Yossarian in Africa

sorry, i think only the one pic worked!

Nov. 19 2006
Yesterday was a really interesting day. The training staff started the morning cooking several traditional dishes, as we watched and helped. The dishes varied from tasty (the “orange” with a hard shell, and a brown pudding like substance on the inside with really large seeds) to chewy (biltong a.k.a. jerky, onyx) to bland (a thicker-than-mashed-potato-looking substance) to disgusting (cow stomach). I also had caterpillars, cooked and uncooked, raw was better. They are chewing, which is not an asset given the good flavoring (spices) doesn’t last long. I found it amusing that one of the trainers referred to them as butterflies; others called them worms.
After lunch the women put on traditional outfits. They beat on drums and clapped in a circle. They would call out a specific region from the country, and whoever was from that region would do a dance specific to that region in the center. Each region had different outfits too. Even one older woman could move her feet really quick. The dancing was quite the crowd pleaser, and brought out the tourist in all the Americans.
We went to try and climb one of those mountains after lunch (see above). On top of one of the cliffs sits the towns water supply and on this day it was guarded by a troop of baboons. When they saw us, they started going crazy – yelling and jumping (I found out today they’ve been known to throw rocks at people). It was quite exciting since these are the first animals anyone had seen since out arrival. We wanted to climb up, at least a little bit, to get a better view, but some dogs at the bottom of the cliff kept us a good distance away (as a result, the pictures are somewhat blurry, although if you blow up the clearest of the three pictures, you can see four unmistakable baboons). Dogs in Namibia are used as guards, not pets. It is culturally acceptable to kick a dog as well, and I wouldn’t hesitate if some of these mean ones came running toward me. After the baboons, our group of eight or ten somewhat disbanded, and Lindsey and I trekked up another cliff (I’ll try to load the landscape panorama I made, but I don’t know how long it will take on the slow computers…).

The afternoon also brought a van tour of Okahandja. First I should explain a little Namibian history. They won their independence 16 years ago from South Africa, who practiced apartheid (racial segregation supported by the government). Blacks were not allowed to be educated and were forced to live in certain parts of town. Most of them still live in those spots today. Our van of 15 white people drove through these locations of several thousand blacks. Their “houses” were made of scrap metal and were no larger than a typical bathroom in an American home. People were everywhere. Most of the young children were excited to see us; they would wave and chase the van around. I’m still slightly confused as to why, but they appeared to be genuinely happy. Several adults were also friendly and would wave to us our shout to us, but I heard one woman who couldn’t have been four feet from me say, “What are you looking at?” It was a valuable learning experience for everyone in the van, but I can understand her viewpoint. I had seen places like this on TV, but it completely different to see, hear, and smell it first hand. Our living conditions and the part of town we had been restricted to previously were all very nice. Many afternoons, children (presumably) of the kitchen staff here come around, and we all enjoy playing with them. Lindsey saw one of them there, and that really hit hard. I was and am still filled with a lot of emotions (and guilt) that I don’t know how to put in words.
Our trainer finished the tour by driving through the nice houses. These neighbor hoods were predominantly, although not exclusively, white. He had some second hand knowledge of home prices, and doing a quick conversion in my head, I figured that houses were probably twice what they cost in Missouri. That fact is made even worse considering that most goods in Namibia are between 20-50% as much as in America. There is no middle class from what I know, but since independence, there are also concrete structures on the locations, although few in number. Namibia has the largest disparity between rich and poor in the world.
After a somber dinner, a rainbow brought my spirits back up. I’ve already mentioned how large the sky is. The rainbow was bright and complete in color and was a full half circle from end to end. After a few minutes a larger rainbow appeared above the first. The clouds were a nice counterpart. They were different shades of grey, but looked like smeared pastels. It was a surreal experience for sure. I shared with Raymond, one of the trainers, that many people believe that rainbows were a promise from God that He would not flood the earth again. He laughed and said that elders in his village said that rainbows were merely a sign of more rains to come (not bad logic considering it only rains during the rainy season, and it only pours when it rains).
Raymond is one of my favorite trainers. He has by far the best English-speaking ability of any of them, so I was shocked to hear that he asked Lindsey for resources for learning more English. He wants to attend the University in Windhoek to become a teacher. He told me today as he was leaving (the trainers stay at a different site) he was eager to get home to watch The Apprentice and that Donald Trump was really arrogant. Raymond is from the Kavongo region, and I have practiced my very weak Rukwangali skills on him.
Several of us ended the night with a bonfire on the beach (a.k.a. dried out river bed). It was really fun sitting, talking, and watching the bright and twinkley stars.
Today we slept late (for once!), relaxed, and of course played the obligatory game of ultimate frisbee after dinner. Lindsey was successful in receiving calls from the U.S., free for us but not you! The current plan is to go to the internet café on Tuesday. I hope to be able to post my pictures. Ewa, mbaa.



Nov. 17 2006
It’s the end of the week, and that always feels good – even if we do have training tomorrow morning. We’ll have Saturday afternoon and all Sunday free which is going to be great even if I don’t do anything more than just get out of the training compound, the training is thorough and effective, but monotonous.
I think some people are going to arrange a hike on Sunday. There is a small mountain range that looks to be fairly close (I’m sure this sentence will remind my Mom of the time she tried to walk to the mountain “real quick,” but never even got close. Yes, Mom, I already thought of that, it is closer than that). We are hoping to walk along the ridge and see some better scenery on the other side.
Today we learned we will be going to the Kavango Region, in the northeast. We ditched Afrikaans, and started learning Rukwangali this morning. I feel really lucky because the pronunciations are the same as Spanish. Next weekend we depart, so we are going to be practicing phrases faithfully until then.
We just got a cell phone. “Half of me” was really enjoying not having one for the past two weeks, but “the other half of me” couldn’t wait any longer. Anyway, all incoming calls and texts (SMS) are free, and someone said texts to the U.S. are really cheap, although I kind of doubt that. Here you buy the phone and then have to buy cards with minutes on them from a store. A good system if you don’t talk very much.
Yesterday was the first rain. There is no sprinkling, light rain, medium rain, or heavy rain. Only know rain and heavy rain. The drops looked like bullets. It made last nights Frisbee and yoga really humid, in the past I hadn’t sweat at all, but last night by shirt was drenched. I didn’t notice an increase in the mosquitoes like I expected, but the Namibians assure me they will come.
So, last time I posted I guess there was a USB port, I just didn’t check the back of the computer, so I shouldn’t have that trouble anymore. Here’s some of what I was going to post:

Nov. 13
We have been here Okahandja for a few days now. The waiting, traveling, waiting, traveling, waiting and traveling took forever. D.C. training wasn’t specific enough to be informative about Namibia, but it was necessary to get last minute paperwork done and a nice opportunity to meet our fellow volunteers before we left the country. We also had good time eating amazing Thai food with Lindsey’s friend Dan from Mizzou who is writing for a magazine in D.C.
The plane ride to Jo’burg was 15 hours. They have some pretty cool features on international flights now. Each seat has a TV mounted in front of it with movies, music, and games on demand, but the best is a camera posted on the back rear of the plane. We were able to watch take off and landing and check back anytime we were inclined during the flight. Jo’burg is not safe at all; we stayed in a gated hotel and casino compound that even had armed guards. The hotel was fancy, and the casino really cool. We ate dinner at a sea food place. A salad, platter of prawns (shrimp like creatures that are served with heads and eyes attached), calamari steak, fried calamari, muscles on the half shell and chips (freedom fries) for two, and a bottle of wine was only about $30, and it was top rate, the best sea food I’ve ever had. And casino food is usually pretty expensive. Everything in Africa is way cheaper, on the other hand, during training we are only given the equivalent of $3 a day…but there are no necessary expenses.
The next day was a short flight to Namibia. The last 20 minutes were really impressive coming in over the grasslands and (small) mountain range. The airport was only a small building, and we exited the plane on the runway. The sky was the first thing I noticed, so blue and so huge. We were greeted by some current volunteers, then proceeded to our training facility – which is in Okahandja (silent “d”), a short drive from Windhoek (pronounced “Vinhook”, Afrikaans is very similar to German). Everyone was impressed with the beautiful drive, and as we passed through Windhoek we saw a great sunset. After the sun set, it was dark in about five minutes. People started dropping like flies, and we were really tired as we reached the training center. We were tardy by a few hours (trouble with the lost luggage paper work at the airport plus no one here is in any hurry), but the staff hung around to greet us with songs as we walked in. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that. Our first meal was fried chicken.
Training has been informative, especially compared to the amount of information we knew before we left D.C. A typical day so far has consisted of culture training in the mornings followed by medical in the afternoons. Currently my arm is sore from the yesterday’s typhoid shot. There are several more to come, my fear of needles may be cured before too long.
We have our own room, a luxury no one else here has since we are the only married couple. We have electricity, warm water and showers, a sink in our room. The only difference than a really nice church camp would be the mosquito nets. The malaria mosquitoes come out between dusk and dawn, but I haven’t seen any yet. Apparently they are only a threat after a rain, which it hasn’t done yet.
Okahandja has the feel of the small town, but that might be just because I don’t have a car to explore it. They say there are about 100,000 people here. The area I can cover on foot is much much smaller though. There is an open air market about a quarter of the mile down the road that sells trinkets to tourists. There is a group of guys that sit around there that talk and joke. I met James who taught me “ashitynawa” (I don’t know spelling or how many words it really is, which means everything is good. I forgot what “how are you doing?” is, so I won’t even be know when to say “it’s all good.” The guys at the market are relentless, but they lay off when I tell them I’m going to be here for two years, I don’t need a wooden elephant, and I don’t have any money. One guy tried to sell me his sister; being married actually shut him up very quickly though. The other direction down the road is town, there is a grocery store, car dealership, churches, cell phone shops, bank, electronic shop, hardware shop and internet café (that I have discovered so far). Our training center is on the outside of town, and a short walk away from town is a dried out river bed. Today we played ultimate Frisbee, which is quite the workout in the sand. I’ve also worked out, jogged, and done yoga.