Dumelang Borra le Bomma
I hope that you all are doing well and enjoying the summer in the northern hemisphere. We are still in winter here in southern Africa but things are bound to change and the heat from the Kalahari will be upon us sooner than we expect, but things are gradually moving along and we are adjusting to life as Peace Corps volunteers here in Molepolole.
The first few months as official volunteers involves fully integrating into your community. This means spending ample time both at work and in your respected community getting to understand and know the people, the layout, and overall way of life in the village, a thorough community assessment. The importance of this transition cannot be stated enough. Without a solid effort, things could become tougher as we tend to have many different values, norms and cultural beliefs compared to the Batswana. Personally, thus far I think that we have laid a solid foundation both at work and in our community. It does help having traveled to many different places and submersing ourselves in very different cultures previously, but realizing the length of time we are here and the fact that Botswana is unique in itself provides its own challenges and interesting opportunities.
Being with the District Health Team for six weeks now has been a unique experience. I am placed with the Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (PMTCT) Coordinator at the district level. The office looks over the program in 48 health facilities throughout Kweneng East. The health facilities consists of 2 hospitals, 23 clinics, and 22 or so health posts, so it is definitely functioning with consistent action. My counterpart, Mma Simane, is super nice and I am certain our relationship will only grow. She has been away at various workshops for the program since I have been there. At first I had an assistant to show me around and help with understanding how things work. Now, I have been running the office this week, basically doing administration work while looking at clinical reports on antenatal, post-natal maternal and child health, infant feeding and testing rates while my counterpart is away.
It is office work, sometimes busy work, but all work that needs to be done. Some of my day is spent teaching people computer skills as they are lacking greatly while others are spent grappling through unorganized data and files. A workshop in organizational skills is definitely something we need to think about, it would help in all facets. Furthermore, I spend a lot of time getting to know co-workers and their roles in the overall district health plan. It is a slow process and some things are coming together, while collecting different ideas and thoughts on developing overall capacity.
I have yet to get to the clinics like I hoped for at this time but in actuality, it is totally fine. I have two years and being in the office has allowed me to understand some of the complexities at the district level before getting to the clinics. After all, I requested the district level assignment to have the opportunity for both, while most volunteers are assigned to a specific clinic. Both have their adantages and disadvantages. Moreover, I am able to meet people, mostly nurses and lay councelors that come to the offices for various things, all the while developing relationships with my colleagues. Most everyone have been really really nice, helpful and accepting of me being there. It is really working out and I truly think my integration into the DHT office and Moleps has started well.
The first thing I wanted to do once training was over is develop relationships with people, both at work and in the community. I can’t go anywhere without seeing someone I have met or who has met me in one fashion or another. It is pretty funny and really shows you how small a 60,000-person community is. There are a few volunteers from the last group and three from our group in Moleps, plus Batswana are used to seeing white people, but you still stick out wherever you go and everyone remembers your name. For me, trying to remember names is really tough because of the amount of people you meet in one day and trying to train your brain to remember the Setswana name is tricky. The names are tough I tell you. Try to pronounce our (two) surnames, Mothlobogwe and Mogotlwane. It’s cool though because we are meeting people in different sectors, from the barber to the chief, and really trying to fit in with the Moleps community, regardless if I have to ask them three times for their name. It can only make the entire experience better and more helpful with the work to be done. Developing important relationships is probably the most important thing if you want to get a lot accomplished in a short amount of time, and we are trying.
Moreover, this last 6 weeks has given me a glimpse to the realities of life in Botswana, both positive and negative. On the surface and on paper, things look very promising for the most part. At the workplace and in the community, we are slowly digging a niche and trying to find where best we will fit, what kind of projects we will work on and what groups we will target. There are many gaps and broken chains in all sectors, but I keep telling myself that Botswana is only 43 years young and things are getting better, compared to the late 90’s when everyone was dying. HIV/AIDS has become a chronic illness here and the focus has turned from treatment to prevention. Changing cultural beliefs and habits is not easy and not possible overnight, or even generations.
There are a lot of things to be done. A former volunteer once told me that you could make a list of 100 things you wanted to do and be lucky to get to three. It is so important to step back every so often and realize where you are and what you are doing. Some days can be very frustrating while others are great. You have to have both good and bad days to understand the true complexities and existence here in hopes of doing more than those three things.
For those of you that have written, sent packages, called, emailed, etc. thanks so much. It is such a treat to get when the phone rings or a letter arrives. It means a lot. I can’t tell you how much I miss my family and friends. CONGRATS to the Frizzells on the new edition Joseph Laurance Frizzell, so happy for you guys. Makes it tough knowing we wont meet him for some time.
Hope all is well for now, I will try to keep writing as much as possible. Also, we are trying to post more pictures on picassa now as we got a few things up and running at the internet café. There should be a link on the blog so it is easily accessible.
Enjoy the rest of your summer as ours is just beginning…………………………on our way to post office to get new packages………the excitement is killing me.
Matthew
a.k.a Thuso
