This weekend, I also spent some time at a semi-local orphanage helping out a couple of friends of mine with a "Freedom Fun Day" activity camp. Just something fun for the kids to do over a long weekend. There was a little boy there who couldn't have been older than 3. The first time I saw him he was just skirting the edges of all the activities and was completely filthy. His clothes were crusty, his face was snotty, he was carrying around a bucket and rag (not sure why) and there were flies all over his face. He's the youngest kid there by a few years, my friend told me that he and his sister are from Mozambique, though he speaks siswati.
This child broke my heart. He gets fed, he gets washed every now and again, but he's certainly not potty trained (he can't even reach the toilet) so...you can imagine. It was so obvious, nobody touches him, nobody holds him, nobody spends the time to play with him or talk to him or cuddle him or do any of the 100 basic things that every child deserves. The first day he just skirted all the action, though halfway through I gave him some soda (well, I gave him some of Mike's soda) and then he was my shadow for the rest of the day. The second day he was less shy, and got kind of into the balloon game the kids were playing (by which I mean he got sad when his balloon was popped and happy when I got him a new one). Halfway through the day he was happy to sit by Christy or myself, to be tickled and played with, though he still seemed deeply skeptical about this whole affection thing. By the end of the day he was sitting in my lap, perfectly happy with his balloon (or occasionally my watch or camera) and a safe place to be.
When was the last time somebody let this child sit in their lap? When was the last time he was hugged? And this is South Africa, so I had to wonder too: what happened to his parents, and what about all of those old sores on his arms and legs? (Well, you know, southern Africa, 1 in 4 infection rate. Take a guess). This is HIV, isn't it? This baby that I held in my lap because nobody else would, or could. The children with no parents and the classrooms with no teachers. It would be easier if there were somebody to be mad at. Someone who I could go yell at, or blame, or be pissed at until they got their act together. But there's not. There's just these babies with no parents, with nobody to love them, and not a few of whom will die of the same disease their mothers passed on to them.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Do Re Mi in 6 8 Time
I mentioned to one of my favorite teachers about 2 or 3 months ago that I had studied music a bit in college, and play an instrument or two...including the piano. She, suddenly and spontaneously, broke into any number of emphatic 'hallelujah amen, oh praise jesus!'-es so that I started looking around me wondering if maybe the big man himself had materialised somewhere behind us. Nope, turns out that they were in desperate need of a piano accompanist for an upcoming choir competition in which EVERY SCHOOL IN THREE DISTRICTS was participating. So, you know, good thing I hadn't touched a piano in about a year. So I spent about three days at a semi-nearby teachers center that had a piano, practicing the music that turned out to be kind of hard (damn). And then approximately 3 hours of one saturday playing for all the music teachers/choir leaders so that they could get an idea of what things would and/or should sound like before the big day. (They had the option of bringing their choirs that day so that the kids could actually practice singing with the piano but, well, TIA).
Last saturday was the big competition, and THANK GOD the official piano player actually showed up. The teachers all claimed that they would rather have had me because I "listened better" (which means I was perfectly willing to ignore all musicality and ink on the page in favor of whatever they wanted) and wouldn't really believe me when I told them that no, they didn't. By coincidence two of the schools that I had been hanging out at the past week also did really well and will move on to the next round.
The school that I was at this past week claims that those two schools did well because I happened to be around (because, you know, sporadically clapping my hands to the beat every now and again and occasionally pointing out things like 'hey, I think you're supposed to be a bit louder here' = BEST CLINIC EVER!!!) so my job for the week was to hang out with the choir. Thats fine, I can do that. It was really fun.
I felt so bad for the kids though, the teachers had them practicing 5 hours a day for a week! Which, of course, is just horrendously bad for you. A lot of them couldn't even talk at the end of the week, I'm hoping that the long weekend will help them out some. They're singing "Funniculi Funnicula" which is actually really hard even if you do read music, and apparently none of the teachers do. Every song, every tune, everything is learned by ear or by do re mi sight singing. Its really amazing when you consider how much singing happens around the village and how beautiful it all is. ...But I've spent a lot of time explaining time signatures and rests and chords.
The kids are sounding really good, which is impressive because they've only had a week to practice. I'm rooting for them on Friday, its the second round of competition so they're not just up against the neighboring schools, now there are the rich schools from around Malelane and Komatipoort in it too. I don't know if the teachers are thinking of it this way, but what a coup for the to do well, to win or move on. I know they can, I have total faith in them, and they're so dedicated too. Wish us luck.
Last saturday was the big competition, and THANK GOD the official piano player actually showed up. The teachers all claimed that they would rather have had me because I "listened better" (which means I was perfectly willing to ignore all musicality and ink on the page in favor of whatever they wanted) and wouldn't really believe me when I told them that no, they didn't. By coincidence two of the schools that I had been hanging out at the past week also did really well and will move on to the next round.
The school that I was at this past week claims that those two schools did well because I happened to be around (because, you know, sporadically clapping my hands to the beat every now and again and occasionally pointing out things like 'hey, I think you're supposed to be a bit louder here' = BEST CLINIC EVER!!!) so my job for the week was to hang out with the choir. Thats fine, I can do that. It was really fun.
I felt so bad for the kids though, the teachers had them practicing 5 hours a day for a week! Which, of course, is just horrendously bad for you. A lot of them couldn't even talk at the end of the week, I'm hoping that the long weekend will help them out some. They're singing "Funniculi Funnicula" which is actually really hard even if you do read music, and apparently none of the teachers do. Every song, every tune, everything is learned by ear or by do re mi sight singing. Its really amazing when you consider how much singing happens around the village and how beautiful it all is. ...But I've spent a lot of time explaining time signatures and rests and chords.
The kids are sounding really good, which is impressive because they've only had a week to practice. I'm rooting for them on Friday, its the second round of competition so they're not just up against the neighboring schools, now there are the rich schools from around Malelane and Komatipoort in it too. I don't know if the teachers are thinking of it this way, but what a coup for the to do well, to win or move on. I know they can, I have total faith in them, and they're so dedicated too. Wish us luck.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Abyss
Yesterday I left school a little bit early to begin my walk home. Class had gotten out about 30 minutes ago, so there were still lots of kids all over the place. A few of them decided to walk me home. And then a few more, and then a few more, and a few more – until I had an enormous pack of children giggling and surrounding me like an atom cloud as I cruised down the road. They practiced their English (“Good morning! Hi, Nomvula! Good morning!”). I practiced my teaching skills (“seriously guys, its 2 in the afternoon – at least say ‘good afternoon.’ Okay, how about this: ‘whats cracking’ – say ‘whats cracking’” They didn’t) So we all headed down the road together while everybody in the village laughed at me and my new-found horde. I was beginning to congratulate myself on how well I was putting up with my popularity, feeling all proud of my tolerance and patience, etc… and maybe enjoying my celebrity a little bit too when all of a sudden…my horde disappears? Wtf?
I look around –
I’ve been abandoned for a new and interesting hole in the ground.
Such is fame, I guess.
I look around –
I’ve been abandoned for a new and interesting hole in the ground.
Such is fame, I guess.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Spring Break...Woo!*
I just got back from a vacation in Mozambique – which I can actually see from my backyard, so I suppose it was about time I made it over there. I think that the best part of being an education peace corps volunteer in Africa is probably about the same as the best part of being an education worker anywhere else in the world –ridiculous amounts of vacation time. So for spring break (well, autumn break. I am so tired of this stupid southern hemisphere) we decided to head to a tropical beach.
We spent a night in Maputo, the capital, which is a little bit sketchy but can be pretty interesting if you’re willing to walk all over the place to find stuff. Probably the best part is the ridiculously fresh seafood. There’s a fish market right on the beach, and then all of these little restaurant-like places that are basically glorified kitchens. They cook your food for you for about the equivalent of $2 a plate. Its completely delicious.
After a night in Maputo we got into a bus for a comfortable and delightful 8 hour ride up Tofo beach – which is incredibly beautiful and totally worthwhile. You know all those corona commercials where you’re looking from the perspective of a person in a hammock and its all white sand and completely clear blue water and coconut trees? Pretty much just like that. And I spent about the whole week in that hammock. We also tried to go snorkelling with whale sharks (what a ridiculous sentence to write. Who does that? Who says, “oh, last week when I was snorkelling with whale sharks”) but sadly we never actually found any. We just rode around in a boat off the coast for 2 hours instead. It was a nice boat ride. Maybe some other time.
Generally the whole trip was really amazing (especially the part where I accidentally pulled the handle off the backpacker’s propane stove and created an enormous fountain of flames and explosion that kind of threatened to burn the whole place down, when all I really wanted was to make spaghetti. That was fun.) Mozambique is definitely much more what people probably think of when post-colonial Africa comes to mind. Its very poor, but you can see the remains of the Portugese/Arabic/European influence in the architecture and infrastructure, which is occasionally very pretty even in a completely run down state. It has a very Caribbean tropical feel to it, lots of palm trees and sudden rain storms. I kept thinking to myself how much mom and dad would love the place, its so beautiful and so very real and down to earth at the same time. I wouldn't be surprised if Mozambique and its beaches start becoming a real touristy resort destination in not too many years. (Maybe 20). I'm glad I got to go there now and get the 'backpacker' feel before that dissapears. Of course, it is also a complete economic mess: the people are poor, the streets are covered in filth, and the cops are corrupt.
We actually got hassled by a group of cops when we were walking through Maputo on our last night. They wanted our passports, but only one of us actually had his on him. They wouldn’t accept our PC IDs, were giving us a hard time, and generally things were looking like we were headed towards a night in a Mozambican jail (and…ew) because God knows we didn’t have the money for bribes, when this dude in a car pulled over and just started shouting at them over and over in Portugese. I have no idea what he was saying, but he was pissed. So the cops turned to us and asked if there was a problem here. We said most definitely not and got the hell out of there.
So Mozambique was fun.
*This might look pretty familiar to a few of you getting letters pretty soon. Sorry, but I can only write the only thing so many times in so many ways, you know?
We spent a night in Maputo, the capital, which is a little bit sketchy but can be pretty interesting if you’re willing to walk all over the place to find stuff. Probably the best part is the ridiculously fresh seafood. There’s a fish market right on the beach, and then all of these little restaurant-like places that are basically glorified kitchens. They cook your food for you for about the equivalent of $2 a plate. Its completely delicious.
After a night in Maputo we got into a bus for a comfortable and delightful 8 hour ride up Tofo beach – which is incredibly beautiful and totally worthwhile. You know all those corona commercials where you’re looking from the perspective of a person in a hammock and its all white sand and completely clear blue water and coconut trees? Pretty much just like that. And I spent about the whole week in that hammock. We also tried to go snorkelling with whale sharks (what a ridiculous sentence to write. Who does that? Who says, “oh, last week when I was snorkelling with whale sharks”) but sadly we never actually found any. We just rode around in a boat off the coast for 2 hours instead. It was a nice boat ride. Maybe some other time.
Generally the whole trip was really amazing (especially the part where I accidentally pulled the handle off the backpacker’s propane stove and created an enormous fountain of flames and explosion that kind of threatened to burn the whole place down, when all I really wanted was to make spaghetti. That was fun.) Mozambique is definitely much more what people probably think of when post-colonial Africa comes to mind. Its very poor, but you can see the remains of the Portugese/Arabic/European influence in the architecture and infrastructure, which is occasionally very pretty even in a completely run down state. It has a very Caribbean tropical feel to it, lots of palm trees and sudden rain storms. I kept thinking to myself how much mom and dad would love the place, its so beautiful and so very real and down to earth at the same time. I wouldn't be surprised if Mozambique and its beaches start becoming a real touristy resort destination in not too many years. (Maybe 20). I'm glad I got to go there now and get the 'backpacker' feel before that dissapears. Of course, it is also a complete economic mess: the people are poor, the streets are covered in filth, and the cops are corrupt.
We actually got hassled by a group of cops when we were walking through Maputo on our last night. They wanted our passports, but only one of us actually had his on him. They wouldn’t accept our PC IDs, were giving us a hard time, and generally things were looking like we were headed towards a night in a Mozambican jail (and…ew) because God knows we didn’t have the money for bribes, when this dude in a car pulled over and just started shouting at them over and over in Portugese. I have no idea what he was saying, but he was pissed. So the cops turned to us and asked if there was a problem here. We said most definitely not and got the hell out of there.
So Mozambique was fun.
*This might look pretty familiar to a few of you getting letters pretty soon. Sorry, but I can only write the only thing so many times in so many ways, you know?
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