Phil Curtis peace corp update

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Jon Manss
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Phil Curtis peace corp update

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Phil is in Zambia as a peace corp volunteer. He has asked me to keep the clan updated. Here are his first tales of his adventure.


Natupalwa ne Mfula

Years ago, as we sat waiting for waves on the Big Island, it suddenly started to rain. An old Hawaiian man had been watching us surf, sitting on his board just outside the reef. As the shower strengthened, the sun’s rays slanting through it, he raised his arms and smiled and said,

“We are blessed”

I am reminded of that time today.
The process of getting here took months. But after the forms had been filled out, the documents faxed, the shopping done, it was at last down to the week before leaving. Family and friends had contacted me. There were many words, of both concern and encouragement. Some couldn’t understand why I was doing this. Others were excited for me, anticipating my adventures. All wished me well. There were gatherings, dinners, phone calls, parties, last surf sessions, last walks around the golf course. These were people I wouldn’t see for over two years.
The last morning before leaving, I drove up the north coast to my favorite spots.....knowing full well that the conditions were all wrong for surfing. I just wanted one more look. The wind in my face as I watched the large swells crumble and crash onto the cliffs below, the pelicans soaring by, the bobcat in the field, the coyote on the road.....these were the images I took with me as I came to this land-locked country.
Within minutes of taking off, leaving the west coast behind, the land below turned white. It stayed white across the entire country. We touched down in Denver.....I saw nothing but a mile radius of flat runways, mounded snow, and more of it being blown horizontally past my window. We de-iced and took off, the last flight out before they closed the airport.
Philadelphia was icy too. I met the rest of our Africa-bound group. We slipped and slid our way around town.....going for cheese steaks, to the clinic for inoculations, to visit the Liberty Bell. We had to leave early, on the bus to New York, to get out before the storm closed the city.
The next morning, shuttles carried us and our gear across the sloped, iced-over thirty yards from the hotel lobby to our bus. It was a short anxious drive to JFK.....cars and white everywhere.......the wheels pulled to the curb of the international departure area, accompanied by a communal sigh of relief.
Now it hit us. As we watched our luggage, labeled for the Peace Corps office in Lusaka, disappear past those hanging rubber curtains on the conveyer belts, it hit us. We were leaving.....for another place, for a long time.
The flight was the flight.....long, not much sleep, a few glasses of wine with meals, some conversation. We followed our flight path on the cabin screen, noting how we briefly entered the air space over western Africa in the dark, before crossing more ocean toward the coast of Angola. The sun popped up quickly as we headed toward it, to illuminate the dry hills, valleys, and escarpments below us. This didn’t look like home at all.
Our layover in Johannesburg was brief. We wandered, through the daze and confusion of jet-lag, through the shops of the airport mall. People looked and talked differently here. It was warm.
It was too dark on the short hop north to Lusaka to see much, but the many lights below us, as we descended over the city, looked to be coming from fires.....lots of small fires.
The Southern Cross lay on its side, just over the horizon, as we bussed into town. We grabbed our bags from the pile in the parking lot, had a brief orientation meeting, then headed up to our rooms, a cold shower and the first real night’s sleep in three days.
We soon learned about mosquito nets and malaria pills.....I’m still waiting for the vivid dreams to start. The Peace Corps Zambia staff have all been very friendly and encouraging.....it’ll take a while to learn all their names.
So now it’s Sunday, and we’re at the Peace Corps office for a “ringing in” ceremony. Each of us trainees will ring a bell to signify our intention to work as volunteers in Zambia. We will hear speeches from the Country Director, the U.S. Ambassador to Zambia, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and the Zambian Deputy Minister of Education, all thanking us for coming and encouraging us in our work.. This ceremony is the first of its kind for Peace Corps Zambia.....a very big deal. The timing is appropriate, as the agency celebrates it 50th anniversary next month. It’s our starting point as well.
The thing is, it’s the rainy season here. This is the time of year when the locals count on showers to help the maize crop mature. There’s been no rain though, not since we arrived. This has been cause for concern on the part of Zambians we have met. No rain.
That is, not until now. Just as the dignitaries are seated and the speeches are to start, it comes. It comes in buckets. The sun is still shining through, but it is pouring .Everyone has moved toward the center of the canopy, away from the curtains of water falling along its edges, and the mistress of ceremonies has come to the podium with a huge smile.
“In Zambia, the rain is called mfula, and we say that we are blessed when it comes. This is truly a wonderful start to this ceremony. We are blessed.”
Zambia is about as far away from Hawaii as one can get. It seems, though, that some things ring true for both.. It is nice to realize that, as we end our journey to get here and start our journey living here.
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and another

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And a further accounts



Bashikulu

Man, it's a maze in here. Let's see now. After leaving the boma, I turn left onto the wide trail just past the last structure, follow it through the small plots of head-high corn, sweet potatoes and plowed ground until I see the mango trees just ahead. Then I pedal left onto the small path and follow it across the other wide trail to.....oops, I'm in somebody's yard.
The family looks up, amused to see a helmeted musungu in their midst.
"Njeleleniko, I'm lost."
We all laugh. I go back to the wide trail, take a left and follow it to the next trail, take a right and.....I'm home. Whew. I'd hate to have to do this in the dark. But then again, neither Peace Corps nor our families want us to be riding around in the dark anyway.
I’ve just come from language class. Our group is learning Bemba (Tulasambilila ifyakulanda Icibemba). Others are learning Nyanja, Lunda, Tonga, or Kaonde, depending on where we will be placed at our sites. Learning Bemba means that I’ll be going somewhere in the Northern, Central or Luapula Provinces.
We all got a preview of what it’s like at the sites. A few days after arriving in Zambia, we were land-cruisered out to various parts of the country for a three-day visit with a working volunteer. Our group took the four-hour jaunt (short by Zambian standards) to Nyimba District (crossing the Luangwa River along the way, keeping an eye out for hippos and crocodiles…..no luck), then left the road at the boma and headed over the dirt to the village of Chief Ndake.
We pitched out tent/hammock outside Tabatha’s thatched mud ing’anda and followed her around as she introduced us to her Zambian family (bataata, bamaayo, abaana), the government basic school and its teachers/students, the Chief and the magistrate. We learned how to get water from the borehole, heat the charcoals in the brazier (imbabula) for hot water and cooked food, squat to relieve ourselves in the icimbusu and take tub baths in the ulusasa. We could see that what might take little time back in the States, like cooking, bathing, washing clothes, will take up a significant part of our lives here. We could also see that we’ll need to be comfortable with dirt. The words I had read before leaving home, from the blog of a current volunteer, came back to me:
“It’s like a two-year camping trip.”
By the end of our stay, we could see what that volunteer had meant on her blog, but we could also see that Tabatha seemed quite happy at her site, was living comfortable among the people, corn, animals, trails.
On the way bak to the training center, as we again approached the Luangwa, two baboons chased each other through the bush and onto the road just behind us…..our first encounter with the sort of animal one associates with Africa…..am reasonable certain we’ll see more, once we’re finished with training and move to our sites.
For now, though, ours is a very human pursuit. I live in a 10’ by 15’ blockhouse, a mosquito net over my bed and a water filter in the corner. The house has a door and a 3’ window on one side, small slits like musket holes on the other sides…..it’s dark in there. The roof is corrugated iron, and the walls are of bricks formed from the mud just forty yards away. Home sweet home.
The Luchembe Family is my host, though to them I am bashikulu (grandfather). Bataata, a former soldier, is a security guard for the local generators. Bamaayo is the vice-headwoman for the area. She helps mediate disputes among the villagers. The kids and grandkids (theirs, that is….so I suppose they’re my grand- and great-grandkids) total fifteen, as near as I can discern, with all the explaining and coming and going. They range in age from little Naomi, at five months, to Colins, who lives up north in the Copperbelt and is somewhere in his twenties.
The Luchembes are wonderful…..so patient with my cultural faux paus (you don’t smell the food, you avoid eye contact to show respect) and my neonatal Bemba. As far as I can tell, I have not yet butchered a word to the point where it came out as something rude, though my hosts are so respectful that they probably wouldn’t let me know if I did.
I’m fed at home three times a day, plus whatever we eat at the Training Center in Chalimbana. If I don’t get fat here (which I’m told I must do, as old fat men get the most respect), my fate as an ectomorph is firmly sealed. Meals almost always consist of ubwali, which is made from cornmeal and kneaded into a very thick porridge-like ball. Often soya flakes are present too. They’re really good….like a very solid tofu that takes on the flavor of whatever sauce or spice is added to it. There will be a relish (umunani) of sliced, cooked cabbage or sweet potato, cassava, or pumpkin leaves. There will be fish, eggs, or chicken as well. You take the ubwali into your hand, form it into a ball, then dent it on one side to scoop the meat and relish. You might scoop up a chili sauce or meat juice as well. Then you pop the lot into your mouth…..fyawama saana!
As grandfather, I sometimes eat alone. It’s better, though, when bataata, bamaayo, or one of the kids joins me. I’m still mostly eating alone, while they watch, but at least we can talk. They will eat before or after, in another room.
The Training Center, where we learn about Zambian schools and our jobs in relation to them, local African culture, health and safety issues for us here, how to help with the HIV/AIDS pandemic and how to promote food security, is seven kilometers down a rutted, rocky, loose-sand-over-hardpack road. It’s a bit of a challenge to bike there and back…..I’m getting more fit by the day. Each of us has a brand new Trek mountain bike, complete with lock and toolkit. They’re really good bikes. I’m starting to realize that they need to be…..those wide tires, strenghthened rims and frames, racks and fenders aren’t just to look cool. The real test will come when it’s pouring and the road turns to red mud, or when we’re twenty km from our site, cycling to (or from) some school in the bush and get a flat. The experienced volunteers just say:
“Yeah, it happens. You just have to suck it up and get creative.”
I am by far the oldest member of my training group. The only ones who even come close are 41 and 31 respectively. The rest are in their early-mid twenties. They seem to appreciate my comment as an older guy and a former volunteer though. In some ways, I’m the grandfather there too.
Some things we’ve learned so far:
--We probably already have the malaria parasite inside us, but it’s controlled by our weekly pill and can be eradicated from our blood by other pills if symptom start to show.
--A good way to cut back on Sunday clothes washing time is to just use the water and soap in the tub after you’ve had your bath. You just strip down, bath, throw in the clothes you wore that day, scrub and…..done deal. They’ll dry on the line in the sun here in a couple of hours.
--80% of the volunteers don’t need significant treatment by the Peace Corps medical staff.
--The typical Zambian government school classroom has desks, chairs, a blackboard, chalk, 40-50 students, and sometimes newsprint charts on the walls .That’s pretty much it.
--A form of intimacy here involves each partner shaving the other’s body hair. They put the hair into a special receptacle and hide it, because if anyone else gets it, they can use it for witchcraft. The same goes for unwashed underwear.
--borehole water is safe to drink after going through our filters, especially if it was boiled first. Steam water might need iodine tablets as well.
--I won’t be swimming much. Schistosomiasis is prevalent in freshwater lakes and streams here. The larval forms of the blood fluke worm which cause it live in freshwater, will penetrate human skin, and head for the lungs, liver, and veins of the abdomen. The good news is that symptoms take years to develop and there’s a med you can use to get rid of it.
--Zambian kids are very well mannered at school. They say, “yes, mother” and “yes, father” to their teachers, and they stand up when an adult enters the room.
--If a lizard lands on a woman, she’s pregnant. There are lizards all over the walls here.
--Many volunteers have been successful getting villagers to correctly and consistently use condoms. The topic just needs to be approached slowly and through the appropriate people of influence in the village.
--There are snakes around, many of them poisonous. The black momba is particularly so. Not many people see them though. They kill them when they do.
--Cold beer is available in many of the bomas (towns within 20-30 km of our sites), and it’s OK to drink in the lodges. There might even be wine.
So anyway, I’ve been successfully navigating the maze through the maize to my block-home. I’ll have a quick ubwali-with-relish-with ?? for lunch, then cycle off to the Training Center for more sessions. It feels like we’ve already settled into a schedule, though that will change radically when we go out to our sites in a couple of months. Lots of language, culture, and skills to learn yet. The fun has really just begun. I will try to uphold my status as grandfather.
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Post by skansand »

Enjoyed reading this .... what an adventure Phil ! inspirational... I remember you had the grandfather aura at Jon Mans house party aswell...
Tide is the master, tide can be a disaster...-Dub side of the Moon
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Post by KEL »

VOLUNTEER..............SHOULD BE IN CAPS.........THANK YOU PHIL
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Phil Curtis update

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Another addition to Phils encounters
                                                   Off the Grid
 
    I’ve got this thing…..paid 20 bucks for it on eshopper.com (or whatever).  It’s a box with a solar panel on top and will charge AA, AAA, C, D, and other batteries just by setting it out in the sun.  Amazing…..and it’s saved my butt many times already.  When you’re walking down a narrow trail in the dark, in snake country, you don’t want your headlamp to crap out.  When you want to catch up on world news, you really don’t want your shortwave radio to die.  If you’re listening to your favorite tunes on the MP3 player or discman, it’s a drag if everything shuts down.  I’m telling you, this thing is important.
    We volunteers have various versions of the same general idea.  There are the radios and lanterns with solar panels on them.  There are the triple-panel cloverleaf arrangements that trap and store the sun’s energy for later use.  There are the fold-out sheets of panels that concentrate light energy to charge batteries in phones, music systems, and computers.  Then there’s my box.  If you’re living off the grid, these are all viable options.
    And we will be living off the grid, or at least one of them.  If we’re lucky, there will be a house in our village with a generator.  The owner will fire it up, for a fee, to charge our cell phones (yes, even in the bush there are cell phone towers.  You may have to find the right anthill to climb to tree to stand under, but the chances are you’ll get a bar or two of reception.   No wires, no wall plugs, no streetlight, but the phones work…..go figure).
    At the Center, there’s one slab of cement in the grass, just outside the main insaka.  It’s far enough from any trees so that it’s baked by the sun all day.  During our sessions, we all have our solar devices on that slab.  It’s a little strange to look out from the insaka, to the dirt roads, water tanks, and simple architecture of a developing nation, and see that one space covered in brightly-colored examples of frontline technology.   Of course, nature will have the last say…..any sign of rain and we all rush out to grab our devices from the clutches of short-circuiting H2O.
    When the sun shines here, it shines brightly…..probably has to do with the fact that it’s more directly overhead here in the tropics and that, at  a couple of thousand above sea level, there’s less atmosphere to filter it out.  Clothes hung on a line will dry in just a couple of hours of cloudless midday sunlight.  On that slab, my little box will charge two AAA batteries in about an hour.  The other devices might take longer, but then they’re storing a lot more energy.
    For instance, we each received a solar lantern.  This thing is great.  The top puts out light in all directions, or you can switch on a flashlight beam at the bottom.  It even has a bug zapper option…..the thing puts out a dim blue glow that draws in the flying critters to the wires and zzzzzzzzzzzfffttttt……charcoal.  To charge it, you just leave it in the sun for half a day, and you’ve got a few hours of light to read, bathe, or crap by.
    One thing about that lantern, though…..it goes, goes, goes, then, suddenly, it’s done.  No warning, the light just goes out.  It’s kind of the same thing wit rechargeable batteries.  They’ll power your device fine, but when they fade, they fade quickly.  Batteries are hard to replace, even if you have them, in the dark.  So it’s good to have back-up.  Here’s where the hand-cranked versions come in handy.  A few turns on the little dynamo light and you’ve got enough illumination to finish up at the pit toilet, navigate out of the bathing area without crashing through a grass wall, or finish a chapter of your book under the mosquito net.  A minute’s cranking on the emergency radio and you’ve got music or news.  This is fantastic.  Radios don’t take a lot of juice, so a little bit of cranking goes a long way.  
    What would really be cool is a little hand-cranked headlamp…..haven’t seen one of those.  It could have a handle that folds out from the back of the thing, gets cranked, then folds back in, out of the way.  It would work best if it had a really efficient storage cell in it though.  At this stage, the lamp would have to be pretty big to hold enough energy to light the bulbs for long.  Dang…..we need better terchnology!!
    …..this said by a guy who’s about to go into the bush for two years.  To a place where the main sources of energy after dark are candles and charcoal.  To a place where most go to sleep by 9 pm (21 hours).  A place where people have been happily living for centuries.  Hmmm…..this off-the-grid thing actually doesn’t sound too bad.  Maybe I’ll just stick with what I’ve already got.
   
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And again

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                                                 Ilinso ne Icisa
                                           (The Eye of the Fetus)
 
    Site announcement day was awaited with some anticipation.  This was the day we would each find out where we would be spending two years of our lives in Zambia.  Because of the specific language we were studying, we each knew which  general regions of the country we could be headed for, and we had been allowed input, through various interviews with Peace Corps staff, about our preferences.  Mine had been for as cold a place as possible, one that was near water, and I didn’t mind if it was isolated.  The question was, how much of our input would be heard?  We all had picked the brains of volunteers we met, asked the staff about the various parts of the country whenever given the chance.  Based on what we’d heard, we had each made a wish list.  Today was the day to find out.
    Lucky packet #7 was handed to me, my name written on the outside, on a corner.  I opened it and pulled the paper out slowly.
                 CONGRATULATIONS, PHIL.  Your site is KATANSHYA
                       (OK, great……where the heck is Katanshya?)
                                          SANFYA DISTRICT
                                    (??…..don’t know that one either)
                                       LUAPULA PROVINCE                  
(!!!!…..that one I know.  It’s north and east of Lusaka, not far from DR Congo, and it’s
                        supposed to have lots of water…….yes!!)
    After the initial hubbub died down, we all moved to the outside wall of the dining room, to a map of the country.  I was at the back of the crowd, waiting my turn to zero in on the map, when the APCD approached me with a smile: “Well, Phil, you got your water.”    
    Katanshya is so small that it’s not named on the map, but they’d stuck a post-it note where the village sits.  I could see Samfya boma, about 30 km to the west.  The thing, the big thing, that stood out was this…..that sticker was right on the coast of Lake Bangweulu.  If you look at a map of Africa, Zambia has the shape of a fetus curled up in the womb.  Right about where the eye of the fetus would be is a lake.  That’s Lake Bangweulu.  It’s huge, it’s water, and I was stoked!
    The next day, we each met with our bosses-to-be.  Mine is the Head Teacher of Katanshya Basic Government School.  For two days, we talked about the role of a Peace Corps volunteer in a village.  I learned from Ba Moses that Katanshya Zone includes 14 schools and that they’re interested in help with math, science, and especially English…..right up my alley.  Though I tried to get more information about the lake and its surrounds, it wasn’t really the right time to be asking.  That would come soon.
    Four days later, we were stuffed into multiple Land Cruisers that fanned out from Lusaka to all parts of Zambia, each of us packed for a five-day preliminary visit to our individual sites.  It was a ten-hour trip to Samfya, and one of our few opportunities, thus far, to view the Zambian countryside.  The road was mostly flat and straight, with people walking/biking along it pretty much every step of the way.  For the first few hundreds of kilometers,  the bush was thick with grasses, acacia-like trees, and others I couldn’t identify.  Next we moved across savannah and past a national park…..saw two kudu, their three-foot-long antlers spiraling vertically.  Then we started to see water.  Dambos (swamps) appeared on either side.  We crossed the “longest bridge in Africa” at Mukuku, near the headwaters of the Luapula River, and proceeded north through open country to  Mansa, where we spent the night. The next day, we drove to Samfya.  From there, we followed the shores of the lake, 31 km of dirt road to Katanshya.
     Lake Bangweulu is big water.  We looked over reeds near the shore, men stand-up paddling their dugout canoes through them, to water that stretched to a landless horizon.  I was to later discover that it’s so big that, from the middle, “you can’t see where you are going or where you came from (taulemona ukobaleya na ukobalefuma).”  It only goes to about 11 meters deep and is full of fish.
    I was dropped off first.  Ba Gershom, who is the Zonal Inservice Coordinator, met us as the Cruiser pulled into the schoolyard.  He directed us to my newly-built house, which was just having the finishing touches added to it by the PTA chairman…..lockable wooden doors for the windows.  The house is a typical one for the area, with walls of brick made from local mud, smeared on the inside with lime, and a thatched roof.   It has a front porch, which will be great for when it rains, and a small insaka for greeting guests outside the main house.  There is a combined ulusasa (for bathing)/icibusu(for squatting) nearby, also brand-new with brick walls and thatched roof.
    The Cruiser reversed track, back towards Samfya.  The other two trainees that were to be sited in Samfya District would be dropped off north of town, about 70 and 90 km away, respectively.  For the time being, as I was to find out, I was the only musungu (European) within a radius of 30 km.
    As the Cruiser left, people came over to greet me.  I met Ba Kabonga and Ba Siame, my neighbors.  Ba Gershom suggested that I get settled in at the house and that I think about how to greet the staff and students at the school…..a short speech would be appropriate, he said.  Some students brought over a classroom desk from the school, just across the soccer field from my house, and a chair…..temporary furnishings for this first brief visit.
    I strung my netted hammock between the walls of my bedroom-to-be and sat down to work on the speech.  Basically, I just wanted to greet everyone, introduce myself, and thank them for building me such a fine house.  I wanted to say it all in Bemba, though…..it took a while to get it all together.
    Later, after having met some of the teachers, I stood on the raised front steps of the school to address its entire population.  I’m pretty sure that some of the kids had never seen a musungu before, or at least not one at this close range.  As I walked to the steps, some of them had run away from me, others had come up to touch me, others just stared.
    I looked out over the crowd, through the eucalyptus trees, to the lake beyond.  As I started to speak in Bemba, some of the audience looked confused, others broke into outright laughter.  They all clapped at the end, and I was told it was a good speech.  Maybe someday I’ll learn how much of it was actually comprehensible to them.  
    The day continued with a meeting of many of the Head Teachers from the surrounding schools, to which I repeated my speech.  They seemed especially pleased when I thanked them for building me such a fine house.  I visited a classroom or two and met with Ba Moses and Ba Gershom to discuss the school organization.  The day ended with one of the teachers bringing dinner to me in my house…..ubwali made of mixed cornmeal and cassava, pumpkin leaves, and fish.
    This is a place of fish.  The next days, as we walked along the road, exploring the village, meeting headmen, headwomen, shop-owners, clinic workers, ministers, people would pass on their bikes, baskets laden with fish.  Many were making the hour-and-a-half trek to Samfya to sell them in the market there.  Some were selling fish house-to-house.  Small fish like imensenga and chisense, caught by net and eaten by the dozens per person per meal.  Large ones like umulobe and impende, caught by net or line and cut into steaks for a meal.  Tigerfish, the sport fish that people come to Zambia to catch, come in close enough to be caught from shore at certain times of the year.  They are excellent eating.
    There are crocodiles too, apparently fairly common in this part of the lake.  For certain months each year, many of the men, and sometimes their families, will move to the small islands offshore to set up fish camps.  There are stories of individuals being taken and/or mauled by crocs.  Part of the juju here involves the Crocodile People, humans who change into crocs to attack their enemies in the water.  Many folks around Katanshya include this witchcraft as a part of their reality.
    Ba Gershom was my guide around the village.  We walked to the small local market,  which sits next to a bridge over a small river that leads from Lake Bangweulu to Lake Kampolombo.  It looked like I’d be able to do mid-week shopping there, between trips to the boma at Samfya for bulk items like soya, rice, vegees, wine.  A lot of fishing craft were hauled out next to the shops.  I’ll bet there are times when the fish selection at that market is fantastic.
    We rode our bikes to the schools at Chisuku and Njipi.  There’s a great path, about 10 km along the shore of Lake Kampolombo, to get to them.  Ba Gershom seemed to know just about everyone we passed…..I was introduced to quite a few locals.  This is a path I will probably ride many times, so it was good to see it so well maintained and lined with friendly people.
    After five days, the Land Cruiser came to pick me up.  It felt too soon, like I’d just started to get to know this part of Zambia.  That, of course, was the point of the visit…..for each of us to briefly touch down at our future homes.  Then we would have a base to build on, during our last month of training.
    As we moved across the schoolyard toward the road to the boma, kids running and waving behind us, I got to thinking.  For many of us, the Peace Corps experience, especially back in the days when it was a new program, brought forth images of grass huts way out in the bush and cooking over a fire for two years.  Since then I’d served in a country where I had running water, electricity, wood walls and a  shower.   I’d seen volunteers living in multi-room houses that were wired for TV and internet service.  I’d heard of others living in high-rise apartment complexes.  But this…..this was confirming those original images.  I will be living in a mud hut.  I will be cooking over a fire.  I will be squatting into a hole in the ground.  I will be drawing water from a well and carrying it by bicycle to my house to cook, wash, and bathe.  I’d already done it for five days.  I’d be back to do it for another two years.  This felt like the real deal.  Call me crazy, but I was stoked.
    We were on the road to the boma now, dodging potholes and people.  I looked out over the lake and thought about what I wanted to do when I returned.  Working with the teachers and students, of course…..I already had a few thoughts along those lines.  I would find out more about the clinic, maybe work there.  I would grow a vegetable garden, see about helping with fish ponds.  I would find out about local HIV/AIDS activities and school clubs and how to help with them.  I would explore, explore, explore…..the back shelves at the markets, the side paths, the main road to its terminus some 30 km further into the bush/lakes/swamp, the shores of Lake Bangweulu.  I would fish the lake, from its shores and from the water.  I would find out about the Crocodile People and other local witchcraft.
    OK…..so I knew where I was going now.  We all did.  We’d each visited our future home.  The last month of training would have a different aspect to it because of that.  Everything we would be doing would have a direction.  This whole proposition had become real…..we were going to do this.  I could hardly wait to get back to that village by the lake.    
     
 
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Jimbo
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Post by Jimbo »

This is so cool- thank you for posting!
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Scott
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Post by Scott »

Great account, Phil--I read it with rapt attention. Thanks for posting it, Jon.

Nice to hear about your connection with "propositional truth". That's an important concept to me, but certainly not something I've ever thought about in a mud hut by a huge lake in central Africa!

"Crocodile People"--a good name for spooky locals in the surf, as well as in Lake Bangweulu.
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Jon Manss
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Post by Jon Manss »

He gave me three letters but one didn,t make it through to me. If Bob or Barry got it could they post it.
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JohnS
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Post by JohnS »

Great reading. Thanks for sharing these. I was checking out a map of Zambia, that lake is huge 8)
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