Kruger, Work, Guns, and More

Again, swamped by work, adventures and lack of internet, I've been unable to be as eager as wanted but here's another post.

These past few weeks have been consumed with the testing event that I'm organizing. The first meeting was a disaster: I asked just about everyone in the district involved with HIV to help me with the event, and these professionals seemed like they had no desire in helping and had no idea what was going on. There were literally points during the meeting when there was 10 minutes of silence. Thankfully, awkwardness can be blamed on being foreign and I was able to find a couple of interested people with the Ministry of Health and we're slowly getting together and helping to get this thing going. Its hard because I've really come to encounter the African work ethic. Things take a long time here, I understand that. But the problem is that everyone shows up late. I hosted a meeting this last week at 10am... 1 person arrived on time, but 20 others came in by 11. I understand work ethic culture, but showing up late is rude, especially with a culture obsessed with politeness, where entire conversations can be made in Sesotho just saying "Mr" and "Hello", in a competition between the politest tones. Anyway, I'm running the event and its a lot of work but I'll keep the updates coming. The other work this is that the final list for the kids coming to Camp Mamohato (the HIV camp this january) has been made (finally). I've been driving all around the capital and then out to Mafetang to get the list finalized. The problem is that the infrastructure is so bad. Normally, if you had a patient you'd just call them up but half the kids have no contact information to give and lots of them miss appointments. The patients in Mafetang have been really difficult. There are no books or systems recording the kids there, and when I visited on Monday to ask, a fourteen year old girl had died in the last few days. I guess that's not something that regular camp has to worry about, the campers dying before they get a chance to go. The brightside is that at least this camp will make a difference. Accounts from last year tell of kids who would never take their medicine, to kids completely transformed, happy and ready to beat HIV.

Now for the fun stuff:
Two weekends ago the Baylor docs and I went to the Morija Arts and Cultural Festival, which is 45 minutes outside of Maseru. This is the big event... basically in all of Lesotho. Its lots of shops and singers from Lesotho but really it felt pretty shady and haphazardly thrown together. We drove past the hustle and bustle of Maseru through the dry roads to Morija and we arrived to find plenty of people staring us down. I think they didnt expect to see many Americans at this thing but it ended up being pretty fun. As we entered the event, hundreds of vendors shouted to come to their stalls, which all sold meat on a stick, so we weren't entirely too excited about it. We got to the centre grounds and we stopped off at a art stall, which actually only sold things from Swaziland, but everything was dirt cheap and beautiful. The festival was at this old camp grounds area and it was the weirdest experience, the feeling was definitely a bit southern American with an African twist. Unfortunately most of the Basotho there were pretty drunk but they provided entertainment as they rocked out to the music, with using their billowing Basotho blankets to further express their enjoyment of the event. We had a great time just walking around, getting in the sites and being yelled at constantly to come eat some meat on a stick from about fifty people. God, I don't want some damn meat on a stick!

We left the festival early. I learned from several expats that the party gets going at 12 midnight and goes on till six am, but I had fun before the real action started. Oh crazy Africa. The weekend after that I was able to get up to Kruger National Park. I went up with Baylor's visiting scholars, who were pushing to get there because they're on a rotating schedule and only get to be in Lesotho for a month each. So it was Dan (4th year med school student), Nina (fourth year resident in med peds) and Sachin (also a fourth year resident, and also Princeton '01). The drive up went relatively smoothly, nine hours north, and we decided to go to Crocidle bridge, which is the southern and eastern most part of the park, literally 10 minutes from the Mozambique border. The border getting out of Lesotho was ridiculous, which postponed our trip for an hour and 45 minutes. They had one person serving a line-up of 200 people. And each person took 5 minutes to interrogate. Even 10 year olds were taking forever to get the visa stamp, I have no idea why, I think 10 year olds in Africa have better things to do than to smuggle drugs. It seems like the most frustrating part of Lesotho is the bureaucratic standstill that always seems to happen with everything: health, building construction.. the border. After waiting for an hour in one line we were moved to another and waited again. We were happy to say goodbye to Lesotho.

The drive up was beautiful and one thing that I really do love about South Africa is that the countryside changes a lot. North of Johannesburg it becomes much more tropical and lush and a nice change from the Iowa looking south.

We arrived in Kruger around 6pm and got to the house we rented. It was absolutely beautiful. Less than 200$ total for the weekend, and for a massive beautiful house (read: the bar was in the bedroom. wow). Since arriving the South African rand has fallen a lot... from 7R for a buck american to 10 R. So I'm actually really enjoying that aspect of Africa. Anyway, we arrived too late to enjoy the park on the Friday, so we booked a safari guide to bring us around the park. It was really nice because we were in this big open vehicle and the guide would tell us all about the animals and their social behaviors. So we woke up at 415 in order to see them during their prime eating time... It was freezing cold but literally we drove into a pack of zebras and giraffes, just in the first five minutes. The tour was long... 10 hours during the day but we saw lots...rhinos, packs of elephants, even a pair of lions (which arent all that exciting because they sleep 20 hours a day) but it was amazing and we definitely got to see a lot of the park. We were actually pretty exhausted from the day, so we did a quick night tour as our final farewell to Kruger. The tour was actually hilarious.... with the guide this time saying: "This is a zebra. It has stripes". We slept in the next morning after a long day and drove back to Maseru.

On the way we decided to take a different route back home and got to go through Swaziland. Swaziland is basically the opposite of Lesotho... its lush and well... beautiful in a tropical sort of way. We got to weave through the high mountains as we made the quick detour but on the way, we read about the history of the place. Basically its the last absolute monarchy in the world. The King has officially banned political parties and well... 40% of the population has HIV. So despite it being a beautiful place.. .I'm not too sure if I'd want to live there. Woot woot Lesotho!

So the trip back wasnt all too exciting but after an intense safari and 18 hours of driving during the weekend, i was ready to unwind. Unfortunately that wasnt in the cards. I was driving back home after dropping off one of the travellers and was continuing down a winding road... I heard a strange whistle from someone behind me. I attributed it to nothing and countinued on to a pack of men and a couple of cars, warning lights flashing. I decided perhaps this was a sticky situation so I stopped and tried to reverse but someone runs up beside the car with a gun in hand. I'm in Africa, its dark, I'm a prissy white ivy leaguer and a man is running up to my car with a gun... Wasnt too happy about that combination. I'm pretty sure I said: "he's got a f***ing gun" about twenty times... the passengers told me to shut up and remain calm. The man came up and acted coy and didnt say much. I thought he was just stalling, waiting till I gave him money. I was about to reach for my walet (again... probably not a good idea) but then another gun weilding man ran up. He yelled at us: "You, take your car and park over there". Of course he had a gun so he was boss and I did what he said. A third gun man ran up and told us: "We are the police. There has been a carjacking recently. Get out of here". Of course he didnt have to repeat that for me to get out of that situation so I stepped on it and wheeled off. The whole situation really frightened me because it was just so confusing. Either they were lying and I was lucky, or they were the police.. perhaps undercover because they werent wearing any uniforms and had no police cars. But the fact that someone had just been carjacked 15 minutes earlier wasnt a nice thought either. Either way, after being yelled at by a gun man and thinking I was about to get robbed, I got a reality check that I was in Africa. I've been informed of all the bad areas of the city and have been directed to plow down anyone in my way. With pleasure. Windows up and doors locked at all times, despite the fact that Lesotho is now becoming a hot african country. Hopefully I'll continue to be lucky.. woot woot not so much Lesotho.

Anyway the trip was great despite the little incident and speaking of Swaziland, this week Smita, Sachin and I had a dinner party with some of Smita's Swazi friends. It was actually a really interesting and hilarious experience. The topic of conversation? American politics. It was actually really interesting to hear their thoughts about what was going on and they seemed much more informed than me actually.... joking about the possibilty of Sarah Palin becoming president. And them "knowing Obama" because "he was one of them". So even though theyre from a country that doesnt allow voting for a leader, they were interested in everything that was going on thousands of miles away in the US.

These last weeks have seen the continuation of our Sesotho lessons. The lessons are actually lots of fun and the three teachers that we have are ridiculous. They break down the lessons quite well. The first was just making sure that we were saying the words correctly. To say "Lumela" (hello) she would grab our throats and make sure that we had the proper raspyness... and for hantle (good) she would pinch our mouths to make sure we had the click at the end of the word. The teachers are also hilarious and put on little skits for us to describe Basotho culture. Because the language lessons are centred around the PAC doctors, we use a lot of vocabulary from medical situations. On Wednesday they described how Basotho people feel about doctors. Basically a doctor can away with murder as long as they are wearing a white coat and a stethoscope, and someone who isnt wearing that is just a "student" or can't get a job in the US. So despite feeling professional for shaving or ironing my shirt when I go to work, I'm thinking the Basotho think I'm just some wash-up from the US. Anyway, the teachers were explaining the respect that they give doctors and that in the doctors offices the translators or janitors that happen to be there are referred to as "nurse pinks". Nurse pinks, are "the worst people in Basotho culture". Supposedly they are easedroppers and they are overly assertive and dont mind their own business, something I guess that is not appreciated in Lesotho. The teachers did a skit where the doctor and the patient were talking and the nurse pink in the background is trying to listen in. Very funny plays we've got going and I guess I'm learning something about Basotho culture.

So at the moment I'm just enjoying a lazy sunday, writing a bit and watching movies. Yesterday was pretty jam packed. We had teen club with the younger kids and we painted masks to reflect how people can stigmatize kids because of their HIV status. The experience was a bit trying, try to get these kids to talk about how people stigmatize them, all using paint. But we were able to touch a few kids, with one of the kids painting his mask blue (respresenting his HIV status) and black (his strength). So it was kind of cool. What a little poet. Next we had some professionals to come in and talk about their jobs. We had a doctor, social worker, teacher, etc. The first guy was a singer and he broke out with the best song. In Sesotho, q is a click sound (something like from the jungles of Papua New Guinea) and he wrote an entire song full of clicks... so even for a foreigner it was a good time and the kids absolutely loved it. The whole point was to remind the kids that despite their HIV status, they have futures and they can dream to grow up and work and become something.

Last night we went out to the Maseru Club for a going away party for one of the directors of the UN. It was kind of frustrating because as a white person, I wasnt being served at this place, which was considered to be a classy upscale Basotho bar. I guess I now know what it feels like to be discriminated against. Oh and have a gun in my face. Woot woot. The night was fun anyway... I met the director of the top honors film in the Lesotho Film Festival (from Vienna) and the head of the French society in Lesotho (who I got to practice my rusty French with). So despite being in the middle of Lesotho, I am meeting lots of different people. The following weeks will involve lots more work and hopefully a trip to Durban.

Until then,

Sala Hantle (Stay Well),

Stuart

And someone leave a comment. come on.