Swaziland!

Here's my address for the first 3 months:

Peace Corps Volunteer MY NAME
Peace Corps Swaziland
Box 2797
Mbabane H100
Swaziland
AFRICA

Write to me snail mail style, facebook style, blog style, and always in your own personal style. 

Take care friends and family- I will try to keep you updated often. 

I realized that I may someday want a long Swaziland reading list in a central location, so I decided to start a list on here.  I will keep updating this list as I read more.  Most highly recommended books/articles are listed first.  Most of these relate to the politics of Swaziland.  (I had to write a lot of grad school papers this semester.)  There’s TONS more out there that I have yet to discover, so stay tuned for updates!  

O’Neil, Owen Rowe.  Adventures in Swaziland: The Story of a South African Boer. (Free on Kindle!)

AMAZING AMAZING AMAZING!  This is Heart of Darkness, but real life.  It’s the autobiography of a colonial Boer’s coming-of-age in Swaziland around the turn of the 20^th century.  I was cringing at the number of times O’Neil can write ‘savage’ on one page, as well as his sensationalist account of Bhunu’s short but cruel reign.  The matter-of-fact way O-Neil describes his treatment of slaves, his own murdering of blacks, and his utter disdain for the ‘lesser’ race is absolutely bone-chilling.  However, it is an important time piece, and a well-written book.  It provides a stark contrast to the academic, politically correct literature in the rest of this list.  His descriptions of Swazi customs around this time are fascinating, but should probably be taken with a grain of salt.   

Fleminger, David (2009).  Swaziland Southbound Travel Guide.

Most thorough and up-to-date guidebook for the more serious traveler.  It also includes a great deal of Swazi history as well as detailed histories of the places it recommends visiting.  The tidbits make it worth it.  For instance, a queen in the 1700s boiled her son’s right hand in porridge so that he would be forced out of the succession due to Swazi suspicions about left-handedness!  Information about border crossings, highways, transport, etc. is also good and up-to-date.  A must-read! 

Gillis, D. Hugh. (1999). The Kingdom of Swaziland: Studies in Political History. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Fantastically thorough political history of Swaziland, beginning with Swaziland’s consolidation in the early 1800s up to the 1980s.  People who are interested in politics will get the most out of this book.

Kuper, Hilda. (1986). The Swazi: South African Kingdom. New York, NY: CBS College   Publishing.

Written by an anthropologist who spent many years in Swaziland.  Generally good at history, cultural practices, and profiling modernization.  Most other prolific works cite her as a source, and she has many interesting tidbits that I have yet to read in other books.  This is updated from an earlier book based on research conducted in the 1930s.   

Liebenow, Debra.  In the Kingdom of Roses and Thorns.

Fiction, but could be true stories.  The stories of 5 Swazi women of different worlds and life experiences.  All of these stories are simply narrated, giving it an easy-read vibe.  Definitely a tear-jerker.  It also does an excellent job of highlighting some of the greatest tragedies of Swaziland in a non-judgmental way- AIDS, the violence and oppression of patriarchy, and neo-colonialism are all expertly weaved into the plots. 

Potholm, Christian. (1972). Swaziland: The Dynamics of Political Modernization. Berkley, CA: University of California Press.

Excellent modernization-theory book.  Potholm examines the question as to why Swaziland remained a monarchy, despite the generally opposite trend in other post-colonial African states.  He concludes that the strength of the monarchical political institutions, as well as their ability to adapt to a Western political culture were key, although there are other, less-important factors discussed in the book.  (Basically, the pre-colonial political institution of the highly-centralized monarchy just changed its name to become a political party). 

Marwick, Brian. (1966). The Swazi: An Ethnographic Account of the Natives of the Swaziland Protectorate.  London: Cambridge University Press.  

Similar to Kuper’s work.  Also cited as an important source for later works.  Haven’t actually read this one yet, so I’m not able to give an opinion. 

Booth, Alan. (1983). Swaziland: Tradition and Change in a Southern African Kingdom. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, Inc.

Good book, but a bit redundant of other, better reads.  Also a bit colonial.

Kuper, Hilda. (1978).  Sobhuza II: Ngwenyama and King of Swaziland, The story of an      hereditary ruler and his country.  New York, NY: Africana Publishing Company.

Another book by Kuper.  A highly detailed read, mostly discusses the political history in great detail, but also some interesting cultural ideas about interactions with colonists.

Lange, Matthew K. (2004). British Colonial Legacies and Political Development. World    Development, 32(6), 905-922.

Basically, whether a country was ruled by the British directly or indirectly determined a lot about their post-colonial political development.  A dual system like Swaziland’s is not discussed, but it really matches the indirectly ruled model closely. 

            

Miller, Norman. (1968). The Political Survival of Traditional Leadership. Journal of Modern African Studies, 6(2), 183-198.

Modernization literature piece, so it’s somewhat dated in its theory.  However, the discussion of the political role of traditional leadership is great for political science students.

           

Mkandawire, Thandika. (2010). On Tax Efforts and Colonial Heritage in Africa. Journal of Development Studies, 46(10), 1647-1669.

Basically, the post-colonial tax systems line up with the colonial tax systems.  Whites get a free ride, and poor blacks pay the brunt of it. 

Barker, Dudly. (1965). Swaziland. London:  Her Majesty’s Stationary Office. 

Extremely colonial and superficial, but worth getting a late-colonial British perspective.

Sihlongonyana, Mfaniseni. (2003). The Invisible Hand of the Royal Family in the Political Dynamics of Swaziland.  African and Asian Studies, 2(2), 155-181. 

Different explanations for the continuation of the Swazi monarchy are summarized. 

Sangmpan, S.N. (2007).  Politics Rules: The False Primacy of Institutions in Developing Countries.  Political Studies (55)1, 201-224.

 Not Swaziland specific, but this article offers an alternative perspective on the role of institutions in developing countries.

Movies:

Wah-Wah

Movie about a colonial British family failing apart around Swazi independence period

Without the King

Banned by his majesty Mswati III, this movie is fantastic at highlighting wealth inequality and political oppression in the Kingdom.  It is an extremely important film.

 Life, Above All

South African film which won a lot of awards, and it could be relevant to Swaziland.  A girl shows courage as she cares for her dying mother and prostitute friend.  She battles the stigma of her community with quiet grace.  It will leave you reaching for the tissues, but the ending is hopeful! 

After months of waiting, guessing, and spending far too much time on the Peace Corps Wiki, I finally received my Peace Corps placement. 

I leave for the KINGDOM OF SWAZILAND on June 26th as a community health HIV/AIDS educator. 

....So what does this mean? 

The job description (as with most community development jobs) is pretty vague.  If you're curious about the work/lifestyles of volunteers in Swaziland, I strongly recommend googling "Peace Corps blogs Swaziland."  Past and current volunteers have executed some pretty interesting projects, and I'm excited to follow in their rather large footsteps.  (Did I mention that Netflix founder Reed Hastings and Hardball's Chris Matthews both served in Peace Corps Swaziland?)   

I will have 9 weeks of pre-service training with other volunteers in Swaziland before I move to my permanent residence for the next two years.  Pre-service training is supposedly a crash course in language, culture, job training, and health/safety training....I sincerely hope they teach us the best ways to kill black mambas without getting bit.  Gulp. 

While there are a thousand things I'm looking forward to about my new home, there are also some things I look towards with a certain level of trepidation.  Most of all, I will miss my wonderful family.  They have always patiently put up with my international travel/years abroad, but we all recognize that two years in a country as different as Swaziland will be hard on everyone. 

There are a few tragic facts of life in Swaziland that I will confront in my job on a daily basis, HIV/AIDS being the primary one.  Swaziland has the highest HIV/AIDS rate in the entire world.  Conservative estimates put it at roughly 25% of the population.  Others put the rate at closer to 40%.  For 20-30 year olds, the rate is 40-50%.  The life expectancy (32) is the lowest in the world.  These facts are staggering, and painful even to think about.  The future of the entire country rests on its ability to battle the disease, and I'm intensely curious to see the response on the ground.  There's only so much you can learn scouring NGO reports and public health journals.

I am keeping my expectations low in terms of the work I'll be doing and the impact I'll have.  Perhaps I'll only impact the lives of a few individuals, perhaps I won't produce any change other than a ripple, or perhaps I'll be just another well-meaning Westerner in a country with thousands of well-meaning strangers. 

In the mean time...

I will do my best to learn as much culture, language (siSwati), and technical skills as possible.  For anyone who wants to learn about the political situation and wealth inequality in Swaziland, I recommend the superb documentary (on Netflix!) "Without the King."  While it is a stark indictment, I would recommend reflecting on wealth inequality and political rhetoric here in America.  Perhaps the 99% movement's greatest success was its ability to bring the discussion of wealth inequality to the forefront of our nation's consciousness.  In this way, the film's subliminal message rings eerily true in our own drastically different political and cultural context.        

I am still very much in the learning-process about Swaziland, although I find myself rattling off more and more complex details each day.  Now, it's just another waiting game until departure....