Africa, Meet Mom: Reunion Edition

In exactly two weeks, mother and daughter will be reunited in the land of zebras and sand!

We will embark on a two week adventure that will take us from around southern Botswana to South Africa and finally to Mozambique. The beaches and wildlife are a perk to the main attraction - we will be together! Talk about lighting up a girl's life! I can't wait!

PC Botswana's First All Volunteer Conference

Peace Corps Botswana held its very first all volunteer conference to commemorate 10 years of HIV/AIDS work in country. This was a monumental time for our post and something worth acknowledging on a grand scale.

For three days, all 134 volunteers from across the country gathered together in one of the capital's nicest hotels to share best practices, to coordinate collaborations, and to be briefed on the scope of key issues facing Botswana to date as a means of developing pragmatic solutions and innovative projects.

I am proud to say that the conference was an overwhelming success. It was met with praise by volunteers and distinguished guests alike, both for the content of the sessions and for the overall event. And this is no small feat when your guests include the American Ambassador to Botswana and the heads of many international organizations like the CDC and Baylor Center for Excellence.

I am even more proud because the planning, logistics, and execution of the entire event was entrusted, in large part, to myself and a fellow PCVL. This meant long hours working alongside staff, making calls to representatives from various international and national organizations, meeting with banquet managers at the site, making session plans and outlining evening activities (complete with a "coffee house"!), and stuffing personalized folders and making name tags for every PCV, among other tasks. It was a tireless effort that paid off in spades. I am so grateful to have been given the opportunity to support such a significant event for our post - the very first of its kind. And I am so happy that it was deemed "the best training to date" by PCVs. Because, after all, they're who it was all for!

Young Single Mothers Workshop

We all too often take for granted things that shape who we are. Things like upbringing, presence of supportive caregivers and adults, nutrition, and friends. But what if these things didn't exist in our lives? Or if they were offered in fragments and then taken away from you? What if you were an orphan and raised yourself? There are lessons learned in life that naturally happen in so many of our homes and schools that we don't even recognize. What happens when people don't learn how to communicate effectively or care for their basic needs? I am now much more conscious of that reality, as it is the basis for much of the work I have been doing in the past months. This has given me the opportunity to delve deeper into the issues facing the youth of Botswana, in particular, young women.

Twenty-three young single mothers turned up for the two-day workshop run by one of our implementing partners in a nearby village. I was invited to attend to support the partner and assist in facilitating sessions on self-awareness, self-esteem, and communication. I was joined by two other members of the PCI team and some nurses from the local clinic, who were scheduled to discuss sexual reproductive health and topics on caring for young children.

The workshop was designed to be participatory, encouraging the young women to search for their own solutions and to create a sense of community among those in similar circumstance. As such, activities were collaborative, involving a lot of group work and discussions, and the women were challenged to work through differences in order to create viable options for their collective future. This meant focusing on problem solving, planning, and critical thinking - all of which are often neglected in a country that prides its education system on rote memorization.

Overcoming the challenges of the workshop model was met first with argument and then, in time, with laughter. The latter lead to dialogue that brought great results and the girls began to prosper. It wasn't long before the women were opening up and starting to acknowledge some of their commonalities (something we believe will unite them and give them strength). It was empowering to witness.

In the end, the women made great strides in both their approach to examining and addressing issues, as well as in creating a team among one another. They were able to learn from one another and, thereby teaching them lessons long deprived. What's more, the partner organization gained the experience in facilitating a workshop of this nature and have vowed to follow the women and support them as they work towards implementing some of the activities they decided, as a team, to go for. They are no longer orphans, alone, trying to overcome hardship and raise children. They are together.

This is the sort of sustainable development that we always hope for - the kind where people learn how to help themselves and local organizations gain the skills necessary to support those efforts. I am going to be mentoring this organization for the final months of my contract but I am confident in their ability to continue in this manner. I am just proud to be there to witness it.

"Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are.

When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you."

“There is some good in this world, and it's worth fighting for.”

Even among employees and organizations that are qualified, passionate, and maintain strong values, apathy and atrophy tend to set in from time-to-time. It is a disheartening truth that impacts the quality and amount of work that is able to be done. Sometimes, when these infect a single (but key) person, the ripple effect can be great. These negative attributes, then, can lead to an under-utilization of motivated human resources or a withdrawal of those resources altogether. This is the reality I have been facing.

I have spent the last few months as a stunted version of myself. I have felt somewhat ineffectual in carrying out significant meaningful work within my primary assignment and have struggled to find a way to make a contribution within the confines outlined to me. Simply, I didn't have the freedom to create the change I wanted - and have become accustomed to - and I saw myself falling into professional doldrums.

That is not to say I have been stagnant. Besides my work for Peace Corps (as a Volunteer Leader), I have, in fact, been working on a couple large scale projects that stand to be extremely influential in the future. These include a Life Skills Toolkit and an IECD Resource Pack, both to be published and adopted by the Government of Botswana to strengthen its current National Strategies. Unfortunately, despite my dedication to these efforts, my work was constantly being put on hold in favor of, what seemed to be, waiting around for others to get motivated and involved enough to sign off on my (finished) work. This has caused me great frustration. I hold myself to a certain standard of giving back and helping others and have dedicated myself to that. Not being able to achieve to my full potential is a difficult pill to swallow, especially when you want it so badly.

Something had to be done. And now.

So I had a few conversations - conversations with colleagues that led to conversations with my superiors at Peace Corps that culminated in some very staunch heart-to-hearts with my counterparts and supervisors at my primary assignment. While the conversations were difficult, I am optimistic that positive change is on the way. Why am I so optimistic? Because I am no longer directly tethered to others within my agency so what happens next is up to me.

I am now taking over and managing a number of fairly high profile national projects and have been granted independence to build capacity of implementing partners across the country. This means I can go out in a technical capacity and work directly with the providers in the field to help them integrate and actualize programming, as well as strengthen systems and organizational capacity in order to improve service delivery. Working directly with the implementing partners is a resource and valuable experience both for me and for the organizations I now have the authority to work with. And the quality and level of my involvement is mine alone to determine, with the support of my counterpart, her supervisor, and the agency as a whole. Hallelujah! I am finally free to start making an impact  in a much more meaningful way again! Good news all around!

Water Water Everywhere But Not A Drop To Drink

This is a road about six hours north of Gaborone. Can you see a road in this picture? No, me neither because it is completely flooded with water. This is what most of the mid to northern part of the country looks like right now after intense and long-lasting rainfall. In fact, the overflow of water has been declared a national disaster, as many of the rivers have overrun their embankments and roads have become impassable.

Gaborone and the southern part of the country, however, is still without water. It has not rained, our dam is at 11%, and water restrictions remain at three days per week without. We are also experiencing a national disaster but ours is because of drought. The experiences within one country when you drive a mere few hours away is expansive.

What now?

Well, the logical thing would be to build a pipeline to funnel water from the north to the south to more evenly distribute the water. The government assures us this is in the plan. But it has been for some time and to no avail. Protocols, red tape, materials acquisition, and so forth take time, and significantly more time in the developing world than this American would like (and most Batswana too, for that matter). So we wait and we deal with our individual struggles and we take comfort in the fact that we can escape from one world to the next within this crazy beautiful country that we live in.

Another PAC Meeting

The quarterly meeting for Peace Corps Botswana's Project Advisory Committee (PAC) Meeting was held yesterday. Leaders from the Government Ministries, the National AIDS Coordinating Agency (NACA), Peace Corps staff, and other relevant stakeholders came together to discuss our post's program and build on previous meetings. This meeting is invaluable for sharing information and improve both relations with these parties and the quality of our service to the country. Simply being a representative is an honor. This meeting, however, my Country Director asked me to step up and present to the group.

My task was to present examples and best practices of volunteer activities across the different sectors (Local Government Capacity Building, Community Health Team, Non-Governmental Organizations, and Life Skills). This meant scanning the work done by 134 PCVs and isolating projects that would be of interest, both because of their direct relevance to the PAC members and to demonstrate alternative types of projects volunteers participate in that have a significant impact on their communities. (I have to state that this was no easy task because PCVs in Botswana are doing some very good work!) I then created a presentation to accompany my discussion and prepared for what I assumed would include an onslaught of questions by the PAC members. This was going to be a very big meeting for me - presenting and honoring the work of my fellow volunteers to such high level officials within Botswana. If I'm being honest, this means I fretted about it.

I needn't have worried, however. My presentation went smoothly, the PAC members were extremely impressed with PCV activities around the country, and Peace Corps staff were happy with how I portrayed our work. In fact, they were so pleased with it that they sent my presentation back to Peace Corps Headquarters in Washington DC to show the type and quality of activities going on at our post! It was a proud day for me. I was proud of myself for a successful presentation in the face of these bigwigs and proud of my colleagues and friends for all of the great things they are doing. It was an honor and a privilege to share their work with PAC.

Dan Pallotta: The Way We Think About Charity Is Dead Wrong

Those of us working in the non-profit or development sectors will shake their heads in agreement or maybe tear up a few times at this TED Talk. My hope for it is that more people take the time to watch it and internalize what Mr. Pallotta is saying and then start a conversation that will help spread the message. We can be the generation that makes real and lasting change but it has to start with a perpective shift. Give it a shot. It will be a worthwhile nineteen minutes in your day.

Merry Christmas from Botswana!

Another Botswana Christmas spent with the Monks/van Dyk clan!

From all of us to you, stay warm over there in the polar vortex! And we'll try to thwart off heat stroke in this 110 degree weather! Oh the difference 9,000 miles makes...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Homesickness

I don't often express feelings of homesickness. Perhaps this is because I have felt so blessed to be in Botswana and to be doing the work I am able to do here so it seemed petty to talk about being homesick. After all, I signed up for this, I even extended my contract to stay, so any longing for home is of my own making. But today I feel like sharing that homesickness does not evade me, even if I rarely mention it.

So why am I choosing to talk about it now? In part for future Peace Corps Volunteers so they know it is normal to feel homesick. Even if you love your life, as I do, there will be days when you miss home and that is okay. In part for posterity. This blog is a documentary of my experience in Botswana and homesickness is part of that tale. And, finally, in part to explain a few things that I have been mulling over these passed months...

During Pre-Service Training (PST), we tell trainees that it's important to live firmly in this world and to avoid trying to straddle two places at once. Basically, we tell them that it will be important to detach somewhat from their lives in America and to start forging strong connections in their host country. This really is an effective method because it helps ground you - you gain strength and independence, you push yourself, and you bond with your cohort. Your cohort will be the people that genuinely understand what you are going through and will be your sounding board, your shoulder to lean on, and your loudest fans since they understand the value of even small successes. Not to mention, your cohort is in the same time zone as you are so it makes talking to them all the easier!

So what happens when your cohort goes home? This is exactly what happens when you extend your service - your biggest support system in country, the people that you grew to love and respect and see as your allies in Peace Corps, are no longer there. That is trying on a psyche. You have to learn how to navigate this experience in a new way. While you remain deeply grateful to everyone that has remained an active part of your extension year, you become increasingly aware of the distance and, surprisingly, to the fact that people are moving forward in their lives. Looking at the photos your cohort uploads is different now since they no longer resemble your own - pictures of small children are replaced with new pets and hiking spots. You are happy for them, just as you were happy for the friends you left before, but there's a new sting to it.

And what happens when you allow yourself to start looking ahead to jobs and returning home because that actual date starts looming ever closer? Well, you stop heeding the advice of fifty-one years of Peace Corps Volunteers before you and start straddling two worlds again. As you're roasting away in over 100 degree weather, you daydream about snowboarding and snowmen and snow days. As you spend quiet nights at home with a book or your favorite new television show (The Newsroom), you also tab through photographs from three and four years ago with friends who don't even live in that town anymore and think about how great those times were (even if you know they wouldn't be the same today). You allow yourself to miss things and you lose focus on all of the greatness of living and working abroad. In a country that you love, no less.

This is where I sit today, pondering all those things as I watch the rains clear from outside my window. The sun is shining and there is beauty all around me.

Somehow even just typing this has been cathartic. It has reminded me that I have a conscious choice about my own happiness and my own thoughts. And this is the cycle of a Peace Corps Volunteer and of a development worker living abroad. It is a constant rededication to the cause and to yourself. It is important not to forget where you come from because that is where you gained the power and strength of conviction to come this far. Being homesick means you had a life that was worth longing for. That is something to be grateful for and to be embraced. What matters most is how you move forward. I have six months left of my extension contract and I intend to focus on Botswana - on the work and on life - so that, one day, when my mind wanders back here, I will be homesick for this country too.

PULA! (Poo-Lah!)

Finally, after months and months of waiting, the rains have come! They started early in the morning yesterday and continued throughout the night and all day today. As you can see by the picture, taken from my bedroom window, there is even rain water buildup, meaning that the ground is saturated and we are well on our way to filling up the dam! Yes, I do realize that may be an optimistic statement but I am a "glass half full" kind of gal and I am positive that the rains will continue for the days to come... In the meantime, the skinny, hungry, and dilapidated animals are lapping up water from the puddles and we are all watching as the plants turn green before our eyes. This is cause for celebration. It is amazing what a little rain can do! PULA!