March Happenings and South Africa

The Beginning of March in the Village
In the beginning of March I started working more in schools again but this time I had help. I worked with NAPS and designed a program that we could implement in a school and have classes with each grade 1-9 and reach an entire school in one day. It was challenging and tiring but we did it, and it was fulfilling. The teachers appreciated our presence there and the youth asked a lot of good questions.

After the school push I decided it was time for a vacation so I packed my friend's backpack (my backpack couldn't fit all my junk) and took off for South Africa. I visited Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Durban. It was an adventure!

South Africa

First stop was Johannesburg, which unfortunately we didn't stay that long or do that much touristy stuff because of the fear that everyone ingrained in us because of the crime and assault rates in the city. But we got around a bit anyway.

Johannesburg is like the New York City of Africa, almost all of South Africa is extremely Westernized or "developed" if you will. All the roads are paved, the consumption of material goods is high, the country has a lot of money, the vehicles on the roads are as diverse as in the states, it was a real culture shock for me since I've been in Zambia for almost a year now and it is considered "under-developed", fewer paved roads, and maybe only 4 or 5 different styles of vehicles.

The night life is huge, we went to a lounge, very chic! And Jo'burg must have a mall in every town and they are HUGE! It was too much for me, from the village to the BIG city.

Guess which city this is?

I










Or this one? Which bridge is this and in which city?








I also had an opportunity to visit the Museum of Africa situated in Market Theatre of downtown Johannesburg.



And my last stop was the Apartheid Museum which was a huge and well designed history of the Apartheid in South Africa. The journey through the museum took me almost 4 hours and ironically they had a special exhibit on the "Separate but Equal" history of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. It included info on Brown vs. the Board of Education and other issues over the country. And it compared Apartheid to the Civil Rights Movement, it was fascinating. Unfortunately I couldn't take pictures inside but I have a few of outside.



The next stop was Cape Town. I was fortunate to have a college buddy who was doing an internship there, she had been there only a week and a half before I got there but she knew enough to show us around and help us save a huge amount of time in the city. Here's a picture of all of us. (Left to right, me, Nyasha, and Beyola)

Highlights of Cape Town included the Robbins Island tour of where Nelson Mandela was held for 27 years in captivity for his political affiliations with the ANC. The tour of the prison was led by a former prisoner.

The things that stuck out for me on the tour were the gruesome hardships that the prisoners had to go through. Apartheid even stretched through prison bars by the differentiation of treatment of Black prisoners (also called Bantu), coloured prisoners, and Indian prisoners. The Black prisoners were given less rations of food than the coloured and Indian prisoners. Here is a record of rations based on race.

There were 100-150 prisoners per cell and only three blankets and a mat were given to each prisoner. Cape Town is extremely cold, especially on the island and the prisoners only had one uniform khaki shorts and shortsleeved shirt to wear year round. They could only wash it once per week. They were only allowed one 30-minute visit per 6 month period, and they had to speak in English or Afrikaans so that the guards would be able to monitor them. They were only allowed 1 letter for every 6 months that had to be 120 words or less, if it was more than 120 words the guards would tear off from word 121 onward and not deliver the rest of the letter until the next 6 months. They sometimes buried prisoners alive with their heads left out as punishment, and when the prisoners asked for water when they were thirsty, the guards urinated on them and made them drink it. If you read Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom autobiography, you can learn of more of the horrors.

The tourguide also talked about the more positive parts of prison. Many prisoners entered illiterate and left with degrees because they taught each other with every spare moment they had. They said the "each one teach one" saying originated at this time and they received donated books from other countries and materials for learning.

We also visited Cape Point where the Indian Ocean meets the Atlantic. Cape Town is a beautiful place, very mountainous. You can see Table Mountain from all over the city, it's so dominant.

The final stop was Durban, where we stayed with my lovely Soror Charlotte Fuller. She owns ocean front property, so every moment we woke up to the sounds of the waves and a beautiful Atlantic sunrise.

Soror Charlotte was the hostest with the mostest! She is a retired teacher who is making big moves in Durban, and still organizing projects to help orphans, street children, and the larger Durban community. She is well respected and well connected. We had the most home-cooked meals of our entire trip as we met her kind friends such as the Naidoo family, where we had home-cooked Indian cuisine.

We enjoyed our time together immensely. It's wonderful to connect with Deltas all over the world!

The End (for now)

Long Time, It's Rainy Season so Everything Slows Down

Well a lot has obviously happened since I last wrote. And unfortunately I'm on speed dial even now and have to write a quick synopsis of all these pictures I uploaded. So this can be more of a picture entry, with God's love and my parents love I was able to get another camera so I am able to share my experience with you visually once again.


I was able to travel a bit in Zambia recently to support another volunteer in her area. I travelled to Mkushi in Central Province, about an 8 hour journey if public transport is cooperating. I went to visit Beyola one of the very few other African-American volunteers in Peace Corps. She did an Income Generating Activity and HIV/AIDS Training for a group of Parent Teacher Association Chairpeople and I helped her design her HIV/AIDS portion of the workshop and assisted in facilitating it as well.

I was also able to visit Niko briefly on the way to Beyola's site. He's also a HIV/AIDS Volunteer who lives in a neighboring town called Monze.

After returning to my village we had a visit from the NAPS (National Association for the Prevention of Starvation) Global President Dr. Paul from Alabama. He's actually Trinidadian come to find out, I caught his accent of course. So left to right is Derrick Banda, NAPS Zambia director, Me, and Dr. Paul. They have been doing a lot of relief work in the village, but it has been more productive relief work because they include education and interaction with the relief, they don't just drop food and leave. Because of my good working relationship with them I was invited to work with them on their activities while their visitors were here from Alabama. I helped pound Nsima, the Zambian staple food made of pounded maize, I'm holding a huge spoon (Muungo) especially made for stirring and pounding Nsima. This large amount was to feed about 500 people in the local area.

I brought one of my patients who has a very sick child, and fears she is HIV positive along with the child. As you can see she is quite frail, but at least she is eating so there is hope for an improvement in her help. She is a twin but she is significantly thinner then her twin who has managed to maintain her health.

I was also asked to make a statement for Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation about NAPS and my own HIV/AIDS work in Kayoba Village where we both live. So I was on Zambia national TV last weekend I think, of course I didn't see it, I'm a couple of sockets short of electricity.

I also helped serve food to the youth in the area.








Then I played games and sang circle songs with the children. It was a lot of fun.







Then later in the week we had a lunch with the United States Ambassador to Zambia, so I took a snap with her. She is the newly appointed ambassador and she's very tall and energetic.


Okay for now, that will have to be it. I will communicate again after my trip to South Africa. I haven't decided whether or not to bring my digital camera with me since it's far more dangerous there than here regarding theft, and I don't want to have it stolen again. So I might just bring a few disposables.

Please keep in touch, keep writing letters or start writing again if you have stopped. And stay blessed.