John told me I should post a recent email I sent home to Dad and Karyl.  I took out the specific family stuff and fixed a few spelling errors.  The email is below:

 

Some thieves broke into the post about two weeks ago.  The post office here is also a bank of sorts.  Many old people get money sent to them from family and they also get a 225 pula (about $35) pension mailed to them once a month.  Many can’t read or write so the post office serves as a savings and loan where received funds can be immediately deposited.  It is sort of surreal to see so many people using their thumb print for signature.

 

I happened to go to the post office the morning after it was robbed and about 75 people (mostly really really old people)  were just waiting around outside hoping it would open.  One of the workers came out and told me about the robbery.  He said it would take several days to sort it out and the post office would be closed until it was sorted.  I wondered why he didn’t tell the others, but I couldn’t tell them because they only speak Setswana.  I called several days later and they still were not open.  About 10 days later they opened up, but were too busy to do packages and asked me to wait a few more days.  I called when I got your email and sure enough there were 2 packages.  Yours and another package from one of my friends.

 

We have been so lucky to have so many family and friends send us so many great things for us and the children here.  I know this isn’t just about me.  I know people want to do good in the world and love being able to send “nice things to poor children in Africa” and I am in a place to help them participate.  But it also makes me feel good to have so much good will in the world that people view me as a trustworthy and earnest enough person to be the vehicle for their own generosity.

 

I loved everything in the box, especially the books for the children.  There are four kids in the neighbourhood who read everything you send (except Mark Twain because they don’t get the colloquial speech).  They beg me to discuss the books with them when they are done and are very disappointed if I don’t know the book myself.   One of the books has a list of Classical Starts at the back and one boy is keeping a list of all the “classical” books he is reading and is hoping to get to 100 before he finishes grade school.

 

I was going to donate all the books I am getting to the school library.  But the library is so protective of the few crappy books it has that it will not hardly ever let the students in and they are not allowed to check books out.  I am as close to a library as the kids at the school.

John and I have met a nice American ex-military couple here.  They guy was a mechanic in the air-force and Botswana has a bunch of old planes America doesn’t want anymore, so the Batswana have some American ex-military on their payroll to keep the airplanes going.  They are an interesting couple and have lived here for 10 years.  We had planned to go to nice little resort right over the border in South Africa with them this weekend.  They said there was a great grocery and hardware store with lots and lots of supplies directly from Europe.  We were so excited to be able to go with someone fun who has a car and could drive us there and back!

But the truck drivers in South Africa went on strike and a few people have been killed so the Peace Corps denied our travel request.  We had planned to go this weekend because it is a four day weekend.  The couple spent all day trying to find a place in Botswana we could go – but everything is booked up.  So instead we will go on a picnic on Monday afternoon at a park just outside Gaborone.  This is quite a disappointment – but at least I will be able to catch up on housework and school work.  John and I did finally book a trip to Victoria Falls over New Years Eve.  It is one of the seven wonders of  the world and we will look forward to that.

I can’t believe we have been here for a year now.  Everybody kept telling us things will start to click at the year mark – and things sort of are clicking.  It takes about a year for people to trust you and to understand the value of your work .  But I think this gives a false sense of success here.  I think when PCV’s get to this point of service they believe people will listen to you AND take your suggestions.  In fact they will listen but they don’t really change who they are or what they are just because they trust you and let you add your own value to their workplace.  So, while things are nicer on a personal level – the struggle to accomplish something stays the same.  There are very nice moments of satisfaction or success – but not that many.

All morning I had 4 children over wanting ALL my time and energy.  This is a daily event with 1 to 10 children a day.  I was just so tired of their constant needs.   I almost always ignore my feelings of wanting to be alone, because these kids truly don’t have any adults that are kind or interested in their lives.  I also want to constantly show parents how to better interact with their children.  But dang it – I never had children and didn’t really want children mostly because of the constant needs that they have and it has been really getting to me.

But then, I started to think that this was really the crux of my Peace Corps work.  I have never viewed my work at the school as a sacrifice or an accomplishment.  It has been a job, which I am often extremely frustrated about, but a job a great deal like other jobs I have had in my life (with a lot less pay).  But taking care of these kids – that is Carol going out of her comfort zone.  This is me learning to love people I have no obligation to love or to like.  This is finding all of the resources, education, love and support I have been given and giving back to the world, where it is truly needed.

I see children learning manners, learning how to speak/read/write English, learning empathy, showing kindness and love, and coming back every day to learn and find out more.  I also see them thrive in my attention and love.  They wait at my gate for me to get home from school to show me their accomplishments, ask for more help, or just spend time with me or John.  That is what this is all about.  I have made this commitment for two years and I should be able to work at giving of myself, of my heart, and of my soul to small children who need it for two years of my whole great big giant life.  I have always been able to give my labour – but love is much harder to give as though it is your job.  Now that I think of it that way – I am better and more patient with the children.  They still do exhaust me – but I have posted a quote from one of my favourite people on my wall:

“Do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.” — Mother Theresa

Miss you and love you much – Thanks so very very much for the box and all the goodies.  You truly make our life and the life of the kids in the neighbourhood so much better!

Peace

Carol/Gofaone

I had one of the best moments of my Peace Corps experience at the one-year mark!

I am supposed to be building the capacity of teachers.  I am supposed to help them learn to teach Life Skills or critical thinking skills.  Almost all the teachers resist this for many reasons.  Some don’t want to learn anything new, some don’t want to do more work, some resent sending a non-teacher in “to teach them” to teach better.  Nearly all of the teachers will allow me to teach for them or do their job for them – but they don’t want me to teach them.  It is hard to find a middle mark of teaching them without being the class teacher for them.  But I think I finally had some success, as the story below will show.

More than half the kids at school do not have books.  One of the ways teachers deal with this is to copy the book on the chalkboard and ask the kids to copy the information into notebooks.  While this does provide the children with more information, it is not teaching.  Teachers don’t seem to mind this.  Everyone believes the children need the information in the book and spending the entire class copying the book is considered an accepted lesson plan.

Over the last four months, I have been writing study guides.  I make real study guides instead of a summary of information or verbatim copying from the book.  I always:

• Make a vocabulary section defining all new or hard words
• Provide current event examples or related stories
• Refer to other class subjects that are correlated
• Provide directions for study or test taking
• Provide the guide in an attractive layout with colour pictures, graphs and charts or little cartoons.

I am trying to do a guide for each chapter of the lesson books.  Most of the study guides are between 6 and 12 pages and it takes about 10 hours to complete – so it is quite time consuming.  However, the School Head (principle) has agreed to allow the teachers to make copies of any notes for Form 3 students (the last grade of middle school) as they will be tested at the end of this term to see if they are allowed to continue their education.  The school is also given a rating based on the student pass rate.

At first the teachers were sceptical about my project, especially because they saw how time consuming it was.  They told me the kids never read their notes and I was wasting my time.  Nevertheless, once they had a study guide, that saved them from having to copy the book on the board, they decided to use it.  The students LOVE the study guides – and they are being used with enthusiasm.

But that is not the GREAT MOMENT part.

My favourite class to co-teach is English – especially literature.  We were reading a play about Shaka Zulu’s life, which is an intriguing story to these children.  The play is a fictionalised biography about the greatest African warrior and his demise.  It is written at a personal and compelling level.

When we finished with the play, I started connecting the play to history lessons in Social Studies.  The time Shaka ruled is also called the time of the Mfecane Wars, which means, “the great shake up”.  The history book barely touches on the personal life of Shaka.  It provides the historical facts about the place and time of the battles as well as the cultural and social impact of decades long  bloody wars.  The history book shows this as a bad time in Southern African history.

I connect the Shaka play they had just read, which showed Shaka’s human struggles, visions, quests, and desires for “one great Zulu nation” to the historical devastation of the wars in the history book.  I saw that they got it and were starting to rethink the social study lessons and/or the play.

Several kids in the class had light bulb moments.  One kid said he wanted to go back and read his Social Studies lesson about the wars and other agreed.

I  compared several parts of the play to history and science lessons.

We talked more about the value of education and how they should look at each subject as a way to help learn and understand another subject.  While the classes were notes of music, their education was the final song.  I told them there were hundreds of examples of cross reference learning – and tens more in the single play we were learning.

This all happened on Friday and many of the kids asked if I would come back at 4:30, when school is out and go over more of these connections.  I could not do it, because I was leaving to celebrate my one-year anniversary with my Peace Corps class.  But I was feeling very very good – and then the GREAT MOMENT came – THE TEACHER AGREED TO COME BACK – at 4:30 without me and go over more concepts in the play.

I could leave the Peace Corps right now and feel like I have accomplished what they asked me to do, which is something I have been doubting could be done.

This teacher is teaching critical thinking and the kids are learning!  This is one of those rare moments in life – one year’s worth of work and I am get 10 minutes of utter and complete satisfaction of job well done!  What a great way to mark my anniversary here!

Below are a few pictures from our one year anniversary party.  (Go to the web site and double click the picture to see the whole thing)

Bots – 11!  I love each and every person in this picture!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tracy and John enjoying Breakfast

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are a few stories I have been collecting for few weeks.

 

Pottery Workshop

Last weekend I was able to pull off a Pottery Workshop at a rural village.  I say “pull off” because it is most unlikely that any plans made for just about any activity will actually happen.  Through a network of connections  the head of an Art Department at a Junior High School  asked if I would be willing to come and do a Workshop on Pottery.  I was skeptical since I had tried to set this type of thing up at several schools and failed miserably due to the schools having no clay, no wheels, broken kilns, and lots of false promises of getting all that stuff fixed.

 

 

After several very difficult to understand phone conversations I convinced the school to drive the 100K to pick me up so I could do a survey to see if a Workshop would work.  Remarkably, they arranged a pickup, brought me to the school,  had some old clay, one very old wheel, a broken kiln and lots of interest.  So I agreed it would be a fun project.  I had to hitch hike back home because the vehicle used to bring me was attending to some road emergency.

 

A few weeks later we arranged for a 9:00am pickup on that Saturday.  The driver actually showed up at 6:00 am which I was  grateful for and he smiled as I told him to come back in 3 hours, which he did.  Me and Carol and 2 teachers from our school arrived safely and on time for a fun day of slide shows, videos, hand building pots and a throwing demonstration.

 

 

 

There were 36 kids and 4 teachers plus us 4.  Everyone was very attentive and had some good questions and at 5:30, after almost 6 hours at a volunteer workshop these kids were still going strong.  We had to force them to quit.

 

 

 

 

It was a successful and rewarding day and I have been asked to come back and do a Glazing and Kiln Loading Workshop in a few weeks when they have been able to fix the electric kiln.  I’m not holding my breath for that!

 

 

 

 

Botswana Survey Results

A few months ago, the Peace Corps Headquarters in Washington, DC sent out a survey to PCVs globally.  The survey was a fairly sophisticated format for getting feedback from PCVs all over the world, on various issues.

The Botswana Country Director, Tim Hartman, is a man all the volunteers really like as a person and appreciate the his ways of doing his job.  The groups of PCVs who arrive in Botswana at different times are referred to by group numbers such as Bots 9, Bots 10, Bots 11 (that’s us) and Bots 12, etc.   Tim decided to create a competition among the several groups and advertised a small prize of two additional vacation days for the Bots group who filled out and returned the survey in the quickest time, with the most participation of the group members.   We were all up for the competition, so we heavily encouraged our own group members to help accomplish the goal.

The survey took about an hour to fill it out, but our group, Bots 11, seemed to have a particularly rapid response so we anticipated an easy win.

We have not gotten the official results of the inter-Botswana competition yet, but the below email to our Country Director was just a fun response that all of us PCVs in Botswana got as a result of one of two things…

One, We are an extremely cohesive group, with way above average attitudes and capabilities and we are driven far beyond our supervisors expectations, or….

Two, There is no internet in any of the other countries besides Botswana.

 

 Thanks All Bots Staff and PCV’s – this is a first for PC Botswana!

**************************

Hello Tim,

Congratulations on achieving 100% AVS participation! PC Botswana is the first post in the Africa Region to achieve this response rate. Today’s AVS results were just posted; here’s is the Africa Region chart:

I just amended today’s AVS update for the Peace Corps homepage to include Botswana in the 100% posts! 

 We very much appreciate the support of your staff and the dedication of the PC Botswana Volunteers who made such an extra effort to participate in the AVS this year!

Best regards,

Alice-Lynn

AVS Project Manager

Peace Corps |Research, Evaluation and Measurement| Office of Information, Research and Planning

“What we call results are beginnings.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

Dusty Roads…

Everyday I make part of my voyage to work along the dusty road that leads from our school, roughly a mile, to the main tarred road.  It’s usually a fairly pleasant walk except for the unevenness of the surface and the dust.  If there is no wind and no vehicles the dust is not too much of an issue, but with a whisper of wind or even a slow moving vehicle it can be a cause for concern.  With 4 or 5 fast moving vehicles it can be a nightmare.   We arrived here last September.  September is also the dust season and now I see why.  As we sit inside a building looking outside nearly everyday, there is a strong wind that is constantly blowing tremendous amounts of dust all over the place. There are quite a few car washes here, which are basically just 4 sticks holding up a shade tent that a car parks underneath while someone pressure washes the car.

It is most amusing and at the same time sad and pathetic to watch the entrepreneurs work fruitlessly against the blowing dust.   It’s just a part of life here and I seriously believe that it contributes directly to the poor health of most of the people, which in turn explains the extreme lack of energy, drive, motivation, confrontation, responsibility and many other characteristics that keep this country in the dark ages.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Living but not Learning

This morning I got a hitch to work like I do 50% of the time.  The other 50% is either a taxi or Khombi (small, entirely over crowded bus).   Half way there we came to a delay caused by a four car fender bender.  The back three cars had  smashed into the car in front of them, quite obviously caused by the front car coming to a fast, unexpected stop.   Each of the three cars had their noses wedged in to the trunk of the car in front of them.  As we slowly passed the mess on the shoulder, I made the comment that this is caused by people driving too close to each other and not paying attention.  There were several other people in my ride and they all made a resounding “agreement” sound and the driver himself verbally agreed aggressively, while shaking his head, as if in contempt.  We had a small conversation about the need to drive better in this country, which would include more space between vehicles.  Everyone vehemently agreed.  As we passed the accident site we immediately sped up to reach the next car in front of us and from there to my drop-off we maintained a solid 8 to 12 foot distance from the car in front of us.

I have been here for a year now and have come upon two very bad accidents and this minor one.   Both of the bad ones involved a military transport vehicle that had gone off the road at high speed and rolled many times.  In the first case both axles had separated from the vehicle and were located 150 yards from the rest of the wreckage.   We arrived just moments after the accident had occurred and we stopped to help and transported two very injured people to the local hospital.  I learned later that everyone in that accident remarkably, had lived, but I know some of them will be in bad shape for a long time.  Both of these bad accidents were probably caused by last minute swerving due to a goat or cow crossing the road.  Animals are a huge hazard on all roads.  At night this hazard is increased to infinity.  For the most part people are quite cognizant of the animal dangers and slow down well in advance, sometimes ridiculously so, and put on their hazard lights as they come to a full stop waiting for an animal or herd to cross.   The Military trucks are big and have a high center of gravity for high visibility and good ground clearance.  As a result, they are very susceptible to roll overs if forced to turn quickly.

But I digress…..   The reason I found this morning particularly interesting is that the actions of my driver; to see an accident, understand why it happened, agree that more distance would avoid that type of accident, and then speed up only to produce the same accident prone environment; were indicative of some of the things that I am learning about this country.  There is simply no critical or logical thought processes in their actions.   The concepts of Learn and Apply, Risk and Reward, Actions and Consequences and other logical ideas just don’t register.  This is evident in almost everything they do; from driving, to teaching school, to starting new businesses, to not buying some cheap memory to make their computers significantly faster.  They just avoid change, conflict, effort, responsibility, leadership and all the attributes most American think are so sensible and easy to employ.

Of course this is a large generalization, but it is applicable to a significant portion of the population.   There is a small good side to this.  This type of passivity creates a very peaceful people who are never upset about anything.

Anywhere in the world, at any time, we are all subject to the whims of accidents and driving in this country is no more risky than walking in New York City, but it frustrates me to see the lack of “learning from experience” as they drive through their streets in organized chaos.

As you may remember John desperately wanted a baby goat when we moved here.  Even when every single African person we met told him goats were very very bad pets, not allowable at the school, cost 500 pula, and would likely get stolen and slaughtered, John still wanted a goat.  He said he would regret, for the rest of his life, that he lived in Africa and did not have a pet goat.

I had to be the heavy and outright refuse.

Last weekend John conducted a pottery workshop at a school about 100k outside of Molepolole and HE FOUND A CUTE LITTLE GOAT!   It had lost its mother and was frantically  NEAY NEAYING.  John calmed him and scooped him up to help him look for his mother.

 

I had to again be strong and deny John his most desired wish in Africa!!  I almost feel like a bad and uncaring wife – until I remembered we will be able to have a garden, hang clothes on the line, and keep plastic chairs to watch the sun sets only if we DON”T have a goat.  It was especially hard when we could not find the mother.  I had to nearly threaten divorce to make John set him down.

The little goat was 10 times madder than John and literatlly started screaming (the way goats scream) at me as we walked away.

 

 

 

On Sunday, August 12th, 2012, a few Peace Corps Volunteers were called and invited to attend an Open House at the Botswana Defense Force (BDF) Military Base just outside Molepolole.  It was a nice opportunity for the PCVs selected, as the Air Base is the biggest in the country and one of just a small handful of military bases in Botswana.  The event was in celebration of the 640 US military soldiers who had come to Botswana  on a training mission and been camped at the BDF base for the past few weeks.  They are here for a month or so to help with training the BDF in military responses, particularly Medivac and other medical related initiatives.   They are also helping with capacity building in areas such as construction, roads and health services.  Both country militaries are working hand in hand to improve each other’s capabilities.

The American Embassy was there along with many high-ranking US military from the 4 branches of the Armed Forces.   The Peace Corps Volunteers were invited to share some experiences with the military and to give us a chance to see how our military is also participating in similar activities as we are.  This comes as a bit of a surprise, since traditionally, most people have the impressions that the Peace Corps and the US Military should be at odds in their missions.  As we were told, in 1961 John F. Kennedy started the Peace Corps along with the US Special Armed Forces (Green Beret’s).  The idea was that both components would have the same mission with one using force and focused on immediate short-term  solutions and the other being a longer term solution.

We spent the day touring the base and seeing first hand how the US military reacts to emergencies (Focused primarily on medical evacuation and other medical related operations).

They gave us a tour of the US Chinook Helicopters which were way cool.  These are the latest and greatest in the US military arsenal, with highly update avionics and the most efficient engines.

(You can see these pictures full size if you go to our website and double-click them).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They also showed us several of the BDF helicopters which are mostly American made civilian Robinson Helicopters with small conversions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the President’s private ride.

 

We also got to see up close the US C-130 Hercules plane.  This plane was given to the BDF in 1993 by the North Carolina National Guard.  It is pretty impressive and I was even promised a ride in it somewhere along the way!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few weeks ago Carol and I were introduced to an American couple who live in Molepolole.  He works on the C-130 plane as an avionics mechanic for a US based  contracting company and they pay him huge money.  He and his wife are quite generous and invite the PCVs in the area over to their very nice home frequently for dinner and to swim in their little swimming pool.  The last time we were there they cooked a very delicious meal and stuffed us with appetizers, main entre, deserts and even after dinner Cuban Cigars with 100-year-old Brandy to dip them in.   I’m not much of cigar connoisseur, but I sure enjoyed the hospitality for a while!

 

 

While I am loving the Peace Corps, Africa and all the cute good little kids:

Jony coloring at the table

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am missing my family, friends, America, movie theatres, hair salons, 8 lane highways, a vehicle to drive, beef with fat in it, real cheese, skepticism, direct frankness,  general courtesy (as expressed in America),  the computer age, Subway, Pizza, the El, TV,  data that means something, grass,  alone time, baseball and apple pie.

Please do me the biggest favour and email me one or two pictures of you, your family and/or something in awesome in America.  I will enjoy it now and put it on our always running screen saver and maybe feel a little more in touch with the good ol days!

(You can blow the pictures up and see how cute the kids are if you go directly to the web site and double-click the pictures).

 

 

Before Carol posts her elaborate post tomorrow of our recent trip to Durban, South Africa, I have been meaning to post several small interesting pictures we have collected since the last one.

These are pretty much all unrelated tid bits, but I felt the need to write “something” since I haven’t written for so long.

 

 

This picture was taken of the toilet in our old house.  Not entirely a rare occurrence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Every year there is a huge event sponsored by some of the worlds largest companies.  Its is called the Toyota Dessert Race and it’s a two-day, 1000 Kilometer race that starts and ends in a tiny (and I mean tiny!) village just 30 minutes from our house.  I spent a night camping there with some work associates and got a close up view of some of the cars.  It was an exciting event and the amount of dust everyone was eating would blow your mind.

This is thorn tree (like a hawthorn) and I can’t imagine how these people got to the top of this tree!  They were watching the cars zoom by below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you all know,  I was denied my request for a pet goat.  That being said,  I have found a satisfactory sense of companionship in the many short-lived (literally) chickens that enjoy feeding from my hand in exchange for leaving their droppings on my front porch.

John-and-his-chickens

 

 

 

 

You probably didn’t hear, but George Bush (Junior) came to Botswana to promote a project he and his wife Laura are doing for Cervical Cancer.  They chose a small village near our home and a select group of Peace Corps Volunteers were asked to attend the small ceremony and meet and greet with the ex-pres. Since I was a veteran I was invited, along with several others who were from the state of Texas; all in hopes of making Mr. Bush feel more…well… at home. It was an interesting meeting and I got to shake his hand a few times and chat for a few moments about what I am doing in the PC and about my fun in Air Force Basic Training a few years back. I’m the hippie in the front row, on the left.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In case you have never been to Molepolole, Botswana, Africa, these are some typical landscape scenes from around our home. Double click them to enlarge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the Fabulous Gaborone (the one and only “city” in Botswana) Skyline.  Not much to look at, but gives you an idea what we see on those infrequent trips to “the city”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And last and probably least…. some resourceful use of old tires.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for your indulgence!

 

 

I was asked to attend a 10 day Youth Forum funded by the World Bank and the U.N.  The Forum has gone on for 15 years.  Its purpose was to help orphan and vulnerable children deal with emotional and economic issues facing the youth today, specifically as it relates to HIV/AIDS.

Five students from my school were selected to attend.  Everyone agreed I would go as the teacher from my school with responsibility for the children.

The Ministry holds the Forum at a middle school that boards students.  This year the school was in a very small village about 2 hours from my house.  Many of Botswana’s middle schools and high schools are boarding schools because the population is very sparse in rural areas.  The boarding schools make for great accommodations for Forums or camps when schools are on break.  It isn’t luxury or even comfortable – but it is how half of the teen population lives during the school year.

It was a rough start as it took the Ministry of Education (MoE) 14 hours to deliver me and the students to a village 2 hours away.  We mostly sat on a school parking lot waiting for MoE to find buses to take us.  The original buses had canceled when they learned the last hour of the trip was on a gravel road that many thought to be impassable.

After that, the first 8 days were pretty good, with the standard Botswana hiccups (they always say hiccups instead of problems) including being way behind schedule, running low on food except porridge, and lack of structure and oversight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, the facilitators were good, and the content of what the children were being taught was well-developed.   Two or three dance parties a day would break out.  Entertainment included two talent shows, traditional dancing, and movies every night.  There was a mobile dental office and each child got a chance to have his/her teeth cleaned and cavities filled.  They also received free toiletries including roll on deodorant.

Many kids popped the ball off the deodorant, and used the little ball to play soccer.  It is amazing the types of things these kids can turn into toys and amusement.

However – day 8 started an unforeseeable nightmare.  Several children, including a student I was responsible for watching, became “possessed by a demon”.  One of the formerly “normal”  facilitators became possessed also and we learned another facilitator believed she was a messenger from God and could help cut the connections to the demons.  While that concept is bizarre beyond words, what was even more inexplicable is how the teachers, conference leadership, and trained psychologist all went along with the whole demon scene.  Children were screaming “The Prince of Darkness is here and people will die”.  They were flailing, and inconsolable.  Other children were terrified they too were going to be initiated to Satan.

I was with 3 other PCVs and we were all somewhere between utter disbelieve, fear for our own safety, and complete helplessness.  We called or reached out to other PCV friends, work acquaintances, and PC Staff.  Needless to say – the incidents were not really explainable on the phone and most people were making a joke of  the incident or simply didn’t realize how bad it was.  Imagine being a character in the Crucible by Arthur Miller (about the Salem witch trials).  In retrospect I can see that I was in a Group-Think situation.

I found this definition of Group-Think on the internet:  Group-Think is a term to describe a group unwilling to think outside of the overall consensus of the herd, many times it is out of a lack of drive or ambition to ask original questions to arrive at genuine answers.  But more importantly – and dangerously – it is also an occurrence that spawns from the fear of looking foolish in front of peers.

Religion and Politics are forms of Group-Think.  Words such as “Faith” and “Patriotism” are also words for “blind submission”.

The other PCV’s left at various points though out the day when they could no longer tolerate the irrational behaviour that looked very very harmful to the children. But I didn’t think I could leave because I was the parental authority for one of the afflicted children.

The administers and teachers called a pastor to “deliver” the children.  While this process occurred the manager of  the Youth Forum called a meeting with the adults (teachers, facilitators, psychiatrist, and Ministry of  Education Administrators).  The manager was speaking about demons being everywhere.  I asked everyone (30 adults, many with advanced education)  in the room if they all had the same beliefs and the only people who answered said they did.  One Ministry official did remind the group it was against policies to be engaging in these types of “delivery” actions, and he didn’t think the group was adequately trained to deal with this.  He was ignored and later people talked of him asking us all to turn a blind eye.

When he had finished, the pastor reported to the group that all students had been “delivered.”  Later the teachers called the possessed children into our meeting and asked them to confess that they were Satanist, explain how they were initiated, if they had initiated anyone else, and confirm that they were delivered.

The manager brought in the students to ask the students to confess that had been possessed, to tell us how they got initiated, if anyone else was initiated, and to assure us that they were delivered.

Three of the four students confessed.  My student was crying that she was not a Satanist and refused to confess.  But the crowd just got more and more angry with her refusal.   I asked many many times if I could take her home, but I needed them to give transport.  I was never allowed to take her home.  I also could not get a hold of the girl’s mother.  Eventually I told the girl she needed to confess to leave the room.  I told her it was ok – she and I would both know the truth and the confession wouldn’t really matter.

After all 4 had finally confessed, all the adults were relieved and they went back to their rooms to pray late into the night.  The next day everyone assured me the child had accepted Jesus Christ, prayed, read the bible and now everything was absolutely fine.  But it wasn’t.

It started over again near evening the next day.

The accusations, delivery, and confessions went on for two days and nights.  The students were completely irrational, accusing other students of being Satanist and saying things like “a sacrifice was going to made – a child would have to be sacrificed”.  No one could make sense of any of their stories.

It went on and on and on. Finally, the teachers took the students somewhere where we PCVs could not follow.  We talked with Peace Corps staff again and we agreed that there was nothing more the we could do to help, protect or document the incidence and we should go home.  We sat together stupefied for hours.

I wrote a 10 page report that I handed in to the school.  If anyone I know should read this report you would laugh (or cry hysterically) at the ridiculousness and not believe that any of this happened.  I can barely believe it happened myself.

A great deal of the time the adults there were telling me and other PCV’s that white people and America’s simply cannot understand the African culture.  They said America was built entirely on Christian principles and doesn’t have  the history of spirits that existed before Christianity came to Africa.  (I guess the Native American religions don’t count.  This concept also does not acknowledge that many founding fathers were Deist and Freemasons and other similar non-Christians.   But I am digressing.)

After I wrote my report I met with PC staff and they assured me this was abnormal, especially for a government sponsored and internationally funded activity, and they said they would try to address these issues with the manager of the Forum and her boss.

I also met with the School Head – who often disappoints me – but he did not disappoint me this time.

He took my report to the Regional Education Office and is working through the system to get this issue addressed.  He also assured me the behavior is not something all African people believe and those that do believe these things are not allowed to impose their beliefs at school activities.  My counterpart and other school management at my school affirmed the School Heads assertions.

This was one of the very worst moments in my life when I could see utter and complete injustice and ignorance be pushed on vulnerable children.    I felt so very very helpless.

I find that new and different cultures get harder and harder to understand the more you are immersed.  Before I came to Africa I read everything I could about the culture and one of the constant struggles is convincing people they have HIV/AIDS instead of a curse.  There are many widespread believes in witch craft, spells, and curses.  I was so relieved to find Botswana far advanced of this issue shortly after I got in my village.

I have now learned that while Botswana is advanced, it has not detached itself entirely from the issues of   evil spirits, demons, witches, and curses yet.  Being an outsider, (a “protected” American) has kept this issue from my life here until now.

Now, I am trying to focus primarily on the sizable number of people who have encouraged me to file my report, become educated to the issue and help the students and teachers at my school to fight this type of socialization, rather than the bizarre events that occurred at the Forum.   I am very happy there is written policy forbidding this type of action that many officials know about and think should be enforced.  I truly hope the Ministry of Education employees who allowed and encouraged these Satanic events will be re-educated or re-directed in their work (no one ever gets fired here).  If I can play any role in that I will feel purposeful in my work here.

In summary:  We are rarely out after dark, but I now see that there are other things besides drunks and criminals that need to be negotiated during the darkness.